The Silver Wolf Read online

“A bath?” Regeane asked.

  Elfgifa glanced coquettishly up through her eyelashes at Regeane.

  “Yes,” Lucilla said waspishly, “a bath. He got his bath and his silver and,” she continued, placing her hands on her hips and glaring down at Elfgifa, “a big, wet kiss.”

  Elfgifa pursed her lips and lowered her eyes modestly. “I promised him a kiss, but I told him I wouldn’t kiss anyone as dirty as he was.” She tossed her head. “My father says a man who doesn’t wash himself before he goes to a woman and after doesn’t respect himself or the woman. I can understand ‘before,’ but why ‘after’? I told him I thought once would be enough, but he said after, too. Why is that?”

  “Why didn’t you ask him?” Lucilla’s lips twitched.

  Elfgifa frowned. Her lower lip began to creep forward. “He smiled the way you’re smiling now, and told me I’d understand better when I grew up.”

  “Don’t start going on about how you want to understand now,” Regeane said haughtily. “You embarrassed me in front of Stephen and Antonius.”

  Elfgifa stared up at them mutinously.

  “You must remember you’re only a child,” Lucilla said. “There are some things you’ll have to wait to understand.”

  Elfgifa sighed. “Thank you for calling it to my attention. That’s what my father says when I tell him things he doesn’t want to hear. I know I’m a child, but I understand …” She broke off as another train of thought struck her. “Besides, my Uncle Thungbrand and Aunt Huldigun visited and neither one of them washes ever. I asked my father about it. He says they are both strangers to any kind of water. I couldn’t understand that either except that they both got as drunk as some of my father’s men and rolled up under the table with them and …”

  “I think possibly that may have been what your father meant.” Lucilla said.

  “They don’t put any water in their wine either?” Elfgifa asked.

  “Yes,” Lucilla said. “Now run along. I’ve called my personal physician to see Regeane.”

  “Did he beat you?” Elfgifa asked. “Postumous—he’s the boy who told me where you were—he said three Franks, one called Hugo, lived near the Forum. He said you were screaming this morning.”

  Lucilla began hurrying Regeane along the peristyle walkway toward the back of the house. “Yes, he beat her.”

  “Oh,” Elfgifa said. “May I see?”

  “No, you may not,” Lucilla said sternly.

  Elfgifa clasped Regeane’s hand firmly. “If I’m going to be her lady’s maid, I’m going to need to—”

  “Who in the world said you were going to be her lady’s maid?” Lucilla asked.

  “Your maid, Susanna, told me,” Elfgifa said. “And I want to be one. She says it’s wonderful to be a lady’s maid. You get to order the menservants about, and all the tradesmen give you expensive gifts so you’ll bring them your lady’s custom. You can take all the lovers you want and you don’t even have to marry some dirty old man for his money and … though why you should marry a dirty old man for his money is another thing I don’t understand. Don’t young men have any money?”

  “I can see,” Lucilla said ominously, “that I must have a word with Susanna.”

  “Oh, no,” Regeane said. “I’m sure the woman meant no harm.” The feel of the small, warm hand in hers was very comforting. “Please don’t send Elfgifa away.”

  Lucilla stared down her nose sternly at Elfgifa. “Very well, I won’t if … if you promise to sit in the corner and be absolutely quiet while the physician examines your mistress. If you’re going to be a lady’s maid, the first thing you’ll need to learn is when to speak and when to be silent.”

  “Susanna didn’t tell me that was part of it,” Elfgifa said.

  “Didn’t she?” Lucilla said. “Expensive gifts from the tradesmen, eh? Apparently it’s something she hasn’t learned herself.”

  The physician, Pappolus, arrived. He was a tall, well-dressed young man who assumed an air of dignity beyond his years.

  Regeane balked at undressing in front of a man, but with Lucilla standing over her like a female dragon and Elfgifa watching curiously from one corner of the room, she was at length prevailed upon to show the physician her back.

  He sniffed and studied her, then gave his opinion in long, complicated phrases well-larded with very impressive Greek words, took his pay, provided an ointment for Regeane’s back, and left.

