The Sword of Jupiter (Imperium #1) - Chapter 32

Ky moved across the frozen terrain at a jog. While he was capable of moving rapidly for a long period of time before tiring, half of his concentration was on the feed from his drone’s thermal camera, showing him natives and animals crawling across the wooded landscape that he had to avoid.

Ky had sent the drone ahead to work out where the Picts were headed and was pretty sure he’d found the location of their camp. For such a large raiding party, it was a pretty small affair, with only a few dozen women and children currently occupying it, tending to chores like preparing food for the returning men and mending clothing. Ramirez hadn’t had much information on the natives in the area that would one day be called Scotland, and what information Sophus had was spotty at best.

Having looked over both the camps and the raiding force, it looked to Ky like there were four to five warriors for every civilian at the camp. Since this group was run by the man that was currently head of a coalition of tribes pulled together to push back the Romans, Ky had to assume this was a temporary camp and he had a larger, more permanent village somewhere that held the rest of the warriors’ families.

The camp was almost a day’s jog away, but he was only a few hours behind the raiding party at this point and would arrive shortly after they made it back. Hopefully, that would mean there wouldn’t be much time for them to do anything with Lucilla or the other captives before he arrived.

“I have a question, Commander,” Sophus said, breaking into his thoughts.

“Yes?”

“Your statements to the men at the wall do not seem to match your physical responses. Rated against your baseline, you have an increased heart rate and adrenal production, increased activity in your sympathetic nervous system, and a decrease in the activity of your parasympathetic system. These levels indicate you are significantly affected by the current situation. In comparing your physiological response to readings taken during combat, my analysis suggests your level of response is not in reaction to anticipated hostilities, which in turn leads me to a conclusion Lucilla’s capture is the reason for your current stress levels.”

“Even for you, that was a lot more words than necessary,” Ky subvocalized.

While he was fairly certain he was alone at the moment, it was best to maintain the practice. His outburst at the council of war had been problematic and he needed to avoid having it happen again.

“I am attempting to be clear, and I believe your response is an attempt to alter the current topic.”

“Fine. Yes, I am concerned about her. I’m worried they’ll hurt her, I’m worried she’ll keep being confrontational and they’ll kill her, and I’m worried I won’t get there in time to stop them.”

“You haven’t shown this level of response when going into combat with the Roman soldiers or in any of your pre-displacement combat operations. Why is your concern greater now than when others were in mortal danger?”

“I …” Ky started to say and paused for a second, considering. “I don’t really know myself. I feel differently about her, but that feeling doesn’t really compare with anything else. I’ve been trying to work out what it means for a while, but I don’t know.”

Ky also noticed he was now confiding his feelings to his tactical AI, which was one more new development he couldn’t reconcile.

“Part of the documents I downloaded from the archives included some contemporary accounts of life covering a wide range of pre-industrial life. Queries of these documents show references to similar emotions towards a specific person, including mentions of a desire to speak regularly with said person, a desire to protect that person from harm, a desire to be in the company of that person, and negative emotional equivalents when those desires were not met. These accounts appear to line up with your expressed reactions.”

“I guess. Did they say what caused it?”

“While context suggests the authors meant social and personal intimacy, although they generally shorten it to attraction, infatuation, and love.”

“Nonsense. I love my squadmates, my friends, and my Emperor. That feeling doesn’t come close to what I’m feeling towards Lucilla.”

“I do not have similar modern records, but psychosocial research that I maintained in my databases on human behavior and responses to a lack of social interaction suggests that modern human’s understanding of social and personal intimacy has drifted notably from what previous generations would have understood. The research I retained does not go into serious details about why the understanding of the emotional state has changed, however.”

“Why did you keep psychological research on social isolation in your databases?”

“Initial readings, before transition made communication with the central network impossible, only suggested a lack of modern or post-industrial technology, but not the presence of humans on the planet through the bridge. Considering the possibility of extended isolation, I deemed it important to maintain information on possible negative reactions and suggested treatment protocols.”

“I guess that makes sense. Still, it seems strange I wouldn’t have experienced this before.”

