“You talk about it like it was some geometry problem you’re trying to unravel,” Aculeo said irritably.
“It is like that, yes, and why not?” Zeanthes said, holding Aculeo’s gaze with his own placid eyes. “The murders follow a pattern designed by the killer, or killers, choosing the victims, the time, the place, the means of their murder. He would have needed to have access to them, gaining their trust, their cooperation at least for the time it took him to take control of them. And after killing them, he needed to be able to escape unnoticed. Can you picture Apollonios doing all this?”
Aculeo stared back at him for a moment, then glanced back towards the city, towards Olympia. He thought for a moment that he could just make out the pink walls of Calisto’s villa. “Not on his own, no. What do you know of Albius Ralla?”
“Ralla? Why do you ask?”
“He was Myrrhine’s patron. They were together at Gurculio’s symposium the night she was murdered. He was also Neaera’s patron which links him to both Iovinus’ and Neaera’s fates. Posidippus of Cos also owed him money before he disappeared.”
“Is your concern simply about Ralla, or about his relationship with Calisto?” the sophist asked gently.
“What if he’s behind the murders? What if he used Apollonios as his instrument?”
“Even if you truly thought such a man as Albius Ralla is capable of such a thing, why would he rely on such an unreliable instrument?” Zeanthes asked.
“I don’t know. I don’t know anything anymore.”
Zeanthes put a hand on his shoulder and they gazed at the waves crashing down below. “So much death, so much tragedy,” he said. “And you are left with your own sense of culpability, trapped in this madness, incapable of stopping it, incapable of helping anyone in fact.” Aculeo didn’t answer. He couldn’t have spoken, even if he wanted to. “Everyone plays a role in these things, you know. None of us are innocent.”
“What do you mean?”
“I think you know my meaning. The real question you need to ask yourself is, are you a hero, a villain, or simply part of the chorus? Whatever your answer, be careful, my friend. Ralla is no fool, and he’s not a good man to have as an enemy.”
“Don’t you fucking move,” a quavering voice said. Aculeo opened one eye a crack and saw a filthy, bearded face inches from his own, the man’s breath hot and fetid. He thought at first it must be some beggar who’d broken in to rob him. It took him a moment to recognize it was Gellius – the man looked wretched, his tunic torn and stained, his body odour enough to make a Carthaginian’s eyes water. The knife he pressed against Aculeo’s throat, however, left little doubt as to his intent.
“Alright,” Aculeo said, as calmly as he could. “I’m not moving. Where’ve you been, Gellius? We’ve been worried about you.”
“Fucking liar!” Gellius hissed, pressing the blade close enough against the flesh to nick the flesh.
“Gellius, put the damned knife down before you kill me.”
“That’s the point though, isn’t it?”
“I thought we were friends.”
“So did I, but that was before you betrayed us. Trogus was right – I never should have trusted you again. More fool me. But I wasn’t the one to pay for it, was I? He was!” Gellius’ eyes welled with tears, his voice tremulous. “You won’t get away with it though! Not this time!”
“I’m sorry about Trogus, but I swear I never betrayed anyone.”
“Liar!” Gellius cried. “Sorio said he saw you at the fucking Games sitting alongside your dear friend Gurculio, watching Trogus get cut down like a common slave! You were playing us all that time!” He gripped the knife in both hands and held it over his head, readying to plunge it into Aculeo’s neck.
“Wait! It wasn’t me that betrayed you, dammit, it was Bitucus!”
Gellius paused, an expression of doubt crossing his face as he lowered the knife an inch. “What are you talking about?”
“I went to the Little Eagle to find the two of you the night Trogus was taken. Bitucus was waiting there with the merchant Theopompus.”
“The Icarian?”
“Yes. They wanted me to tell them your whereabouts, even offered me coin. I told them to go fuck themselves. I’d never have betrayed you, Gellius. You or Trogus.”
“You’re … you’re lying. Bitucus would never do such a thing. We took him in, put a roof over his head when he had nothing.”
“He’d have sold his father’s bones for soup to be with his family again,” Aculeo said. “I was at the Games with Gurculio, I admit it, but I was forced to be there. He wanted me to witness Trogus’ murder.”
