The Warrior's Princess Read online

  As they retraced their steps through the market place Julia caught at Eigon’s arm. ‘Didn’t you enjoy it?’

  Eigon nodded. ‘I enjoyed it very much.’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘I couldn’t pay him, Julia, that is what is wrong. I would love to have bought some of his things. Of course I would, but I will not owe money to you or to your aunt and I certainly will not leave him at a loss. I don’t need jewellery. I have plenty.’

  ‘You don’t. You have a brooch, a few bangles and a small child’s ring,’ Julia exclaimed. ‘Which you have to put on your little finger as it is!’ She gave an exclamation of indignation as a man rushed past her, pushing her violently, almost knocking her into the gutter. Flavius was there at once, his arm for a few seconds protectively around her, the two other slaves drawing their cudgels from their belts.

  ‘Idiot!’ he yelled after the man. He turned to Julia, all concern. ‘Are you all right?’ Julia nodded, shaken.

  Eigon was staring after the man who had dodged into the crowd out of sight. It had happened so suddenly and it had been so easy for the man to get near them. They were protected by three men and yet they had been helpless. Silently she slipped her hand into Julia’s as they resumed their way back to the horses. ‘Are you scared?’ she whispered. She was still scanning the crowds.

  Julia shook her head. ‘No harm done. He wasn’t a thief. Or if he was he was running from someone else.’ She clutched her wrap around her tightly. ‘These things happen!’

  ‘Do they?’ Eigon scanned the crowds nervously. In the distance a squad of soldiers was marching smartly away from the city centre towards one of the outlying barracks. They turned away across the market square and disappeared up one of the narrow streets out of sight, the rhythm of their nailed sandals ringing on the cobbles echoing round the square long after they had gone.

  ‘He didn’t see you. I’m sure he didn’t see you.’ Jess was talking in her sleep. She clutched at the thin sheet as in her dream she watched the small party of riders draw up at last. The two girls slid from their saddles and with Flavius ran into the outer courtyard of the villa as the slaves led the horses away. ‘Don’t go out again, it’s too dangerous!’

  Long shadows were lying across the paving slabs and the villa smelled of the great pine trees whose shade was thrown across the courtyard from the road outside. There was no one there to see them creep indoors and flee to their bedrooms to wash off the dust of the city. The house was very quiet. Eigon slipped on a fresh gown, brushed back her hair and tied it then she crept out of her room and went to find her parents. Her father was lying on a couch in the shade of the fig tree near the fountain. He seemed to be asleep. Her mother sat nearby busy with her spindle.

  ‘Mam?’ Eigon whispered.

  Cerys looked up. ‘Where have you been?’

  Eigon shrugged. ‘I fell asleep in the orchard. It is so hot down here.’ She blushed, uncomfortable with the lie, but her mother didn’t notice. She seemed to accept the answer. She glanced at her husband. ‘Your father has been asleep for most of the day.’ Her worry was engraved on her face.

  ‘What does Melinus say?’

  ‘He is trying a new medicine. One to bring the fever down. He is cross he can’t find the right herbs here. He says he needs something that grows only in the mountains at home.’

  Eigon bit her lip. Her mother hardly ever mentioned their old life, before their exile. It was as if she had wiped it from her memory. ‘Has he asked the doctor who comes to see Aelius’s family? Flavius speaks highly of him. His father calls him in when any of them are ill.’ She did not add that Flavius thought Melinus a terrifying magician.

  Cerys scowled. ‘All he does is tell me to sacrifice before the altar to Febris.’

  ‘And you have no faith in a Roman goddess?’ Eigon smiled. She went and sat down on the edge of her father’s couch and took his hand. The powerful warrior had shrunk to a shadow of his former self, the scars on his shoulder and neck stark ropes of raised tissue against his skin. He was pale and weak as he opened his eyes and smiled at his daughter.

  ‘She prays to every goddess of healing there is,’ he said fondly. His voice was husky. ‘But I fear our gods do not hear us from so faraway. I need a Druidess with the skills of Gruoch, who tended my wounds when I was a guest of Cartimandua.’ His voice grew bitter. ‘She brought the skills of the goddess. Melinus is good, but he lacks the gentle touch of a born healer and as your mother says he cannot find the right ingredients in this climate.’ Stretching out on the couch he groaned with pain.