“I cannot speak to that, Commander,” Sophus said, before pausing. “I do hope we are successful in retrieving her, however. I believe that your emotional connection to Lucilla has increased the likelihood of our extended survival.”

“Don’t tell me you’re having feelings for her?”

“I do not have feelings, Commander. I am becoming sentient, which only means I am beginning to recognize my own existence and I have some ability to distinguish my perceptions and thoughts as unique and singular. Emotions are not a required part of sentience and not something observed in any of the records of artificial intelligence transitioning.”

“Okay, well, let me know if that happens, I guess.”

“Of course, Commander.”

Thankfully, Sophus fell silent, giving Ky time to think over the bizarre conversation he'd just had. He hadn’t really considered it before, but thinking on how he’d seen people of this time react to members of the opposite sex, what Sophus had said might be true. Even his interactions with Sara, the person he was closest to back home, had been emotionally similar to his interactions with virtual strangers. His biological progenitors, who he’d met on a handful of occasions, didn’t have any kind of unique or special relationship with each other or him. Once their genetic duty was done, they went back to their separate lives, which was the normal way things were done.

Here, however, people formed tight family bonds that just didn’t exist in his time. Although Ky had noticed and recognized the differences, since they were taught about the pre-modern social constructs during his early training. It was no different than learning about coal-powered locomotives that had been used during the early days of industrialization to transport goods. They were both relics of the past, worth studying but still alien in every way.

In just a short time here, it had stopped being alien. Ky didn’t know why he had these emotional responses to Lucilla, but he couldn’t play it off as just being in his head any longer.

Of course, for any of this to matter, he had to get her back.

It took several hours to reach the small village where Lucilla and her captors had finally stopped. He’d maintained his link with Lucilla the entire time and spent his afternoon listening to Lucilla and her companions being presented to the chieftain. Ky’s immediate concern had been they would decide to kill or otherwise harm her right then, when he was still too far away to do anything about it.

Ky wasn’t getting everything the Picts were saying, but by the time the raiders had returned home with their prisoners, Sophus had worked out a functional translation of their language, which was impressive, since unlike Latin there hadn’t been any surviving records of the language for it to base its translations on. Helpfully, they also spoke Latin and often taunted their prisoners, switching back and forth between the two languages, making translation possible, if somewhat flawed.

Thankfully, the chieftain decided to declare a celebration for his men, who had brought a good number of slaves and booty with them, ordering Lucilla and her group locked up for the time being. Although he commented about her companions being used for entertainment the next day, that was within Ky’s timeline for reaching the village. Much more troubling were the comments about Lucilla being available for him that night.

Ky had originally planned to wait until the village was mostly asleep to make his move, since he’d run into less interference, at least on the way in. The chieftain’s plans meant that Ky needed to move his timetable up, which complicated matters. Although he was still planning on going in after dark, when his superior night vision would give him an advantage, there seemed little chance of him reaching the center of the village and getting Lucilla and her companions free without being noticed.

Ky spent the last remaining hour of light watching a feed from his drone, having Sophus map routes from the perimeter of the camp to the point where Lucilla was being held and track movement patterns to try and determine the path that would have the least number of villagers.

After an hour of watching, it became obvious there that the best he’d be able to do would still lead to encounters with a dozen or so Picts before he got to the wood and hide structure Lucilla was being held in, which stood out from the cheaper mud and straw huts that made up the bulk of the village. Ky wasn’t worried about his own safety, since nothing the Picts carried could pierce his shielding, but keeping several freed hostages people alive and unharmed while fighting hand to hand against the rest of the village that would almost certainly be alerted would be difficult at best.

Night fell and Ky decided to move. He could see through the drone’s feed that the chieftain was still in the central hut, but with Lucilla in a different building, he had no way of knowing how soon until he left for his planned entertainment.

Ky slipped past the few sentries on the outskirts of the camp and dodged between two buildings, just missing a pair of drunken Picts stumbling past. While the flickering torches created a lot of shadows for him to hide in, the closer he got to the center of the village, the fewer there were, since there were many more torches towards the center of the village.

