Dark Horse (5 page)

'They'll forget soon enough,' Leo said, dismissing the notion with a wave of his hand. 'Isn't that right, Shamshi, old man?'

The Persian laced his bony hands together and locked his dark eyes on Claudia's. 'I've said everything I have to say,' he lisped quietly. 'Before a new light is born in the sky, bad news will come over the water.'

The last click of the castanets died away in an echo.

'When the gods speak,' Shamshi whispered, 'only a fool covers his ears.'

Drifting on her swansdown mattress beneath a damask coverlet scented with rose petals, Claudia dreamed. She dreamed of thumping great lobsters, of crayfish and, of course, those succulent white truffles from the forests on the Istrian mainland, and there was nothing to interrupt her aromatic slumber. In Rome, darkness signalled the opening of the city gates to traffic, and thus there was a rowdy cacophony of rumbling wagons, cracking bullwhips, shouts from the drivers, tavern brawls, the whinnies and neighs of the dray animals and the constant clatter, clack and bang of loading and unloading. In Arcadia there was only silence, broken, perhaps, by the odd creak of settlement, the muffled sound of a door closing, the faint too-woo of an owl in the pinewoods behind the villa.

Nestled into the dip at the base of Claudia's spine, Drusilla, her blue-eyed, cross-eyed, dark Egyptian cat twitched her whiskers and dreamed, too. She dreamed about big fat spiders, crunchy moths and the mice she would torment in the morning.

Peace. Perfect peace. The night was warm, the air pleasant and, together as always, mistress and cat slept, and the three-quarters moon rose in the sky. Far away, a fox barked, and a nightjar churred on the wing.

Fire!

A sixth sense alerted her, even before her throat prickled with the distinctive tang of burning. Claudia swung her legs over the side of the bed, stubbing her heel in the dark on its bronze foot. Like every room of this single-storey villa, hers had double doors opening outwards. Throwing open the shutters, she saw that, less than a hundred paces from the house, flames were licking through the roof of a small building raised on vermin-thwarting stilts.

Leo's grain store.

With a low howl from the back of her throat, Drusilla shot behind the chair.

'FIRE!' Claudia shouted.

Croesus! Nobody heard! She cupped her hands round her mouth.

'Fire in the grain store!'

No good. People were in too deep a sleep. She drew a deep breath to yell her lungs out when something caught her eye in the moonlight. There, on the steps. Squinting through the swirling smoke, she tried to make out the twisting shape. Wrong. Not one shape. Those were two separate figures, writhing together on the narrow stone stairs. Bugger. That's all we need. A private war while an inferno rages!

Decisions, decisions.

Raise the alarm? Or stop the fight before the fire spreads?

Racing across the flagstones in her bare feet, Claudia covered her mouth against the choking fumes and questioned the intelligence which made two grown men scuffle on the steps while the whole damn corn supply went up in flames behind them.

'Hey!'

They couldn't hear for the crackle of the flames.

'Hey!
'
she called, louder. 'Stop that!'

From the corner of her eye she saw movement in the bushes. Praise be to Juno, the cavalry was here!

'Come on,' she called, 'we've got to stop those two and prevent the fire spreading.'

What was this clot waiting for? A bloody medal?

'Well, hurry, then!'

The figure in the bushes backed away. Oh, suit yourself. Spinning round, she raced on down the path. Two seconds later, she heard heavy footsteps thumping behind her. About bloody time! The footsteps were gaining. Even better. Stronger muscles to break up the fight.

'What the hell?'

Shit! The muscles were strong, all right. They'd clamped round her in a bear hug.

'Not me, you idiot.
Them.'

But the vice was tightening. Breathing, heavy in her ear. _He tried to wriggle her arms free, but the lock was tight.

'Let me go, you bastard!' Squirming, kicking, Claudia tried to wrestle herself out of his grasp. 'Let go of me!'

The air was being squeezed out from her lungs. She couldn't scream. Could hardly breathe. She tried to dig her elbows back, but there was no room for manoeuvre. What the hell was going on? Was he trying to prevent her breaking up the fight? Or was the motive more personal? Rape?

