“The centurion…” Gaius’s head was pounding, but he was becoming able to think once more.
“…has more than enough on his hands without this, and so do the tribunes. Discipline has gone to hell since the assassination. You and your father know the British better than anyone. What do you think will happen if some of our men are discovered raping a native priestess? Boudicca’s rebellion will be nothing to it, and we’re in no condition to respond!”
“Yes…of course,” said Gaius. “I will go. Do you know exactly when they left? Have you any idea which way they took?”
“None whatever, I’m sorry to say,” Valerius replied. “I suppose I could ask around.”
“No, there’s not enough time. I’ll have to go home for clothes.” He rubbed his eyes.
“I have them,” said Valerius. “I had an idea you might need a change.”
“My father was right,” muttered Gaius, “you do think of everything.”
He let the slaves dry and shave him, and forced himself to eat something. He had been a fool, he thought bitterly, trying to drown his sorrows in wine when the world was falling to pieces around him. Somewhere during the process of returning to sanity he had realized that tomorrow must be Samaine. Half the tribesmen in the West would be converging on Vernemeton for the festival. It didn’t matter what Eilan and Senara thought of him. His blood ran cold at the thought of their danger if a war started there.
“I’ll get your niece to safety,” he told Valerius as he prepared to ride out of Deva. And Eilan, and the boy…and if they still hate me they can tell me about it on the way home. He folded back his cloak to free his arms, and patted the last thing he had borrowed from Valerius—a sword.
Not all the years since the coming of the Romans—not all the years since the building of the great Temple of the Sun on the plain, could have been longer to Eilan than the next two days. The night before the Samaine festival seemed to last a thousand years. She had sent Senara away hours ago. As the lights burned down, it seemed to her that the growing shadows were engulfing her own spirit as well.
This must have been what was meant when the warning had come to her; death had waited within her heart and spirit like a seed; it seemed now to expand through her body like an unfolding flower. Her heart pounded as if it would break through walls of bone. Even when her child was born she had felt no such pain. But whether the pain was of the body or of the mind and spirit she could not tell.
When she dozed, her dreams were chaotic; she saw Caillean surrounded by evil men. Then the priestess raised her arms to Heaven, lightning flared, and when Eilan could see again, her attackers were stretched lifeless on the ground. But Caillean was lying still as well, and Eilan could not tell if she lived.
She came to herself, shaking, her cheeks wet with tears. Had that been a true seeing? Caillean ought to be safe on the holy Tor with her priestesses. But if she was not, then what hope was there in the world?
Toward morning, Eilan crept into the room where Lia had put Gawen to bed. Huw, barefoot, padded softly at her heels. For almost the first time since she had taken up her duties as High Priestess, she found herself resenting the big man, as if Huw was taking up air which she needed for her own breath.
She remembered a horror story she had heard in the House of Maidens; how a Priestess of the past had been attacked by her own guard, and given him over to the priests to be put to death. For the first time, she could understand how that woman, desperate for a little human warmth, could have reached out to the only thing human within her reach, and how her appeal might have been misunderstood. Shuddering, she turned to Huw and told him to wait at the door.
Ah, gods, she thought, if only Caillean were here—or Lhiannon—or even my mother—or anyone so that I were not so desperately alone. But there was no one. In her mind even Senara, for all her weeping and denial, was a foe. And her father? He was the greatest of her enemies.