Sour Grapes

by Marilyn Todd

  ‘She intends to install a sundial surrounded by roses,’ the sorceress continued, ‘and add a fish pond down by the paddock.’

  ‘I’m surprised you haven’t talked her into putting in a boating lake.’

  ‘Your mother-in-law does not strike me as the type of woman one could talk into anything…’

  How true, but that was in the old days. Before dementia kicked at her shins.

  ‘And in any case, it is neither my interest nor concern what renovations she does or does not make. Larentia employs me to cast spells, not act as her decorator.’

  Technically, since Larentia had no monies of her own, it was Claudia who was employing her, but she let the point pass. ‘Are they working?’ she asked innocently.

  ‘All my spells work.’

  The edge to Candace’s voice was unexpected and Claudia resisted the urge to smile. So then, not quite the confident little cat she made out? Adopting a hopeful expression and wringing her hands as though embarrassed at asking, she hesitantly enquired whether Candace could help her some time…you know, when it was convenient. Her husband, she murmured. Larentia had spoken with him at length, as had Flavia…

  ‘Of course, my dear, but of course,’ the sorceress purred, because no self-respecting con artist is going to let an opportunity like that slip by them in a hurry. ‘Suppose we say tonight, after dinner?’

  ‘Won’t it be too dark?’

  When Candace smiled her slow, feline smile, Claudia’s skin started to crawl. ‘The dead live in the darkness, my dear. They will not come when it’s light.’ Black hands covered white in a well-rehearsed act of sympathy. ‘How you must miss your soul mate, my child.’

  Child? The woman could not have been more than thirty herself.

  ‘Candace, you have no idea,’ Claudia replied sadly, remembering Gaius’s fat, shiny body and foul-smelling breath. ‘I am just grateful to be blessed with so many wonderful memories.’

  Most of them glittering merrily away in his moneybox, as she recalled.

  ‘Tonight, then,’ Candace crooned. ‘Tonight husband and wife will be reunited, you have my promise on that.’

  Claudia tilted her head in a gesture of coyness. ‘I think you are more than a sorceress who casts protective spells,’ she said with a simper. ‘Look what you’ve done for Larentia and Darius.’

  ‘Your mother-in-law did not ask me to cast spells for her heart. It is the winged spirits who brought them together on the winds of freedom and fate. The triumph is not mine to take credit for.’ Candace leaned forward and transfixed her with her eyes. ‘The forces of the supernatural surround each of us, my child. I am merely their instrument.’

  As she turned away, the scent of her lingered for a long time in the open portico. Incense. Arabian incense, to be precise. Which struck Claudia as an odd sort of choice. And as she stood with her back to one of the columns, she noticed a young couple down by the wood store. Both dark and hawk-like, with deep olive skins, they performed backward stretches and made bridges of their spines in perfectly synchronized movements. From time to time, they broke off from their gymnastics to converse with foreheads almost touching. Lovers, so close that they mirrored one another’s actions? She did not think so. Their noses, their jaw lines, the kinks in their hair. These things were too similar…

  ‘Knew you’d be up here sooner or later, poking your nose where it doesn’t belong.’

  ‘Ah, Larentia! Lovely to see you again, too.’

  And what a surprise it turned out to be. Far from the modest country woman Claudia remembered, her mother-in-law’s hair had been skilfully dyed, with fine golden fillets woven right through it, a task that would have taken quite literally hours. Her gown was fashionably pleated and flattering, and dear me, was that rouge on her lips?

  ‘If it’s the money you’re worried about, don’t be. Darius has covered the cost of every single item, right down to new bread ovens in the kitchen.’

  A tingle of alarm ran down Claudia’s spine. ‘He’s moving in?’

  That would explain his buttering up of the mother of a wealthy wine merchant, his generous acts of renovation, his worming his way into her heart. No doubt the old boy saw Larentia as the perfect inheritance for his children and grandchildren, and she couldn’t wait to see his reaction when it was pointed out to him that, actually old chap, your bride-to-be owns nothing, not even the clothes she stands up in.

  ‘Move in here?’ Larentia snorted. ‘Certainly not! Darius is a horse-breeder from the south, with a stud farm ten times the size of this place, and that’s where he’s taking me once we’re wed. And since he’s had nothing but coughs since he arrived, he insists the climate will be better for my health, as well.’