  ‘Poor Papa.’ Eigon bent to kiss his forehead.

  He smiled. ‘You have that touch, my daughter. Ask Melinus to teach you some of his skills.’ His eyes closed and he sighed. ‘If Melinus were to register as a doctor he would be given his freedom and the citizenship of Rome. It is our blessing that he chooses to remain with us. Learn from him, Eigon. As much as you can, my child. Now,’ he stifled another groan as he tried to ease his aching limbs, ‘sing to me, Eigon. That always soothes me.’

  Eigon sat with him for a while, then as he drifted into an uneasy sleep she rose and went back into the house. Her mother did not notice her leave. Julia was in the atrium. With her was Pomponia Graecina.

  ‘So, Eigon, I hear you paid a visit to my favourite shop this afternoon.’

  Eigon glanced at Julia, furious that their secret was out, but Julia shrugged. ‘The goldsmith told her,’ she said crossly.

  ‘I was not spying on you, children,’ Pomponia said with a smile. ‘I went there to select a gift for one of my friends. It is her birthday tomorrow. And he commented that you had just left. I am not cross. I think it is wonderful that you have been enticed outside at last.’ She smiled at Eigon. ‘So, did you enjoy your excursion?’

  Eigon nodded. The fright they had suffered had already retreated into the shadows.

  ‘And you admired his handiwork?’

  She nodded again. ‘Almost as good as the craftsmen at home.’ She didn’t remember the craftsmen at home. She didn’t remember very much at all but it had become part of the good-natured banter between the girls to stick up for her barbarian origins.

  ‘So, you wouldn’t turn down a piece of his work if it was offered as a gift?’

  Eigon laughed. ‘Indeed not.’

  ‘Good, because I have a gift for you.’ Pomponia reached into the small basket she had put down on the edge of the fountain and produced a small packet wrapped in linen.

  Eigon took it gingerly. ‘You shouldn’t have done this, Lady Pomponia!’ She had already guessed what it was. The ring she had so admired and had put down so reluctantly, lay on her palm.

  ‘Of course I should, child. You have few enough treats, shut away here with a sick father and a stern tutor monitoring your every move. Put it on. Let me see if it suits your hand.’

  It fitted perfectly. They all admired it for a moment and Eigon smiled again, radiant.

  ‘So, how is your father?’ Pomponia Graecina asked.

  ‘Not well. The fever returns and his scars hurt him so much. Melinus thinks there is infection deep inside the wounds.’ Melinus was well aware that he was being compared unfavourably to the female Druid who had tended his lord’s injuries in Brigantia and he had become convinced that the illness was the result of some magic the woman had performed, designed to reawaken far into the future and bring King Caradoc to his knees.

  ‘My father thinks I should train to be a healer,’ Eigon went on. The glitter of the gold on her finger caught her eye and for a moment she held her hand out, angling it in the last of the sunlight, streaming low through the doorway. It was an innocent feminine gesture which Pomponia Graecina noted with affection.

  ‘And do you feel you would like to be a healer?’ she asked.

  Eigon nodded. ‘I sometimes feel I want to rest my hand on Papa’s head and draw away his pain. I can feel there is power in my hands, but I don’t know how to use it.’ She shrugged. ‘Melinus has taught me some of his
knowledge of herbs and how to gather them when the stars and the moon are strongest. He knows I am interested.’

  ‘And she’s good,’ Julia put in. ‘She makes my headaches go away. Her hands are cool. They command the evil spirits that plague me to leave.’

  Pomponia Graecina raised an eyebrow. ‘I didn’t know you were plagued by evil spirits, Julia. Are you sure they are not the spirits of laziness?’

  Julia blushed. ‘I’m not lazy!’

  ‘Her headaches come monthly,’ Eigon put in. ‘I have noticed they are regular and they are very painful. It is part of being a woman.’

  Pomponia Graecina looked startled. ‘You noticed that by yourself?’

  Eigon giggled. ‘It is not something I would have discussed with Melinus! But I have found a soothing blend of plants here from our own herb beds which helps her.’

  ‘As do your hands,’ Julia insisted.

