Daughters of Rome

by Kate Quinn

  Diana came halfway through the ceremony, bringing a momentary pang of panic to Cornelia’s throat. Diana had been late to Lollia’s last wedding too, bringing something unspeakable in a sack, something with a terrible distorted grimace—“Aunt Cornelia, you’re squeezing,” little Paulinus protested, and she loosened her death grip around his strong little body as Diana slipped empty-handed into place. “I suppose we should be glad she didn’t bring a severed leg this time,” Tullia tittered.

  Diana turned and eyed her. “Could be arranged.”

  Lollia and Fabius Valens joined hands; the contracts were signed. A ripple of applause from the Cornelii; an inarticulate roar from Fabius’s Germans. “Now the feast,” Cornelia heard Lollia’s grandfather mutter, twisting at his rings. “Dear gods, my cooks—!” But the massive triclinium was in order when the wedding party returned; the silk couches perfumed and plumped, the slaves smiling and immaculate, the statues garlanded with flowers and the fountain outside flowing Aminean wine in golden streams instead of water. Even the sky above was an immaculate blue, echoing the blue of the marble columns circling the triclinium and the cornflowers strewn on the mosaics underfoot. Did Lollia’s grandfather contract with Apollo for a sunny day? Cornelia wondered, fanning herself with one hand as they entered. I wouldn’t be surprised.

  Paulinus was hot and fretful, drooping against her shoulder. “Tullia, Paulinus is tired. He should have a nap.”

  “Well, get his nurse!”

  “No, I’ll tuck him in—” But the nurse was already descending, bearing Paulinus off with a frown for Cornelia as she tried to take him up herself. Clearly, in the nurse’s view as well as Tullia’s, patrician women should not be allowed to tend their children. Paulinus smiled sleepily as he was carried off, and Cornelia’s heart squeezed. I dreamed of having sons like that. Dreamed and prayed and wept, while Tullia—

  But she couldn’t think of old dead dreams like that. She would never have children; she would never marry again. Her life belonged to Piso, and at least she had avenged him. It would have to be enough. When Paulinus was grown, and all her nieces and nephews still unborn, they would whisper about their aunt Cornelia, gray-haired and old, but still in black: “She could have been Empress,” they would whisper, awed by her devotion, “but her husband died and now she dedicates her life to his memory. Fifty years and she still wears his wedding ring . . .”

  Fabius’s Germans descended whooping on the wine fountain, grabbing silver cups from the slaves. Fabius led Lollia to the couch of honor, talking over her head to his officers. Cornelia saw her sister send a poisonous look to the steward when she found herself paired on a dining couch beside Tullia: “Wonderful, why didn’t you just seat me in a snake pit?” For herself, Cornelia fared better on a couch with Diana, though she had a moment’s surprise when Diana’s shawl slipped off her shoulders. “What have you been doing?” she exclaimed, eyeing the purple bruises that marched up and down her youngest cousin’s arms. “Did your father finally take a belt to you for all your running about?”

  “No.” Diana shrugged. “I fell out of a chariot.”

  “You got all that from falling out of a chariot?”

  “Well, it rolled on me a little.”

  The gustatio courses entered in a stream: white and black olives, sparrows cooked in spiced egg yolk, grilled sausages and damsons and pomegranate seeds, a ragout of oysters and mussels. Lollia turned to wash her fingers first in a basin of rose water, but Fabius plunged a hand directly into a silver dish of sausages. The rest of his officers followed suit, calling to each other across the couches. Of course, legates who had spent half their career in Germania couldn’t be expected to know the niceties.

  A trio of flute players entered to play, but sudden trumpets drowned their melodies out. “The Emperor—!” Another flood of men; Praetorians in red and gold, a dozen more Germans in their barbaric trousers, a few brightly painted women, the Emperor himself loud and laughing in a wine-stained synthesis. Lollia’s grandfather bustled forward, bowing very low; the couch of honor was brought forward, and Vitellius flung himself on it with a happy roar, waving Fabius Valens to join him. “And the bride—a pretty one, eh!” as the Emperor patted Lollia’s cheek. The guests streamed up to offer their smiles, their bows, their desperate hopes that no one would ever find out how brightly they had smiled and how low they had bowed to Otho.

