She called a soft greeting but there was no reply. Not even a dog. She unlooped the twine and pushed the gate open.
Her ancestors had fought alongside Venutius in the failed struggle for freedom, and her father kept an ancient sword oiled and hidden in the thatch, ready for the day when a new leader would rise up and call them to victory. But the thatch had been ablaze before they realized it. The sword could not be reached.
In the light of the flames she had seen her mother struck down in the doorway. She knew then that the raiders would show no mercy. She had expected to die herself. Instead the knife had been torn from her hand and she had been dragged away into the darkness, still screaming threats she could not carry out.
For the first days and weeks among the Votadini she had waited. Ready to run. She had closed her eyes and her mind whenever she lay crushed beneath the grunting mass of Trenus, and told herself it would not be for much longer. When she was alone, she watched the woods for any sign of the warriors from the south who would come to help her escape. Or even of the army, come to enforce the law they claimed to uphold. But the weeks had turned into months and autumn hardened into winter, and still there was neither a raid nor even any word of anyone offering a deal to buy her back. The melting of the winter snows and the opening of the roads had brought no news. Gradually, deliberately, she had buried all hope of seeing her family again. If they were alive, they would have come for her. She had comforted herself with thoughts of them waiting for her in the next world. But perhaps she was wrong. Perhaps someone was still waiting here.
A lone blackbird was warbling his evening song. The dark bushes behind the house shivered in the breeze. Tilla told herself not to hope too much. Hope would mean disappointment. She looked around her. The sun was gone behind the black skeletons of the trees on the horizon.
That family are all dead.
Dead. As if a family could be summed up and done away with in one word.
She pulled the knotted shawl tighter around her shoulders. Surprised to realize she was trembling, she put her bag down on the stone outside the door-the stone where the water bucket used to rest-and called, “Who is here?”
There was movement from behind the house. Someone was limping toward her carrying a horse harness. A man. A man she had known from childhood…
But the hair was too fair. The frame was too broad.
The walk- The walk had stopped. He was standing there with his mouth open. There was dried blood on his upper lip. Bruising around one eye. He reached one hand out toward the wall as if trying to steady himself.
She said, “Are they all dead, Rianorix the basket maker?”
“All dead, daughter of Lugh,” he whispered. “Have you come to haunt me?”
“No,” she said, pushing the door open. “I have come home!”
25
She had done her best to treat what the soldiers had done to him at the bar last night, but he had no herbs in store and it had been too late to search for any growing around the house. She had cleaned up the cuts and put cold compresses on the vicious bruises, struggling to see what she was doing in the uneven light of the fire and the smelly rush taper that was almost burned out. “I could do better with some herbs,” she assured him. “I will go and see what there is outside tomorrow. Mam used to grow lots of things. They might have seeded themselves.”
He eased himself into a more comfortable position on the bracken bed, closed his eyes, and murmured, “Your touch is healing, daughter of Lugh.”
“Your flattery is still as clumsy, I see.”
“I am out of practice.”
She said, “You should have gone to your sister. She would have medicines.”
“I have no sister.”
She sighed. “You are still not speaking to Veldicca?”
“She is still not speaking to me.”
She shrugged his spare overshirt back up over her shoulder. Her own clothes were at last put out to dry, draped across a chair by the fire. Running the cool damp rag down the small of his back, she said, “I am surprised you have no wife to do these things.”
He gave a tentative smile: a careful move to avoid reopening the split lip. “If you had been here, things would have been very different.” The faint lisp reminded her that he was still learning to form his words without the shattered tooth.
“I suppose Aemilia would not have you?”
She felt his body stiffen.
“How did you know?”
“I am not a fool, Rian. I used to see how you looked at her when you thought I was not watching.” It was the way all men looked at Aemilia. Tilla had frequently thought that if men were obliged to choose their partners with their eyes closed, they would make far more sensible decisions. She said, “I did not expect you to mourn me forever. But I could have told you Aemilia was not interested in marrying a basket maker.”
“If you had been here, I would never have tried.”
“So tell me. Has she married an officer?”
“Not yet.” He gave a snort of disapproval. “No doubt Catavignus is eyeing the legionaries who marched in this afternoon.”
“And nobody else suited you?”
“I am a busy man with a business to run. Have you not noticed the stock of baskets over by the door? I shall go to sell at the market in Coria tomorrow.”
“With your warhorse between the shafts of the cart.”
“One day I will have a warhorse,” he promised.
“You have been saying that for a long time.”
He sighed. “When I think of the horses we rode when your Da was alive…”
“Trenus kept Cloud for a while,” she said. “I tried to steal her and ride home.”
“What happened?”
“I got lost. His men caught us.”
“Bastard,” muttered Rianorix. “You can never trust the Votadini. What Trenus did to your family was an outrage. Did he apologize when he released you?”
“Trenus did not release me,” she said. “It is a long story. I will save it for tomorrow.”
His hand sought hers. “It is not easy to remain strong when your enemies prosper,” he said. “Your family was kind to me. I came here and rebuilt the house in their honor. And now you are home, we can begin again.”
After a moment she wrested her hand free. “You are very thin,” she said. “Was the harvest bad?”
“I am fasting.”
“You have made a vow?”
“I am sworn to protect someone.”
“Who?”
“Never mind,” he said. “That was why the fight happened at the bar. There is a soldier who shamed this person and will not pay compensation.”
“Then the soldier must be punished,” she agreed, feeling the warm muscles of his shoulders begin to relax beneath her fingertips. “Have you spoken to his officer?”
His body jerked. “His officer?”
“Sometimes if a man needs to be disciplined-”
He chuckled. “Daughter of Lugh, you have been away a long time. Have you forgotten how things are here?” He touched his split lip. “This is the only answer you get from the army when you ask for justice.”
She said nothing. Her experience with the gate guards suggested he was right. On the other hand, Rianorix’s efforts to negotiate were probably as well-meant but clumsy as his flattery.
He said, “What does my eye look like?”
