Ashes Under Uricon
Chapter 10. Sabrina (364)
By Mihangel
Navita caudiceo fluitans super aequora limbo
Per medium, qua sese amni confundit imago
Collis et umbrarum confinia conserit amnis.
The boatman in his barge glides by midstream. Shadows and mirrored mountains merge the river with its fringe -- but where, he cannot tell.
Ausonius, The Moselle
That journey was a delight verging on a dream. It took us almost out of the world of man. We did see human beings, and we exchanged greetings with the occasional fisherman and washerwoman. But our world, in essence, was the world of the river, of the otter and beaver, the heron and kingfisher, the vole and the dabchick and the rising fish. It was a world of rapids and still water, of reflections of cloud and hill and tree, of mysterious mists at dusk and dawn, of reed-fringed plains and thickly-wooded banks fresh with the green of spring. At first the Sabrina passed between familiar meadows dotted with cattle and sheep and sporadic humble farmsteads, and it meandered wonderfully. The tump of Virocodunum loomed now in front, now on our right, now on the left. Then it vanished from view as we entered the gorge, whose sides were peppered, like over-ripe fruit invaded by maggots, with little black portals from which grimy miners dragged baskets of stone-coal. But the current here was fast, and soon they too were behind. Never before had I been so far down-river, and it was an empty land.
"This is all so strange," mused Lucius. "Round Camulodunum it's flat. Not much woodland. And every mile a villa -- a really nice one on its own estate, like ours was. There's not much of that here, is there?"
"Not much. There can't be more than half a dozen villas -- proper ones -- within a day's walk of Viroconium. Otherwise it's all farms like ours, owned by people in the town, or else peasant smallholdings. There isn't so much money around here as there must be at Camulodunum."
"Maybe not. But you don't splash your money out so . . . well, so ostentatiously as they do there. There, appearances have to be kept up. A lot of the villas belong to Gaulish families, you know. They got fed up with the mayhem the Germans were creating in Gaul, and bought up land in Britain to get away from it. A lot of them settled around Corinium and Aquae Sulis too, or so I'm told. Britain was safer than Gaul, in those days. It still is, I suppose, even if we got fed up with the Saxons and moved west. And we weren't the only ones."
"I hope you haven't moved too far west. I suppose somewhere in the middle is safest. Furthest from Saxons and Picts and Irish."
"Depends which of them turns out to be the worst, doesn't it?"
Light was fading as we stopped for the night at a clearing on the left bank. Bitucus and Lurio, our boatmen, tied our mooring ropes to bushes and lit a fire to cook supper. It was strange that so ponderous a boat could be managed by only two men. It must have been fifty feet long and twelve wide, and with its heavy cargo sat quite low in the water. It was allowed to drift, wherever the Sabrina was narrow or shallow and the current strong, but where the flow was feebler the boatmen either punted with long poles or rowed, one on each side, with enormous oars which they wielded standing up. There was also a mast with a sail which they occasionally spread, but our course was essentially southward and, for the first few days, against the wind. The boat was called the Fortuna, and it amused us to be wafted along by Fortune, carried wherever she took us, wholly beyond our control.
From time to time we grounded, and it took much vigorous poling and much vigorous language to get us afloat again. We had passed a few boats making their laborious way upstream, sometimes under sail but more often bow-hauled by men on shore. The long rope stretching from their shoulders to the masthead was high enough, usually, to clear the bankside bushes. Once, when we were willy-nilly following the current on the outside of a bend and they failed to lower their towrope to let us pass over, we snagged it and almost pulled them in. They responded with language just as vigorous as our boatmen's, and the ancestry they ascribed to us was curious and unexpected.
So as not to get in Bitucus' and Lurio's way we sat, for the most part, in the bows, but if they were in earshot and we wanted private talk we could always use Latin, of which they had virtually none. They preferred, when they could, to camp on shore in a crude tent by the fire, while we, on Tad's advice, slept on board. The lead, being so heavy, did not occupy much of the barge's depth, and there was ample room under an oiled canvas sheet stretched across the gunwales in the bows. A simple flooring of planks laid on the knobbly pigs, and a good supply of blankets, made a very adequate bed.
We had passed, that first day, two fishermen in coracles and, as they paddled alongside, haggled with them for four fat bream. These we now grilled on the fire and ate messily with the olives and sour bread we had brought, and over the meal we got to know our boatmen better. Bitucus and Lurio were an interesting pair. They were, as Tad had said, rough as raw timber but endlessly good-hearted, tickled pink at carrying such passengers as us, but full of banter and not in the least deferential. Bitucus was perhaps thirty and, we learned, married, Lurio in his late teens with a girlfriend. Both lived in Viroconium but spent much of their time away. On the two occasions when we moored at a settlement they spent the night at a brothel. The other nights they made do with each other. Indeed they had figured out our relationship from the start, and that first evening they cheerfully invited us to join them in their tent. Having our own agenda, we declined, and they were not in the least offended. If our cavortings on board made the barge rock despite its weighty cargo, we did not care. Bitucus and Lurio, to judge by the gruntings from the tent, were up to exactly the same thing.
