by Simon Turney
I found him sitting at the bottom of a stairway lit only by a small oil lamp. He turned, startled, at the sound of my approach, then relaxed as he saw who it was.
‘I came seeking solitude.’
‘Solitude is not always good for you,’ I replied quietly.
He acknowledged this with a sigh. ‘When will people stop trying to kill me?’
I laughed mirthlessly. ‘When someone succeeds. You are the most powerful man in the world. There will always be those who covet what you have.’
‘Emperors seem made to be killed,’ he added, rather darkly. Before I could interject, he pointed back up the stairs. ‘Up there? The Flavian palace built by Domitian, stabbed in the groin at his writing desk not more than two hundred paces from here. The room down there? Part of what was Nero’s house before it was ravaged and built over. It might have been in that very room that Nero, knowing his reign was over and the wolves were coming for him, spent his last night in the city before waking to find all his guards and servants fled. See that corridor?’
I peered myopically into the gloom. A wide, arched passage led off into the subterranean world.
‘Somewhere at the other end of that, just outside Tiberius’ palace, was where Caligula was butchered. This is not a palace. This is a mausoleum.’
I shivered. Down here in the darkness it actually felt like one. ‘Come with me. Back to the light.’
He was not deep in a black mood, just hovering on the maudlin, and he nodded and followed me back up the stairs. As we climbed, while we were alone, I confided in him.
‘The bodies in the forum did not add up.’
Commodus frowned. ‘How so?’
‘Your saviour said the enemy numbered Maternus and four others. There were six attackers slain, even before Maternus was found.’
The emperor dismissed it with a wave of his hand. ‘The man was probably just estimating numbers.’
‘Perhaps,’ I admitted. ‘But it was impossible to tell who was a real Praetorian and who was not with the white togas and the blades. What if two men of your own guard were part of the attack?’
‘There was no way they could have been in touch with the plotters.’
‘No,’ I admitted, ‘but if they happened to be there when the attack occurred and felt that they might be able to achieve a despicable goal of their own by supporting the assassins? Opportunists? I know you trust Cleander—’
‘Not this again, Marcia. Yes, I trust Cleander. He has protected my back since I was a boy. And I know you two do not like one another, but that does not mean that either of you is my enemy. He speaks of you just as you speak of him, you know? Cleander will not move against me. There are few things in life about which I am certain, but that is one. Just as I am sure you will never turn on me.’
I nodded. It was unthinkable. And perhaps, while I hated Cleander, I was doing him a disservice to suggest that he might be plotting against the emperor. ‘But Cleander is not the only man with authority over Praetorians,’ I insisted, a dog with a bone, not willing to let it go. ‘There are two prefects. Numerous tribunes. The commander of the cavalry. What if one of them has reason to hate you? Remember those emperors you spoke of in the ruins down there? Caligula: murdered by a Praetorian. Nero: betrayed and abandoned by his Praetorian prefect. Domitian, whose prefect had been part of the plot to drive in that knife.’
As we reached the top of the stairs, I could see that my words had had an impact. It was all speculation and might be built on nothing but flights of fancy, but there was truth in the danger of placing too much faith in the imperial bodyguard. Like all men, they could be bought.
‘I must see out the rest of the festival, Marcia. I have planned great things. But like all right-thinking citizens, I intend to abandon the stink of the city in summer. When the week is over, we shall quit Rome early and move to one of the country estates. It will be more pleasant and, if there is anything in your fears, we shall be safer there.’
I nodded uncertainly. Was that we, he and I, or he and his wife? ‘Will I come?’
‘Yes,’ he replied, and I tried not to sigh with relief. ‘Bruttia too,’ he added, casting a pall over my brief joy. ‘Cleander can stay in Rome and keep things in order for me.’
I nodded again. While leaving Cleander in control of Rome was far from ideal and putting up with the presence of the empress was a loathsome thought, it was still a good idea. How things had changed. A few years earlier I had visited that same villa to drag Commodus back to Rome, fearing he was becoming a new Tiberius. Now here I was urging him to retreat there.
