“Here, let me help you,” Alerio offered. He reached down and placed his left hand under the woman’s arm. All the while, his eyes bore into Ignazio’s and his other hand remained on the hatchet. “Somedays, it feels as if the Goddess Nenia is looking over my shoulder. And often, she takes control and guides my weapon to victims she selects.”
He said it not for Lady Rudentis or her daughters, but as a threat to Ignazio Dispansus. The implication did not go unacknowledged. Ignazio released the hilt and his gladius settled into the sheath.
By removing his hand from the weapon, Senior Tribune Dispansus proved something to Alerio and saved the lives of his sisters and his mother.
“I have something that belongs to you,” Ignazio exclaimed. The fear was recognizable in his voice. Not fear for his own safety but, for his mother and sisters. “Please. Please come to my office.”
Ignazio lifted his hands away from his blades and begged, “Please.”
***
“I did not expect you,” Ignazio remarked.
“From the way you say it, it seems you expected someone,” Alerio suggested. “Who did you expect?”
“After what I did for Satoris Megellus, I expected an assassin,” Ignazio replied. “Someone sent to keep me quiet.”
“How do you know it’s not me?” Alerio asked.
“An assassin would have killed my mother at the door and my sisters before I could make it down the hallway,” Ignazio described. “In a way, I’m disappointed.”
“Why is that?” Alerio inquired.
“Because I don’t sleep at night,” Ignazio confessed to Alerio. “I lay awake listening to night noises, waiting for the killer. In the morning, I patrol the perimeter, looking for his footprints. Personally, I am not afraid to die. But I am the only heir.”
“And if you die, the government will take your estate,” Alerio commented. “And your mother and sisters will be left homeless.”
“My mother held us together when my father died,” Ignazio reported. His affection for his mother softened his voice. “She made do without servants and used the last of our coins to buy me a Tribune position. Now I am home, exiled from the Capital and, just as poor. And our family has nothing to lure in potential husbands for my sisters.”
“What about the travertine blocks in your front yard?” Alerio asked.
“I don’t have the money for a broker or the craftsmen,” Ignazio told Alerio. He walked to a desk, opened a box made of travertine stone, and pulled out the temple voucher. “The stone is only valuable once chiseled into a shape.”
He handed the voucher to Alerio and rested a hand on the hilt of his gladius.
“If you feel you need retribution for the eye,” Ignazio said with more steel in his voice. “I’ll loan you a gladius for the fight.”
“Let me ask you something,” Alerio quizzed. He held the temple voucher in his fist. “If you had the money, what could you accomplish?”
“Those five blocks, once cut into products and sold, would throw off profit. Enough coins to clear the overburden from the hill to the north,” Ignazio explained. His voice rose in tone, displaying his excitement. “With the rock exposed, I could begin to quarry more stone. In a year, I’d be solvent and in business for the rest of my life.”
Alerio stepped to the doorway then stopped. Turning to Ignazio Dispansus he asked.
“How much do you need to get started?”
“Two thirds of that voucher would get me an agent, craftsmen, and pay shipping,” Ignazio replied. “Why?”
Alerio crossed the room to the desk, uncapped the ink, and picked up a pen. He wrote on two pieces of paper before handing them to Ignazio.
“What’s this?” Ignazio asked.
“One is a partnership agreement,” Alerio responded. “After you pay me back, I get ten percent of profits from your travertine quarry for the rest of our lives. The other is a letter of credit with my guarantee.”
“But you are not a patrician,” Ignazio pointed out, “nor are you rich enough to be noteworthy.”
“Read the name,” Alerio insisted.
Ignazio Dispansus studied the papers. At the bottom of both he read, Alerio Carvilius Sisera.
“Senator Maximus adopted you,” Ignazio guessed. Then he waved both pieces of paper in the air and demanded. “After posting you in Echetla, lying about the charges, and treating you badly, why?”