  Claudia chewed her lip. Horse-breeders live and breathe pedigrees, which meant Doddering Darius would already be apprised of Larentia’s financial status, and he seemed more concerned with prolonging her life than shortening it. Claudia’s thoughts turned to Orson and Flavia. The way they’d gripped each other’s fat, lumpy hands all the way up here from Rome, gazing deep into one other’s eyes, regardless of the cart’s jolts and jostles. Could it be that Larentia, a woman who could melt glass with one glare and slept upside down in a cave, wasn’t senile at all, but had genuinely found love in her twilight years? At sixty-eight, though, she’d be keenly aware of her mortality, at the speed with which time slips away. Could that explain why she’d brought in this Candace? To give her an emotional cushion?

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with your health,’ she pointed out. In fact, her mother-in-law was radiant and blooming, and looked a full decade younger.

  ‘Then I’ll live even longer.’ Larentia twisted up her mouth in resignation. ‘Suppose you’d better come in.’

  Very generous, considering it wasn’t her house. But then, much as one would like to, one can’t go tossing unwanted mothers-in-law into the middens. Even the most venomous ones.

  ‘No doubt you’ll be wanting to give my fiancé the once-over.’ Larentia sniffed. ‘Might as well get that over and done with, too.’

  ‘Dodd—Darius is here now?’

  ‘The sooner I get his feet under my table,’ Larentia cackled, ‘the sooner I get ’em under my mattress! Oh, for heaven’s sake, girl, snap your jaw shut. You look just like Flavia did when I said the same thing to her.’

  And to think Claudia had castigated the girl!

  ‘What?’ Larentia scowled. ‘Don’t you think old people get consumed by the same urges as you youngsters? Course we do, and when you see my Darius, you’ll understand why. Quite the stud, if you pardon the pun.’

  Claudia sucked in her cheeks as she followed Larentia towards the atrium. So far the week had been one shock on top of another, but the idea of two wizened bodies writhing in ecstasy in the afternoon sunlight, their toothless gums clacking together like castanets, a sound matched only by the creak of their knee joints, was just too hilarious to contemplate. Good luck to you, Larentia, you poisonous old bat. And power to Darius’s doddering elbow!

  ‘You wait here.’ Larentia stopped abruptly in the doorway. ‘Not another step, understood? I need this threshold purified first.’

  Claudia looked round, but the command was for her, not some slave she’d imagined, but by the time she’d turned back to protest, Larentia was speeding down the corridor on feet that were moving twice as fast as someone half her age. Claudia stuck her tongue out at the retreating figure. Heaven knows what gods Larentia imagined her to be offending by stepping over them, but she gave the threshold a bloody good kick anyway. A male voice chuckled as it stepped out from behind a marble pillar.

  ‘I fear Larentia’s been taken prisoner by local superstition,’ he said, and his voice had enough gravel in it to pave the Forum. ‘However, I won’t tell, if you won’t.’

  Claudia studied him as he bowed. Early fifties and whilst not exactly a sculptor’s dream with his pepper-and-salt hair cut Caesar-style to cover his baldness, he wasn’t gargoyle material either. Lean and tanned, with
corded muscles that bulged out the long sleeves of his tunic, his eyes were as hard as granite, and instantly Claudia relaxed. Perfect. Another family member suspicious of their parent’s motives! Presumably the eldest son concerned about his inheritance, but either way, someone she could do business with.

  ‘Superstition be damned,’ she replied. ‘The old trout has never forgiven me for marrying her son at an age when he should have known better. I’m Claudia,’ she added. ‘Larentia’s favourite person in the whole wide world.’

  ‘I know,’ he said, with a slight cough. ‘I’m Darius.’

  Five

  As the constellation of the dragon clawed its way slowly over the horizon, Marcus Cornelius Orbilio attempted to define the word ambition. It could, he supposed, be deemed any personal aim or aspiration, however small or unimportant—the desire to learn to swim, for example. To travel, write a poem, or even, for cack-handed hacks like himself, thread a needle. At the other extreme, it translated as obsession. A fixation with hunting down the biggest boar, being the best baker in the city, catching that elusive brown trout before your competitor hooked it. Then again, he thought, ambition could be construed as the pinnacle of personal achievement, the way a charioteer might set his sights on passing the winning post in the Circus Maximus to beat the record, say, or an athlete training for that once-in-a-lifetime Olympic crown.

