The only reason you said yes to Varus was to guzzle our fine vintages. That wasn’t what he said, but it was what he meant. Arminius looked back just as coldly; the Romans often scorned someone who let his temper run away with him. “I like beer about as well,” he said in a wintry voice, adding, “I’m no water-drinker. You ask for a flux of the bowels if you do that when you don’t have to.”

“He’s got you there!” Quinctilius Varus said with a chuckle. “You can’t very well tell him he’s wrong, either.”

“No, sir,” Numonius answered tonelessly. That quiet reply didn’t mean he agreed. Oh, no. It meant he despised Arminius all the more, but he didn’t feel like showing it. A German would have. But the Roman was a serpent, all right. He tried to make himself invisible in the grass, but he’d poison you if you stepped on him.

Varus either took no notice of Numonius’ unhappiness or affected not to see it. “Well, let’s go back,” he said. “You have a horse, Arminius?”

“Yes, sir,” the German said. He vaulted into the saddle without bothering to ask for a leg-up. It was less of a feat than it might have been; he was a big man getting up onto a small horse. Standing next to the Romans, he was taller than any of them. Riding with them, he was the shortest man in the group. They noticed as soon as he did. Their chuckles said they liked it.

Arminius shrugged. Yes, he craved a charger like the one Vala Numonius rode. But he was still himself, the Romans still themselves. Had he been sitting on a short stool while they used high ones, he still would have been taller than they were. And so he was now, whether they liked it or not.

They didn’t have much to say to one another or to him as they all rode back to the Roman encampment in the German heartland. Their glances his way told him they would have liked to talk about him, but their silence proclaimed that they remembered he spoke good Latin.

The Roman sentries frankly stared at him when he rode in with Varus and Vala Numonius and the rest of the Romans. Arminius didn’t think he could behave haughtily toward the Roman officers in whose company he found himself. Sentries? They were a different story. He affected not to notice them as he went by.

“Miserable scut!” one of the common soldiers growled.

“Who does he think he is?” another said. Maybe they didn’t know he could follow their language. More likely, they just didn’t care. Unlike their superiors, they weren’t hypocrites. When they didn’t like somebody, they didn’t try to hide it.

Quinctilius Varus’ Greek slave looked surprised to see Arminius in the company of his master. The weedy little man - Aristocles was his name, Arminius remembered - somehow contrived to look down on Romans as well as Germans. Varus and the legionaries here knew it, too, but for reasons beyond Arminius’ ken they failed to get angry. Come to that, he’d seen the same thing with the few Greeks he’d met in Pannonia. He didn’t understand it, but he was sure it was real.

“I’ll let the cooks know we have a . . . distinguished guest,” Aristocles said.

“By all means. Thank you.” Quinctilius Varus didn’t notice the slave’s discreet pause -or, if he did, he pretended not to. Yes, Romans were master dissemblers.

He noticed Aristocles’ hesitation. He knew what it meant, too. Aristocles thought he would have got angry if he heard something like We have a hairy barbarian eating with us tonight. Well, the Greekling wasn’t wrong.

“Oh, Aristocles!” Varus called when his slave had already taken a couple of steps away.

The man perforce stopped. “Yes, sir?”

“Bring us some wine when you come back. It’s been a long day. We can all use some refreshment.”

“Of course, sir.” This time, Aristocles succeeded in disappearing.

Of course, sir. What else could a slave say? The Germans kept slaves, too - what folk didn’t? Theirs, though, were less like to be body servants, more likely to be farmers who owed their masters a share of what they raised. A German master was less likely to beat or whip a slave than a Roman was. But a German was more likely to lose his temper and kill a man he owned. And why not? It wasn’t as if he had to pay any penalty for doing it.

If the Romans got their way, they’d turn all the Germans from the Rhine to the Elbe into slaves - maybe even farther, if they thought their legions could bring it off. They’d already enslaved more lands, more peoples, than most Germans had ever imagined. Arminius remained determined he wouldn’t let them do that to his folk.

Aristocles returned with a large tray, cups, a jar of wine, and a jar of water. He set the tray down on a light, folding table: a clever and useful piece of furniture. He mixed wine and water for the legionary officers, but paused before serving Arminius. “How would you like your wine, sir?” he inquired.

“The same way the other Roman citizens are having theirs,” Arminius replied. Face carefully blank, the Greek handed him a cup of watered wine.

Laughing, Varus said, “He got you there, Aristocles.” The slave affected not to hear. Arminius would have boxed the man’s ears for such insolence, but Varus put up with it. Some Romans, as Arminius had seen in Pannonia, let slaves get away with more than free subordinates. No German would do that.

“I thought you would sooner drink your wine neat,” Vala Numonius said to Arminius.

“I would if you gentlemen were doing the same,” the German answered. “But if I get drunk while your heads stay clear, you’ll laugh at me. I don’t fancy that.”

The Roman cavalry commander looked surprised for a moment. Then he raised his cup in salute. “I’ve heard you were clever. It seems to be so.”

“For which I thank you.” Arminius also raised his cup. “Your health.” They grudgingly drank to each other.

When the cook came out to announce that supper was ready, Arminius was glad to see the man had a double chin and a potbelly. Who would have wanted a meal from a man who didn’t like his own cooking?

He had a skinnier slave of his own - or maybe the man who carried out the heavy tray of food was a more junior cook. The greens course was covered with a mixture of wine vinegar, olive oil, and ground spices. No German would have seasoned them that way, but Arminius had met such dressings in Pannonia. This one didn’t drive him wild, but he could deal with it.

Boiled turnips in a cheese sauce seemed less exotic. A German cook might have made the same dish, though the Roman cheese was sharper than Arminius was used to. The main course was roasted slices of boar. The meat was fine. The sauce, on the other hand . . .

“I know you Romans like garlic,” Arminius said. “But what’s that other spice you put on it, the one that bites the tongue?”

“That’s pepper,” Varus told him. “It comes into the Empire all the way from India.”

“Why?” Arminius asked.

“We like it,” Varus answered. The other Roman officers nodded so promptly, Arminius didn’t think they were agreeing only because their superior had spoken. Varus went on, “Don’t you care for the flavor it adds?”

“Maybe I’m just not used to it,” Arminius said. “I suppose it would be good to mask the taste of meat that’s going off. But what you have here is nice and fresh. It doesn’t need to be hidden by all that garlic and, uh, pepper.”

“We think bland food is boring,” Vala Numonius said. The officers nodded once more.

“What you eat is your business,” Arminius said. “But if you try to feed it to me, I may not like it so well. Romans and Germans are not the same.”

A considerable silence followed. Arminius decided he might have said too much even if his wine was watered. Varus said, “Do I need to remind you that you are a Roman citizen?”

“No, sir. I am proud to be a Roman citizen. It is a great honor.” Arminius knew the Romans reckoned it one. And he was proud - it showed he’d successfully deceived his foes. He went on, “My head and my heart are glad to be Roman. My tongue and my belly remember I was born German. I don’t know what to do about that.”