Hercules Invictus was the god of the triumphing imperator and held sway over the Forum Boarium, in which lay the various meat markets, and which formed the large open space in front of the starting post end of the Circus Maximus. There he had his Great Altar, his temple, and there too his statue, naked save on the day a general held his victory parade, when it was dressed in triumphal robes. Other temples to other aspects of Hercules also dotted the area, for he was the patron god of olives, of merchant plutocrats, and of commercial voyages personally placed under his protection. On the feast day of Hercules Invictus, announced Sulla in a citywide proclamation, he would dedicate one tenth of his private fortune to the god, as thanks for the god's favor in all his martial endeavors. A huge stir of anticipatory pleasure went through the populace, as Hercules Invictus had no temple funds, so could not keep the moneys donated to him; they were spent in his and the triumphing general's name on providing a public feast for all free men in Rome. On the day before the Ides of Sextilis this being the god's feast day five thousand tables of food would be laid out, each table catering for more than a hundred hungry citizens (which was not to say that there were half a million free males in Rome what it did say was that the donor of the feast understood that it was hard to exclude spry grannies, determined wives and cheeky children). A list of the location of these five thousand tables was appended to the proclamation; a formidable exercise in logistics, such an occasion was very carefully planned and executed so that the participants by and large remained in their own districts, did not clog the streets or overflow into rival regions and thereby cause fights, public disturbances, crime waves and riots. The event set in train, Sulla left for his villa at Misenum with his wife, his daughter, his children, his grandchildren, his stepdaughter, and Mamercus. Dalmatica had avoided him ever since the dissolution of Aemilia Scaura's marriage to Glabrio, but when he did see her in passing, he had noticed that she looked ill. A holiday beside the sea was clearly called for. This entourage was augmented by the consul Decula, who drafted all Sulla's laws for him, and by the ubiquitous Chrysogonus. It was therefore some days after they had settled into seaside living before he found the leisure to spend a little time with his wife, still tending to avoid him. "There's no point in holding things like Aemilia against me," he said in reasonable but unapologetic tones. "I will always do what I have to do. You should know that by now, Dalmatica." They were sitting in a secluded corner of the loggia overlooking the water, cooled by a gentle zephyr wind and shaded by a judiciously planted row of cypresses. Though the light was not harsh, it revealed that several days of healthier air had not served to improve Dalmatica's ailment, whatever it might be; she looked drawn and grey, much older than her thirty seven years. "I do know it," she said in answer to this overture of peace, but not with equanimity. "I wish I could accept it! But when my own children are involved, it's different." "Glabrio had to go," he said, "and there was only one way to do that sever him from my family. Aemilia is young. She will get over the blow. Pompeius is not such a bad fellow." "He is beneath her." I agree. Nonetheless, I need to bind him to me. Marriage between him and Aemilia also drives home to Glabrio that he dare not continue to speak out against me, when I have the power to give Scaurus's daughter to the likes of a Pompeius from Picenum." He frowned. "Leave it be, Dalmatica! You don't have the strength to withstand me." "I know that," she said, low voiced. "You're not well, and I'm beginning to think it has nothing to do with Aemilia," he said, more kindly. "What is it?" I think I think ..." "Tell me!" "I'm going to have another child." "Jupiter!" He gaped, recovered, looked grim. "I agree it isn't what either of us wants at this time," she said wearily. "I fear I am a little old." "And I am far too old." He shrugged, looked happier. "Oh well, it's an accomplished thing, and we're equally to blame. I take it you don't want to abort the process?" "I delayed too long, Lucius Cornelius. It wouldn't be safe for me at five months. I didn't notice, I really didn't." "Have you seen a doctor or a midwife?" "Not yet." He got up. "I'll send Lucius Tuccius to you now." She flinched. "Oh, Sulla, please don't! He's an ex army surgeon, he knows nothing about women!" "He's better than all your wretched Greeks!" "For doctoring men, I agree. But I would much rather see a lady doctor from Neapolis or Puteoli." Sulla abandoned the struggle. "See whomever you like," he said curtly, and left the loggia. Several lady physicians and midwives came to see her; each agreed she was run down, then said that as time went on and the baby in her womb settled, she would feel better. And so on the Nones of Sextilis