"This was deliberate, Sita. There were four separate fires here, now threatening to grow into one big one. Somebody set this place alight on purpose. I don't know who and I don't know why, but I don't want to be caught unawares if the whoreson has other plans for tonight. So get down to the villa quickly, but take the longer route down, not the main path; that way you'll avoid the people coming up. If they see you going back, it could cause confusion. But get there quickly. You understand?" He left at a loping run and I saw him begin to pick out his men.
I remember then that I left him to it and turned my attention to organizing a bucket-chain from the unfinished cisterns in the fort, and that there were not enough men available to make it work. And I remember the arrival of the first newcomers, a trickle that grew to a flood as the flames rose higher and the wind sprang up again to whirl blazing sparks towards the four minor granaries that were still untouched by the fire.
The granaries themselves were no more than stout wooden boxes, bins pitched at the seams and raised on stilts to protect their contents from the damp earth, and covered with heavy, sloping roofs. They burned disgustingly well. I don't know when I realized we could not win, but I think the awareness came only slowly to me. Dense, awful smoke swirled everywhere, roiling obscenely upwards. It filtered everywhere through the piles of grain, ruining the food forever, even before the wooden side panels burned through, allowing the grain to gush out onto the ground. In a short time, all our vigilance was dedicated to protecting the four silos that remained.
I staggered off at one time, away from the searing heat, in search of some clear air, my insides raw and burned from inhaling the smoke-laden air close to the fire. I found a wooden saw-horse to lean against, and someone handed me a jar of water. God! I remember still how good it tasted. I drank deeply and then sat there for a while, looking at the activity going on around me. I was exhausted, but then, everyone else was, too, by that time.
Too tired to move, I stared at the men around me and wondered if it was one of them who had set the fire in the first place. I knew them all, and I had to accept the possibility, but I found it hard to believe that any of them could deliberately wreak such malicious damage. And yet someone most definitely had. Then came a crashing roar mixed with screams of agony as one of the bins collapsed in flaming ruin, sending burning bursts of sparks in every direction and catching at least one fire-fighter unaware. I plunged back into the smoke and lost track of time again.
There came a time, at last, when there was no more to be done. The fire was as close to being under control as it would ever be. There was no hope of extinguishing it completely; the scattered piles of grain would smoulder for days, unless it rained again. I delegated a crew of soldiers to police the area and guard against new outbreaks, promising them they would be relieved in four hours. In the meantime, dawn was breaking and everybody else began to go home in search of sleep. I climbed up into a wagon that was crowded with weary men, all of them crusted in soot and grime, the whiteness of their eyes and teeth startling against the blackness of their faces. My nostrils were clogged with soot and the stink of burning. I do not know who was with me in the wagon, or whose back it was I leaned against. Before the cart reached the bottom of the hill I was asleep. I think everyone else was, too.
The man I was leaning my back against woke me by leaving the cart, but I shifted my position and dozed off again immediately, and then somebody was shaking my shoulder and calling my name. I opened my eyes and looked at my tormentor. His face was black and strange-looking, and as soon as he caught my eye he gestured sideways with his head, saying nothing. Groaning, I pulled myself erect, saw that I was home and began to climb stiffly down from the cart. I reached the ground, looked up to thank the carter, and only then realized that everyone was staring over my head at something behind me. I turned, and my guts churned as I saw a body spread-eagled face down in the dim half light of dawn, at the bottom of the steps to the main doorway of the house. The door lay open, and there was no sound to be heard. My tiredness vanished instantly, but my legs were unwilling to move from where I stood staring, and I felt fear and panic washing over me.
Somehow, I took the first step, and my paralysis was gone. I began to move quickly towards the sprawled shape and, before I was halfway towards him, I knew who had set the fire. I recognized him, left him where he was and veered away, heading directly into the house. As I set my foot on the bottom step, young Sita emerged from the doorway and paused in surprise at finding me so close.
"Commander," he said, "I didn't hear you coming."
"My wife, where is she?"
His eyebrows rose. "In her chambers, Commander."
I swallowed my relief. "And my children?"
"Asleep." He nodded towards the corpse. "You saw that?"
"Aye." I walked back to the body and turned it over on its back. Lignus the carpenter would set no more fires. He had been warned he would die if he ever came back, and he had. The tragic part was that he had cheated death for long enough to be able to do what he did. Outrage, anger and deep hatred for this man and all that he had stood for swept over me, so that I had to close my eyes and take a deep breath to control myself against the urge to kick his corpse. And then I noticed that all of his blood seemed to be on his back. There were no wounds on his front. I looked up at Sita.
"Did you do this?"
He shook his head. "No, Commander, but I had the body brought here."
"Brought here from where?"
"From where he died. The cottage where his wife and daughters are lodged. He tried to get them." He grinned, a small, nervous grin. "Unsuccessfully."
My thoughts were racing. "How did you know to search there?"
"We didn't. We heard the noise as we came through the village. Women screaming and crying. I decided we had better take a look at what was happening, and there he was, dead."
"He was alone? No accomplices?"
"He was alone there, sir, no accomplices that we could find, and we've searched the entire area."
"Who killed him?"
He cleared his throat. "Your wife, Commander. The Lady Luceiia. It was all over when we arrived."
"What?" I looked down at the body again, unable to believe what I had just heard. "Luceiia did this?"
The young decurion nodded, wordless in the face of my shocked surprise. I shook my head to clear it and then remembered the men on the wagon, watching this. I turned back to them.
"Thank you, my friends," I called out. "You can go home now. It's all over." I pointed to the body on the ground. "This is Lignus, the carpenter. He set the fire and he died for it." I turned back to young Sita, looking again at Lignus's body and wondering how my gentle wife had been able to do this thing. "I must go to my wife. Is she well?"
He nodded. "Perfectly well, Commander. Completely in control. She showed no signs of falling apart, and no compunction over what she had to do."
"Hmmm." There was nothing more I could say. I moved to walk away and then remembered. "One more thing." I touched Lignus's remains with my toe. "You'd better detail someone to bury this refuse somewhere out in the fields or in the woods; can't leave it lying around here to stink. And now good night. We will talk further tomorrow — later today, I mean. Good night, Sita."
"Good night, Commander." He snapped me a perfect, punctilious salute and marched away about his business.
As soon as I had watched young Sita out of sight, I made my way indoors and went directly to our sleeping chamber, aware of the noises of women somewhere at the back of the house. Luceiia was not in our chambers. In the middle of an emergency situation, she would have fires of her own to tend to. I had to restrain myself from searching her out immediately, to find out from her what had happened and how she had come to kill, and to be able to kill, Lignus, but I knew I would be interrupting whatever important chore she was attending to at such an ungodly hour. I would find out everything I needed to know in the morning. I realized all at once that it was now light enough for me to see myself, though dimly, in Luceiia's big, polished-bronze mirror against the wall; I leaned close to the mirror's surface and peered at my reflection. I was filthy, my clothing, my skin and my hair all black, thick with soot and ashes, and my nostrils told me I stank of sour smoke. I was in no condition to get into my wife's bed, yet neither was I in any condition to go looking for hot water. I dragged a woollen blanket from a pile in the chest at the foot of our bed and set out to look for a comfortable couch to lie on.