“But why?” Gellius asked, dumbfounded.
“Because he’s a sick bastard. Or was. Someone murdered him last week.”
“Wait. What? Gurculio’s dead?”
“Yes. Someone tortured him and hung him in his own villa before setting fire to it.”
“Oh,” Gellius said, sitting back on his heels, lowering the knife. “Oh.”
“Can I sit up without you stabbing me? Again?” Aculeo asked. He saw Xanthias watching from the doorway, eyebrows raised in puzzlement, and waved him off.
“What? Oh, yes, of course,” Gellius said, lowering the knife.
Aculeo sat up in the bed, tentatively dabbed at the nicks on his throat, twinging at the touch and sting of sweat. “You’ve really got to stop trying to murder me.”
“I’m sorry, Aculeo, truly. When Sorio mentioned he’d seen you at the Games, I thought for certain it was you who’d betrayed us.”
“It’s alright, I understand,” Aculeo said.
“Yes, I’m sure a number of people dream of murdering my Master,” Xanthias offered helpfully from outside the bedroom. “Why even I …”
“Enough, old goat,” Aculeo growled.
“It’s been so … so challenging of late,” said Gellius. “I thought I’d hit bottom already. Not as bad as Pesach perhaps, but still…”
Pesach, Aculeo recalled guiltily, I’d forgotten about him.
“But then to lose Trogus …” Gellius looked up at Aculeo, his eyes hollow with grief. “I truly loved him.”
“I know you did. He loved you too.”
“I miss him so.” Gellius buried his face in his hands, unable to utter another word.
“Stay here as long as you like. It’s better than living in the street.”
“Not by much,” Xanthias muttered.
“You would offer me refuge?” Gellius said in astonishment, tears streaming down his cheeks. “I racked my soul for days plotting my revenge against you.”
“You had good reason to, or thought you did,” Aculeo said.
“And yet the day I come to kill you,” Gellius said, “I learn you’re still the dearest of friends, still a man of virtue!”
Aculeo stepped reluctantly into the fullery’s taberna, eyes stinging from the ripe stench of the smoldering sulphur pits with little breeze to thin it. He walked through the stuffy little fauces and poked his head around the doorway to the atrium where he could see the slaves hard at work. And there was Pesach, carrying a yoke slung with two great slopping skins of aged urine. He looked even worse than he had before, just sticks and hide, his face raw and red as a radish boiled too long in a pot. His left shoulder and arm were discoloured with a sprawling, yellowish-purple bruise, remnant of a beating no doubt. He felt sick at the sight.
“Pesach,” Aculeo called in a low voice, walking towards him.
The slave glanced up and one of the skins sloshed its odious contents onto the dusty ground. “Gah, look what you made me do!” he spat, then continued staggering towards the treading vats. “I told you last time to fuck off and leave me be,” he growled as two slaves helped him unhitch the skins from the yoke.
“Gurculio’s dead.”
Pesach scowled, taken aback. “What did you just say?”
“He was murdered in his villa a week ago.”
The fuller’s slave nodded slowly to himself, lips twis
ting into a half smile. “Who did it?”
“Panthea I think.”
“That fucking whore,” Pesach said, then shrugged and dumped a foul smelling skin into the vat. “But it hardly helps me. The treacherous shit already sold me off like some old plough-horse.”
“What does that matter? Come on, let’s go.”
“Easy enough for you to say. Do you know the punishment for a runaway slave?” He nodded towards a thoroughly wretched looking young man limping painfully through the atrium, lugging a basket heaped with dripping wet clothes. “He tried to run away four months back. When he was finally captured, they cut the three middle toes off each foot. He won’t be running far anymore. Thanks very much for your encouragement, Aculeo, but I happen to like my toes.”
“Stay then,” Aculeo said. “You’ll likely be dead before the year is out.”
“There is that,” Pesach allowed grudgingly. “But where would I even go? I dare not face my family. I’ve no friends left. None that would admit to it at least.”
