Azanties noticed Marcus shaking his head. "Something troubles you?"

"I see they have speed, and their shallow drafts will be useful for river travel. But in the ocean . . . and the weight distribution of cannons in battle . . . "

"They would not use the cannons in battle, young man. They are intended only for transport. For rivers and ocean travel and war alike we have other ships. Ironships. Please pardon me if I wish to keep their locations hidden."

Marcus' anger and dizziness finally sliced through his mask and staggered him backward; a handy oak tree kept him from tumbling completely. "What have you done?" he whispered, then louder, "What have you done, Quintillius?"

Silence faced him—even the Northmen refrained from growling.

"What devil possessed you?" the young general continued. "What bargain did you make to create all—all of—this? What do you plan to do with it, attack Rome? Take the Empire for yourself after you're finished with this one? Why else would you be so desperate to protect your secrecy?" He straightened and his eyes flared. "I will make it back to Rome. I will tell Caesar about this Terra Ambrosia of yours, about your steamships and new weapons, and he will stomp you into the earth before you can ever dream of moving eastward!"

Quintillius stepped forward calmly like a single cloud drifting in a darkening twilight.

"And salt our fields, and poison our wells?" the older general asked. "Rome would find that more difficult than you think. And you must realize by now that we are not completely out of touch with the world—"

"I've already reasoned that you have spies on the other side of the Atlanticus."

"Name them what you will. But they—we—have no intentions of doing the Empire harm. Some collect news of Rome's doings for our own survival—how we discovered that Maxentius permitted your expedition here. We wish to know Rome's view of the war's progress rather than just the Northmen's. And—"

He leaned forward tiredly, white hair gleaming in the starlight and showing every bit of his sixty-eight years and then some.

"Marcus, most here remember Rome. The majority of us consider ourselves Ambrosians rather than Romans, but still have loved ones across the sea. We wish to know how they fare even if we cannot reveal our survival."

That instant, Marcus and Quintillius were the only two men in Terra Ambrosia, confronting one another with exhaustions born of vastly different mothers.

"What would you have of me?" the younger man snapped. "To live in your little province forever? Be your subject, Gaius Julius? I tell you again—best you have me killed now, for I will try to escape."

Quintillius raised his head, strength returned, eyes burning more fiercely than Marcus even remembered in the general's youth. "Yes, you will try. And if you succeed, Marcus, if you do—you will tell Maxentius about us. Inform him that we know the Empire is faltering, crumbling from within and without. Tell Caesar that Terra Ambrosia could be an extraordinarily cooperative ally to Rome. But we shall never, never be Rome's subjects."

Marcus stalked in a daze back to Quintillius' villa, his mind coming to only when the gardens' aroma overwhelmed him.

You are no Roman, he chastised himself. A Roman would free his men and fight to get home or die trying. Xenophon led ten thousand Greeks across the harshest country while surrounded by enemies. Then again, Marcus had only twelve men and Xenophon hadn't needed to cross the entire Oceanus.

His eyes shot skyward hoping for stars and some hint of his fate, but caught only the luminescent green bird gazing at him from over the path. It leaped from its branch with wings beating so fast they were only blurs, then flew toward the villa again. Marcus followed.

Much of that last night would be as blurry as the strange bird's wings.

He was aware of another pair of hands helping him undress and easing him into bed, but the tired haze corroding his thoughts prevented any alarm being raised, convinced him it must simply be one of Quintillius' slaves—free servants, the old man still insisted. Indeed, the hands were soft and feminine and applied salve to his wounds. She chanted liquid words again and again like a slow whirlpool pulling Marcus irresistibly into sleep. Light glittered just above his eyes, and then, "You must not go to sleep, Roman."

A dagger cut through the haze and Three Rivers hovered her necklaces over him in gradually widening circles. "You must not sleep." Her tone carried promise and menace on the same breeze.

"Or else?" he whispered. He felt nothing. No anger that she invaded his bedroom; likewise no lust for an obviously magnificent body under the supple deerskin. No spirit to fight against his wounds; no fear that sleep could mean slipping into death. His heart was a colorless balance where a single word could alter the weave of his fate in any direction.

"Quintillius is waiting for me to make a move," Marcus realized. But even so knowing, Marcus knew he would move—one way or another—regardless.

"He waits. As do they all, the Northmen and the Skraeling nations. Where they move next will be around you, Roman. Are you a dead tree to be washed away in their river, or a stone they may flood over but never move?"

"And you? Are you waiting for me?"

"I have seen Terra Ambrosia. Now I will see Rome."

Her dark eyes bore through him. He was finally aware of his own nudity but felt no self-consciousness—and again, no lust. He felt certain his body was nothing more to her than the vessel of his soul, and it was his complete and unhidden soul she desired of him at this moment.

"Why Rome?" he finally asked.

"My people are many but scattered across the plains. My family has dreamed of strangers from across the sea for many generations. As have I. When Ambrosians first came to the us three springs ago, I knew these were the beings from our dreams. There are few of you here now, but we know you are more in the eastern lands than stars in the sky. I must fit them into my visions."

"You've seen the Ambrosians," Marcus said, "and now you want to determine if Rome is a threat."

"Or a friend. You will change us, next year if not this, the year after that if not next year. We can do nothing about that. But we would see if you will be wind in the grass, bending us and then passing away, or a storm that rips the earth and leaves it desolate."

"Rome is . . . far."

"If you will trust me, I can teach you to fly."

Marcus scowled. "How will you prove I can trust you?"

"I will tell you my secret name. My magic name." She whispered it, and Marcus knew somehow that it was the name of the iridescent green bird from the gardens.

She placed her palms on his cheeks and turned her eyes on him. Dizziness came first, nausea a heartbeat later, and then the world spun away.