SEBASTIANUS AND ULRIKA RETURNED to the camp, having found a trustworthy guide to take her to Colonia, one who had families in his caravan. But a refreshed and considerably cheered Timonides greeted them and, with star-charts in his hands, declared, "Master, the message is astonishing but clear. This girl Ulrika is meant to travel with us."
Timonides spoke hurriedly lest his voice betray the lie. Showing Sebastianus his calculations, he said, "Master, you know that your sun sign is Libra with Capricorn your Moon sign." He went on to fill the air with words such as house and aspect, elliptic and ascendant, conjunctions and crescent, explaining the placement of the five planets in relation to the sun and moon and how they affected not only Sebastianus Gallus, but the caravan, the girl named Ulrika, and the outcome of the race for the imperial diploma.
Sebastianus frowned over the papyrus sheet covered in numbers but he had no reason to doubt the outcome of the calculations. Timonides used a small calibrated instrument to determine the intersecting angle between the horizon planes and the ecliptic, and his most prized possession was a zodiacal casting wheel made of finely hammered gold, with symbols and degrees imprinted in the metal. It was said to have belonged to the great Alexander himself. These left little room for error in the casting of horoscopes.
Still, this reading came as a surprise. "What does this young lady have to do with us?"
Timonides did not meet Sebastianus in the eyes, looking instead at Ulrika. "It makes logical sense, master. I was unable to make good readings because of my pain and hunger. The gods sent the girl to us to take away my pain and to fill my belly again. Now I am able to serve them once more. She is here for a reason, master, and that is only for the gods to know."
Sebastianus could not argue with this logic. He also could not deny that the girl had been able to affect a cure that Rome's physicians could not, so perhaps she would be an asset on the caravan. But how would she travel? Where would she sleep? How could he keep a watchful eye on all his men?
"But I am in a hurry," Ulrika said. "I must travel with speed and your caravan is too large, it will take too long."
"As it so happens," Timonides said quickly, "my master is also in a hurry and must reach Germania Inferior as fast as he can, and so we will be traveling at a healthy pace."
Timonides saw how his master hesitated and so he said, "Master, you know that in the next towns, a family will join us, or a group of women. They always do. It will only be for a short time that the young lady is unchaperoned."
Sebastianus considered this and then, as he had never questioned the stars, he finally said, "Very well," as Timonides had known he would.
It was done! The girl was coming along and Timonides was guaranteed of freedom from salivary pain. He struggled to conceal his joy.
They entered into an agreement. With the corner of her veil covering her fingers, Ulrika shook hands with Sebastianus and in that instant a startling vision filled her head: an explosion of small bright lights streaking across the black sky and coming to rest, like a shower of golden sprinkles, on a vast, grassy valley. The image was so strong, so vivid that it held her briefly transfixed.
In the next moment, her mind was filled with the vision of a breathtaking landscape of rolling green hills, a rocky coastline, winds blowing in from the sea. She knew it was a land called Galicia, although she had never been there. She knew it was this man's beloved home, verdant with thick forests, ending in a wild and rugged coastline, a place that his people called Land of the Thousand Rivers—and yet thoughts of Galicia caused him great pain. He is homesick, she thought, yet he can never go back. Sebastianus Gallus was a man without a country.
As Gallus picked up her travel packs and she followed him to a line of covered carriages, as her heart raced in anticipation of meeting her father at last, Ulrika shivered with a chilling thought. If her illness was indeed back, what other frightening visions and sensations awaited her on this journey into the unknown?
BOOK TWO
GERMANIA
8
STAND ASIDE IN THE NAME OF IMPERIAL ROME!"
Ulrika did not recognize the stranger demanding to be let in. "Who are you?"
"Agents of Claudius Caesar. You are hiding someone in there."
"I am hiding no one. We are a simple trade caravan, taking grain to the northern outposts. You must speak with Sebastianus Gallus, he is the leader of this caravan. You cannot mistake him. He is tall, with hair the color of bronze, and a deep commanding voice, and a way about him that makes one notice. He is unmarried, although I do not understand why, for he is very attractive, quite handsome, in fact—"
Ulrika opened her eyes to darkness and found herself in bed. Where was she? To whom had she been speaking?
It was another dream ...
She held her breath and listened, and heard, beyond the cloth walls of her small tent, horses galloping through the encampment. Men shouting. Women crying out.
Ulrika frowned. It was barely dawn. The camp wasn't due to break up for another two hours.
Clutching her shawl at her throat, her long hair streaming over her shoulders, she stepped out and peered through the atmosphere thick with mist and smoke. Eerie figures were marching through the camp, brandishing swords and barking orders. Roman legionaries, rousing people from sleep, disrupting breakfasts, interrupting prayers.
As Ulrika watched the commotion in the pale morning light, Timonides appeared from around the side of the tent. "What's going on?" the astrologer asked with his mouth full. He held a greasy lamb chop with a bite taken out; his tunic was stained down the front where honey had dripped from wheat cakes. It was the first of several meals of the day for the corpulent Greek who had discovered the joy of eating again.
"I do not know," Ulrika murmured.
Timonides wrinkled his nose as he watched the red-caped legionaries stride through the crowded encampment, entering tents and covered wagons, kicking over hay bales, jabbing swords into barrels and bundles of merchandise. "They appear to be searching for something," he observed as he sank his teeth into the spicy chop.
Or someone, Ulrika thought.
"Where is your master?" she asked as she watched the legionaries brusquely pull people from tents, bringing torches close to their faces, to examine them and then push them away.
"Sebastianus will come soon. Mistress, go back inside. With your fair hair and that symbol you wear about your neck..."
Ulrika's hand went to her breast, where she wore the Germanic Cross of Odin. She turned and looked out over the Rhine—a wide, flat, silver river that, in the early morning mist, looked unreal. Roman naval vessels patrolled the waters, great ships moving under the power of sail or rhythmic oars, a constant reminder of Rome's imperial and mighty presence in this northern land. On the other side of the river, dark green forests holding ancient secrets stretched to the horizon.
Ulrika brought herself back to the camp and the intruders. The caravan of Sebastianus Gallus had stopped, along with several smaller caravans and groups of traders and travelers, at a garrison called Fort Bonna, one day's journey south of Colonia, birthplace of Empress Agrippina and the cause of the new outbreak of war in the region. Since leaving Lugdunum in Gaul and following the eastward road that skirted alpine foothills, the mood of the caravan had become one of nervousness and anxiety. Lugdunum was a major trading hub in Europe, a cosmopolitan city of marble towers and fortress walls and roads that stretched away like the spokes of a wagon wheel. And along those roads, men traveled, bringing with them word of fighting in the east, rumors and unconfirmed reports but no one saying for certain what was happening—or was going to happen, or had already happened—in Germania Inferior.