The Wolf Den

by Elodie Harper

  Amara feels suddenly exhausted. After so much time alone, it is going to be a strain returning to the total lack of privacy. “I might just have a rest so I’m not too tired tonight.”

  “Oh, you can’t go in there…” Victoria says as Amara draws the curtain to her own cell.

  “Who’s this?” Amara asks in surprise. An unfamiliar woman is sitting on her bed. She is shockingly pale and has a tangled mass of long red hair. At the sight of the others, she springs up, towering over them, babbling urgently in a strange, guttural language. Amara cannot tell if she is furious or terrified. She steps back into the corridor in alarm.

  “Sit!” Victoria shouts, pointing at the bed. “Sit!”

  The stranger goes back into the cell, still talking in her incomprehensible tongue, gesturing at them.

  “Felix bought her with your old man’s money,” Victoria says. “He told us it’s because you and Dido are out so much, we need more bodies in the brothel.”

  “Where am I sleeping then?”

  “You can come in with me,” Dido says. “Makes sense.”

  “Doesn’t speak a word of Latin,” Victoria says. “We’ve called her Britannica, because that’s where she’s from. Cressa’s the only one she seems to like. She’s off buying more food for the greedy thing now.”

  “I thought all the Britons had blue faces,” Beronice says, looking at Britannica with disappointment. “That’s what everyone says, isn’t it? Blue-faced Britons.”

  “She’s certainly a savage,” Victoria says. “She just screams all night, scratching the men, biting. She punched one yesterday! Like some sort of animal!”

  Amara doesn’t like the way Victoria is talking about Britannica, even if the other woman doesn’t understand. She glances at her again. The Briton is silent now. She certainly looks like a wildcat, with her mane of red hair and green eyes. But the emotion in them is all too human. Rage at her confinement.

  “Are you all just standing there talking about her again?”

  It’s Cressa, carrying a lump of bread. She shoves them out of the way so she can get in the cell. “You might have a little compassion.”

  Britannica’s face lights up at the sight of Cressa, and she begins gabbling. Cressa sits beside her, talking soothingly to her as if she were a small child, stroking her hair. She gives the bread to Britannica who wolfs it down. “Sorry, Amara, I didn’t realize you were back,” she says, finally noticing her.

  “That’s alright,” she replies. “I remember my father telling me about the women in Britain. A lot of them are warriors. Maybe Britannica was a soldier.”

  “The women go to war?” Dido says.

  “Not all of them. My father told me they had a famous queen; I don’t know her name. But she destroyed a Roman army.”

  Beronice makes the sign of the evil eye. “Women aren’t meant to rule. It’s unnatural.”

  “Britannica’s hardly a warrior queen! She can’t even defeat a drunken sailor,” Victoria says, though Amara notices that she eyes the stranger with a new, wary respect.

  “Were you a warrior?” Cressa asks Britannica gently. “Is that why you hate it here so much?” Britannica smiles at her, not understanding the words, only the kindness behind them.

  “Amara!” Thraso is shouting from the doorway of the brothel. “Are you still in there? I told you to go up to Felix.”

  “I’m just coming,” she calls back.

  “No, you’re not,” he snaps, barging inside and grabbing her hard by the arm. She cries out in pain. “You’re a fucking timewaster. Move it.” He lets go of her and stomps off again.

  “He’s just annoyed Balbus gave him a black eye yesterday,” Victoria whispers. “Some stupid fight about Drauca.”

  “What about her?” Amara asks, suddenly anxious.

  “Who knows,” Victoria shrugs. “Thraso would start a fight about anything.”

  *

  It is a room she had hoped never to see again. The red glow, the bulls’ skulls. She stands, saying nothing, as Felix goes through her new clothes.

  “Is this all he gave you? After a week?”

  “There was this as well,” she says, holding up the scroll but not handing it over.

  Felix gestures impatiently, and she gives it to him. He unravels it clumsily, looking for hidden coins or jewellery. “Anatomy?” He frowns, looking more closely at one of the illustrations. Amara doesn’t answer. If Felix understands her attachment to Pliny’s gift, he will only use it against her. He hands it back, and she takes it, rolling it up again, trying not to let the relief show on her face. “Not much after such a long stay.”

