‘You know her personally?’
‘Yes, of course. I know all the heads of legation I appointed. She’s also the heir of one of the Twelve Families, although Caius Tellus informed me they were being disbanded.’ I grabbed the back of the nearest chair and bent over it. More than fifteen hundred years of mostly efficient government and history cut down by one brutal man. I straightened up after a moment. ‘I don’t know how secure her position will be, though, as Tellus had started dismissing all senior and middle-grade women state servants when I escaped.’
‘So she wouldn’t necessarily extend the legation’s protection to you?’ Goss continued.
‘I can’t count on it. If she’s had instructions from Roma Nova, she might just as easily detain me and send me back there.’
‘I see.’ He touched his silk tie for an instant and looked away. ‘Well, I’ll consult the minister, of course, but I have to warn you that we can’t provide this level of protection for very long.’ He meant the policeman outside and this secure apartment, I was sure. ‘Perhaps you would be safer if you were not so close to Roma Nova. Your daughter in the EUS, perhaps?’
* * *
‘He just wants us out of his hair,’ Miklós said after Goss left.
‘I’d want the same if it was happening in Roma Nova, darling. No state can tolerate third country assassins operating on its territory. There’s too much potential for political embarrassment, not to mention scandal if it gets out. I’m fairly sure that’s why the foreign minister has sent his assistant and not come himself.’
‘Maybe you should think of going to Marina and William. You’d have a comfortable life in the EUS and you have many business interests there.’
I caught my breath. ‘Why are you saying “you”? You’d be coming with me. Wouldn’t you?’
Oh, gods.
‘I’m too European, Aurelia. If you think I sometimes feel uncomfortable in Roma Nova, I’d suffocate in those cities. And we couldn’t live in the plains where we could breathe – the Indigenous Nations own most of that.’ He took both my hands and kissed my forehead. ‘I love you, my heart and soul, but I would give you up if it meant you would be safe.’
I had almost become used to his weeks-long absences when we lived in Roma Nova, but this – a permanent parting? My heart thudded with the horror of such a thought.
‘Caius would put somebody on a plane,’ I said in a voice hardly above a whisper. ‘Or get his friend White in the EUS CIA to arrange an “accident” or have me deported back to Roma Nova despite my new passport. It could put Marina and William in danger.’ His fingers gripped harder. I searched his face, but all I could see was sadness. ‘No, I’m not going to be safe until Caius and I finish it between us.’
‘There is one other possibility,’ he said. ‘You would be safer and have a way to make common cause against Caius Tellus. But it would mean submitting yourself to hostility and possibly abuse.’ He stroked my cheek. ‘I don’t doubt your courage, Aurelia, but you are still fragile inside. And I don’t mean your body. You need more time to recover, to rediscover your core. And even if you went through with it, I don’t know if it would succeed.’
‘I can’t remain in this limbo, Miklós. It’s like floating on the Styx unable to land. I know the exiles were hard when I went there last time, but they can’t be worse than the judges deciding whether to let me into Elysium, can they?’
5
I dithered for days about contacting the exiles again. Miklós said it was driving him mad watching me unable to sit or lie still. Would it look weak or pathetic if I approached them? I hoped I wasn’t too proud, but I couldn’t bear to be half accepted, outside the inner circle, tolerated at the edge. I’d torn up several draft letters – formal, simple, comprehensive – but all begging for a hearing. But in the end, I didn’t need to send anything.
Miklós had gone with one of the police guards to collect post from our closed-up house. He didn’t say anything when he came back, but just handed me an envelope. Local, from the postmark. I flipped it over to see the sender’s address. It was the exiles’ safe house. I tore it open.
* * *
From the Roma Nova Decuria of Exiles
To Aurelia Mitela, sometime citizen of Roma Nova
* * *
‘“Sometime”! How dare they!’ I threw it on the table.
Miklós picked it up and held it out to me. ‘Calm down and just read it.’ I glared at him, but he was right. Having a tantrum was childish as well as undignified. Perhaps he’d been right about me still being fragile inside. My hand trembled as I picked it up.