  In two more months Otho will be forgotten. Cornelia smiled, watching Gaius and Tullia simper at Vitellius. When news came of Otho’s death there had been an hour or two of cautious panic—plebs running through the streets to tip over his statues, smash his busts in the public forums, and hang garlands of flowers about the statues of Vitellius instead. The old statues of Galba had even been brought out and garlanded, since Vitellius had declared himself Galba’s avenger. All the friends and acquaintances who had looked past Cornelia during Otho’s reign as if she had the pox had come to her door in a stream, pressing her hand and offering their sympathies for Piso’s death. “Such a fine man, Lady Cornelia, and he would have made a great Emperor. I was intending to visit you earlier, of course—”

  In a week no one will ever admit they supported Otho at all. Cornelia hugged the thought to herself. And in a month, he’ll be written neatly out of every history and every mind in Rome.

  The fercula course was brought in: pheasant cooked inside its plumage, roast sow with her roasted litter of piglets around her, an entire eel served on a bed of grilled vegetables. “I’ll take the head!” the Emperor called, and the eel’s head was brought to him on a silver dish inlaid with garnets. A troop of African dancers came out to entertain, all gilded curls and oiled ebony skin, but the drumbeats of the music could scarce be heard over the appreciative shouts of the Germans.

  “My dear Lady Cornelia!” The Imperial steward gushed forward—a supple Greek who had served all three emperors with equal fervor, Cornelia thought with disdain, and would probably serve the next three too. “Have you been introduced to Commander Fabius Valens? He particularly wished to meet you—”

  Ushered to the bridal couch with oily introductions, Cornelia bowed low to Lollia’s new husband. “Commander, I must congratulate you on your great victory at Bedriacum.” Who cared if he had greasy handprints all over his white lawn synthesis, or if his Latin was a trifle rough? He had still crushed Otho’s armies and crowned Vitellius. Fortuna wasn’t picky about the tools she chose for her vengeance, and neither was I.

  “So you’re Lady Cornelia?” He wiped his hand down his front as he gestured her up. Lollia had gone to the next couch to greet a friend, and he waved Cornelia to sit in her place. “I’m told you’re one of the ones to thank for my victory. You kept us well informed as to Otho’s movements.”

  “Yes, Commander.” She smiled. “I did what I could for the Emperor.”

  “Our Emperor.”

  “For me, Commander, Vitellius was the only Emperor.”

  Fabius smiled, eyes going over her. “You were married to Piso Licinianus, weren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “You should have been Empress, then. Pity about your husband. We’ll have to see what we can do about that.”

  “I need no reward,” Cornelia started to say, but Fabius had already turned away, calling across the room to the Emperor.

  A tiny thread of unease curled through her stomach. If she meant to be an unmarried figure of tragedy for the rest of her life, perhaps it would have been better to wear her mourning black tonight . . .

  The slaves came staggering out with the next round of courses. Exotic dishes this time: flamingo necks, peacock brains, pike livers, lark tongues, sow’s udders, elephant trunks and ears extravagantly frilled with parsley. A dish of red mullet was laid before Cornelia as she returned to her own couch: the fish was still alive, flopping and expiring slowly in a sauce of lamprey milk. Some said a delayed death improved the fish’s flavor.

  “I find,” Marcella observed on the next couch, “that I prefer my food to be dead by
the time it reaches my plate.” Tullia was exclaiming and tucking in on the next couch, but Cornelia waved the dish away, wrinkling her nose. Of course Lollia’s grandfather had gone a little overboard in his urge to impress the new Emperor.

  He never went overboard before, a little voice whispered in her head. He gave Galba severe suppers . . . Otho got exquisite banquets . . . and now for Vitellius, all this excess. Exactly what they each wanted.

  A Greek poet entered to recite an ode dedicated to the new Emperor, but not one word could be heard over the din of the drunken Germans. They were stumbling off their couches toward the gardens, grabbing at the dancers, roaring drinking songs. Two of Fabius’s officers quarreled over a wine flagon and grappled drunkenly at each other. Lollia’s grandfather had them whisked apart by two burly slaves, but more quarrels were erupting all over the room. Cornelia looked at her empty wine cup, but called for water instead.