  Lucilla sniffed the ointment suspiciously, then threw it away, saying, “He once prescribed an eye ointment for one of my girls. Her problem got worse, not better. I investigated and learned he believed hippopotamus dung, which he imports from Egypt in powder form, is a sovereign remedy for everything. I was hard put to save the girl’s sight. But much as I hate to admit it, he has greater expertise than I have in preventing scars from forming. That’s why I asked him to see you.”

  Lucilla pressed a sleeping draught on her. Again, Regeane resisted, but finally drank. Lucilla conducted her to a cubiculum. The small room was dark, even by day. The only light was the lamp in Lucilla’s hand and the glow from the sun shining beyond the pillared portico into the atrium. She made Regeane stretch out on the bed.

  Lying down, Regeane could feel the sleeping potion clouding her mind, dulling her senses.

  Lucilla stood over her, holding the dove-shaped lamp. By its flame she seemed only a disembodied face, a void in the cool, pleasant gloom. “Rest,” she said quietly in a soothing tone. “Sleep.” Then, even more softly, “Sleep.”

  Though Lucilla was as quiet as possible, the snick of the bolt on the heavy door going home was loud to both Regeane and the wolf.

  She was half paralyzed by the sleeping draught and absolute exhaustion. The wolf’s powers weren’t infinite. All her reserves were completely drained. She’d been warmed and fed. Now, she must sleep.

  Antonius? He was alone on the Campagna. Without her help, he would die. She reflected that Lucilla might not starve or torture her, but she was capable of imprisoning her just as efficiently as Gundabald could. More so, in fact, as she had the greater resources.

  Regeane’s eyelids lifted. She saw the window of the bedroom was as well-barred as that of the one in the lodging house.

  The daylight was brighter outside than it had been earlier. The rain must have passed. It was early afternoon. The wolf yawned. Sleep now. Do now what now demands. Night must fall.

  VIII

  REGEANE WAS AWAKENED BY THE WOLF AT DUSK. Her eyes opened slightly. Through her lashes, she could see the stars, each tiny light pricking through the deep, blue velvet twilight. She lay still. Two voices were speaking nearby.

  “Well, I’m sorry. I simply won’t give her any more. It might kill her.” She recognized the voice. It belonged to the physician, Pappolus.

  “I doubt it,” Lucilla replied skeptically. “She has the constitution of a lioness. You wouldn’t believe the condition she was in when I found her. Now, she’s nearly healed. She’s not completely human.”

  “Bha!” Pappolus snapped. “Good God, woman, I had thought you superior to your sex in trusting reason above the spider’s web of superstitions that bind most women hand and foot. Besides, I told you: sometimes it doesn’t work.”

  “Yes, but in this particular case, why not? The rest babbled of everything—loves, friends, plots, lust, greed, and a simply unbelievable amount of envy, jealousy, and downright hatred.”

  “Yes,” Pappolus replied. “Some of it real and a lot of it imaginary.”

  “But all she did was talk nonsense,” Lucilla snapped.

  “Nonsense that made my skin crawl,” Pappolus said. “Rose petals, pink and white like a fair woman’s skin, steeping in pools of blood. I understand she’s to be married. Well, marry her off. You’ll be rid of her.”

  “Now, who’s being superstitious?” Lucilla asked.

  “She could be a thing of nature. Many strange and dangerous things are thrown up by the real world. I have, after all, seen the giraffe while I studied on the b
anks of the Nile. Few more peculiar things exist than the giraffe. I was greatly impressed by it.

  “Besides, she may talk nonsense because her thoughts are nonsense. I’ve told you in the past, you judge other women by your own nobility of mind. Most are really very stupid. Some philosophers, as you know, saw them only as animals, like a cat or a cow that somehow acquired the power of speech. A fine horse or hound exceeds them in an ability to think abstractly and in the virtue of loyalty. A horse or hound will, as you know, serve or defend its master’s interest to its last breath. Whereas women, all too often, fail to show any appreciation for the benefits conferred on them by men. They defy their fathers, deceive their husbands, and demand completely unreasonable loyalty from their sons! Most unsatisfactory. Most,” he clucked. “Now, dear lady, if I may be so bold, I have another patron of distinction to wait upon. He has gout. I pray you give me leave to depart.”

  “By all means, go,” Lucilla said darkly.

  When Regeane heard the door close, she sat up and opened her eyes.

