The morning was cold and bright. Livia could sense it through the window shutters, though she waited until she was certain Marius had left the room before opening her eyes. She’d been in bed, as close to the wall as possible, when he’d come back the previous evening and she’d been determined not to get up again until he’d left. She didn’t want to speak with him. Until she’d calmed down, it was far better for them to keep out of each other’s way as much as possible.
She was still furious. When he’d only been talking about leading a patrol north, it somehow hadn’t seemed so dreadful. He’d said that he’d only been going to look around, but the fact that he’d been fighting—fighting!—her mother’s people made her as angry as if he’d attacked her himself. It didn’t help that she knew he was only doing his duty. In his mind, he was protecting Rome, holding the frontier, working towards his ambition of becoming Senior Centurion. It wasn’t his fault that he’d married a woman with mixed allegiances. He didn’t even know. Because she hadn’t told him, not before their marriage or yesterday when she’d had the chance.
The thought brought with it an unwanted stab of guilt, although surely he’d guess the truth soon enough if she kept on behaving the way that she was. She couldn’t help it. How could he talk about the boy’s future so casually, as if slavery was acceptable just because Rome said so? He’d even called him a barbarian, as if he were just as prejudiced as every other Roman! Which perhaps he was and she’d simply been too blinded by attraction to see clearly before. In any case, she certainly couldn’t tell him the truth now. Their whole situation was unbearable. She’d wanted to visit the wall for almost as long as she could remember, thinking it was where she belonged, but now she was trapped, caught between two sides in a war. Was that where she belonged? If it was, then she’d prefer to belong nowhere.
At least Marius had never kept slaves himself. She’d been unable to shake Julius’s opinions on that subject—had actually shocked him by giving Porcia her document of manumission on the very day he’d purchased her as a gift—but then she’d given up hoping that he might change. She’d been unable to do anything for his other slaves either, ending up as powerless as she’d ever been in Tarquinius’s household.
Well, this time, she decided, she would do something. She didn’t know what exactly, but she wasn’t going to stand by while anyone was treated as less than a human being. Marius wouldn’t appreciate her interference, but there was no harm in making sure the boy was all right, surely?
She got to her feet and dressed with a new sense of purpose, trying to ignore the musky male scent of the blankets as she climbed across them, collecting a few items before marching determinedly out of the villa and across the fort. A few auxiliaries nodded to her as she passed and she nodded back, glad to see them all back safely, though struck with a twinge of disloyalty, too. She pushed it aside. Tending to the enemy didn’t mean that she cared any less about them, but someone had to do the right thing and make sure the prisoner was properly looked after.
‘I’ve brought some food.’ She spoke to the guard outside the prison, prepared for an argument that never came as he immediately stepped aside to let her in.
The prison wasn’t a single large room, as she’d expected, but a series of cells lined with wooden bars, all of them empty except for the last where the warrior was leaning against the wall in one corner, his eyes closed. Judging by the bandage around his left arm, his injuries had already been tended to. So had his comforts. There was a pile of blankets around him, as well as a cup of water, a jug and an empty plate to one side, and she felt a fresh pang of guilt for having misjudged Marius. Again. Whatever else he intended to do with the prisoner, he clearly wasn’t mistreating him.
She crouched down, bringing her eyes level with the warrior’s, though up close he looked even younger. His skin bore traces of woad, giving him an odd, bluish pallor, while his chest was decorated with a series of intricate, interlacing tattoos. She lifted her eyes to his face, looking for some semblance of her own features. There were no obvious physical similarities between them, but there was still something, a feeling of kinship that meant she couldn’t ignore or abandon him. For all she knew, they might be related.
‘Are you awake?’ She dragged the words from her memory, the Caledonian language her mother had taught her, and his eyes snapped open at once.
‘I’ve brought you some food.’ She rummaged in her bag and held out a chunk of bread. ‘I thought...’
She didn’t finish the sentence as he sprang forward suddenly, reaching between the bars and grabbing her forearm.
‘You speak my language?’
‘Yes.’ She winced at the tightness of his grip. ‘Let me go.’