At least I would be free of Cleander.
XVII
WICKED BLADES
Via Appia, 6 miles from Rome, ad 187
The villa that had formerly belonged to the sour-faced Quintilii brothers was a self-contained world. Surrounded by a huge, walled estate and fed by its own aqueduct, it provided everything a person could need for months of retreat. Sporting two bathhouses, an amphitheatre, a small auditorium and even a private race circuit, it really did cater for the luxurious life.
Indeed, being just a few short miles from both Rome and Albanum, there was always a ready source for anything we desired. If we wanted an amphora of Setinian wine, we could have it in little more than an hour, and, Commodus being Commodus, ever a man given to life’s luxuries, we had those indulgences.
He had them, in particular. His pet lanista, who had been brought here two years ago by the empress in an attempt to draw her husband out of his gloom, had been far from idle during his time here. He had increased the stable of gladiators, trained them and improved the facilities. When we arrived at the villa, it transpired that those brutal fighters were now guarding the estate as well as practising for bouts in the small private arena.
Commodus launched into the world of gladiators again with gusto. It was no place for the emperor, standing on the sand of the arena and swinging steel at a slave. His place, like mine, was to sit in the stands and watch. But Commodus was of a different mind.
‘Must you?’ I asked as he stepped out of the doorway clad in linen padding and streamers, carrying a gleaming bronze helmet and a wicked-looking blade. He was oiled and showing much lean, muscled flesh. If the stuffy senators of Rome had seen him like this they would have collapsed in shock.
‘It is a sport, Marcia.’ He rolled his eyes.
‘There are other sports that are less demeaning. Less dangerous.’
‘But this serves a secondary purpose,’ Commodus said, and his face took on a more serious cast. ‘I was attacked, Marcia. In the streets, by soldiers, and my guard could do nothing, for they could not even tell who the enemy was. Only the fact that I was armed and knew how to wield my club saved me from death. That will not happen again. I shall become a killer, Marcia.’
I shuddered. I didn’t like that word.
‘But a soldier can teach you to use a sword. Other emperors have had a strong pedigree in war.’
Commodus fixed me with a look. ‘I have told you before of my thoughts on war. It is indiscriminate and wasteful. I have no desire to learn how to stand in a wall of shields and be part of the legion, hacking at barbarians in rotation. I need to learn from true warriors. Men who can kill with a stick, a stone, a finger. I need gladiators. I shall train for the summer and beyond. I shall be the best, the Hercules I should be.’
There was a certain logic there, I had to admit. He had avoided the assassin’s blade twice now, largely through luck and the intervention of others. If he could defend himself against any opponent? Well, then he would not join the ranks of Caligula, Nero and Domitian amid the ghosts under the Palatine.
‘And they have been guarding the estate well,’ he added. ‘If they can guard something the size of the villa, then they can guard something the size of me. I shall add to the Praetorians from the ranks of these men.’
And h
e did, despite argument to the contrary. The Praetorian centurions were less than thrilled to have gladiator units mixed among their ranks, but they had little say in the matter. I cannot say how it was organised, but certainly I saw well-padded, half-naked killers standing stoically by doors that year as often as I saw a gleaming, stuffy Praetorian.
He trained. Not just on the sand, but wrestling on the palaestra with them, stretching and boxing, running and swimming. Narcissus, the wrestler we had brought back from Centum Cellae all those years ago, became a favourite, teaching the emperor and pushing him, strengthening and encouraging. Commodus was all but one of them at times. Bruttia Crispina disapproved in her quiet, mousy way. With her slide from popularity, her veneer of friendship with me had corroded somewhat. Some time, a month or so after we settled in, I was sitting on a marble bench overlooking a pond when, to my joy, Bruttia appeared. I tried not to glare at her.
‘Marcia?’