“Don’t forget the eye,” Alerio reminded him. “To answer your question. Because I have a mother and two sisters. I tremble at the thought that they or your family would end up as paupers.”
“I don’t know what to say,” Ignazio admitted, “or what to call this turn of events?”
“Call it travertine justice,” Alerio stated. “Because it was a hard decision for me to make.”
Chapter 34 – Not Answers or Questions
The trip down river took fewer days. And while it too less work to keep the barge moving, it required fighting to keep the barge loaded with travertine off the riverbanks. At times, the sixteen-foot poles did not seem long enough. Despite the struggle to navigate the Aniene, Alerio enjoyed the work. He was a little let down when the barge reached the dock near Rome.
“In two days, we are poling upstream,” Captain Scripuli tempted Alerio while counting out the pay. “The pole position is yours, if you want it.”
“Thank you, sir, I appreciate the offer,” Alerio replied. “However, business beckons me back to the Capital and away from the river.”
“I thought so,” the bargeman stated. “Be well, Sisera.”
As Alerio walked away, a young man approached the barge Captain.
“I hear tell you are the man to see about a job on the river.”
“Let me see your palms,” Scripuli instructed.
***
At the city gate, Alerio sensed something familiar. Upon closing his eyes, the smells and sound from a market reminded him of the trip in the temple’s cart.
“You want to move along?” a city guardsman warned when Alerio stopped in the gateway. “Or do I have to make you move?”
“Sorry, I was just…” then Alerio realized the guard did not want to know why he stopped.
Stepping through the gate and into the city, Alerio contemplated adding another stop. He already had three places to visit. Was finding the temple where he had been held and punched worth his time?
Visualizing the turns, straightaways, and the bumpy road surface, he strolled the route taken by the cart. At an intersection, he lost his sense of direction. Closing his eyes, he imagined the cart ride.
“Get out of the road, servant,” a man shouted.
The rider’s horse brushed his shoulder and shoved Alerio to the side of the road. After stumbling, Alerio monitored the rider’s progress. The mounted man turned off the road then, beyond a line of trees, he turned again onto a road hidden by the greenery. Alerio picked up his pace and followed.
Several turns later, he walked onto the forum. To his left, the Temple of Vespa sat in all its rustic glory. But Vespa was not the temple where he had been held. Off to his right, a temple with travertine steps and painted columns of wood rose into the air. It wasn’t the columns or the steps. The thing that caught his attention was the enclosed entrance on the side.
His footsteps echoing in the entrance and the sounds of the flooring underfoot let him know the temple, where he had slept on a cold stone floor, was the Temple of Saturn. Satisfied with the discovery, he strolled out of the temple and continued heading south across the Capital city.
***
A short way from the docks and beyond a line of warehouses, Alerio located the entrance in a tall brick and stone wall. Stopping, he peered at a tiny chiseled out image of a bee cut into the side of the gate frame. He knocked while glancing at the street behind him. It was empty except for a child sitting across the road. Male or female was impossible to judge due to the layers of dirt on the youth.
“We do not disburse charity,” a voice from behind th
e gate said.
“An ally of the Golden Valley is not a charity case,” Alerio responded. Lifting his tunic, he briefly displayed the dagger. “Do you want me to pull the ally of the Golden Valley dagger and flash it around for the entire Republic to see?”
He was teasing and the suggestion unnecessary. The small dirty street urchin jumped up and raced around the far corner of the compound’s wall. Shortly after, the gate opened.
“Welcome, ally of the Golden Valley,” a man in a silk robe greeted him. Alerio noted that the child from the street was perched on the roof of the building behind the man. “Your credentials have been observed. May I hold the dagger?”
Alerio stepped through and the gate door closed behind him.
“I have a request,” Alerio announced while passing the rare dagger to the man, “but I’m not sure if I need to make it.”
“You speak in riddles, Centurion Alerio Sisera,” the manager of the Golden Valley Trading House observed.