We were woken next morning by great splashes as they leapt into the river and chased each other up and down. Everyone who grew up in Viroconium could swim like a fish. But, try as I would, I could not tempt Lucius in. So I left him on board and leapt in too. The water, still largely snow-melt from the mountains, was ball-shrivellingly cold. I surfaced gibbering, and promptly went under again as Lurio ducked me. To escape, I swam off some distance underwater, and on resurfacing I heard Lucius frantically shouting my name. But I was able to catch Lurio unawares and repay him, and for good measure Bitucus too. A little of Sabrina's chill, however, went a long way that morning, and soon we were out, teeth chattering like castanets. Bitucus' equipment, despite the cold, was of prodigious size and bounced ponderously as he scrubbed his shaggy body dry.
"Tenent media omnia silvae, Cocytusque sinu labens circumvenit atro," Lucius remarked, gazing in awe, envious not only of Bitucus for owning such a weapon but of Lurio for being able to take it. "Nothing but forest in the middle, and hellish Cocytus curling and sliding around."
Hilarious to me, but incomprehensible to the boatmen. They had left a jar of mulled beer in the embers of the fire which warmed us up. Then we pushed off for our second day.
"Why were you yelling at me?" I asked when we were back in the bows. "Did you think I'd drowned?"
He was sheepish. "Yes, I did. I can't even swim, myself. We didn't bathe at Camulodunum, not like that. The rivers there are muddy creeks. Not nice. So I'm not at home in water, and I thought you'd drowned, like poor Antinous in the Nile." He was making light of it, now. But he had been genuinely scared. "Or that the nymphs had fallen in love with you and dragged you under, like Hylas."
"Uh? Who was Hylas?"
"A beautiful boy. Hercules was his lover."
"Oh. Well, at least I've heard of Hercules. And who was Antinous?"
"Another beautiful boy. The Emperor Hadrian was his lover."
"I've heard of Hadrian too. There's that great big inscription to him in the forum at home. But what was he doing loving a boy? Was he breaking your rules?"
"I don't think so. Antinous was Bithynian and wouldn't have had citizen's rights, not then. For all I know he was a slave. Anyway, everyone knew about it and saw no problem. What did worry them was when Antinous died. Hadrian turned him into a god and built temples to him."
Astonishing. "And would you build temples to me if I drowned in the Sabrina?"
"Of course I would. All over the place . . . Well, on second thoughts, perhaps not. That would mean everyone else worshipping you. I'm selfish. I want to worship you by myself."
We laughed and kissed, and from the steering oar Bitucus gave us a cheer. Lucius stuck up his middle finger at him. He was coming on, this boy, and I loved him.
"But how do you know," I asked, "about these beautiful youths who came to damp ends?"
"Oh, Papias told me about them. My tutor."
"I wish Nonius had told us about them. But he wasn't very forthcoming even about the lovers in Vergil. Euryalus and Nisus, Corydon and Alexis, and all the rest. Is Papias into boys? If you see what I mean."
"Probably he was once. He is a Greek, after all." To Lucius, that seemed to explain everything. "And he was always going on about Greek stuff when he could. But he never showed any interest in me, and he's married now. I like him, but not in that way. He's a good man. Not long ago he let slip that he's interested in Christianity, and when he realised what he'd said he begged me not to tell my father." He chuckled. "You can guess why."
"Anyway, passion for boys doesn't square with the Christian line, does it? Don't they say the only person you can shag is your wife? And only to get babies, not for fun? And if you haven't got a wife you can't shag at all?"
"That's right. But Papias isn't a Christian. Not yet, anyway. Only interested. I asked him about it, and he said that what he got stuck on was their attitude to sin."
"Sin?" I knew the word, but it did not mean much to me.
"Offending against the gods. Or their God. For which you're punished. Rather like in the Aeneid, remember? Venus says to Jupiter that if the Trojans have gone against their destiny -- against what he's decided for them -- luant peccata, neque illos iuveris auxilio. Let them pay for their sins, and you stop helping them."
