Scorpion Rising

'You know the stumbling block to every investigation?' he asked cheerfully. 'Apart from you, that is.'

'Very amusing.'

'I thought so.'

He did know, then, but how? Despite the sticky heat, Claudia shivered. Who could have told him she'd helped prise Pod away from Sarra? Who had been watching them?

'Motive,' he said, and she couldn't help noticing that his eyes had narrowed in suspicion. 'Motive is the key to any crime, and do you know what I think?'

'Do men think?'

'I think this whole killing thing stems from rejection.'

He polished off the last of the sausage, seemingly oblivious that she hadn't so much as taken one slice. And had turned as white as a sheet.

'Take Clytie's death,' he continued evenly. 'We know for a fact that the bastard who stalked Santonum raped and strangled his victims, probably at the same time, then painted their faces to make them resemble cheap whores.'

He plucked a blade of grass and began to chew.

'Suggesting that not only decent women had rejected him, but that prostitutes wouldn't have anything to do with him either. Santonum's stalker made them pay for that rejection.'

Claudia's nails were biting deep into her palms. She pretended she hadn't noticed.

'He arranged their bodies in a certain position, then left his victims in a place where they were bound to be discovered, because that was his signature, if you like, and he was proud of his work.'

'No great loss to society, then,' on the grounds that she had to say something.

'None whatsoever, but what I'm driving at is, men like that don't kill and leave clues because they secretly hope to be caught and punished for their wickedness. They kill and kill and go on killing, in the firm belief they will not be caught, because they're too clever.'

'Sarra's murder was nothing like Clytie's.'

'Indeed it was not.' He grimaced. 'You said yourself it was the product of rage, but rage is a classic outlet for rejection.'

'Goddammit, is there a point to this?' she snapped, and there were red weals in her palms from her nails.

'Yes there is, because do you hear that fluttering sound, Claudia?'

'No,' she said, straining her ears.

'You should, because that's the flutter of wings of an avenging angel,' he said. 'So why don't you just tell me the reason you're here.'

Claudia had been called many names in her life. Strangely, angel had never numbered among them.

'Orbilio, I'm a woman. I flutter eyelashes, not wings.'

'How true. You normally keep them well folded as you hang upside down in your cave at night.'

'Is that another crack that's supposed to be funny?'

'Guilty as charged, though a good lawyer should get me off with a fine.' He picked a sprig of wild chamomile and crushed it between his fingers. 'The point is, I've sensed a distinct change in your wing colour lately.' When he swivelled his head round to face her, his fringe flopped forward over his forehead. 'Why did you come to Gaul, Claudia? What made you come back?'

She took a deep breath and considered what she could tell him without it actually being a lie, while the scent of chamomile mingled with his sandalwood. Chamomile. For many cultures, this herb was sacred to the sun, though mostly these were eastern traditions. The Sons of Ammon, for instance, who placed boiled meats on an altar below a sandstone outcrop in whose cliffs the sun was believed to reside. The Persians, of course, some of whom sacrificed to the sun from chamomile on the mountain tops and who considered leprosy to be punishment for offending the sun. These peoples didn't cremate their dead like the Romans, since fire was part of their godhead, and this was what was needling away at the back of her mind. Fire and sun, sun and fire, to many peoples they were the same thing. Including certain Teutonic tribes…

Forget spring and midsummer. Both Clytie and Sarra had been killed at a time when sun and fire united, and she thought back to the rock where the life had leached out from a twelve-year-old child. From the outset, its flat shape had been reminiscent of an altar, and, with the exception of the Hundred-Handed, every culture Claudia knew had made sacrifice at some point in their history with blood. And a picture formed of a young German with prematurely grey hair and tight pants. Handsome, dashing, confident, funny The wings of the avenging angel fluttered behind her. Claudia re-folded them quickly.

'My dear Orbilio, if it wasn't for business, nothing on earth would bring me back to this dreary, depressing little backwater of the Empire. Unfortunately, last autumn I sold a consignment of wine to a merchant in Santonum and such was the profit, it was necessary to make a return visit in order to agree personal terms for annual shipments.'

'Ah.' He nodded in understanding. 'So you decided to investigate Clytie's murder at the College while you were passing.'

Dammit, that was the problem with fibs. You forget what you tell people, yet even though they were lying stark naked in the bathhouse at the time, they can still remember every word — and then have the cheek to dredge it up in your face. I'm staying there to investigate the murder of a twelve-year-old novice was what she believed she had told him, now that she racked her brains, and Claudia made a mental note to take more horseradish with her food. It was supposed to improve memory, and goddammit, Orbilio must wolf a whole root every morning for breakfast.

'In a manner of speaking,' she said calmly. 'The journey from Rome played havoc with my back and since the Hundred-Handed have an excellent reputation as healers, I decided to give them a try. Which is how I came to hear about Clytie.'

One lazy eyebrow tweaked upwards. 'In a silent order?'

'Kitchens carry gossip the whole world over, Orbilio, the College is no exception.' She had no intention of telling him they spoke aloud most of the time. 'And given that the murder remained unsolved since the spring equinox, I thought it was high time you started earning that preposterous salary of yours, instead of sitting around on your base end all day.'

There was a long pause, which Claudia put down to Orbilio's acceptance, until she realized he had simply been laying into the cheese.

'Nothing personal, then?' he asked, swallowing.

The feathers on the angel's wings fluttered again. This time she sat on them. Firmly.

'Does deafness run in your family, Marcus? If so, there's a place in the Forum that sells top-quality ear trumpets.'

He grinned as he rose to his feet. 'I'll bear that in mind, thanks, but just to recap. You stumbled upon Clytie's murder by accident. There's no personal crusade. You're not in trouble. You're not hiding anything from the Security Police, such as the reason Sarra's body was dragged from the oak, for instance. And naturally you're not holding anything back from me.'

When he stretched, the muscles bulged out his linen shirt and pulled the tendons tight in his neck.

'Correct on all points. No wonder you were promoted.'

Something twitched at the side of his mouth. Jupiter willing, it was indigestion.

'I'd best get back to the Field before they miss me.' He rolled his eyes upwards and sighed. 'Lucky me, being tasked with passing round food, offering goatskins of wine, listening to the most god-awful gossip… If she was going to cuckold her husband, it wouldn't be with his spotty apprentice.'

Despite her concerns, his comic imitation made Claudia smile.

'The boy denied it, of course,' this was someone else's voice he was mimicking, 'but somebody saw them and sent the miller a note. "The lowest millstone grinds as well at the top". Couldn't be plainer, my dear.'

Marcus Cornelius blew out his cheeks and shook his head sadly.