  “He introduced me to a new client though. So those dresses will come in useful.”

  “What new client?”

  “A man called Rufus. He will be calling on you to buy me for an evening.” She hesitates, knowing how much Felix hates being given advice. “I’m hoping that he is a long-term investment, so I think we might be better not charging too much at first, so that he continues paying.”

  “You’re running the business now, are you?”

  “No,” she says. “I didn’t mean…”

  “Amara,” Felix says, grinning. “I was joking. You’ve done well. The old man paid a fair price.” He picks up one of the dresses. “If this new one turns into a regular client, you can keep these to wear out with him. If not, I will sell them.” He waves a hand at the clothes she still has on. “But you certainly don’t need to be wearing them now.”

  Amara had guessed he might make her change and has brought her old gaudy toga up from downstairs. She strips off, handing him the new clothes.

  “You’ve put weight on,” he says, looking her over as she dresses. “It suits you.”

  “You’ll have to feed me more then,” she says, risking a joke, “if you like it so much.” Felix shakes his head but looks amused. A memory of the night they spent together comes back to her. The way he rested his head on her shoulder, looked up with the same flash of humour in his eyes. And she had smiled back.

  Amara doesn’t like remembering. “Thraso looked worse for wear,” she says. “Why were he and Balbus fighting?”

  She knows, as soon as she has asked, that it was a mistake. Any hint of playfulness has gone from his face. “I thought the old man was going to buy you,” Felix says, ignoring her question. “The Admiral of the Fleet! What a change that would have been. But here you are, back at the brothel.” She says nothing. “What did he do with you all week?”

  “Just the usual,” she says, her mouth feeling dry.

  “I doubt that,” Felix says. He puts his arms round her in an exaggerated parody of affection. “Did he tell you how lovely you were? Gaze into your eyes? Was he gentle?”

  “No.”

  “He wasn’t gentle?” Felix pretends to be shocked. “What a shit! He certainly fed you well. But I’m not sure I believe you. I think he spoiled you, that old man. Made you forget who you are.”

  His fingers are digging painfully into her upper arms, but she doesn’t flinch. Amara has belonged to Felix so long, she knows that he is going to rape her, to humiliate her, to try and destroy the last traces of the happiness she has brought back, now fading like the scent of jasmine on her skin. She grips the scroll Pliny gave her. There are parts of herself Felix cannot know or touch.

  “I never forget,” she says.

  “Good,” Felix lets go of her. “You should get back to work then.”

  She is almost over the threshold of the doorway, giddy with relief, when he stops her. “Did I say you could take that?” Amara waits as he walks up to her, lets him take Pliny’s gift from her hands. “I might be able to sell it.” He turns the scroll over, a dismissive look on his face. “You never know what someone else will value.”

  26

  Thais: Me not speaking from my heart? That’s not fair! What have you ever wanted from me, even in fun, that you didn’t get?

  Terence, The Eunuch

  The theatre’s stage is blazing with t
orches, even though dusk has not yet fallen. The brightly painted columns and statues, the flamboyance of the actors, the laughter, reminds her of the atmosphere at the Vinalia. Amara has never been to see a play before and is enjoying the luxury of watching rather than being watched. Let someone else have the hard work of entertaining for a while. Beside her, Rufus has taken her hand, and his look of utter delight at the unfolding scene endears him to her. He really is like a child, she thinks.

  She finds the play easy to follow. It is The Eunuch by Terence who, Rufus eagerly assures her, is a greater master than Virgil. She would certainly like to borrow the luck of the play’s courtesan, Thais, who seems to rule the men through charm alone. Amara suspects Thais never encountered a pimp like Felix.

  She finds herself laughing at this world where the slaves are cleverer than their masters, and the men love women to distraction. She remembers Rufus telling her he admired the theatre for telling the truth – can he really think the world is like this? On stage, she watches as an actor disguises himself as a eunuch in order to rape the slave girl he fancies. He is a tall man, lisping and mincing to convince everyone he is safe to leave with the young virgin. Laughter ripples round the theatre at the absurdity and audacity of the joke.