  Pomponia Graecina looked thoughtful. ‘If your father approves, then ask Melinus if you can study medicine with him in greater detail,’ she said, ‘but realise that he is an intellectual, a philosopher, he studies the properties of healing plants but is not necessarily the man to apply them. That takes a gentle kindness. He is an austere man, I have always found.’ She nodded slowly. ‘Do you pray to your own gods, Eigon?’

  Eigon nodded. ‘But Papa thinks they do not hear our prayers. They are too far away so I pray to the gods of the household here and to Febris for my father, but perhaps I am wrong to do that as I fear they do not listen to me.’

  Pomponia Graecina shook her head. ‘The gods hear one wherever they are, Eigon. If your gods are all powerful, pray to them, as I do.’ She smiled. ‘I found your gods in Britannia to be strong. Why do you think I brought Melinus back with me? He taught me their names and why I should pray to each one. They live in the mountains and rivers of Britannia and Gaul, but their power stretches across the world.’

  ‘But don’t they quarrel with the gods of Rome?’ Eigon sat down on the rim of the fountain, her brow wrinkled in concentration.

  Pomponia Graecina shook her head. ‘This is something you must discuss with Melinus. Rome is a centre for all the gods. The gods of Greece and Egypt, the god of the Jews, the gods from North Africa and even the lands traversed by the silk road, they all meet here and are worshipped in their way. Each one of us must speak to our own gods. Rome accepts that men must be free to worship in their own way as long as it does not conflict with our loyalty to the Emperor.’

  ‘Who is a god himself,’ Eigon said softly. ‘Do you believe that?’ She glanced up under her eyelashes.

  Pomponia grinned. ‘The Emperor and I do not agree about many things,’ she replied. ‘He knows I do not fear him.’

  ‘And you don’t worship him either.’ Eigon raised her eyebrows.

  Pomponia shook her head. ‘Such talk is dangerous, Eigon, even for me. Concentrate on your healing and pray to the gods that listen. Enough for now. I shall go and see your mother.’

  Julia had been lost in her own thoughts, bored with talk of gods and emperors, but the sight of her aunt rising to her feet galvanised her into action. ‘You won’t tell Eigon’s mother we went into the city?’ she put in anxiously.

  ‘I will say nothing,’ Pomponia Graecina said with a smile. ‘And next time you decide to go out you will come and see me, both of you.’

  Julia watched her depart. ‘You are not serious about learning to be a healer!’

  ‘Why not? If I feel it is the right path for me.’

  ‘Because it is boring. You want to go out and meet nice healthy people, not sick ones!’

  ‘You mean young men?’ Eigon smiled.

  ‘Of course young men.’ Julia giggled. ‘Don’t tell me you aren’t interested!’

  Eigon shook her head. ‘I have met no one who interests me, Julia. Perhaps I am not meant for marriage. My parents have never mentioned it.’

  Her parents had never so much as hinted that this was her destiny. They had made no mention of her destiny at all.

  Julia gave an exasperated sigh. ‘Since when have girls waited for their parents to suggest it!’

  ‘Would your father approve of Flavius as your partner?’ Eigon asked.

  ‘No, of course not. He’s only the son of a freedman. Papa has probably destined me for some old widower whose land borders our estates.’ Julia tossed her head. ‘In which case I mean to have some fun while I still can. If my aunt has invited us to go out and see her I mean to go as soon as possible.’

  Eigon shook her head. ‘It is frightening out there.’

  ‘Frightening!’ Julia looked at her askance. ‘What, that man who pushed us? Nothing happened. I don’t suppose he even saw us, he was far too intent on running away. He had probably stolen something! Don’t be foolish. Besides we would be perfectly safe going to the house of her husband, Aulus Plautius. They live on the Palatine Hill near the Emperor in a beautiful huge place with lots of visitors and relations and handsome young musicians. You can flash your lovely ring at them and twirl your gorgeous hair and bewitch whoever you please.’

  Eigon knew it would be hard to refuse. The thought that the house was near the Imperial palace and therefore the Imperial bodyguard was something she did not even consider.

