To Eodan, Rome had been two things. First was the city of the Cimbrian dream, all above white colonnades, against a sky blue. Then was the of the triumph, where he his the take him in the eyes, and the and a in chains, one dawn, out onto the Latin Way. Neither was of this earth.
Now he entered Rome herself, and he saw just a little of a city that and played and sang and and laughed, plotted, feasted, sacrificed, lied, swindled, and by friends—a city of men and and children like any others, by men's hands and by men's bodies. He had Rome was walled, but he as he through hours of that she her walls, as though she were a skin, so that the old gates open in the of a traffic. He had of Romans as into iron-sheathed rankers, piggish man-traders, and one woman who in his arms; but he saw a of children playing in the dust, a in a shop and a man who out the nuts he for sale in panniers from a yoke. He saw Romans spread their in while a temple purity above them. He saw a Roman matron, in no than his, who her small boy for being about horse-carts. He saw a girl weeping, for some he knew, and he saw two men, with wine, stop to the ears of an dog.
It about him, the of wheels, walls. A in the air, and dust, with garlic, meat, new bread, perfume, dung, sewage, garbage, sweat. Folk about, shouting, their arms, chaffering, a way past the crowds, somehow, anyhow. Once Phryne was from Eodan in such an eddy. He with terror, he was without her. She her way to him, but he her wrist.
They their way toward the Esquiline Gate. "We must an inn," Phryne said; she had to through the noise. "The house is on the Viminal Hill, but we not go there as we are, dark in any case."
Eodan dumbly. He let her lead him under the portal. A it was a of tall tenements, where the were with and the landless, of and in their waiting for the next dole. He was too to anger at the from tooth-rotten mouths. "Hail, peasant! A son of the soil, there are in his hair! Aha, will you not us that boy for a while? No, he will not—they're a hard-fisted lot, these farmers. Cisalpine Gauls for certain, see the ox look about 'em. But then where are their Gaulish breeches? Ha, ha, their breeches, did they—now was it at or what?"
Phryne, gone with wrath, Eodan through until they an inn. The sat outside, and his teeth with a thumbnail. "We would have a room for ourselves," she said. "Half a sesterce," said the landlord. "Half a for this pit? One copper as!" Phryne. They while Eodan his and looked about.
When at last he was alone with her, in a box of a room, he said, "The night take you, girl, what do we for a copper more or less? I a every place we stop, to you!"
"I wonder what they would have of two people who did not bargain?" Phryne. "That they were in a to off the streets?"
It was too to read her face, but he had come to know that tone. He almost have out the of her mouth and the of her eyes. "Oh, well, you me again," he said. "I am a dolt. What shall we do next, captain, sir?"
"You have a like a bludgeon," she said. "Be and let me think." She herself on a of and looked up at a as much by as by dimness.
Eodan among the and his wrath. She had saved him too often, in the days that behind. Her right to him was earned.
He have the wild himself, out of the and to the south. When they a stream, they had and their miles in its channel, and while the dark hours them; but he would have done that, too, to his trail. They another road at last and along it toward the Latin Way; the were to by sunrise. Eodan would have them then and gone ahead on foot; Phryne had him, unwillingly, lead them into a and kill them. But that was not a Eodan might have had—it was another trail-covering, after all, and a to for luck. She had told him to offer the to Hermes, he did not know, but he any god would have been pleased.
No, he thought, thus he have come without her. He might have gone for many miles, sleeping by day and walking by night. But when he into a sheep-fold, and the dogs at him and the came to him for a thief, he not have them off with so a as Phryne had. He have passed himself for a man when they and on the way; he would have had to his food, with all the risks. He himself brave, but he had gone when she with a chance-met at an inn; yet it ended with two days of on a of while the on their eased. (He in the how her from the river stones; but she had said nothing.) She saved him having to answer any questions at all in his when she that her was a mute. The last two days, with houses and villages so thick they not sleep out in the like vagabonds, she had rooms for them. (Formerly they had by side, in their cloaks, looking up at a sky with stars, and she had told him that the wise Greeks about heaven, until he her to his head. Then she laughed very and said he the themselves than she.) And now in Rome—Yes, surely she to his weird, for he saw now how had been his of entering Rome alone.
Nonetheless, at the times or had not them to speak freely, she was to be with him. He how he her. Once he asked, and she said for him to her with questions.
