She came from the garden and at first he did not turn, wondering whether she would cough or speak, but she did not. Was this a test? He waited and the silence stretched on and on. The Silures raised a boy to cherish silence, but he doubted that his grandfather and the other elders had ever anticipated a situation like this one. Probably they would despise him for creating it.
‘You know,’ Ferox said at last and started to turn, ‘I’d never noticed…’ He stopped.
Claudia Enica stood like the statue of a goddess. Memory is a fragile thing, often vague, and if he had known that she was beautiful that was not the same as seeing her just a few feet away. Her dress was green silk, shimmering in the light of the open door behind her and just hinting at the elegant lines of her legs and body. She liked green, feeling it set off the vivid red of her hair, which today was piled high and dotted with tiny pearls in what was no doubt her own adaptation of a current fashion. It suited her, as did the rouge on her lips and the gentle make-up. This was Claudia, the Roman lady, well educated, teasing and dignified as an equestrian should be. At other times this same woman became Enica, granddaughter of Cartimandua, the witch queen of the Brigantes, surrounded with the same awe. That person was wilder, a warrior trained to a high pitch, who killed readily if she felt the need and was as out of place at a sophisticated dinner party as a tiger.
Ferox knew what it was like to have two souls in one body, with the prince of the Silures, the wolf people, living alongside the Roman centurion. Claudia Enica was so much younger and yet seemed to find the dual life more natural, perhaps through some magic inherited from her grandmother.
The door closed, and he caught a glimpse of the dwarf Achilles, Claudia’s ‘whisperer’ when she was acting the part of the frivolous and fashionable lady. Still she stood, without a trace of a smile so that she was more than ever the perfect goddess, as cold as she was lovely.
Ferox took a pace forward. ‘I am…’ The words trailed away and he stopped. What was there to say that would do any good? ‘You are so beautiful,’ he managed at last, and although he meant it the words sounded false, just what any man would say in flattery.
Claudia moved quickly, one step, then another, the built-up heels of her light shoes tapping on the wooden floor boards. Her hand moved even faster and she slapped his left cheek, so hard that it stung. Still her face was rigid.
Ferox flexed his jaw. Although tall like many Brigantes, she was shorter than him by a good few inches in spite of the extra height from her shoes. That meant staring up at him, her green eyes hard as flint. The last time they had met those eyes had blazed with anger.
Claudia’s hand swept back and slammed into his other cheek so hard that his head jerked to the side. Ferox straightened up and stood absolutely still. He knew he deserved this and far more. Almost four years ago the army had given him six months furlough to be with his wife. She was busy, working as queen of the Brigantes to rule her people, and working even harder to persuade the Romans to make official and final acknowledgement that she was indeed queen, recognised forever by the empire. There was not a lot for him to do and idleness never suited him. The fiery Enica was frustrated and short tempered, not helped by a difficult pregnancy, the result of a leave he had spent with her a few months earlier. He was bored and started to drink, and when she snapped at him once or twice he had snapped back, which led to fights. There was a little scar next to his eyebrow from where he had been hit by a nicely decorated Samian cup. Whether he was patient or argued back it only seemed to rile her all the more, but he had to admit that he might have done better had he found things to do rather than drink. As Vindex had so aptly put it, he had buggered it all up.
She hit him a third time and then stepped back.
‘You look older,’ she said.
‘You do not.’ Ferox meant it. Claudia smoothed her hands down her silk dress past her waist. Her figure was as lithe as it had ever been. ‘You truly do not.’ Years ago, when he had first started to learn about this strange young woman she had told him with absolute assurance that he was hers. Whether or not it was true then, it had become true. He belonged to her, to do with as she wished. ‘How are the children?’ he asked.
‘How should I know?’ Her head was slightly on one side, and Claudia was in charge, always ready to mock. ‘They are at home.’ She sighed as if in disappointment. ‘You have received the letters?’
‘Yes.’ Every month Claudia had one of her servants write to him to say that their twin girls were well, and list accomplishments such as the times they had learned to crawl and then walk.
‘I would guess that they are squealing and dirty, demanding food and attention and anything else that takes their fancy. That is how they usually behave.’
‘Would a mother’s guidance—’
‘Silures!’ Claudia interrupted. ‘They make their women work like slaves, whether they will or not. Brigantes and Romans alike are more enlightened.’ Her hands were on her hips now, and she snorted. ‘Huh! Your children are well, no thanks to you, that much I sense even from so far away. They are cared for and loved by women and a few men utterly devoted to them, rather than a mother who finds their bawling and self-absorption tiresome. That is a good deal more than most children get!’
‘How do they look?’ Ferox asked.
Claudia smiled. ‘They take after their mother, thank the gods for great mercies. And so alike that I for one cannot tell the little mice apart. No wonder the Romans call them both Flavia.’ Her head went back on one side. ‘You are grinning like a halfwit, Flavius Ferox,’ she said. ‘They have each sent you a snail shell, and you can have them later. Why snail shells? Why indeed, but I understand the choice was between that and some leaves. They are as half-witted as their father, but at least have the excuse of being infants and may learn in time.’
‘Thank you,’ he said, and on instinct put his hands on her arms. She did not flinch, but did not respond either.
‘Your gifts for conversation have not improved, have they.’
‘Why are you here, my queen?’
There was another smile. ‘At least you know your place, even if you speak like a surly brute and maul me about. Well, I could be here as the dutiful little wife, to help her husband in his many onerous tasks, could I not? Just as dear Lepidina follows her Cerialis half way across the empire.’
‘It seems unlikely.’
‘Pig.’ She pulled one arm free and reached up to her forehead as if wiping away tears. ‘I have missed you,’ she added, serious once again.
‘Not every time, but I am pretty good at ducking.’
‘Brute.’
She did not pull free from his other hand and her skin was soft and warm. Her scent was all around him, and brought back memories of better times.
‘I am here to help,’ she said, and brushed his chin with her fingers. ‘Philo still does a good job, and more remarkably yet manages to restrain himself from slicing the razor through your throat. Remarkable fellow that.
‘And I am here because I am queen and my people are going to war.’
‘We are still at peace.’
Another snort. ‘War is coming. You know it as well as I unless you have truly become a fool. So the commander’s wife has joined her husband as far as the Romans are concerned for there is much that they could not or would not understand. My warriors will know that their queen is here, her sword as sharp as any of theirs.’