* * *
The Decuria has seen the recent press coverage of the murder of a Hungarian citizen living in your household and noted the speculation about links to Roma Nova.
Exceptionally, as you are proscribed, you are invited to present yourself to us to discuss this matter next Tuesday at 10:00.
M. Quirinia
For the Decuria
* * *
Quirinia, as senior minister, flanked by Volusenia, the military commander, and Calavia, the next senior of the Twelve Families, looked up at me as I paused at the door of the faded ballroom in the safe house. My former friend was now my chief judge. I took a deep breath to settle the fluttering in my stomach. Juno, I’d given full-blown speeches in the Senate, debated in council, presented at international business conferences. I should be able to cope with this ramshackle gathering. In the dim light, the three women didn’t look like Minos, Rhadamanthos and Aeacus, but their expressions could have belonged to those fearsome judges on the bank of the Styx. And their verdict would exonerate or condemn me as surely.
My sense of dread grew as I crossed the empty space to the back of the two blocks of chairs. Numerus escorted me down the aisle between the chairs filled with silent, staring people, about fifty of them. Quirinia, Volusenia and Calavia sat behind the trestle table at the front, facing into the room. I didn’t look right or left. A short bench had been placed at the front, as if it were a defendant’s bench in a courtroom. Numerus stretched out his hand and indicated I should sit there.
So, I was on trial.
I laid one hand within the other in my lap and waited. I’d made a bookful of notes and rehearsed a formal speech. But during an afternoon in the legal section of the Vienna business library, I’d almost leapt up and shouted ‘Victis’ when I’d made an important discovery; more of a reminder of something I’d forgotten years ago. It was the key to unlock everything. But I didn’t know if any of this preparation would help me. Nobody said anything after I sat; perhaps they didn’t know how to start. But I was damned if I’d make the first move.
Eventually, Quirinia cleared her throat, picked up a sheet of paper.
‘Aurelia Mitela, you have been summoned here to appear before the citizens to provide an explanation of your conduct. As a proscriptee, you have no right to be heard, but the decuria grants this as an exception.’
I held up my hand. Time for the bombshell.
‘Before you go on, Quirinia, let’s get one thing straight. No, two things. Firstly, you did not summon me. If I remember correctly, your letter invited me. Secondly, the proscription is ultra vires.’ I paused, enjoying in a sad way the dismay on Quirinia’s face, Volusenia’s frown and Calavia’s disbelief. ‘Although she is the late Imperatrix Severina’s direct blood heir, Silvia Apulia is not yet empowered. We may recognise her by consent and custom, but until she presents herself to the Senate and is accepted by them, she has no legal power to make any law or issue any legal instrument, including proscription.’
The silence was so thick, I could almost touch it.
‘So you will delete any mention of this in connection with me from any records you are keeping,’ I continued and glanced at the clerk scribbling furiously in a bound book. ‘I will waive my right of redress for inuria and infamia for the moment, but the attack on my personal honour and my public shaming I will not easily forget.’ I glared at all three. My anger had returned
to boil inside me at the injustice of it all, but I gripped my fingers hard to stop it bursting out.
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ Calavia shouted. ‘Of course Silvia Apulia can’t present herself to the Senate at the moment.’
‘Exactly so,’ I retorted.
The three of them went into a huddle, whispering frantically together. Behind me, I heard murmuring from the other exiles. I glanced at Numerus. He didn’t meet my eyes, but a smile hovered on his lips. A touch on my shoulder. I turned to see Styrax. She simply looked at me steadily then nodded. After a couple of minutes, Volusenia thumped on the table.
‘Quiet.’ She looked directly at me. ‘The legal niceties may not stand, but there is little doubt of the reasons behind the proscription. You collaborated with the traitor Caius Tellus and betrayed Roma Nova by giving him countenance and support. There is no place in this community for you.’ She looked away and I caught a look of regret in her expression. ‘You will please leave.’ She signalled to Numerus who sighed.
