Varro set his jaw and rolled his shoulders.
“Now we ride like merry hell for the wood of Phaianis. They’ll not follow us in there.”He
Chapter Fourteen
The ride had been furious and unrelenting for almost three hours. Varro had refused to slacken the pace for even a moment, and even Catilina now wore a concerned look, fearing for her horse. The poor beasts had been slowing through necessity for the last hour and would likely drop from exhaustion at any moment. In the eerie quiet of the night, they could always hear, just on the edge of their range, the sounds of pursuit. They’d been lucky really. It had taken their pursuers a good ten minutes to organise and follow on, the few ready and mounted outriders having kept an eye on the three fugitives as they travelled.
It had occurred to Salonius that perhaps they could have somehow hidden and evaded their pursuers, but Varro had been adamant. These were not only professional soldiers, but the chances were if they went back to Cristus with talk of failure they’d now see another dawn. Besides, the few outriders Varro had seen wore the uniforms and gear of northern barbarian scouts. He’d used such scouts himself on duties and knew they could track a rabbit over twenty miles by smell alone, they were that good.
No. Their only chance was to reach some place of safety, and that, to Varro’s mind was the sacred wood of Phaianis. Salonius was sceptical, though only in a background, racial fashion. In fairness, he told himself, his own people had plenty of sacred places, including copses and pools. Phaianis was the Imperial Goddess of the hunt and her places were inviolable, but Salonius’ problem was with Imperial pragmatism. His own people would never violate a sacred space, but then none of them would dare choose to seek shelter there either. But his years spent among the Imperial army had led the young northerner to the conclusion that the people of the Empire didn’t really believe in their Gods. They just kept them around because it was important to have someone to thank or someone to blame. That Varro was willing to break religious law and violate the sacred space of Phaianis was reason enough to worry that their hunters would do the same.
But Varro’s mind was made up and another thing Salonius had learned, though relatively recently, was that Captain Varro’s mind was changed with difficulty.
His horse slowed again, enough that he actually felt the change of pace and the shifting of the beast’s gait. Slapping the reins and kicking the horse’s flanks, he urged what speed was left in her, but with no success. Varro was ahead, but Catilina seemed to be having similar trouble.
“There!”
Varro’s voice calling out from ahead was such a relief Salonius actually smiled. The low, dark bulk of the sacred wood loomed on the slope ahead of them. They had ridden for hours through open countryside and Salonius wasn’t entirely sure exactly where they were any more. He knew of several shrines to Phaianis that the army’s scouts visited to pay homage, but had never been to one himself. He knew the main road to Crow Hill was somewhere off to their right, probably about five miles away, but that was the limit of his geography.
They had just crested a ridge and ahead of them lay a long, grassy slope that descended into a wide valley with a river at the bottom, as evidenced by the ever increasing sound of rushing water. The scene was almost as clear as day, given the bright moonlight and only occasional light, scudding clouds. An owl flew overhead, and Salonius followed its path until his eyes came to rest once more on the woods ahead.
Perhaps half way down the slope, the sacred grove of Phaianis occupied perhaps seventy or eighty acres. It was tightly packed with undergrowth; no human would have trodden paths through the wood, and the only point of ingress would be animal trails. The young man sighed. They would have to leave their horses out in the open. In a way, they had swapped the defensible ruins of the villa for an open wood and no steed. He fervently hoped that Varro knew what he was doing. As they approached the eaves of the wood, Varro finally slowed his shattered horse to a walk and the other two caught up with him.
Off to their right, perhaps twenty yards away, was an altar, ornate and decorative. Salonius couldn’t make out the detail from here, but the shallow depression in the top would undoubtedly be stained with long-dried blood from various animal sacrifices to the Huntress. The front face of the stone would detail the soldier or wealthy civilian who had set up the altar, either as a gift of thanksgiving or a plea for future aid. Such altars would ring the wood.
Dismounting, Varro began to remove his kit from the horse. As Salonius and Catilina followed suit, the captain turned to the elegant young lady and stretched.
“We’ve got at least five or ten minutes before they get here.”
“Yes?”
Varro hesitated for a moment.
“I know you’re not going to like this, Catilina, but the plain truth is that it’s me they’re after. They’d hunt young Salonius here too now, but if you get out of here you’ll be safe. They’ll not do anything to the marshal’s daughter if you’re not with us. We’re going in, but you should saddle back up and head for Vengen again while they’re busy with us.”
“You idiot.”
Varro stared at her.
“You know damn well I’m not leaving the pair of you,” Catilina snapped. “I’m as much a witness to all this as you. You think I’ll be safe riding back into the darkness? How many more groups do you think Cristus has out there? He’ll be watching every road for my father coming. And I expect he’d think it a real shame if I just disappeared in the night and never reappeared. The safest place I can be right now is with you two. Besides, you think in straight military lines and Salonius can only wrap his mind around a problem if it involves building or dismantling something. You need some common sense. Now get going.”
Varro opened him mouth and then closed it again with a look of frustrated defeat. As he followed Catilina into the edge of the tree line, Salonius trod quietly behind him, a look of mixed confusion and disappointment on his face.
“You don’t think I’m like that do you?”
Varro laughed.
“Salonius, between you and her, the pair of your could outthink the Gods themselves.”
The young engineer glanced up to either side warily, regarding the trees of this hallowed space from the narrow deer trail, and imagined the face of the angered Huntress peering from every knot hole in every tree.
“Well that’ll be useful.”
Varro laughed again.
“If Phaianis has enough time on her hands to worry about three folk wandering among her trees then I’m sure there’s better things she could be doing. Besides, I’m almost out of her reach and your people don’t even believe in her.”
Salonius grumbled.
“She’s still there though. If I didn’t believe in air, would I stop breathing?”
“Besides,” the captain went on jovially, glancing over his shoulder, “we’ve got the Stag Lord on our side.”
Salonius glared at him but walked on silently.
After a few minutes they reached a small, overgrown clearing and Varro judged they had passed far enough into the woods and drew them to a halt.
“I think we’ll be safe now. I suggest we sit and wait.”
Catilina dropped her pack to the ground at the base of a tree and slumped against it, rubbing her sore hand and adjusting the splint before tightening the knot that had worked itself loose on the ride. Varro frowned and reached out to her wounded hand.
“I hadn’t noticed that before? What happened?”
Catilina shrugged. “Just a bit of bruising. Hurt my fingers on a man’s jaw.”
She sighed.
“I don’t wish to sound negative, Varro, but what exactly are you planning next?”
The captain grumbled.