  Instead she went to find Melinus. She would ask him to start her special training as a healer this very day. She glanced back at Julia. The poor girl seemed oblivious to the fact that she would be prostrate with her headaches and belly pain by this time tomorrow, as she always was at this quarter of the moon. So she would pick some tenacetum and some yellow iris from the pond in the formal gardens and make a decoction ready for her. She gave a wry chuckle. Just as well someone was paying attention to what was going on. Julia, her head in the clouds and her attention on her dreams, never would.

  15

  In her dream Jess stirred restlessly. As the moon rose, five days from the full, the light spilled across the gardens, throwing shadows before Eigon as she walked out to the pond, a basket on her arm, a small pair of shears in her hand ready to cut the iris. She smiled to herself in the moonlight. Melinus had been delighted with her request. Tomorrow they would set aside the studies they had been doing – for the time being at least – and begin to plan a course of ancient Druidic lore on the art of healing.

  Wrapped up in her dreams she did not notice the movement along the top of the wall, or see the figure of the man heave himself up to sit astride it in the darkness, watching her every move.

  They arrived home late from the Villa Borghese and with plates of spaghetti on their knees as they sat on cushions and watched a DVD, they had whiled away the heat of the evening until Jess, the first to admit to exhaustion, had made her way to bed. She fell asleep at once, oblivious to the fact that after she had left the room Kim had reached forward and turned off the TV. ‘How do you think she is?’ she asked.

  ‘She’s fine,’ Steph said at once.

  ‘No mention of Dan following us or anything?’

  Steph shook her head.

  ‘And no mention of Eigon and the Romans?’

  Steph hesitated. Kim’s gaze sharpened. ‘I thought so. When you two lingered behind as we walked back she looked really weird. Sort of haunted.’

  ‘She was talking about history,’ Steph said defensively. ‘She’s interested in the story. We can’t blame her for that. I’m interested too. After all it is my house where all this started. I want to know who Eigon is and what happened to her. Lots of rational people believe in ghosts.’

  ‘I’m not denying it.’ Will frowned. ‘I’m just not sure I believe in them myself. I’m trying to understand. People like Carmella seem to have an intuitive ability to see things other people don’t see. It’s easy to mock her because she uses the trappings – the tarot cards, the mystical language, the faraway dozy expression.’ He grinned and shook his head. ‘Kim, you like Carmella, you brought her into the equation. Do you really believe her?’

  ‘Yes, I do!’

  ‘Are you sur
e?’

  Kim shrugged. ‘Perhaps it is better to say I want to believe her and I enjoy her card readings.’

  ‘You shouldn’t mock the tarot, Will,’ Steph put in quietly. She wrapped the last of her spaghetti round her fork thoughtfully. ‘Let me tell you something about them. They are an ancient system of archetypes, loaded with a symbolism which most so-called card readers don’t understand properly themselves. Some packs are incredibly beautiful. The first tarot to appear in Europe were thought to be from Italy, you know. The secret of reading them is to allow the pictures to set the mind free to pick up on extrasensory perceptions. Some people are better than others at doing that, of course. The standard meanings of the cards which come on the printed instructions are not worth the paper they are printed on.’

  Will and Kim stared at her. ‘Since when have you been an authority on the tarot?’ Kim asked.

  Steph smiled. ‘I went on a course. Years ago. In London when I was a student. I bought myself a pack out of curiosity. Then another. Then another. I was fascinated by them. I stuck the cards round the walls of my bedsit. Then one of my boyfriends came over and he hated them. He was terrified of them. Screamed about evil and superstition and doom and death. He said I was a messenger of the devil and that I would go to hell. Needless to say we didn’t meet again but it made me think. I realised I was looking at them purely as art forms, intriguing historical anachronisms, not as ways of telling the future and I had entirely missed the fact that some people are really scared of them. So I enrolled in this course. And I was very lucky because it could have been the kind of course which taught you to read them in the way that boyfriend imagined. I could have put a sequinned scarf over my hair and imitated one of the three witches moaning about doom and dark strangers and crossing my palm with silver. It didn’t happen that way. Our lecturer talked about history and philosophy and the mystical origins of the cards in Ancient Egypt or somewhere in the Middle East after the Great Flood or in Ancient Rome in the time of Hermes Trismegistus – no one seems to know for sure. And he taught us to learn the symbolism, then to empty our minds and read the cards from our inner wisdom.’