The interior surprised me. From the outside, it looked like a modest Roman house with an atrium. Everything was squared that wasn’t warped or broken. The inside, however, was that of a native round house.
A circular room, supported by wooden pillars, seemed to be the main eating and living area. Constructed around a large hearth, it was too warm and too dark. A small opening in the roof let in a little sun, while a hallway surrounded the center room and led to several other doors. Branches of mistletoe hung in the traditional places. The chickpea smell was drifting from behind the hearth.
Red-Beard stumped ahead of me toward the fireplace. He walked with a limp-one leg looked shorter than the other. I followed him.
Sitting near the fire, on a hefty couch covered in furs, was an old man. His long, stringy hair had once been blond; it was now a faded straw, tinged with silver and white. His beard was neatly trimmed, and he was sitting up and staring at me.
The clothes he wore had been young once, too: a Roman tunic, trimmed with molted rabbit fur, and old-style leg wraps. A torque and a set of gold phalerae hung on his withered body like old cronies swapping war stories.
His sharp, beaked nose jutted between two milky eyes that had once been the same blue as his daughter’s. He reminded me of an eagle who could no longer hunt for itself. There was pain in his face, and rage, made all the worse because of its helplessness.
He looked me over with pride, since that was all he had left. I kept a respectful distance, and nodded my head. Red-Beard grunted.
The old man’s voice said he was dying, and it said it wouldn’t be long. But it was still a voice that commanded, not questioned.
“Who are you? Why do you wish to see my daughter?”
“Julius Alpinus Classicianus Favonianus. I’m usually known as Arcturus. I’m the governor’s physician.” I let him take that in before adding more.
“I’m here because your daughter’s sponsus was murdered last night.”
His impassive face flickered a moment. “Sit down”.
He gestured to an old, well-made chair that wore some battle scars of its own. He tried to sit up straighter, and the effort tired him. It also infuriated him. He turned to Red-Beard, who waited with the devotion of a favorite dog.
“Leave us, Meuric. And tell Sioned that we will have one”-he looked at me questioningly. “Did you come alone?”
“I have a slave outside.”
“-two guests for the midday meal.” Meuric-Red-Beard-lowered his head and backed out through a door by the hearth. The old man studied me for a few moments.
“I am Urien. I am Gwyna’s father.”
I nodded again. I knew what the name meant. But I’d already figured he’d been an important man among his people-probably a local chief.
He leaned forward. “I have always-always-been a friend to Rome. You see these?” He gestured with a long, graceful hand to the bronze torque and the phalerae.
“The Emperor Claudius himself gave these to me. I was an ally of Verica, the Atrebate King. I led many of my people, the Trinovantians, into battle for the Romans against the Catuvellauni. But that was many years before your birth,” he muttered. “No one remembers.”
“Your length of service and devotion to Rome must be honored by all who see you.”
His face twisted into a bitter smile. “No one sees me. I cannot stir from this bed; my legs are useless. All, all have forgotten me. Even Agricola, who could use my wisdom to help heal deep wounds. No, I am forgotten, even before I am fully dead.”
I pitied him. That was my first mistake.
“I will ask the governor to visit you.”
A flash of anger passed through the milk of his eyes and curdled any remaining softness.
“I do not need or invite your patronage. If he wished my advice, he would have come already. But I am not valued. I am not remembered.”
His shoulders twisted with pain. “But you didn’t come here to hear the laments of an old, dying man. You are here because Vibius Maecenas is dead.”
“Murdered.”
He looked at me, his face more interested than before. “How do you know it was murder?”
“I’m a medicus. It’s my job to know. I saw the corpse, and he’d been killed.”
“How?” Urien sounded more like he wanted confirmation than answers. I gave him the obvious.
“His throat was slit.”
“Ah.” For an old, dying man who couldn’t get out of bed, not much surprised him.
“Did he have money with him?” He shot the question suddenly, and surprised me. My second mistake.
“Yes. No. I-I don’t know.”
He didn’t say anything. He folded his fingers together and stared at me hard, as if he were waiting for something. I was beginning to wonder if he wasn’t blind at all. And I tried to remember I was supposed to ask the questions.
“Did he owe you money?”
He raised his eyebrows. “Of course. Surely you knew that he was to marry Gwyna. That is why you’re here, isn’t it?”
A parry and a jab. I was bleeding on the floor. I tried again. “Maecenas was a foreigner-how did you meet him? Why betroth your daughter at all?”
He smiled and spun it around like a praetorian on parade. He was enjoying himself. “You’ve seen my daughter, no doubt. Do you find it hard to believe that the stories of her beauty traveled to Rome?”
I shook my head.
“I thought not. Vibius Maecenas is-was-a friend of a friend’s. Marcus Caelius Prato. I’m sure you know of him-he is the owner of the brothel and tavern in which Maecenas, unfortunately, spent his last evening. Maecenas had written him to find out if there were any beautiful women of good birth in Britannia. It is an unfortunate but indisputable fact that our family’s fortunes have been in decline since Gwyna’s first husband was killed. I had several subsequent offers for my daughter’s hand, and Maecenas’ was the most lucrative. That was all.” He waved off any objection with a dismissive gesture.
But that wasn’t all. He’d told me too much. A man of his birth, his pride, should not so easily admit to needing money. And what was that bastard Caelius doing with this dying old man?
Urien was watching me again. Amusement animated his face, and made him look more alive.
“What happens to you now that Maecenas is dead?”
He shrugged. “Someone else-with money-will wish to marry Gwyna. Maybe you.” His laugh was as dry and mirthless as a leaf from last autumn. It chilled me. The old man was still dangerous.
“Is that why you won’t give her to Rhodri?”
I hit a nerve. “What do you know about Rhodri?”
Now I took my time. I was worn out, sore and hungry, and couldn’t afford to make the wrong move. Urien, even crippled and nearly blind, was too skilled an opponent.
“I know that he wants to marry your daughter. And I know that he was at Lupo’s last night. Rhodri may’ve been the last man to see Maecenas alive.”
He smiled at me sardonically. “Then he’d better be careful. I told you, no one marries my daughter without paying a very large dowry. Rhodri is not penniless, but he is far below Gwyna’s worth.”
“Was the marriage the only reason Maecenas was here?”
He shrugged again. The gesture was painful and unnecessarily elaborate. “Who knows? One hears rumors. There was a rumor circulating that he was a bearer of bad news for Agricola.”
I leaned forward. “What kind of news?”
A fit of coughing-real or not-racked Urien’s thin body. At the sound of his gasps, a middle-aged woman-I assumed Sioned-entered from the kitchen, bearing two large bowls and a plate of bread.
She was short, doughy, and grey-haired, and hovered over him, glaring at me each time his chest gurgled. When he could breathe again, he motioned for her to leave.
“Sioned and Meuric are the only servants we have left. They are my people. Meuric served under me in the war. Unfortunately, Sioned and he are childless, and so are dependent on me.”