the slaves packed up the villa and the cavalcade set off for Rome, Sulla riding ahead because he was too impatient to dawdle at the snail's pace the women's litters made inevitable. In consequence he reached the city two days ahead of the rest of his party, and plunged into the last moment details concerning his coming feast. "Every baker in Rome has been engaged to make the bread and the cakes, and the special shipments of flour are already delivered," said Chrysogonus smugly; he had arrived in the city even earlier than Sulla. "And the fish will be fresh? The weather is scorching." "All taken care of, Lucius Cornelius, I do assure you. I have had a section of the river above the Trigarium fenced off with nets, and the fish are already swimming there against the day. A thousand fish slaves will commence to gut and cook on the morning of the feast." "The meats?" Will be freshly roasted and sweet, the guild of caterers has promised. Sucking pigs, chickens, sausages, baby lambs. I have had a message from Italian Gaul that the early apples and pears will arrive on time five hundred wagons escorted by two squadrons of cavalry are proceeding down the Via Flaminia at this moment. The strawberries from Alba Fucentia are being picked now and packed in ice from the Mons Fiscellus. They will reach Rome the night before the feast also under military escort." "A pity people are such thieves when it comes to food," said the Dictator, who had been poor enough and hungry enough in his youth to understand, for all he pretended otherwise. "If it were bread or porridge, Lucius Cornelius, there would be no need to worry," soothed Chrysogonus. "They mostly steal what has a novel taste, or a season." "Are you sure we have enough wine?" "There will be wine and food left over, domine." "None of the wine's vinegary, I hope!" "It is uniformly excellent. Those vendors who might have been tempted to throw in a few air contaminated amphorae know well who the buyer is." Chrysogonus smiled reminiscently. "I told every one of them that if we found a single amphora of vinegar, the lot of them would be crucified, Roman citizens or no." "I want no hitches, Chrysogonus. No hitches!" But the hitch when it came bore no connection (or so it seemed) to the public feast; it involved Dalmatica, who arrived attended by every wisewoman Cornelia Sulla could find as they passed through the towns on the Via Appia. "She's bleeding," said Sulla's daughter to her father. The relief on his face was naked. "She'll lose the thing?" he asked eagerly. "We think she may." "Far better that she does." "I agree it won't be a tragedy if she loses the baby," said Cornelia Sulla, who didn't waste her emotions on anger or indignation; she knew her father too well. "The real worry is Dalmatica herself, tata." "What do you mean?" "She may die." Something darkly appalled showed in his eyes, just what his daughter couldn't tell; but he made a movement of distress, shook his head violently. "He is a harbinger of death!" he cried, then, "It is always the highest price! But I don't care, I don't care!" The look of amazement on Cornelia Sulla's face brought him back to his senses, he snorted. "She's a strong woman, she won't die!" "I hope not." Sulla got to his feet. "She wouldn't consent to see him before, but she will now. Whether she wants to or not." "Who?" "Lucius Tuccius." When the ex army surgeon arrived in Sulla's study some hours later, he looked grave. And Sulla, who had waited out those hours alone, had passed from horror at what always seemed to happen after he saw Metrobius, through guilt, to resignation. As long as he didn't have to see Dalmatica; for he didn't think he could face her. "You don't bear good tidings, Tuccius." "No, Lucius Cornelius." What exactly is wrong?'' Sulla asked, pulling at his lip. "There seems to be a general impression that the lady Dalmatica is pregnant, and that is certainly what she thinks," said Luciu
s Tuccius, "but I doubt the existence of a child." The crimson patches of scar tissue on Sulla's face stood out more starkly than usual. Then what does exist?'' The women speak of haemorrhage, but the loss of blood is too slow for that," said the little doctor, frowning. "There is some blood, but mixed with a foul smelling substance I would call pus were she a wounded soldier. I diagnose some kind of internal suppuration, but with your permission, Lucius Cornelius, I would like to obtain some further opinions." "Do whatever you like," said Sulla sharply. "Just keep the comings and goings unobtrusive tomorrow I have a wedding to see to. I suppose my wife cannot attend?" "Definitely not, Lucius Cornelius." Thus it was that Aemilia Scaura, five months pregnant by her previous husband, married Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus in Sulla's house without the support of anyone who loved her. And though beneath her veils of flame and saffron she wept bitterly, Pompey set himself the moment the ceremony was over to soothing and pleasing her, and succeeded so