Celtic Fire Part 31

He picked his way around the unconscious men sprawled in the yard, pausing at the gate to peer into the street. To the left, a rowdy cl.u.s.ter of soldiers played at dice near the west gate. "This way," he whispered to Marcus, moving to his right.

"But Rhiannon ..."

Lucius's jaw clenched. "What of her?"

"I saw the quartermaster take her to the residence. We have to get her out."

"We don't. She knew of the attack. Helped plan it, most likely. She's with Brennus of her own accord."

"She's not! He nearly had to drag her to the door. He'll hurt her."

Lucius's resolve wavered, then hardened anew. Rhiannon was not some barbarian peasant girl in need of rescue. By Pollux, she was the hidden queen Aulus had written of in his history. She had fled his protection, then rallied her people to the sword. It was clear where her loyalties lay.

"We'll not endanger our escape for a barbarian woman," he told Marcus. "She's chosen her path."

"But Father, we must rescue her! She's my friend."

"No. It's not our concern."

A drunken soldier chose that moment to stumble into the road from the alley between the headquarters and the residence. He shoved past Lucius, barely sparing him a glance as he lifted his tunic and relieved himself against the wall. His need taken care of, he stumbled toward the group at the west gate.

Lucius shoved Marcus in the opposite direction. "Go."

The boy dug in his heels. "No."

"Marcus ..."

"She doesn't want him! She wants you. You have to get her out." He darted toward the residence door. Lucius cursed and ran after him, setting his jaw against the pain that shouted from his ribs.

He caught Marcus by the scruff of the neck. "We are not going in there."

"We have to! You told me yourself that a Roman fights with honor. What honor is there in crawling out of the fort gates and leaving a helpless woman behind?"

Lucius snorted. "Rhiannon is hardly helpless. She-"

A woman's angry voice cut into the night from the high window directly above Lucius's head.

Rhiannon.

Gaius Brennus answered with a snarl. "Ye'll not deny me, woman. Remove your tunic."

Lucius's fury exploded. He looked down at Marcus. The boy's eyes had gone wide with fear. "All right," he said. "We'll save her. Keep your dagger close and follow me."

"Ye'll not deny me, woman."

Brennus had returned just as Owein was leaving. Rhiannon cursed her luck soundly. Somehow she had to get out and free Lucius. She had little time to waste before her brother located a pony on which to carry his captive to the Druid circle.

"Remove your tunic."

"I told ye, I canna lie with ye this night. 'Twill be several days at least." She dropped her chin a bit, feigning embarra.s.sment. "The moon flux ..."

Brennus gave her a scowl and half turned away. He unsheathed his dagger and Lucius's sword and flung the weapons onto a long stone table. His war belt clattered to the floor. Rhiannon watched with growing unease as his mail s.h.i.+rt followed it.

He faced her, wearing only a dirty s.h.i.+rt and torn braccas, braccas, the laces straining with his arousal. "Unclothe yourself." the laces straining with his arousal. "Unclothe yourself."

"Nay," Rhiannon said, fighting the urge to step back. "I would not dishonor ye so."

He laughed. "Your concern is touching but misplaced. I've wanted ye since I saw ye in the fort hospital, and I'll have ye tonight. If your woman's flow is truly on ye, ye may service me with your mouth." His hands curled into fists.

Rhiannon didn't doubt he would use them on her. Her gaze strayed to his dagger, lying unprotected such a short distance away. She took a step toward it, her hands lifting as she did so to the pin that fastened her cloak. The mantle fell away. Brennus's gaze raked her, leaving her feeling soiled.

She took another step, positioning herself between Brennus and the table as she twisted her fingers into her skirt and pulled the hem up over her knees, then her thighs. Swallowing her revulsion, she swept the fabric over her head.

He was on her in a heartbeat, pressing her bare b.u.t.tocks against the cold granite. His arousal prodded her legs. Her fingers groped the table behind her and closed on the hilt of the dagger. When Brennus's hands moved to untie the laces on his braccas, braccas, she struck. she struck.

Her blade slashed across his throat, loosing a river of blood. Brennus stared at her with disbelieving eyes as his knees crumpled. Rhiannon kicked free of him and scrambled out of the path of his body. Lurching for the corner of the room, she doubled over and retched. Brennus's soul burst from his flesh in waves of pulsing rage.

When it was over, Rhiannon sprawled on the floor, gasping. A rivulet of blood made its way toward her across the tiles. She heaved herself to her feet, s.n.a.t.c.hed up her tunic, and dressed swiftly. Dagger raised, she crept toward the door, praying Brennus had dismissed the guard before entering.

