While I did not care for the answer, I hadto acknowledge that Motius had shown his character by agreeing witha man he clearly hated, and my respect for him grew.
Alex immediately complicated things byasking me, “Should we tell him?”
Of course, I knew what he was talking about,but Saloninus did not, nor did Motius, both of them looking at mewith sharp interest. Why, I thought, do you have to be so fuckingthorough all the time, Alex? Feeling their eyes on me, my mindraced as I tried to think through all the possible outcomes if Iacquiesced and told Motius. And, I freely admit, if I had to do itover again, I would have kept my mouth shut.
But, when I nodded, I left it to Alex toinform Motius, “The rope that Vellocatus used to secure himselffrom being swept away wasn’t snapped; it was cut through by aknife. And,” he added before Motius could respond, “only Cador wasanywhere near Vellocatus during the storm.”
Motius’ face twisted into a mask of hatred,but there was something more there, and while I did not know him, Ithought that it was grief.
He opened his mouth, but what came out werewords that I did not know, although I did not really need to inorder to understand; when he spoke in Latin, everything wasexplained, “Vellocatus was my older brother.” Taking a deep breath,he continued, “Just before we left to come to the Amisia totransport you home, he told me that he planned on making me secondin command. He had come to realize that Cador was not the seamanthat he claimed, and he intended to put Cador ashore as soon as wereturned home.”
“Juno’s cunnus,” Saloninus muttered, and this was theinstant I regretted my decision in telling Motius thetruth.
However, while I certainly sympathized andunderstood Motius’ grief and would not blame him for wanting toavenge the death of the man we now learned was his brother, I couldnot allow what was ultimately a personal matter to harm our chancesof reaching home. While I was concerned about that, however, I wasnot at the point where I worried about our survival, but that wasnot going to be long in coming.
In the moment, I tried to proceed carefully,beginning by telling Motius, “I’m sorry for your loss, Motius. Wedidn’t know Vellocatus was your brother, and I grieve with you.But…”
“Centurion,” he cut in, “you do nothave to worry about me killing Cador. At least,” his mouth twistedagain with what I think was from the bitter taste of the words,“not until you and your men are safely returned to Ubiorum.” I didnot try to hide my relief, and I heard Alex’s sigh that expressedthe same sentiment. “Besides,” he gave a laugh that held no humor,“we are already shorthanded as it is. Killing him now will makematters harder for all of us.”
“Thank you.” It was all I could thinkto say, and there was an awkward silence, which Motius broke bysaying, “If you will excuse me, Centurion, I need to inform theothers and make sure that Cador has set the watch.”
I waited a moment after he closed the doorand I heard him scamper up the ladder before I turned to the othertwo, but it was Saloninus I addressed first.
“Aulus, have you been keeping an eyeon our ration situation?”
To my relief, he nodded, because I hadcompletely forgotten; I blamed the blow to my head.
That feeling was not destined to last longbecause he answered glumly, “Men are already on their last loaf,and while it’s better with the pork, it’s not by much.”
“What about water?” Iasked.
“That’s better,” he admitted.“Apparently, during the last storm, the crew managed to fill mostof the barrels with rainwater. Although,” he added, “the barrel Itasted has some seawater mixed in it. It’s salty, but it’sdrinkable…barely.”
I thought for a moment, then made mydecision, knowing that by doing so we were creating a whole host ofother problems.
“We’re going to pool the rations wehave left, and we’ll have Herennius from your Century and Mus fromthe First keep them, with Gemellus and Tetarfenus helping them tokeep those thieving bastards from filching more than theirshare.”
“That’s going to let them know we’rein bigger trouble than we’ve been letting on,” Saloninus correctlypointed out.
“I know,” I admitted, “but if we’re atsea more than another day, and it looks like we will be, we’ll beeven worse off if we don’t start cutting rations now.”
I saw that Saloninus understood this,although I was not certain he agreed, but then he tried to look onthe bright side by pointing out, “At least we don’t have to worryabout them mutinying and taking over the ship.”
“Oh?” I was a bit surprised; I did notshare his optimism. “What makes you say that?”
“Because then they’d have to fuckingrow,” he answered simply.
Within a couple heartbeats, all three of ushad tears from laughing so hard, but it was the kind of laughterthat had an edge to it, like I have seen happen after a hardbattle.
“Hopefully, this will be over soon,” Isaid as I opened the door to head to the main compartment to breakthe news.
And the gods laughed again, although, atleast this time, they did not send a storm.
When we resumed movement at dawn thenext morning, I was cautiously pleased. The men were certainly nothappy at having their rations reduced, but I think they understoodthat our predicament was through no fault of their officers; ifanything, they were angry with the gods. The Hortator set a steady rhythm, and we beganrowing south, and while it was cloudy, they were mostly white oronly slightly tinged with gray. The wind was stiff, and coming froma southerly direction as it was, it made our progress slower thanwe would have liked, yet without a sail and only oar power, Motiusassured me that we were making the best speed possible. Once we gotunderway, we allowed the men up in small groups, and I used
