Page 10 of Brother at Arms

The children transferred their attention from me and the stranger to Cassia, tugging at her hands. She sank down to speak to them, fond of Marcella’s unruly horde.

I led Lucius into the house’s large square courtyard of packed earth, where the animals came in for the night and Marcella stored anything she needed. Her stove and oven were also here, so the cooking smoke could escape to the open sky.

After dark, the stout gate was shut and bolted, keeping the world at bay. Only a siege engine could have breached the barrier, which Xerxes had built and I now fortified from time to time.

Marcella and Fabricia had retreated into the living quarters, which consisted of one large, low-ceilinged room on the ground floor, with a staircase to a loft where Marcella and the children slept. Fabricia and Marcella were setting bowls onto the long table in the middle of the room when we entered.

I held Lucius back at the door, while Cassia and the other children surged around us into the house.

Marcella pretended to ignore me and Lucius as she set down bowls, laying spoons beside them. Finally, she turned from the table, pushed straggling hair from her face, and approached.

When she halted in front of Lucius, Marcella went very, very still. Her throat worked and her eyes moistened with sudden tears that she blinked away.

“You are very like him,” Marcella announced, with barely a catch in her voice. “But not quite the same.”

“I am a year older,” Lucius said. “He married you, did he? My brother grew up to have remarkably good taste.”

Marcella’s mouth tightened. “Not quite married.”

The oldest son, a lad called Ennius, popped around Marcella’s sheltering body. At nine years old, he already bore a legginess that said he’d match his father in height.

He stared at Lucius in both curiosity and some belligerence. Ennius was conscious of his place as oldest male of the family, which meant he considered himself obligated to defend his mother and younger siblings.

Lucius gaped down at him. “Jove and Juno,” he whispered.

“What is it?” I asked, moving protectively toward Ennius.

“He is so like Manius. When I last saw my brother, he looked like this, exactly.”

Ennius continued to stare at him, and Lucius’s eyes flooded with sudden tears. He put his hand over his face and abruptly turned his back.

Marcella didn’t move. She’d not trust him until she knew him further, and neither would I. Neither of us attempted to comfort him.

Cassia, who’d begun helping Marcella set things on the table, was the one who went to Lucius and laid a hand on his shoulder.

“It is difficult to lose family,” Cassia said in true sympathy.

Lucius’s back quivered, then he wiped his eyes and raised his head. “I lost him so very long ago, when we were both as young as this lad. I never saw Manius again.”

“Who is Manius?” Ennius asked in confusion.

“Your father, dear boy,” Lucius answered, clearing his clogged throat. “That was his true name, the one I knew him by.”

Ennius shook his head. “Our dad was called Xerxes.”

“Xerxes was who he’d become when I met him,” Marcella stated firmly. “He told me the name he was given at birth, but he’d forgotten Manius years ago.”

Lucius let his gaze rove the large room and collected children. “I am pleased my brother found such a life. Landed on his feet, I’d say. So like him.”

“He did not land on his feet.” Marcella’s tone told us she did not like Lucius claiming he knew her husband better than she did. “He was a gladiator, a slave. He died for that.”

Marcella turned her back on him and headed for the table, joining Cassia in laying out round loaves of bread.

“Poor woman,” Lucius murmured to me. “I did not mean to offend her.” His words held distress.

I shrugged and motioned to the table. Marcella was not a woman who made herself agreeable to please others. She had a heart as large as Campania, but this did not mean she was soft or weak.

“Mum is always testy when someone talks about Dad,” Ennius confided in us. “Except for Leonidas. He can talk about Dad all he likes.”