I avoided the hour of reckoning—of wakening—as resolutely as I could. Eventually, however, I could procrastinate no longer. Camulod and my duties were waiting and I had to go to them. Cassandra helped me to dress and walked with me, her arm around my waist, to where my horse stood grazing. I felt a stab of guilt that I had left the poor beast there all night wearing his saddle. I tightened the girth and turned to bid my love farewell, but she was gone. I looked all around me, scanning the entire valley with my eyes. She was nowhere to be seen, yet I knew she was watching me, unwilling to display the tears that this leaving must bring.
I stepped up into the saddle and walked my horse away, back into the world of men and their cares and woes.
XV
The door of my father's office stood open and the sentry on duty there saluted smartly as I approached. I returned the salute and stepped into the doorway, rapping my knuckles lightly on the door post as I saw my father in his usual position at his table, his head bent over an unfinished report. He looked up under his brows and grunted at me.
"Ah! You're back, good. Have a seat. I'll be with you in a moment."
I took off my helmet and made myself comfortable, looking around at the Spartan austerity of this tiny cubicle where General Picus Britannicus spent so' much of his working life. The room measured less than four good paces long by the same in width and held nothing but my father's work table, two chairs, two wooden chests bound with iron, and his own stool. Along the back wall ran a double shelf that held some bound books, a pile of reports and some rolled maps. His swordbelt, helmet and cloak hung from wooden pegs in the wall beside the door, and a large leather bucket by his feet served as a receptacle for anything he did not want to keep lying around. I looked long at the battered table on which he was writing; it was as much a part of my father as anything else he owned. Long and narrow, it formed a partitioned box two handsbreadths deep and sat on two collapsible trestles that fitted into slots fashioned to hold them on the underside of the table. It could be locked with a spring-loaded tumbler lock, and it went with him everywhere he went, loaded upon the commissary wagon. On campaign, it held the same place in his tent that it held here within his office.
On the wall at his back, above the double shelves, hung a simple wooden cross, a gift from his old friend Bishop Alaric, and I wondered again, as I did each time I came here, at the strength of the faith of men that had turned this symbol of shame and degradation into a symbol of triumph and love.
There had never been anything admirable about a cross in Roman eyes. Since the beginnings of time it has stood for the direst punishment a criminal could suffer. Death on the cross meant death by slow degrees of consummate agony as the force of gravity dragged inexorably at the victim's body, tearing the bones from their sockets, ripping joints and sinews, searing his brain with pain that dragged on with no respite until death, which came more often from thirst and starvation than from any other cause, and thirst and starvation are slow ways to die.
The Christ, they said, had died in three short hours, nailed to his cross. If that were true, he had been fortunate and had barely known the pain of crucifixion—some men screamed for days up there. He had been fortunate, or he had had help. The spearpoint that pierced his side might have been premature, and might have been heavily handled. It should have been a mere test to see if blood still flowed in the veins of the condemned man, for while blood flowed, life remained, and while life remained the body stayed on the cross. I have heard people swear it was the nails that killed him. That is flat untrue. Nails through the wrists and ankles will cripple and maim, but they will not cause death. That would have been too merciful a death for someone sentenced to the cross. Others said the flogging he received had caused his death. That might have some truth in it, especially if the man was already weak, but this man was the Son of God. How could he, then, be weak within Himself? Besides, I knew about the skill of Roman floggers. They had centuries of tradition behind their art and knew precisely how far they could go without causing fatal damage. My father's voice broke in upon my thoughts.
"How is your foundling?"
I snapped back to the present. "Cassandra? Oh, she's well." I tried to keep my voice casual and betray none of the emotions that filled me, but I was unsuccessful, for his eyebrow rose immediately.
"She is...well, is she? It pleases me to hear that. When will she be well enough to visit us here in Camulod?"
"I.. .I do not know, Father." I made my face as grave as I could, wishing him to think I still had grave reservations about her overall health. "I could not guess with any confidence. She is still...weak, in some ways."
"Aye. And quite strong in others, I can see." His voice was heavy with irony and I felt my face flush.
"You sent for me, sir."
"Aye. I did. For several reasons, the first of which is the least important in real terms. This barbarian, the Scot. What do you intend to do with him?"
"Do with him?" The question caught me unprepared. "What do you mean?"
He looked at me, wide-eyed, his face reflecting an uncharacteristic bewilderment as he admitted, "I don't know what I mean. I was hoping you would help me define what I mean. You have managed to saddle us with a useless mouth to feed and a responsibility to guard this man for years. I only hope you have some idea of what's involved here. Have you thought about it?" In spite of his bewilderment, his frown indicated that here was matter for serious consideration.
I nodded. "Of course I have."
"And?"
I shrugged, trying to put conviction into my tone. "I have decided to offer him the opportunity to pass his time here usefully."
"How, in God's name? The man's an Outlander and an enemy!" That was almost a bark.
I shrugged again, recognizing the repetition and attempting unsuccessfully to stifle the movement before it was complete. "I don't know yet."
"Not as a soldier, then?"
"No...I don't know! Perhaps, or perhaps as a servant of some kind."
"A servant? Caius, the man is a warrior and a king's son, and a Scot, to boot. Trying to make a servant out of him would be akin to training a grown wolf to act as guard dog to a child! It is not in his nature to be a servant. He will never submit to that."
"Well, perhaps a soldier, then."
"Trained to our ways?" I almost flinched at the scorn in his voice. "The way the Romans taught their enemies to overwhelm them? I tell you, lad, you teach this man to fight the way we do, and he'll go home and teach his kinsmen how to beat us."
I shook my head at him. "No, Father, that he won't. I would not be so stupid as to raise a viper in my bosom. I intend to talk with him today. I locked him up as soon as he arrived to let him think about imprisonment. I hope he will see reason and decide that he has more to gain by working with us than by mouldering in a cell. We will see. I'll inform you later how the meeting goes. What else did you want to talk about?"
"Uther," he growled. "There's still no word from him. I'm starting to worry."
"Why?" I had not even begun to grow concerned. "No news is good news, in this case. If Uther had been killed or defeated, we would know of it by now. Lot's forces would be everywhere, drunk with victory."
My father looked unconvinced. "Well, you may be right," he growled.
"Father, you know I am. Uther has turned them back and, being Uther, he is worrying at their heels like a dog baiting a bear. He'll drive them home to Cornwall and then he'll come back for more men to keep them there, confined in their wooden stronghold. You'll see. I'd be prepared to wager on it." That earned me a glowering glance and a sharp warning.