At one time, Alerio believed the managers of the trading houses were mind readers. After noting the small notches on the dagger, he realized they were reading the hilt of the weapon. And his assumption that the managers could see through the defensive wall was also wrong. The apprentice assassin with the dirty clothing on the roof was the manager’s exterior eyes.
“Someone may buy a contract for Ignazio Rudentis Dispansus’ life,” Alerio submitted to the manager. “If they do, I want to buy out the contract and cancel the delivery.”
“A magnanimous gesture,” the manager acknowledged.
“I know you can’t talk about that part of the Golden Valley’s business,” Alerio remarked. “I’ll just ask, do I owe you any coins?”
“Come into my office,” directed the seller of fine merchandise and vendor of death by assassin. “We will talk.”
***
The gate closed behind Alerio and, as he walked, he studied the temple voucher. Based on his calculations, he had one silver and two bronze coins remaining from his profits from selling the grain mill.
“Easy come, easy go,” he ventured while turning down the street towards the Chronicles Humanum Inn. “At least Dispansus is safe from paid assassins and has a chance to pay me back.”
At the entrance to the inn, Alerio climbed the stairs, crossed the porch, and walk through the doorway.
“Master Harricus, I am in need of two things,” Alerio announced.
“Four,” Thomasious Harricus responded.
“Four what?” Alerio questioned.
“A bath, a change of clothing to civilized dress,” Harricus remarked, “and whatever you started to say.”
The innkeeper indicated the double doors on one end of the great room. Alerio crossed the room and left through the doorway heading for the baths and his storage room at the inn.
***
“You smell better and look the part of a young gentleman,” Thomasious Harricus declared when Alerio returned. “What did you need?”
“Vino and sage advice,” Alerio replied.
“Vino I have by the barrel,” Harricus admitted. “Prudent advice is a much rarer commodity.”
“I resigned my Centurion position and left Rome without seeking approval from Senator Maximus.”
The innkeeper stood mute as if thinking about the issue. Finally, he indicated two chairs and a pitcher of wine.
“And what is the question?” Harricus asked while filling a pair of mugs.
“What am I supposed to do?” Alerio asked.
“That, Alerio Carvilius Sisera, is not a patrician question,” Harricus commented. “Noblemen do not worry about what but how.”
“I deserted the Senator and failed to consult him,” Alerio said to the innkeeper. “I don’t know if I am still a nobleman.”
“There is a question I can entertain,” Harricus said. “Go see the Senator and find out. Until you do, there is no sage advice.”
***
Alerio attempted to relax in the carriage. Worry about the Senator’s reception had him perspiring even as the coach crossed the city. When it pulled up in front of Villa Maximus, he hesitated before stepping down.
“There’s always my father’s farm,” he said while handing the driver his last silver coin.
“Excuse me?” the driver inquired.
“Nothing. Just pondering future career choices,” Alerio replied.
“Don’t take up being a teamster,” the man warned. He pointed at the rear of the horse. “That is my view day in and day out.”
“Good advice,” Alerio said with a laugh.
From the door of the villa, a voice demanded, “Alerio Carvilius Sisera, where have you been?”
Turning, he regarded the face of a worried Aquila Carvilius.
“Lady Aquila, I had some business that required my absence,” Alerio offered.
“Did you kill him?” Aquila asked. “Spurius said you went to cut the fangs from a serpent.”
Shocked at the blunt description from the usually gracious woman, Alerio’s mouth hung open.
“Don’t stand there looking surprised,” Aquila scolded. “I’ve been married to a fighting man since I was a young, innocent girl. Stop standing there like a peddler. Get in the villa.”
Despite the tough talk, Aquila tenderly placed a hand on Alerio’s arm as he walked through the doorway. The gesture told the adopted son that he was still of the patrician class.
***
Senator Spurius Maximus peered up from the papers he was reading.
“Is the issue settled?” he asked.
