Chapter 4
All right, about time I add a disclaimer to this...all things Dreamworks...except my own characters, those mentioned in this first book and those others still to come as the story progresses...and by this point, if you don't know who's who, then I think you need to see the movie again (that doesn't exactly sound like such a bad idea actually;)
Also, a few things to explain that I probably should have put into the first chapter, but here it is now. I will say this now, for all the history buffs, and for those who aren't: THE HISTORICAL OUTLINE OF THIS STORY IS SCHIZOID. Meaning, some of the events that happened between 180-185CE, I've combined with those occurring after Commodus' death in 192CE. This is not excessively apparent in this first book, but will become more so as events unfold in the second book. Frankly, I figure if Hollywood can mess with history, so can I.
In addition, I feel I should apologize for the lack of any major action in this first story. Redemption was meant more as a character study of a man who became disillusioned by the world he was living in, and must find some new purpose/direction with his life. Promise, there will be more war, grandeur, etc. , etc. (just hope I can deliver), with the next book.
One more point, then I'll stop babbling. The historical period, and events surrounding it, are as interesting, if not more so, than any fiction/fanfic that I could ever hope to write. It's never actually mentioned in the movie how much time passes between when Maximus is made a slave, and when he kills Commodus. In truth, 12 years actually elapses, but that's a little too long for the purpose of what I'm writing, so I've narrowed down to about 2 years...i.e., instead of 192, I've made it 182. At about that time, chronologically speaking, somewhere between 183-185, Britain was experiencing some heavy assaults from tribes north of Hadrian's Wall (which will be mentioned in this Chapter 4), as well as discontent amongst the legions stationed on the island. Speed forward to 192, after the death of Commodus, and we see an empire thrown into the midst of civil war with 3 factions all vying for the throne of Caeser (Septimius, Albinus, and Niger). Albinus governed Britannia at this time. His legions, those on the island, were in favor of his desire to claim the throne. Hence, my schizoid history...the events of these two time periods in factual history provided such "juicy" (excuse the tacky term) events for a story, inspired by the character of Maximus, that I'm here now, trying to take advantage of my spring break to finish some uh, needed research before I have to get back to my studies;)
So read on if you dare and enjoy the angst...I promise, the guy won't stay this bitter always;)
Oh yeah, place names: Tarraco is in Spain, nowadays known as Tarragona; Isirium Brigantium is actually known as Aldersborough which is close to York in the UK, and Eboracum actually is York. Also, thanks to one of the very informative, and much appreciated reviewer's comments, the Latin name for Genova was actually Ianua.
O-kay, now here it is:
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Chapter 4
The rest of the journey to Genova was marked by points of contention, often resulting in Maximus' temper erupting in lew of Maeve's judicious discussions of Rome and Her presence in the lives of the citizenry. It was obvious he did not want to hear the things Maeve had to say, especially regarding the empire he had once served with his life, nor about the emperor whom he had sworn his loyalty to, even after his death. There was a day, a week, or so into their overland journey to Genova, where they would catch sail to Tarraco before they headed north, when Maeve and Maximus came to heads once again. Nemyhn made a valiant effort to hold her tongue during such exchanges, commonplace as they had become, letting her mother's words soothe the man's agitation with her sibilant voice washing over him like cool water upon a febrile brow.
It was still early morning, and there were few farm-hands in the expanses of grain fields, or in the orchards of orange and pear trees they passed. The sunlight from the east filtered down in rays spliced by the branches of maples lining the road, their limbs tethered with tapers of colorful cloth—the signs of some recent bucolic festivity.
He asked on seeming impulse, "That village where we stayed at was inhabited by Christians, wasn't it."
Nemhyn, as usual, was reluctantly amazed by his powers of observation, listening with interest from where she walked by the donkey, as to how her mother responded.
"You saw what they did to the sculpture of the river god over their well," Maeve inquired, unsuprised.
"You mean the fish they carved upon it," he replied. Nemyhn knew a great many Christians were killed in the arena, and she supposed he had probably encountered them often enough, though they were usually saved for the beasts, and not the gladiators themselves.
Maeve was studying him with her astute gaze, and Nemhyn heard her mother say, "Rome is a very old empire, tolerant to an extent, but extremely set in Her ways. She has little respect for those who find another god to worship in Her place, frightened She will be displaced by a rival loyalty."
With a significant glance, she added before facing forward, "Even your exulted emperor, Marcus Aurelius had no love for the followers of the Cristos."
"If he didn't," Maximus remonstrated, "it was because they contributed to a world all ready brimming with dis-unity. One he was trying to guard against invasion."
"Yet," the older woman disputed," others see them as a symbol of martyrdom, resisting the yoke of imperial chains placed around their necks. They will bear their crosses, and proclaim their God above all others, even under the wings of the Eagle."
"Then its fortunate for them the glory of Rome died with Marcus Aurelius," he said caustically, before adding, "Whatever his policies were to a bunch of mid-guided hermits form the east, Lady, I won't hear you insulting the name of the one man who's memory I still hold in good faith. I loved him as a father, and as an emperor, he was above comparison."