well that by the time they left, she was smiling. It ought to have been Sulla who informed Dalmatica of this unexpected bonus, but Sulla continued to find excuse after excuse as to why he couldn't visit his wife's rooms. "I think," said Cornelia Sulla, upon whom his communication with Dalmatica had devolved, "that he can't bear to see you looking so ill. You know what he's like. If it's someone he doesn't care about he is utterly indifferent. But if it's someone he loves, he can't bring himself to face the situation." There was a smell of corruption in the big airy room where Dalmatica lay, reinforced the closer a visitor came to the bed. She was, Cornelia Sulla knew, dying; Lucius Tuccius had been right, no baby was growing inside her. What was pushing her poor laboring belly into a travesty of pregnancy no one seemed to know, except that it was morbid, malign. The putrid discharge flowed out of her with sluggish remorselessness, and she burned with a fever no amount of medicine or care seemed to cool: She was still conscious, however, and her eyes, bright as two flames, were fixed on her stepdaughter painfully. "I don't matter," she said now, rolling her head upon her sweat soaked pillow. "I want to know how my poor little Aemilia got on. Was it very bad?'' "Actually, no," said Cornelia Sulla, with surprise in her voice. Believe it or not, darling stepmother, by the time she left to go to her new home, she was quite happy. He's rather a remarkable fellow, Pompeius I'd never more than seen him in the distance before today, and I had all a Cornelian's prejudice against him. But he's terribly good looking far more attractive than silly Glabrio! and turned out to have a great deal of charm. So she started out in floods of tears, but a few moments of Pompeius's telling her how pretty she was and how much he loved her already, and she was quite lifted out of her despond. I tell you, Dalmatica, the man has more to him than ever I expected. I predict he makes his women happy." Dalmatica appeared to believe this. "They do tell stories about him. Years ago, when he was scarcely more than a child, he used to have congress with Flora you know who I mean?'' "The famous whore?" "Yes. She's a little past her prime now, but they tell me she still mourns the passing of Pompeius, who never left her without leaving the marks of his teeth all over her I cannot imagine why that pleased her, but apparently it did! He tired of her and handed her over to one of his friends, which broke her heart. Poor, silly creature! A prostitute in love is a butt." "Then it may well be that Aemilia Scaura will end in thanking tata for freeing her from Glabrio." "I wish he would come to see me!"
The day before the Ides of Sextilis arrived; Sulla donned his Grass Crown and triumphal regalia, this being the custom when a man of military renown sacrificed on the Ara Maxima in the Forum Boarium. Preceded by his lictors and heading a procession of members of the Senate, the Dictator walked the relatively short distance from his house to the Steps of Cacus, and down them to the empty area in which the meat markets were normally located. When he passed by the statue of the god today also clad in full triumphal regalia he paused to salute it and pray. Then on he went to the Great Altar, beyond which stood the little round temple of Hercules Invictus, an old plainly Doric structure which enjoyed some fame because inside it were located some frescoes executed by the famous tragic poet Marcus Pacuvius. The victim, a plump and perfect cream colored heifer, was waiting in the care of popa and cultarius, chewing her drugged cud and watching the frenzied pre banquet activity within the marketplace through gentle brown eyes. Though Sulla wore his Grass Crown, the rest of those assembled were crowned with laurel, and when the younger Dolabella who was urban praetor and therefore in charge of this day's ceremonies began his prayers to Hercules Invictus, no one covered his head. A foreigner within the sacred boundary, Hercules was prayed to in the Greek way, with head bare. Everything proceeded in flawless fashion. As donor of the heifer and celebrant of the public feast, Sulla bent to catch some of the blood in the skyphos, a special vessel belonging to Hercules. But as he crouched and filled the cup, a low black shape slunk like a shadow between the Pontifex Maximus and the cultarius, dipped its snout into the growing lake of blood on the cobbles, and lapped noisily. Sulla's shriek of horror ripped out of him as he leaped back and straightened; the skyphos emptied as it fell from his nerveless hand, and the wizened, stringy Grass Crown tumbled off his head to lie amid the blood. By this the panic was spreading faster than the ripples on the crimson pool at which the black dog, starving, still lapped. Men scattered in all directions, some screaming thinly, some hurling their laurels away, some plucking whole tufts from their hair; no one knew what to do, how to end this nightmare. It was Metellus