uncomplicated. We Romans once more laboriously erected our canvas against the starry sky while the unoccupied barbarians built a large fire in the ruins of the house to roast some meat. The flames seemed to push back the haunting. “Come, eat with us, Romans,” the Roman turncoat Onegesh called, “and drink, too. Don’t dwell on what can’t be undone. Think of our mission to Attila and peace in the future!”
We sat in the roofless triclinium, its owners likely lying somewhere nearby. While the walls reflected some of the fire’s light and heat, the habitation was sad. Its bright plaster murals were mildewed and peeling, cherubic gods and bright peacocks glazed with the dirt of neglect. The mosaic floor displaying a feast of Bacchus was obscured by litter.
Weeds had erupted through the pavers of the courtyard, and its pool was thick with scum. More vegetation crowded the outer walls, and I had the curious feeling that the house was slowly sinking back into the earth, like bones into soil. The Huns had started the flames with broken furniture and were using the detritus of the dwelling to keep it fueled, turning to ash the last evidence that these dead had ever truly lived here. To my dismay, I saw that Edeco was even feeding half-ruined books and scrolls into the fire. The chieftain glanced at some before throwing them in, but often held them sideways or upside down. It was obvious he couldn’t read.
“Don’t burn those!” I exclaimed.
“Relax. There’s no one left to read them.”
“That’s a thousand years of knowledge and history!”
“What good did it do them in the end?” He threw another into the flames.
We sat uneasily. “By God, even I need a drink,” muttered the normally abstentious Maximinus. “I’ve never seen a boneyard like that.” He took his wine unwatered, gulping the first cup. Bigilas, of course, was already ahead of him. The Huns were drinking
“Only two times do you see so many together,” Edeco said, “when they fight like cornered bears and when they flee like sheep. These were sheep, dead in their own hearts before we slew them. It was their fault. They should have surrendered.”
“If you’d stayed in your own country they all would have lived,” the senator grumbled.
“The People of the Dawn have no country. We follow the sun, go where we please, settle where we wish, and take what we need. These dead tarried to cut and rob the earth, and the gods don’t like that. It’s not that we came but that the Romans stayed too long. It isn’t right for men to nest and dig. Now they will stay here forever.”
“I hope you are as philosophical about your own death.”
Bigilas stumbled on the word
Edeco laughed. “Who cares what I will think! I will be dead!”
“But you destroy what you could seize,” Maximinus tried to reason. “You burn what you could live in and kill those you could enslave. You take once, yes, but if you showed mercy and governed the people you conquer, you could live in leisure.”
“Like you Romans.”
“Yes, like us Romans.”
“If we lived like you do we would rule until we became fat, like the people who lived here, and then someone else would do to us what we did to them. No, better to stay on our horses, ride, and keep strong. Who cares that this city is gone? There are many, many cities.”
“But what happens when you’ve raided everything, burned it all, and nothing is left?”
The Hun shook his head. “There are many cities. I will be dead long before then, and like those bones.”
At length the drink began to numb us and lighten the Huns. The conversation slowly turned to other things. Both nations had sacked cities, of course. Rome had prevailed by its own ruthlessness, we knew. In the end, it was only the threat of Roman arms that gave our own embassy any meaning. So it did no good to brood on the fate of Naissus, just as Edeco had said. As they became drunker, the Huns began boasting of their mighty home camp and the deeds of their king, who they said had no fear, no greed, and no guile. Attila lived simply so his followers could become rich, fought bravely so his women could know peace, judged harshly so his warriors could live in harmony, talked to high and low alike, welcomed freed slaves into his armies, and led his men from the front rank.
“So let us drink to both our kings,” Edeco proposed, slurring his words, “ours on horseback and yours behind his walls.” The company hoisted their cups.
“To our rulers!” Maximinus cried.
Only Bigilas, who had been drinking steadily and who had remained uncharacteristically dour and quiet, neglected to join the toast.
“You won’t drink to our kings, translator?” the Hun chieftain challenged. The shadows of his facial scars were lit so that his visage seemed streaked with paint.
“I will drink to Attila alone,” Bigilas said with sudden belligerence, “even though his Huns killed family I once had here. Or to Theodosius alone. But it seems to me blasphemy for my comrades to raise their cups to both together when all know that the emperor of Rome is a god and Attila is only a man.”
The group immediately fell silent. Edeco looked at Bigilas in disbelief.
“Let’s not pretend a tent and a palace are the same,” Bigilas went on doggedly. “Or Rome and Hunuguri.”
“You insult our king? The most powerful man in the world?”
“I insult no one. I speak only the truth when I say no mere man is the equal of the emperor of Rome. One is mortal, one is divine. This is common sense.”
“I will show you equality!” cried an angry Skilla, hurling his wine cup into a corner where it clanged, and standing to unsheathe his sword. “The equality of the grave!”
The other Huns sprang up and drew their weapons as well. We Romans stood awkwardly, armed with nothing but the daggers we had been using to eat with. The barbarians looked murderous and could slay us in an instant, as casually as they had slain the people of Naissus. Bigilas stumbled backward. His drink-benumbed brain had finally caught up with his mouth and he realized he had risked us all.
“You fool,” Maximinus hissed.
“I only said the truth,” he mumbled truculently.
“A truth that could get us stabbed or crucified.”
“When Attila speaks, the earth trembles,” Edeco growled ominously. “Perhaps it is time you trembled yourselves, Romans, and joined your brethren on the riverbank there.” Any pretense of genial debate was gone. I realized that our complaints about the slaughter on the riverbank had gnawed at the Huns. Was there guilt there after all? Now the tension had become manifest.
Bigilas looked uncertain whether to beg or flee. His mouth opened and shut uselessly.
Rusticius decided to come to the defense of his fellow translator, even though I knew he could hardly stand the man’s pretensions. “No true Roman trembles, any more than any true Hun,” Rusticius tried. “You are brave, Edeco, with your head full of drink and your sword at hand, while Bigilas and the rest of us are defenseless.”
The Hun grinned evilly. “Then fill your hands.”
“I’ll fill them when we have a chance, not to give you another excuse for slaughter like your massacre on the riverbank.” Rusticius looked stubborn, and I was taken aback by his courage. I hadn’t seen this side of him before.
“Don’t test me, boy.”
“I’m no boy, and no true man threatens murder and pretends it is combat.”
“For God’s sake,” Maximinus groaned, fearful his mission was about to end before it had properly started. Edeco’s knuckles were white on the hilt of his sword. Something had to be done.
“You misunderstood our companions.” I spoke up, my voice sounding even to my own ears as barely more than a pathetic squeak. As the youngest and least-threatening traveler, perhaps I could smooth things over. Gulping, I found my normal voice. “Our translator Bigilas doesn’t assemble his words well when he’s had too much to drink, as all know.
He meant to honor Attila, because your king has achieved as much as a mortal as our emperor has with divine powers. He meant a compliment, not an insult, Edeco.”
“Nonsense. The young Roman is trying to save himself,”