‘So I’m not even granted a hearing? This is not a legally constituted court, agreed, but have you so departed from Roma Novan legal standards that you ignore the right of audiatur et altera pars, that my side must be heard as well?’ I stood and covered the three metres between me and my judges. I planted myself in front of Quirinia, crossed my arms with more confidence than I felt inside and looked down at her. She kept her eyes down on her sheets of paper. I was angry that she wouldn’t even look at me. ‘What a miserable state you’ve come to,’ I said.
‘Don’t you dare judge us,’ Calavia said and leapt to her feet.
I glared at her. ‘You’ve already found me guilty without due process. Even the lowest-ranking soldier knows that’s illegal. You should be stripped of your commission for such wilful ignorance.’ She was young and passionate, so in my head I gave her some slack. But their collective behaviour was inexcusable.
‘Sit down, Calavia,’ Volusenia said. She looked up at me. Her fingers were tapping the table. She glanced at Quirinia, who still avoided looking at me, but Quirinia nodded at Volusenia. ‘Very well,’ the latter said. ‘Say what you want to.’
‘We are all in a state of loss and hurt so our emotions are flying high,’ I said. ‘I would therefore ask you to hear me calmly,’ I began.
Volusenia’s expression tightened but she gestured me to continue.
‘You, Colonel Volusenia, have known me for fifteen years since the time you guarded my child in the palace against Caius Tellus. We stood in that same palace four months ago, fighting Tellus when I ordered you to take Silvia Apulia to safety. Not, I think, the actions of a traitor.’
‘You, Pia Calavia, guided Consiliaria Quirinia here and me to safety. When you and I returned to Roma Nova to look for Silvia Apulia and were captured by the nationalists, I thought we were both dead and the mission finished.’ I waved towards the audience. ‘There are so few personnel here qualified or competent to continue the search so it was vital that you and Atrius should somehow be freed to carry on. I bargained with Tellus for your lives and release.’
‘You found a way back into your life in Roma Nova like a good politician and took the easy way out by shacking up with Tellus.’ Calavia’s voice was uncompromising.
‘Oh, grow up,’ I snapped. ‘The only reason you’re sitting here sniping at me is because I went down on my knees and begged him for your life.’
‘Literally?’
‘Yes. It was a moment I shall look back on with nothing but shame, but it was the only way to save you and Atrius.’
She said nothing.
‘The days that followed, I had to obey his every whim until I had proof you were both across the border.’
‘But you were intimate with him. I saw it myself.’
‘No. He gave that impression and threatened that if I didn’t play along, he’d execute you both out of hand. Do you think it wasn’t the most repulsive thing, being so physically close to him?’
‘He said you were his companion in every way.’
‘Tell me his exact words.’
‘He asked me to think about why you had come back. Was it really for Silvia Apulia? You’d exerted authority as an imperial councillor and senior senator for so long, you naturally gravitated to the centre of power. Perhaps you were being a realist? You’d been defiant at first, but were settling into a new role at his side. You were to be Livia to his Augustus.’ She glanced up at me. ‘This would be confirmed by your new appearance. Then when you came into the room in tunic and sandals, you looked like something out of history.’
‘For your information, that’s all I was given to wear.’
‘Then—’ She paused. ‘You didn’t resist when he held you close to him.’ She looked at me with fire in her eyes. ‘I hated you at that moment. Good bloody riddance.’
‘You believed the traitor who killed his way to power, who executed your own grandmother, over me?’ I stared at her, but she’d bowed her head. ‘Listen to me, Calavia. Ever since we were children, Caius Tellus has tried to destroy me in front of others. He has the knack of charming others to believe him. If that didn’t work, he’d destroy people’s faith in somebody or something by dropping just the right amount of doubt into their ear. He is a charming, manipulative predator and you fell for it.’