Pius the Pontifex Maximus who took the hammer from the stupefied popa and brought it crashing down upon the dog's working head. The cur screeched once and began to whirl in a circular dance, its bared teeth snapping and gnashing, until after what seemed an eternity it collapsed in a convulsing tangle of limbs and slowly stilled, dying, its mouth spewing a cascade of bloodied foam. Skin whiter than Sulla's, the Pontifex Maximus dropped the hammer to the ground. "The ritual has been profaned!" he cried in the loudest voice he had ever produced. Praetor urbanus, we must begin again! Conscript Fathers, compose yourselves! And where are the slaves of Hercules, who ought to have made sure no dog was here?" Popa and cultarius rounded up the temple slaves, who had drifted off before the ceremony got under way to see what sort of goodies were being piled upon the readied tables. His wig askew, Sulla found the strength at last to bend over and pick up his blood dabbled Grass Crown. "I must go home and bathe," he said to Metellus Pius. "I am unclean. In fact, all of us are unclean, and must go home and bathe. We will reassemble in an hour." To the younger Dolabella he said, less pleasantly, "After they've cleared away the mess and thrown the carcass of the heifer and that frightful creature into the river, have the viri capitales lock the slaves up somewhere until tomorrow. Then have them crucified and don't break their legs. Let them take days to die. Here in the Forum Boarium, in full sight of the god Hercules. He doesn't want them. They allowed his sacrifice to be polluted by a dog." Unclean, unclean, unclean, unclean: Sulla kept repeating the word over and over as he hurried home, there to bathe and clothe himself this time in toga praetexta a man did not have more than one set of triumphal regalia, and that one set only if he had triumphed. The Grass Crown he washed with his own hands, weeping desolately because even under his delicate touch it fell apart. What remained when finally he laid it to dry on a thick pad of white cloth was hardly anything beyond a few tired, limp fragments. My corona graminea is no more. I am accursed. My luck is gone. My luck! How can I live without my luck? Who sent it, that mongrel still black from its journey through the nether darknesses? Who has spoiled this day, now that Gaius Marius cannot? Was it Metrobius? I am losing Dalmatica because of him! No, it is not Metrobius.... So back to the Ara Maxima of Hercules Invictus he went, now wearing a laurel wreath like everyone else, his terrified lictors ruthlessly clearing a path through the crowds gathering to descend on the feast once it was laid out. There were still a few ox drawn carts bringing provisions to the tables, which created fresh panics as their drivers saw the cavalcade of approaching priests and hastened to unyoke their beasts, drive them out of the
way; if one ox plopped a pile of dung in the path of priests, the priests were defiled and the owner of the ox liable to be flogged and heavily fined. Chrysogonus had obtained a second heifer quite as lovely as the first, and already flagging from the drug the frantic steward had literally rammed down its throat. A fresh start was made, and this time all went smoothly right to the last. Every one of the three hundred senators present spent more time making sure no dog lurked than in paying attention to the ritual. A victim sacrificed to Hercules Invictus could not be taken from the pyre alongside the god's Great Altar, so like Caesar's white bull on the Capitol, it was left to consume itself among the flames, while those who had witnessed the morning's dreadful events scurried home the moment they were free to do so. Save for Sulla, who went on as he had originally planned; he must walk through the city wishing the feasting populace a share of his good fortune. Only how could he wish them that when Fortune's favoritism had been canceled out of existence by a black mongrel? Each made of planks laid on top of trestles, five thousand tables groaned with food, and wine ran faster than blood on a battlefield. Unaware of the disaster at the Ara Maxima, more than half a million men and women gorged themselves on fish and fruit and honey cakes, and stuffed the sacks they had brought with them full to the top so that those left at home including slaves might also feast. They greeted Sulla with cheers and invocations to the gods, and promised him that they would remember him in their prayers until they died. Night was falling when he finally returned to his house on the Palatine, there to dismiss his lictors with thanks and the news that they would be feasted on the morrow in their precinct, behind the inn on the corner of the Clivus Orbius. Cornelia Sulla was waiting for him in the atrium. "Father, Dalmatica is asking for you," she said. "I'm too tired!" he snapped, knowing he could never face his wife, whom he loved but not enough. "Please, Father, go to her! Until she sees you, she won't abandon this idiotic