"Oh, right. Well, that takes us back to what I was saying, doesn't it? When we were out by the watermills, about how that side of Vergil bugs me. Fate . . . destiny . . . that we can't escape the will of the gods . . . it's almost the moral of the Aeneid, isn't it? Sic fata deum rex sortitur volvitque vices. So does the king of the gods draw the lots of destiny and sets events in motion. It's full of that sort of thing."
"Fata obstant. Fate willed otherwise . . . Yes, you could go on till the cows come home."
"And the point is, if the gods dictate what we should do, where's our free will?"
"That's just what Papias said. He said . . . oh, let me get this right. Yes, he said that Christians believe that when their God created the world, it was perfect. But the first man . . . what was his name? Amad, or something . . . he sinned. Disobeyed God. And so sin and death came into the world."
"Death? But that's crazy. It's natural. With or without the gods. It's bound to happen. Not only to man. To everything."
"I know, I know. And what they say about sin is equally crazy. That all the descendants of this first man -- that's us, that's everyone -- sort of inherited sin from him. So the Christians say that everyone's born evil. You know that God wants you to do good, but you can't do it without God's help. If you don't believe in God, their God, you're doomed to sin. And therefore to punishment. And even if you do believe in him, it's all predestined -- if you're predestined to sin, then you sin, and can't escape what's coming to you. I'm sure I've got that right. It's what bugs Papias."
"And it bugs me," I said, angry. "It's blackmail. If everything's predestined, you don't have any choice. Where's the justice in that? It isn't fair. And if you're predestined to do wrong, what's the point of trying to do right? We're taught, Britons are taught, that we're all born good and innocent, with an equal chance. If we live well, we'll do well. That's much fairer."
"Docco, my love," said Lucius seriously, "something I've learned this last month or so is that the Romans aren't very just or very fair. And the Christians don't seem to be either. I think the Britons have a much better idea of fairness."
That moved me hugely. I thought of Tad, and Mamma, and Bran . . . "And the Irish too."
"Yes. The Irish too."
It began to rain, and drove us under our canvas for shelter. Lucius told me about the snooty lifestyle of Camulodunum. His had been a closed world, almost as closed as mine. He had been to London and Verulamium but not, until their move, any further afield.
"Where I'd really like to go, of course," he said, "is Rome. Not even my father's been there. Silly, isn't it? A senator of Rome who's never been there."
"And one day," I replied, "you'll be a senator of Rome yourself. But right now you're my Lucius, all mine, in a scruffy little boat in the middle of nowhere, and I love you."
"And I love you, brother." As we kissed again, his hand crept into my drawers and cradled my manhood. And then he worshipped it.
So the voyage continued, rain and cloud and shine, in deep delight. We learned each other's mind and body, we talked the sun down, we loved the nights away. Herons speared fish before our eyes, swallows swooped by to snap up evening gnats, beavers swam past to laugh with us. Fed by tributaries, the Sabrina grew wider -- which meant more rowing in the lesser current -- and river traffic heavier. The second night we stopped at Vertis, the first significant settlement we had seen, and the boatmen left us in charge while they disported themselves. Next day the land became flatter and more cultivated, although the great range of Mailobrunnia, as Bitucus called it, kept us company some miles to our right.
On the morning of the fourth day we woke to find the mooring ropes slack and the river level higher than the night before. A flood must be coming down. I said as much to Lurio, who laughed. Not a flood, he said, but the tide. Tide? Like sin, I had heard of it but no more, and Lucius, who knew all about these things from Camulodunum, had to explain. But as the tide emptied itself out again it helped us on our way, and that evening we moored at the stone-built quay of Glevum.
It was a disappointing place. The most interesting thing about it, our boatmen told us, was that last year a woman there had given birth to a dog. When we pooh-poohed the tale, they were quite offended. They had seen the dog with their own eyes, and indeed it was still there for all to see. Apart from that, they said, Corinium, which was a half-day's journey inland, offered far more attractions. But Glevum could still boast a fair choice of brothels; which, after we had eaten in a quayside tavern, they went off to patronise. We were left again in charge.
It was just as well, for barely were we asleep than we were woken by a rocking of the boat. I peered out from under our canvas and saw three shadowy figures bending over the pigs of lead. Not Bitucus and Lurio returning early, but thieves. It was Tad's lead, and anger made me bold. We had no real weapons, but I found our small belt knives, scraped one against the other so that they sounded like a sword being drawn, and uttered my deepest possible shout. The intruders fled, and we settled down. Much later, with the first hint of dawn in the sky, the boat rocked violently again, and I peered out once more. Not a soul to be seen. But, when I crept cautiously to the side, the water was rushing past us, and the quayside, which had been above our gunwale, was now below. Lucius, when I reported back and restored my knife to its sheath, nearly wet himself with laughter. It was the tide coming in, he said. That was all.