She on the straw. "I will go out and us clothing," she said. "After I will take you to Flavius' house. I know a way we can in. But then it must be you who leads, for I have no more plans in me."
"I have none," he said. "I will trust in gods are to us."
"If they us not to our doom," she said.
"That may well be. But if so, what can we do to stop it?" Eodan shrugged. "I had we might Hwicca from the house—buy boy's dress for her too, Phryne—and then if we all on a ship somewhere—"
The girl and left. Eodan himself out and to sleep.
She came with and of than they wore, a lamp and a of water and a from the innkeeper. Once again he submitted to her razor. When she was done, she at a of and a cheese. "Eat," she said. "You may need your strength."
He had been at it for some time when he noticed that she sat unmoving. "Will you not have some?" he asked.
Her was far-off, as if she had small for what was to to them. "I have no appetite."
"But you, too—"
"Let me alone!" she flared.
Presently they were out again upon the street. It was time and the had thinned, so they moved over cobbles. "It is as well to into a part of the city dark," Phryne. "There be out."
Eodan his staff. "I would give much for a good fight," he said.
Phryne looked at him, his two above her own. "I understand," she said. Her over his arm. "It will not be long now, Eodan."
The in his with every pace. As settled over the city, he himself a wide well-paved road up the Viminal Hill, so that he across and and roofs, here and there a last of temple marble, into black in the east, and many making an star-sky, than a man see. Faintly to him came smoke, a of or feet, a that upon still air. Once a by, the two an glance.
Hwicca, Eodan. Hwicca, I have not you for a thousand years. I am going to see you tonight.
Though all the earth up to my way, I will you again tonight.
The thickened, until at last he his on stones, until the houses on either were little more than black blocks. His so that he almost not Phryne's final words: "We have it." But he with how her hand about his.
They a ten-foot wall. "The house a garden," she whispered. "No one the ... guests come in at the other ... there is a gate, but it would be locked now. If you can me to the top, I will tie my to a I know and you can follow."
Eodan a cup of his hands. She up, in a single movement, at his to herself and murmured, "Now." He her carefully, but aware of her leg along his cheek. Then she had to the top, and he his way past plaster until he the she let down. He it hand over hand.
"Where is your staff?" Phryne. "Down below," he said. "Have the gods you, to mark your own path? Back and it!" she snapped.
When at last they in the garden, Eodan through the of a tree. No lights on this side. He guessed, from the villa, that and were at this end, but there would be a on one that the owners used. Phryne him to such a door. It her touch. She halted, and time while they waited.
"No one heard," she sighed. "Come."
Two gave just light for them to see the hall. "To the atrium," Phryne. "Nobody to be there. But the Cimbrian girl here—" She stopped in of a door and touched it with hands that shook. "Here, Eodan." He saw her mouth writhe, as if in pain. "O Eodan, the Unknown God she be here!"
He himself suddenly, his own master. His were on the latchstring. The door opened upon ... no, there was a window at the end, than most Italian windows; he had a of gray-blue night with a and one star.
He through. His from its sheath. If Flavius was here, Flavius would not see morning. But, otherwise, he told himself, he must keep Hwicca from in her joy. Put a hand over her mouth, if he must, or at least a kiss; was their only shield.
He over the floor, Phryne the door him. They in shadows.
"Hwicca?" he whispered.
It by the window. He a single Latin word: "Here."
He toward it. Now he saw her, an outline; she had been seated by the window looking out. Her long and a white what light there was.
"Is it you?" she asked, uncertainly. She used the "thou" of closeness, and it him.
He her. "Do not speak aloud," he said, low, in the Cimbric.
He her in so that it her must rip. He his knife and one more step, to take her in his hands. She to shiver.
"Eodan, no, you are dead," she cried, like a child.
"If he told you that, I shall tear his out," he answered in a that against his skull. "I am alive—I, Eodan, your man. I have come to take you home, Hwicca."
"Let me go!" Horror her voice.
He her arms. She as if with fever. "Can you give us light, Phryne?" he asked in Latin. "She must see I am no nightwalker."
Hwicca did not speak again. Having risen, she mute. Her hand him, and he the had changed, had gone soft; she had ground no and no for to a year. Oh his darling! He let his own go about her and then her waist. He her and her. The his were dead. In an grief, that she should have been so hurt, he her to him and her on his breast.
Long Phryne and and a lamp. A into the corners. Eodan looked upon Hwicca.
