floor at the same time, the latter ejecting a great gout of blood.
In a corner, the head rocked like a spilled pot.
The barbarian staggered back, his body shaking from the violent exertion, muscles dancing, his great sword wavering.
'Arden!'
Then his own sword dropped, and he collapsed into Valeria's arms.
Even as the barbarian chieftain gasped for breath, bloodied and naked, the locked door of the commander's house boomed dully as Roman soldiers roused by Marta hammered against it. 'Open up!'
Falco, frozen in fascination by the fight, jerked to action. 'Come!' he shouted to the couple. 'Onto the roof!'
'Wait.' Arden broke from Valeria, stooped for something, and then came back to seize her hand. The rhythmic pounding followed the fugitives as they clambered upstairs to the building's loft. Below they could hear the front door splintering.
'What now?' Valeria asked when they reached the rafters. They seemed trapped.
'Across the rooftops to the parapet!' Falco explained. 'You'll find a horse waiting on the far side.'
'A horse?' Arden asked.
'My slaves, it seems, have friends among your people.' It was a grim, almost regretful smile.
'You're a Celt yourself, aren't you, Falco?'
'Aye, loyalties have become blurred. Who's a Roman and who's not? Who a Briton and who an invader? We sort it out with blood and thunder.'
Falco used his shoulder to butt the underside of the roof. Clay tile broke loose and skittered to the pavement below, making enough of a hole to let Arden scramble out onto the roof's slippery surface, his torn tunic now tied haphazardly around his waist. He reached down and pulled Valeria up after him. They could hear the front door caving in far below, the shouts of anxious Roman soldiers, and then their sudden stunned silence at the sight of the decapitated body of Galba Brassidias.
What had happened to his head?
'Go!' Falco called up at them. 'I'll misdirect them. The moat has been dammed and filled with recent rainwater as a defense. It may be enough to break your fall.'
'They'll kill you, centurion.'
'No, I'm the only commander they have left. Get over the Wall, and they'll stop worrying about you and start worrying about their own survival. Run!' He disappeared to intercept the soldiers climbing the stairs.
The couple looked around. It was cool and clean up on the roof. There was a rosy glow to the east from the rising sun, a promise of renewal, and yet the longer they lingered, the surer the light would make them targets. They could hear argument in the house below, Falco's voice among them, and knew they had only moments before discovery.
Arden grasped Valeria's hand. 'Can you jump?'
She took breath, and with it, courage. 'I'll not leave you again.'
'Run now, as hard as you can!'
They sprinted on the tiles, the edge of the house a yawning pit, and then leaped, legs churning, bodies falling, and in salvation sprawled on the stable roof across an alley, skidding to safe purchase. They could hear the horses neighing in consternation below. Loose tiles slipped off the building, breaking with a bang. Soldiers were shouting. Then they were up and running lightly along the stable peak, hearing like music the confusion of sleepy sentries.
Another edge and another wild leap, this time into a canvas awning that spilled them into a hayrick. Even before Valeria had time to understand what they'd done, Arden was hauling her up once more, and they sprang over a low fence and made for one of the stone stairways leading to the top of the wall.
It was all a wild blur.
A decurion loomed to block their way, his sword out, his look desperate and undecided. Arden had no weapon! But then suddenly the Roman looked at Valeria in startled recognition and lowered his blade.
She recognized that it was Titus, their guide in the forest, long since promoted by Galba. He'd avoided her after the ambush. Now he bowed his head in shame.
'I betrayed you once, lady. I won't again.'
Even as she gasped thanks, they rushed past, hurtling up the stairs to the parapet and gaining a glimpse of the lightening countryside beyond.
Caledonia! Freedom!
'There they are! Stop them!'
An arrow whizzed by their heads, and then another. Boot steps rang on the paving below, a horse was screaming, and somewhere a trumpet called an alarm.
'Now!' Arden shouted in her ear. 'The water!'
'Not yet! We need to slow them!'
She pulled free and bent to a rack of weapons. Another arrow hissed by. But then she had a bow too, hastily strung. As Brisa had done to her long ago, she swiftly notched, pulled, and shot. There was a cry in the dark and yells of warning. The next Roman arrow went wide.
'Now!' she agreed.
He jerked her off the edge of the wall.
Valeria's heart seemed to stop as they plunged into a void. Then she saw the glint of water. She was slowly rotating backward, looking back up at helmeted heads popping over the edge of the wall to look for them, and then with a titanic splash they hit the water rump first and, an instant later, the muddy bottom.
They recoiled upward, and before she could even notice the shock of cold, they were scrambling up the muddy bank. There'd been just enough water to break their fall.
'Where are they?' soldiers were shouting. Shadows briefly hid them. A random arrow plopped into the mud with a sucking sound, and they tumbled down the outer hill, running wildly from the fort and its white wall.
Arden's hand gripped hers as if welded. Valeria's decision was irrevocable, and it felt good. Tremendously right.
A horse whinnied. 'Over here!' someone called.
It was Galen, Falco's slave, who'd crept over the Wall as his master freed Caratacus. He'd found some barbarians, and a conscious Brisa, her arm and head bandaged after the recent battle, had come to lend a horse.
The chieftain vaulted onto the stallion's back and pulled Valeria up behind him. She was breathless, sore, dizzy, and as wildly triumphant as she'd ever been in her life, grasping her man like a tree in a storm. Brisa mounted another horse as well.
'Come with us, lad!' Arden urged Galen. 'Come to freedom!'
The slave, lying on the ground to escape detection and Roman fire, shook his head. 'My life is with my master. Ride quickly now. Ride with the gods!'
An arrow arced down and slunk into the ground not far from them. Then another and another. It was at an extreme range, but the Romans were trying. Soldiers were aiming a ballista.
'Soon!' Arden promised. 'Soon a free Britannia!'
'Tell Savia I love her!' Valeria added, her voice breaking.
Then he kicked and, riding like the wind, made a wild race for the trees.
One of his hands was on the horse's mane, guiding it.
The other held the wet, bloody head and soul of Galba Brassidias.
XLI
You let a rebel loose to kill your commanding officer and abduct a daughter of Rome?' As I put this question to Falco, my tone is more incredulous than my actual surprise-my informants have, after all, been leading up to this-but still, how am I to explain all this in my report to the Senate? A deserter and brigand escaped, an
