Lions of Rome

by S. J. A. Turney

  Rufinus turned to him. ‘I swore to kill him by the end of this day.’

  ‘I am confident that you will have ample opportunity,’ Cestius replied, ‘just not until I give you the signal.’

  Rufinus ruminated for a moment. He was being blinded by loathing, and he knew it. Fulvius did have to die, but Cestius – and Severus – were right: Cleander had to be the prime target. Without Cleander Fulvius would be powerless, or near enough. He nodded. ‘Once things are moving, though, I deal with the tribune.’

  ‘With my blessing.’

  The two men walked their horses on, heading down the southern slope of the Esquiline, making for the circus, and Rufinus felt the stirring of excitement despite everything. All the appalling things they had done to the city and its people in a bid to bring down an untouchable tyrant, all were coming to a head this day. By nightfall it would be over. Cleander would fall, Fulvius would die, the city would be free, the granaries opened, and Rufinus could be himself once more. Or… they would fail somehow.

  That didn’t bear thinking about.

  Rufinus’ fingers danced hungrily on the pommel of his sword as they rode on to the circus and the culmination of their plot.

  Chapter Twenty Five – Vox Populi

  Rome, June 17th 190 A.D., morning

  Clearly something was wrong – Rufinus could tell that even from a distance. He had been to the races in the circus plenty of times over the years he had lived in Rome in one guise or another, and he knew its sounds, its smell, its feel. Personally he always favoured the gladiatorial bouts in the arena – to him they showed more skill – but he understood the danger of driving a chariot for one of Rome’s four teams, and appreciated it. And that, of course, was what the crowd usually bayed for: blood and wreckage, death and disaster. What was the point of a day at the races if there wasn’t a crash, after all? Of course there always was one.

  He was used to the noises of an excited crowd, the smell of horses, blood, sweat and the many unrecognisable grilled meats purveyed in the stands, the crackle of excitement in the air…

  This was not like that.

  There were raised voices moving together like a murmuration of starlings, but not in the waves of enthusiasm that traditionally accompanied a race. There was no tense silence as riders came close to disaster, roars and cheers in a crashing din as they narrowly escaped death, and cries of dismay as a favourite charioteer joined horses and chariot alike as a pile of broken detritus by the track side. No, this was a muted din, more like ripples in a dark pond than crashing waves in the sea. And it contained no dismay, or excitement, or joy. It carried only seething anger with an undercurrent of hate.

  They rounded a corner and paused, bringing their steeds to a halt. Vibius Cestius looked over at him. ‘Clearly we should not arrive together. I shall be observing events carefully from the top of the eastern arch, beside the statue. Look there for my signal. Fare you well and see you when the world has changed.’

  The frumentarius gave him an encouraging hand-clap on the shoulder and then turned his horse and disappeared into a side street. Rufinus waited a moment longer, looking at the great, arcaded curve of the circus’ eastern end and the grand, decorative arch that rose in the centre. There was, as far as he knew, no access to the top of the arch where the great bronze chariot statue stood, but he knew better than to ask Cestius how he intended to get there. The man was ever a mystery.

  He breathed as deeply as the constrictive chain shirt allowed, wishing for the hundredth time that his jailor had been a little fatter. This was it. Inside that great venue were the two men he hated most in the world. Today would see them both fall, unless things went wrong, in which case it was unlikely that Rufinus would be around to care.

  It was not lost on him that so many of the tumultuous events of his life seemed to happen in Rome’s entertainment venues. In the Flavian amphitheatre he had saved the emperor’s life and won renown. In Pompey’s theatre he had witnessed the fall of Perennis to public outcry. And now, here in Rome’s great racing venue, he would witness the end of a tyrant’s reign.