I looked up, startled. She rarely spoke to me, and certainly never in a familiar manner, using my given name.
‘Majesty?’
‘I know there is no love lost between us. We are opponents and ever have been, and I will continue to fight for my place.’
I acknowledged this with a nod, lacking any emotion.
‘But he has to stop this, and while I would tear out your gut with hooks, I know that you share that opinion, and you have known my husband longer than most. How do I stop this madness with the arena?’
I frowned. Neutral ground? I had never thought to find it.
‘I’m not sure you can. If there is a way to divert his attentions it is only by raising the stakes. Find him something even more distracting than his current diversion. When we were children and I needed to change his direction, I took him to see Maximus, the Palatine lion. He loved that lion. He is clever, but he is permanently slave to his emotions. He obsesses over the arena? Find him something better.’
She nodded, deep in thought. ‘A lion.’
I honestly thought she might go and get a lion then, but in actual fact she left the villa for a number of days, and when she came back it was as much a surprise as anything she could have brought.
In her wake, she fetched a menagerie of fierce beasts. A famed bestiarius from Syria had come to Rome for Commodus’ great festival of Cybele. I vaguely remembered seeing the fellow in beast shows, leading his teams of men in the amphitheatre as they hunted animals, and now here he was, entering the villa. Behind him came his troupe of half a dozen expert bestiarii and more than a dozen vehicles carrying animals. I stared, wide-eyed, as enclosed timber wagons rolled past, shaking and lurching as their occupants roared and huffed and bellowed.
Commodus emerged from the bathhouse and stared in amazement as Julius Alexander, with the empress at his side, took a bow. It took me a moment to realise why Bruttia was so comfortable in the man’s company, while it had taken her years to use my name. He was of a royal line himself, with blood as old and as noble as hers, albeit Emesene rather than Roman.
‘What is this?’ Commodus breathed, watching the wagons with breathless anticipation.
‘Hunting,’ Bruttia Crispina said with more determination than was her norm. ‘A good, noble pastime. Julius Alexander here brings wild beasts to release in the estate. You can hunt in the privacy of your own villa.’
It was a masterstroke, I have to admit. I knew from the sudden gleam in Commodus’ eyes that he was instantly hooked. Over the following days the bestiarii were lodged in the villa, the animals released into the extended estate, and new safety measures instituted at the villa proper. After all, no one wanted to emerge from their bedchamber, yawning, to find a lion waiting outside. I had to grudgingly nod my approval to the empress, but the look she returned confirmed for me that our neutral ground had slid away once more to leave that same bitter chasm.
The new diversion did not quite have the results the empress expected, though. Commodus began to hunt with the bestiarii across the estate, sometimes on foot and sometimes either on horseback or by chariot, and he threw himself into the sport. However, rather than this exotic hunting supplanting his apparent desire to fight in the arena, it simply added to it. Now his time was divided between the two. More, even, for he began to race chariots around the private track, as well. I saw him less and less. Had he spent any time with his empress these days, she would have noticed that lessen too.
The height of his beast-hunting came one summer night as the evening began to draw in and the sky glowed with that glorious indigo twilight. As I emerged from the villa onto a wide path, taking the air, I peered carefully into the dim light in every direction. The guards were everywhere and in all the time we had been there not one of the beasts loose in the park had actually come up to the villa, especially with well-armed and skilled gladiators all around, but it was still wise to check as you left the structures.
In the gloom, I could see a column of men and animals returning to the villa. I stood and watched, fascinated. Three of the bestiarii came first, then Commodus, with a wry smile. Behind him, four huge slaves carried a stout wooden staff with the body of a lion dangling from it. Then came Julius Alexander, and then various other hunters and slaves. There had been only one lion among those beasts released into the estate, and it had evaded the hunters for months. Out of respect and nostalgia, Commodus had named him Maximus and had more than once vowed that he would bring down the beast himself.
I smiled as they approached. He had finally achieved his goal.
