The Songs of Slaves (49 page)

             
Connor turned away from the fire and looked around. The bright light of the full moon eased the transition of his night vision. It was the third full moon since the harvest began, seemingly a lifetime ago. The pass they were following had opened up considerably, and though they had just crossed through the
bacaudae’s
ravine that morning they were camped on a bald mountaintop. The icy wind and freezing rain of the last few days had given way to a clear, starry sky. The open ground and the bright moon would protect them from any enemies who may have followed them, and the sentries posted at double-guard stroked the fur of the quiet watch dogs. As the conversation around the campfires looped the familiar routes it had taken since the morning’s victory, Connor looked out to the giant, snow-clad peaks that formed the world around him. The snow showed pale blue in the moonlight, the shadows impenetrable black. No man could hope to survive such mountains, he thought. They seemed a place where only the spirits could go, where the gods of the old ways would be at home. They seemed to stretch forever, stout pillars holding up the skies. In the winding pass they had followed the titanic peaks were behind them now as much as in front. Connor took a deep breath. He felt
trapped in this world of angles, stone, and ice. They must find a way out before the advancing snow covered their lifeless bodies.

             
“I would that we still had some of that wine that they took,” Henric said, looking in his cup.

             
“You’ll drink what’s on hand readily enough,” Gaiseric laughed. “But I agree. I was getting spoiled living off the bounty of the rich. Poor man’s wine and soldier’s food is better for the work at hand. Only the hard can cross these mountains.”

             
“Nothing’s wrong with taking a little comfort where you can,” a man named Ogdren said.
“Anything to ease the load.”

             
“Aye, and now what’s worse? That Sarus stole our share of the treasure, or that we probably burned it in turn?” Gaiseric said.

             
“The warrior takes what Fortune gives him, but holds it with an open hand,” Valia said. “What we gain we just as easily lose. That is the way of it. I tell you this, though – there is much more treasure than what we have ever had waiting for us in the cities of Italia. Once
we join Alaric outside Rome there will be no poor men amongst us.”

             
The men raised their cups and drank their thin, sour wine.

             
“But what will you do then?” Connor asked. “Once we join Ala
ric and either Honorius or the C
ity gives in, what will you do when it is over?”

             
“What will we do, I hope you mean,” Valia corrected amiably.

             
“Of course, God-willing,” Connor replied, lifting his cup slightly in an implied toast to their leader. “But what I mean is, say Honorius meets Alaric’s demands and this whole crisis comes to an end; what then?”

             
“It’s a good question,” Valia said, though from some of the blank looks Connor saw around the fire it was not a question many of them were used to thinking about. “We Visigoths get our recognition and are paid our recompense; we are treated to the place in the
Imperium
we deserve – then we keep our part. We fight for Rome. We go back to fighting the Persians in the east, the Franks and Burgundians in the north, the
usurpers in the west, the Moors in the south. And we take our revenge on the Huns. We push the Huns back to the steppes. We make things right again.
Right on our terms.”

             
“So it is to be endless war,” Connor said.

             
“Such is the way. It is good for the warrior to have war. What else would we know?”

             
“And if our demands are not met?” Connor pressed.

             
“If they are not met?
They must be met. We have the city of Rome at our mercy.”

             
“But what if they were not met?”

             
“Then we would take Rome, and push on perhaps to Ravenna, Mediolanum, Genua, Portus Pisanus, Neapolis
–
all of Italia would be at our feet. We could take the whole land for ourselves, punishing the faithless slayers of our kin as we went. Depose Honorius and raise someone else in his place.”

             
“Then it would be us who were surrounded on all sides by enemies,” Connor said.

             
Valia laughed, and most of the others joined him. “Can you remember a time when you were not surrounded on all sides by enemies?”

             
“I can,” Connor said. “Perhaps that is my problem. Let me change my question, my friend. What will you do when the enemies are pushed back and you are too old to fight? If there was a chance for peace, would you take it?”

             
Valia was quiet and then took a long drink.

             
“Yes,” he said finally. “I would retire to the country when it was all over, when I had gone as far as I could go. I would not go back to our homeland across the Danube. That land is gone forever now, closed to us. It is the land of Huns and unquiet ghosts. But I could find a place. Not in Italia – it is too crowded
–
but perhaps in the Gallic countryside
. Perhaps that place you brought us to when we first met you. That was good land. A man could be happy there.”

             
“Indeed he could,” Connor said. “If happiness came from within, it could flourish there.”

             
Valia nodded. “On our first morning there, while you were still hiding away with that silent woman
of yours, one of the slaves came to me begging to bury his
dominus.
It was a touching sight, really, for the man was obviously terrified of us – he was stammering, repeating
himself
, and rubbing his bald head. You could almost hear his knees knocking together. But his loyalty to the man who enslaved him was stronger. Right there and then I told him that I had seized that land for myself, but I would make him my steward. I had Strabo come and write up a document, which I gave to him, saying that the whole estate and everything in it was mine and that the slaves were to mind the property and share the profits in common. I told him that I would come back to claim my land and the profits when I could, whether it be months or decades from now. I told him that he better be ready
, for if I found him abusing what was mine I would flay him alive
!”

