Felicia’s eyes widened at the revelation, and she moved to back away from his leering grin, but the grip on her hand tightened, and she started as he put a hand under her stola’s hem, his questing fingers cupping her crotch.
‘So here’s what we are and are not going to do, my dear. You are going to submit to my attentions in an accommodating manner, make encouraging noises and generally do whatever it takes to give me the impression that you’re enjoying it just as much as I undoubtedly will. You are not going to call out for help, not that it’ll bring anyone other than a woman who gave birth only a day ago and whom I will have no compunction in knocking senseless given her clearly expressed attitude towards me. And in return for your complicity your friend and her child will be safe from the dangers that so often frequent places like this. After all, there are hundreds of soldiers cooped up in that fortress with nothing better than a selection of saggy, over-used whores to service their needs. It wouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, least of all me, if half a dozen of them were to abduct your friend and she was never be seen again. Or at least not alive. I can make that happen with a few words in the right ear you know, I have a tame centurion who does whatever I tell him to, not that he takes much encouragement. So, do we have a deal, Doctor?’
He tugged at the knot in her loincloth, pulling the garment loose and tossing it aside, pushing her back against the wall and probing vigorously between her legs.
‘There we are! A little dry, but a few minutes of vigorous fingering will soon change that.’
Felicia grimaced at the intrusion, closing her eyes to block out the sight of his triumphant grin.
‘You know that my husband will kill you for this, when he returns from wherever it is that you’ve sent him.’
Sorex lifted the hand that was massaging her vagina and slapped her face.
‘Eyes open, madam. Please don’t think that I’m going to be satisfied with you scowling and crying your way through this. I want to see the signs that you’re loving every little bit of it, or I won’t be able to keep my side of the bargain and leave your friend unharmed. As for your husband’s return, let’s just say that I’ve sent his cohort into the jaws of the nastiest, most dangerous tribe on this entire disgusting island. The centurion and his cohort are going to vanish without trace in the bogs and mists north of the Antonine Wall, and you will be left here as a widow. I foresee a long and entertaining relationship between the two of us, at least until I am recalled to Rome to enjoy the fruits of having delivered the right results to the right people. But enough about me, I think it’s time to introduce the star of this evening’s performance.’
Smiling happily in the face of her horror he raised his tunic to reveal a bobbing erection.
‘Ah yes, here he is, and looking rather keen as well, if I might say so. Doubtless he’s keen to be hidden deep inside you, my dear, and I see no reason not to indulge his every whim, do you? I think you’re about as ready for him as you’re ever going to be …’
Turning Felicia to face the wall he gripped her hair and bent her forward, pushing her face up against the painted plaster and spreading her legs wide with his feet.
‘Stop it!’
Sorex turned his head to find the child Lupus standing in the door of the house’s dining room where he had been playing on his own, his half-sized sword drawn and a pale expression of fury on his face. Sorex tightened his grip on Felicia’s hair and turned her to face the boy. A draught of cold air raised gooseflesh on her buttocks.
‘Tell him to leave us, woman, or I’ll be forced to take that toy from him and make him eat it!’
‘Will you now, Tribune?’
Sorex released Felicia, turning with a look of fury to find a tall, dark-skinned man standing in the house’s open doorway, Desidra peering round him with a look of terror on her face. After a moment’s silence the newcomer stepped forward into the room, unpinning his cloak and dropping it onto a chair.
‘I believe it’s customary, Fulvius Sorex, for a tribune to stand to attention in the presence of a senior officer. I’ll remind you that while I am no longer in command of this legion, nothing in my orders to relinquish operational control of the Sixth to you made any mention of demotion. A legatus I was and a legatus I remain, to be accorded every right, privilege and every little bit of respect I’ve earned in ten years of soldiering for the empire. And that’s before we get onto the fact that I have four very ugly and easily provoked soldiers of my personal bodyguard who I have little doubt would take the greatest pleasure in subduing you, were I to give them the command to do so.’
He gave the tribune’s exposed and wilting erection a wry glance.
‘And that doesn’t count as standing to attention, Tribune, although I see you’re having trouble on that front too …’ He strolled across to Felicia, who had straightened up and rearranged her clothing. ‘Doctor, it’s a pleasure to meet you again although we might both have preferred the circumstances to be a little more auspicious. I do hope that your dignity isn’t too bruised, it looked to me as if this man was struggling to make much of an impression upon you.’
She nodded, looking at the child who was still standing in the dining room’s doorway with his sword raised and a look of murderous anger on his young face.
‘Ah, if I remember rightly, this young man’s name is Lupus?’ The boy nodded, his gaze fixed on Sorex. The legatus walked slowly across the hall and squatted in front of him, his face a bare six inches from the short sword’s point. ‘I am Legatus Septimius Equitius, young man, and I have known your guardian Centurion Corvus for long enough to have heard your story from his lips. I recall him telling me that you train in swordsmanship with your tribune’s German servant most days?’ Lupus nodded again, his lips pulled back to show his teeth and his eyes still locked on the tribune. ‘And so if you decided to punish this man for hurting my friend the doctor, you could probably hurt him very badly indeed.’ He reached out slowly with a gentle smile and pushed the sword’s point aside. ‘Sheathe your sword, young soldier, the time for you to use it in anger is not yet upon you, and there are other ways to achieve the same result, even if they are less immediately satisfying.’
He stood and turned back to Sorex, shaking his head in disgust.
‘It was fortunate for everyone that I happened to spot Prefect Castus’s woman lurking in the entrance of her own house as I rode up to the fortress gates. She was initially reluctant to explain why she might be shut out of her own house, but I thank the Lightbringer that I persisted with my questions for long enough to discover that you intended raping the doctor here. While she has not spoken of it, something is telling me that the centurion’s wife is unlikely to have been your first victim. You can thank the gods that I came along in time to save you from the child.’
Sorex scoffed, his confidence starting to reassert itself.
‘The child? I’d have broken his neck like an unwanted puppy.’
Equitius raised an eyebrow.
‘Perhaps you would. Or perhaps he’d have opened an artery with that deceptively harmless-looking sword. It has the look to me of a weapon whose acquaintanceship with the polishing stone is a very close one. And now, I’d suggest that you make your exit, and resolve not to trouble any of these ladies again for fear that you have a good deal more than a vengeful child to worry about. I suspect that Prefect Castus, whilst being at the end of his military career, would take the most grave and fatal objection were he to discover your forced relations with his woman. Get out.’
Sorex turned on his heel and left with a scowl of fury at the legatus.
‘And there goes a man who will now stop at nothing to see me either dead or disgraced. Not that he’ll have too long to wait for the latter, I suspect, once the new legatus arrives with whatever orders he has from Rome for me.’ A movement at the bedroom’s door caught his eye. ‘Ah, madam, you must be the proud mother that Desidra here was telling me about.’