  “The comic timing!” Rufus whispers to her. “It’s perfect.”

  The girl’s exaggerated screams off stage cause further titters of amusement. Rufus laughs with the rest. Amara sits listening to the actress’s cries, a fixed smile on her face. Perhaps comedy is a mirror after all.

  The sky turns a deeper blue, and the shadows on stage lengthen. Rufus is caressing her hand, teasing out the shape of her fingers with his own. She had worried, before this evening, about being out of place in a respectable crowd. Victoria had insisted she let her make some changes to the white robe Pliny gave her – “You don’t want Rufus thinking he’s taken his mother! At least show a bit of shoulder.” – and now she is grateful to her friend. Many of the women here are obviously courtesans, out with wealthy lovers. Her eye is drawn to one woman, sitting with the poise of a queen, her robes elegantly dipped at the back to show the line of her dark brown shoulder blades. Amara shuffles on her seat, trying to pull her own dress a little further down her arm.

  The play’s end surprises her. Thais gets to keep both her lovers – the one she likes and the one who pays. She looks at Rufus who is cheering enthusiastically. Perhaps her life will disturb him less than she feared. He turns to her, face lit with excitement. “Did you like it?”

  “It was wonderful!” she exclaims. “I cannot think of a happier evening!”

  “I’m so glad,” he says, kissing her hand. “I hoped you would.”

  They spill back out onto the streets with the rest of the audience. Laughter and conversation warm the evening air. Amara can see a small crowd pressed around Marcella’s bar and instinctively turns away.

  “Is there somewhere to entertain privately at your place?” Rufus asks. He has not yet been to the brothel – one of his slaves was sent to collect her.

  “Oh!” Amara says, looking horrified. “We couldn’t go there!” She imagines Rufus stepping into the narrow, sooty corridor, greeted by some vomiting laundryman, embracing her to the sound of Victoria’s moaning, the air stagnant with the smell from the latrine. She would never see him again. “It’s a terrible place!”

  “But you seem so… lovely,” Rufus replies, looking at the nearly-respectable white dress, her carefully dressed hair.

  Amara knows she cannot tell him she is ashamed of the squalor; she must invent a more poetic reason to stay away. “My master is unbelievably cruel,” she replies. “If he thought there was a chance I might be happy with you, even for an hour, he would never let me see you again.”

  “Really?” Rufus looks alarmed.

  Amara glances at him sidelong, as if too shy to be direct. “If he thought I might care for anyone, he would punish me dreadfully.” Even as she says it, she can imagine Felix laughing. As if he would care about anything other than the money.

  Rufus squeezes her hand. “I will take you to my home. My parents are away for the summer.”

  They walk to his house, accompanied by a small retinue of slaves who must have had to hang around outside the theatre during the performance. Rufus is still enjoying talking about the play, and together, they amuse themselves imagining what mischief Thais and her lover might make after the action has ended. “And even our eunuch married his girl in the end,” he says about the rapist, “so no harm done.”

  The porter lets them in, and Amara feels a flood of relief that they did not go to the brothel. It is a wealthy home, not far from Zoilus’s house, and as Rufus leads her across the atrium, a beautiful marine mosaic beneath their feet, she imagines his horror at the Wolf Den’s baked mud floor. They pass through the courtyard, and he stops to break off a sprig of jasmine.

  “This scent always makes me think of you,” he says, giving it to her. “The way you were sitting in that garden! Surrounded by a thousand white stars. I was just thinking to myself I had no idea the admiral had a daughter and then I remembered…” He stops abruptly.

  And then you remembered Pliny had hired a whore, Amara thinks. “That’s such a beautiful thing to say,” she whispers, inhaling the flower’s scent before tucking the stem behind her ear. “Thank you.” She doesn’t stop him when he kisses her this time. Why else, after all, is she here?

  “A little further,” he says, letting go of her. “My rooms are this way.” One of the slaves has accompanied them, and Rufus turns to him before leading her off. “Some refreshments please, Vitalio.”