‘Your hunt went well, Majesty.’ I grinned. This was better than watching him risk his life on the sands any day, though hunting a lion clearly carried its own special perils.
Commodus shot me a look that for just a blink of an eye I thought was one of anger, but then he laughed. ‘Well indeed. After months, I had my javelin ready. There was Maximus, upwind, unaware. I brought my horse to a position where I had a good throw, waiting for the wind to pick up and rustle the trees, covering the sound. I managed to get into position, and you know how I am a master of the thrown spear. Maximus was mine.’
‘I am impressed, Majesty.’
‘I am not,’ snorted Commodus. ‘I pulled back my arm, ready to throw, and suddenly the lion was hurled across the clearing, howling, a javelin through his neck. I stared in shock, and then Julius was there, whooping like a lunatic. The bastard had taken it with his first throw. Beat me to it by a heartbeat, and no more. The lion is Alexander’s, not mine.’
Julius Alexander threw out a horribly apologetic look, and Commodus burst out laughing. ‘If I were the sort of man to kill for something so small, you’d never have made it back to the villa, Julius. Come, we must have wine and talk about javelin weights. Then, tonight, we shall dine on the most exotic of meats.’
And we did. That night we ate lion. It was the first time I did so, and the last. I will admit that I found it to my taste, as much for the fascination as the meat itself. The roasted flesh was rich and pungent and added to a wild array of aromas in the dining room. Julius Alexander, not the least, had a very individual scent, strong enough to override the spiced meat of the meal and the burning incense. There is something about Emesenes that makes them smell like a heady combination of sweat and warm spices. I spotted signs that night of what was to come, though I did not recognise them at the time. Had I realised, I’m even now not sure what I would have done.
The days rolled on, then. More hunting, more racing, more fighting. More of Bruttia Crispina watching in dismay as her somewhat estranged husband raced and fought with men and beasts rather than the rhetoric and literature she clearly thought more appropriate.
One night, quite by chance, I entered the empress’ section of the villa – she and her husband were no longer living as man and wife – simply on the way through to visit Commodus. I climbed the stairs quietly. I had removed my sandals for the blessed cool of cold marble on my feet in the warm, sultry, breezeless su
mmer night. I was, therefore, almost entirely silent. I had neared the top of the staircase when I heard a door open. I’m not sure precisely why, but I slowed. As I reached the upper steps, with a view along the lamplit corridor, I could see a figure leaving at the far end. I noticed the door from which the figure had emerged click shut, and my blood chilled.
It was the empress’ chamber, and the unidentifiable figure I’d seen disappear at the far end was most certainly not Commodus. In fact, there is a way conspirators move that identifies them more than any evidence, and the figure had moved like that. I stood at the top of the stairs for a long time, dithering, wondering what to do next. Then I took a step, then another. Moments later, I was outside the empress’ door. But before I even considered whether or not to knock, my nose wrinkled.
There was just a whiff of a heady scent in the corridor. Spicy, sweaty.
I felt cold, even in the heat of the summer evening. I knew that scent. And now that evening of the lion meal came back to me. The looks shared between Julius Alexander and Bruttia. I knew then that their affair had been going on for months, right under our noses, possibly since the day the Emesene hunter had arrived. In fairness, while Bruttia was apparently barren, she was still a warm-blooded woman, and the emperor had not lain with her in so long. I can hardly blame her for her actions – what woman wants to live her life solitarily, without the touch of another? But an empress cannot be as forward as any other woman, and how dare she cling to my Commodus while bedding another?
Bruttia Crispina and Julius Alexander.
There was no time to lose. A vapour stays in the air for mere heartbeats, even in an enclosed space. I hurried away.
The emperor’s door was guarded by two gladiators rather than Praetorians, and I am still not sure how I feel about that. I nodded to them. While I did not know them, they had to know me.
‘I need to see the emperor.’
‘Na, no see,’ grunted one of them in barely recognisable Latin, with a thick Numidian accent. I rounded upon him angrily.