  The strange, even eerie change from a normal race day was palpable even outside. Usually, the streets around the circus would be thronged with people. There would be the disappointed and hopeful spectators, unable to secure a seat but waiting for one to open up as someone else leaves, all listening to the events they could not witness, guessing which charioteer had just died. Then there were the hawkers, selling everything they could to the crowd, the beggars taking advantage of the good humour, the thieves and thugs plying their unpleasant trades, the whores looking for someone bored of waiting but with a fat purse… humanity in its myriad forms. Not today. Today the streets were empty, more or less. A few desperate beggars sat in the gutters, one or two aimless souls wandered, coughing up their life into their hands. And a few members of the Guard, as though there were any need to keep the peace.

  No sign of the Urban Cohort, which surprised him. It was standard practice to have a century on duty around the circus on race days to help keep order and arrest the various criminals caught in the act. And in the current situation, it would have been more sensible to triple the number rather than reduce it. Yet there was no sign of even one soldier from Rufinus’ unit. It seemed unlikely to be Pertinax’s doing, and Rufinus put it down to the machinations of Cestius. Their absence would not worry Cleander or his Praetorians, for they would be here in force anyway. After all, they were more devoted to protecting the chamberlain than the emperor these days.

  Rufinus rode towards the circus and around the southern edge of the curve. He could see a small knot of horses corralled by two Praetorian cavalrymen and a couple of slaves, and quickly changed his mind. He needed to blend in and get inside, but the last thing he wanted right now was to get caught up in the duties of a cavalry unit. Instead, he walked his horse over to one of the archways where a young lad with a filthy face was staring out at the world with an expression of abject misery.

  He fished in Curio’s purse, hanging from the belt, hoping the man had plenty of loose change, and drew out a brass dupondius, holding it up for the boy. ‘Look after my horse until I return and there’s another one waiting for you.’

  The boy snatched the coin greedily, eyes afire, and took the proffered reins as Rufinus slid from the saddle with some difficulty. It was not a lot of money, and the horse was worth much more, but Rufinus had to hope that a combination of greed and the fear of angering a Praetorian would make the boy do as he was told. Leaving the animal with him, Rufinus strode into the nearest entrance.

  The eeriness of the race day was continued inside. Where the alcoves beneath the stands were commonly filled with stalls selling everything from toy chariots to sweetmeats to boots, they were almost all empty. There was something unsettling about moving through the tunnels in such solitude and with only an angry murmur from the stands above rather than the dip and roar of an excited crowd.

  Had Cestius gone too far with his preparations?

  Rufinus passed a couple of Praetorians on guard, and returned their comradely nods. He passed a spectator with a blank face descending the staircase in search of the latrines. He climbed the steps up to the stands. Once more he shivered at the atmosphere as he emerged into the light.

  It was a balmy summer’s day with a clear blue sky and the annual aroma of warm dung that filled a Roman June. All four chariot teams were still represented on the sand below, hurtling inexorably at dangerous speed around the track. The hangings below the imperial box and at both ends of the circus identified this as the sixth race, while the bronze eggs and dolphins were almost all tipped, indicating that the penultimate lap was in progress. An impressive number of chariots had survived this long, then.

  Every seat was filled. The stands were a riot of colour as the population of Rome watched the race. Neither plague nor tyranny was going to stop the people of Rome enjoying the largesse of their emperor, even if he was never in the city these days to see it himself. If
a man was deaf, he might even think this a normal day, though with fewer excited spectators leaping up and down in their seats and pointing.

  But the sound changed it all. That rumble of malcontent sat like a seething fog over the entire place. Rufinus’ eyes strayed around, his head turning this way and that to allow a better view through the narrow eye slits of the helmet.

  Cleander was here. Rufinus could make out the figures in the imperial box across the far side. He couldn’t actually make out the man’s face at this distance, but he was dark-haired and clad in a purple toga, which would have cost more than most people would ever earn. Only the emperor would have worn a garment of that value, other than this tyrannical would-be ruler of Rome. Besides, the box was empty apart from him and a dozen or more white-clad figures. He was well-protected as always.