  “Ah,” Lucilla said, “I thought you were awake. I heard your breathing change when it became dark outside.”

  “You drugged me to learn my secrets,” Regeane said.

  “Not expertly enough, I fear,” Lucilla said. She directed an incandescent glare at the door through which the physician had departed. “Idiot. Did I not know that that imbecile develops a palsy of shivering at the mere thought of my displeasure, I would have him followed from my house by assassins. Probably do his ‘noble patron’ more good than his medicines.”

  “What did you want to know?” Regeane asked.

  “Where is Antonius?” Lucilla lifted the lamp she was holding higher so she could see Regeane’s face.

  “Hidden on the Campagna,” Regeane said. “I’ll tell you where, but I can’t be sure even you could find it.” She managed to meet Lucilla’s stare with a look of limpid innocence. From somewhere warm and bright, the wolf gave Regeane a stare of pure disgust.

  “Well,” Lucilla said. “Basil’s men certainly can’t. My sources tell me something—or someone—got him away from Basil last night and hid him so well that even all of Basil’s men combing the area close to the old shrine of Apollo couldn’t find him.”

  “Yes, well I can,” Regeane said.

  Lucilla walked to the door. She opened it to be sure no one was in the corridor. The hall was empty. In the distance, Regeane could hear the clatter of pots and pans and the sound of feminine laughter. Lucilla closed the door. This time, she bolted it from within.

  The only light in the room was cast by the alabaster dove lamp in Lucilla’s hand. The flame burned deep in the lamp, seen only through the translucent sides of the bird. It flickered and danced over the wick and oil, casting kaleidoscope shadows that fluttered against the walls.

  Lucilla placed the lamp on a low table near the bed. This left her face in shadow, her expression unreadable.

  Regeane could smell Lucilla’s body fear, an acrid smell so strong it almost made the wolf’s eyes tear. The odor was so powerful, Regeane could only remember smelling it being so overpowering once before—on a brigand captured on the Via Julia when she and her mother were entering Rome. He was being conducted out of the city by soldiers. They were going to execute him. Lucilla had to be desperate.

  “What do you want?” Regeane asked.

  “It’s time for Antonius to die,” Lucilla whispered out of the darkness.

  “I’m not a murderer,” Regeane said.

  “You don’t have to be,” Lucilla said.

  Regeane realized the reason Lucilla was whispering was because she was panting. She sounded as if she couldn’t get her breath.

  “What do you want me to do, then?” Regeane asked.

  “Take him the poison. And … and.” Lucilla’s breaths increased in rapidity. She sounded almost like a spent animal.

  “And?” Regeane prompted.

  “And tell him I sent it. He will know what to do and how to do it.” Lucilla gave one last gasp.

  “The choice of life or death is his,” Regeane said.

  Lucilla didn’t answer. She sank down next to Regeane on the bed.

  “Very well,” Regeane replied. “I will do as you ask. I will wish a reward.”

  Lucilla said, “Naturally,” with a negligent wave of her hand. Her head was bowed.

  “I will need help with the marriage contract,” Regeane said. “I want it written to give me a separate residence, my own servants.”

  “And bodyguard—men-at-arms you can pay and who are correspondingly loyal,” Lucilla added.

  “You are clever,” Regeane commented.

  Lucilla smiled. A dreadful smile, Regeane thought. A smile the ghastly-faced woman must use in place of tears or madness.

  “Is that what I am?” Lucilla asked.

  The wolf turned away, afraid, her hackles up.

  “God knows what happened last night. I certainly don’t,” Lucilla whispered. “You vanished. You simply vanished. One minute Basil was after you with his sword, the next … nothing. But Basil’s men were screaming and, by the amount of blood, wounded when they ran.”

  When Regeane made no response, Lucilla gave her an appraising glance. “How I would love to get that fool Charles here. We’d hear no more of mountain lords. He’d want to plunder your blossom himself. At least for the first time. I could plant you at the Frankish court as a friend of Hadrian’s. You would be a wealthy woman, powerful, able to engage in any nefarious activities you …”

  The wolf didn’t listen. She was far away. She’d found the morning. The sun was hot on her face. She was walking at the top of a hill. The countryside was open, a parkland. The grass at her feet was low, not lush, but still rich, though tufted and coarse.

