The Commander was on a tree facing his two subordinates. The undergrowth which might have interfered with the view was gone, trampled down or hacked away. The shimmering filter of air before the guild officer’s face was studded with sweat like that of a human. When he moaned, the droplets shuddered and occasionally splashed down onto his suit where they vanished in the fabric.
A number of the soldiers had gleefully helped, but no one had disputed Niger’s right to drive home the daggers that pinioned the Commander to what had been part of the luxury in which the guild kept him.
His arms were outstretched, and his fingers twitched beneath their blue covering. The daggers by which he supported his upper body had been driven through his wrists, where the network of sinews and bone could accept a strain that would have torn apart the lighter structure of his palms and let his torso slump forward.
The Commander’s legs were flexed sharply at the knees and turned to his right side. His feet had been drawn up to provide a cushion of sorts for his buttocks. Then the third spike had been hammered through both heelbones and deep into the wood beneath.
The slight, blue-clad figure was alive and would remain alive for a considerable time before shock or suffocation carried him off. The blood which dripped with spittle from the corner of his mouth was only from the way he bit himself while gnashing his teeth in agony.
“What’s your Federation going to do with you,” said Clodius Afer, his voice harsh but no longer shouting, “that’s going to be worse than that?”
The Commander whimpered.
“You don’t understand,” said the Medic who was closing his eyes tight and then reopening them, not blinking but more an unconscious attempt to wring visible reality into a more acceptable guise. He was almost whispering, but he got somewhat better control of himself when Vibulenus looked back at him.
“You’ve been gone,” the crewman explained, “not the time you’ve been awake on the ship or on the ground, but all the time the ship’s in Transit, too. Do you understand? You haven’t been home for thousands of your years. There isn’t any home left for you.”
Quartilla stroked the tribune’s back, her touch sensuous, this time for its power rather than its delicacy. “Yes,” she said in answer to the question her lover has not needed to ask aloud. “He’s telling —”
She paused to rephrase. “He’s not lying.”
Existence was sand, rushing down a slope to bury the soul of Gaius Vibulenus Caper in tiny, harsh realities. Everything they had fought for, everything he had promised these men who trusted him —
He had promised them a chance to live free and live as men. Whatever else home might be was less important than that.
“We never thought it would be the same,” Vibulenus said. His voice stirred echoes even from the rough boles of the synthetic trees. “It wouldn’t have been the same if we’d marched back from Parthia with all the loot of Ctesiphon in our baggage — home would have changed, and we would have changed even more.”
“All right,” said the Pilot in a voice like twigs snapping. “Cut me loose and I’ll take you to what you think your home is.”
Quick hands moved, anticipating Vibulenus’ nod of assent.
“I warn you, cargo,” said the Pilot as his face worked against new pain as his injuries were jogged. “You don’t understand what you’re doing.”
“Perhaps we don’t, guild crewman,” said Gaius Vibulenus. His right hand and those of his two centurions gripped each other in a knot as tight as that which Alexander cut at Gordion, and the soft warmth of Quartilla beside him was hope itself.
“But we understand that we are Romans.”
THE END