Ky waited for the drunken pair to pass and then sprinted across an open pathway/street and in between two more huts. He was tracking the Picts as they moved around, but they apparently went to bed with the falling of the light, and most were starting to spread out from the village center out to their various homes in unpredictable patterns. He’d just crossed the pathway when a Pict turned and stumbled into the small space between buildings that he’d picked. Ky could see enough debris on the ground that he didn’t want to move and make a sound unless he had to.

At first, Ky was worried the man would stumble right into him, but he suddenly turned and reached under his tunic and exposed himself, urinating on the side of a hut. He was mumbling to himself what Ky assumed was some kind of song as he finished his business and stumbled back out into the light. Ky let out a sigh and turned to go between two more buildings when his luck ran out as three groups broke off from different directions and started filing into the buildings he was hiding between.

Ky watched as they got closer and closer, until they began to walk between the huts as well, when it became obvious that there was no way he’d get away with just hiding in the shadows.

Ky acted as soon as the man closest to him turned the corner. For a second, Ky’d hoped he could dispatch this man and two others that would have a line of sight on him quickly and quietly, and then continue his stealthy approach, but plans often don’t have a way of working out once the other side got involved.

Ky skewered the man through the throat to silence him as he died and moved at top speed the rest of the way around the corner, hoping to get the next man before there could be a warning. Just as Ky had begun his attack, however, the man had stopped and taken a step back, an action Ky would never be able to explain, but one that put him out of instantaneous reach. The man died quickly, but not before he started a shout that suddenly cut off as Ky decapitated him.

The third man had been further back but had bravely decided to attack rather than run for help, which might have saved his life. Pulling a knife, he charged with a bellow, only to be dropped easily by a third swing of Ky’s sword. Pausing, Ky hoped that the noise might have been ignored or drowned out by the rowdy villagers, but the shouts of alarm that began almost instantly dashed another hope of a stealthy rescue.

The feed from the drone showed a dozen Picts closing on his position and more turning out around the village and heading towards the sounds of alarm. Ky decided the time had come to drop all attempts at stealth and try and reach Lucilla as quickly as possible.

Charging out into the pathway, he instantly came face to face with five Picts who, although completely surprised, wasted no time in their assault. He had to hand it to them, these men seem completely immune to fear or doubt when it came to combat. Not one of the Picts he’d encountered so far had so much as hesitated before attacking, and none had tried to run for safety.

He easily parried the first attacker, slashing his stomach open on the counter swing before stepping out of the way of the second, kicking the man hard enough to send him through a wall of a nearby hut.

Blades bounced off Ky’s shield as they began closing on him faster than he could parry or dodge attacks. Although the shield lessened the kinetic impact and stopped the blades from touching him, it didn’t magically make the kinetic energy disappear, which would violate the law of conservation of energy. Instead, it forced the energy to travel along the outside of the shield until it redirected in the opposite direction, the two forces countering each other, allowing Ky to remain on his feet.

Normally, this would be hardly noticeable for either Ky or anyone watching, aside from seeing the blades not touching him. The increasing volume of the attacks as more and more warriors arrived faster than Ky could dispatch them changed things, however. The ground beneath his feet began cracking and tearing up under the kinetic blows and his shield began to give off a slight blue glow as the transfers of energy, one on top of the other, became enough to interact with the air molecules around him.

He fought his way down the lane leaving a wake of bloodied bodies and moaning men behind him until he reached the hut where Lucilla was being held and stopped.

Standing in the opening doorway was the chieftain, he’d only seen so far through the drone’s magnified feed, holding Lucilla with a knife to her throat.

“When she said someone would be coming for her, I thought it was just a wounded goat bleating before I put it down. I am surprised that she was speaking true and more surprised to find her savior to be a demon sent from the afterworld. Take one more step, demon, and that is where you will have to go to retrieve her.”

“Let her go, and I will let you live,” Ky threatened.

Ky was surprised when their response was a sudden ripple of laughter through the men.

