Free Night of the Wolf by Alice Borchardt Page B

cones tipped with strawberry nipples, as her eyes covertly searched for signs of the watcher.
    Nothing, nothing she could see. The light was bright now, the water a pale, blue, wavering curtain falling from above, boiling into lacy foam in the pool.
    For a moment, just for a moment, the water took on the outline of a woman’s body as if it flowed over an invisible she standing in the sheeting flow.
    Dryas’ breath caught in her throat, then the illusion, if illusion it was, faded. She saw the ears on a rock ledge near the top where the waterflow plunged over. Ears, two pointed ones, pricked as if their possessor was absorbed in the view.
    Yes, he had come. But Dryas remembered the woman’s form outlined before her.
Something,
she thought,
someone doesn’t want me to succeed.
     
    The Romans came . . .
    She was high up on the hill, harvesting flax with an iron sickle. He lounged on his belly in the shade of a broken pine. It was late summer and the scratchy tunic protected his human skin from the burrs clustering thickly in the dried grass.
    She lifted the sheaves of flax, throwing them across rocks exposed to the sun where they could dry out and be ready for retting in a pond at the foot of the cliff.
    She stood, sickle in hand, looking down at the rath below. She wiped sweat from her brow, then shook out her hair clinging at the neck, temples, and forehead, wet with perspiration.
    The wolf saw her face change.
    “No,” she whispered, and threw down the sickle.
    He reacted without thinking. On his feet in a split second, he had one massive arm around her waist and the other covering her mouth so she couldn’t scream.
    Riding up to the farmhouse below were three of Caesar’s light cavalry and one officer. The wolf didn’t know it at the time, but the officer was careless and sloppy. The troopers carried their weapons, but wore no armor and were without their shields. A cart, with the horse led by a woman camp follower, brought up the rear.
    Kat and her mother were working in the farmyard. The troopers herded the women to one side and began robbing the granary at the back of the house, filling improvised bags made from clothing and such cloth as they found inside.
    Imona bit Maeniel’s arm. He ignored her, but slid his arm back and placed his hand over her mouth. She kicked and squirmed.
    Leon came out. He shambled over to Imona’s loom and stood quietly. Des arrived on the run, but stopped when he reached his wife, and made no attempt to interfere with the foreigners.
    When they’d loaded up the grain, the troopers began going after the livestock, tying chickens and ducks by the legs and throwing them over the high wooden sides of the cart.
    Imona stopped struggling. Maeniel removed his hand from her mouth. “Be quiet,” he told her, “or I’ll knock you out. You can’t help them. All your running down there will do is get you into trouble.”
    One of the troopers hurried toward the pig wallow. One of the sows was suckling a litter. He jumped the fence and snatched up two of the piglets, then leaped back as the sow reared up to defend her litter.
    They whooped with laughter when the trooper, piglet under each arm, cleared the fence with the infuriated sow on his heels.
    The laughter ended with shouts of astonishment as the sow charged the fence and it splintered. The trooper put on a burst of speed. The sow was really dangerous.
    His two fellow soldiers spread out on either side, Roman cavalry spears at the ready.
    The first cast his, but missed. The second made a run at the sow, but she was too fast for him and the spear skidded harmlessly along her ribs.
    The still-mounted officer swore savagely and leaped to the ground.
    At that moment, the trooper carrying the piglets looked back. He tripped and fell. The piglets let out almost human shrieks of terror and pain as they went flying from his arms.
    The sow was a vicious four-hundred-pound juggernaut, saliva spraying from a tusked mouth with teeth that could