Celtic Fire(58)

Rhiannon clung to the lad’s confidence as the two men circled. Brennus stood taller than Lucius and outweighed him as well. Lucius’s plated armor provided a far better defense than Brennus’s mail, yet it would provide scant protection if the garrison mutinied. Her gaze moved to the foot soldiers. How many of them had rejected Rome and pledged their secret allegiance to the quartermaster? Would they come to his aid if he fell today?

The two men circled slowly, like winter wolves. Behind, men jostled for the best view, discipline forgotten. In the rear of the pack, wagers were being cast and recast furiously.

Brennus’s arm whipped toward Lucius.

Lucius parried easily. He dodged the next slice as well, then darted forward more quickly than Rhiannon would have thought possible for a man weighted in full battle armor. Brennus spun away, but even so the edge of Lucius’s blade caught the larger man’s leather breast shield, carving a path through it to the mail beneath.

Enraged, Brennus lifted his sword with both hands and brought it down and to one side, the edge angled toward Lucius’s neck.

Rhiannon’s cry mingled with Marcus’s gasp. Lucius lunged to one side, unscathed. In the same motion, he spun about. Taking advantage of Brennus’s forward motion, he slammed the flat of his sword into the quartermaster’s back.

Brennus hit the ground with a dull thump, drawing a mixture of shouts and groans from the audience. The large man lay motionless, the point of Lucius’s sword pricking his neck. Rhiannon let out a long breath.

Marcus took one last look, then dropped to the ground and snatched up his pen. “Magnificent!” he breathed.

Rhiannon was inclined to agree. Lucius’s hard body had been a breathless combination of strength and grace, his sword but a flash of light. Had he wished Brennus dead, she had no doubt that the larger man’s blood would now be soaking the earth.

Lucius looked to the battlements and speared her with his dark gaze. Heat washed through her veins in a flood. She gripped the edge of the railing, sending a splinter of wood into her palm. On the first night of her captivity and every night after, Lucius could have forced her to his bed far more easily than he’d thrown Brennus to the mud. Yet he hadn’t. He had stepped back and waited.

She watched him now, heart pounding with a violence that left her gasping. She wanted him—she could deny it no longer. Yet perhaps it was better that Lucius hadn’t come to her last night, whatever his reason. He would soon be locked in battle with her kin. How could she give her heart to her tribe’s enemy?

He lifted his sword. Silence fell as Brennus heaved himself from the ground and retrieved his own weapon. Lucius turned his back on the man and barked an order for the soldiers to resume their sparring. The command afforded his opponent some measure of dignity, Rhiannon thought.

Brennus didn’t seem to appreciate the gesture. The glare he shot at Lucius’s back spit venom.

She now had no doubt Brennus meant to betray Lucius.

A wash of nausea stole over her as she realized that when Brennus joined forces with Edmyg, the quartermaster would be in a position to exact revenge on Lucius for today’s humiliation. Dear Briga. Peril circled Lucius like a hawk for the kill, yet he walked through his enemies unconcerned, as though a Legion guarded his back.

What fate awaited Marcus should his father be killed? Only death, of that she was certain. There would be no mercy for a Roman commander’s son.

Nausea surged. She could not bear to allow either father or son to come to harm. But how could she warn Lucius of the danger without betraying her clan? By some miracle she had to convince Lucius to take Marcus and travel south before the moon of Beltane, four nights hence.

Rhiannon swallowed a sudden rise of bile. Shakily, she tore her gaze from Lucius and hunkered down beside Marcus. He was sprawled on the planks, dipping pen to ink and drawing furiously.

“There,” he said, carefully wiping the ink from his pen with a bit of cloth. “What do you think?”

She examined his drawing. His lines were simple. If taken separately, each was hardly more than a swirl of ink. Seen together, the strokes took on a life beyond the boundaries of the papyrus. They danced and leapt, clashed and collided. Gazing at the trapped fury of the swordsmen, Rhiannon almost expected the figures to soar from the page.

“Truly, Marcus, you do magick with your pen.”

He gave her an uncertain look, as if unsure of her sincerity but wanting more than anything to believe. “Do you really think so?”

“Your father will be proud,” she said, her voice catching.

The lad’s hopeful expression crumpled. “No, he won’t. He hates my drawings.”