“Stay with me then. We’ll figure it out from there. I just took Gellius in as well.”
“Gellius?”
“It’s a long story.”
Pesach considered him for a moment, then gave a bitter laugh. “No, I don’t think so,” he said, hoisting the second of the skins of stinking urine to empty into the treading vat.
“Why not?”
“You’re up to something. What’s in it for you?”
“What do you mean?”Aculeo asked.
“Why are you trying to help me?”
“Because this is no way for a Roman citizen to live. I feel responsible for you somehow. I can’t bear to have your fate hanging like a millstone around my neck.”
Pesach snorted. “See, it’s always about you.”
“Just put down that pisspot and let’s go before the fuller catches us.”
“But I’d be giving up all I accomplished here. I’m to be head velicus once Polus over there is dead. Which should happen soon enough. He’s not looking well lately. It comes with an extra ration of bread per day, you know.”
“I’ll get you all the fucking bread you can eat, alright? Now come on!”
“I might as well, I suppose,” Pesach said with a sigh. “What’s the plan?”
“What do you mean?” Aculeo scowled. “We just … go.”
“So we’re to simply traipse out the front gate? You really planned nothing better than that?”
“Well …”
“I have to do everything I suppose. Alright then.” Pesach grabbed a clean tunic from a drying rack and changed into it, tossing his old one onto a smouldering sulphur pit. A yellowish-grey stream of smoke spilled forth as the tunic ignited. “Come on, help me out,” he snapped and they grabbed a few more tunics and piled them on the fire until a thick smoke reeking of rotten eggs filled the atrium.
Then came the first screams of panic from the other slaves.
“Now we can go,” Pesach said, coughing and gagging from the smoke.
The master fuller stumbled through the atrium and looked around, florid-faced and confused. “What the fuck’s going on here?” he cried. He grabbed a pair of frightened slaves by the shoulders. “Empty the vat on the fire you fools! Pesach, help them!”
“Why would I help them put out the fire, you pox-faced cunt? I’m the one who started it,” Pesach said cheerfully.
The fuller gave him a bewildered look, then threw up his hands in exasperation and ran towards the exit. Pesach tripped him as he went past, sending him sprawling to the ground.
“Can we go now?” Aculeo demanded.
“With pleasure,” Pesach said, leading the way to the posticum at the back of the atrium.
As they walked back along the city streets, Aculeo revealed what he knew about the murders of Gurculio, Myrrhine, Trogus and Iovinus and the search for Neaera and Posidippus of Cos.
“I’d have been safer staying in the fullery,” Pesach said. “It sounds like a madhouse out here these days.”
They came to the edge of the Agora, the smell of fine food and rich spices from all the merchants’ carts and little shops like heavenly perfume. Pesach stopped, closed his eyes and sniffed the air, licking his cracked lips. “Ah, the smell of freedom! I’ve not eaten anything decent in months, unless you count maggoty bread. Which isn’t all that bad, by the way, you rather get used to it, but still ...”
“Come on then, we’ll get you some food.”
“Not so fast,” Pesach said. He was looking towards a tall limestone building with long blue glass windows and a pair of weathered statues of some old Egyptian gods dragged from some abandoned temple propped up on either side of the entrance. The Baths of Sabinus, the inscription over the lintel read.
“The baths? Now?” Aculeo asked irritably.
“Of course. What are we, barbarians? If I’m to return to some semblance of civilization, surely a visit to the baths is a requirement, is it not? Besides, we can get something to eat in there.”
“Fine. Whatever, let’s go.”
A few minutes later they’d stripped off their chitons in the change area, walked barefoot down the mosaic-tiled corridor to the showers and stood next to one another as funnels of cool water poured from the stone lions’ maws overhead, dousing them both head to foot. After the showers they headed into the vapour room, taking a bench well away from the braziers of hot coals. The steam smelled of sandalwood and enveloped them like a thick cocoon. Bath attendants came forward to apply oil to their skin.
“Make certain you use real Attican oil, not that cheap Syrian dreck,” Pesach said haughtily. “And don’t skimp on the myrrh.” He leaned back against the wall and sighed as an attendant rubbed oil into his shoulders, arms and back and began to scrape it off with a strigil.
