She turned on her heel, wishing she had the height to make an impressive exit, and stalked from the room, leaving the priestess gaping behind her. As she crossed the threshold, the ache in her back became a stabbing pain that for a moment took her breath away.
“My lady—” Charis reached out to help her.
“Go summon a chair for me,” Julia told her, supporting herself against a pillar. “I believe I will ride home after all.”
Gaius did not return to Londinium until late in the evening, having seen to it that the distinguished guest got the trophy he wanted, and taking leave of him with some relief. When he came in, he discovered all in chaos; for during his absence, Julia had gone into premature labor and borne him a daughter. He received the news from Licinius, who said all had been over for an hour or two, and Julia was asleep.
It was time to toast the birth of his first child, said Licinius, holding out a dusty clay flagon with a Greek seal. It was all too clear, Gaius thought, that his father-in-law had already been celebrating.
“I do not know how to thank you for this great gift,” he said somewhat drunkenly. “I have always wanted to be a grandfather; and if the child is only a daughter, well, I do not mind that; Julia has been as good a child to me as forty sons, and she brought you into our family. No doubt that your next child will be a boy.”
“I certainly hope you are right,” Gaius said. It would not be his fault if she did not, since he had begotten one son already.
“I put this wine away when Julia was born, to be drunk when my first grandchild was born,” Licinius said, removing the seal. “Drink with me, my son; and don’t spoil it by putting too much water with it.”
Gaius had had no supper and would much rather have had a cup of ale with a bowl of beans or a roast fowl, but with the household in such disarray he’d be lucky to get some cold bread and meat if he could corner one of the household slaves. He resigned himself to going to bed half drunk, and joined Licinius.
“To your daughter,” Licinius said. “May she be as good to you as Julia has been to me.”
Gaius drank and then the old man proposed a toast to his son. Gaius blinked and sputtered, and his father-in-law elaborated, “Surely you will have a son next year.”
“Oh, yes, of course.”
But as Gaius lifted his goblet it was of Eilan and the son he already had that he was thinking. By now the boy would be a year old. Was he walking? Had the fuzz of dark hair turned to gold?
And then of course they had to drink to Julia; if the serving woman had not come in at around that point to say he might see her, Gaius would have been very drunk indeed. Grateful for the interruption, he followed the woman to the bedchamber.
Julia struck her husband as very small, small and pale. Tucked in her arms was the tiny swaddled form of the child.
Julia looked up at him and began to cry. “I’m so sorry. I did so want to give you a son—I was so sure…”
Made generous by the thought of Eilan’s son, far to the west, he stooped and kissed her. “Don’t cry,” he said. “We will have a boy next time, if the gods wish it.”
“Then you accept her?”
The slave woman picked up the child and held it out and they all looked at him expectantly. After a moment Gaius realized what he was supposed to do and took the baby, rather awkwardly. He looked down into the crumpled features, waiting for the tide of tenderness that had overwhelmed him when he held his son. But his only emotion was amazement, for it seemed to him impossible that something so tiny could be real. He sighed.
“In the name of my ancestors I claim this child as my daughter,” Gaius said loudly. “Macellia Severina shall be her name.”
Just after Beltane, Bendeigid sought audience with the Lady of Vernemeton. By this time Eilan had settled into her role as High Priestess, but it still seemed strange that her own father, a powerful Druid, should seek permission to visit her. Yet she sent an equally formal reply that she would gladly receive him, and when he appeared in her outer chamber that afternoon, she made ready to give him a cordial welcome.