'I'll kill you for this,' she hissed, kicking backwards with her heels. 'Your life won't be worth a—'

The alarm horn blew then - long, low and piercing - and instantly every dog on the estate began barking. As though this was a signal, the grip broke and she found herself tipping forwards through thin air. She put out her hands to break the fall, yelped as her knee grazed the flagstone. Then a shadow fell across the path. Glancing up, she heard a whooshing sound, caught a faint scent of cinnamon, saw something dark scything towards her.

Suddenly a thousand stars exploded in her head.

And this time, when Claudia Seferius toppled forward, she didn't get up.

Ooh, fank gawd!' The anxious face of one of the maidservants pushed its way into focus. 'When I couldn't wake you, I fought somefing terrible 'ad happened!'

Hadn't it?
Through a thick haze, Claudia tried to piece back the memory. Vaguely she saw two figures. Wrestling on the granary steps. Felt two strong arms round her chest. Huh. Bad dream! She was here, wasn't she? Tucked up in bed. In her room. With one of the maids Leo had hired for his new bride bending over her.

'Ouch.' Except dreams don't leave lumps the size of onions. Or clash cymbals against your brain. Or smell of - 'Fire!'

'That's why I was trying to wake you,' the girl said, hauling Claudia up by her shoulders. 'Do 'urry, mistress. Please, mum.'

What was that dreadful noise? Was that inside her head, too? Then she realized. It was the sound made by feet stampeding down the villa's cool marble floors mingled with screams and shouts, with whimpering sobs and the slamming of doors in a mad clamour for open air. Through the windows, a ghostly grey light was pushing its way through the heavy blanket of sky to the east.

This, Claudia thought, is one hell of a way to greet a new dawn.

Holding her head with both hands to prevent it from rolling into a corner, she fumbled her way to the window. How long had she been unconscious? Weeks? Months? It could only have been minutes, she thought. Just a few minutes. Thick plumes of smoke smothered the courtyard and panic was spreading. Fieldworkers from the dormitories knocked one another aside in the rush. Slaves huddled in terrified knots. Children wailed.

'We're going to die! We're all going to die!' someone shouted.

'Run for your lives,' cried another.

Four rooms along, Silvia's imperious tones drowned the rumpus. Any frantic activity on her part had taken on a distinctly more pragmatic note.

'The jewels,' Silvia ordered her servants. 'Save the jewels.'

'Please, mistress,' Claudia's maid pleaded. 'You've gotta get out.'

'Go away.'

'What?' The girl blenched. 'An' leave you when you're ill?'

That was the trouble with hired help. Claudia could have brought her own entourage, but the fewer who knew where she was, the safer for all concerned, so she'd only brought the head of her bodyguard.

'I'm not ill.' If only those castanets inside her head would stop trying to compete with the cymbals . . .

The maid flung her single heavy plait over her shoulder as a gesture that she was standing her ground. 'You've picked up one of them fevers, that's what you 'ave. If I wrap you up nice and warm, you'll feel better.'

'You'll feel the back of my hand, if you don't stop fussing.'

'Now where the devil did I put your long lick woollen wrap? It's bin so 'ot, I honestly didn't fink you'd need anyfing that warm.' The girl scratched her head. 'Perhaps it's in that chest over there . . .'

She lifted the lid. Claudia slammed it down hard.
'Out.'

Bundling the girl unceremoniously out of the room, she explored the lump on the side of her head, the bruises round her upper arms where she'd been clamped. She swallowed. Lifted her shift. All right. She swallowed again. Let's see what other violations had taken place . . .

Juno be praised, she hadn't been raped.

Across the narrow pathway, orange flames crackled and spat, and shattered the terracotta roof tiles. What the hell kind of twisted mind knocks a girl unconscious then takes the trouble to carry her back to her bed? The burning stung

her eyes. As she watched, one of the interior timbers let out an ominous crack. Hysteria swept through the crowd like a flash flood. As one, they surged towards the cliff path.