notion your conduct has put into her head." "What idiotic notion?" he asked, stepping out of his toga as he walked to the altar of the Lares and Penates on the far wall. There he bent his head, broke a salt cake upon the marble shelf, and laid his laurel wreath upon it. His daughter waited patiently until this ceremony was done with and Sulla turned back in her direction. "What idiotic notion?" he asked again. "That she is unclean. She keeps saying she's unclean." Like stone he stood there, the horror crawling all over him, in and out and round and round, a wormy army of loathsome sensations he could neither control nor suffer. He jerked, flung his arms out as if to ward off assassins, stared at his daughter out of a madness she had not seen in him in all her life. "Unclean!" he screamed. "Unclean!" And vanished, running, out of the house. Where he spent the night no one knew, though Cornelia Sulla sent parties armed with torches to look for him amid the ruins of those five thousand tables, no longer groaning. But with the dawn he walked, clad only in his tunic, into the atrium, and saw his daughter still waiting there. Chrysogonus, who had remained with Cornelia Sulla throughout the night because he too had much to fear, advanced toward his master hesitantly. "Good, you're here," said Sulla curtly. "Send to all the priests minor as well as major! and tell them to meet me in one hour's time at Castor's in the Forum." "Father?" asked Cornelia Sulla, bewildered. "Today I have no truck with women" was all he said before he went to his own rooms. He bathed scrupulously, then rejected three purple bordered togas before one was presented to him that he considered perfectly clean. After which, preceded by his lictors (four of whom were ordered to change into unsoiled togas), he went to the temple of Castor and Pollux, where the priests waited apprehensively. "Yesterday," he said without preamble, "I offered one tenth of everything I own to Hercules Invictus. Who is a god of men, and of men only. No women are allowed near his Great Altar, and in memory of his journey to the Underworld no dogs are permitted in his precincts, for dogs are chthonic, and all black creatures. Hercules is served by twenty slaves, whose main duty is to see that neither women nor dogs nor black creatures pollute his precincts. But yesterday a black dog drank the blood of the first victim I offered him, a frightful offense against every god and against me. What could I have done, I asked myself, to incur this? In good faith I had come to offer the god a huge gift, together with a sacrificial victim of exactly the right kind. In good faith I expected Hercules Invictus to accept my gift and my sacrifice. But instead, a black dog drank the heifer's blood right there at the foot of the Ara Maxima. And my Grass Crown was polluted when it fell into the blood the black dog drank." The ninety men he had commanded to attend him stood without moving, hackles rising at the very thought of so much profanation. Everyone present in Castor's had been at the ceremony the day before, had recoiled in horror, and then had spent the rest of that day and the night which followed in wondering what had gone wrong, why the god had vented such displeasure upon Rome's Dictator. "The sacred books are gone, we have no frame of reference," Sulla went on, fully aware of what was going through the minds of his auditors. It was left to my daughter to act as the god's messenger. She fulfilled all the criteria: she spoke without realizing what she said; and she spoke in ignorance of the events which occurred before the Great Altar of Hercules Invictus." Sulla stopped, peering at the front ranks of priests without seeing the face he was looking for. "Pontifex Maximus, come out before me!" he commanded in the formal tones of a priest. The ranks moved, shuffled a little; out stepped Metellus Pius. "I am here, Lucius Cornelius." "Quintus Caecilius, you are closely concerned in this. I want you in front of the rest because no man should see your face. I wish I too had that privilege, but all of you must see my face. What I have to say is this: my wife, Caecilia Metella Dalmatica, daughter of one Pontifex Maximus and first cousin of our present Pontifex Maximus, is" Sulla drew a deep breath "unclean. In the very instant that my daughter told me this, I knew it for the truth. My wife is unclean. Her womb is rotting. Now I had been aware of that for some time. But I did not know that the poor woman's condition was offensive to the gods of men until my daughter spoke. Hercules Invictus is a god of men. So too is Jupiter Optimus Maximus. I, a man, have been entrusted with the care of Rome. To me, a man, has been given the task of helping Rome recover from the wars and vicissitudes of many years. Who I am and what I am matters. And nothing in my life can be unclean. Even my wife. Or so I see it today. Am I right in my assumption, Quintus Caecilius, Pontifex Maximus?" How much the Piglet has grown! thought Sulla, the only