This damn chapter caused me more trouble than the previous ten combined. I had real difficulties over it. Oh and then there was also the fact that I resigned from my job because a) the bloody publication was on life support from the start, b) trying to find news for it was so hard that I was getting severely stressed and c) my wife has been diagnosed with osteoarthritis, meaning that it's better for me to be at home freelancing. So having just finished off a major and highly lucrative feature for a US magazine I went back to this chapter and lo and behold - no more problems! Normal service will now resume.
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Cato raged through the bowels of the fortress of Eboracum like a force of nature, questioning, querying, talking and in the case of one bewildered and drunk man, shaking until the wretched man fell to his knees and then threw up.
Some had seen Caecilius. Some had not. Some had seen a man who looked like him. Some had not. And some had seen someone who might have looked like him, but he’d been travelling too fast to tell for sure.
All Cato knew was that he was in a very bad mood. Caecilius. Caecilius the idiot. The man who was supposed to have been the spear-carrier for Beliatrix, if a slow one. He had played them all for fools. Not bad. And now he was gone, his quarters empty, probably running with more gold. He needed to track that bastard down, stick a knife against his throat and then a lot of questions.
He strode down a corridor, turned a corner – and then stopped dead. There was a junction up ahead and someone was standing there. Short, wearing a green cloak and with a large helmet. Oh, and he had a nocked bow and arrow in his hands, which he was pointing at someone. He strode towards him – and then as he approached he saw the other man. Caecilius. Who was the man being threatened with the bow and arrow. Excellent.
And then the man with the bow spoke and Cato froze. “Why did you kill my father? And how?” Oh. Oh. Not a man. Not a man at all. It was her.
He looked at the tip of the arrow and did his best not to sweat too much. Whoever she was – and what the hell was a woman doing here, in the bowels of the fortress? – she was holding that bow at full draw without any difficulty. While he was wearing a breastplate for protection it wouldn’t do him any good if that arrow went where it was being pointed right now, namely at his left eye. “Who are you?” he growled.
“You killed my father,” she repeated. Which was unhelpful.
“I’ve killed many people,” he hissed. “Who was your father?”
“Tortorius.”
He felt his eyes widen at that name. The name of the annoying little fool who had always avoided him, who always looked at him as if he seemed to suspect something but could never say what. Then he put the last pieces together. “Cottia.” He said the word in shock. She was supposed to be some spoilt only child, who had vanished weeks, no, months ago. She wasn’t supposed to be here, still less pointing a damn weapon at him!
“Yes, Cottia.” She smiled slightly and briefly. “Now – my father?”
He stared at her. All of a sudden he had very dry lips and he needed to find the nearest latrine. There had to be a way out of here, away from this crazy bitch with the bow. Unfortunately he had no doubt at all that if he reached for his dagger she would loose that arrow straight at his head. He’d seen what happened in such cases. The defender tended to die horribly.
“I thought that he died of a stomach complaint,” he said eventually, partly in a need to waste time and partly because he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
The slight creaking noise made by the bowstring as it was pulled a little further back was the kind of answer that he really didn’t want to hear. “The truth.” She said the two words through gritted teeth.
Cato took a slow step forwards. This had gone on for long enough. He didn’t know how in the name of hell Cottia had gotten to Eboracum (although he had some sudden suspicions) but enough was enough. Caecilius had to be taken into custody, He had to be questioned. They needed him to talk.
“Lucius Caecilius,” he said quietly, “You are under arrest, upon my authority as Legatus Legionis.”
To their credit neither jumped at his approach, although Caecilius seemed to shift from one display of tension to another. Cato watched him carefully. The man looked as if he was about to run – if he felt that he could. The man’s eyes flickered in his direction for a heartbeat. “Cato.” He said the word in a way that somehow managed to combine relief and dread.
“Cottia…” He said her name carefully. There was much that he wanted to ask her (such as how she had gotten here), but also much that did not want to be asked at that moment.
To her credit she never took her eyes off Caecilius. “Cato.”
“He needs to be captured and questioned. He has done much that needs to be answered for.”
The bow creaked slightly. “I want to hear from him about what he did to my father.”
Cato looked at the man. “And I want to hear from him about why he tried to foment civil war here. The fate of your father was just a part of this.”
Cottia’s eyebrows twitched at this, before coming down again as she scowled. “I want my revenge, Lucius,” she growled.
“You will get it, eventually. I swear it.”
Cottia smiled bitterly for a moment – and then she took a step back. Unfortunately Caecilius took that to mean that she was somehow taking her eye off her, because his hand flashed to the knife at his belt. This was a mistake. The bow came down in a flash and then it sang. The arrow sped across the corridor and embedded itself in the man’s shoulder, where the breastplate ended, forcing a moment of sudden shock as he stared at it, followed by a scream of pain.
Not that Cato cared about the pain that Caecilius must been feeling. He launched himself at the traitor, knocking him against the wall with a great clatter and then he drew his sword quickly and held it against the throat of the keening man as he reeled against the bricks. “Yield!” He roared the word so loudly that it echoed down the corridor.
Caecilius looked at him with a face wracked with a combination of agony and fear – and then the bow creaked again. “I yield,” he moaned.
“Relax that bowstring, Cottia,” Cato said with a grim smile. “He’ll tell us all that we want to know.” There was a long moment of silence, punctuated only by the gasps of pain coming from the wounded man, and then they heard the first clatter of hobnails on flagstones as soldiers rushed towards them. Only then did the bow slowly creak as the tension was gradually released. He relaxed slightly. Oh, this was going to be a fascinating set of conversations.