Never mind. I had a legate who hated me, but I also had a war to fight and a ladder to climb. More than enough to deal with without borrowing trouble.

A long day’s march. We cycled through most of our marching songs, and at the midday rest I learned a few new ones from a friendly clerk in the Sixth. Very dirty ones. “We were posted out in Syria for years,” the clerk confided. “Nothing to screw up there but the cows. You think Dacia has any pretty girls?”

“Pretty,” I said, “but they’ll leave scratches down your back a mile long.”

“Better than mooing,” he leered. “You’ve got a woman?”

“One, and that’s one too many.” I’d patched things up with Demetra, mostly because Titus had gotten very stern with me. “She’s carrying your child,” he said, exasperated. “In plenty of traditions that makes her your wife, whether or not you stood before an altar and recited any vows—”

“Don’t say it,” I winced.

“—and a husband at least owes his wife a farewell before he marches off to war.” For such a skinny self-effacing young sprig, Titus had a surprisingly flinty stare. “Do right by her, Vercingetorix.”

In truth I cared more about keeping Titus for my friend than keeping Demetra for my woman, but the result was the same. I gulped under his gaze, fortified myself with a fair amount of unmixed wine and a good-bye cuddle from my redhead, and went to see Demetra the night before we marched. It was about as bad as I’d feared—she cried a lot, and I tried to be soothing, and she cried some more, and I made noises about having to be up in time for the dawn march, and that set her crying the hardest of all. “You’ll be dead,” she sobbed into my chest. “You’ll be k-killed in Dacia by that king with the lion skin and the horns—you’ll never come back!”

“None of that, now,” I cajoled. “Takes more than a king with horns to kill me. I’ll be back soon with a sack full of gold, you’ll see.”

“Really? You’ll come back to me?”

“Really.” Maybe. Maybe not. By that time I’d have promised anything to stop the weeping. Her little boy watched me from the corner with big brown eyes just like hers, only less red and blotchy.

“I’ll have your son,” she said, hands sliding to her still-flat stomach. “I know you’ll want him when you see him, Vix. All men want sons.”

“You could still, you know…” I hedged. “Before it gets dangerous. Then maybe we could get married when I come back. It would make everything easier.”