The Bow of Heaven - Book I: The Other Alexander

by Andrew Levkoff

  “Then Romans,” she replied, fixing me with an impish leer, “are the thing you see when you lift a horse’s tail.”

  I stifled a guffaw as Sabina exclaimed, “Livia! You must never speak like that.” She glanced toward the hallway, a reflexive movement common in non-Roman conversations: were we being overheard, there would be consequences. Roman consequences. “Where ever did you learn such a thing?”

  “At home, of course.” And she was gone, twirling off at speed. Sabina called her back unsuccessfully. The sadness came rushing back into her expression, a thief of joy intent on stealing a mother’s smile. “Home?” I tried. “But this is her home.” Sabina ignored me as she refilled my water cup from a terra cotta pitcher. “Keep drinking,” she said, her healer’s demeanor restored. She ruffled my hair with genuine affection. I ached to know more, but dared not pick further at a scab that was not my own.

  ***

  By the time we reached the entrance to the tablinum, sweat dotted my forehead; Sabina steadied me, her arm an oak branch under my own. The study was small, crowded with the work assigned to one of Sulla’s new favorites. The day was surprisingly warm; curtains had been pulled so that the room was open to the adjacent peristyle. Iron rings discouraged a spray of scrolls from going outside to play with the occasional breeze. There was room for but one chair, and its occupant was unlikely to give it up to the bandaged young heron wobbling before him. Sunlight fell from the columned garden onto Crassus’ outstretched, sandaled foot, the leather lacings only a few shades darker than his tanned calf. His bare arms draped languidly over cedar armrests, hands hanging down in repose. The man I must now call lord wore a tunic hemmed with silver thread; the only other adornment was a band of iron on his left ring finger. His form begged to be sculpted; his face belonged on coins. Marcus Licinius Crassus, one of Rome’s new masters, had just turned thirty-four. As my eyes rose to meet his, I saw that he was studying me as intently as I had been taking account of him.

  “You live,” he said.

  “Apparently.”

  “I am pleased.”

  I did not respond.

  “I’ve decided I am not going to have you whipped.”

  “I am pleased,” I said with emphasis.

  There followed a second of silence in which I tried to hold his gaze, but faltered. “Take him back, Sabina,” Crassus said with a flick of his wrist. “Give him another day’s rest, then have him report to Pío.” We turned to go, but he stopped us. “You studied philosophy, did you not?” I nodded. “Next week,” he said, returning to his work, “you’ll spend an hour each day tutoring my son. Why should we hire out when we have our very own expert on the Greek thinkers.”

  “But how did ....”

  Crassus did not look up. He took another scroll from the pile, but his lips curled into an involuntary smile. “We keep excellent records on captives’ backgrounds. Unlike some, I read them.”

  “Isn’t Marcus a little young?” Sabina asked.

  “When the other boys start at seven, he’ll be that much further ahead. Just an hour a day; enough to whet his appetite.”

  “Yes, dominus,” Sabina said. She elbowed me.

  “Yes, dominus,” I repeated dully, marveling at his knowledge of me, and that he had bothered to discover it.

  Crassus spoke again. “Now we shall ascertain if your educational gifts equal your prowess as an archery butt.”

  My face reddened. Was that a dismissal? Crassus read his parchment while we stood there, stuck in a hot, uncomfortable limbo. I shifted painfully on my leg. Finally, he said, “Oh, one more thing.” He looked up, his expression impenetrable. “Pío is a Laletani - Hispanic. His Latin is passable but rudimentary. He does not understand sarcasm. He boasts twice my weight and half my sense of humor. Need I say more?” he asked with eyebrow raised. I stared at him in mild surprise. Was he trying to look out for me, or was he merely protecting his investment? Dare I ask? Too late. The interview was over. Crassus had returned to his work and the moment to wave the banner of my own ironical sense of humor had passed. Timing is all.

  In any case, my stamina was flagging.

  That was the extent of my first conversation with Marcus Crassus. I would not have another for three months.