He released her almost as quickly and sat back on his haunches, his eyes burning fiercely in the half-darkness. ‘Who are you?’
‘It doesn’t matter, but you can trust me.’
‘Trust a Roman?’ He spat into the dirt.
‘I’m not...’ She bit her lip before she could say it. She couldn’t say it. She couldn’t deny that side of her heritage any more than she could deny her mother’s and she didn’t want to choose. ‘I’m only half-Roman, but I want to help you.’
‘How?’
‘You need to answer their questions. They already know about the rebellion, so you won’t be betraying anyone. If you tell them what they want to know, then they won’t hurt you.’
His gaze narrowed, but she kept going.
‘The rebellion won’t succeed. It can’t. No matter how hard you fight, the new Emperor will keep on sending legions to defeat you.’
‘So you think we should just surrender and become slaves of Rome?’
The word made her look away. ‘No, just hold your own territory. Don’t attack the wall. What’s the point of dying in a fight you can’t win?’
He stared at her for a long moment and then spat into the dirt again. ‘Not all of us are prepared to make treaties with Rome!’
‘Livia?’
A voice from the doorway made her spin round with a jolt.
‘Ario!’ She stood up to face him, feigning composure even though she felt as if her insides had just turned to water. ‘I was just giving the prisoner some food.’
‘I see that.’ His gaze swept over the prison cell. ‘Have you finished?’
‘Yes.’ She picked up her bag, resisting the urge to throw one last imploring look at the prisoner before making her way to the door, keenly aware of two pairs of eyes watching her. ‘I’m all done.’
‘Did Marius send you?’ Ario’s face was grave as they stepped back outside.
‘No.’ There was no point in lying when he could check her story so easily. ‘But I don’t see what harm taking the boy some food can do.’
‘None the less, in the future...’
‘I’ll ask.’ She flung the bag over her shoulder, adopting what she hoped was a convincing smile, but which she had a strong suspicion didn’t fool him at all. ‘I promise.’
‘What is it?’ Marius knew the Decurion well enough to know when something was wrong.
‘Not here.’ Ario jerked his head, leading him inside the camp headquarters, through the main hall and into the commander’s office.
‘Why the secrecy?’ Marius drew his brows together as Ario closed the door behind them.
‘It’s something you might not want others to know. It’s about your wife.’
‘Livia?’ Every muscle in his body seemed to go rigid at once. ‘What about her?’
‘I found her in the prison a few minutes ago.’
He felt a cold, prickling sensation at the back of his skull. ‘And?’
‘She claimed she was taking the prisoner some food.’
‘Claimed?’ The coldness seemed to be spreading, trickling down his spine as if there were a block of ice slowly melting against his neck. ‘Don’t you believe her?’
‘I do. I just don’t think it was all she was doing.’ Ario muttered an oath. ‘Look, Marius, what do you know of her loyalties? Where is she from?’
‘Lindum and I trust her.’ Even as he said it, he felt a cross-current of doubt. Did he really trust her? ‘Get to the point, Ario. What are you trying to tell me?’
‘She was speaking to him.’
‘Who?’
‘The prisoner. She was speaking Caledonian.’
The cold reached his toes and fingertips at the same time, as if all his blood had just frozen. ‘Are you certain?’
The Decurion nodded gravely. ‘I only caught the last of it, but, yes, it was definitely Caledonian. She speaks it better than I do.’
Marius gripped hold of a chair back, clenching the wood in his fists as he tried to understand. How the hell could she speak Caledonian?
‘Do you think she might be a spy?’
‘No.’ He shook his head, certain of that much at least. How could she be? Her brother was a respected citizen of Lindum. He’d sent her north against her will. She’d never seen the wall before—her emotional response to it had proved that much—so how could she be spying for the tribes?
The wooden chair splintered apart in his hands as a new idea dawned on him. New and improbable and yet, he was suddenly convinced, the truth. It made all the small things that had puzzled him about her finally make sense—her eagerness to see the wall, her barely concealed antagonism towards Rome, her reaction to the prisoner, the momentary pause when he’d asked which tribe her mother had belonged to...
