‘I didn’t mean—’
‘Shut up. Shut up. You make so angry!’ She threw the cloth at me then. It slapped pathetically against my face as she crashed from the room.
‘Fuck!’ I screamed after a moment, sinking down. ‘Fuck…’ I groaned through hands clapped tight on to my face.
Depression washed over me like the waves of my nightmare. Linza had called my self-pity pathetic, but she was wrong. I was pathetic. How else could a man go from having a woman admit her love of him, no matter how grudgingly, to her spitting oaths and storming from his company a few seconds later?
She loved me, I then cursed myself. Loved not loves. I had that chance to take hold of her feelings, and I had let it fall through my grasp through my own self-loathing. Loathing that only grew stronger and heavier now that I looked back at my weakness. I cursed myself for a fool. I cursed myself for a coward. In my dream, Stumps had been right; how many people needed to die for me? Had I earned their sacrifice? Had I earned the right to live when they had died?
Of course not.
I wanted to lie in my bed, then. I wanted to lie there, and to forget about walls, and sieges, and soldiers, and enemies. I wanted to lie and sleep, forever. I didn’t want to wake up. I just wanted it to be over. I couldn’t take care of the love who had been everything to me when I had everything. How was I supposed to protect Linza, and be a man for her, when I had nothing but a head full of nightmares?
‘Enough!’ I shouted through clenched teeth, desperate for it to be over. ‘Enough!’ I screamed again, before lapsing into silent misery.
‘Felix?’ A timid voice broke through. ‘Can I come in?’
I opened my eyes. Moved the fingers that were pressing with hatred into my skin.
Micon.
‘Is it all right if I come in?’ the boy asked again. ‘Stumps asked me to come and get some of his things.’
Stumps. My friend. What had I done to the man? When I had left Malchus, there had been nothing before my eyes but rage. Seeing Linza threatened, I had known that I loved her, just as I loved my friend. A friend that I had beaten without mercy for putting Linza’s life at risk.
‘How is he?’ I forced myself to ask.
Micon shrugged, eyeing me nervously. I had protected him in the forest and fort, but now the young soldier looked at me with respectful fear, as if I were a snake on a path.
‘Where is he?’ I asked.
‘With Titus.’
‘And Brando?’
‘With Titus.’
‘I suppose you’re with Titus, too?’ I asked, hatred for myself redoubling.
‘He said we should give you some space,’ Micon explained. ‘So you could sort things out. With her.’
‘Titus said that?’
The boy shook his head. ‘Stumps.’
My chin sagged to my chest. Even after what I had done to him, my comrade was selflessly looking to my own interests.
‘Wait,’ I urged the young soldier as he moved to the doorway. ‘Can you help me put my mail on? I’m coming with you.’
55
‘So you saved his life, then tried to kill him?’ Titus greeted me as I entered the building that served as the centre of his black-market racket. It was quiet, a few groups of off-duty soldiers and archers playing dice or talking over watered-down wine.
‘I don’t really remember,’ I answered honestly.
The man let out a snort, taking in the injuries I had sustained myself, my century having had to beat me into unconsciousness to put an end to my swinging fists and gnashing teeth.
‘Do you think he’ll see me?’
‘Doesn’t have a choice. He’s not running fast in the state he’s in.’ Titus smiled darkly. He then offered a shrug of his huge shoulders. ‘Girls make us do daft things.’
‘He should never have used her like that,’ I argued, feeling the anger tighten my chest as I thought of Linza being put in danger.
‘You known many women?’ Titus asked, catching me off guard. ‘If you had, you’ll know it’s not us who pulls the strings. Look at her.’ He gestured across the room towards Metella. ‘I could get into business with anyone, Felix, but I do it with her.’
‘Why?’
‘Because one way or another, she’d get what she wanted. Better I’m cut in on it.’
‘You and her, are…?’ I asked, a little surprised.
‘No!’ the man scoffed. ‘But they see things we don’t. The gods made us different for a reason. If it was just about fucking we’d have our own dick and hole, wouldn’t we? It’s about this,’ he explained, slapping me across the head and grinning. ‘You’ve got some miles on you, Felix, but you’re still a clueless bastard. Come on.’ He gestured. ‘Let’s go see him.’
Titus led me through a door into a storeroom that was stacked high with engineering supplies. There was a brazier set in its centre, and around the warming flames were the shapes of Brando, Micon and the shrouded figure of Stumps.
‘You made some mess of him,’ Titus remarked as if it were a casual observation.
I looked at my friend, seeing his eyes dark and his lips swollen.
‘Looks like an eastern whore with his eyes like that.’ Titus smiled, gently easing the mood. ‘Sit down, Felix.’
I could not. ‘Stumps…’
‘It’s all right,’ he mumbled from between his thick lips. ‘I know why you did it.’
I sat then, heavily, facing my friend, forcing myself to meet his forgiving eyes.
‘You two.’ I sensed Titus gesture to the other men. ‘Come help me set up for tonight.’
And so we were left alone. The silence held for a long time, and within it, my self-recrimination grew.
‘I think I love her,’ I eventually offered as my defence.
My friend tried to smile. ‘I worked that out when you stuck my head through the bunk frame.’
He chuckled then. I was a second from following, but then I saw him wince in pain, and shame fell heavily upon me.
‘She reminds me of someone,’ I told him, anxious for him to know why I had behaved the way I had against him. ‘I don’t know if I love her, or if it’s the old love. Does that make sense?’
‘Course it makes sense. But Linza’s a great girl in her own right. I’m sure it’s that,’ he offered.
I knew that I had to tell him more. It was a duty to a friend. A debt I had to pay for my crime against him. And yet the words stuck in my throat like the barbs of arrows. My chest tightened, and my head swam.
‘I couldn’t protect the last one,’ I confessed, letting my chin drop.
For a moment Stumps said nothing. I hoped that my admission would be enough for him to understand why I had reacted with so much rage to seeing Linza placed in harm’s way.
‘Felix, I’m not saying this to start trouble, but I need to tell you because I would never put someone you love in danger.’
I lifted my gaze.
‘It was Linza’s idea, Felix. Not mine. I’d never do that to you.’
I struggled to accept the words. They sounded almost like a betrayal.
‘It was her idea?’ I finally said.
Stumps nodded, wincing at the pain from his bruised spine. ‘When we went to get the rations. I just wanted to humour her a bit. She’d cooked up the idea with another of the Batavian girls. It was her I sent to get Albus, and you. I thought he’d bring the whole century, the twat,’ he added with a curse.
‘Why would she do that?’ I asked, suddenly uncertain that my friend was telling me the truth.
‘Put yourself in her position,’ Stumps urged. ‘Her husband’s missing, Felix. Which, let’s be honest, means he’s dead in the forest. She’s got no control over that.