  Chapter VI

  82 - 81 BCE - Winter, Rome

  Year of the consulship of

  Gaius Marius the Younger and Gnaeus Papirius Carbo

  Two days later, the morning rose surly and bitter, wrapping itself in a thick cloud blanket against the cold. Crassus had left early for the senate. From there he would ride to surprise his wife on the Via Laurentina as she returned to Rome from Lavinium with her two children, one of which Crassus had never set eyes upon. As the morning progressed, I quickly discovered that when the cat is off in search of other game, the mice in this house had better keep their mouths shut and their whiskers well hidden if they didn’t want them plucked out one by one.

  I was owned by Crassus, but my quotidian fate rested with the Spaniard, Pío. He was the kind of man whose features are difficult to describe: the moment you set eyes on any one of them you are struck with the need to look quickly away. I do not make a practice of such thoughtless prejudice: just because he looked like an unwashed, overfed barbarian did not necessarily mean he wasn’t the sweetest of men. So to be clear as an Alpine lake, let me set your mind at rest: Pío was not the sweetest of men. Crassus had found him during the months he had been forced to flee the city. Publius, Crassus’ father, had been governor of Hispania Ulterior, and his fair and prosperous rule had gained him many friends. Vibius Piciacus was among them. When the disheveled son of his murdered comrade sought refuge, Piciacus did what he could to keep young Marcus safe from the spies of Cinna and Marius. There was a large cave by the sea on Piciacus’ estate, and there Crassus and his few retainers hid for the better part of a year. Piciacus, fearing reprisals should his generosity be discovered, would not visit his guest himself, but sent his manservant Pío there each day with food and anything else Crassus might require, including the company of two young women paid well for their silence and their service. When news of Cinna’s death reached Hispania, Crassus came out of hiding. As a reward for his constant and discrete care of his charges, Pío was given his freedom. He chose to return with Crassus to Rome; Piciacus must have been glad to see the last of him.

  My first encounter with Pío occurred in the dining room. Appropriate, considering his capacity for consumption. He had stripped the meat off a roast leg of goat and was absentmindedly gnawing the bone to splinters. With his free hand he held a serviette beneath the machinery of his mouth to catch the falling detritus. From this visage of dainty gluttony my eyes fled to his feet, but the sight of those broad, hirsute plains sloping to the grimy boulders of his toes gave them no shelter. I know he wore a belt; I could see the leather escaping his sides to find sanctuary across the broad expanse of his back, but head-on there was no sign of it: the sagging lozenge of flesh had overwhelmed and smothered the sweat-stained band. Crassus had not employed the man as his atriensis - an archaic term for the manager of his household which Crassus still favored - for his good looks. Was it the Spaniard’s talent or my owner’s sense of obligation that had moved him? If talent, it was well-hidden.

  The house was preparing a feast for the masters’ return that would double as the start of the seven days commemorating the Saturnalia, the most raucous of Roman holidays. I limped into the room on my own with Sabina by my side, who watched my progress closely. She had furnished me with a staff, but warned that I should use it as little as possible if I wanted to strengthen my wounded leg. I did indeed want that, but more immediately wanted not to lose my balance and fall crashing to the ground. I clasped the crutch like a lover.

  Livia came in, carrying a small tripod table which she carefully set down near one of the couches. She waved at us, then ran back to the kitchen, skidding to avoid a servant heading the other way. A little bird chittered after Pío picking up verbal crumbs. Pío spit
directions that were barely Latin at the bustling servants who were mostly Greek, and this little man translated. I didn’t recognize him at first for he was washed, shaved and healed of all his sores and bruises. But then another serving girl got in his way and he elbowed her aside to regain his position near his master. The familiar rudeness also jostled free a memory: a bedraggled chain whose links could barely be called men, trudging without will toward whatever unplanned future the auction block held in store. Here was my bilingual companion-in-misery, saved from a choiceless fate (almost at my expense) and thrust into one of his own making a lifetime ago. I hobbled to him with one arm outstretched, but to my surprise he backed away and Pío’s giant hand came down between us.

  “This is Alexandros,” Sabina said. “He is the second translator for the house. You know Nestor?”