The topped a slight rise in the road, and her mother's response was belied by the appearance of troops marching from the opposite direction, in formation, the hobnails on the soles of their sandals clanking with each pace in a disquieting unison of metallic clangor. Hercules shied at the cacophony of noise and Maeve, with Nemhyn's lead at the beasts halter, guided the wagon off the road, under a canopy of blossoming crab-apple trees.
The soldiers paid them little attention, but she noticed Maximus pull his hat somewhat lower over his head as she and her mother hugged their shawls tighter about themselves. Nemhyn recognized the standards of individual cohorts from throughout the Empire, though none, thankfully, from Britannia.
When the last rank of troops passed, sometime later, their reverberating rhythm echoing in the distance, the small trio headed back out onto the road.
Maeve spoke into the suddenly resounding silence, her voice low but carrying. "I don't say this to belittle the man you honored and loved, nor to deny his accomplishments as a ruler of nations, Maximus. I say this because all men contain varying amounts of darkness and light in their souls and there is always more than one way of looking at a truth, even regarding the actions of a man like Marcus Aurelius."
He said nothing to her, staring furiously into the western horizon as they passed under boughs of another orchard, this time of apple trees, only beginning to blossom. A flock of finches was startled form where they had been picking for seeds amongst the crevices of the stone-laced road, seeking refuge in the branches over-head, their feathers flashing yellow. Nemhyn reached up to grasp at a fragrant blossom, her motion disturbing the tree limbs and releasing a rain of petals under which the small group made their way. Maeve watched the cascade of flowers as Maximus reached out distractedly, with his uninjured arm to catch some of the white blossoms in his hand, crushing them to breath their sweet scent before letting them fall.
"Fear not, Maximus," Nemhyn heard her mother say. "The histories will remember your emperor as a ruler of fair mind and temperate judgment, and indeed, he was better than many who came before him. But history is often written by those in power, and has a tendency to forget the nameless, voiceless masses it wishes to silence for the glory of those it chooses to praise."
Nemhyn did have to credit him for knowing how to place words meant to affront. "If you're not a Christian, then I don't believe you have anything to fear," he said in a low, stinging tone.
Typical of her mother though, Maeve gave him a profoundly amused look, ignoring the implied umbrage behind his words. "One has only to read the dialogues of Julius Caeser or Tacitus to remember how history already views my people, Spaniard.
"Nearly a century and a half ago, when Rome first invaded our shores, Her citizens still considered my people little more than barbarians. And perhaps it was true," she said with a faint smile, "for our world, according to Roman law, had no order to it—we rallied armies on a whim for no better reason than to raid another tribe's pastures. If sickness or famine broke out, we did not hide in temples and make supplications to our gods, but danced in defiance of death—our eulogy to the temerity of life.
"We were something the Romans did not understand, wild and untamed as we were," a curious yearning had come into her voice, disappearing with the inevitable fall of her next words. "They never anticipated the island's people had no wish to be part of Her Empire.
"But the lure of Britannia's mines, her wool, her fertile lands were too strong for Rome to ignore, and she invaded with her armies, establishing her garrisons to quell any further revolts after the Iceni uprising, laying down Roman dictate and seducing my people with Roman wealth, and Roman luxuries—silks, wines, and entertainments."
Maximus, who had been staring obstinately ahead until now, broke in, giving Nemyhn's mother a resentful look. "What about Her peace and Her prosperity? Your island hasn't seemed so resistant to that."
Her gentle laugh, once again diffused the slight his words intended. With an ironic glance, she said, "Now you see, Spaniard. Two sides to every truth. Rome's ideals of unity under one name have prospered for the most part upon the island's soil. We have come to appreciate the amenities of civilized life—Her bathhouses, Her cities, Her learning.
"But," she stressed, "Rome never thought to examine the gifts my people might have given Her. You Romans call yourselves enlightened, yet never did my people deny any person—man, woman, slave, or free-laborer—the dignity of their humanity, nor the right to justice guarded by laws meant to protect that dignity.
"In Rome, when a woman becomes a widow, her property reverts back to her closest male relative; when a slave's master is judged guilty of a crime, the slave himself is tortured, for he has no rights separate of the one who owned him."
Nemhyn glanced back to see Maximus give her mother a hard look at the mention of slavery, as Maeve concluded. "Such laws did not exist amongst my people before Rome invaded, Spaniard, but to survive, we have learned to incorporate the dictates of Roma Mater alongside those of the older brehon beliefs. Romes' light shines far, but She must learn to temper Her flame so that Her various people's light may shine with Her.
"So you see Maximus," she finished with a simple nod, turning back to the horizon, " there is always more than side to any truth."
He punctuated her statement with a sarcastic, "And more than one truth to every tale. What, I wonder, is the truth behind your own tale, Lady?"
Her mother smiled enigmatically, catching his implication. "Later, Spaniard. My promise was not an empty one, and we have time enough to tell it."
"Is there a reason why now isn't a good time," he asked with a tinge of annoyance.
Maeve simply shook her head in patient humor, but her daughter looked back at him, scowling. "Stop the wagon Mother," she commanded.
With a puzzled look, Maeve pulled back on the donkey's reigns, and Nemyhn approached the side where Maximus was seated. "If you're going to be impertinent, Spaniard, you can walk up by Hercules for a while. I'm tiring, and you're not as dependent on your crutch anymore. Your leg could use the exercise, and Hercules a slower pace."