  It took some time to locate Fulvius, on the other hand. Amid a crowd of a hundred and fifty thousand one man is hard to spot, yet some unnatural affinity gradually drew Rufinus’ eye to a figure, in white and with a cloak, which had to be the tribune high up at the top of the stands, perhaps halfway between the imperial box and the curved end with the arch. Rufinus mentally marked the position and then continued on with his perusal. Praetorians were at many of the entrances to the stands, by all the significant locations and even at the starting gates, safely out of the way of the racers. More were spaced periodically along the top arcade, like the tribune, and a cluster stood amid the crowd around the imperial box. It looked worryingly like the chamberlain was containing the crowd within a cordon of white and steel. Rufinus shook his head. The man was being careful. He knew just how unpopular he had become.

  His gaze finally reached the arch at the eastern end and rose past the carvings and pillars to the top, where a glorious bronze statue of a quadriga drawn by four horses and manned by a handsome youth crowned the structure. The lone figure standing beside it would go unnoticed by almost everyone, especially since he had positioned himself in the shadow of the statue.

  How in Hades had Cestius got up there, and so quickly, too.

  He wondered idly, as the frumentarius lifted an arm to scratch his head, what signal the man was going to give him. He’d not thought to clarify it. Hopefully not a scratch of the nose. No, Cestius was far too damned clever for that. Rufinus would know when the time was right. But there was something almost rhythmic about the frumentarius’ scratching nonetheless, and he was gazing off in another direction. The distinct suspicion that the man was already giving signals to other people sank into Rufinus. He wondered who else was here. Was Severus seated somewhere in the stands? Was Dionysus? Nicomedes?

  An explosive noise drew his attention and he turned and peered back along the track. The remaining white chariot had clearly misread his turn. Rufinus had seen enough races to be able to picture what had happened from the marks in the sand. The lines gouged in the surface marked where the vehicle had overturned, and the many stains showed that it had been there where the driver and at least one of the horses had died. The rest had ended in a broken heap towards the stands. One beast seemed to have survived intact and was struggling to free itself of the wreckage, while another screamed, waiting for someone to rescue it, unaware that its wounds were mortal and the first man who came would kill it as quickly and cleanly as possible.

  It was a testament to the level of anger in the crowd that reactions to the crash, which would normally raise a din that could be heard halfway to the coast, were instead limited to a few individuals standing and shouting, not enough to be heard over the general murmur of hatred.

  The egg and dolphin on the spina tipped and the last lap began.

  Rufinus could feel the tension in the air, like a scorpion bolt-thrower that had been overwound, when the cables had become so tight that at any moment either the bolt would shoot a mile and go through a wall, or the whole thing would explode and kill the team manning it. That very thing had happened several times during the war, once even in front of Rufinus’ blinking eyes.

  That same tautness filled the air now as the chariots raced round on their final lap.

  Something preternatural made Rufinus look to his right, and he spotted the shadowy figure of Vibius Cestius holding an arm out to his side like a flag, gazing off into the crowd somewhere. Things were moving. Right now, he realised, they were already moving. Like a microcosm of their entire plot over the past three years, this scene was playing out the same: Rome had drifted on in misery and discontent, unaware of the machinations of a select group who worked to bring about a critical change. Here, too, Rome simmered in anger and gloom, unaware of the signals of a frumentarius to a hand-picked selection of figures among the crowd.

  The hair rose on the back of Rufinus’ neck.

  The race was coming to an end, the chariots racing on, the leaders neck-and-neck, for the finish line. Any other day the crowd would be on their feet now, roaring at their champions. No one was standing.

  No, that wasn’t true.

  Rufinus felt that frisson of energy again. Figures were standing. Somewhere across the circus, in the far stands, unnoticed by most, figures had risen and were beginning to move down to the lowest tier of seats. Rufinus swallowed. These must be the recipients of Cestius’ subtle gestures.

