The oracle took a few steps toward her. The snake exhaled and let its forked tongue loll. Anthea did not move. “Witness the wedding of the whore and the aspirant emperor! Witness it, Hermas!”
The snake twitched at its name. Claudio took a step forward: a weak, trembling step. His eyes were unsure. He cleared his throat. Here he was: Claudio-Valens, Grand Legate, brave-heart, a veritable god among men… awkward, nervous and utterly undone by a woman. It had always ever been. “A-Anthea—” He began with a stutter.
“Yes,” Anthea responded. “Yes, I will marry you.”
“Then it’s done… I have wed her.” His voice still trembled.
“No!” the oracle shouted. “A man has not wed his wife until they have become one. Let the marriage be consecrated on Mount Hylea, at the temple of the Trifold Goddess.”
Nervousness. Anticipation. Claudio walked toward her and she felt weak.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN:
Vengeance
Bruesio Lornodoris, August
At the morning meal, Bruesio stared daggers at his wife Flora. If she noticed, she made no fuss; any woman of proper breeding knew not to bring her problems to a guest’s dinner table. Silvio made small talk, chatting endlessly about gods-know what. His sullen child Niccolo shoveled the stew into his mouth without regard for proper table manners. His wife, Marcia, went on and on about Dualmis’ latest gossip. And Flora.
Flora. He had trusted her all these years. All he could think about was Flora, in a lover’s embrace with Lucento-Valens. With an Adamantus. He couldn’t abide the thought. He threw the napkin down and stood up. “Excuse me,” Bruesio said, and left in a rush.
He followed the paved road, past the lofty palms. The rain had stopped for now. A while down a road was a town: one of those small, idyllic villages in the midst of wealthy enclaves. But even those would likely have what Bruesio looked for; and he had brought a pouch of gold coins enough to purchase it.
The apothecary was a square stone building. Inside, shelves full of powders, liquids, and jars of strange ingredients, greeted him. Behind the desk was a man of pallid complexion and light hair; perhaps a man of Gad, but Bruesio wouldn’t hold it against him. At least, he wouldn’t for now.
“How can I help you?” he said.
“I have a rat problem. A very, very big rat problem. I’m going to need poison… the deadliest poison you can get. I have human-sized rats in my house.”
The man grinned. “A human-sized rat… I know what you want. I will get you the deadliest poison I have on hand.”
That afternoon, Bruesio asked his wife to tea.
“Tea,” Flora said, the sniveling shrew. “I didn’t think you liked tea.”
“I do now.” Bruesio put on the best false smile he could muster. The more unprepared she was, the more shocked she’d be that her husband knew her for what she was.
Lucento-Valens… he shuddered.
Flora peered into his eyes. “All right, my dear.”
The day was cold but not insufferably so, and dry. Bruesio had set the tea out in the garden, on Silvio’s elegantly-chiseled stone table. He took a seat, and Flora sat across from him.
She put her thin fingers round the cup. She peered into Bruesio’s eyes, and for the first time in nearly forty years of marriage, he saw distrust in them. “I thought you hated tea, husband.”
“Things have changed.” The words had more meaning than she knew.
The distrust in her eyes seemed to increase. “Husband, you don’t look well.”
He took his tea and sipped it. He remembered why he didn’t like it, but swallowed it just the same. “I am fine, dear wife.”
“I’m not sure…”
“I bought all this tea for you, and you won’t drink it?” Bruesio glared.
“I…” She searched deeper into his eyes but she would find nothing; he was stone cold, now, and impossible to read. She put the cup to her lips, and drank.
Bruesio grinned a cold, joyless grin. “Tell me about Lucento.”
She went white. Soon, she would go whiter. “I—I don’t know—”
“You betrayed me. And not only did you make that most unfortunate mistake, you kept the letters. You kept them. Took them with you like a treasure. You let that arrogant man have you. Didn’t you?”
“No!” Her eyes had grown moist. The poison was entering her, even now. Her life, their life, slipped away each second. “Those weren’t mine…”
“No more lies.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Too little, too late.”
“Haven’t you ever made a mistake?”
“I’ve made plenty of mistakes,” Bruesio said. His voice shook with anger. “But never once—not once—did I make the mistake of betraying you.”
“I’m sorry!” she wept. “I’m so sorry! Gods, I’m so sorry!”
Bruesio shook his head. “I do not accept your apology. If you flung yourself off a high rooftop, if you crawled a mile across shattered glass… even then, I would not forgive you.”