“Not in the way I planned,” Alerio admitted. “Remember when I questioned you about making enemies?”
“And I told you Belen had more debt scrolls that weren’t delivered,” Maximus replied. “How did you resolve the dilemma?”
“I went into business with Ignazio Dispansus,” Alerio confessed to his adopted father.
The Senator placed the papers on his desk and leaned back in his chair.
“What business?” Maximus inquired.
“Travertine products,” Alerio explained. “and later if it works, a quarry in Tivoli.”
“Do you have the funds to construct a quarry?” Maximus asked.
“We are hoping to begin with the profits from the first sales,” Alerio answered. “But to be honest, I do not.”
“That is excellent,” Maximus exclaimed. “You have learned the first rule of business. To entice investors, you need to have your own coins at risk. It shows commitment and gives your other investor confidence.”
“Who has confidence in me?” asked Alerio. “Wait, what other investor?”
“Me,” Maximus declared. “Tell me about the agreement.”
Alerio handed the Senator the hastily scribbled contract.
“I’ve always wanted to get into the travertine business,” Maximus remarked. “It is becoming the fashion, when building temples, to use stone. Aquila was right about you.”
“About me, sir?”
“She said a man like me needs to have a strong, smart son,” the Senator reported. “But neither of us knew about your business insight.”
Chapter 35 - Letters, Numbers, and Bruises
Alerio rolled out of bed before the sun came up. After strapping on his hobnailed boots and pulling a tunic over his head, he walked softly to his bedroom door.
“Good morning, sir,” Belen greeted him.
Lined up in the hallway were four men in scholarly robes.
“A late-night game of chance?” Alerio inquired indicating the men behind the secretary.
“No, sir, these are your tutors,” Belen indicated the men. “You are an early riser. To accommodate your habit, I had them come at the most opportune time.”
“Can any of you run?” Alerio asked the teachers.
“When I was younger, I ran in the Pythian Games at Delphi,” one of the older teachers bragged.
Alerio studied the man. He was well past his prime.
“Can you keep up?”
“Do you refer to foot speed?” the tutor inquired. “Or wind in the lungs? Or the strength of leg muscles? Maybe clarity of the route? Or possibly, a never-ending race against the Goddess Nenia?”
“What do you teach?” Alerio questioned.
“My name is Eridian and I instruct on the teachings of Master Stilpo’s school of philosophy,” the tutor replied. “Our emphasis is on logic and dialectic.”
“All those questions about the run,” Alerio pointed out, “do they have answers?”
“How could they?” Eridian coached. “Each thing is separate from another and thus not the same. A run this morning is different than a run this afternoon. Or even a second run completed after the first.”
“What good are questions without answers?” Alerio demanded.
He wanted a run to loosen up his muscles and to clear his head. What ambushed him in the hallway was the double talk of a grain purchasing agent.
“The value, sir, is the thinking that precedes the formation of each question,” Eridian responded. “I could of course run in the opposite direction.”
“What would that accomplish?” Alerio exclaimed. “What are you getting at?”
“Although on separate routes, we would be running together. Unfortunately, having eliminated my possible maladies, your question of who can run would be nullified,” Eridian described. “And my pace would have no effect on your progress.”
“Do you have to talk while we run?” Alerio asked.
Eridian shrugged off his scholarly robe and handed it to another teacher. Displayed under the tunic, the muscles on the old man’s frame rippled.
“I can talk,” Eridian announced, “for I have the wind. You, young sir, have yet to prove yourself. In your ability to run or to express yourself in a dialectic exchange.”
“Your argument is well stated,” Alerio acknowledged. “Let’s find out.”
The young man and the old teacher strolled down the hallway. At the front door, they jostled to see who could get through the doorway first and start the run.
“He will be insufferable after spending time with Eridian,” Belen complained.
The three remaining tutors nodded in agreement.
Muted Implications (Clay Warrior Stories Book 12) Page 22