She looked furious and embarrassed at the same time. She was so young despite her military competence; she took everything she saw so literally. The passionate fighter who’d led our escape out of Roma Nova with such expertise and unflagging optimism now looked like a crushed child.
I looked at Quirinia last. Her face was resolute, but two dark red patches burned in her cheeks.
‘You, my childhood friend,’ I said, ‘I expected more of you. We’ve served together under Imperatrix Justina and her daughter Severina until Caius Tellus’s coup. But even you were nearly taken in until that Families meeting after Constantia Tella’s funeral. We froze together on that mountain escaping from him. Tell me, please, what has convinced you to judge me, even after you saw for yourself what he was like?’
‘I—’ She rubbed the fingertips of one hand with the fingers of her other.
‘Yes?’
‘I refused to believe what Calavia said when she came back. We couldn’t get hold of the Acta Diurna for ages – they stopped printing it. But the first international version we got hold of, there you were named as his companion. I still couldn’t believe it.’ She looked up at me and searched my face.
‘I escaped that night, Quirinia. His political troops pursued me, helped by the damned tracker he had me fitted with. They wounded me and eventually captured me.’
‘Why did you delay escaping after Calavia and Atrius were released? Volusenia shot at me.
‘I hardly call three days a significant delay, Colonel.’ She flicked her fingers at me as if dismissing it. ‘Two things,’ I continued. ‘Firstly, he threatened my daughter through his friend in the EUS security services. Marina should have been safe in America with her husband, but Caius Tellus said it would take one transatlantic call to destroy her. I managed to send a covert warning to her husband and prayed he would take appropriate measures. Secondly, it’s not easy to acquire walking clothes, boots and equipment for crossing an alpine range in winter when you only have access to indoor tunics and sandals. I’d managed to gather a few basic things together when I saw that damned notice in the Acta Diurna. Although I wasn’t fully ready, I went that night.’
‘But you had help?’
‘Yes.’
‘From whom?’
‘I’d rather not say in open session, but will tell you privately.’
‘We have no secrets here.’ She swept her arm round to include the fifty-odd souls in the room.
‘Nevertheless, it is poor operational security.’
She didn’t reply, but the muscles on her face tightened. What on earth was wrong with them all? Volusenia jerked her head at Numerus who left the room. I dropped down onto my hard bench; my legs were trembl
ing. We sat in silence for a few moments, but I turned at the noise of the door opening and watched Numerus and another tall figure escorting a slighter one between them. As they marched up to the front, everybody stared, watching their progress. The trio halted by the side of the trestle table where my three judges sat. Numerus resumed his place, but the other two stood. At first, I didn’t believe who I was seeing. I stood up to get a better view.
‘You remember Turturus, who wanted to join the rescue mission?’ Quirinia said.
I would never forget him. A frightened adolescent, yes – the grim-faced guard was gripping his arm none too gently – but a conniving little bastard all the same. This was Caius’s spy who’d been responsible for my arrest – along with that of Calavia and Atrius – and for Atrius’s ill-treatment at the hands of Caius’s punishment squad. What the hell was he doing back here?
‘Oh, yes, I remember him well.’ I gave him what I hoped was a look that would freeze him to the furthest cell in his body. ‘I stood before Caius Tellus, manacled, and this little traitor was brought in. Tellus explained to me that Turturus followed us in a fit of pique and offered his services to the nationalists to spy on us. Apparently, he was fed up with being told what to do by a woman – me – and having his masculinity stamped on, so he’d come back to Roma Nova seeking a “better way”. As far as I was concerned, he’d been far too young to take on an extremely dangerous rescue mission.’ I glanced away for a few moments.
‘Perhaps it was my misjudgement, but I never dreamt that any loyal Roma Novan would betray a unit seeking to rescue the imperial heir, certainly not this miserable child.’ I jabbed my finger in the boy’s direction. ‘His actions not only brought our mission to an end, but he was directly responsible for a loyal guard who had befriended him being subjected to hours of pain and humiliation. And he put another, Calavia, under threat of summary execution.’
Retalio Page 4