This has nothing to do with the Carvetti! That was what she’d told him yesterday and it was true because the Carvetti did have nothing to do with it. Because her mother hadn’t been Carvetti at all. She’d been Caledonian. Which meant that even if Livia wasn’t a spy, she was a liar.
‘She’s not a spy.’ He said the words with authority.
‘Are you certain?’
‘Yes.’ He nodded tersely. ‘I’ll deal with this. In the meantime, tell the guards not to let anyone but you or me near the prison and don’t tell anyone.’
‘What do you take me for?’ Ario gave him a sharp look. ‘Just make sure you find out where her loyalties lie. There’s too much at stake here to take risks.’
‘I know.’ Marius was halfway out of the door already. ‘I know.’
There was no sign of her in the courtyard. It was mid-morning, but the villa was silent, filled with dim and mysterious shadows. He felt an obscure sense of discomfort followed by a momentary panic. Had she run away? If she’d suspected that Ario had overheard her, then no doubt she would have guessed that he’d tell him. But if she’d run away, where would she have gone? In which direction?
‘Livia?’ He called her name, relieved to hear a faint answering call from the bedroom.
‘In here.’
He followed the sound of her voice to the doorway. She was sitting in the middle of the bed, her knees drawn up to her chest with her arms wrapped around them and her hair tumbling loose over her shoulders, so much of it that she looked half-hidden beneath the red tresses. All this time he’d taken her loyalty to the Empire for granted, assuming that she was more Roman than Briton. Now he didn’t know if she were Roman or rebel, but he had the uncomfortable suspicion that he might not like the answer.
‘Have you spoken to Ario?’ She got straight to the point.
‘Yes.’ He leaned a shoulder against the doorjamb.
‘What did he tell you?’
‘What do you think he told me?’
A look of defiance mixed with guilt crossed her features. ‘I was only trying to help. I took the prisoner some food.’
‘Did you think I would starve a boy?’
‘No...maybe.’
‘Because I’m such a monster?’
‘No.’ She pressed her teeth into her lower lip. ‘But you called him a barbarian. I wanted to be sure he was all right.’
‘And was he?’
‘Yes.’
‘So then you turned around again and left?’ He folded his arms. ‘Or is there something else you want to tell me?’
Her gaze slid to one side guiltily. ‘I told him to answer your questions about the rebellion. I thought that if he told you what you wanted to know then you wouldn’t hurt him.’
‘I’ve already told you I’ve no intention of hurting him.’
‘Not you, but...’ she waved a hand ‘...others. I thought that perhaps you might let him go.’
‘He’s a prisoner, Livia. I can’t just let him go.’ He sighed. ‘So you admit that you spoke to him?’
‘Yes.’
‘How?’
She dipped her head. ‘I told you, my mother was a Briton. She taught me some of her language.’
‘Is that so?’ He felt a surge of anger, pushing himself up off the doorjamb and advancing slowly towards her. ‘Except you told me she was Carvetti. According to Ario, you were speaking Caledonian. Or do you imagine us Romans don’t know the difference?’
Her whole body tensed visibly and he took another step forward, looking down at her from the edge of the bed and lowering his voice dangerously.
‘Tell me the truth, Livia. No more lies.’
For a moment he thought she wasn’t going to answer. Then her face seemed to crumple abruptly.
‘I never wanted to lie! I had to, or at least with Scaevola I had to, and then I didn’t know how to tell you. I’ve spent the last ten years not being allowed to talk about it.’
‘Talk about what?’
‘The truth! I thought you might prefer not to know.’
‘I would imagine every husband wants his wife to tell him the truth... What’s so funny?’ He scowled as she gave a bitter-sounding laugh.
‘My first husband probably thought so, too, before he found out.’
‘I’m not your first husband,’ he growled. ‘I’m your second and I do want the truth.’
‘All right.’ She pressed her lips together tightly before looking up at him again, a look of resolve on her face. ‘The truth is that my mother was Caledonian. She came from north of the wall. She was also a slave.’