She heard the clump of hoofbeats on the wooden bridge. She kept walking, head down, close to the shoulder so the horses would have plenty of room to pass.
Something inside the sack was poking into her back. As she shifted the weight the sack pulled at the fabric on her shoulder. She felt the gray hood slip backward. Quickly, she lifted her right hand to pull it forward again, but the cloth was caught under the weight of the sack and her weak arm did not have the strength to tug it free.
The horses were only about thirty paces away now. She turned to one side, swung the sack to the ground, and bent over, busying herself with adjusting the hood and pinning it back into place. She could hear the approaching crunch of hooves on the gravel. The men were talking to each other.
The hood was back in place. The horses were almost level with her now. She slid her right arm in under the cloak, realizing as she did so that two or three inches of grimy bandage had been poking out of the end of her sleeve.
The horses were next to her. The riders were still chatting as if they had noticed nothing. The bandage had probably looked like a glimpse of undertunic.
They had passed. She grabbed the neck of the sack and swung it back over her shoulder.
Behind her, the hooifbeats faltered and began to grow louder. The riders were coming back.
"Halt!"
Tilla froze.
"What's your name, girl?"
She turned, keeping her head bowed in a pretense of respect.
"Brica, sir."
"Brica, eh? What are you doing all the way out here, Brica?"
Tilla stared at the polished hooves of the front horse. "I go to visit my aunt, sir. She is sick."
The second rider moved around to take up a position beside her.
"What do you think?" said the first rider to him. "She look like a Brica to you?"
"Hm." There was a creak of leather as the second rider bent down from his saddle to examine her. "Chin up, girl."
Tilla lifted her head a fraction.
"You know what she looks like to me?" offered the first rider, circling his horse behind her and nudging her forward into the middle of the road. "She looks like 'Attractive female, age about 20.' "
"Slim, about five feet four inches," continued his companion as if they were quoting from something. "Hold out your arm, gorgeous."
Tilla slid the sack off her shoulder and held out her left arm.
"The other one."
Her left hand darted inside the cloak and tugged down the offending sleeve before she reached out her right arm. "If you touch me," she said, "my master will have you punish."
A sword swished out of its scabbard. A blade glinted in front of her.
Its tip plucked back the fabric of her sleeve, revealing the dirty linen bandage.
"I think you're the one who gets to be 'punish,' gorgeous." Both horses were circling her now. "We're the ones who get the reward."
Tilla let the sack fall, grabbed her skirts, and dodged through the gap between the two horses. Leaping across the ditch, she scrambled up onto the rough grass and raced toward the woods. If she could just get between the trees, she stood a chance…
Over the rasp of her own breath she heard cheering. Then the approach of hoofbeats. There was a horse cantering on either side of her now. She slowed: They slowed. She speeded up: They increased their pace. The men were laughing. Playing with her. She stopped dead, spun around, and ran back the other way, but it was hopeless. There was no cover ahead of her now: only the open road. The thud of hooves on turf surrounded her once more. The horses were crowding her. Hands reached down and flung her cloak back over her shoulders. "Now!" shouted one of the men. She ducked. Too late. They grabbed her under both arms and scooped her up with a swift, practiced movement. Legs flailing helplessly, boots brushing the tips of the grasses, she dangled between the two horsemen as their mounts cantered back to the road.
71
Truso should have gone straight to the hospital, but instead he hurried to the house and spent several minutes scratching notes onto a tablet, which he then thrust into the trunk with all the versions of the Concise Guide.
Albanus was waiting for him with the look of anxiety that seemed to be his permanent expression lately. "Lots of people have been asking for you, sir. There's a line waiting in the hall."
"Where's Valens?" Ruso was still breathless after sprinting from the house.
"Officer Valens has been taking the urgent cases and telling the rest you'll be back any minute, sir. And Officer Priscus said you had an appointment with him-about the Aesculapian Thanksgiving Fund?"
"Yes, I know about that one. Anything else?"
"I need a word with you too, sir."
"Is it urgent?"
"Not really, sir."
"Good. Let's get working on this line."
He had almost emptied the bench in the hall when there was a commotion in the corridor and the door shuddered as someone fell against it. Ruso glanced up. "Put the bar across, Albanus, will you?"
The clerk leaped to secure the door and Ruso carried on cleaning up a nastily torn ear as the shouting faded away down the corridor. "How did you get this?" he asked.
"Over at the wrestling," explained its owner. "We're cheering our lad on and there was a bit of an exchange with some lads sitting behind, and next thing I know I'm upside down with somebody's boot kicking the side of my head."
"Ah," said Ruso. "Sport. Always brings out the best in a man. Albanus, just poke your head into the corridor and make sure there's nobody lying dead out there, will you?"
Moments later Albanus returned to report that some plasterers from the Twentieth had got into a dispute with a visiting crew of sailors. Knives were out before the centurial staff had been able to wade in and restore order. Now the wounded of both groups had been brought in for treatment and, having tried to carry on the fight in the corridor, had been sent to wait under guard in separate rooms.
"Idiots," observed the man with the torn ear.
"What a joy payday is," remarked Ruso. "I'll just pop a few stitches in this ear, then you can go and have a nice nap while I have the pleasure of meeting the navy"
In fact it was Valens who dealt with the sailors while the plasterers were assigned to Ruso. Only one was seriously injured: a stab wound that had probably penetrated a lung. The man required some immediate and careful patching before he was admitted for observation, nursing care, and an outcome whose uncertainty would have frightened him if he had been sober. The others he released into the care of their centurion, who looked willing to inflict a few injuries himself if anyone showed any more signs of misbehaving.
"We'll be seeing that group lined up outside HQ tomorrow," observed Ruso as they left. "What's next?"
" 'Evening, Ruso." Valens appeared around the door in a gruesomely bloodstained tunic. "Good of you to turn up."
"Nice outfit," Ruso observed.
"Don't insult me; I've taken time off from my onerous duties to bring you some news. They've found Tilla."
"Where? Is she all right? Where is she?"
Valens shrugged. "According to my sources, a road patrol found her taking a stroll eight or nine miles out of town."
"Where is she? Is she all right?"
"I imagine they've taken her to Priscus in the hope of a reward. As advertised."
A dreadful thought crossed Ruso's mind. "To Priscus?"
"That is what it said on the advertisements, isn't it?"
Ruso turned to Albanus. "What time is it?"
"I think I heard the eleventh hour just now, sir."
"Is the cashier's office still open?"