The look her gave her would have made stone tremble, but he made no protest as he climbed down.
"Consider it male-bonding," she said. "He spends the majority of his time in the company of women. It's good for him to have a man walking beside him now and then."
Nemyhn settled herself next to her mother, and Maeve snapped the reigns once, signaling faithful Hercules to carry on.
Maximus, walking where Nemhyn had been, muttered deprecatingly, "You know you've come upon sorry straits when your sole source of male camaraderie is a gelded beast."
She didn't know if he meant it in humor or not, but she found herself chuckling at his statement all the same, and wasn't too taken aback when he joined her moments later.
That humorous respite was an isolated occurrence, however, as they approached the walls of Genova along the western roads. Indeed, for a man whose physical injuries were knitting as cleanly as his were, his mood grew increasingly glum, at odds with the verdancy of the newly ripening fields they passed and the prolifically blossoming trees of the Italian spring. And, Nemhyn thought, a true contradiction to Hippocrates' theory that when the spirit suffers, so does the body.
Truth to tell, he was thriving in body, making no secret of his appreciation of the cooking she and her mother did when they camped along stream beds, or in sheltered gullies at night. It was, perhaps, the one thing from which he garnered any satisfaction. His brooding grew more frequent, and he would often curse the lot of them, her mother, for not yet revealing the full nature of their excursion to Rome, and herself…herself for being the only other available target for his anger whenever she changed his bandages in the morning, or insisted he still take the pain medication at the end of a long day's journeying.
Hence, she would try to stay out of his way, as much as possible in any case, in at attempt to avoid his glowering mood. Not because she was intimidated, though she could see how his strong passions—even his grief and sorrow, most certainly his rage, could put the fear of the gods into weaker souls. She avoided him because her own temper was such that she did not back down from confrontation, but rather, met it head on--a characteristic of her personality, she knew from past experience, that usually threatened to increase already bruised sensitivities.
Between his dour gloom and his rages, he would storm off, either into the night to find what solace he could by the rippling of a stream if they were camped, or to sit in lowering silence in the commons of a village inn if they passed through a town, mother and daughter offering their services as healers for food and lodging.
In truth, they were listening for information of Pertinax's rise to the throne, how he chose to initiate his reign occupying the highest seat in the world.
And what they heard, while promising superficially, did not translate well to the longevity of Pertinax's rulership. A group of officers from a road patrol in a wayside tavern one night, spoke of how the man who had once been governor of Britannia was endearing himself to the Senate, supporting policies meant to favor its members, while instituting disciplinary actions upon the Praetorian Guard such as they hadn't known since Marcus Aurelius.
"Not wise, " Maeve said with ill-concealed anxiety when they retired to their rooms later that night, leaving Maximus downstairs to do as he normally did. Not drowning himself in drink, but staring off into the emptiness he felt his world had become. "Necessary, but not wise, courting the favor of one governing body at the expense of the other," her mother repeated, unbraiding her hair for the evening. "He will not last long because of it."
Nemyhn said nothing, keeping her troubled thoughts to herself as she readied for bed. She didn't care about Pertinax, it was the fact that a good portion of the legions he had summoned to uphold his elevation to Caeser had come from Britannia—leaving the already vulnerable territories south of the Wall horribly exposed and critically under-manned.
The dreams she had that night were disturbing enough to keep her up late into the out-tide hours of earliest morning, when Maximus finally came to collapse upon his own pallet on the opposite side of the room.
This mood couldn't last. The tension had been growing like the proverbial weed between Maeve and Maximus, so much so, that the evening they came to stand outside of the walls of Genova, it finally erupted, with Maximus storming off, as usual, into the darkness of night, leaving her mother to stare at the flames of their camp fire, reaching with immense reserves of composure to not show how much she was shaken.
The had completed a hard days travel, traversing through copses of orange trees, passing between hills blanketed with lavender and violets, making their way to the coast carefully along a narrow ledge, over-hung by cypress trees and bordered by grape vines descending in steps to the rocky beach below. The gates of the city had already shut for the evening, with the watch patrolling along the bulwarks. Maeve decided to await morning before entering , and they found a near-bye knoll bordering a stream, edged with marsh lilies and nettles, lined with oak trees whose branches extended over the small water-way.
Maximus gathered the firewood and helped set out the food, a simple fare of left-over bread, a wedge of peculiar cheese stuffed with berries that gave it a tart flavor. She and her mother prepared a soup using dried meat, supplemented with wild leeks and other herbs collected from their immediate area.
He could move now, with almost no inhibition from his injuries, his sword wounds, even the deepest mostly scabs. His injured arm, though it showed a furious mottled bruise from shoulder to elbow, he almost had complete use of.
They had been eating in silence, both women with mantles drawn back, he without his customary shepard's hat, enjoying the balmy coolness of the evening. He sat across from them on the other side of the fire, hunched over his food, chewing with methodical action. Her mother was staring absently into the flames, lost in her own thoughts.
He was the first to break the quiet, his voice addressing her mother, startling Nemhyn out of her own internal reverie for his attention had seemed focused inward. "Well Maeve, you can prostelatize about every virtue of Rome while on the road. Yet, here we stand outside of Genova, and I know nothing more about you and your daughter—if she is indeed your daughter—than I did two weeks ago."
