He gazed up at Sulla, looking for mockery. Instead, he found only sternness and believed him. He looked away. Did this man expect Mithridates the King to laugh and say all was forgiven? The soldiers had been men of Rome and this golden figure was their master. Was a huntsman not responsible for his dogs?
‘Here is my sword,’ Sulla said, offering the blade. ‘Swear by your gods that you will not rise against Rome in my lifetime, and I will leave you alive.’
Mithridates looked at the silver gladius, trying to keep the surprise from his face. He had grown used to the fact that he would die, but to suddenly have the offer of life again was like tearing scabs away from hidden wounds. Time to bury his wife.
‘Why?’ he grunted through the drying blood.
‘Because I believe you to be a man of your word. There has been enough death today.’
Mithridates nodded silently in reply and Sulla reached round him with the unstained blade to cut the bonds. The king felt the soldiers nearby tense as they saw the enemy free once more, but he ignored them, reaching out and taking the blade in his scarred right palm. The metal was cold against his skin.
‘I swear it.’
‘You have sons, what about them?’
Mithridates looked at the Roman general, wondering how much he knew. His sons were in the east, raising support for their father. They would return with men and supplies and a new reason for vengeance.
‘They are not here. I cannot answer for my sons.’
Sulla held the blade still in the man’s grip.
‘No, but you can warn them. If they return and raise Greece against Rome while I live, I will visit upon her people a scale of grief they have never known.’
Mithridates nodded and let his hand fall from the blade. Sulla resheathed it and turned away, striding back to his horse without a backward glance.
Every Roman in sight moved off with him, leaving Mithridates alone on his knees, surrounded by the dead. Stiffly, he pulled himself to his feet, wincing at last at the score of pains that plagued him. He watched the Romans break camp and move to the west, back to the sea, and his eyes were cold and puzzled.
Sulla rode silently for the first few leagues. His friends exchanged glances, but for a while no one dared to break the grim silence. Finally, Padacus, a pretty young man from northern Italy, put out his hand to touch Sulla’s shoulder and the general reined in, looking at him questioningly.
‘Why did you leave him alive? Will he not come against us in the spring?’
Sulla shrugged. ‘He might, but if he does, at least he is a man I know I can beat. His successor might not make mistakes so easily. I could have spent another six months rooting out every one of his followers left alive in tiny mountain camps, but what would we have gained except their hatred? No, the real enemy, the real battle –’ He paused and looked over to the western horizon, almost as if he could see all the way to the gates of Rome. ‘The real battle has yet to be fought and we have spent too much time here already. Ride on. We will assemble the legion at the coast, ready for the crossing home.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Gaius leaned on the stone window ledge and watched the sun come up over the city. He heard Cornelia stir on the long bed behind him and smiled to himself as he glanced back. She was still asleep, her long gold hair spilling over her face and shoulders as she shifted restlessly. In the heat of the night they had needed little to cover them and her long legs were revealed almost to the hip by the light cloth that she had gathered in one small hand and pulled closer to her face.
For a moment, his thoughts turned to Alexandria, but it was without pain. It had been hard for the first months, even with friends like Diracius to distract him. He could look back now and wince at his naivety and clumsiness. Yet there was sadness, too. He could never be that innocent boy again.
He had seen Metella privately and signed a document that passed Alexandria’s ownership over to the house of Marius, knowing he could trust his aunt to be kind to her. He had also left a sum of gold pieces, taken from his estate funds, to be handed to her on the day she purchased her freedom. She would find out when she was free. It was a small gift, considering what she had given him.
Gaius grinned as he felt arousal stir once more, knowing he would have to be moving before the household came awake. Cornelia’s father Cinna was another of the political heavyweights Marius was flattering and working to control. Not a man to cross, and discovery in his beloved daughter’s bedroom would mean death even for Marius’ nephew.
He glanced at her again and sighed as he pulled his clothes to him. She had been worth it though, worth the risk many times over. Three years older than him, she had yet been a virgin, which surprised him. She was his alone and that gave him quiet satisfaction and more than a little of the old joy.
They had met at a formal gathering of Senate families, celebrating the birth of twin sons to one of the nobilitas. In the middle of the day, there was nothing like the free licence of one of Diracius’ parties, and at first Gaius had been bored with the endless congratulations and speeches. Then, in a quiet moment, she had come over to him and changed everything. She had been wearing a robe of dark gold, almost a brown, with earrings and a torque at her throat of the same rich metal. He had desired her from the first moments, and liked her as quickly. She was intelligent and confident and she wanted him. It was a heady feeling. He had sneaked in over the roofs to her bedroom window, looking on her as she slept, her hair tousled and wild.
He remembered her rising from the bed and sitting on it with her legs drawn up under her and her back straight. It had been a few seconds before he noticed she was smiling. He sighed as he pulled on his clothes and sandals.