Bitucus and Lurio, returning like cats from a satisfactory night on the tiles, made ready to leave at once and use the ebb -- I was fast learning the jargon -- to carry us down. The river was now meandering again and growing ever wider, but it was only a dozen miles before we stopped in midstream by throwing the anchors out. The boatmen took great care that they were holding firmly, lashed our canvas roof more tightly down, and told us to obey instantly when they gave orders. The tide was still ebbing gently and I asked why we were not making use of it.
"The wave. Like at Glevum, but bigger. This is a safe place to meet it."
There we waited for hours. I took my daily dip, tasting to my amazement the salt of the sea, and dried off in the sun. But where I was brown as a berry, Lucius was always pale and careful of his skin.
"O formose puer, nimium ne crede colore," I teased him. "Don't bank too much on your complexion, lovely boy."
But he insisted on using the awning's shade, and there we sat, talking desultorily and, at the boatmen's suggestion, eating an early and cold dinner. When the sun neared the horizon Bitucus and Lurio stood together in the stern, gazing intently ahead. They heard it first, and shouted. And then we heard it too, a distant roar as of a mighty waterfall.
"Hold on to the mast now, boys," ordered Bitucus. "Tightly, and don't let go till I say. Then be ready to pump."
We obeyed, and looked downstream. A long line of foam, stretched clean across the river, was rushing up towards us. As we watched in fascinated horror the wave lost its white crown and became a menacing wall of water, tall as a man and almost vertical. I knew fear, real fear, as it hit us. The bows rose and the stern sank, and with a stomach-heaving lurch and a dismal creaking of timbers the Fortuna was over the top and plunging back down.
"Keep holding on!"
Instantly another wave hit us. It was smaller, but this time we were already bows-down and went through it. A flood of water surged on board, swilling sideways off our awning or backwards into the cargo. Then a third wave, a fourth, and a fifth, diminishing all the time, leaving us bobbing in a turbulence of wavelets.
Lucius and I looked at each other in awe. "Gods above!" he said. "We didn't have anything like that at Camulodunum!" He laughed shakily. "Rather like shagging, wasn't it? Or making seed. First a big one, then a lot of smaller ones, then that huge feeling of relief."
"I wouldn't call it orgasmic. But relief, yes." And in our relief we kissed.
"Don't snog! Pump!" came a bellow from the stern.
In front of the mast was the pump, an endless chain of balls coming up a pipe. Standing on the lead we heaved together on the handle, and water spewed from the pipe-top, along a gutter, and out through the side. By the time the boat was dry the sun had set and the tide had turned. Lurio raised the anchors and we drifted down for another few miles before anchoring again. It was somewhere around midnight and pitch dark, but the boatmen seemed to know exactly where we were. We were sent to bed, a rather damp bed, and told to sleep. All too early we were roused for a repeat of the same performance; and there was another at sunset, and a final one next sunrise.
Then the river widened into an estuary, too wide for such waves -- half a mile, a mile, three miles, an expanse of water such as I had never seen. I knew of it well enough in theory, but having it before one's eyes . . . Lucius however was unimpressed. He had stood on the eastern shore and looked out across the grey swell of the German Ocean. There was no other side to be seen, he said; but one knew that far out of sight, beyond the curve of the world, lay land, the land from which the Saxons came. Maybe one day, I thought, I would look out across the Irish Ocean, beyond which lay the land of Bran.
The whole of this seventh day was spent under sail. The wind had shifted to the north and bowled us merrily along, at which we thanked the gods and Bitucus made an offering. After a while I ceased to thank the gods, for I was in misery, and my offering to Sabrina was the contents of my stomach, over and over again, long after it was empty. The boatmen sympathised. The sea sickness, they called it, to which many a novice fell prey. They told me to lie down and close my eyes. Cold and rain made that more welcome. Lucius lay down with me and, what with lack of sleep, we dropped off in each other's arms. A change in the barge's motion woke us, and we looked out. We had left the choppy estuary and were in the mouth of a smaller river. The Abona at last. We anchored, and the ebbing tide deposited us gently on a mudbank.
My stomach having returned to normal, I ate avidly. Our need for sleep being reduced and the clouds having vanished, we sat together under the vault of heaven, speaking quietly to avoid disturbing Lurio and Bitucus who, under their own canvas at the stern, were sleeping the sleep of the just. Then we lapsed into wordless togetherness, tacitae per amica silentia lunae, through the friendly silence of the quiet moon. When we finally retired we made up for our abstention of the last two nights. No need to worry now about disturbing our friends. The Fortuna, like our love, was unrockable on a stable bed.
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