The Saint's Mistress by Kathryn Bashaar Read Free Book Online Page B

and
    numbed my face. “Oh,” I said again, and Numa put her arms around me. Maron the man had
    been surly and angry, and had treated us like his slaves. But, now I remembered Maron the boy,
    the playmate who made the bigger children include his little sisters in their games of run-goat-
    run and Romans-and-Gauls, who twisted little dolls for us out of leftover wheat.
    “I know,” Numa said, reading my mind. “Do you want to see? It isn’t pretty.”
    I shook my head and frowned at her, not understanding.
    “His body and five others are hung outside the forum.”

    For once, I was not impatient with Numa’s slow pace. I wasn’t sure I wanted this last look at
    our brother. Yet, another part of me buzzed with a mixture of dread, morbid curiosity and
    impatience to just get it over with.
    We soon reached the gateway to the forum.
    The six bodies hung from rough scaffolding, in various states of ruin. Carrion birds swooped
    and cackled overhead. I was afraid to look up and identify Maron, hoping childishly that Numa
    had made a mistake. Slowly, though, I raised my eyes and scanned each body. It wasn’t hard to
    spot Maron’s, the darkest one. His mouth hung open as innocent as a sleeping boy’s, but the
    birds had already plucked his eyes and pecked at his smooth brown cheeks. His side showed a
    long sword gash and one of his arms hung from his shoulder by a few threads of muscle.
    Numa burst into tears. A sour, burning liquid rose in my throat and I had to turn away from
    the sight of Maron’s body.
    I wrapped my arms around Numa. “Come on. We’ll have to go home and break the news to
    Father.”

    Father already knew. We arrived home at our hut to find it crowded with men we’d never
    seen before.
    Father and Tito sat at our small table with a tall, sinewy man with a wild gray beard and the
    robes of a priest. Three younger men stood nearby.
    Father glanced up when Numa and I came in, but didn’t greet us. “Burying dead bodies,” he
    growled at his guest, “is a disgusting Hebrew custom. I won’t have it even if it were possible. If
    I’m allowed the body, it will be burned the way my fathers’ bodies were burned. But, you’re
    wasting your time talking to me. The Romans won’t allow a funeral of any kind.”
    “They might, with the right kind of persuasion.”
    Numa started stirring the porridge that had been simmering on the fire all day, gently, as if it
    might explode if she weren’t careful. I took a lead from her and went to the larder and quietly
    unwrapped a cheese.
    Father snorted. “You think because your Christ is the new official god, they’ll make
    exceptions for you? You’re as naïve as your god.” He jabbed a finger towards the bearded man.
    24

    “The Romans understand one thing: power. Challenge their power and die. It’s as simple as that.
    My boy’s body will hang there until it rots, to get that message across.”
    “We can send a message of our own,” the bearded man argued, tipping his head toward his
    silent companions.
    Father stood. “The same kind of message you sent yesterday? My son was killed delivering
    your message, and now I have one less set of strong arms to help support this family in my old
    age. You used him. You used a stupid, headstrong boy to fight your little internal religious
    battles and now you want to use his body to make some kind of point to the Empire. No. It’s
    nothing to do with him, do you understand?”
    I stole a glance at Numa as I started slicing cheese. She widened her eyes and shook her head.
    “To the contrary,” the priest answered. “Of the six dead, four are martyrs. Maron is one. He
    was a baptized Christian.”
    Father leapt from his seat. “What? No, he wasn’t.”
    “He was. He was more Christian than many who claim the name. He was baptized by a
    legitimate priest, one ordained by a bishop of the martyr tradition.”
    I had seldom seen my father speechless. Numa and I stopped our work and turned towards the
    men,