  “So that is your name,” I said, peering over Pío’s flattened palm. Nestor gave me a look that would freeze the Kephisos in summer.

  “Keep him away from me,” Nestor said with a mixture of pleading and revulsion. “He’s insane, Pío.”

  I started to protest, but upon reflection could not argue; with what Little Nestor knew of me, even I was forced to credit his opinion. He was, after all, witness to my botched attempt at suicide before the great Sulla. Pío’s voice matched his countenance: its assault on the ears made one want to retreat a step; two would be better. Stalwart, I held my ground as he said, “You love your father?”

  Now that was unexpected. “I beg your pardon?”

  “You love your father,” Pío insisted. “I love my father. When he with my mother fifteen years, master Piciacus allow him bring carpenter to build fine cabinet to hold my mother’s clothes which he bought. Twelve years I had. Every day this man come to work on cabinet. My father work in fields. My mother spread her legs for this man. My father killed him. Slow. Then they killed my father. More quick. The carpenter’s name was Andros. I do not like this name. I do not like your name. Here you will be ... Alexander. Like the famous one. I think maybe you will not be so famous? This name I like - Alexander. Sabina, show him to kitchen and let him see that cook’s meanings are pure. No mistakes like last week. You, Nestor, you will speak for everything but kitchen? Good.”

  With a word from that Hispanic grotesquerie another chip from my old life fell to the tiled floor. I am certain he had no idea how cruelly this arrow had hit the mark. At home in Greece, no human property was allowed to keep his or her own name – new ones were always assigned by their owner. It was purposefully dehumanizing, and completely sustainable, in my opinion. I never dreamed it would be happening to me, and not for any practical reason, but on a whim, because Pío didn’t like the sound of it! How absolutely rich! The sting of it burned as deeply as the wound in my leg. Well, that is an exaggeration, to be honest. But it did hurt; you need only imagine it happening to you. Sabina barely took notice, accepting the tyrant’s ruling without comment. “He is well enough to take quarters,” she said. “Where do you want him?”

  “Who has empty bed? You, Nestor,” he said, pointing a fat finger, “you have empty bed. Translators share room.”

  “No!” Nestor protested.

  “I’ve an empty bed,” offered a servant wearing the tunic of the wine steward.

  “No,” said Pío. I sensed he was the kind of man who believed thoughtful reconsideration to be a sign of weakness. “Translators together.”

  Fuming impotently over the theft of my name, I wanted to lunge at Pío. I, however, am the kind of man who believes thoughtful reconsideration to be a sign of manliness and strength. In any case, before Sabina could lead me out of the triclinium, others had performed what pride and fear were about to suppress. Oh, I was scathingly articulate and brutally eloquent when complaining about someone to someone else, even if that meant talking to myself. Given the opportunity to actually vent directly to the object of my anger, I was as ferocious as a puppy, as outraged as an oyster.

  A young, be-freckled woman with honey hair, tied in fraying braids intertwined with daisies marched into the dining room, her bare and muddied feet marking her determined passage. No one had dared remind her to don a pair of indoor sandals, six of which, in varying sizes, lined every entrance to the house. Her face, as flushed from the sun as her tunic and knees were begrimed by yard work, was set and grim. She walked straight up to Pío and knocked the napkin out of his hand, bits of goat and bone, so fastidiously gathered, now littering the floor. With her other hand she slapped him as hard as she could, and before he could make a grab for her was out the way she had come.

  Medusa would have applauded the frozen and stony silence caused by this performance, and a second was just beginning. Keening rose from the direction of the baths, a flooding river of sound that crested with the arrival of another woman, her face streaked with tears. Pío spun to face her, comical with rage and discomfiture. She was upon him, spearing his eyes with a look that needed no translation. Looking up at him, she paused for the barest of moments, then spoke her terse jeremiad with hoarse and indignant fury: “How could you?”

  Rhetoric at its finest, for it demands, nor permits reply. Pío, of course, did not know the rules.