“I’ll see you in the pools,” Aculeo said irritably, and headed into a vast, crowded chamber with several large mosaic-tiled hot and cold pools. He plunged into a cold pool, the chilled water pumped up from the underground caverns prickling against his feverish skin, and tilted his head back so that only his mouth and nose broke the surface, letting the cool air fill his lungs in slow, deep breaths. Pesach entered the pool a few minutes later, looking almost meditative.
After a few minutes they moved to a steaming hot pool, sitting on one of the underwater ledges. Fresh, hot bath water gushed from the amphorae held by a pair of marble nymphs standing at the edge of the pool, both of them with generous curves and welcoming smiles. A food vendor carried his tray over to the side of the bath and met them with an eager grin. “Some food, gentlemen? I have spiced pork, wonderful fresh bread, luscious, plump olives, aged cheese, perhaps some chilled wine?”
“Mmm yes – I’ll have everything,” Pesach said, then settled back as the vendor began to set out some plates and cups at the pool’s edge, humming happily as he worked. “Wretched baths, you must admit. Is this where you usually come these days?”
“When I can afford it, yes,” Aculeo said, worrying what his generosity might cost him.
“They’re nothing like the Baths of Vitus, are they? I wouldn’t be surprised if they pump the bath water in from the latrines to save an as. Still, I suppose we all need to make accommodations in these trying times.”
“I suppose.” He was already beginning to question his wisdom in freeing Pesach – he’d forgotten how irritating the man could be!
“It’s not like we’re alone in this ignoble fate, I suppose. You’ll never believe who I saw in the vapour room after you left. Bitucus! Remember him?”
Aculeo sat up suddenly, startling the food vendor. “Who did you say?”
“Bitucus. That pompous prick, I never liked him.”
“We need to get out of here,” Aculeo said, and started climbing from the bath. He spotted a fully clothed man emerging from the vapour room, scanning the crowded room. Bitucus. Theopompus and Viator the slave were right behind him. “Shit,” he whispered, and sat back down, sliding down as low as he could in the water.
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“What’s the matter with …?” Pesach began, then spotted the men. He grabbed Aculeo’s upper arm, digging his fingertips deep into the flesh. “What trap have you led me into now?” he hissed. “It’s not enough to see me suffer in that fucking pisshouse you induced me to escape and then this?”
“Shut up and hide, fool!”
Pesach scowled at him, then slid down in the water, watching, waiting. The four men finally turned around and left, not having seen them apparently.
“Come on,” Aculeo said. They climbed out of the baths, walking naked back towards the vapour room.
“Wait, what about your feast?” the vendor cried.
Aculeo peered into the vapour room. No sign of Bitucus or the others. They had just made their way back into the shower room when someone called out, “There he is!” Theopompus! Pesach sprinted back into the vapour room, shoving past the other bathers.
Aculeo tried to follow but Viator caught his wrist in a vicious grip and slammed him face-first against hot, dripping wall of the vapor room, twisting his arm so far behind his back he feared his shoulder would tear out of the socket. Viator wrapped his powerful forearm around Aculeo’s throat, almost choking him as he turned him about, then thrust his knee up hard between Aculeo’s naked buttocks. The other bathers and the attendants quickly cleared out. A moment later, Bitucus appeared, barely managing to keep ahold of the spitting, cursing Pesach.
Theopompus was right behind them, and gave a predatory, brown-toothed smile. “Good to see you again, Aculeo. And you’ve got a friend with you? What are you doing out, Pesach?”
“Fuck you, Icarian,” Pesach growled. “On my oath I’m going to kill you.”
“You’re not in much of a position to do that.”
“Not you, ball-sucker. Him,” he said, jerking his head towards Aculeo.
“You’re moving up in the world, Bitucus,” Aculeo gasped. “First working for a moneylender, now kissing his sycophant’s ass.”
“Shut your mouth, Aculeo,” Bitucus snapped.
“Just tell us where you stashed them,” said Theopompus.
Furies Page 23
