198 "And whal is that, Elder?"

Vaco belched and patted his pampered belly. "Lions and wolves are less greedy than other creatures. They are merely neighbors when well fed. Hungry is a different matter. Now, it is that I have dogs that are kept hungry all the time to bail wolves and a bear now and then."

"There is no gentling them," his nearest wife snickered.

"Would you put even your queen's hound against one of them?"

Dorelei wriggled bare toes in Rot's matted Hank as he worried a meaty shoulder bone in huge jaws. "Rof be gentled in Jesu as myself. But even Wolf prays not to meet him."

"Do even wolves pray, then?" Vaco laughed.

"When a sees Rof," Bredei attested through a mouthful.

"Be not a thing of hungry or fed, but-of-faith!"

Drust bounced to his feet. "Vaco, be Drust Dismas, hon- ored by Raven to carry the Chi-Rho. Hear me, as have been reborn in Jesu."

Annbrosius regarded him with a mixture of puzzle- ment and pity. "Patricius, how old is that boy? He looks a child."

"Ask the time in Eden," Padrec said easily. "He's closer to it than I."

"The magic of Jesu be no trick," Drust maintained.

"How many dogs dost speak of, Vaco?"

"Three there are."

"Let a come out."

"Against the queen's hound, and himself half asleep?"

"Against me."

Holy Jesu. Padrec choked on barley beer to mask his dismay. He saw Vaco's eyes narrow with a cruder interest.

"And what weapons?"

Drust drew his knife and handed it to Malgon, spread- ing his empty hands. Mother of God: Padrec glanced fur- tively at Dorelei, who seemed calm as Drust. None of fhain turned a hair at the suicidal recklessness. Guenloie even trilled her delight at the challenge.

"Drust be most beautiful among men. Be gentle with's poor hounds, husband."

"As lambs," he promised. "Let Padrec shrive me and hounds will sit at thy husband's foot and lick a's hand."

199.

Incredulous reaction murmured up and down the hall. "Boy-child," Vaco rumbled, "it is a braggart you are."

"Nae, be God in my heart as in Daniei's. Do not carry the Sign alone, do live in il. Will Vaco try't?"

One of Ambrosius' aides, moving up from the lower hall, bent down to whisper in his tribune's ear. "Sir, is that little savage mad?"

"Worse, a total Christian. I'd rather not see this."

Ambrosius leaned to Padrec. "Faith or not, this is folly.

Can't you stop it?"

"Not now. I know them."

The thing bothered Ambrosius most in that he fore- saw impediment to his mission. Negotiations were hard enough in tranquility. "Stop him, Patricius. Surely you fear tor him?"

Padrec looked strangely troubled. "I do. And perhaps to the measure I fear, my faith may be less than his.

They've not yet learned to ration faith, Tribune. Remem- ber Daniel."

"Fat lot of good that'll do."

"Who can say?" Padrec watched Drust as the proud boy led Guenloie out of the longhouse. "Rome has not all the words for faith."

Faith? To Ambrosius in his self-occupied youth, faith was something kept in a niche and trotted out for cere- mony; common sense was quite another. While the excited Venicones readied the contest, no one talked about any- thing else, nor would they for some time. and even his own men were wagering, giving long odds on the dogs.

Whatever the outcome, it took Vaco's mind off recruits.

Ambrosius would have to labor longer in this Venicone vineyard of misery.

From the open gate, he watched the boy Drust lead his tiny wife up the hill to a purpled smear of heather, where they began to remove the tittle clothing they wore.

"By the Bull of Mithras." Ambrosius turned away in consternation and discovered Padrec at his elbow, beam- ing at the distant lovers. "Do you see what they're doing up there?"

"Making love, I suppose."

"In the middle of the day? In the bare open like dogs?"

200 "Or Eden," Padrec suggested. "Ii puts his spirit at peace, opens it to happiness and God. I will shrive him, but Guenloie first. It, shocked me once, loo. The accep- tance is all."

"Rot." Ambrosius felt his sophistication had been tweaked. "Not shocked at all. Seen cruder customs among the Demetae. But civilized men have some sense of occasion."

"Really?" The priest's direct gaze might have seemed rude to the brittle young soldier without its leavening mildness. "You could watch two gladiators gut each other in the arena and even cheer. I daresay. Yet an act of simple loving makes you uncomfortable."

"One has nothing to do with the other."

"You think not?"

"The arena is manly."

"And this is effeminate? I once thought Germanus the most passionate soul housed in a living body. Drust is all of that and love beside. I don't think the soul's joy divides in separate closets."

Ambrosius bridled somewhat under Padrec's scrutiny.

The priest had the same expression to his eyes as his Faerie wife and the rest of them, used to open vistas with nothing between himself and the horizon or possibly some other world. The man looks right through you.

"Excuse me, Tribune." Padrec bobbed his head. "Drust will be wanting confession before he meets the dogs." He started away, then halted with a footnote by way of after- thought. "The Venicones make love sometimes in the mid- dle of eating. They're on their best behavior for you;

didn't want to offend Roman sensibilities."

And he was gone, leaving Ambrosius to seethe over the talent of savages for wasting time and energy.

"Idiots."