Maeve, her ice-pale eyes cast to an eerie reddish light from the flames, her braid melting to shadow in the surrounding darkness, was as still as a carved statue, considering his words in silence. When she finally did speak, she let the words fall from her mouth like dead weights, their effect upon the man visible even beyond the glow of the fire, as he struggled to cope with their implications.
"Commodus's rule wrecked havoc along the northern border of my homeland. Only by the hand of my husband and the devotion of my eldest son, has Rome managed to fend off the worst of the assaults from the northern tribes across the Wall of Hadrian. Still, precious territory has been lost, and the legions, what's left of them, have been forced to fall back as the tribes lay waste to lands once held under the banner of the Eagle."
"And who, Lady, is your husband," he asked with menacing undertone.
Nemhyn held still, her food half chewed, the rising friction between her mother and the man palpable. They had locked gazes, her fathomless depths reflecting his simmering fury.
"Marcus Antius Crescens Calpurnianus, leader of the garrison troops along the Wall of Hadrian, and-
"-and general of the VI Victrix stationed at Eboracum," he finished for her with cutting inflection. "Has the situation grown so bad in Britannia that he now relies on his wife for the recruiting. Is that what you had in mind for me, woman, because if so, I warn you to reconsider your plans. I won't be used as a means to someone else's ends again!"
Maeve was unaffected by his threatening exclamation, saying, "Rome is coming upon a time when those powers that hold Her together will begin to rip Her apart at Her seams, and more precious cohorts will be called away from the Wall to serve the personal interests of men who seek the throne of Caesar. You are hardly a means to any end I have, Maximus. I simply wished to offer you some direction before the tidal wave of war crashes upon us all."
His voice was almost frantic with self-deprecation, as he said scathingly, "Doing what, Lady? Taking up the sword and shield once more, the man who was the general of the Felix legions, brought back from the dead to fight for…for what…the Empire, your husband...against the northern tribes?"
"There are worse tinges for which to aspire, Maximus. Less worthy ways a man might lead a life than in defense of that which he loves."
Emotions chased across his face, a mirage of open resentment at her words, anger and grief at the way they laid bare the pain of his soul. Tight and gruff, he said, "I commanded men once in service to an Emperor I would gladly have given my life for, only to stand helpless as his son destroyed my home, my family…and my belief in a dream that was once Rome."
The desolation of those words made Nemhyn cringe, and she suppressed the involuntary shudder running down her spine. She was expecting a sharp rejoinder from her mother, was surprised when instead, a gradual compassion came over the older woman's face, as Maeve responded softly, "They were never buried, were they Maximus?"
He whinced at that, unable to hold her gaze longer, turning away , his face hidden by the shadow of evening and firelight. His voice though, when he answered, was cold enough to stop the wind in its tracks. "I tried to cut them down from where they'd been left to hand after being scorched to death, but I couldn't reach them. I think I passed out…from exhaustion maybe. I don't remember."
"When we reach Tarraco, we will head west to Trujillo, instead of north," Maeve said in tones of condolence.
"Why?" One word, spoken in simple anguish as he looked back at the older woman, drawn to her gaze once more.
"Because Maximus, you must lay the spirits of your dead to rest before you allow yourself to move on." Despite its gentleness, there was an unyielding iron behind Maeve's words.
It must have been too much for him by then, for he got to his feet as smoothly as he could, given the stiffness of healing injuries, ready to disappear into the night.
Before he could make his retreat, Maeve called out to him, "You are still bound with us to the shores of Britannia, Spaniard. If for no other reason than you owe me the favor of my having told you of our identity." Nemhyn could see her mother hated forcing that knowledge on him.
He stepped back into the firelight. "To the shores of Britannia, then." There was exhausted resignation in his voice, but his eyes glinted like hard flint at his next words. "I will not take up arms again in the name of Rome, nor lead men under the banner of the Eagle. When we reach Londinium, I go my own way, to live my own life." With that he turned, his retreating figure absorbed into the darkness as he stalked off toward the stream.
Nemhyn, too, stood-up, gathering their food-stuffs and cleaning the bowls they'd used before re-packing them. Her mother kept staring into the flames, the Pythia upon her stool watching the revelations of the future unfold. "If it were up to me, Spaniard, you would be allowed to live your life as you choose," she heard her mother whisper into the flickering light. "But you, unfortunately, have been branded by the gods for other things. You can not escape the weaving of fate, nor be other than what you are, and that is a leader of men."
Nemhyn found him sitting beside the bank, underneath a massive old oak tree later that night, its trunk thickened and knarled by the years, its leaves silver in the light of the moon, its image reflected by the ribbon of dark waters over which its branches reached up and out to the sky. She didn't really know what compulsion bade her seek him out, and she hesitated, debating with herself if it was a good idea at all to approach him. Her words, if she had anything to say to him, were hardly to be inspiring, and she hadn't her mother's knack for patient guidance.
He ignored her, purposely she supposed, looking out into the murky waters, legs extended in front of himself, arms clasped over his chest. He was still fastidious about his beard, trimming it closely every other day, shaving when he could, though his hair was beginning to grow out, curling over his ears and down his neck.
Despite the feeling of intrusion, akin to the way she felt that first night he'd awakened, she cut her inward deliberation short, plopping herself down next to him without invite, dropping the ointment jar she had been holding into his lap.