  Many small trees were scattered across the hills. They had thick, deeply ridged bark, and small, feathery green leaves. They, and the grass, still flashed with the scattered diamonds of morning dew. Birdsong rang out all around her. The wind’s voice rose and fell in her ears. Now a ragged fluttering followed by a rasp as it visited undergrowth and the tree trunks, then fading away into a sigh.

  The wolf lifted her head. The hills rolled away into the distance. Green at first, the closest ones, then hazy pale blue until they reached the edge of the world at the horizon’s rim.

  “Now go and bathe,” Lucilla’s voice intruded. “We will dine together and take the poison to Antonius.”

  Regeane rose and went in search of the baths. She bathed, and when she stepped out of the pool, she found two of Lucilla’s maids waiting for her. They dressed her in a chiton. A Greek garment of great beauty that draped over her slender form. It hung straight down to the floor in soft folds.

  Lucilla’s maids offered her jewels. This required more thought. At length, Regeane selected an antique necklace of silver and pearls. The links were large, the metal very soft. She could dent it with her fingernail. Gold sandals were laced to her feet and a gold fillet bound her hair.

  She realized she was being dressed for Lucilla’s pleasure when she looked at herself in the mirror. The soft, tightly woven linen was almost transparent. Not quite, but almost. It showed the pink breast tips and the dark pubic triangle.

  One of the maids showed her how to undo the girdle at the waist and the two clasps at the shoulders. This would allow the chiton to fall around her feet.

  Regeane asked to see Elfgifa, and was conducted to a small, comfortable chamber. Elfgifa was sleeping curled in a tangle of knees and elbows. She looked like a grimy little ball. It appeared as if she might have spent the afternoon playing in the garden. A few tendrils of soft, blond hair curled on her forehead. Regeane brushed them aside and kissed her gently.

  The maid who shared Elfgifa’s chamber was a stout, motherly woman with graying hair. “I was Antonius’ nurse once,” she told Regeane. “We haven’t had a child in the house for some time. I miss them.”

  “What do you think? Did she take any great harm from her captivity?”
Regeane asked.

  “No,” the woman said. “I don’t think so. She is, as she claims, gently bred. Despite her sometimes hoydenish ways, she is very mannerly and obedient. Always has a ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ for everyone waiting on her. She has been a bit indulged. She says her mother died before she can remember her. Her father did not care to marry again. I believed he cherished the child. She worships him. He must be wild with grief. I hope he can be reunited with her as soon as possible. Theirs is a cruel separation.”

  Regeane nodded.

  “So tender, and she is not even your own.” Lucilla was a dark shape in the doorway. “Imagine how you would love her if she were your own.”

  Regeane didn’t answer. The maidservant made as if to squeeze past Lucilla.

  “Fausta!” Lucilla said to the woman. “You loved him as much as I did. Don’t abandon me to my grief.”

  “My lady,” Fausta said softly, “years ago my family took me to the slave dealer. My mother wept while my father bargained for the best price. I was but thirteen years old. They saw my sister as the beauty who would ensnare a husband. My brother as a strong back to work the land. In me, the purchase of a new bullock. You took me from the slave dealer because you said I had a kind face. I helped you bring up your son. Everything good in my life has come from you. I have loved him. I have loved you. But no one in the world loves Antonius as you do. If he finds his death tonight, so will you. Don’t ask me to betray either of my loves. You are not the only one in mourning.” After so speaking, she slipped away softly, taking the lamp and leaving only darkness behind her.

  Once the light distracting her eyes was gone, Regeane found she could see quite well. The wolf was present.

  Lucilla’s face was blank with shock. She was trembling.

  The wind was flowing into the casement, blowing Lucilla’s scent away from Regeane. She was glad. Even the wolf didn’t find the atmosphere Lucilla walked in interesting.

  “Your son, Lucilla?” Regeane asked. “Your son?”

  Lucilla didn’t answer. “I’ll go bathe now. I will meet you in the dining room. And … I cannot bear any more discussion of the matter. My decision is made. Did I not love Fausta, I would put her out on the street tomorrow to beg her bread on church steps and spend her old age sheltering in doorways from the rain.”