Arthur Britannicus

by Paul Bannister

  He had risen to his high rank of praefectus through connections and menace. He was a coarse bully who used his huge hands and massive strength to stamp his will on anyone, man or beast. Once, when his horse kicked him, he broke the animal’s teeth with a single blow of his fist. Another time he choked to death an old, arthritic dog that snarled at him when he booted it aside. He was notorious for his very strong sexuality, sampling both women and men, sometimes incurring accusations of rape. His rank and influence ensured that none of them caused him real trouble. One scandal from which he’d incredibly emerged unscathed involved the forcible deflowering of an elderly Vestal, who had afterwards taken poison before she could undergo the statutory punishment for her sect, of being buried alive outside Rome’s Collina Gate.

  Maximian, also facing the possibility of death for his profane actions, simply used his connections and bullied his way out of trouble. The Vestal, everyone timidly agreed, must have been smitten by the gods and imagined it all. The fact that the body of the general’s accuser was found garrotted with his own tunic cord and left on the steps of the Temple of Mithras had no bearing on the case, all agreed, glancing nervously around.

  In military matters, Maximian had a notable understanding of tactics, although he was mule-headed about accepting the opinions of others, and was stubbornly unwilling to spend what he called ‘book time’ studying the scrolls of previous campaigns and victories. He’d work it out for himself, he declared. His soldiers gave him grudging respect, though they muttered that he’d torch his own grandmother to keep warm.

  In some ways, Maximian was like Carausius, a pagan and a military man, but the Briton had what Maximian did not: an innate sense of destiny and purpose. The Roman simply wanted to be a soldier and climb the military ladder to power, at any cost. Carausius, on the other hand, was beginning to feel he could do more than just that. He wanted to restore his downtrodden Britain, where his murdered father had been a nobleman and where the people now were being milked by rapacious landowners far away in Rome. Maximian merely lusted after power and had no tiresome philosophical baggage about justice, freedom or betterment of the human condition.

  In the event, after a brief meeting, Maximian agreed to have one of his scribes send messages to Belgica to see what could be done about Carausius’ twin brothers. It was the best he could do and the favour might be useful to him if he needed the Briton in the future. In a gesture that was hugely cordial for the brutish Maximian, but which also served the purpose of impressing his colonial visitor, the general invited his guest to view the work he was having done to his villa.

  The pair strolled through the peaceful atrium, with its fountain and foliage where a slave sat discreetly to provide lulling music from a lyre, and crossed into a large, airy chamber. Nine small boys were working at long, low tables under the imperious supervision of a striking blonde woman. “This,” said Maximian with unusual deference, “is the most talented mosaic artist in the whole of the empire. I was only able to induce her to work on my home through the personal intervention of the emperor’s wife herself. Carausius, please meet Claria Primanata Scalae of Claros, home of the great Apollo.”

  The woman stood, brushing grout from her fine linen robe, and said offhandedly: “He’s quite wrong, as always. Claros is famous for the temple and oracle of Apollo. It is not the home of Apollo at all.” Carausius was taken aback. Everyone he had seen so far deferred to the coarse, brute power of Maximian and this young Ionian was treating him like a servant. He glanced at the hulking soldier and was stunned to see he was almost simpering at being noticed.

  To ease the moment and cover his thoughts, Carausius asked Claria, “What exactly are these children doing?” She looked at him coolly. “We’re making a mosaic. It takes little boys’ fingers to accurately place small, sharp mosaic tesserae. Sidonia,” she addressed a young, dark-haired girl who was overseeing the small boys. “This is my handmaid Sidonia Strada, and she keeps my small elves at their work.” Claria smiled at the slave. “Pass me a few tesserae, girl,” she said. She turned to Carausius. “See for yourself.”

  She handed him a squared block of marble half the size of his little fingernail. “As you see, we first assemble the designs in panels on these tables, and grout them before we put them in place on the floor. For the mosaic pieces, we use marble, glass, stone, even precious gems where the householder has far too much money and too little taste.” She glanced meaningfully at Maximian, who lowered his head. Carausius looked at the half-finished design, a stunning representation of a naked man, perhaps a wounded gladiator, half reclining on the ground, wrist supported on his upraised knee. “It’s very beautiful,” he said admiringly. Claria looked at him properly for the first time, taking in the battered, scarred face, and flashed a dazzling, sympathetic smile. “It’s a change from what people usually want; the picture of a snarling hound at the entrance, with ‘Beware of the Dog’ written under it.”

  At that moment, a balding, dark-haired man in an unfashionable, very short tunic entered the room and bowed to the woman. She gestured to him and spoke to Carausius. “This man’s from your country, he’s a slave but it’s only because he doesn’t know how to gamble with dice. He had to sell himself to me to pay his debts.” The man bowed to the new legate. “Lord,” he said. The woman continued: “He’s a maker of images, and if he ever gets his lazy British self-working, we’ll have a fine mural on that wall.”