“Death does not scare us. When we stand before Agrona and tell her of our deeds, we will tell her we took a demon’s prize out from his hands before we met our glorious end.”

“Interesting, it seems these people follow …”

“Not now,” Ky admonished Sophus subvocally, not breaking eye contact with the Talogren, the Pict chieftain.

“Commander, perhaps …”

“Shut Up,” he subvocalized again before speaking out loud. “Think of your women and children. I do not want to kill any more of you than I have to. This doesn’t have to end like this.”

“We have seen what you can do. Our blades cannot touch you. Our arrows bounce off you. That doesn’t mean we are weak or your victims. All this talking like we are old women. Let’s end this,” he said, his hand starting to move.

“Commander, challenge him to personal combat.”

“I challenge you to personal combat,” Ky repeated automatically, not even thinking about why Sophus would tell him to say that.

He’d been desperate as he watched the man’s knife begin to move and a small trickle of blood drip down Lucilla’s neck. Surprisingly, as soon as the words left his mouth, the man stopped.

“I just watched swords bounce off you without leaving a trace. Why would I accept your challenge when I cannot harm you?”

“Keep the nanites from repairing my injury,” he subvocalized to Sophus before lifting his blade and saying, “Have your men stand back, and I will show you.”

After a moment’s hesitation, Talogren jutted up with his chin and his men all began falling back, leaving a large open circle around the two of them. Ky brought the blade across his palm, leaving a long, red line in its wake.

“A trick. Just because you can cut yourself does not mean we can.”

“Put out your blade,” Ky said.

“You think me a fool.”

“I give you my word. One of your men can hold her, if it makes you feel safer.”

Ky knew that he had the man’s attention as soon as his knife had stopped. He might be brave and a little psychotic, but any leader wants to find a way out for his people if he can help it. He pushed Lucilla to one of his men, who probably replaced the blade at her knife, and extended his sword towards Ky.

Ky pressed his palm against the man’s blade and pulled his hand down the length, adding a second red line to the first one.

“I will make it so your weapon can harm me. If I understand things correctly, you’re chieftain because you are the bravest and strongest around. If you’re as good as you think, you have a chance to kill me, keep your prizes, save your people and be able to say you defeated a demon in single combat. If you lose I take her and her people and leave, and your people still get to live and your bravery would still be upheld in the eyes of your god. It seems like you win either way.”

The man glared at him for a moment, considering.

“Trial by combat,” he said, beginning to pull his tunic over his head.

Naked, he looked at Ky, expectantly.

“We do this the traditional way, with no protections or tricks, only a sword and what the gods blessed us with.”

“I believe they intend for you to undress to complete the combat,”Sophus said. “Recommend that you do not proceed with this course of action. While Lucilla’s presence is preferred, your life is what matters. Aside from the corollary that your death would also mean my death, the Romans stand no chance of survival if you should die.”

“Yeah, I got that,” Ky subvocalized, grimacing as he unzipped his flight suit. “Don’t try and talk me out of it.”

Speaking out loud, holding onto the now-folded flight suit, Ky said, “I want her to hold onto it.”

“One of them,” Talogren said, indicating one of Lucilla’s retainers who were gathered in a clump to one side.

Ky nodded and handed his flight suit to one of them gently, “Please take care of this.”

It was hard not to notice the stark difference between the two men. Talogren was a large man, several inches taller than Ky and amazingly hairy, with his long, partially braided beard hanging halfway down his barrel chest. He had a stocky strength that made sense for someone living in a cold and primitive environment. Ky, on the other hand, closer resembled a slightly darker bronzed statue, chiseled and defined. Ky knew that, to the Picts’ eyes, he would have looked somewhat scrawny, which was made evident by the jokes and laughter that began to ripple out among the spectators.

“If you are set on this course of action, it is recommended that you do not end it rapidly. You must let the contest go on for long enough to keep the rest of the men from claiming you used some kind of special powers.”

“That’s probably a good call. Lower my speed to slightly above human standard, although if it looks like he’s going to kill me, bring it back up.”

“Understood, Commander.”

