The Wolf Den

by Elodie Harper

  Cressa exchanges a quick glance with Victoria who bends to whisper in her lover’s ear. After a pause, all four rise, the men a little unsteadily, and they leave the bar.

  “That was fast,” Nicandrus says, coming to collect the plates and glasses. “Even for Victoria.” He has switched to speaking Greek, both his and Amara’s mother tongue. Dido speaks it too, though Amara suspects Nicandrus doesn’t realize that Punic, not Greek, is her first language.

  “Felix told us to make five denarii each by tomorrow,” Amara replies.

  Nicandrus winces. “What brought that on?”

  “It didn’t go well at the baths this morning.”

  “Sorry to hear that,” he says, looking at Dido who still hasn’t spoken. “I hope nobody gave you trouble.”

  Dido shakes her head. Nicandrus smiles at her before heading back to the kitchens with his stack of dirty dishes.

  Amara looks round the room, trying to see if there are any other potential customers. Three men engrossed in a game of dice ignore her, another drinking alone at the counter scowls when she finally manages to catch his eye. Lunchtime is never the easiest hour. Victoria and Cressa did well to find a pair of willing men.

  “We’re going to have to go further afield, aren’t we?” asks Dido, her slim shoulders sagging at the thought.

  “There were a few sailors hanging around the Forum earlier,” Amara says. “And the rain’s easing off. It might not take us too long.”

  Dido looks at her, her eyes dark. There’s a grief deep enough to drown in, if you let it rise unchecked. Amara never will. She stands up, waits for Dido to join her, holding out her hand with the poise and confidence that belonged to her other life.

  3

  All other animals derive satisfaction from having mated; man gets almost none.

  Pliny the Elder, Natural History

  The sounds of Victoria entertaining the toothless man – and his appreciation – are loud in the street. Felix gave Victoria the room by the main door for precisely this reason, knowing she would be a good sales pitch for passing trade. Gallus slouches by the wall, looking bored.

  “Can you give this to Beronice and Fabia?” Amara asks, handing him half a small loaf. “We’re going to try our luck in the Forum.”

  “Sure,” Gallus stuffs the bread into a fold in his cloak. She hopes he won’t eat it himself.

  The air smells fresher after the downpour, though it’s left the narrow road looking more like a canal. Amara and Dido walk carefully, holding their cloaks up to stop the hems trailing in the water. In the winter, their profession is harder to tell on sight. Hidden underneath the outer layer, they wear togas, the uniform of men and prostitutes. Amara used to feel naked without swathes of fabric shielding her body from head to foot, but over a slippery pavement when agility matters, it’s almost a relief to have her legs free.

  The journey gets easier when they reach the wide main street, the Via Veneria, which leads back to the Forum. They switch to walking side by side, rather than single file. Amara takes Dido’s hand, squeezing it gently. “You can’t look down all the time,” she says. “I understand it’s difficult, but we’re meant to be attracting men’s attention not avoiding it.”

  “I know,” Dido says. “But it’s really hard.”

  “Not really. Your face is already doing half the work for you. You’re easily the most beautiful woman in Pompeii.” Amara has never seen anyone as lovely as Dido. Though it’s a loveliness shot through with fragility, like the exquisite glass statue of the goddess Athene she remembers from her childhood. It was so precious her parents kept it high out of reach.

  “I hate it,” Dido says. “I hate men staring. I hate it when…” she trails off. “I guess I’ll get used to it, all of it, eventually.”

  “No. Just endure it. Never get used to it.”

  They pass a shop selling jewellery, stop a moment to admire the cut glass and cameos. “My mother wore a stone like that,” Dido says, pointing.

  “The red one?”

  “Yes. She was wearing it the last time I saw her.”

  Amara knows the rest of this story. How pirates swept through Dido’s hometown, stealing people to sell as slaves. Dido was kidnapped along with her younger cousin, her uncle killed trying to defend them. Her cousin died on the voyage from Carthage to Puteoli. Dido, like Amara, was completely alone when they first met, lined up, side by side, at the slave market. Amara wants to tell Dido that she may see her mother again one day but finds she can’t. She doesn’t believe it’s true.