“I don’t feel well,” she choked through tears. Her stomach growled. “I feel…”
“Your life is a lie,” Bruesio sneered. “The son of your lover marches across the Empire. Perhaps you gave birth to him!”
“No!” She retched.
“You have committed the ultimate betrayal against my name. You are no longer a Lornodoris! I divorce you! Let it be known that, before you die, you are no longer my wife.”
She vomited blood. She had begun to grow white. She would die soon.
Like a statue, Bruesio Lornodoris stood there, hovering among the myrtles, the fig trees and the lemon trees. Soon Flora had given her last spasms, and was still, lying in a pool of blood. And Bruesio was alone. Alone, like a ship cast adrift into waters unknown by man. He no longer had Flora… his companion. She had betrayed him. But what was he now?
Silvio burst into the garden, and went white: almost as white as Flora. “What is going on here? What have you done?”
“I poisoned her.” Bruesio’s honesty surprised him. But he felt numb. The threat of prison did not faze him. He had gone cold. He was empty, a spiritless body in this cruel world.
“Get out!” Silvio screamed.
“What?” Bruesio looked into his friend’s bulging, irate eyes.
“Get out!” Silvio screamed. “Get out, now!”
Bruesio left the mansion with his luggage in tow. He had the box of his wife’s letters. Perhaps he would read them. He walked through the cold day, detached from all worry. He walked along the beach and took in the salty air. At last he sat down on a rock.
He shivered. Through a veil of ocean fog lay Imperial City. As he sat there, thunder rolled across the narrow channel; a storm raged, but only within the city proper. Here, in Dualmis, he was safe. Safe from the rebels, but not from himself.
He buried his head in his hands, and cried.
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT:
No Retreat
Claudio-Valens Adamantus, Grand Legate
When Claudio told Milo about the marriage, his friend smiled and congratulated him. Milo, neither an August or a Knight, took no issue with his marrying a whore.
It was the other matter—the oracle’s demand that they march to Imperial City on blind faith—that Milo would not accept. “Perhaps she is mad. Thought of that?” His voice rose above the rain pattering against the tent.
Claudio smiled wearily. “Of course I have. It is entirely possible. She worships a goddess I’ve never heard of. She lives in an abandoned temple. She lets a snake coil around her body, and she is blind. Madness is, perhaps, the best explanation. But what other options do we have, Milo? What else can we do, but take this chance?”
“We could leave. Move the capital to Bregantium or Brilium…”
“Retreat?” Claudio frowned. “You sound like you belong on the Imperial Council. If you wish to run, Milo, go ahead. I will march to Imperial City… alone if need be.”
“You know me better than that.” Milo knelt down on the tent floor. “You are my commander, and wherever you go I will follow… even to the Gates of Hell.”
“And that, my friend, is where we are headed.”
In the midst of an early morning storm, they departed. Minute by minute, hour by hour, Mount Hylea faded from sight. They found themselves again on the Path of Tidus with its wide breadth. The sound of eight thousand marching feet echoed as Claudio led them. Imperial City lay before him, and the time waxed late.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE:
Darkness Forevermore
Anthea Abantes
She could still feel him inside her. After the impromptu wedding, and the sudden wedding night, it seemed he had forgotten about her. But she had a feeling he had cast aside the cares of marriage for now; his resolve was indomitable, and she could neither ease his burden nor help him. But when he had accomplished his goal—as he had accomplished all else before him—he would remember Anthea Abantes, the lowly girl he wed. Then, when he sat on the White Throne, she would sit by his side as empress.
Empress! Never once in her life did the thought enter into her mind, not even in dreams. But the winds of fate are fickle, as the augurs well know. And somehow that madwoman, that oracle, had worked some magic on Claudio’s mind, or perhaps convinced him with her mad blabbering.
She had climbed the mountain on a whim. She had slipped out of the camp, followed the trail as fast as she could. Who knew it would end up so impossibly in her favor? Anthea the lost girl… the daughter of a “sacred” concubine and an uncertain father. The girl whose father could be—and likely was—a vagabond, a wayfarer or diseased soldier-of-fortune. Anthea the Empress? She did not deserve it, and in truth, she still did not believe it all was real.
As she walked down the road, the sky darkened. The rain picked up and the winds howled among the brush and the scraggly pines. She remembered it probably would not come to pass at all.
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