The Strength of the Few by James Islington - 9

THE TELIMUSES’ CATEN ESTATE ECHOES, a hollow shell, in the predawn light that drifts through the atrium roof. Torches crackle around us. I grit my teeth at an artistic interpretation of Etrius on the wall opposite as I sit, naked to the waist in the chill, while Kadmos unwinds the bandage around my chest. The stringy-haired Dispensator is gentle. It still hurts.

“You really should not be here.” Kadmos says it mostly to himself, another version of something he’s already muttered several times since he let me in.

“Sorry to inconvenience you.”

“You know what I mean.” He snaps it, though his annoyance isn’t at the mild joke. “This isn’t some cut you can just ignore, Master Vis. You need rest. You should have been forced to rest.”

“Would you have let them, in my position?”

The portly man accedes with a reluctant twist of his mouth. The last of the stained cloth strips fall away and Kadmos bends, studying the raw stump.

“You said this happened a week ago?”

“Eight days.” I note his frown. “What is it?”

“Nothing.” He hesitates, then carefully pushes at it with a finger. “Pain?”

“A little.” It’s tender, certainly, but not especially so.

“Hm.” Kadmos’s brow crinkles and he brushes a strand of limp black hair from his eyes, probing again. “Here?”

“Same.”

He lets go. Leans back, obviously puzzled this time.

I give him a pointed look.

“It’s healed more than I would have expected.” He’s evidently confused, but eventually shrugs. “Better is better, I suppose. How is your balance?”

“Improving.” I’ve spent every spare second in private since the Necropolis on my feet. Walking. Jogging. Jumping. Testing myself, pushing myself. I fell over a lot, at the beginning. I rarely do anymore.

“Good,” Kadmos murmurs thoughtfully. He applies some ointment and starts on a clean bandage. “I hear you’re going to the Aurora Columnae after this.”

It’s not as if I’d forgotten, but a renewed rush of sick anticipation forces me to take a moment before I respond. “Yes.”

Kadmos nods carefully. “And then you are to work for Governance.”

“I had to go where I thought I could make a difference.”

“That is all any of us can do, Master Vis,” the Dispensator says quietly. “But I hope you will remain a Telimus, regardless.”

I shuffle. “I cannot imagine Ulciscor will be particularly keen for that to happen.”

“Ask, Master Vis, if you wish it to be so. Ask anyway.” He keeps bandaging. “I have known your father all his life. He is prone to mistakes and fixation and rash decisions, but he does care for you.”

“He’s not my father.” I regret it as soon as it comes out. Petty and small and stupid, knowing how it will hurt only Kadmos here. Still. Ulciscor’s betrayal in making me run the Labyrinth is a bitterness that has only feasted on events since. Without that, I still have my arm. Without Ulciscor’s obsession, I maybe still have my friend.

Kadmos pauses in his ministrations. He looks at me and there is sadness rather than anger in his gaze. Wisps of smoke from the nearby torch drift between us.

“I sometimes forget that you are still young, Master Vis,” he says softly. “Ulciscor may not be the one that you want. But fathers rarely are.”

I say nothing to that, letting silence speak my gratitude to his kind reaction. I remember him talking about his own father, once. A hard man. Loving, I gathered, but hard . Unappreciative of Kadmos’s evident academic talents. The Dispensator’s experience growing up in Sytrece was so very different from my own.

“Thank you for doing this,” I say eventually. The stringy-haired man could well have refused to see me, after the schism I’ve caused by choosing to join Governance over Military.

He snorts. “You are a Telimus,” he says by way of dismissal, squeezing me gently on my other shoulder and standing. “Let me prepare you some tea before the ceremony, too. It would not do to have Catenicus stumble with the eyes of the city upon him.”

“Thank you, but no. Not today, Kadmos.”

He pauses. Frowns his surprise. “Your recovery is remarkable, young master—I was expecting to insist that you not attend this morning—but you cannot tell me you are not still in pain.”

I lock gazes with him. “I can’t. But not today.”

His brow’s still furrowed, but he nods slowly. Despite his own acceptance of the Aurora Columnae, I think he understands.

“Perhaps before your Placement exam for Governance, then, at least?” he says eventually. I told him about that a little earlier.

I nod. Placement could be months away, but it’s still a good idea. Any way to mitigate my disadvantage on those tests, I should take. “If you give me the recipe—”

“You can come by when it’s time.”

“Alright.” I give a half smile to show I didn’t really think he would. He’s refusing out of care, has always warned me against leaning too heavily on his concoction. And we both know that giving a way to make it to a man in my position, with my injury, is needlessly tempting.