  They have lingered too long. The shopkeeper comes out to try and persuade them to try on a string of cheap beads, becomes offended when they refuse. They hurry off towards the Forum at the top of the hill. It’s even more crowded than earlier, the street sellers have wasted no time setting up again after the rain. Amara leads Dido towards one of the wide colonnades surrounding the square. “Just smile at everyone,” she says. “Pretend you’re Drauca.”

  “Is that what you do? Pretend you are someone else?”

  “I am someone else. Amara isn’t even my real name; Dido isn’t yours.”

  They walk slowly arm in arm along the brightly painted walkway. For all her bravado, Amara’s heart is beating fast. Nobody pays them much attention. Expensively dressed men, perhaps meeting to discuss the upcoming elections, brush past as if they are invisible. Hawkers ignore them, too busy with their own selling. They’ve no time to buy what the women are offering, not at this time of day. Undeterred, Amara suggests they try another circuit.

  They walk again, pausing more often this time. Amara looks everyone in the eye, unwittingly carrying herself with the assurance of a young man rather than a flirt, while Dido occasionally manages a shy smile. They don’t quite hit the mark, neither looking like prostitutes nor respectable women, but this time, a few glance at them out of curiosity. They loiter at a stall for leather shoes, catching its sharp scent of freshly tanned hide. The seller demonstrates the suppleness of a pair of sandals, twisting the straps in his fingers. One man starts to haggle and another, perhaps the customer’s friend, stands waiting. Amara brushes lightly against him, as if by accident. He looks up and sees Dido who manages, somehow, not to look down. For a moment, Amara thinks he is going to see through them, realize they are two frightened women who haven’t any idea what they are doing. But that’s not what he sees. Encouraged that Dido hasn’t walked off, he leans towards her. “Too rough for your lovely little feet, surely?”

  “We don’t have far to walk,” Amara answers. “Only a street away.” She stares straight into his eyes so he cannot mistake her meaning. “Why don’t you and your companion join us?”

  They are standing so close he can slip his hand inside Dido’s cloak. She stiffens, gripping Amara’s arm until it hurts. It takes all Amara’s willpower not to slap him. She thinks of Felix, thinks of what he might do if they have nothing to give him tomorrow.

  “That’s enough,” Amara says, more harshly than she intended. The man drops his hand, surprised. She forces herself into a false, lopsided smile. “Nobody handles goods for free, not if they aren’t buying.”

  The man looks them both up and down. “Maybe later, ladies.” He turns his back.

  They walk away from the leather stall. This time it is Amara gripping Dido; she feels as if her legs are going to give way. “Do you need to sit down?” Dido asks. She shakes her head. “I had a bad feeling about him,” Dido continues. “It’s just as well.”

  “I shouldn’t have let him touch you,” Amara says. “I should have told him to fuck off.”

  Dido laughs, taking her by surprise. “The shortest-lived whores in the business. What an opening line that would be. You can ALL fuck off!”

  Dido’s laughter is contagious and soon they are both shaking, trying not to snort out loud, overtaken by hysteria. They clasp their hands round a pillar, swinging and leaning back, giggling like children. Neither care that they are attracting contemptuous stares, suddenly it doesn’t seem to matte
r.

  Eventually, they both calm down and straighten up. “Come on,” Amara says. “Back to the beast hunt.”

  They walk with more confidence this time; Dido isn’t even having to force her smile, although the men aren’t to know it’s at their expense. They stop by a group dicing near an archway to the indoor food hall. The air is heavy with the smell of meat and spices. They stand at the edge of the circle and watch. “Good throw,” Amara says, as one man scores a six and scoops up a small pile of coins. His friend slaps him on the back.

  The players seem to be split into two teams. They all look like out-of-town traders, speaking with a wealth of accents and languages as they argue over the money. Amara and Dido pretend fascination with the game, slowly leaning more towards the winning side, ingratiating themselves. A flask of wine is passed round, and Dido accepts a sip.

