Walking quite at random through the camp, Maximus had come to the market. It was surprisingly large. After he had paid some duty to a Herul official, a trader had been authorized to sell him a large amount of cannabis at a reasonable-seeming price. Strolling back, turning over in his head ways to consume it without bothering to build a special tent, he had run into one of the Herul women from the river. He had struck up a conversation with her. She spoke Greek. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, he had decided to test the encouraging stories about the sexual mores of the Heruli. At first he thought he had misjudged things horribly. She had just stared at him, an inscrutable expression on her face. Even he had been surprised when, almost wordless, she had taken him straight to her tent.
Although there had been male belongings — among them a gorytus, a hunting spear and a couple of fine swords — they had a packed-away, unused air. Nevertheless, the woman had hung the bowcase outside. She had closed the hangings, spread bedding, removed her clothes and gestured for him to lie down with her. Something about her very brisk practicality — that and possibly her bizarre dyed-red hair — had set him aback. But he had persevered — thinking about those two blondes in the brothel in Arete had helped — and after a time things went better. Afterwards they had talked a little, but she had looked sad, and told him to leave.
Now, on the fourth morning, Maximus was thinking about her. From the other side of their tent, Ballista was delivering what amounted to a lecture on the moral corruption of living under an autocracy as analysed by Tacitus. Calgacus was outside, cooking, his movements awkward because of his arm. Tarchon had vanished. Unable to account for the woman’s sadness, Maximus was wondering if it would be a good idea to visit her again.
Andonnoballus appeared at the entrance. They invited him to enter. Calgacus came in too. Maximus got them all a drink. At least, Maximus thought, it should call a halt to the drone about politics.
‘When will Naulobates grant us another audience?’ Ballista asked.
‘The answer to your request was unambiguous,’ Andonnoballus said.
‘There are other things, beyond the ransoms, we would discuss, preferably alone with the king.’
‘I am sure he will receive you again soon. Although the work of a lawgiver consumes his time. He does not spare himself, and he has been called away the past two days.’ Andonnoballus looked serious. ‘The tauma of Naulobates has brought back word that the deity prefers Naulobates be called not King but First-Brother.’
‘It is not an easy thing to change the laws of a people,’ Ballista said. ‘Solon, the great Athenian, went abroad when his reforms were complete. Sulla, the Dictator of Rome, retired into private life. When he introduced the rule of the emperors, there were attempts on the life of Augustus.’
Andonnoballus shot Ballista a hard look. ‘There is no question of such with the First-Brother. The reforms are God-given. All Heruli are united in support.’
‘Yet people are accustomed to their old ways, often they resist…’
‘There is no resistance. Those who objected showed they were not true Heruli.’
‘Tell me about the reforms, especially about the women,’ Maximus said quickly.
The conversation had been heading into uncomfortable places. It was unlike Ballista to be so tactless. It was almost as if he had been sounding out the loyalty of Andonnoballus to his father’s regime. For a nasty moment, Maximus wondered if Ballista had received further instructions from Gallienus’s court, instructions beyond the unlikely task of trying to turn the Heruli against their Gothic allies. Something pricked his memory, then disappeared again. ‘Tell me about the women,’ he said with an open, affable smile.
Andonnoballus laughed. ‘Outsiders always want to know about the women.’
‘You all have your women in common?’ Maximus asked.
‘As in Plato’s Republic,’ Ballista said.
‘Not at all, it is far better than Plato imagined,’ Andonnoballus said.
This was safer ground altogether. Although Maximus suspected that Plato might prove even less entertaining than Tacitus. The young Herul was obviously setting himself for some weighty discourse.
‘Plato abolished marriage, the home and the family. He took babies from their mothers. The guardians of his ideal polis were to be mated like hunting dogs, although the occasion would be called a festival. Who got to mate was decided by lot. To ensure only the best mated, the lots were to be fixed. It was cruel, unnatural and all based on deceit.’
‘And yours is better?’ Ballista said.
‘Without doubt. What is more natural than the family? The deity instructed Naulobates that men should continue to marry, should have a tent and possessions of their own. How could a warrior live on the Steppes without his herds? Their number are the measure of his valour. But to ensure harmony, to make us a true band of brothers, no husband objects if another man enjoys his wife. As paternity must be uncertain, every Herul regards every child as if it were his own.’
‘How do you avoid incest?’ Ballista asked.
‘It is a large tribe. You do not lie with the daughters of women you had around the time of the girl’s conception.’
‘So the Rosomoni are descended through the mothers?’ Ballista asked.
‘Not altogether. Only exceptionally will a Rosomoni woman lie with a man who is not Rosomoni.’
‘What sort of exception?’ Maximus was interested now.
‘If he is a great warrior, or for some other unusual reason.’
Maximus grinned and got up. ‘Sure, that helps me make a decision. I will be off to see the Rosomoni woman I saw the other day.’
‘What is her name?’ Andonnoballus said.
‘Olympias.’
A strange look crossed Andonnoballus’s face; not disapproving, let alone hostile, more compassionate. ‘Enjoy, but always remember, pleasure is fleeting.’
‘Not that fleeting,’ Maximus said complacently.
Outside, walking between the neat rows of tents and wagons, Maximus remembered the thing that had snagged at his memory earlier. He had meant to tell Ballista the other day, when Olympias had said it. They were the second embassy of foreigners in the camp this summer. King Hisarna of the Urugundi had ridden out two days before they had arrived.
He was back in Ephesus. Lost in the alleys of the potters’ quarter. It had rained. The stucco on the close, blank walls was running with water. Thick mud squelched under foot. In the band of sky visible the stars raced to their extinction.
He crouched in the shallow recess of a doorway. Doubled up, gasping. The door was barred. He did not dare knock. The labyrinthine alleys played with the sounds. The baying of the mob came first from one direction then another. Each time, it was closer. If only he had not lost his way. If only he could get down to the Sacred Way, achieve the sanctuary of some holy place in the civic agora.
The mob rounded the corner. He could not run. They closed on him, their eyes as pitiless as the dying stars.
He woke, his heart racing, sweating heavily. It was dark in the tent. He forced himself to peer through the gloom into the further recesses. Only the humped shapes of his contubernales sleeping like brute beasts. No sign of the daemon. Just a dream then. Thank the gods for that.
He had made a mistake, had misread the signs. Just once, but that was enough. The daemons of those justly slain did not walk. The little girl in Ephesus had been innocent. Since her daemon had appeared to him, he had ensured another such could not happen. The mutilations kept any unjustly killed from seeking revenge. When time was pressing, licking and spitting the blood and wiping the blade on their heads should prove enough. Jason had not been haunted by Apsyrtus. If a murderer of the innocent stood on sacred ground, the gods sent madness and disease. He had been in temples. He was healthy and sane. To rid himself of her, he needed purification. But the ritual called for things he could not obtain. If not a priest, it demanded at least privacy and a suckling pig. Neither had been available as they crossed the Steppe, and neither were to be had here among the Heruli.