one privileged to see his face: Yesterday it was the Piglet took charge, and today it is only he who fully understands. "Yes, Lucius Cornelius," said Metellus Pius in steady tones. "I have called all of you here today to take the auspices and decide what must be done," Sulla went on. "I have informed you of the situation, and told you what I believe. But under the laws I have passed, I can make no decision without consulting you. And that is reinforced because the person most affected is my wife. Naturally I cannot have it said that I have used this situation to be rid of my wife. I do not want to rid myself of my wife, I must make that clear. To all of you, and through you, to all of Rome. Bearing that in mind, I believe that my wife is unclean, and I believe the gods of men are offended. Pontifex Maximus, as the head of our Roman religion, what do you say?" "I say that the gods of men are offended," said Metellus Pius. "I say that you must put your wife from you, that you must never set eyes upon her again, and that you must not allow her to pollute your dwelling or your legally authorized task." Sulla's face revealed his distress; that was manifest to everyone. "I love my wife," he said thickly. "She has been loyal and faithful to me. She has given me children. Before me, she was a loyal and faithful wife to Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, and gave him children. I do not know why the gods of men require this of me, or why my wife has ceased to please them." "Your affection for your wife is not in question," said the Pontifex Maximus, her first cousin. Neither of you needs to have offended any god, of men or of women. It is better to say that her presence in your house and your presence in her life have in some unknown way interrupted or distorted the pathways whereby divine grace and favor are co
nducted to Rome. On behalf of my fellow priests, I say that no one is to blame. That we find no fault on either your side, Lucius Cornelius, or on your wife's side. What is, is. There can be no more to be said." He spun round to face the silent assemblage, and said in loud, stern, unstammering voice, "I am your Pontifex Maximus! That I speak without stammer or stumble is evidence enough that Jupiter Optimus Maximus is using me as his vessel, and that I am gifted with his tongue. I say that the wife of this man is unclean, that her presence in his life and house is an affront to our gods, and that she must be removed from his life and his house immediately. I do not require a vote. If any man here disagrees with me, let him say so now." The silence was profound, as if no men stood there at all. Metellus Pius swung back to face the Dictator. "We direct you, Lucius Cornelius Sulla, to instruct your servants to carry your wife, Caecilia Metella Dalmatica, out of your house and convey her to the temple of Juno Sospita, where she must remain until she dies. On no account must you set eyes upon her. And after she has been taken away, I direct the Rex Sacrorum and the flamen Martialis in lieu of the flamen Dialis to conduct the purification rites in Lucius Cornelius's house." He pulled his toga over his head. "O Celestial Twins, you who are called Castor and Pollux, or the Dioscuri, or the Dei Penates, or any other name you might prefer you who may be gods or goddesses or of no sex at all we have come together in your temple because we have need of your intercession with the mighty Jupiter Optimus Maximus whose offspring you may or may not be and with the triumphator Hercules Invictus. We pray that you will testify before all the gods that we are sincere, and have striven to right whatever wrong it is that has been done. In accordance with our contractual agreements, which go back to the battle at Lake Regillus, we hereby promise you a sacrifice of twin white foals as soon as we can find such a rare offering. Look after us, we beg you, as you have always done." The auspices were taken, and confirmed the decision of the Pontifex Maximus. The clear morning light, which struck the interior of the temple through its open doorway, turned suddenly darker when the sun moved toward its zenith, and a chill breath of some strange wind came whistling softly in the sunlight's stead. "One final matter before we go," said Sulla. The feet stilled at once. "We must replace the Sibylline Books, for though we have the Book of Vegoe and Tages still safe in the temple of Apollo, that work is unhelpful in any situation wherein foreign gods are involved, as is Hercules Invictus. There are many sibyls throughout the world, and some who are closely connected to the Sibyl of Cumae who wrote her verses on palm leaves and offered them to King Tarquinius Priscus so long ago. Pontifex Maximus, I wish you to depute someone to organize a search throughout the world for the verses which were contained in our prophetic books." "You are right, Lucius Cornelius, it must be done," said Metellus Pius gravely. "I will find a man fit for the purpose." The Dictator and