‘Gwellia!’
Chapter Twenty-seven
She was exactly as I remembered seeing her that last cruel time, when each of us was tethered to a cart, and for a few heartbreaking seconds I met her eyes and knew she was alive. Not the dark, lively beauty I had married but she still wrung my heart, though she was subdued and lined, bowed by a dreadful weariness.
I looked at her and saw the matching tears that welled up in her eyes.
‘Gwellia!’ I said again, in a voice that scarcely obeyed my will.
She looked from me to the governor, and seemed to hesitate. Then in a dreadful gesture of submission Gwellia came and knelt before me, bowing her head to the floor beneath my feet in the eternal sign of servitude. I do not think that I have ever seen a sadder thing.
‘Master?’ she said, and I thought my heart would break.
I took her by the hand and raised her up, but she evaded my eyes. I saw the tears on her lids. ‘You were one of the leftover slaves?’ I said gently. ‘One of the ones that Eppaticus had for sale?’
She nodded, and then said in that beloved voice, from which all laughter had fled, ‘Few people want an older female slave — we are too frail to work, too old to breed.’
A glimpse of what those years of servitude had been for her almost broke my heart. How many children had she borne, I wondered. How many owners had pawed that lovely frame? ‘Oh, Gwellia,’ I sighed.
Pertinax looked at me anxiously. ‘The gift displeases you?’
I shook my head, almost incapable of speech. ‘These tears are pleasure, Mightiness,’ I managed at last and saw him smile with satisfaction.
It was the same that night, in the cubiculum. I called her to me. She came and stood beside the bed, silent and shivering, to await my next command. For a moment I caught her eyes — and saw, or thought I saw, the ghost of the old fire that once had sparked between us. Then it was gone, and she was once again a picture of obedient resignation, tinged, I saw, with fear.
‘It’s all right, Gwellia,’ I said softly. ‘Lie down.’
She took up station at my feet, as Junio did.
‘You are my wife,’ I said. She shook her head.
‘That was dissolved,’ she murmured brokenly. ‘I could not have borne the shame of my life else.’
She was right, of course. Once we were taken into slavery the marriage between us was not recognised in law.
‘But I have found you now,’ I urged.
The phantom of a smile touched her lips. ‘I am happy just to be your slave,’ she said. ‘They told me I was purchased for Libertus, but I did not know the name. What should I call you?’
‘Don’t call me master,’ I said. But she was right again. The old name she had called me in my youth belonged to other days, another life, when we were free and young and full of hope. ‘ “Libertus” if you must.’
‘Then, sleep well, Libertus. Thank you for your care.’
‘I have dreamt of you every night,’ I said, my heart thumping.
‘And I of you,’ she said. She gestured to the bed. ‘Libertus … if you wish…’
It was tempting, but I had read those eyes and I knew better now. ‘Not like this,’ I said. I kissed her on the head. ‘When you are ready, Gwellia. Not before. And never as a slave. I’ll take you to the courts, and set you free.’
She looked at me warily, those years of use and torment in her eyes. ‘And until then?’ she said.
I laughed. All desire left me and I felt only a great welling surge of protective love. ‘Until then, I am an old man,’ I said gruffly, ‘and I have had a difficult few days. Go to the servants’ room and get some rest. And send my slave — my other slave — to me. I want him to help me to undress.’
Her eyes lit up with a little of the old tenderness. ‘You understand! I didn’t think you would. You’re still the same man that I always knew.’
She left me with a smile. Junio, proud to be still wanted at my side, was grinning like a fish when he came in, but he had the grace to look surprised.
‘Master?’
‘I have waited for my wife for twenty years,’ I said. ‘I can wait a little longer. She will come to me one day, in her own time. Willingly.’
And she did. It was worth the waiting for.