He was, apparently, not as unacknowledging of her presence as she'd presumed, for he caught the jar with a deft motion of his hand. On his injured side, she noted, the movement causing him no apparent discomfort.
"You're able to put the salve on yourself now. You might as well use the last of it." She failed to keep the acidity out of her voice.
He fingered the jar carelessly. "Your mother is a very persistent woman. Do you suppose she ever grows frustrated because I'm not compliant to her counsel, as yet?"
She shrugged, arranging her skirt more comfortably as she encircled her arms about her knees, gazing off at the shadowy outline of trees on the otherside of the bank. Somewhere in the distance a dog barked. "I expect you'll be doubly resistant now that you know who we are," she admonished.
He didn't agree or disagree, studying her with a gadging look that annoyed her. "The daughter of Antius Crescens. So, where do you fit into all of this. Do you always agree with the direction your mother takes?"
She found herself scowling, wondering about his sudden curiosity. "Mother is the seeress, I'm not. But no, I don't always agree with her. Case in point, the night Lucilla summoned us to examine you, I argued rather vehemently against even meeting with her. It was a dangerous exposure of ourselves if we had been caught, given who my mother and I are, and what Lucilla was embroiled in—plotting against her brother."
He snickered at that, picking up a pebble and tossing it into the stream, the sound making a dull plunk.
"Besides, " she added, "I figured it was a waste of our time better served elsewhere. You were most likely dead."
"I was dead," he insisted. "You should have let me be."
She shook her head, feeling the characteristic impatience that arose, having contended this point one too many times in the last few weeks. "You were in shock. Your body lost a lot of blood, Spaniard. This is old ground and I won't go over it again."
He laughed at that, an embittered sound, gazing back out across the water with a bleak expression. "I'm still not entirely sure I believe you. Two women, one the wife of a senior officer and the other his daughter, traveling as witch-healers to the poor. Tell me why I ought to trust you, if you're traveling under such a guise?"
Once more, he seemed to know the words that could ignite her temper, and it was an effort to over-look the implied insult. "You know better than to call us witch-healers," she castigated him harshly. "The way your injuries have mended speaks to that. Regardless if one has had formal training with the Greek and Roman medical texts, unless you graduate from Alexandria and are male, physician is a title denied women.
"In the eastern provinces, we might get away traveling as women from our own class. There, it is not unusual for upper-class women to work as professionals of some skill, particularly in midwifery and gynecology. Here in the west though, we are relegated by that same position of privilege to traveling as you now see us—supposed peasant women dealing our folk remedies and our herbs…unless, of course, one takes notice as to the content of our treatments."
"And in your homeland," he asked.
"In Britannia, my mother and I are known," she offered as explanation. "That is our protection there."
He exhaled shortly, in a derisive fashion, saying, "I don't suppose Lucilla would have entrusted my life to women not of her class in any case."
"True enough," Nemhyn agreed. "Mother attended to the birth of Lucius nearly ten years ago, when Lucilla and her husband had come to the isle. "
She saw him look at her questioningly. "Verus and my father served on campaign years before, along the fronts of the eastern Danube."
Again, that same derisive breath, as he turned back to stare across the water. "Do you know, she betrayed me, if my figuring is correct, the night before you and your mother came." It could almost have been conversational, except for the scornful nuance behind his words.
She looked at him once, quickly, frowning, struggling for a response that would neither be hurtful nor insulting, unable to concieve of an appropriate reply, only thinking with an empty sadness, and now her son is as dead as yours.
He must have had the discerning power of the gods, for he caught her off-guard. "I know what you're thinking," he said quietly, without his usual embittered tone.
She made to answer then, but he cut her off with a shake of his head. "No, I'm not accusing you. I've thought it often myself these last weeks, and it makes me wonder what good, if any, my actions had at all. The man I was when I promised Marcus Aurelius I would safeguard the Republic is not the man who slew Commodus." Again, those tones of defeat and self-condemnation.
"Vengeance drove my action, but his daughter made me believe in something again—a dream she and her father had shared, a vision of Rome. That dream died when I figured out she'd betrayed me."
In carefully neutral tones, Nemyhn said softly, "She told an inspiring tale. One that's drawn men for centuries…the idea of Rome." It was a simple comment, one without pity and devoid of judgment. She saw, when he studied her, he acknowledged that with the light of unspoken gratitude in his eyes, before nodding once, and going on.
"I used to tell my men before going into battle that what we do in this life echoes in eternity. Now I find myself wondering if that's true, what purpose any of my actions served. Commodus is slain, but then so is Lucius, and as for my family—" He broke off, his throat working.
"As for your family," Nemhyn murmured, "we will see they have the last rites they never received."
"I don't know why I'm telling you this," he said in a strangled voice. "Perhaps I'm seeking absolution, but if that's the case, I know you're not the one to give it, Nemyhn." He was staring out again, across to the other side, seeking answers never to be found in the shadows of the trees.
Perhaps it was because of those words, she finally came upon what she had been meaning to say, though it hadn't occourred to her until now.