the Pontifex Maximus walked back to Sulla's house together. "My daughter won't take it kindly," said the Dictator, "but if she hears it from you, she may not blame me for it." "I am very sorry for this mess." "So," said Sulla unhappily, "am I!" Cornelia Sulla did believe her father, a fact which surprised her as much as it did him. "Insofar as you're able, Father, I think you do love her, and I don't think so badly of you that I credit you with wanting to be rid of her." "Is she dying?" asked Metellus Pius, smitten with a qualm because it had been his idea to place Dalmatica in the temple of Juno Sospita for however much longer she had to live. "Very soon now, Lucius Tuccius says. She's full of a growth." "Then let us get it over and done with." Eight sturdy litter bearers took Dalmatica from her sickbed, but not in dignified silence; the forbearance with which Sulla's wife had conducted her life to date vanished in the moment she was informed of the priests' decision, and realized she would never see Sulla again. She screamed, she wept, she shrieked his name over and over and over as they carried her away, while Sulla sat in his study with his hands over his ears and the tears coursing down his face. One more price to pay. But did he have to pay it for Fortune's sake or for the sake of Metrobius? There were four temples in a row outside the Servian Walls in the vegetable markets: Pietas, Janus, Spes, and Juno Sospita. Though this Juno was not one of the primary goddesses who looked after gravid women, she was simultaneously a warrior offshoot of the Great Mother of Pessinus, Juno of Snakes from Lanuvium, Queen of Heaven, and Savior of Women. Perhaps because of this last aspect in her makeup, it had long been the custom for women safely delivered of a child to bring the afterbirth to Juno Sospita and leave it in her temple as an offering. At the time of the Italian War, when money had been short and temple slaves few, the Metella Balearica who had been wife to Appius Claudius Pulcher had dreamed that Juno Sospita appeared to her complaining bitterly that her temple was so filthy she couldn't live in it. So Balearica had gone to the consul, Lucius Caesar, and demanded that he help her scrub it out. They had found more than rotting placentas; the place was green and runny with the detritus of dead women, dead bitches, dead babies, rats. Herself pregnant at the time she and Lucius Caesar had performed their stomach turning labor, Caecilia Metella Balearica had died two months later after giving birth to her sixth child, Publius Clodius. But the temple had been beautifully kept ever since; the offered afterbirths were placed in an ooze proof basket and taken away regularly to be ritually burned by the flaminica Dialis (or, in these days, by her designated replacement), and no temple floor was cleaner or temple interior sweeter smelling. Cornelia Sulla had prepared a place for Dalmatica's bed, to which the litter bearers transferred her in an agony of terror, men brought into a woman's precinct. She was still crying out for Sulla, but weakly, near her end, and seemed not to recognize her surroundings. A painted statue of the goddess stood upon a plinth; she wore shoes with upturned toes, brandished a spear, and faced a rearing snake, but the most striking aspect of her image was the real goatskin draped about her shoulders, tied at her waist, and with its head and horns perched atop the goddess's dark brown hair like a helmet. There beneath this outlandish creature sat Cornelia Sulla and Metellus Pius, each holding one of Dalmatica's hands to help her surmount the mortal barriers of pain and loss. The wait was one of hours only, a spiritual rather than a physical ordeal. The poor woman died still asking to see Sulla, apparently deaf to the reasonable answers both Cornelia Sulla and Metellus Pius gave her. When she was dead the Pontifex Maximus had the undertakers set up her lectus funebris inside the temple, as she could not be taken home to lie in state. Nor could she be displayed; she sat in the traditional upright position completely covered by a black, gold edged cloth, hedged in by the keening professional mourners, and had for her background that strange goddess with goatskin and rearing snake and spear. "When one has written the sumptuary law," said Sulla afterward, "one can afford to ignore it." As a result, Caecilia Metella Dalmatica's funeral cost one hundred talents, and boasted over two dozen chariot borne actors who wore the ancestral wax masks of the Caecilii Metelli and two patrician families, Aemilius Scaurus and Cornelius Sulla. But the crowd which thronged the Circus Flaminius (it had been decided that to bring her body inside the pomerium would be imprudent, given her unclean status) appreciated so much luster less than they did the sight of Dalmatica's three year old twins, Faustus and Fausta, clad in black and carried by a black festooned female giant from Further Gaul.
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