The Barbarian (The Herod Chronicles Book 2) Page 13

  Herod's black eyes burned with hate. "Kadar suspected Lazarz."

  "Half of Jerusalem is searching for the murdering fiend," Kadar added.

  Herod exhaled heavily. "My brothers and I promised our mother we wouldn't be gone long."

  James thanked Herod and watched him and his brothers file out of the room with satisfaction. Turnabout was fair play—Herod employed spies to watch James, and now he would have a spy in Herod's camp. Freckle-faced Niv didn't realize he had a new master, but he soon would.

  Saad hobbled in with a plate of food. "Physician Hama wants you to eat."

  James frowned. "Let me see, do I want to eat roast lamb and unleavened bread…or unleavened bread and roast lamb?" Unmoved by knowing every family in Jerusalem was serving and eating the same meal, he stuck his tongue out at the unappetizing gray lumps on the plate.

  Kadar continued to lean against the far wall. James scowled at the enormous man. "I overheard my sister and her slave talking about you. My father will burst a blood vessel when he learns Lydia is in love with a barbarian."

  The giant's blue eyes iced over. "Your father has arranged a marriage for Lydia to a man from Parthia."

  James made a face. "I hope for Lydia's sake this husband isn't older than Adam or bow-legged and toothless."

  Kadar pushed away from the wall, raised his tree-trunk sized arm, and pointed. "I want a serious answer from you, Onias. If something happens to your father, and you become Lydia's guardian, will you choose a husband she finds acceptable?"

  James gripped his blanket. His father, dead or out of the way. Wouldn't that change everything? Could he stand back and allow his father's murder? He chewed on his lip. His father had a penchant for making enemies. Was James supposed to spend his life thwarting murderous plots? Kadar's blue eyes burned a hole through him. Did the giant ox actually think he'd be allowed to marry Lydia? Insulting a man four times one’s size was a good way to end up dead, so James selected his words carefully. "Lydia must marry a devout man."

  Kadar smirked, but not in a good way. "Say it. I know you're thinking it."

  "Hell and damnation," James muttered. Taking a deep breath, he hurried his words. "Lydia can't marry a pagan barbarian. But if she could marry a gentile, you would be at the top of the list." He waited for the eruption.

  The Goliath-sized man didn't flinch. "Do you have a devout Jew in mind?"

  James shook his head, relieved to still have his thick skull on his shoulders.

  "I'll marry Lydia," a calm voice said.

  James and Kadar turned. Physician Hama stood in the open door exuding confidence and boldness in enviable abundance.

  CHAPTER 17

  Nehonya Onias's darkened home might well have been death's door. Kadar had suffered his fair share of difficulties, but none as burdensome as resigning himself to the proposed marriage between Lydia and Avda Hama. Knowing it was for the best didn't lessen the hurt. Kadar dreaded delivering the news, a duty rightfully belonging to James, who had the tact of a charging boar. Kadar could at least spare her that.

  Lydia stepped out of the shadows and rushed to him. His arms opened for her of their own accord. She buried her face in his chest and wrapped her arms around his waist. The scent of white jasmine filled his nose. Her voice was breathy. "Kiss me."

  His blood heated, and he crushed his mouth to hers. Cupping her round bottom, he tasted of her moist, supple lips. Mouths and tongues slipping and sliding together in mutual plunder threatened to send them places they couldn't go. He broke away. "Where's Brynhild?"

  Lydia tipped her head back. Yearning glistened in her hauntingly beautiful eyes. "I wanted to be alone with you."

  His loins tightened and his heart beat faster. "Holy gods, woman, do you have any idea what you do to me?"

  "Don't talk. Kiss me, again...please."

  Sweet stars in heaven and moon above, he knew she wouldn't be a passive lover. With very little encouragement, she would be stunning and glorious. He wanted to be the one to unleash the banked passion vibrating through her more than he craved life itself. "I'm tempted, woman. I truly am. But, you know as well as I do it wouldn't stop with kisses."

  "I ache for you. I want the pain to go away."

  "It wouldn't be fair to you."