"Antoninus Pius and father had their differences of opinion in how to deal with the tribes across the Danube where my father served as a young man. Father felt they should be incorporated into the empire as feodorati, in service to the State, and eventually granted full citizenship. While Pius agreed, he thought the Empire not ready. Two enemies in the same borders, he said, meaning the politicians of Rome and the newly settled tribes, do not make for a stable peace.
"But the tribes kept growing more aggressive, and father persisted with his suggestion, which is why he ended up in Britannia," she said sardonically, "and Verus was kept on as leader of the Eastern legates.
He glanced at her with an expectant expression. "Pius," she explained with a wry twist of her lips, "didn't want to be plagued by the ideas of an inexperienced military tribune."
The bleakness of his countenance was replaced by a truncated outburst of laughter. The unanticipated sound caught him by surprise almost as much as it did her, and she wondered at the momentary perplexity in his gaze, a reflection of the fact he had thought himself incapable of such an open disclosure of levity. He was still staring across the stream, resuming his morose mood, but she knew she had his interest when he asked, "So what happened. You're father went to Britannia, and…"
"He had already obtained the command of various companies of men, none of whom were pleased at being sent off to the hinterlands, but they had served with my father and knew him for an able commander and a respectable leader.
"By the time they came to South Shields, where they were stationed, my mother's people, the Brigantes, were involved with an uprising of various other tribes. Of course, the companies under my father were called in to quell the revolt.
"So there on the fields just south of Isirium Brigantium, two armies were bout to meet, the cohorts led by my father, and the Brigantine soldiers led by my mother's father, King Aderturex."
He shook his head in puzzlement. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but unless my memory of military history is hazy, I re-call no battle having been fought against the Brigantes during the time of Pius' reign."
"Of course not," she said insignificantly. "Mother rode out between the two armies surrounded by a delegation of Celtic priestesses robed in white. The tribes' symbol for peace and mediation. Even my grandfather couldn't over-ride their authority; the Romans, however, were not quite sure what to do with them when they approached my own father.
"Father, fortunately, was a reasonably educated man concerning the customs of the isle, due mostly to the fact that his own family traced their origins back to Gaulish roots. The gens Crescenii were once as Celtic as mother's people, until Claudius extended senatorial privileges to the ruling tribal families, one of whom was Father's.
"So," she continued, "on a horridly blustery day in late autumn, just as a drizzle was beginning to fall, mother walked alone to stand before father out on that field. She handed him a torque of silver with the insignia of Lupa, and placed in his other hand, the Silver Branch—the Celtic symbol of sovereignty.
"You serve Rome, she said. I serve my people. Together, we share a vision of what Britannia could be, and it need not be a vision of blood if you take my hand in marriage.
"Of course, " Nemhyn concluded, "Father won more than the Brigantine peace. He also managed to weasel out a promise of added troops to the Briton auxilia. In return, when he eventually attained the rank to do so, he agreed to appoint chieftains of mother's people to some of the local magistrate positions in the surrounding towns. These pledges were sworn to be upheld so long as Roman and Celt co-exist together on the island."
She turned then, to look out on the water as well, letting him contemplate what she had just said for a few moments in silence.
When he spoke, it was with unwilling admiration. "She sounds like a courageous woman. Do you think it will last beyond her lifetime though; the peace she and your father won with that marriage?'
" You mean, do I think her actions will….echo into eternity," she elucidated, quoting his words with a small grin.
The look he gave her was slightly amused before becoming troubled once more. "I mean, what good did her action do if, after she and your father die, no one remembers the end it was meant to serve, or the motive behind it?"
"My mother and father both saw a vision of what Rome could be—a dream embodying Britannia where Her people—Her provinces—are allowed to contribute to the over-all greatness of the Empire if they were but granted the same privileges of her more established lands."
That made him laugh humorlessly, a sound that wrankled for it made her feel like some untried idealist, spouting notions of trite optimism to a more seasoned, knowing realist. "They see the ideal, then. Rome is hardly her people anymore…hardly a Republic. She is a few self-serving, greed-driven senators, controled into intimidation by the Guard."
"No," she argued back with more passion than she meant. "They see Her potential, but then Rome to my parents has ever been the freedom of Her hinterlands—not that whore of cities, "she spit out, "from which stems Her control."
He seemed startled by her tone, turning once more to watch her with an emerging look of respectful regard, cautious, as though seeing her in a new light.
"What about eternity," he prodded.
"I don't know, Maximus," she said quietly. "That's something you would have to ask my mother. Perhaps its measured in the minds of men, to keep alive the memory of an event long after that event has passed."
He contemplated what she said for a moment. Then tossed a pebble into the stream. "Or, perhaps eternity is like those circles of water fanning out, " he motioned with his hand, "from where that stone broke the surface. They widen into eventual nothingness. That is what I now believe eternity means—an action that once had purpose, but fades to insignificance in the minds of men and the march of time."
Again she negated him. "Or that action becomes a part of something greater—like the ripples from that pebble merging with the larger flow of the stream." She could tell he was becoming aggravated by the way she countered him.
He frowned, about to speak, but she forestalled him, saying, "Regardless of eternity, in Britannia, the actions of my mother and father did count for something. Roman and Brigantine now fight side by side against the northern tribes, united by a common cause in protection of the isle."
He had an uncanny way of throwing her off, turning the direction of their conversation back on her. "And what about you, Nemyhn—child of a Roman and a Brigantine. You never did answer my original question of how you fit into all of this."