Before Kadmos can respond there’s motion to the side, and Ulciscor fills the doorway. His pristine white toga is slashed with purple, formal attire befitting what’s to come this morning, identical to my own except the colouring. A trio of young Octavii slip through behind him carrying filled plates and glasses, setting them on the table with practiced precision before scurrying off again. Ulciscor doesn’t pay them any mind, but nor does he speak until they’ve vanished.

“Kadmos. All’s well?” He ignores me.

“Yes, Dominus. Our boy is recovering splendidly.”

Ulciscor quirks a half smile at the affection in Kadmos’s voice, which is no doubt at least partly an attempt to thaw the sudden chill in the room. “Good. If you could check in on Lanistia, too?” He makes a small motion, indicating his head.

Kadmos frowns worriedly and nods, giving me a last, encouraging glance before leaving us alone. The only sound is the fountain burbling in the atrium’s triangular pool as we seat ourselves at the table.

“Is Lanistia alright?” Not how I intended to open the conversation, but there was evident concern in both Ulciscor’s voice and Kadmos’s response.

“Headaches. More than a week, now. They seemed particularly bad this morning. Still insisted on coming today, of course.” His delivery is odd. Not awkward, exactly, but certainly less comfortable than I’m used to from him. He reaches over and pours me some watered-down wine before doing the same for himself. “Now. We only have a few minutes before we need to leave, but let’s at least get started. Tell me what happened at the Iudicium.”

I take a sip, then carefully set the cup next to me and meet his gaze. “No.”

“No?” Ulciscor’s expression darkens.

“First there are things we need to discuss. Things I want to make clear. The most important of which is that I am here because I choose to be. You no longer dictate my movements. You no longer give me orders. You have no hold over me, and I owe you nothing.” I thought a lot about how to approach this, on the Transvect here last night. Smart man though he is, Ulciscor is still a Magnus Quintus. He can’t just know I’m no longer pliable. He needs to be shown .

“Nothing? I took you from an orphanage and gave you the name of one of the most powerful families in the world. Nothing? You’d be cowering in some hole or in a Sapper right now, if not for me.” Ulciscor sneers his surprised response.

“You sent me to die.”

“I sent you to find out—”

“YOU SENT ME TO DIE!” I roar the words. Abrupt and violent. Stand and swipe my near-full cup from the table next to me, sending it shattering across the floor. “You valued your dead brother’s reputation over my life!” A step forward. “Because of you, I lost a gods-damned arm!” Another step. I’m pointing at him. Hand trembling. “Because of you, I had to make decisions that ended with my friend DYING!”

Planned though the outburst is, there’s no need to fake my fury.

Ulciscor’s still seated. Shocked, I think, before he recovers enough for his own anger to respond. Broad frame looming as he rises, eyes blackening. “You think you can speak to me like this in my own house? I am a Magnus Quintus.”

“I don’t care. I never cared.” I don’t back down, but eventually I take a breath and look to the side as if calming myself. Deescalating. “I will tell you what happened, Ulciscor. I will tell you what I know because to not would be petty and cruel. And after that? I think we may still have reason for an alliance. But it will be an alliance , this time, if we choose that path. Equal footing. No more orders.”

There’s grim silence as I lock eyes with him again. The illusion of power too often becomes power, my father used to say. I cannot let Ulciscor believe he has even the faintest remaining hold over me.

I can see him weighing my words, my actions, as wine spreads across the mosaic like blood. He still thinks of me as the hot-tempered youth he saw fight in the Theatre, but I’ve come a long way since Letens. My fame means I could survive losing the Telimus name; if anything, my defection to Governance would make disinheriting me an expected move. And others would rush to fill the void.

An eternity later, Ulciscor nods. Curt but resigned. The scales of our relationship shift.

“Which one of you is being the idiot this time?”

Both of us turn and I summon a genuine grin at the sight of the lithe woman entering the atrium. Lanistia’s familiar dark glasses flash at me, reflecting the dawn’s intrusion past the hanging plants and into the courtyard. She’s more elegantly dressed than I think I’ve ever seen her be.

My smile slips a little as she approaches. She looks distinctly wan.

“Lanistia!” I move to embrace her but she stops a distance away, uncharacteristic uncertainty in the motion. I falter. “It’s good to see you.”

Ulciscor looks at her worriedly. “Did Kadmos—”

“He did. I’m fine.” Her usual, vaguely reassuring brusqueness in the response. “Don’t we have a ceremony to get to?”

Ulciscor’s mouth twists, and he exchanges a glance with me but we both just nod. He knows as well as I do the benefit of arguing with her.

“You can tell us what happened on the way there,” he says to me, gesturing to the door. “After, we can talk.”

Lanistia leads us out. She glances over her shoulder as we exit the villa into Caten’s cobblestone streets, which are already seeing plenty of bustle. “It’s good to see you too, Vis.”

We head for the Aurora Columnae.