  “Throw for us.” One of the men pulls at Amara’s arm. “Go on, you throw.” The winners are in good spirits. After the game, they will need to spend that money somewhere.

  Amara squats down and takes the dice. “For Venus,” she says, looking up sidelong at the team who’ve claimed her. She rolls a five, higher than their rivals had just managed. The men cheer.

  “It doesn’t count,” says one of the losers, face scrunched in anger, watching eager fingers rake through his last few coins. “You can’t get a whore to throw.”

  “You can get a whore to do whatever you like,” Amara retorts. “That’s the whole point.”

  Her new friends fall about laughing, one slipping his arm round Amara as she stands up, but her opponent is unamused. “Cheating little Greek,” he spits. The loser gathers up his remaining money, gesturing at his three companions to do the same. They hurry away, and Amara and Dido are left with the winners. Five men whose attention has now turned from dice to other games. Her heartbeat quickens. She would prefer not to be outnumbered like this.

  “Pompeii has brought you good fortune,” Dido says, inclining her head in a way that reminds Amara of Victoria. “It pays to serve Venus in the goddess’s own city.”

  “You’re from Africa,” one of the men says, noticing her accent.

  “Venus has a wide dominion,” Amara replies. “And the road to her house is short, if you care to join us.” The man who urged her to throw the dice still has his arm tightly round her waist, his fingers kneading her flesh. There is no way she and Dido could fight this gang off if the men decided to cut the transaction short by taking without paying. The food hall is still being repaired from earthquake damage, and there are plenty of deserted arches where building work has paused.

  Dido steps away from the group. “We share a home with three others,” she says. “Five women! Such a happy chance. You must celebrate with our friends; the goddess of love deserves some thanks after all.”

  The men exchange glances, perhaps weighing up the possibility that they are going to be led into a den of thieves by a honeyed bait. “Perhaps you’ve seen our home?” Amara says. “We live by The Elephant.”

  “The Wolf Den!” one of them laughs. “We’ve got an invite to the town brothel!”

  “Is that what you are?” The man holding Amara loosens his grip, turning her towards him, so he can see her face. “A little Greek she-wolf?”

  His skin is tanned, cracked across the cheeks from being out in all weathers, and there is a mark at the bottom of his chin where it must have been nicked by a knife. She knows this man will be no stranger to violence, but then, none of them are. Amara decides to roll the dice again. She leans in to kiss him lightly on the lips then pushes him away, darting just out of reach. “Wolves from Greece, Carthage, Egypt and Italy,” she says over her shoulder, beckoning him to follow. “All worshippers of Venus Pompeiiana.”

  Dido swiftly joins her, and they hold hands, walking down the colonnade towards the Via Veneria, aware the men are close behind. “We need to get there quickly,” Dido whispers, her eyes wide with fear.

  “Don’t run,” Amara says. She looks back over her shoulder, smiling at the man who until recently had her in an iron grip. He and the other dice players look flushed with excitement rather than anger, enjoying the thrill of the chase.

  They weave past the shops and the grand houses on the Via Veneria. The road is still flooded with water. One of the five players, a short, brawny man with a patched cloak, grabs Dido and makes as if to throw her in. She screams and the men roar with laughter. The man sets her back down as a mule cart approaches, and Amara seizes her hand, dragging her further along the pavement.

  Amara doesn’t think she has ever been happier to hear the raucous chorus from The Elephant as they round the corner to the brothel. She feels ready to collapse with relief at Gallus’s feet. He collects the money from their five customers. As Amara steps over the threshold, she glances down at his left hand for the signal. Three fingers. Only three women are in. Amara’s heart contracts.

  Beronice is waiting in the corridor, wreathed in smoke from the lamps.

  “There’s Egypt!” shouts the short man, grabbing her roughly round the hips. “Where are the other two?”

  “On their way,” Amara replies, draping her arms round the man with the marked chin. “Fabia will go and fetch them.” The old woman scurries past her, hood pulled up to her face, and darts into the street.

  “For fuck’s sake, you promised five!” The two men left without women are furious.