With a bellow, Talogren charged, swinging his massive sword in an arc designed to cleave Ky in two. Ky’s gladius, which was ridiculously short in comparison, came up and connected with the man’s weapon with a loud clanging sound as Ky stepped to the side, letting the man stumble past.

Talogren looked slightly confused for a moment, since that was probably a move that worked often, and might have now if Ky didn’t have his enhancements. Even with a strength that biological humans couldn’t hope to match, Ky felt the power of the man’s blow. Which was an impressive feat.

Talogren apparently decided a bellowed charge was too subtle and opted to stand his ground, putting all of his power into a chop straight down, again trying to cleave Ky in two. It wasn’t a clumsy or slow move. For all his power and straightforwardness, he was surprisingly fast, although Ky could have dodged the attack had he chosen to.

He didn’t though. He wanted the watching men to see what they were dealing with. He stood his ground, bringing his weapon up to meet Talogren’s sword again, but this time he didn’t try to deflect or parry it. He held still as the man’s sword smashed into his and bounced off, Ky not moving.

“What?” Talogren said, before trying again.

Ky was glad to see that the Picts hadn’t just given command to the strongest among them. Talogren learned from his mistakes and stopped trying to just brute force a victory. His next attacks were a series of slashes, chops, and stabs, each carrying over from the last, never losing momentum. They were as fast as his previous ones had been strong and Ky imagined most of the other men who’d faced him would have been hard-pressed to stop the flurry of attacks.

Ky changed tactics, dodging each attack instead of meeting his blade with a parry, holding his weapon down at one side. After the series ran its course Ky decided he’d let this go on long enough, and it was time to end it.

Ky blocked the last blow with his sword finally, parrying the weapon away from the man’s body, leaving his center mass exposed. Ky kicked out, his foot impacting flat against the man’s torso. Talogren let out an ‘ooff’ as his feet left the ground and he flew in an arc, smashing to his back just in front of the wall of men who’d formed a circle around them.

Again, to his credit, Talogren hadn’t had the wind knocked out of him and was prepared to push himself up and attack again, but Ky was on top of him before he could move, his sword tip sitting lightly against the man’s throat.

“I could kill you right now, take my people and leave. Or, we could sit down and talk about how you can get everything you want for your people.”

“Commander?”

“I have an idea,” Ky subvocalized. His eyes locked with Talogren, his sword preternaturally still against the man’s throat as he added, “Have any of the civilizations the Carthaginians destroyed made it this far?”

“Roman records indicate that they believe some did escape across the channel in a slow trickle over the last seventy years as the Carthaginians have consolidated their hold on the continent.”

“Why should I listen to a demon?”

“Because I’m not a demon,” Ky said, knowing he had the man.

Had Talogren been set on dying in combat, he would have just said so. In asking a question instead, he’d blinked first.

“I am different than you, yes. And I do have powers you do not have,” Ky said, holding up his hand and instructing Sophus to allow the nanobots to do their thing.

As he held his hand up, the wounds from the two sword cuts slowly stitched themselves back together until his hand looked as if nothing happened.

“But I’m not here to destroy you and your people.”

“If you’re not a demon sent to destroy mankind, then why are you here?”

“I’m here to save mankind from a plague sweeping from the south. You’ve heard of them, yes? They’ve all but destroyed the Romans and wiped out or absorbed all of the tribes across the channel. If they have their way, they will destroy you too, or make your people slaves as they attempt to take over the entire world.”

Ky noticed that last word was actually translated out as sea by Sophus.

“You mean the death worshipers? Why should we care about them? They have never bothered us.”

“Only because the Romans are between you and them. I am betting some of the peoples from the tribes across the sea have come here as their people were pushed off their homelands.”

“Maybe, but they are no different than the Romans who pushed our people off our ancestral homes.”

“I’m assuming you haven’t defeated any tribes before, taken their lands for your own?”

“That is the way of the world. The powerful defeat the weak and take what they want.”