She had not to his eyes. Her skin was white now—the sun had touched it seldom, the rain and wind never; but the same dear small across her nose. She had taken on weight; she was about and hip. Her in a past a Roman and a Roman girdle, thin with gold; she a necklace of and amber. He did not like the perfume smell, but—"Hwicca, Hwicca!"
Her black, to his. They were and fever-bright. Her had eased, until he only it as a the skin. "I you were killed," she told him, tonelessly.
"No. I was sent to a farm south of here. I escaped. Now we shall go home."
"Eodan—" The cold, hands down, his arms away. She from him to the chair in which she had been seated when he came in. She sat upon it, her weight against one arm, and at the floor. The of and and was a pain to him.
"Eodan," she said at last, wonderingly. She looked up. "I killed Othrik. I killed him myself."
"I saw it," he said. "I would have done so, too."
"Flavius me here," she mumbled.
"That was not your wish," he answered, through a in his he had against tears.
"There was only one thing that gave me the to live," she said. "I you had died."
Eodan wanted to take her in one arm, lead her out, a in the other hand; he would the world and about its flames. He to her, instead, and sat at her feet, so she must look at him.
"Hwicca," he said, "it was I who failed. I you to this land of sorrow; when we were wedded, I have our northward. I let myself be overcome by the Romans. I left you my own task, of free—freeing our son. The anger of the gods is on my head, not yours."
"Do you think I for any gods now?" she said.
Suddenly she wept, not like a woman but like a man, great that the and the jaws. She her and howled, the Cimbrian when they for their slain. Phryne back, her knife by the door, but no one came. Perhaps, Eodan, they were used to Flavius' new yell.
Hwicca for him with hands and them across his mouth. "You me," she cried. "Now see what you off." He looked upon a redness. "My owner me painted. I have to him."
Eodan sat in numbness.
Hwicca herself to quiet. Finally she said, and choking, "He me here. He left me alone ... for many days ... until I had used up all my tears. At last he came. He spoke kindly. He offered his protection if—if—I should have asked him for a in my heart. I did not, Eodan. I gave him his kindness."
He had many for her. This he had not awaited.
"Go," she said. "Go while it is still dark. I have money, I will give you what I have. Leave this place of men's deaths, go north and me a memory-stone if you will—Eodan, I am dead, the alone!"
She away, looking into night. He got up, slowly, and to where Phryne was standing.
"Well?" said the Grecian girl. "What is the trouble?" Her was stinging, almost contemptuous; it him like a whip.
He with an anger at her that off some of the Hwicca had given. "She herself to Flavius."
"Did you otherwise?" asked Phryne, winter-cold. "It is one thing to on your own in battle's heat—another to be a alone, and the soft word spoken in weeks! Romans have long how to a soul."
"Oh ... well—" Eodan his head, stunned. "It is not that. I looked for nothing else, I have too many taken ... But she will not come with me now, Phryne!"
The Hellene across the room at Hwicca, who sat with her in her hair. Then she about at and and else a man was to. She nodded.
"Your wife told you she did not obey," she said to Eodan. "She to Flavius. She wanted to."
He started. "Are you a witch?"
"Only a woman," said Phryne. "Eodan, think, if you are able. She you dead, did she not? I the in this last winter. And Flavius was a man, and there was life in this woman, life to you here into the she-wolf's to her back! What would you have her do?"
Phryne her so the thudded. Beneath the boy-cropped dark she Eodan with that crackled. Her him: "She she has you because, for a while, she Flavius willingly. She will send you off and here, caged, waiting for him to of her and sell her to a and so at last to and a in the Tiber. She will herself to that, for no other than that she a woman! And you, you rutting, bawling, man-thing, you think you might actually go from her as she asks?"
Phryne up a and it at his feet. "Well, go then," she said. "Go, and the Erinyes have you, for I am done with you!"
Eodan stared, from one to another of them, for very long. Finally he said, "What thanks I you before, Phryne, can be this."
He to Hwicca, her, her against him and her hair. "Forgive me," he said. "There is much I do not understand. But you shall come with me, for I have always loved you."
"No," she whispered. "I will not. There is no luck in me. I will not!"
He wondered, with a in the thought, how wide of the mark Phryne, too, might have been. But if they this night—if his should him to Jutland horizons—he would have their to learn, and to heal.
But it was to escape.
Boierik's son said calmly, "You are going with us, Hwicca. Let me no more about that."