Her prayer went unanswered. The door opened, revealing two men in Gaulish helmets and mail. She made a desperate stab at the closer one's neck only to have her wrist caught in his unrelenting grip.

"Rhiannon. Be still. It's Lucius."

"Lucius?" She blinked up at him. "But ... I was coming to save you!"

Lucius's gaze swept past her, taking in Brennus and the pool of blood in which he lay. "I thought to rescue you," he said. His mouth lifted, first one side, then the other, in a genuine smile. "I might have known you would need no help."

Chapter Twenty-Three.

Lucius watched Rhiannon greet Marcus with a glad cry. "You're safe! Thank Briga." She enfolded him in a fierce embrace.

"But Magister Demetrius ..." He buried his face in her tunic.

Rhiannon's questioning gaze met Lucius's eyes. "Dead," he said. "But we have precious little time to mourn him. We must flee before my absence from the yard is noted."

They left the house by the front entrance, avoiding the boisterous soldiers in the courtyard. Though dawn was a few hours off, some of the men sprawled in the avenue connecting the east and west gates were already starting to stir. Since the barracks flanked the north gate, that route promised to be even more trafficked.

Lucius led them down a side alley toward the south gate, sword at the ready. His fingers gripped the wolf's head. He'd counted Aulus's gift as lost until Rhiannon had lifted it from the Egyptian table in the receiving room. She'd taken Brennus's dagger for herself, belting it in a sheath at her waist.

Lucius hadn't seen Aulus since before the Celt attack began and now, with Rhiannon nearby, he would not appear. It might be that his brother had found rest at last, but Lucius doubted it. A dread intuition whispered that when Aulus materialized again, he would be in worse agony than before.

He led his small band at a snail's pace between the granaries, only in part because of a need to avoid discovery. The bruises from Brennus's fists ached and one rib was certainly cracked. Vivid agony tore through his side with every step he took.

Marcus and Rhiannon trod softly at his back. Lucius knew that his son's store of strength, sapped by his illness and his flight over the rooftops, was nearly depleted. The boy leaned heavily on Rhiannon, but when he ventured a whisper, it was not fatigue, danger, or even Demetrius's death of which he spoke. His main concern was that Hercules had been lost. Lucius suspected the boy's numbed and grieving mind had seized upon this topic to avoid replaying the horror of the last few hours.

"He will find you," Rhiannon soothed. "He's a clever beast."

If Lucius entertained some doubts on that score, he kept them to himself. No use distressing the boy further, when they all might be dead by morning, like the two Gauls sprawled face down in the alley. The unfortunate pair had been stripped of their armor, leaving them with only torn s.h.i.+rts and braccas braccas to cover their tangled limbs. Lucius kicked them aside to unblock the path, then paused to let the stabbing pain in his side pa.s.s. to cover their tangled limbs. Lucius kicked them aside to unblock the path, then paused to let the stabbing pain in his side pa.s.s.

Rhiannon shot him a glance, and though the night was dark, he did not miss the questions in her eyes. She wondered about the extent of his injuries. He steeled himself against her concern. She'd told him too many lies and owed him too many answers.

He paused at the corner of the fort workshop. The wide expanse of open air between it and the perimeter wall was useful for preventing flaming enemy arrows from firing the fort buildings, but proved a daunting barrier to a wounded man, a woman, and a boy who wished to reach the gate unnoticed. The tall doors between the south towers were ajar, affording a tantalizing glimpse of the fort village beyond. A knot of dicing soldiers hunkered nearby.

"A dog to my Venus," one of them announced in a self-satisfied tone. "The prize is mine." His opponents grumbled as they shoved their coin in his direction. Less than ten paces from the gamblers, a man was on the ground, pumping his seed into a plump woman. As Lucius watched, the soldier grunted and rolled to the side. The woman then lifted her arms to a second man. The newcomer threw down a coin and took his comrade's place between her thighs.

Marcus tugged Lucius's tunic. "How will we get past?"

"Can you walk unaided? Just until we pa.s.s the gate?"

He nodded.

Lucius cast a glance over Rhiannon. Most of the men had seen her enter the fort with the rutting b.a.s.t.a.r.d who had been her husband. She would be recognized when they tried to pa.s.s the gate. After a moment's thought, he paced back to the dead men and cut their s.h.i.+rts from their bodies.

He returned to his companions. "When the show starts, slip out the gate behind us," he told Marcus.