  ‘Here’s that report you sent for, sir.’

  Orbilio thanked the scribe, red-eyed from squinting too long over his smoky oil lamp, but left the scroll unopened on his desk as he supposed that ambition could also be classified as the desire to change society, regardless of the consequences. Revolutionaries, as he knew only too well, were every bit as driven as politicians, which—he sighed and twisted in his chair—was yet another facet of the word. It was that fervent, some might say fanatical, desire for fame, for power, honour, wealth, call it what you will, but which encompassed all the trappings by which certain types of people measured success.

  ‘Oh, and this is the information you requested on the murder victim,’ the scribe added wearily. ‘Will that be it for tonight, sir?’

  ‘It will, Milo. Have an enjoyable evening.’

  ‘Thank you, I will. Although if you don’t mind my saying so, it wouldn’t hurt you to take some time off. “All work and no play,” as my great-granddaddy used to say, “makes for one more funeral a day.”’

  ‘In that case, I shall take great care to cheat the undertaker,’ Orbilio promised, but even as he spoke, there was no question of him slowing down.

  During last year’s visit to Gaul, the Governor of Aquitania had been so impressed with the way Marcus had handled that paedophile investigation that he’d offered him a job running his own branch of the Security Police in Gaul. For all the post’s kudos, however, he didn’t accept straight away, and it was not that he was too young or too ill-prepared for the job, which unfortunately went without saying. As always in life, there are personal complications and his came in the form of a wildcat with dark flashing eyes, rebellious curls and a tongue that could flay skin from a stone.

  ‘Claudia Seferius.’ He whispered her name into the night. ‘Claudia, Claudia, Claudia. What is it about you?’

  Would you believe, he’d actually followed that woman all the way to Aquitania from Rome? Trailed three hundred miles over land, river and sea, just to make an ass of himself? He rubbed his throbbing forehead. When, oh when, will we men learn? He exhaled slowly and realized this was what he’d been coming round to from the beginning, because love was the ultimate definition of ambition. Indefinable, intangible, as elusive as smoke, he questioned its very existence. Sure, there were phases people went through. Searing hot lust, tender affection, he was fully aware of those things. But the churning and yearning that gnawed at his liver? The burning that tore at his guts? Hell no, that wasn’t love, so he accepted the Governor’s offer. The Aquitanian climate was a hundred times better than Rome, averaging two thousand hours of sunshine a year, and since new trade routes had given a huge boost to their economy, the Gauls had proved excellent allies. Unfortunately…

  Tearing his eyes from the dragon’s twinkling scales, Orbilio lit another oil lamp and flexed his tired shoulders.

  Unfortunately, crime doesn’t shrivel with sunshine, murder least of all, and as Aquitania flourished, so too did the frauds and conspiracies. With a heavy sigh, Orbilio picked up the physician’s report on the murder victim. Single deep stab wound to the stomach, which, though fatal, did not cause death. Foam found in the back of his throat indicated the poor sod had died as a result of drowning. For several minutes, Orbilio studied the parchment, making notes on the page, writing down questions, then reached for the first report that he’d requested.

  Hunches, he believed, were the difference between his almost one-hundred percent success record and the ratings of the other members of the team. It wasn’t that he was cleverer than they were. Just that he’d been given an education and military experience that, as a patrician, the Roman class system denied his lower-born colleagues. Instinct, intuition, gut reaction, hunch, whatever you call it, it still boiled down to nothing more than years of insight and observation encapsulated in an instant, then having the nous to act on it.

  He re-rolled the scroll then read through the physician’s report for the umpteenth time. More than ever he was convinced that the chief suspect for this murder was innocent, and despite his personal interest in the case, the work of the Security Police isn’t always about catching the bad guys. Sometimes it’s about making sure a person isn’t shoved in front of a bunch of hungry lions for a crime they didn’t commit—and if you happen to catch the bad guys while you’re about it, then that’s a bonus.

  Satisfied that he was far too busy to be lonely, Orbilio sharpened his quill.