  "For this one night, make me forget everything but you," she begged. "You want me. I know—"

  "Jupiter and Mars, woman. Of course I want you. If I thought only of myself I would take you now, right up against the wall of the house, and the world could go to Hades."

  She blushed bright red. "Why are you being so noble?"

  Images flashed through his mind, of his fellow Northmen armed for a hunt, of snowcapped huts wreathed in smoke, of the night sky alive with waves of shimmering light. He exhaled heavily. "Because I don't want you to have to live with regret and guilt."

  "I'm afraid I will be sorry if I turn my back on this."

  "I understand. I'm drawn to your body, to your presence, to your heart. But I care too much for you to allow you to throw away who you are."

  "What do you mean?"

  He took her hand, pulled her to the end of the lane, and pointed toward the moonlit Temple. "Are you a daughter of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob?"

  Lydia sighed."I am."

  "Are you a daughter of the Lord God of Israel?"

  "I am."

  "Are you a righteous woman?"

  She dipped her head.

  A surge of red-hot anger arose. "You are a righteous woman, but you doubt it because of that ungodly business with Judas the Zealot. Am I right?"

  Her silence proved he had guessed correctly.

  The door to a nearby house creaked open.

  He drew her into the shadows, and directed her southward. "I have a safe shelter where we can talk about this and other matters."

  Keeping their heads down, they moved quickly and quietly through dark alley after dark alley, and emerged near the city's outermost wall. They passed through the arched Dung Gate and trod the road leading to the Hinnom Valley. The rot of dead animals filled the air. Morta's small hovel sat a stone's throw from the smoking hell-fires of Gehenna, the burning pit used to dispose of Jerusalem's filth. This dark underside of Jerusalem was a place Kadar was very familiar with, but one he doubted those of Lydia's class ever visited.

  Kadar knocked on a rickety door. He didn't like the idea of bringing Lydia to Morta's, but Jerusalem didn’t have many safe places for a barbarian to meet, even innocently, with an upright Jewish woman. He'd given Morta extra coins to ensure he was the only visitor she had that night.

  The door creaked open, and the middle-aged widow waved him in. A worn bedroll topped with a frayed cover dominated the one-room hole. Morta's coy smile vanished when she spotted Lydia. "I'm not that low a sinner."

  Kadar made a face. "I'm not looking for that. I told you I need a safe place to talk."

  "Kadar," Lydia stammered. "What... where... who is this woman?

  Kadar hated himself, truly, truly hated himself for hurting Lydia this way, even though he knew it was for the best. "Lydia, this is Morta. Morta is a harlot."

  The widow straightened and pointed at the ramshackle door. "Go, Kadar. Leave now."

  Kadar liked Morta, and was glad to see the whore had some pride left. He wagged his brows. "Return my coins and I'll go." The widow gripped the pouch at her waist and exhaled an exasperated breath.

  He shifted his attention.

  Lydia's complexion had turned sallow. "Why did you bring me here?"

  The misery in her eyes cut to the quick. He longed to hold her, comfort her, but he was doing what had to be done. "Do you know about harlots and what they do?"

  A single tear rolled down Lydia's pale cheek. "I know."

  He swallowed. "I brought you here because I want you to see what kind of man I am. If you gave yourself to me, you would change in here." He put his hand over his heart. "You are a righteous daughter of Israel. And I am a man who enjoys the comfort of harlots. We come from different worl
ds."

  Lydia hugged herself. "I don't care."

  "You should. Morta, how many times have I lain with you?"

  The harlot sighed. "Kadar was one of my best visitors."

  Lydia's chin came up. "She said was. How long has it been since Kadar visited you, Morta?"

  Morta chuckled. "Many, many years."

  Kadar strode to the door and yanked it open. "Go, woman." Morta walked outside wearing a smile wide enough to trip an elephant.

  He slammed the door shut.

  "I don't care about Morta," Lydia repeated.

  He rolled his eyes. "You are the most stubborn, frustrating, drive-me-straight-out-of-my-mind woman I've ever met. Nothing is going to happen between us, because I won't let it, and because Hama would kill me."

  "Physician Hama? What does he have to do with us?"