With Sulla gone from the city for a whole year as the Greek rebellion grew in ferocity, it was easy for Gaius to forget that there had to be a reckoning at some point. Marius, though, had worked from the first day for the moment that Sulla’s standards became visible on the horizon. The city was still buzzing with excitement and dread, as it had been for months. Most had stayed, but a steady trickle of merchants and families leaving the city showed that not every inhabitant shared Marius’ confidence about the outcome. Every street had shops that were boarded closed and the Senate criticised many of the decisions made, pushing Marius to rage when he came back to his home in the early hours of the mornings. It was a tension Gaius could barely share, with the pleasures of the city to distract him.
He looked over at Cornelia again as he tightened his toga and saw her eyes were open. He crossed to her and kissed her on the lips, feeling the rush of longing as he did. He dropped one hand to her breast and felt her start against him as he broke for air.
‘Will you come to me again, Gaius?’
‘I will,’ he replied, smiling, and found to his surprise that he actually meant it.
‘A good general is prepared for every eventuality,’ Marius said as he handed the documents to Gaius. ‘These are money orders. They are as good as gold in your hand, drawn on the city treasury. I do not expect to have them repaid, they are a gift to you.’
Gaius looked at the sums and fought to smile. The amounts were large, but would barely cover the debts he had run up with the moneylenders. Marius hadn’t been able to keep a close eye on his nephew as the preparations for Sulla’s return continued and Gaius had run lines of credit in those first few months after Alexandria, buying women, wine and sculpture – all to increase his standing in a city that had respect only for gold and power. With borrowed wealth, Gaius had come onto a jaded social scene as a young lion. Even those who distrusted his uncle knew Gaius was a man to be watched and there was never a problem with the ever larger sums he required, as the rich struggled to be next to offer finance to Marius’ nephew.
Marius must have caught a hint of Gaius’ disappointment and interpreted it as worry for the future.
‘I expect to win, but only a fool wouldn’t plan for disaster where Sulla was involved. If it doesn’t go as I have planned, take the dra
fts and get out of the city. I have included a reference that should get you a berth on a legion vessel to take you to some far post of the empire. I … have also written documents naming you as a son of my house. You will be able to join any regiment and make your name for a couple of years.’
‘What if you crush Sulla, as you expect?’
‘Then we will continue with your advance in Rome. I will secure a post for you that carries life membership of the Senate. They are jealously guarded, come the elections, but it should not be impossible. It will cost us a fortune, but then you are in, truly one of the chosen. Who knows where the future will take you after that?’
Gaius grinned, caught up in the man’s enthusiasm. He would use the drafts to pay off the worst of his debts. Of course, the horse sales were next week and the rumour was that Arabian princes were bringing new breeds of warhorses, huge stallions that could be guided with the gentlest touch. They would cost a fortune, a fortune very like the one he held in his hand. He tucked the papers inside his toga as he left. The moneylenders would wait a little longer, he was sure.
In the cool night outside Marius’ town house, Gaius weighed up his options for the hours before dawn. As usual, the dark city was far from quiet and he didn’t feel ready for sleep. Traders and cart-drivers swore at each other, smiths hammered, somebody laughed in a nearby house and he could hear crockery being smashed. The city was a place of life in a way the estate could never match. Gaius loved it.
He could go and listen to the orators in the forum by torchlight, perhaps joining in one of the endless debates with other young nobles until the dawn made them all go home. Or he could seek out Diracius’ home and satisfy other appetites. Wiser not to venture alone through the dark streets, he thought, remembering Marius’ warnings about the various raptores who lurked in the dim alleys, ready for theft or murder. The city was not safe at night and it was easy to become lost in the maze of unnamed, twisting streets. One wrong turning could lead a wanderer into an alley filled with piles of human filth and great pools of urine, though the smell was usually enough of a warning.
A month before, he might have gathered companions for a wild night, but the face of one girl had been appearing more and more in his thoughts. Far from dwindling, his longing for her seemed to be fired by contact rather than quenched. Cornelia would be thinking of him in her father’s estate rooms. He would go to her and scale the outer wall, slipping past her father’s house guards one more time.
He grinned to himself, remembering the sudden fear as he had slipped during the last climb, hanging above the hard stones of the street below. It was getting so he knew every inch of that wall, but one mistake would cost him a pair of broken legs or worse.
‘Worth the risks for you, my girl,’ he whispered to himself, watching the night air frost his breath as he walked through the unlit city streets to his destination.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The Cinna estate began the bustle of the working day as early as any other in Rome, heating water, firing the ovens, sweeping, cleaning and readying the clothes of the family before they awoke. Before the sun had risen fully, a slave entered Cornelia’s room, looking round for clothes to be collected for washing. Her thoughts were on the thousand chores to be completed before the mid-morning light meal and at first she noticed nothing. Then her eyes strayed to where a muscled leg sprawled over the side of the bed. She froze as she saw the sleeping couple, still entwined.
After a moment of indecision, her eyes lit up with malice and she took a deep breath, cracking the still scene with wild screams.
Gaius rolled naked off the bed and onto the floor in a crouch. He took in the situation in a second, but didn’t waste any time on cursing himself. He grabbed toga and sword and bolted for the window. The slave girl ran to the door, still screaming, and Cornelia spat oaths after her. Thundering footsteps sounded, and the nurse Clodia came into the room, her face full of outrage. She swung her hand and connected with the slave girl’s face, cutting off the scream with a dull smack of flesh and spinning her right round.