  *

  In the beginning, the Five-Headed Serpent rose from the Darkness and coiled herself round the Chaos. Then, having laid the Egg of the World, she separated the land from the sea, the sea from the sky, and the sky she divided into four quadrants in accordance with the status of the gods. To the east dwelled the highest deities known unto man: Tins, Uni and Menvra. To the north lay the home of the gods of good fortune, such as Ani, who presided over new beginnings, and winged Turan, goddess of love. In the south the gods of the earth made their home: Fana, Horta and Fufluns. But it was in the west, in the dark caves beyond the sun, where the abode of the demons of death could be found.

  Here, in these drear caverns at the edge of the Universe, sat wolf-headed Aita beside his Queen, their thrones flanked by the silver-haired God of Time who sharpened his sickle on the Stone of Adversity, and Vanth, who opened tombs with her bright silver key.

  Around the gods, moving between them like shadows, were the demons who guarded the Underworld, and it was here that the Guardians of the Graves conspired in hushed whispers with the gods of witchcraft and spells. Here, too, the Herald of Death conferred softly with Night before slipping on his winged sandals, and with snakes for hair and the beak of a vulture, the Goddess of Immortality stared into the Pool of Prophesy while Seraphs measured the span of human life with sand that trickled through a holed jug.

  Amongst them all strode a young man wearing a wreath of laurel in his dark wavy hair, and holding a yew bow in his hand. On his back hung a quiver of arrows tipped with gold, for gold was sure, gold was certain, but most of all gold didn’t rot.

  The name of this young man was Veive.

  Veive was the God of Revenge.

  Notching another arrow into his bow, he took aim.

  Six

  ‘Since you didn’t bother to tell me you were coming,’ Larentia said, collaring Claudia in the atrium, ‘you can hardly complain when I’ve invited a group of friends round for dinner.’

  ‘Are you spelling friends with or without the “r”?’

  ‘Don’t get smart with me.’ Larentia pushed her thin nose into her daughter-in-law’s face. ‘You only married my son to get your claws on his money. O
h, yes. I saw right through you, from the moment Gaius introduced us, you devious, gold-digging bitch.’

  ‘Both transparent and devious at the same time. How clever I am, Larentia, but I do wish you wouldn’t keep flattering me. You know it goes straight to my head.’

  ‘Your backchat and smiles don’t fool me, girl. Think I don’t know why you came up to the villa? The old bag’s gone senile, that’s what you thought, but look around, daughter-in-law. Do you see weevils on any of these vines? Has the bailiff reported any signs of rust or blight? Are the slaves still as strong and healthy? Have the draught beasts caught the mange? Has any of the food in the cellars spoiled and gone rotten?’

  ‘No, no, probably, I don’t think so, to answer your questions in order—though as to that fifth one, you might want to double check the wine store, because what you’ve been drinking has turned straight to vinegar.’

  ‘My tongue might be tart, but it’s small fry compared with the tart my son married… Ah, Eunice.’ Acid became honey in the blink of an eye. ‘How are you, my dear? You look ravishing.’

  ‘Ravishing is as ravished does, darling,’ the newcomer said with a wink. ‘It’s the best form of exercise I know.’

  Clearly this “exercise” was doing her good. Eunice must be knocking sixty, yet her jaw line was taut, her skin clear, and her eyes shone with mischief and health. Even her movements were youthful and lithe, and the only trace of her true age—the inevitable brittle, grey hair—had been concealed beneath a flattering wig.

  ‘I’ll leave you two to chat,’ Larentia said, casting a sly glance at her daughter-in-law. ‘Oh, did I mention? Eunice has recently married again.’

  ‘Don’t get me wrong, darling,’ Eunice said, linking her arm with Claudia’s and taking a slow turn round a courtyard lit by a thousand oil lamps and bursting with flowers at every level, from spikes of acanthus surrounded by narcissus in tubs, to columbines and mignonette tumbling from baskets that hung from brackets and hooks. All of which, according to Larentia, had been paid for by Darius, including flowerbeds overflowing with verbena, delphinium, storks bill and alliums, while hollyhocks imported all the way from Damascus lounged indolently against the pillars. ‘I had an absolutely wonderful life with my late husband, who gave me two marvellous sons, three lovely daughters, a hatful of grandchildren and, praise to Minerva, my very first great-grandchild last month. But.’