  Kadar paced one way, and then the other. This wasn't the gentle approach he'd hoped to take. "I spoke to your brother about you. I wanted to make sure he would do right by you after I kill—"

  "I know he doesn't deserve mercy," Lydia said hurriedly. "But I beg you to reconsider."

  "Your father holds his life in his own hands."

  "You changed your mind? You don't plan to kill him?"

  "I will allow him to live if he calls off your marriage to the man from Parthia and gives you to Hama instead."

  "What about your revenge?"

  "Your father's bald eunuch slave will die, that's non-negotiable."

  "Negotiating? Has James heard from Father?"

  "James and Hama worked out the terms of a marriage contract, which becomes void if I harm a hair on Simeon Onias's head. So, if your father knows what's good for him, he'll agree to a marriage between you and the physician."

  "I have no idea what to say." Lydia buried her face in her hands. "I never hoped for so much."

  He pulled her to his chest and rubbed her back. "I made a few stipulations of my own. Money will be settled on you if Hama dies. The physician has agreed to move to Sepphoris in Galilee so you can be close to little James." Lydia's shoulders shook as she wept silent tears.

  "Hama is a good man. He will treat you with respect and kindness." Kadar squeezed his eyes closed. It would have hurt less to rip his heart out and hand it to her.

  Lydia wrapped her arms around him. "Where will you go? What will you do?"

  He patted her back. "I'll land on my feet somewhere." Knowing Lydia was with her son and her sister in the quiet wilds of Galilee would sustain him in the long years ahead. Would it be enough? No, never. He buried his nose in her silky brown hair and inhaled deeply of white jasmine. "Don't trouble yourself about me."

  She pulled away. Tears glistened in her eyes. "Promise me you will marry. I don't want you to be alone."

  He brushed his knuckle over her warm cheek. "I am fated to be alone."

  "No, you are stubborn."

  "I'm used to making my own way. I don't mind it."

  Lydia swatted his chest. "Don't! Don't say that."

  She was gorgeous when she was angry. He laughed, and she raised her fists.

  He grabbed her wrists. "I say it because it's true."

  She tried to pull out of his grip. "I don't believe you."

  "I'll explain, if you promise to settle down."

  She wrinkled her nose. "You are alone because you want to be."

  "Look who's calling who stubborn," he said, but released her hands.

  The corners of her mouth rose. "I was promised an explanation."

  Tempted to kiss her, he moved as far away from her as the cramped room allowed, and leaned heavily against a cracked clay wall.

  Lydia eyed the whore's bed with distaste, then perched on the very end.

  He scrubbed his face and exhaled heavily. "I wasn't always at peace with my fate. When I was young, I believed the problem rested in the fact I was born a bastard."

  "You're a bastard? That's why you've been so good to me and little James?"

  "It's part of the reason."

  She touched her fingers to her lips and blushed.

  His male pride gloried, knowing she was recalling the kisses they shared. He pushed the thought away. "Little James shows great promise."

  "Thank you for taking me to see him. He is amazing and clever, and his smile is so precious."

  "I thought little James ought to know his mother."

  "Because you never knew yours?"

  Kadar rarely ever thought about the woman who had given birth to him. "My mother was a slave girl in my father's household. My father's wife sold my mother when my father was away raiding. I was two years old at the time. Seeing your pain made me wonder about my own mother. Did she grieve for me the way you do for James? I never tried to find her, so I'll never know." Watching Lydia and little James together made him regret not trying.

  "Who took care of you after you lost your mother?"

  He scuffed his sandal over the hard-packed dirt floor. "The villagers treated me like a stray dog, some were kind, others chased me off or scolded me. My stepmother Gerta and my half brothers and sisters went out of their way to make my life miserable."

  Lydia hugged her arms. "I used to dream about little James being alone and frightened."

  "From what I could see, your boy is well cared for and has plenty of aunts and uncles and cousins watching over him." Kadar was happy for the child. The contempt heaped on bastards was burdensome enough without the added strain of begging for your every need or fending off constant threats.

  "You said you couldn't go home. Was it because you were wronged, or because you wouldn't be welcomed back?"

