For the space of half a heartbeat, she wondered which way to go, and then she turned sharply right, simply because Merlyn and the administrative building lay to her left. She took one quick step and collided immediately with a woman who had been walking towards her. The frail figure practically bounced off the solid bulk of her body and fell backwards, a flailing bundle of blue-clad limbs. Nemo hurled herself forward instantly, her arms scooping in front of her, and managed to catch the reeling woman before she hit the ground. The woman's eyes were wide with shock and incomprehension, and the cowl that had covered her head and concealed her face had fallen away to reveal long, once-black hair, heavily shot through with grey, and wide, startlingly blue eyes. Nemo recognized her, and her heart leaped with fright at the thought that she had almost killed Uther's grandmother, Luceiia Varrus.
Luceiia made it clear that she was uninjured and would like to be allowed to regain her feet, and Nemo released her awkwardly, helping her to stand up before doing so. Then the old woman nodded and brushed herself down, absently patting the arm of another, younger woman who was her companion, reassuring her that she was uninjured. Now Luceiia composed herself and turned back to Nemo, nodding her head and looking up into her eyes.
"Thank you, young man," she said. "I know not how you managed to move so quickly, but I am very glad you did. I find that I am very slightly out of breath, but otherwise none the worse for wear. Hitting you was rather like hitting a wall, I believe, although I never have hit a wall quite that hard." She stopped and looked around, aware for the first time of the crowd of onlookers who had stopped to gawk at her. "Thank you all," she said in a tone that was eloquently dismissive. "I am quite well now and have suffered no harm, thanks to the quick-wittedness of this young man. Please go about your affairs now." She stood and watched the people hesitate and then move on, and then she turned back to Nemo, cocking her head to one side. "That is the uniform of the Pendragon Guards, is it not? The Dragons?" Nemo cleared her throat but could only nod. The old woman blinked at her. "I thought so. I should know my own grandson's emblem. And your name is?"
Again Nemo cleared her throat, and then she spoke in her deepest voice, keenly aware that Luceiia thought she was a man. The words resonated inside her helmet, sounding distorted to her own ears. "Geddius, Milady. I'm Geddius." The lie was out before she knew it was there, but it was born of an irrational fear that Luceiia might complain to her grandson that she had been jostled by one of his men. Had this been anyone else in the world. Nemo would have been contemptuous, but she was well aware of the incomprehensible awe and love that Uther held for his aged grandmother.
Luceiia was peering sharply at her, trying to make out the features beneath the full face-guards of Nemo's huge trooper's helmet, but Nemo knew that the old woman could see little more than the gleam of her eyes.
"Have you brought messages from Uther?"
Another nod. "Yes, Milady. Dispatches for Lord Merlyn."
"I see. Well, I trust we shall find out what my grandson has to say before the morning's done. For the time being, once again, I thank you, young man. But perhaps in future you might pay more attention to your surroundings as you make your way. Good day to you. Come, Deirdre."
Nemo stepped back, watching with awe as the old woman began to move away, and only at the last moment did her eyes move to the younger woman whom Luceiia Varrus had called Deirdre. She found the woman gazing back at her, the tiniest frown marring the smooth skin between her brows, and something about the sight of her brought Nemo snapping back to awareness. She knew this woman, but she had no idea from where. Then, as Luceiia Varrus took the other's arm and they began to move away, she saw the huge swelling of a late-term pregnancy showing unmistakably beneath Deirdre's gown.
Nemo stood in the middle of the roadway and watched the two women head towards the entrance of the administrative building, seeing the almost reverential way in which the ordinary people looked at them in passing. A trio of off-duty garrison troopers standing talking near the doors stopped their conversation and held themselves at respectful attention as the women passed by them, and only resumed talking after Luceiia and her companion had disappeared inside.
Nemo wandered over to where they stood, schooling her face to appear no more than casually interested. The troopers paused as she drew near them, and one of them nodded courteously. Nemo nodded back and used her "man's" voice.
"Just got in from Cambria. Who's the woman with the Lady Luceiia?"
The man who had nodded to her grinned. "That's the Lady Deirdre, Commander Merlyn's wife."
"Hmm." Nemo jerked her head in a nod of thanks and farewell and walked away, her head spinning with speculation.
Chapter TWENTY
"That's the Lady Deirdre, Commander Merlyn's wife."
The words echoed in Nemo's head as she walked away, following the slight, naturally declining gradient of the hilltop until she found herself approaching the main gates of the fortress. They were wide open at this time of the day, and she noticed that the guards on duty, none of whom she recognized, were having an easy time, lounging indolently as they supervised the few vehicles that came and went while keeping a wary eye alert for approaching officers.
She had almost drawn level with the gates when she became aware that someone behind her was calling her name repeatedly, and she turned her head to see who was shouting at her. When she saw the waving hand and its owner's grinning face, with its artificially enhanced colouring and enormous, Hashing eyes, she grew angry at herself immediately for even looking, and for not recognizing that distinctive voice immediately. It belonged to Nennius, one of the masseurs who worked in the bathhouse. Sexuality of any kind was immaterial to Nemo, whose interest in such things was virtually nil, so she had no difficulty with the knowledge that Nennius's preference was for boys and men, but the fellow was an inveterate talker who was incapable of keeping quiet and had an unquenchable thirst for other people's business, and his incessant chatter always threatened to drive her mad.
Nennius, however, had been indefatigable in pursuing Nemo's friendship ever since the earliest days of her arrival in Camulod and he had steadfastly refused to take offence or to be discouraged by her continuous and ill-mannered hostility towards him. How could he take offence, he had asked her repeatedly, when he understood too well the pain with which she had to live incessantly, day in and day out? They were two of a kind, he assured her, but of different aspects, like the two faces of a coin. Nemo was a man cursed by some malign fate to live his life inside a woman's body, whereas Nennius was a woman walled up inside the body of a man. So brazen had Nennius been in his pursuit of Nemo, and so unfailingly charming and attentive to her, that even Nemo's immeasurable fund of ill nature had eventually been exhausted, and she had begun to develop a tolerance for his attentions, accepting and eventually even coming to enjoy his therapeutic ministrations in the massage room after she had bathed and sweated the soreness out of hard-used muscles, nevertheless insisting upon what was, for Nennius, an almost unbearable degree of silence.
Today, Nemo had neither time nor patience to spare for Nennius, and she waved him away with a deep scowl that even Nennius, thick-skinned as he was, had no choice but to accept. He held up both hands in a gesture of apology and then stood there watching Nemo as she strode away through the gates.
Merlyn Britannicus had taken a wife, and he had said nothing about it—had sent no notice, either before or after the event—to Uther Pendragon. The insult was unforgivable. Nothing on earth. Nemo knew, would have kept Uther from attending his cousin's nuptial feast had he known of it. Nemo felt the unmistakable stirring of nausea in her guts and sucked air in deeply, holding it hard and willing her insides to settle down, but her head felt light and giddy and there was a high-pitched whining in her ears. No matter what she thought of Merlyn Britannicus personally—and she had held many different feelings for him in the years that she had known him, ranging from admiration to dislike, from envy to indifference and even to blind jealousy—he was one of the underlying constants of her life. His life, in many ways, defined hers. His behaviour had always had a beneficent influence on his more volatile cousin, and Nemo had benefited directly from that. In consequence, the information she had just received, deepening her conviction that something had gone seriously wrong in Merlyn's dealings with Uther, was devastating.