last opponent now, during that predawn quiet that marked the exhaustion of his garrison. He wanted to vanquish the woman by marrying her, thus tying her fate to his. He wanted the political protection she represented.
'Pin the rag, and let's begin,' he muttered. 'Where's that fat maid to help?'
Valeria was sullenly arranging the same wedding dress she'd worn to marry Marcus only half a year before. Galba had insisted she put it on.
'I don't think she wants to witness this.'
'She doesn't approve?'
'She hasn't approved of me for a long time.'
He grinned. 'That, at least, we have in common.'
Galba had ordered the rousing of Sextus, the soldier who'd married Valeria the first time. He liked symmetry in his conquests. The man appeared sleepy, sore, and confused, having received a sword cut over one eye in the recent fighting. The entire side of his head was purple and black, and the blow had left him befuddled.
'I want you to marry again, Sextus,' Galba instructed brusquely. 'Marry the lady Valeria and me.'
Sextus blinked. 'But the lady is already married.'
'Her husband is dead, dolt.'
'Oh. Yes.' He tilted his head as if to clear it. 'When will the ceremony occur?'
'Now, you dull-headed shit! Now! There's a war on!'
'Now? With a war?'
'Yes, now.' It was a growl.
'Here? In this house?' They were in the dining triclinium of the commander's house, Valeria standing stiff and pale and Galba wearing grubby chain mail over a simple woolen tunic, ready for quick battle should another assault come. His belt of rings once more numbered forty, the last in the chain the wedding ring his dead commander had given his new bride. The slave Marta had been pressed into service as witness, the tribune taking perverse pleasure in forcing the wench into the role. It was near dawn, a cock crowing from the village outside the fortress walls, oil lamps providing a dim, smoky illumination. There was no feast, no decoration, and no other guests. Just the mural of Roman triumph over Celtic chariots, which Galba had once more uncovered by ripping Valeria's tapestry down. He liked the cruel triumph the mural represented.
'Yes, here, unless you care to object.'
'Here would be good,' Sextus agreed, finally recognizing the impatience of his commander. He fingered the wound on his brow. 'It's a splendid time for a wedding.'
'Just get on with it.'
Sextus glanced around as if for guidance. 'Which gods shall we use?'
'The good god Dagda,' Valeria suddenly spoke up. 'The god of the wood.'
The soldier blinked in confusion.
'A Roman god, you fool,' Galba corrected. 'No blasphemy, and nothing to challenge the union later. Jupiter. Jupiter and cake. Isn't that a Roman custom? Marta, do we have some cake?'
'Not really, lord.'
'Then use Mars, the god of war.'
'A wedding is not war, tribune,' Sextus ventured.
'This one is.'
Marta was dispatched to fetch a figurine of Mars from Galba's old quarters. Sextus took a wax tablet and scratched the outline of a blessing so he'd not stumble under his commander's stare.
While they waited, the groom leaned toward his bride. 'I've decided I'm going to have you after all,' he told her hoarsely. 'Take you until you bear me a son and thus consummate our marriage.'
'I'll neither take nor give any pleasure from it.'
'Nor will I. After you start fattening with child, I'm going to put you aside for the rest of your life. If any other man so much as touches you, I'll kill you both.'
She closed her eyes. 'What will become of Arden?'
'He'll live, but finish his days as a slave.'
'If you don't keep your word to spare him, then I'll kill you.'
He smiled. 'I don't doubt you would, given the chance. But I never give anyone the chance.'
Marta brought the small clay figure of the god Mars back and Sextus set it in an alcove of the wall alongside a candle. 'Galba's god,' the soldier observed.
'The sword spatha,' Valeria corrected, remembering the senior tribune's comment on that day in Londinium so many months ago.
'What?'
'He told us he worshiped the sword.'
'Enough! Enough! Begin!'
Sextus turned to them. 'Take her hand, please.'
She refused to give it.
'Don't hesitate, Sextus!'
'But why does she withhold her hand?'
Galba grabbed her arm and jerked it to him. 'Begin!'
The soldier took a breath. 'Very well. I call on Mars to witness-'
He got no further. Suddenly something large and heavy sailed through the doorway and hit the central dining table with a bang, making everyone jump. It skidded to a stop, gleaming dully.
'Look,' Sextus said in wonder. 'Galba's god.'
It was Galba's unsheathed cavalry sword, recognizable to everyone by its white hilt and gold pommel and edge nicked in the recent fighting. In respect and custom to his own wedding, he'd left it sheathed and hanging on a peg in the entryway. Yet here it was, thrown as if in challenge.
The centurion Falco stepped after it. He had his own sword and armor on.
The wedding party had frozen.
'What's this, Falco?' Galba growled, uncharacteristically taken aback by this intrusion. 'Can't you see I'm getting married?'
'You might need your sword, tribune. Arden Caratacus has escaped.'
Valeria gasped and jerked her hand away from Galba.
'Escaped? When?'
'Just now. He's in the entry hall at this very moment, waiting to kill you.'
'What! How did he get here?'
'I let him.'
Galba, slowly understanding, darkened like a cloud. 'So you've betrayed me, Falco.'
'It's you who are the traitor, Galba Brassidias, you who let a unit of the Petriana perish outside the Wall and your commander with it. You who conspired to abduct his wife. You who murdered my slave Odo and blamed it on another soldier, setting into motion his death as well. If Caratacus doesn't kill you, I just might.'
'Are you insane? It was the stripling clown who killed Odo, not me!'
'Then why, Galba, did my property have this secreted in his mouth?'
Falco tossed again, this time an object tiny and bright. It too hit the table and bounced, finally skittering to a stop. It was a ring of heavy gold bearing a red stone.
The tribune blinked in surprise, recognizing his own tactic for betraying Valeria.
'I remember you with this trophy on a bloody finger after we ambushed the Scotti for Cato Cunedda,' Falco said. 'What I can't remember is seeing it since the wedding. Why did the dead Odo have it, and why is it missing from your belt?'
Galba involuntarily glanced down, and as he did so, Valeria and Sextus stepped away from him. Suddenly he seemed very much alone.
'He pulled it from your waist, didn't he? He named you from the grave.'
'By the gods, I'll slay you too,' Galba slowly muttered. 'You'll beg not to have me as an enemy. I'll spit on your corpse and possess this bitch anyway!'
'No, Galba,' Valeria calmly told him. 'If you kill Arden and Falco, then I'll kill myself.'
And even as they turned to the entrance hall that Falco had come from, looking for Caratacus, Marta took the