Rhiannon's eyes showed her confusion. "Show?"

Lucius plucked Brennus's dagger from her hand and shoved it back into the sheath at her waist. Then he threw one stolen s.h.i.+rt over Rhiannon's head and the other around her torso. "I hope this is disguise enough," he muttered. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he picked her up and slung her over his shoulder, one palm firmly fixed on her b.u.t.tocks.

She went deathly still, whether from shock or desire he couldn't tell.

"Struggle," he told her.

The dead man's s.h.i.+rt m.u.f.fled her voice. "Nay. You're hurt."

"We'll all be dead soon enough if you don't start screaming."

She must have guessed his plan then, because she began to twist in his arms and shriek loudly enough to wake the dead in the fort cemetery. He made a motion to Marcus and staggered toward the gate.

The gamblers looked up as he neared. "Got a reluctant one there," one of them commented.

"Aye," Lucius replied in Gaulish. "To my thinking, they're the best kind." He shut his mouth, hoping to the G.o.ds he wouldn't be forced to continue the banter. Neither his Gaulish vocabulary nor his accent would suffer much more conversation. He slapped Rhiannon's rump hard enough to make his hand sting.

"Let me go, ye brute!" Her fists pummeled his back in what Lucius suspected was genuine outrage.

"Certainly, love." He gained the gate and heaved her upright, pressing her against the wall and pinning her there with his lower body. He let one hand roam her b.r.e.a.s.t.s while the other lifted the hem of her tunic. Her struggles made his c.o.c.k go hard. The gambling soldiers stopped their game to watch.

His lips took Rhiannon's in a savage kiss. She responded with brutal ardor, thrusting her tongue into his mouth, fingers clawing his neck. If her pa.s.sion was solely for the benefit of their audience, she belonged on a theater stage.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Marcus slip through the gate. Abruptly Lucius released Rhiannon. Grabbing her hand, he hauled her past the tower and into the village.

Gauls and Celts crowded the center lane of the tiny settlement. Men sprawled in the road; sounds of coupling came from the huts. Afraid one of Rhiannon's kinsmen would recognize her, Lucius tugged her through the alley between two dwellings and into the barley fields beyond.

Marcus collapsed between the rows. Rhiannon flung off the soiled s.h.i.+rts and dropped to her knees at his side.

"I'll be all right," the boy panted. "I just need to catch my breath."

"You need herbs and a sennight's rest," Rhiannon replied.

Lucius crouched beside her. "You needn't stay. I can care for my son."

Her eyes gleamed gold in the moonlight. "Are you so eager to be rid of me, Lucius?"

Marcus grabbed her hand. "No! You must stay."

Lucius pinched the bridge of his nose. "Marcus ..."

Gently, Rhiannon disentangled herself from the boy's embrace and rose.

"Marcus and I will travel south," Lucius said. "To Eburac.u.m. I must inform the commander there of the mutiny." No doubt Brennus had not sent Lucius's request for reinforcements.

"Aulus's prison lies in the opposite direction," Rhiannon replied. Hugging her arms about her, she looked toward the northern hills.

He stilled. "What do you mean?"

She paused as if gathering courage. "Your brother was given to my clan as a prize."

"By Brennus."

"Yes, but at the time I didn't know who the prisoner's betrayer might have been. Aulus died on the first night of the winter moon within a circle of stones set by the Old Ones." She drew a breath. "He was slaughtered to gain the favor of Kernunnos, the Horned G.o.d."

If her words had been physical blows, they could not have fallen on Lucius more brutally. "He was sacrificed? Like a calf or a pig?" He felt ill.

"Yes," Rhiannon said. "A Druid master guides my clan. He proclaimed the blood of our enemy, offered to Kernunnos, would make our warriors invincible."

"Go on."

"Aulus died by Madog's hand. It was ... it was not a quick death. Your brother grasped at my skirt as he took his last breath. I felt his soul fly through mine as it left his body. I've felt his touch ever since. I believe that is why he vanishes when I'm near."

Bile rose in his throat. "Then you are a witch."

"If a witch is one who merges her soul with forces beyond the physical, then yes, I am one. I often feel the pa.s.sing of souls, especially of those who die in pain. But I've felt no spirit touch me as strongly as your brother's did."

"I've not seen Aulus since the attack on the fort began. Even before, he lay still as though sleeping."

"Madog called his spirit to the Druid circle before the attack to aid in your destruction."

"The youth with whom you spoke in the headquarters yard. He is the one you saved from my sword, is he not?"