  He scrubbed his face. "Both. I should have seen it coming. I finally found a place where I belonged. My father was a fierce warlord, and I grew to be every bit the warrior he was. I bested everyone, at whatever I put my hand to. And my father came to favor me over his other bastards and his true sons. The happiest days of my life were spent fighting and raiding by my father's side. But the good days ended when he died."

  He touched his hand to the amulet hidden beneath his tunic, the one his father had carved for him. "Afterwards, I pledged my allegiance to my half brother, Jokul, but he and Gerta feared me." Kadar laughed grimly. "I was eighteen years old and believed my ability with a sword made me invincible, but Gerta disposed of me without lifting a finger. The sickness that killed my father continued to ravage our village. Whole households died. Our priests sacrificed a handful of slaves in hopes of warding off the curse, but more people became ill. A greater gift was called for. Gerta whispered in the priests' ears and I and a priest's daughter were chosen."

  Lydia looked horrified on his behalf. "I don't blame you for fleeing and leaving your land behind."

  His flesh crawled, remembering his terrible anger and the sinking dread of that dark day. "I have my doubts now that it was the right thing to do. Under other circumstances, I would have submitted to the priests and counted it an honor to lay down my life to Thor and Odin. Your people count human sacrifice as an abomination, but it's not what troubled me. Gerta's trickery irked me. I wasn't about to allow Gerta and Jokul to get the best of me."

  "How did you escape?"

  Vivid memories returned. "I fought my way out of the village, then I ran and ran and ran. I slept by day and moved by night, until I reached an unfamiliar land. The whole time I wracked my mind for a way to escape the trap Greta had set, and I kept coming back to the same inescapable truth. I was doomed. No warlord would risk the displeasure of the gods or his people by taking me in. So I did the only thing I could."

  He dug in his pouch and pulled out a coin stamped with the image of Julius Caesar. Lamplight danced over the silver disk. "My father gave me a Roman coin when I was a boy and told me it came from a faraway land. The markings fascinated me. I'd never seen letters or writing of any kind. Alone with no other place to go, and cloaked in youthful confidence, I decided to find the people who had made the coin and make my home among them."

  "You were so young." Lydia's voic
e was a soft whisper. "How did you survive?"

  He thumbed the silver denarius. "Desperation pushes a man beyond what he thinks he can endure. I ate berries and small animals and I just kept walking. The loneliness was the hardest part, worse than the bitter cold, blinding rain, and wild beasts. Months and months later I came upon a pack of Cimbri hunters, who treated me a bit roughly, but I eventually escaped, still driven forward by a vague notion of a great city called Rome."

  Lydia's huge eyes couldn't get any wider. "Did you make it to Rome?"

  "I did. And I wasn't there two days before I hated it."

  "Why?"

  He tucked the coin away. "I came from the remote wilds. Rome was too crowded and noisy and busy for me. Imagine one hundred Jerusalems crowded within the walls of Rome, with ten times the animals, markets, and rubbish."

  "You could be describing Alexandria. I never learned to like Egypt." Lydia sighed. "How did you end up in Jerusalem of all places?"

  "I was thinking of returning to Gaul when I heard about a soldier from the east hiring mercenary soldiers. Antipater's man, Obodas, took a liking to me, and by the time our boat crossed the Great Sea I had a working knowledge of Aramaic. I admired the harsh beauty of your land, but the heat from your sun was too strong for my blood." He withheld the prime problem—he'd felt utterly friendless and adrift as a pagan among Jews. He also didn't share how the brief hours he'd spent caring for her after the rescue had soothed like a cool breeze on a hot day. He cleared his throat. "I was on the point of returning to Gaul when your letter came."

  Lydia drew her knees up to her chest and hugged them. "I'm so sorry. It wasn't fair to ask so much of you."

  Her forlorn frown killed him. He pushed away from the wall. "Thundering Thor, I can't stay away from you now, any more than I could then."

  He scooped her up, sunk down onto the bed, and sheltered her in his arms. "Don't torture yourself," he said into her ear. "What happened, happened."

  She pressed her head into his chest. "You are a good man."

  "I'm not good. I killed Sabu Nakht."

  "Who?"