It was a challenge of sorts, she saw—his attempt to stumble her conviction, make her doubt her words. While his statement didn't quite do that, it did make her pause to consider before answering slowly. "I…I am a child of two lineages, Spaniard. Born to one, and raised in the traditions of the other, belonging to neither, but drawn to both for different reasons too complex to expound on this night." That was all she could think to say, and he nodded, pondering her words as he turned to gaze back over the stream.
"You don't know where you belong in all of this yet, either, do you," he stated. The answer seemed to bring him an odd satisfaction.
She shrugged. "I heal. Because of that, I don't think too often of eternity since my duty is to try and keep people in the here and now.
"But, Maximus," she said with emphasis, "my training, too, is a gift of the isle—Greek and Roman learning practiced with Celtic liberties afforded to women of my mother's tribe. I would not have been allowed this had I been raised closer to the shadow of Rome."
He sniffed at that sardonically, his only response. For a few moments they sat in silence, lost to their own meandering thoughts. She wondered if anything she had said effected him in any fashion as she got up to leave with a sudden yearning for sleep, and the reassurance of her mother's calming presence. A strange sentiment, that—one she hadn't felt since she'd been a little girl.
Besides him inclining his head toward her, a farewell for the night, they might never have shared words at all, for he was once more unacknowledging of her presence, staring back across the murky waters of the stream.
She sighed inwardly, but before she stepped around the tree, some compulsion made her speak up one last time. "Things are different on the island, Spaniard."
"You won't let this drop will you," he said, almost indulgently.
She chose to ignore his tone, remarking, "I noticed you had gauged out the sign of the legions on your shoulder." That caught his sudden attention, a slight tilt of the chin as he looked up, his eyes direct, harboring ill-concealed consternation at her observation.
"Indeed, Rome may be dead to you," she said in low toned intensity. "Need Britannia be so as well?"
He blinked, as though the words struck him like a physical blow, his aloof manner cracking momentarily, a turmoil of feeling crossing his visage. She left him like that, to find what meaning he could in her parting assertion.
Both women, as had become habitual, were sleeping on their pallets by the time he sought his own bed that night, hoping he was exhausted enough from the day's travel to escape the nightmares which routinely haunted his oblivion nowadays. His strength had been returning steadily, and since he began walking next to faithful, stalwart Hercules, he pushed himself each day with determined will. The quicker his full faculties returned, the sooner he could be away from the two women, and their ambiguous plans for Rome—or for Britannia. It didn't matter, so long as he was not involved.
He'd come to inhabit a place in his soul where anger, and a removed detachment helped distance him from caring, from the plethora of emotions—none of them pleasant—that troubled his thoughts constantly and disturbed his dreams.
He'd almost come to hate sleeping as much as he did the waking world, wherein his last ditch effort to ensure Lucius' safety resulted in the boy's death while he had been spared once more, a misplaced man in a spiritless body, the dead amongst the living.
His dreams were haunted with visions of his wife and son, happy and at peace in their world of sunlight and wheat, but always separated from him by a vast expanse of water. He could never touch or talk to them. That was heartwrenching in itself.
The ones of Commodus were the worst though, his beloved emperor's deranged son wreaking a havoc of torment upon those he loved—Cicero, his wife and son, Marcus Aurelius. He would laugh maniacally, torturing them, Maximus forced to watch, helpless to do anything, a slave once more to the whims of the mad Caeser, bound by shackles, and gagged, suffering with the victims of Commodus' rage. And always, the same words: I loved them too, just as you did, all of them—my father, my sister, her son, Rome. That makes us brothers, still. So weep for them, brother. Weep for them and feel my outrage at having been cheated your death!
Visions of fire, the smell of burnt flesh and singed hair would fill his nostrils as Commodus carried out his acts of torment, the screams of the dying making him wake up in shaken terror—knowing it for only a dream. He knew it had to be only that. He had to believe that a man so debauched in life would meet only justice in death.
A man can only hope for two things at the end of life Maximus, he remembered Marcus telling him one night, years before, when the winds of winter howled forlorn across the snow covered mountains of Germania. To seek justice from the actions that have wronged him, and absolution for the sins he has committed against others.
And he had sinned. Greatly. These last two years, against his wife and son for not having defended them against the brutality of the Guard, suffering for his own stubborn adherence to the ideal of the State, acting in defiance of Commodus. Against Lucius for not safe-guarding his life, never anticipating the covetous jealously of a Guard accustomed to the privilege of despotic power. And ultimately, against Marcus Aurelius—for failing a dying man's wishes, leaving Rome to face god's knew what uncertainties, lead by an impotent Senate and a title of Caeser which carried with it no more authority than a knat flying into a maelstrom.
He was right, the man who had been hailed the Savior or Rome was no more. I am a husk of a body with no heart, no strength left to worry, for the Empire or the future. But these women wouldn't leave him alone, they kept pecking at him. It was unfortunate they hadn't yet seemed to figure out they might as well have been vultures picking at a corpse, for all the inspiration they awakened in him. Anger was about the only thing Maeve ever elicited in him, although her patient serenity never seemed to waver in the face of his outrages or sullen glum. Her daughter, he noticed, had taken to avoiding him almost completely, since they had set out to Genova, except to change his dressings and make him take the pain medication, sans sleeping potion.