             
The men gathered around the fire laughed, but Connor leaned closer.

             
“Can you do that? I mean just with a lawyer’s document?”

             
Valia shrugged.
“The courts of Constantine here, the courts of Honorius there, and the Burgundians pressing in to sweep them all away – who knows what
you can do?
I figure one official-looking document might be just as good as another when the smoke settles. You should have seen the solemn little fellow’s face when I made him swear to me. It was hard not to laugh, but at the same time I had to respect his metal. I do think I made things a little easier for him by giving him a job to do. Now he and the others think that they are following my orders while they really are just looking out for themselves; and that ruse might just give them the cohesion they need to survive these next years.”

             
Connor shook his head. Philip. The man Valia described had to be Philip. So his old friend was now charged with the welfare of all the slaves and the land, keeping it for one
domina
taken away as a captive and another
dominus
who had small intention of ever returning. What would become of his old friends? Could they weather the coming storms, or would they just be swallowed by them?

             
“If I do not die in battle I will buy a villa in Lusitania,” Gaiseric said.

             
“Why Lusitania?
You’ve never even been there,” Henric asked.

             
“I hear it’s a pleasant place. And what is more
,
is that there are no Huns,” he said,
playfully punching Tuldin’s
shoulder.

             
“Yet,” Tuldin murmured.

             
“Well, I am going to North Africa,” Henric said.
“Because I for one am tired of being cold and wet and hungry.”

             
The others added their ideas, and Connor smiled as the energy brought by victory, wine, and the warmth of the fire raised the volume and pace of the conversation. He could hear the chatter from the other campfires warming too, as the spirit of this group of wayfarers – now so much smaller than it had been – glowed on the barren hillside. But Connor kept his dreams of his peaceful end to himself. Whatever illusion of safety surviving battle and the companionship of his fellow warriors brought him, and no matter how heavy his homesickness, he would not conjure thoughts of Eire in this desolate place. He was too far away to allow his hopes to get up, for fear that once aroused he would not be able to bring them back in.

             
A slim dark figure walking out of the camp caught Connor’s eye.
Lucia
was moving slowly through the open ground, just outside of the perimeter. One of the watch dogs lifted its head to watch her, but soon relaxed again. As always, the baggage carts were safe in the middle of the camp. The latrines were in the other direction, hidden behind the rocks. Connor knew that the cult of Isis did not worship in the open. A glimmer of fear sparked in his chest as he thought she might be simply walking away. But
Lucia
was walking slowly, her gaze straight out towards the north. Some of the men laughed or crooned teasingly as Connor stood to his feet, but as Connor brushed the bread crumbs off his tunic and set down his wine cup he noticed Henric and Valia looking at him. He was not fooling them at least, for anyone paying attention could see that
Lucia
had shunned him.

             
Connor followed the small footsteps in the hoarfrost.
Lucia
was about twenty paces ahead of him. He could see by a subtle turn of her head that she was aware of him, and he was relieved when he saw that her pace did not quicken. In the duress of the last month, the headstrong girl who had once been his
domina
was capable of anything, Connor thought; and the last thing
he wanted tonight was a scene in front of the others. But
Lucia
only took a few more steps and then, smoothing the frost away with her foot, sat down on the bare ground. She pulled her cloak and wool blanket closer against the chill as Connor approached her.

             
“Good evening,” Connor offered, not expecting a response. He ventured to sit down next to
Lucia
. Whether
Lucia
still held him responsible for the loss of her family and home or reason had slowly begun to clear him, the girl was used to his near proximity from their shared quarters and did not recoil.

             
“They are beautiful, are they not?” she said, keeping her gaze to the tall mountains that stretched north.

             
Connor smiled inside, the way he always did on these few occasions when she would offer soft words. It was she who was beautiful, he thought, as he looked at her face in the moonlight. A breeze brought a lock of hair across her cheek, and she brushed it back over her small ear. Her green eyes looked ahead, but they seemed wet from more than just the cold.

             
“They are beautiful,” Connor said. “But they are a fearful sight to me. In my home we have mountains, but I have never seen mountains like these. They go on forever, and they are sheathed in impenetrable ice. I feel as if I am not supposed to be here, as if this is a place mortal man should not trespass.”

             
Lucia
smiled. “High mountains have ever been home to the gods.”

             
“I would not think your desert goddess would come to this cold place.”

             
“My goddess is the Great Mother and the Queen of Heaven. She is everywhere. I would build a temple to her there – in the heart of the White Mountain.”

             
Connor followed
Lucia
’s gaze to the most conspicuous of the peaks. All the mountains in view were white, but he supposed that the girl had some local knowledge he knew not of.

             
“And would she come to you there?” Connor asked.

             
“Of course.
And I would be her priestess and forget the world.”

             
“Alone?”