Free Conqueror by Stephen Baxter Page A

So I was brought to the church, to be paraded before supporters of Theodoric’s case.’
    ‘And you must return in three days.’
    Macson studied his hand. ‘If the wound is healing I must be innocent, for God protects the good, and I will go free. But if the wound is festering it is because of the corruption of my inner heart.’
    Belisarius shook his head. ‘These Germans call themselves Christians, but such a ritual has more of the pagan about it.’
    ‘How true,’ Macson said. ‘And how good it is to be able to converse in a civilised tongue.’
    Belisarius, a hard-nosed trader, was immune to flattery. ‘Are you a slave, Macson?’
    ‘No,’ Macson said fiercely. ‘My father was born a slave, from a line of six generations of slaves. But we never forgot who we are. We are descended from a British woman called Sulpicia, who was raped by a German, or possibly a Norse. Her bastard child, neither British nor German nor Norse, was given up to slavery.’
    ‘Six generations? That’s a long time to hold a grudge.’
    ‘We remembered who we were, and what had been done to us. At last my father was able to purchase his freedom. Thanks to him I am free-born - the first since Sulpicia herself.’
    Belisarius, not much interested, merely nodded. ‘Then tell me this, free-born. Are you guilty?’
    Macson looked him in the eyes, and evidently calculated. ‘Yes. Yes, I am guilty. Theodoric is a fat, greedy fool who cut my pay. I stole food to keep my sick father alive. In your heart, do you believe that is a crime before God?’
    Belisarius stood up. ‘I know very little about God. I have paid for the room for the rest of the day. You should rest. Keep your wound clean, bathe it in more wine, and try not to damage the skin further.’ He turned to go.
    Macson, wincing as he moved his hand, struggled to his feet. ‘Wait. Please.’
    ‘I have business.’
    ‘I know. Perhaps I can help you.’
    Belisarius, used to dealing with chancers, could see that Macson, groggy with pain and opium, was nevertheless thinking fast. ‘You can buy my books at a better rate than Theodoric, can you?’
    ‘No, but I can take you to better customers.’
    ‘Who?’
    ‘The monks. Especially in the north and east. Some of those monasteries are remarkably rich, Belisarius, considering what an impoverished island this has always been. And as they try to stock their libraries the abbots will pay a good price for your books - that is, they will pay a good price to Theodoric, once he brings them the books he purchased from you, marking up a handsome profit in the process.’
    ‘And how would I reach these monks of the north?’
    ‘I will guide you,’ Macson wheedled. ‘The old roads are still good, in places. It is not so difficult, if you know the way.’
    ‘Britain is a hazardous country, of many nations—’
    ‘Four. The British, the Picts, the Irish, and the Germans.’
    ‘Even the German lands are full of squabbling minor kings; everybody knows that.’
    Macson shook his head. ‘For decades much of the German country has been under the sway of Offa of Mercia. The other German kings recognise him as bretwalda, over-king. He has brought a certain brutish calm to the island.’
    ‘Offa’s name is known on the continent.’
    ‘Then you see the wisdom.’
    Belisarius hesitated. What Macson said made a certain sense. Theodoric was a mere middleman, and an odious middleman at that. Would it do any harm to cut him out of the deal, just this once? Besides, he suspected there was something more than Macson was telling him - something Macson wanted out of this opportunity which had so fortuitously fallen into his lap. But what could it be?
    Belisarius was naturally inquisitive and adventurous; he would never have become a trader if he hadn’t been. And now his curiosity was piqued. To see more of this strange island, cut off from the Roman world for four hundred years, might make a good chapter in his memoirs of travel.
    Macson, shrewd