  She turned to leave, but he caught her by the wrist. “I owe you nothing,” he said, spoiling the purity of her lament. She yanked free of him. “Not even the explanation,” he called after her. The woman’s sobs grew, then receded till they became not-so-faint reverberations echoing from the chamber of the baths.

  “Pío controls the slave larder,” Sabina said in response to my raised eyebrows. We spoke Greek as we walked to the kitchen through the atrium. The chill air swirling down from the open compluvium made us quicken our pace. “There’s enough for everyone, unless he wants something from you. Then you find less on your plate.”

  “You must go to the master,” I cried. Take note how quick I was to say ‘you’ and not ‘we.’ Sabina cocked her head, taking her own turn to raise an eyebrow. “Oh,” I said, chastised. “A foolish question. Pío is favored for an old debt. He cannot be touched. And even if the paterfamilias should have him punished, he would find ample opportunity to take his vengeance.” Sabina nodded. “But how then,” I asked, “could that first woman slap him with impunity?”

  “Tessa? Oh, it’s just part of her little act. She likes to be the center of attention, and she’s a little carefree with her charms, if you take my meaning.” She paused. “And, besides, I think he likes it.”

  We entered the crowded kitchen filled with the pungent smell of garum and baking acorn bread. Sabina introduced me to the Roman cook and his three Greek assistants. She turned to go but I stopped her in the doorway. “What about you? Are you safe?”

  “Pío is a bully,” she said, dismissively. As if that answered the question.

  Chapter VII

  82 - 81 BCE - Winter, Rome

  Year of the consulship of

  Gaius Marius the Younger and Gnaeus Papirius Carbo

  Later that day, the fourteenth before the Kalends of January, we were to stand outside the villa’s entrance, eleven of us plus two house guards, Betto and Malchus, shivering in the cold to greet the paterfamilias and his wife. Everyone who was not free wore the pileus, a brimless, conical felt cap traditionally presented to newly manumitted freedmen in a ceremony that included, for some nonsensical reason, head shaving. This was supposed to represent the freedom dangled before us during the Saturnalia season. A cruel joke. The little cap was optional for freedmen only; servants owned by Crassus were forced to wear it. Pío chose to wear his proudly, unaware how ridiculous it looked atop his rockpile of a head. The pate of Ludovicus the handyman was bare. We Greeks celebrated the autumn planting as well, but at least in my family’s house we had never made such fools of ourselves or such a mockery of those who served us. The hat was yet further proof that cultural distinction was sadly deficient in Romans; they stole everything from everyone: culture, gods, clothing. The pilos had been worn by Greek sailors for centuries. It is a marvel to me t
hat a people so successful in subjugating all they encountered could at the same time be so vacant of any original idea that did not in some way assist in those conquests. Roads, bridges, engines of war, I grant them those.

  But I digress. In any event, Sabina had told me that later in the week there would be gifts, games, a suspension of work, and general revelry. The household would even sit at a banquet served by our masters; the meal, however, would be prepared by us, the table cleared by us and the dishes cleaned by us.

  As usual in those first days after my injury, I was late getting to where I was supposed to be. I limped through the vestibule, trying to get my pileus placed securely while struggling with the staff. It had been a bad day for my leg: I had already been on my feet too long. Pío was not about to let me shirk my duties, and I was not about to ask for any favor that might put me in his debt. I leaned up against the wall to catch my breath and peered out at the group huddled outside. My glance fell on Sabina standing behind the soldier Malchus, her hands lightly resting on Livia’s shoulders.

  They were both wearing the pileus.

  ***

  Somehow, three-year old Marcus escaped the far side of the carriage even before it had stopped. With delighted screams he came racing around the back and right into the young senator’s entourage of six armed horsemen. Pío stepped forward with surprising speed. He placed his left hand on the snowy chest of our owner’s horse (the beast came to an immediate halt) and with his right arm whisked the kicking bundle of male energy into the air. Only when Crassus had leapt from his white stallion did the chief of staff put Marcus down. The little treasure turned and kicked his savior in the ankle as hard as he could before rushing past his father to get back to the carriage.