  “I’m going home,” announced Diana. “This is absurd. Not to mention boring.” She slid off her couch, ducked around a blond giant from Agrippinensis, plucked his hand off her breast, and disappeared into the hall.

  On his couch, the Emperor cast aside the plucked bones of a peacock carcass, wiping his massive greasy hands on the blue silk cushions. “Where’s your vomitorium?” he called out to Lollia’s grandfather, who looked frozen for a moment before pasting on a smile.

  “Allow my steward to escort you to the bathhouse, Caesar.” Lollia’s grandfather could not quite hide the twinge of disgust, and Cornelia couldn’t blame him. No one in the Cornelii family ever made use of a vomitorium. But Emperor Vitellius swayed out of the triclinium, still chewing on a sweet-cooked dormouse.

  “I think Diana had the right idea,” murmured Marcella. “What an interesting chapter this is going to make for my account of Vitellius.”

  “Marcella, don’t leave me to stand all this by myself!” But her sister had already slid off her couch, sidestepping a weaving German waving an alabaster vase over his head, and disappearing without a backward glance. Cornelia felt a wounded pang somewhere deep in her stomach but kept her place beside Gaius and Tullia, matching their increasingly uneasy smiles.

  The Emperor came weaving back, an arm slung around Fabius Valens. The slaves were bringing in the mensae secundae course now; goose eggs, pastries stuffed with raisins and nuts, snails in sweet sauces, platters of lustrous perfect fruit. Cornelia waved it all away, so stuffed with food she could hardly move, but the Emperor fell to eating again, sinking his teeth into a fricassee of almonds and jellied roses.

  Sprawled on his couch, Fabius knocked his wine goblet all over Lollia. She gave a tight rueful little smile, dabbing at herself with her red veil, but her husband brushed the slaves away when they came forward with clean cloths and basins of water. “Let’s get you out of those wet clothes,” he grinned, and dragged the white tunica off her shoulder. He buried his mouth in her neck, hand fumbling over her breast.

  Cornelia caught a look of utter fury on the face of Lollia’s grandfather, but Lollia gave a sharp shake of her head at him. “Perhaps we should retire,” she said brightly to her new husband.

  “We’ll see what you look like under those rubies.” Fabius grabbed her arm and dragged her off toward the stairs. His officers whooped and cheered. The slaves looked frozen in the hall, already poised with unlit torches for the bridal procession back to her new husband’s house, the walnuts prepared in baskets to throw under the bride’s feet for luck, the flute players ready to serenade her as she was carried into her new home. Cornelia guessed there would be no bridal procession tonight. Lollia’s grandfather turned away, fumbling needlessly with a wine cup, and Cornelia caught his furious mumble.

  “—vulgar pigs, spilling wine all over my little jewel like a common whore—not fit to wipe her sandals—”

  He stamped away, his chins wobbling helpless fury, and Cornelia looked around the beautiful blue-marbled triclinium. The flowers, the food, the slaves, and the music—all designed as a setting for his little jewel. My father never called me that, Cornelia thought. Had he ever called her anything, except You there, girl? Of course it was proper that a patrician father maintain a certain decorum even among family . . .

  “I need some air,” Cornelia said to Gaius, and stumbled off her couch toward the gardens. The sky was already black—had the banquet gone on for more than five hours?—and the gardens were filled with Vitellius’s Germans. Two were wrestling, stripped to the waist and surrounded by cheering friends; they barreled into a stone nymph holding an urn of summer violets and sent it tumbling over in a crash of stone chips and crushed blossoms. Another soldier lay under a lilac bush, his hips pumping rhythmically over one of the dancers. The blond giant who had groped at Diana unsheathed his dagger to dig the ivory eyes out of one of the matched ebony statues that lined the walls. Pools of regurgitated food lay everywhere. Someone had vomited into the fountain, still splashing streams of expensive wine.

  Lollia’s grandfather gave them just what they wanted, Cornelia couldn’t help thinking. And now they’re ruining his beautiful house.

  Well, none of the damage was serious. They were celebrating, that was all. Of course they were bound to get a little wild—they had defeated Otho, after all, so now they wanted a little raucous fun. No harm in that.

  Someone threw up all over her shoes.

