Household Gods

He stopped, swaying, and blinked at her. “Mistress Umma?” he said doubtfully, as if he wasn’t sure he knew her.

One of his eyes had a large pupil, the other a small. Concussion. “Gaius,” Nicole said sharply, hoping the sound of his name would help him focus. “What hit you?”

“I don’t know.” His voice was vague. He winced. “I have an awful headache.” He peered down at his right hand, and opened his eyes wide in surprise. “Where did my sword go?”

“I don’t know,” Nicole said. Maybe he’d dropped it when he got hurt. If he had, he was probably lucky. The Germans would have been sure to set upon an armed man, where an unarmed one might be – appeared to have been – a figure of fun. “Where have you been all this time?”

“Wandering, I suppose,” he said, still in that dreamy, foggy tone. “I only remembered where I live a little while ago.”

Nicole nodded. Concussion indeed. She didn’t want to bring him into the tavern; no telling what her unwelcome guests might decide to do. She pointed him toward the door of his own shop. “Go in there. Go upstairs. Lie down, but don’t go to sleep. You might not wake up. I’ll come and check in on you as soon as I can.”

He started to nod, then stopped with another wince. A small hiss of pain escaped him. “I’ll do that.” He hesitated, then added, “We lost, didn’t we?”

The legionary’s corpse still lay in the street, though Germans had stolen his sword and armor. The body of Antonina’s husband sprawled not far from it. There were no dead Germans. All of those were alive, well, and roaring their way through a drinking song behind her.

“Yes, “ Nicole said dryly in a lull between verses. “We lost.”

“I thought so,” he said. He looked around a little more alertly than before. “What happens now?”

“I don’t know.” Nicole took a deep breath. If it struck him as normal to stand in the middle of the street talking about the fall of Carnuntum, and with no fear of the enemy either – maybe, after all, it wasn’t invariably fatal to be an adult male in a conquered city – then he was still sufficiently fuddled to be in need of a keeper. She turned him bodily and pointed him toward his own door. “Don’t worry about it now. Just go in, go upstairs, but remember: try to stay awake. Julia or I will check on you as soon as we can.”

He didn’t argue with her, which was also an indication that he wasn’t quite right. He went where she directed him, into his shop. She heard the slide of the bar in the door, and drew a sigh of relief. Some of his wits were scrambled, but some still worked. If he could keep from falling asleep in the next few – minutes, she decided; she’d send Julia over right away, and make her stay there. Julia’s methods of keeping him from falling into a coma might not be exactly family fare, but if they worked, Nicole didn’t care.

But first, as long as Nicole was out, there was one more thing that needed doing. Her stomach crunched at the thought of it. But who else was there?

She slipped back into the tavern. Nobody appeared to notice her. They were all either drowning in the beer that was holding out now the wine was gone, or snoring on the tables or between the stools.

Julia was still standing behind the bar. She greeted Nicole with a look of joy that stabbed Nicole with guilt, but the guilt would be worse if Nicole didn’t do this second errand. Nicole spoke as softly as she could and still be heard: “Will you be all right here by yourself for a little while? I have to check on poor Antonina.”

Julia’s face fell, but she kept her chin up regardless. “I suppose it will be all right,” she said. “If they were going to throw us down and do what they did to her, they’d have done it by now.”

Lucius had gone upstairs not long before Gaius Calidius Severus found his way home. None of the Germans had given him any trouble. One of them had picked up his wooden sword from the floor, thwacked him on the bottom with it, not very hard, then handed it to him. The German had laughed, even when he glared, and called him something in German that got Lucius a round of salutes. He’d kept Lucius by him for a while, plying him with walnuts and coaxing him until finally, unwillingly, he smiled. Then the German let him go. The man was still there, still eating walnuts, swapping war stories with a tableful of his fellows. There was no scarlet brand on his forehead, nothing to mark him as rapist or murderer. He was rather ordinary, really. Shave him, cut his hair, dress him in jeans and a shirt, and he’d be just another big blond guy in a bar.

Nicole knew better. She slipped out of the tavern again and walked warily down the street to Antonina’s house. When she was out in front taking care of Calidius Severus, it had been one thing; she’d been in sight of the tavern, and under Swemblas’ protection. Antonina lived just far enough to be out of reach if another barbarian happened by, and happened to be hungry for blood or a woman or both.

But no one accosted her. The street was deserted. She made it safely to the door, and knocked.