Cal peered out of the shadows at the woman he loved. She was sitting around a campfire talking with the other women about baby Faustus, who lay cradled in his mother’s arms. The women spoke in hushed tones, but he could tell by their gestures that they were doting over the infant. When they gathered together each night, they spoke of little else.
Cal had been following them for many days now. They had stayed in Serenus only long enough to feast on the deer he had secretly delivered them and prepare for their journey. Only days after Faustus had been born, they had started out for Britannia.
Cal had followed them relentlessly, marvelling at their speed. Epona’s sturdy grey mare was undaunted by the mountainous route they travelled and she bore Clodius, Arria’s mother and the baby with gentle agility. Arria, Grandmother and Epona walked beside the large horse and guided its path during the day, stopping in towns to purchase food and clarify the route as they made their way steadily northward towards the Strait of Hellespont.
There, Cal knew they would cross from the senatorial province of Asia into the imperial province of Thracia, heading ever westward towards the wilds of Germania and Britannia. Cal wondered if they understood that the further they got from Ephesus, the more dangerous their travel became—especially a group such as theirs, comprised as it was of a newborn baby, a lame man and four women.
Cal worried for their safety, though he was careful not to underestimate their strength. He had recently learned that women could be as fearsome as men when they wished to be, especially when equipped with wooden poles. Or if not quite as fearsome as men, then at least twice as brave.
In truth, he simply could not bring himself to leave her.
Not even after her brother had threatened to kill him and he had realised that there was no place for him in Arria’s small, fragile tribe. Watching the six of them together over the past twenty days had convinced him that he had done the right thing. With her family finally at peace, Arria was safe, needed and loved. He could never do anything to threaten that.
He could only see that she arrived safely in Britannia and that she and her loved ones found a place they could call home. He knew in time she would forget him, though the thought gave him a pain in his stomach.
In the meantime, he followed her as closely as he dared. He watched her in the mornings, when she sat up on her mat and her honey skin caught the first rays of light. Some mornings she woke up in tears, and it was all he could do not to burst out of his hiding place to wipe them.
He followed far behind them during the day, but when they stopped to rest he sometimes neared, if just to see her touch her lips to the waters of a stream. How he missed those lips. How he would always miss them.
Strangely, it was not Arria but Epona who seemed to suspect Cal’s presence. She sometimes turned abruptly, as if she wished to catch him following behind the group. She often gazed into the brush wherever they made camp. Once Cal had even caught her studying one of his footprints.
Cal knew he should keep himself better hidden, but his body was drawn to Arria’s as if through some invisible force—especially on evenings like these, when he sat in the shadows watching the firelight flicker in her eyes.
‘Arria, will you not tell us how you escaped the governor’s domus?’ Epona asked suddenly. ‘We still have not heard the tale.’
Cal saw Arria flush. ‘It is a lengthy tale,’ said Arria, ‘and one that you may find difficult to believe.’
‘Please tell it,’ urged Arria’s mother. ‘I, too, have longed to hear it.’
Arria gazed into the fire. ‘Very well then,’ she said, then began the story of her escape from a place she called Hades. She spoke in hushed tones, describing a terrible monster called the governor who locked her inside a dark, sweltering dungeon.
Cal could sense her pain as she described a battle with three demons—Heat, Thirst and Hunger, and how she had defeated them with the aid of a talking mouse.
Flames danced upon her cheeks as she painted a picture of smoke and fire, water and steam. Her voice grew softer still as she recalled encounters with a magic lamp, a benevolent dragon and a whale’s hot belly.
Cal watched Clodius sit back in disbelief as Arria described her miraculous arrival at the Temple of Artemis. He saw Arria’s mother shake her head with something resembling pity as Arria explained how the goddess had transformed Arria’s pole into a divine spear.
‘And I bounded into the arena and sent the spear flying in defence of the man I love.’
Cal sat up. The leaves rustled beneath him and he saw Epona’s eyes grow alert.
‘The man you love?’ Arria’s mother asked.
‘The gladiator, Mother. The man you met the night I arrived in Serenus. He is the man I love—the only man I will ever love.’
‘The man who robbed me of my leg,’ Clodius clarified and Arria stared at the ground.
Epona levelled her gaze on Clodius. ‘I am afraid that the heart cannot choose what it loves, or whom.’ Epona’s gaze remained locked with Clodius’s for a long while, as if engaged in some silent discussion. When finally Epona looked away, she gazed into the forest where Cal was hiding.
‘Do go on, Arria. Finish your story,’ said Grandmother and Epona returned her attention to Arria.
‘Cal and I fought side by side,’ Arria continued. ‘We raged and battled against the governor’s guards—Cal with his gladius and I with my spear—but they continued to pour down from the stands, the crowd cheering them on. We realised that our only choice was escape. We had just begun to run away when the Emperor himself stopped us.’
Arria’s mother gasped. ‘The Emperor?’
‘Yes, Emperor Trajan himself. He congratulated us for our performance and told us to name our wish. We asked for freedom.’
Grandmother clapped her hands together. ‘A marvellous story! The gods were with us that night, were they not?’
‘Or perhaps they were within us,’ mused Arria.
‘What do you mean?’ asked Arria’s mother.
‘That night, Epona was Ephesia, the Amazon queen, Grandmother was Kybele, the divine midwife, and you, Mother, might have been Mary herself on her bed of straw.’
‘And you, dear Arria, were Artemis, virgin huntress, ready with your spear,’ added Grandmother.
‘In times of difficulty, the gods give us strength...’ mused Epona.
‘And in times of great difficulty, we become them,’ Arria finished.
There was a long silence and it seemed to Cal as if Arria had just spoken some ancient truth.
‘The tale stretches the bounds of reason,’ grumbled Clodius.
‘It is quite miraculous,’ added Arria’s mother.
Cal wished he could jump from the shadows and proclaim that it was all true. He wished he could shout to the entire universe that it did not matter how fantastic, that he believed Arria’s story.
But if he truly believed all of it, then he had to believe the part in which she had called him the only man she would ever love. And if that was true, then he knew he could no longer simply watch her from the shadows, listening to her stories. He needed to find a way to make himself a part of them for ever.