He complied because it suited him too. Her mother was difficult enough to deal with, the calm peace hiding a deceptively iron will—a subtle means of making him follow her guidance to Britannia for reasons only now clarified. He didn't need her daughter, who had the temper of a hellion, harassing him as well.
Maeve hadn't been so subtle by the fire after revealing her identity tonight, blatantly pointing out the bargain they had agreed to before setting out to Genova. He may have come to a point where honor held no meaning to him anymore, but he still had pride, and in his pride he wanted no debts owed to anyone. He had promised Maeve Britannia if she told him who she and her daughter were. She had done so; now it was his turn to fulfill his part. He had only agreed to accompany them to the island, not stay with them thereafter.
He was aware they may well have been lying; he'd said as much to her daughter this evening. Her explanation, like everything else she ever said when she deigned speak to him, had been full of defensive vexation, the tones of one offended for having their honesty questioned. He knew deep down, Maeve had spoken the truth. Her daughter simply confirmed it; had her mother been lying, their guilt would have shown across Nemyhn's features as plain as day. For all her other qualities, the wry wit, the obvious independence she shared with her mother, a perceptive intelligence, she was a poor dissembler.
Their story also explained why they were as guarded in those times when they encountered squadrons of the Empires' soldiers as he was—shawls pulled closer around heads, faces lowered in apparent modesty, bowing to the command of Rome's troops. But he also observed the way they carried themselves when not in the presence of cohorts marching along the road, or occupying the towns they passed. They did not walk like peasants, stopped form years of hard labor, cowering under the eyes of those in positions higher than the class they supposedly occupied. Mother and daughter, both , stood tall, the mother somewhat shorter by a finger's length, her daughter more slender in her youth, each walking with the long stride of graceful confidence. At ease in a world that was not to be shied away from, but met with the poise of those accustomed to commanding the space around them.
Thus he had learned in two weeks of travel. He was unaware his own bearing --despite his outward glowering, the healing injuries, the invisible scars of slavery and its sorrows—mirrored theirs. He still carried himself with an unconscious strength, never having ceased to walk as a leader of men.
He turned restlessly on his mat, sighing, hoping in unworthy spite, the women were passing as unsettled a night. The nightmares may not plague him, but then, sleep obviously saw fit to elude him too. The sounds from the other side of the now banked fire, were maddeningly, those of regular breathing and the stillness of peaceful rest.
Need Britannia be so as well? Gods, he hated women, hated the way they could crack through two weeks worth of bitter detachment—or two years of embittered rage, for that matter, against a world he'd forsaken in the name of the arena—with a few well placed words, and that voice of solemn regret. Their disappointment at the actions, or lack thereof, when the men they entreated to aid them in their righteous endeavors failed to meet their expectations. I knew a man once, a man of principles…
At least then, the duty Lucilla had re-awakened coincided with his own desire for vengeance. What Maeve proposed was vague, not appealing to anything he wanted now, but disturbing…disturbing because it reflected the command of the god shining out of Marcus Aurelius' eyes that first night he'd dreamt. Maeve had called him fickle, the Wanderer. Maximus was a Stoic, a skeptic at that, questioning men's beliefs in gods. They live on the actions of men. He hoped that was true. He wanted no god, especially one he refused to give credence to, harassing him as well.
And as for women driving him to do things he wanted no part of, he had been ready to fight Maeve every step of the way to Britannia, fortified in his anger, his heart encased its hollow void.
Until she had brought up Trujillo, and his family. That was the one aspect of his buried grief that could still unman him at a word, and she'd known just what words to say, just as her daughter did, later that night. He had no doubt the older woman was a seeress, there was no way she could have known the things she did of him had she been less.
What he hadn't expected was Maeve's compassion, nor the understanding her daughter afforded him later, when he'd spoken of Lucilla. Or after that, when she had spoken of Britannia. Nemyhn's words had roused something in him that wasn't as dead as he'd been trying to convince himself—a will to serve a cause, find a purpose to life again. To learn how to live as a freeman in a world where pain was inevitable, and the best any man could hope for was that the gods granted him an existence without undue sorrow and a death with dignity.
Shadow and dust, Maximus. Shadows and dust! He smiled bitterly into the dark, staring at the overhead branches transposed against the velvet expanse of the night sky, wondering how Nemyhn would have responded to Proximo's words.
He didn't want this, to feel again. …salvage the dream. The question was, how? Feeling meant opening himself up, allowing himself to be at the mercy of chance, vulnerable to the choices made by others deciding where he should direct his life from here on. Need Britannia be so as well? Again, Nemyhn's words, the last she'd said before leaving him to the silence of the rippling stream and the hum of the evening's insects. They kept him thinking, doubting the indifference he'd adhered to with such devotion since he'd been called back form his Elysium.
His mind could not seem to find peace that night, and the unending cycle of this thoughts brought him to no definitive conclusions regarding the path he should chose. He did come to one decision though—that he would not think again of the island until they left Spain. The past still entrapped him to strongly, a grip unwilling to loosen, a vise strangling further inclinations of where to direct his future. If he had one.
The tragedy of the dead when they still walked, displaced, amongst the living.