An Echo in the Darkness(141)

“I’m not hungry,” Julia sighed. “I’m not thirsty. I’m not tired. I’m not anything.”

“Would you like me to tell you a story?”

Julia shook her head, then glanced at her hopefully. “Can you sing, Lady Azar?”

“I am sorry, my lady. I can’t.” Infection and trauma had damaged her vocal cords so that she could only speak in a rasping voice. “I can play a lyre.”

Julia looked away. “I don’t have a lyre. There used to be one in the house, but Primus smashed it to pieces and then burned it.” She had been glad at the time, for the instrument had been a reminder of the slave girl who played it and sang songs about her god.

“I’ll ask Prometheus to purchase another.”

Julia put a trembling hand to her forehead. “Don’t waste your money.” She gave a sad laugh. How much had she wasted over the past years? When she thought of how much she had had, she could scarcely believe she had come to live like this.

Hadassah put her hand on Julia’s shoulder. “It’s the fever that makes your head ache, my lady.” Prometheus had set a small table beside the couch, on which sat a bowl of scented water and a small stack of rags. Hadassah wet one and wrung it out. She dabbed Julia’s face. “Try to rest.”

“I wish I could rest. Sometimes I hurt too much to sleep. Other times, I don’t want to sleep because I dream.”

“What do you dream?”

“All sorts of things. I dream about people I’ve known. Last night I dreamed about my first husband, Claudius.”

Hadassah stroked her forehead and temples. “Tell me about him.”

“He broke his neck when he fell from his horse.” She relaxed under Hadassah’s tender care. She felt like talking about the past today, unburdening herself of it. “He wasn’t a very good rider to begin with, and I heard later he had had several goblets of wine before coming to look for me.”

Hadassah put the rag aside. “I’m sorry.”

“I wasn’t,” Julia said in a flat voice. “Not at the time. I should’ve been, but I wasn’t.”

“Are you now?”

“I don’t know,” she said and worried her lip. “Yes,” she said softly after a moment. “Sometimes.” Would Azar condemn her? Julia waited, tense. Azar reached over and took her hand. Julia was so grateful, she gripped the woman’s small, sturdy hand tightly and went on. “It was my fault in a way. You see, he was looking for me. I’d gone to a ludus to watch the gladiators practice. I was mad for them. One in particular. I’d asked Claudius to take me a dozen times before, but he didn’t approve. All he really cared about was his studies about religions in the Empire. And I was bored with all that, bored with him.”

She sighed. “I never would have married him if my father hadn’t forced me. Claudius was twenty years older than me, but he acted even older than that.” She went on, trying to justify her actions, but the more she talked, the more unjustified she felt. Why did what happened so long ago plague her so much now? The incident with Claudius was only one among so many others.

Hadassah put her other hand over Julia’s. “You were very young.”

“Too young for him,” Julia said. She let her breath out softly on a sad laugh. “I think Claudius loved me because I looked like his first wife, but I wasn’t anything like her. What a shock I must’ve been to him after the first few weeks of marriage.”

“Do you know what his wife was like?”

“I never met her, of course, but I gathered she was gentle and kind and shared his passion for learning.” She raised her head, looking at the veils, thankful she could see no face behind them. “I was none of those things. Sometimes I find myself wishing. . . .” She shook her head and looked away. “It doesn’t do any good to wish.”

“What do you wish, my lady?”

“That I had been a little kinder, at least.”

Hadassah wanted to embrace her, for it was the first time Julia had admitted even a twinge of remorse about anything.

“I don’t mean I wish I’d loved him,” Julia said. “I never could have loved him, but if I’d been . . .” She shook her head. “Oh, I don’t know.” She closed her eyes. “There’s no use in it, I suppose. I’ve been told it’s useless to dwell on the past, and yet, that’s all I seem to have left. Visions of the past.”

“Sometimes we have to go back and remember the things we’ve done and be cleansed of them before we can go on.”