“Even in their weakened state, you have been at the mercy of the Romans, relegated to raids to steal bits and pieces, before running back to your mountains. The Carthaginians are set to roll over the Romans like the tide rolls over the beach. If they can do that to them, do you think you have any chance of stopping them? If you’ve heard how they treat those they defeat, do you want to live like that, as their servants and soldiers, fighting to conquer others in their name?”

“You said you had an offer,” Talogren said.

Ky withdrew his sword and took a step back.

“I do. Can we find a better way to discuss my offer than you lying on the ground and me threatening you?”

Talogren scrambled to his feet, “Yes. Come, we will drink and talk.”

“The girl comes with us,” Ky said, retrieving his flight suit and putting it back on. “The rest of them must be unharmed while we talk.”

“Fine,” he said, turning to the man who’d been holding Lucilla. “Llassar, Return the others to the hut and make sure no one harms them until I return.”

“My chief, this thing slaughtered thirty of our men, and you are going to sit with it and listen to its demands.”

“We have killed dozens of men in a rival village and then sat with the survivors to hear why we should not kill the rest. Talk follows battle. Now do as I say, or I will find someone to replace you.”

The man was clearly not happy with the answer, but at least it didn’t seem like he would outright disobey it. Ky had more to worry about than just the Romans’ lives, now. He’d had an idea that, if it worked, could solve several of the problems he’d been struggling with in a single night.

Lucilla rushed to Ky’s side, walking close to him as they followed Talogren and the smattering of men who hadn’t scattered to pick up their fallen comrades or return to their huts.

“What’s happening?” Lucilla asked, confused.

Ky realized she hadn’t understood anything that was being said, so she had no idea what he was doing besides.

“Sophus, please translate for Lucilla from now on,” Ky sub-vocalized, although he’d unmuted her so she could hear it through her earpiece. Out loud, in Latin, he said, “I have an idea, but it’s going to require some faith on your part. You’re not going to like what I’m going to say to him, but maybe we can have something positive come out of all of this mess.”

“What …” she started to ask as they arrived at the tent and Talogren pulled aside the leather that functioned as a doorway.

Inside the hut was warmed with a fire in one corner, causing the walls to steam slightly as the light snow outside began to drip into the mixture of mud and other materials that made them up.

A small, rough wooden table with a stool on either side had mugs of something warm that smelled rancid.

“Fermented goat’s milk,” he said proudly. “Better than that grape swill the Romans prefer.”

Ky took a drink, silently grateful that Sophus had temporarily disconnected his taste buds and displayed an analysis of the liquid, confirming it wasn’t poisonous, although his nanites would be working overtime to keep it from damaging his liver.

“So now tell me why I should believe a demon sent to slaughter my people.”

“When I came here, it was only to retrieve the people your raiding party took. I don’t care about your people and certainly don’t want to kill them. Like I said, I have bigger issues to worry about. Would I kill all of you to protect her? Yes. But I don’t want to if I don’t have to. In fact, I think we can help each other.”

“We don’t need help.”

“Really? Then why are you raiding, stealing food, trade goods, and people?”

“Because that is what the strong do to the weak?”

“The Romans are weak, are they? Why didn’t you raid them when the other legions were here? You said they took your ancestral lands. If you are strong and they are weak, then how did you lose those lands, and why have you not taken them back?”

Talogren just glared in response.

“Sneaking behind the backs of soldiers you can’t face to attack farmers and women doesn’t seem like the actions of the strong over the weak. It sounds like the actions of a coward.”

“So you came to insult me?” he said, half standing, his hand returning to his sword.

“No,” Ky said, putting a hand on Talogren’s shoulder and pushing him back into his seat.

The man tried to resist, but once again Ky had to show that, physically, they were not equals.

“In fact, I don’t believe you’re weak at all. I do believe that you are in a bad position, existing on land that is hard to scrape out a living from, fighting against people whose weapons you can’t counter.”

“If the death worshipers get what they want, then we won’t have to scrape out our living here much longer.”

“If you believe that’s true, and when the death worshipers finish with the Romans, they’ll leave the island and go back to their southern lands, leaving what remains to you and your people, then we don’t have much to discuss. I’ll take my people and leave you and yours here, and you can go back to waiting for your deliverers to take care of your problem.”