  Rufus’s rooms are set off the large garden. She smiles to herself to see the paintings on the walls: theatre masks and actors on stage. Rufus offers her a couch, reclining beside her. Vitalio brings them wine and sets down a light supper on a small table by the couch: bread, cheese, dried figs. Then he leaves.

  It is clear Rufus has no intention of eating yet. No sooner is Vitalio gone, than he is all over her. Amara finds herself unexpectedly afraid. This feels too familiar, too like the brothel. So much rests on him liking her, and she has no idea how a courtesan might be expected to behave. Should she acquiesce or will he want to chase her?

  “Stop!” she says, pushing him off and sitting up. She rearranges her dress to cover herself. Her heart is pounding with anxiety. “Just a moment.”

  Rufus is looking at her in surprise. He had not, after all, been violent. And what else is a man meant to do when he has hired a woman for the night?

  She thinks of Thais, of the illusion of power she wielded. Rufus believes that is what life is really like. He has all the power, and she has none, but he does not know this. And she cannot let him realize.

  She turns to him in anger. “You presume too much.”

  They stare at one another in mutual astonishment. The words seemed to come from someone else. It is a part Amara is playing, yet somehow, she just found her own voice. She takes the jasmine flower from her hair, allowing the real anger she always carries inside to catch fire. “So you thought I was the admiral’s daughter,” she says. “And then, because I am not, you decide to treat me as a whore. I told you that this has not always been my life, that I value kindness and respect and you show me none.”

  Amara is ready for him to argue, ready to leave him, to blaze out into the night in rage, but Rufus immediately surrenders.

  “I’m sorry,” he says, brow creased with remorse. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  Amara finds, having lit the spark, it is not so easy to extinguish it. “Is that what you think? That you can take without asking?” she demands.

  “No! Not at all, I…”

  “What about all these plays that mean so much to you? What about love?” Her voice is scathing. “I have enough clients,” she lies. “I thought you were different; I thought you wanted something else.” The anger is starting to take on a momentum beyond Rufus, and she knows she has to stop. She takes a breath, turning her face
aside, as if to hide emotion. “I thought you might care for me.” She falls silent, waiting to see if he will accept the role she is offering.

  He touches her arm, tentatively at first, then more confidently when she doesn’t move away. “Please,” he says, laying his hand over hers. “I’m very sorry. Let me make it up to you.”

  Amara slowly allows herself to be won round. It isn’t a difficult part for her to play. Nobody has ever made such an effort to charm her. Rufus teases her, playfully trying to serve her food, turning all his humour against himself. He smiles and his cheeks dimple like Cupid. Amara accepts the glass of wine he offers, smiles back when he compares himself unfavourably to the ‘eunuch’ in the play they have just seen and, when he finally jokes about the terrifying effect that her anger had on him, widening his eyes in a ridiculous parody of surprise, she finds her laughter is genuine.

  “I do so wish I could write for the theatre,” he tells her, once they are clearly friends again. He gestures at her to take a handful of dried figs then, when she has, helps himself. “But I don’t have any talent.”

  “I can’t believe that’s true.”

  “No, it is. I might be an idiot, but at least I know that I am,” he says. “And besides, my father would hate it. He wants me to run for aedile next year.” He pulls a face. “Can you imagine? All that endless smarming, getting people to vote for you, followed by a year of total tedium listening to everyone drone on about grain distribution. I’d be hopeless at it.”

  “Couldn’t you choose the celebrations you threw though?” she says, thinking of Fuscus. “Maybe a free performance at the theatre rather than the usual games at the arena?”

  “Yes, I had been thinking that.” His look of surprise reminds her of Pliny when she quoted Herophilos. “Might make the whole thing more bearable.” They smile at each other. He holds her gaze and leans closer, then, when she doesn’t move away, kisses her. There is more sensitivity to him this time; she can tell he is trying not to rush her. “I have to ask you something,” he says, stroking her arm. “I know you are trapped by your life at the… where you live. I know you don’t have a choice. But is your heart free?”