‘Get out quickly, lad,’ Clodia snapped at him as the slave girl whimpered on the floor. ‘You’d better be worth all the trouble this is going to cause!’
Gaius nodded, but turned from the window and came back into the room to Cornelia.
‘If I don’t go, they’ll kill me for an intruder. Tell them my name and tell them you’re mine, that I’ll marry you. Tell them, if anyone harms you I’ll kill him.’
Cornelia didn’t answer, just reached up and kissed him.
He pulled away, laughing. ‘Gods, let me go! It is a fine morning for a bit of a chase.’
She watched with amusement as his white buttocks flashed over the windowsill and away, trying to compose herself for the drama to come.
Her father’s guards entered the room first, led by the dour captain who nodded to her and crossed to the window, looking down.
‘Get going,’ he shouted to his companions. ‘I’ll cross the roofs after him, you men intercept him down below. I’ll have his skin on my wall for this. Your pardon, lady,’ he said as a farewell to Cornelia as his red face dropped out of sight.
Cornelia fought not to giggle with tension.
Gaius slipped and skittered on the tiles, scraping skin from elbows and knees as he sacrificed safety for breakneck speed. He heard the captain shouting behind him, but didn’t look back. The tiles offered precious little grip and all he could really do was control the speed of his fall as he slid towards the edge and the street below. He had time to swear as he realised his sandals were in the room above. How could he make any kind of jump in only his bare feet? He’d break bones for sure and then the chase would be over. He lost his grip on the toga to save the gladius, by far the more valuable of the two items. He managed to cling to the edge of the roof and inched along it, not risking standing up in case archers were waiting for him. It would not be unusual for a man of Cinna’s wealth to have a small army on his estate, much as Marius had.
Crouching low, he knew he was out of sight to the swearing, puffing captain behind him and Gaius looked around desperately for a way out of the predicament. He had to get off the roof. If he stayed, they would simply search each part of it until they found him and either pitch him off onto his head or drag him before Cinna for punishment. With the heat of betrayal on him, Cinna would be deaf to pleas and death would quickly follow for the charge of rape. In fact, Gaius realised Cinna would not even have to bring charges, he would simply summon a lictor and have the man execute Gaius on the spot. If Cinna was of a mind to, he could have Cornelia strangled to save the honour of his house, though Gaius knew the old man doted on his only daughter. If he had genuinely believed she would suffer, he would have stayed to fight it out, but he thought she would be safe enough against old Cinna’s rage.
Down below, where the roof overhung the street, Gaius could hear shouting as the house guards formed a ring that blocked all the exits. Behind him, the scrabbling of iron-shod sandals on tiles was getting closer and so he took a deep breath to calm himself and ran, hoping his speed and balance would keep him on the treacherous surface long enough to find safety. The guard captain cried out in recognition as he broke cover, but Gaius didn’t have time to look back. The nearest roof was too far away to leap onto and the only flat place on the whole complex was a bell tower with a small window.
He made the sill with a desperate jump as his legs finally lost all grip and he heaved himself up and over it, panting in great gulps of the cold morning air. The bell room was tiny, with steps leading down inside it to the main house below. At first, Gaius was tempted to run down them, but then a plan surfaced in his mind and he steadied his breathing and stretched a few muscles as he waited for the captain to reach the window.
Moments after his decision to stay, the man blocked the sunlight and his face lit up at the sight of the young man cornered in the bell house. They looked at each other for a moment and Gaius watched with interest as the thought of bein
g killed as he climbed in crossed the other man’s face. Gaius nodded to him and stood well back to allow him entrance.
The captain grinned nastily at him, panting from the run.
‘You should have killed me while you had the chance,’ he said, drawing his sword.
‘You would have fallen off the roof and I need your clothes – especially those sandals,’ Gaius replied calmly, unsheathing his own gladius and standing relaxed, apparently unaware of his nakedness.
‘Will you tell me your name before I kill you? Just so I have something to tell my master, you know,’ the captain said, moving lightly into a fighter’s crouch.
‘Will you give me your clothes? This is too fine a morning for killing,’ Gaius countered, smiling easily.
The captain began to reply and Gaius attacked, only to have his sword batted aside. The man had been expecting such a move and was ready for it. Gaius realised quickly that he was facing a skilled opponent and focused, aware of every move in the dance. The floor was too small a space for ease and the stairwell loomed between them, threatening to send one of them tumbling.
They feinted and struck around the space, looking for weaknesses. The captain was puzzled at the young man’s skill. He had bought the position in Cinna’s guard after winning a city sword tournament and knew he was the better of most men, but time and again his attacks were driven aside with speed and precision. He wasn’t worried, though. At worst, he could simply hang on until help arrived, and as soon as the searchers realised where they fought more would be sent up the stairs to overwhelm the intruder. Some of this confidence must have shown in his face as Gaius went on the offensive at last, having got the measure of his man.
The Emperor Series: Books 1-5 Page 27
