Semper Fidelis

Ruso said, “It had to be one of you.”

But Victor was beyond comfort. “Every morning,” he said, “I wake up to another day Tad will never see. And he’ll never see it because I was a coward.” He looked up. “We were all cowards, sir. One way or another. That’s the curse.”

Ruso closed his eyes, imagining the shame of men forced to make the choice Geminus had given them. Men made complicit in the deaths of their comrades. How would he feel if he had been compelled to fight for his life against a friend? It was unimaginable. Valens, he supposed, would have fought back. Albanus would probably have apologized for his blood making a mess on Ruso’s fists.

Victor was still talking. “I went to see his girl. I told her the truth. I thought perhaps if she forgave me …”

Ruso already knew that forgiveness had not been granted.

Victor said, “He said it would turn us into men.”

It had turned them into beasts. Ruso felt almost a physical ache in his chest at the cruel waste of young men who had joined the Legion eager to better themselves in the service of an emperor who had never heard of them. He asked gently, “Did you kill Geminus?”

“I wish I had.”

“Do you know who did?”

“No. And if I knew, I would never tell you.”

“Next time they ask, don’t say that. Just say what you know. Don’t antagonize them.”

“Thanks.”

“Be a friend to yourself, Victor. If not for your own sake, then for your family.”

Victor gave a snort of derision. “Like I was a friend to Tadius?”

Heavy footsteps were approaching. A key scraped in the lock, and within seconds Ruso was being unchained and ordered to his feet.

“Where are you taking me?”

“Tribune wants to see you.”

“Hah!” he heard Victor shout after him, his voice suddenly hard. “Tell the tribune his little trick failed. The native didn’t confess!”

Chapter 67

The tribune was a guest in the commanding officer’s house at Calcaria, as presumably was the empress. Ruso, whose request to wash had been refused, was led into a dining room whose decor made him think of the insides of a raw chicken: yellow fat, cream skin, pink flesh, red blood. In the midst of this lay Accius, propped on one elbow on a yellow couch. He was surrounded by the debris of a formal dinner. Standing in front of one of the tables was Tilla, looking alarmingly pale. He glanced from her to Accius, slightly reassured by the fact that she was fully clothed and her hair was no more ruffled than usual.

Her eyes widened when she saw him. The quick pout and lift of the eyebrows told him only that he should have learned to interpret her facial expressions by now.

“Ah,” said Accius with the languor of a man who had eaten too much and did not want to shake it up with an animated conversation. “Ruso.”

“Sir.”

“I have decided,” declared Accius, “that it is a waste of skill to have a doctor marching in chains.”

Ruso let out a secret sigh of relief and offered the obligatory “Thank you, sir” as if it were not Accius’s fault he had been chained in the first place. This was probably the nearest he would get to an apology.

“I find myself,” said Accius, “in something of a quandary.”

Ruso glanced at the scattered remains of the meal. He could smell wine and fish and spice and lavender. He looked at Accius’s soft leather house shoes dangling from the end of the couch, and thought of Victor crouched in a malodorous cell not two hundred paces away. It was hard to sympathize with the tribune’s quandary.

“I have been informed by this annoyingly persistent young woman”-here Ruso exchanged another uncommunicative glance with his wife-“that there may be further information about the murder of Centurion Geminus. If I tell you that none of this information is to leave this room, do I have the faintest chance of you obeying me this time?”

“Absolutely, sir. Whatever it is, it’s confidential.” Since Ruso already knew what it was likely to be, this was not a difficult promise to make.

Accius turned to Tilla. “Tell him what you told me.”

Tilla looked at them both, opened her mouth, swayed, and grabbed at a table for support. Ruso seized her and lowered her onto one of the couches. “Head between your knees,” he ordered, feeling her forehead for fever and scanning the tables for a water jug.

“It is nothing,” Tilla insisted in a muffled voice.

“Of course it’s something!” Ruso glared at Accius. “What did you do to her?”

“I haven’t touched her.”

From between her knees Tilla said, “I drank too much cough medicine.”

Ruso decided he must have misheard. “You drank too much? Has he been giving you wine?”

“Cough medicine,” she repeated, making no more sense than before. “It made me vomit. Can I come up now?”

When she did, he gave her a look that was intended to mean he wanted to continue this conversation later and that they would be discussing more than medicine, but it was too complicated a message for a simple look to convey.

Restored, Tilla perched on the edge of the dining couch and relayed the account of her anonymous witnesses from Eboracum. Three or four Praetorians, recognizable by the scorpions on their shields, and Geminus talking to them about going into action together again. Then the sound of a struggle and someone landing in the ditch.

When she had finished, Accius said, “Some of us believe in knowing all the facts before we draw our final conclusions.”

Ruso bit back Then why did you send me down the sewers? and said, “I thought the Praetorian prefect was in charge?”

“Prefect Clarus is in overall charge, yes.”

A misdemeanor in the Legion would normally be dealt with by a tribune. Possibly Accius had not taken kindly to having the investigation snatched away from him.

“It has come to my notice, Ruso, that you seem to have the knack of persuading men to confide in you.”

“It’s my job, sir.”

“Yes. It has also occurred to me that a doctor can move about freely amongst all classes of men. And since you are the senior medical officer on this march, you need not confine your attentions to your own unit.”

“Yes, sir.” Or should that be No, sir? Was he being released? What the hell was Accius playing at?

“Do you think you could perhaps attempt the art of being discreet?”

“I’ll do my best, sir.”

“Good. I shall deal with your insubordination when we get to Deva. Meanwhile, just carry out your medical duties as usual.”

Tilla’s face brightened. Ruso looked from one to the other of them. “Thank you, sir.”

“I don’t want our men-or any of the men-more agitated than they already are. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Should you happen to discover anything interesting in the course of your duties, I expect you to report it to me-and only me-immediately.”

So that was it. Accius didn’t trust Clarus, and Ruso the Insubordinate had become Ruso the Useful.

“If you get into trouble, you will deal with it yourself.”

And also Ruso the Expendable. He stifled What do you actually want, sir? There