'Stop.'

Leo's cultured tones cut straight through the shrieks of the slaves, the screams of the women, even the terrified yelps of the dogs.

'Everyone remain where they are.'

This was a voice which was calm, controlled, and brooked no disobedience. Even when a large section of the roof collapsed with an ear-splitting crash, no one dared move.

'Qus.' He addressed his tall, Ethiopian steward, who had come running. 'Organize buckets, use the water from the bath house. The rest of you, form a chain, each man one arm's span apart - and that includes you, Saunio.'

'Me?' The maestro threw back his head in a theatrical gesture. 'I am an artiste,' he protested. 'I cannot risk damaging my hands. These hands are my work. My life. My art.'

'I am told that, over time and given plenty of nursing -' Leo shot a withering glance at the coven of pretty young men clustered around him - 'blisters
eventually
recover.'

Saunio looked for another way out. His contract was to design, not to act as a skivvy. 'But your beautiful frescoes,' he wheedled. 'I am barely halfway through the project. If the famous Saunio's hands burn, who will complete his magnificent masterpieces?'

'The next painter I hire,' Leo barked, 'now jump to it. Listen up, everyone. It only needs one small spark to cross this courtyard and the house goes up with it, so put your backs into it. You too, Silvia. Grab a bucket.'

Straightening the wrap which covered her embroidered linen nightshift, Silvia tilted her patrician chin and was about to give a sharp rejoinder when she realized that Leo was no longer beside her. With a militant sniff, she stalked across the cobbles in the direction of the herb garden. If he wanted to get himself burned to a crisp, that was fine by her. He was only her brother-in-law, after all. She had no intention of so much as singeing an eyebrow herself. Good heavens, what did the man think slaves were for?

'Where the bloody hell are you sloping off to?' Leo snarled, spinning Saunio round by his arm. 'I told you. We need every man we can get, which means you and your nancy boys. Everyone pulls their weight in a crisis like this.
Everyone, 
do you understand?'

'It's Bulis,' the artist whined. 'I'm worried about the poor boy.'

'In your shoes, I'd be more worried about me.'

'You don't understand. I can't find him anywhere—'

'Bugger Bulis. Just join the sodding chain, before the whole bloody place goes up.'

Watching the furious activity from the shadows of her bedroom, Claudia wished she'd seen the combatants more clearly. They had been of a same size and build, that much she could tell, but any further detail had been lost in the dark, in the smoke, in the fact that they were locked together. And before she'd got close enough to identify either party, someone had thoughtfully smashed a flowerpot over her head.

Was that why? To stop her identifying the brawlers? Or to prevent her from breaking up the fight?

Round her ankles, hackles raised and tail swishing like a scythe through hay, Drusilla yowled obscenities from the back of her throat.

'I know, poppet,' Claudia whispered, bending down to stroke the spiky fur flat. 'It's too slick, isn't it?'

Far too slick. Watching Leo striding back and forth across the courtyard, issuing orders in his calm, patrician voice, was like watching rehearsals for some theatrical drama. The slaves and fieldworkers might be terrified, and justifiably so, but not Leo. A fire breaks out, despite the vigilance of a whole corps of nightwatchmen. It catches hold. Becomes an inferno. Not for Leo, though, to be outdoors in his nightshift! There he was, striding around in long, patrician tunic, neatly belted, and he'd even taken the trouble to comb his hair and lace up his boots.

Drusilla's back arched, her tail stiffened.

'Exactly, poppet. Think how little time passed before the alarm was raised. Yet here's Leo, immaculately groomed, establishing authority on chaos.'

It was as though every scene which unfolded had been carefully - if badly - choreographed. In fact, so methodical were her host's actions, a girl could have been forgiven for thinking infernos were a weekly occurrence here at the villa.

'Leo was prepared for this,' Claudia said. Or at least, something
like
this, she quickly qualified. The drill was good, but it was far from practised. As though this was the first rehearsal in a play suddenly sprung upon the actors by the theatrical director.