  Lollia’s grandfather sighed at Cornelia’s shoulder. “Perhaps I’ll have that vomitorium installed after all.”

  WELL, this is better,” Cornelia said aloud, relieved. The Emperor’s box at the Lucaria races was a cheerful hubbub—shouted bets, peals of laughter, rough jests—but the noise was merely highspirited. She hadn’t intended to go to the races at all that day—Lucaria, coming at the height of summer, was always so hot, and she would have preferred a book and a cup of cold mulberry infusion in the coolness of the atrium to a sticky afternoon at the circus. But a Praetorian delivered a scroll that morning with a toneless mumble, and Tullia had ripped it open to find the Imperial seal.

  “Fabius Valens has invited us to the Imperial box at the Circus Maximus,” she said gleeful. “Especially you, Cornelia. Thank goodness for your connection with Piso and Galba—it was a trifle inconvenient with Otho on the throne, I admit, but Vitellius seems determined to honor anyone even remotely connected—”

  “Perhaps the Emperor means to marry you to one of his supporters,” Gaius broke in, taking the scroll from his wife’s hand. “Lollia isn’t the only one who can make an advantageous marriage.”

  “For once you’re right, Gaius.” Tullia eyed Cornelia sternly. “I do hope you’ll be sensible.”

  “Let Marcella make the advantageous marriage.” Cornelia folded her hands at her waist to keep them from clenching into fists. “She and Lucius haven’t even spoken to each other since Brixellum—he’d happily divorce her. Or Diana—seventeen years old now, it’s high time she married—”

  “Of course I don’t want to force you.” Gaius patted her hand. His chin was now covered in patchy stubble in imitation of Vitellius, who unlike Otho was careless about shaving. “But I’d love to see you properly settled again, Cornelia—”

  “Gaius, don’t be stupid!” Tullia cut off her husband. “It’s not about happiness these days, it’s about connections! You have a connection to Galba, Cornelia, and it’s your duty to the family to use that!”

  Haven’t I done my duty enough? Cornelia went straight up to her bedchamber and put on the deepest mourning black she could find, not even a pair of earrings to offset the severity. “How are you supposed to find a good husband looking like a hired mourner?” Tullia scolded. “You don’t have the figure Marcella does, but you could make more of it. Gaius, tell her, this will never do!”

  “It won’t do at all, you know.” Marcella looked up from her desk in the cluttered tablinum, giving her sister an amused head-to-toe glance. “Though not for the reason Tullia thinks.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “If you want to escape attenti
on, don’t wear black. You’re rather beautiful in black.”

  Cornelia looked into the glass at her own reflection. The black dress had turned the coils of her hair to black as well; glossy ebony reflections from silk and hair alike surrounding a pale shield of a face. “I suppose you’re not going, Marcella?”

  “I have a headache.”

  “You’ve been having quite a few of those lately,” Cornelia couldn’t help saying. “At least whenever it’s the races or the games or anything else you think is boring. Imperial dinner parties or Senate discussions, you never have headaches for those.”

  Marcella smiled, turning her ink pot over in one hand. “Pass me any good gossip you hear at the races, won’t you? I’ve heard that Governor Vespasian is making ominous noises in Judaea.”

  “Juno’s mercy, not another rebellion.” Cornelia gave an appalled blink. “Where did you hear that?”

  “From young Domitian. He’s not supposed to correspond with his father, but he does.”

  “He’s not supposed to be spreading rumors like that, either.” Cornelia nibbled at her nails, still stripped down to painful nubs. “Is he still in love with you?”

  “Madly. He wanted me to know he’d be a prince within the year, once his father becomes Emperor.” Marcella gave a small smile, ink-spattered and plain with her hair in a braid over one shoulder. “Should I pass Domitian on to you? If you’re going to be married off anyway, it might as well be to another possible prince of Rome.”

  “You could be more sympathetic, you know,” Cornelia snapped. “Your husband’s already found favor with Vitellius—and he’s gone off to Crete, so you don’t even have to deal with him! No one’s trying to marry you off!”

  “No.” Marcella stretched head to toe like a languorous cat. “I make sure of that.”

  “You’re very self-satisfied these days, do you know that, Marcella?”

  Her sister’s chuckle followed her out.