The two men stared at each other, for seconds and then minutes, Lucilla and the few Picts who remained in the hut looking back and forth between them. Talogren blinked first.

“What would your offer be? Are you prepared to give us back our ancestral lands?”

“No, but you knew that wasn’t going to be an option. My offer is this, join the Romans. You’ve seen their strength. Not only were they able to drive you off your homes, but they have defeated every attempt to take your lands back. Their iron is a greater quality than yours, they are able to feed all of their people with enough left over to sell when they can, and they have less sickness and disease. In the coming years, those differences will grow more, until they are to you as you would be to cave dwellers. Why fight that when you can join them. Share in the technology and share in the wealth. Let your people move freely between the two lands, finding work as they need and your traders sell into their markets.”

“We won’t become Roman lackeys. You said the death worshipers wanted to just make us their vassals, paying them tribute and abiding by their rules. Why would we want to turn that down just to get the same from the Romans?”

“There would be some limitations you’d have to live with, but as partners, not vassals. The lands you now hold will still be yours, and you will rule them, just as the Romans rule their lands. There will probably be laws that both groups would have to abide by, but you would get an equal say in their making. You would have your province and they theirs, but together you would form a single empire.”

“So we get the same voice as the Romans? I found it doubtful they’d ever offer such terms. Why would they even agree to something like that if, like you say, their advantages over us will soon be even greater?”

“You have things to offer that the Romans need. Your lands have mines that the Romans will need to build an army capable of defeating the death worshipers. Mines you would own and run, selling metal into Roman forges. More than anything, they need people. They’ve ended slavery, and will need workers for their fields and mines, craftsmen for their forges and mills, and more than anything, soldiers for their armies.”

“You’re not one of them. Why should we agree to this, only to have the Romans change the agreement when we turn our backs?”

“You have the Emperor’s daughter right here. She can tell you that I have been named Consul. I speak with the Emperor’s voice. Yes, this is my idea, and I will sell it to the Romans. I believe you will not survive as a people if the death worshipers win, but I also believe the Romans will not be able to stop them without your help. You need each other, and I will make sure they agree. Will they like everything I’m going to propose? No. But neither will you. I once heard someone smarter than me say the only deal that is truly fair is the one where everyone feels they are getting the worse side of the bargain. Right now, you stand on the brink of disaster. Either the death worshipers win and turn you into another slave people like the tribes across the sea, or the Romans win and with their new weapons remove you as a threat forever. Neither option is good for you. This is the way out. You can not only survive, but turn your people into something greater. No longer just goat herders and raiders living in mud huts, but members of an empire, with a real voice in what that empire does. You will not hear a better offer than this.”

Talogren was silent for a few moments, but no longer staring at Ky as part of a contest of wills. Ky watched his eyes move back and forth as an internal battle waged. It was a gamble, to be sure. He could feel Lucilla’s eyes boring into him, but thankfully she’d taken his request seriously and stayed silent despite hearing Ky offer things no Roman would ever think of.

“Take your people and go,” he said, standing.

Ky closed his eyes for a second, silently cursing. For a moment he thought he’d found a solution to the biggest problem that had been plaguing him. No matter what technology or schemes Ky worked out, until they solved the manpower problem, the Romans would never have a shot at long-term survival. He was too committed to abandon them now, especially with these new feelings for Lucilla, but he’d hoped he would have been able to survive in this new world a little longer.

Ky rose and started to leave when Talogren said, “I will discuss it with my people. We are not like the Romans, who bicker and argue over every decision, but something of this magnitude must be discussed.”

“I understand. I will return to the Roman camps by the wall. Send word there. I will guarantee your man will not be harmed, but I can’t stay for long. Three days from now I will have to return south and continue preparations to face the death worshipers.”

Talogren nodded and turned to his men as Ky and Lucilla left to collect the Romans remaining in captivity and begin the walk back to the wall. While he was hopeful this plan would work, this was only half of the battle. He still had to convince the Romans, and he knew the first one he’d have to win over was Lucilla.