  He strained his eyes to pick them out, ignoring the last moments of the race as the Greens swept to victory. He had to check several times to be sure, but there was no denying it. The figures drifting down to the front were children. Not quite all of them, though, for he could see another now, risen and moving. A woman. Tall, willowy, elegant, wearing a cloak despite the heat. What was she up to? What were they all up to? What was Cestius up to?

  He watched in surprise as those who had begun to drift down assembled in one spot, waiting for the woman who followed them. Surely the Praetorians nearby must have seen this beginning. They had to have orders to check this sort of thing and prevent it, even if they didn’t quite know what it was yet.

  His gaze rose to the stands again, now seeking out the white-clad figures of Cleander’s Guard. It was then that he realised the scale of Cestius’ scheme. Small incidents had broken out in the stands. Only four of them, with citizens arguing and pushing and shoving. Each of them had attracted the attention of the Praetorians nearby, and would require breaking up, but they were so cleverly positioned. Each argument filled a critical junction in the stands, such that any Praetorian wanting to reach the children and their elegant leader would find it near impossible to pass the incidents.

  He smiled coldly. That was now exactly what was happening. Men in white had noted the growing crowd of children and were moving to disperse them, but they simply could not find a way to get to them without crossing the difficult spots. Gods, but Cestius was good.

  His gaze dropped once more to the children and his eyes widened. Even as the chariots were making their way back to the carceres, and medics and slaves rushed to the injured and dead riders and horses and the wreckage of chariots, half a dozen more burly men in the crowd were lowering the children down from the stands on to the track itself.

  What in the name of all the gods was happening?

  The Praetorians were becoming more urgent now, pushing their way through the trouble spots and arresting those responsible, hurrying to the place where the children were dropping to the sand below. More figures moved here and there, seemingly at random, but causing momentary obstacles, slowing down the white soldiers, as the last of the children was helped down, and then the cloaked woman.

  By the time the Praetorians arrived, the entire group was on the track itself and moving swiftly towards the spina opposite the imperial box. The soldiers were faced with the choice of leaping down to the sand to follow or waiting in the stands to see what was happening. The men who had helped the children down had melted back into the crowd. There was no one to arrest in the stands, and the soldiers seemed disinclined to follow across the track. What harm could one girl and a bunch of children do after all?

  Rufinus’ gaze n
ipped back and forth now, and he almost ripped off the face mask to get a better look before deciding that anonymity was still important. Cestius was still there, and still signalling to people in the stands. Another figure had risen near the imperial box, and Rufinus was sure it was Septimius Severus, even at this distance. In the box, Cleander was on his feet now, shouting angrily at an officer beside him. Praetorians were mobilising. Tribune Fulvius was descending the cavea, gathering his men as he went.

  Rufinus’ gaze landed finally on the children.

  They were particularly humble specimens, yet wearing good clothing and shoes that marked them out as free citizens and not poor slaves. And just as his eyes fell upon the girl, she shrugged off her cloak and seemed to grow in stature to a Titanic figure, an optical illusion surely caused by being surrounded by children.

  But it was not her stature that made Rufinus hold his breath.

  She was a goddess. From her golden curls to her golden sandals, via the dazzling white stola and palla in between, she was a goddess. And in case anyone present were uncertain, the sheaf of wheat in her left hand and the sickle in her right made it clear to all.

  Ceres, the goddess of the harvest, had come to Rome.

  Now the crowd were reacting, far more than they had to a mere race. Some were standing in awed, reverential silence, staring at the glorious goddess before them. Others were bellowing prayers and hope at the divinity, for Rome had starved for so long. Her arms rose as in a demand for silence, and that silence fell instantly and utterly among the crowd. Suddenly the only noises were the booted feet of Praetorians gathering and moving, though many of them had stopped too, perhaps fearing the goddess more than even Cleander or the tribune. Those, and the tiny voice of Cleander far away, bellowing orders at the white soldiers.