  Amara’s customer has already pulled off most of her clothes and is pushing her towards an empty cell. He breaks from kissing her to catch hold of one of his angry companions, drawing him closer. “Stop complaining! You know I always share.”

  The stone bed is hard against Amara’s back; there is a terrible ringing in her ears, the rush of blood pounding in her head, the smell of the strange man too close to her, his grip even tighter than she remembers in the Forum, the movement she cannot stop and cannot control. She is drowning.

  Amara tries to focus on the curtain pulled across the doorway, count its folds until he has finished, anything to quell the unbearable panic. But the second man is blocking her view, his face contorted. He grips her thigh, stopping her from twisting away. She cannot scream. She cannot breathe. Terror is crushing the air from her lungs. Then the curtain opens. Cressa slips inside the room.

  “No need to wait,” she whispers, running her fingers through the second man’s hair.

  He pushes her off. “I want that one.” He points at Amara. Cressa moves so she is standing between them.

  “No, you don’t.” Cressa slides her hands around his hips, pulling him closer. He tries to resist, but the lure of her naked body is too much. He gives in, allows Cressa to lead him away. Cressa glances back as they leave. The kindness in her eyes speaks another language, reaching Amara across the darkness.

  Amara starts to cry. The man with the scarred chin collapses heavily against her. He is finally finished. For a moment, she is forced to lie squashed beneath his weight, then he raises himself on his elbows and steps back from the bed. Amara pulls her legs in towards herself, unable to stop weeping. For a moment, the man stares at her, and she cannot tell if the look of disgust is for her or himself. He leaves without speaking.

  4

  Take one who through long years would slave for you; Take one who’d love with purest loyalty.

  Ovid, Amores I.3

  Night-time at the brothel passes like a scene from Hades: the endless procession of drunken men, the smoke, the soot, angry shouting, pottery smashing, the sound of Dido weeping, the pungent smell of Victoria’s potion as she washes out her insides, the rasp of Beronice’s snoring. When the hour is too late for even the most dedicated Pompeiian to venture out in search of sex, Amara lies alone in the darkness of her cell, unable to sleep, suffocated by rage.

  She is woken the next day by Victoria’s singing. It’s like music from another world, the light earthy voice full of hope and good humour. She sits up in bed.

  “Couldn’t you let us sleep in for once?” Beronice shout
s.

  “Look at the sunshine,” Victoria calls back. “It’s like the Festival of Flora!”

  Amara smiles in spite of herself. She swings her feet onto the floor, wrapping the blanket round her shoulders. Beronice and Cressa are already out in the corridor, yawning and rubbing their eyes. The three of them head to Victoria’s cell. Amara glances up as she goes in. The painting of two lovers above the door shows the woman on top, a gift from Felix to his hardest-working whore.

  “You woke us up!” Beronice says. Victoria is already dressed and styling her hair. It falls in a waterfall of curls about her shoulders. She does not look like a woman who has been up all night, indulging men and deflecting violence. Her eyes are sparkling at the prospect of a new day. Amara has never met anyone like Victoria.

  “Where’s Dido?” Victoria asks. “She can’t have slept through you lazy lot yelling and complaining.”

  The four of them head to Dido’s cell. She is lying on the bed, her face to the wall. Cressa sits next to her, bends and kisses her on the forehead. It is not only Amara and Nicandrus who feel protective of Felix’s youngest she-wolf. “It’s morning sweetheart,” Cressa says.

  Dido sits up. Her face is wet, and her eyes are red from crying. Cressa hugs her, stroking her back. “Were they shits?” she asks.

  “One of them broke all the lamps,” Dido says, pointing to a pile of pottery shards that she’s swept into a corner. “He really frightened me.”

  “Nasty, shitty little man.” Cressa’s voice wavers and for a moment Amara thinks she is going to struggle to keep her composure.

  Victoria sits on the other side of Dido, quickly taking over. “You can’t let him bother you,” she says, smiling. “Not Mr GarlicFarticus.”

  “What a stupid name,” says Beronice, looking doubtful. “He can’t really be called that.”