  “I’ll see that he works, leave it to me.“ growled Maximian. Claria brushed him off. “This is my domain. You go and polish your helmet or something.” Maximian glared at the muralist, who retreated nervously, and a moment or two later the mosaic artist declared she had to attend to the drying grout work, indicating that the audience was over.

  Carausius bowed as Claria swept out, leaving a waft of lavender on the air, and he murmured a comment to Maximian that she was as beautiful as her art. The Roman bridled in an instant. “Keep your dirty mouth shut,” he snarled. The Briton, startled, looked directly at the other man and saw hatred blazing from his eyes. It was as if a storm had blown up from nowhere, an instant tempest of aggression out of a clear blue sky. Without rational thought, reacting purely on the instincts that had always served him well, Carausius knew a deep hatred of the brutish Maximian, felt it welling up inside him. They would be, he knew, lifelong enemies and he should be cautious at this moment. Instead he allowed a hot rage to sweep over him. “Have you reason to be possessive of her?” he challenged. Maximian glared like a bull faced with a hostile rival. “Just get out. Get your crippled self out of here.” Carausius nodded. “One day, Maximianus, you will feel my wrath, but it will not be because of a woman. I already have my own reasons.” The Illyrian stared back at him. “One day, I will strangle you with my bare hands,” he retorted. He turned and stamped out of the room, backhanding across the face a slave who stood mutely by the door. Carausius shook his head. He knew he had made a lifelong enemy, and a powerful one at that, although he wasn’t sure why. And deep inside his soul, he knew it was foreordained.

  X. Tigris

  It was a few months since the new emperor Carus and his legions had crossed the River Tigris and Persia, for so long the traditional enemy of Rome, had lain at their feet, ripe for the taking. Carus was still savouring his role. Not so long ago, he had been the prefect of the now-dead emperor Probus’ Praetorian Guard. Then, like a miracle from the gods, he had been elected to the purple. It came about when his troops, who were alarmed that the emperor Probus, far away in Rome, was planning to disband their legion and much of the army, acclaimed Carus as the new imperator. Carus wasn’t inclined to resist, so assumed the purple.

  Probus promptly declared him a rebel and went with a force to Sirmium to capture and execute him. He made a fatal mistake. After he’d arrived at Sirmium, the unpopular Caesar found a need to keep his troops busy, and ordered them to work, draining some foul swampland ‘to establish my authority.’ His officers protested, but he overruled them. As the officers stood ha
plessly by, much of Probus’ force simply walked away from the stinking mud lands and defected to Carus. The remaining troops judged that now they were inferior in strength to Carus’ legions and were vulnerable, so promptly assassinated Probus to establish where their loyalties lay. The popular new emperor was now in full control. Heady with a sense of destiny and with military might in his hands, Carus shrugged aside any need to consult the Senate, and sent an icy letter to Rome announcing that from now on, he was the new ruler of the empire. Then he turned to his soldier’s business of extending it into Persia.

  Carus secured his back by appointing his sons Carinus and Numerian as junior emperors. “Carinus,” he told the young prince, “I’m giving you considerable power as Caesar. Keep your throne in Rome, take no nonsense from the Senate. You’re better off at the centre of things than up in Milan where you can’t keep a close eye on the politicos. You have the army at your back, so you are in control. Just oversee the western empire and get those damned Gauls subdued. I’m going to seize the east, because there’s a great opportunity. The Persians are concerned with trouble on their Indian border, and they’ve got most of their forces in the wrong place, for them, anyway. The rest are in such disarray with their internal bickering I can settle them piecemeal. Within a couple of years, we should have both the east and the west under control, and we’ll act jointly as Augusti over the greatest-ever expansion of the empire.”

  Carus had cowed the Senate, made new appointments, including that of Carausius, and set about his plans. Within months, the general took his younger son Numerian and the legions east. He crushed the Sarmatians and their fellow Carpiani in a series of conflicts that ended with 20,000 of them in chains and 16,000 more dead on the battlefield, but Carus didn’t stop there. He ignored the usual rules of campaigning, pushed his victorious troops through winter conditions across Thrace and Asia Minor, plundered Mesopotamia and took the meek surrender of the wealthy cities of Ctesiphon and Seleucia without drawing his sword, all while the Persians shivered in winter quarters and watched in dismay.

  Before long, the Great King of Persia sent five of his ministers as ambassadors to treat for peace. The bejewelled dignitaries entered the Roman camp and demanded to be taken to the conquering emperor. What they found astounded them; a travel-stained soldier was sitting on a horse blanket eating a meal of bacon and hard peas. The only clue to Carus’ status was the purple colour of his woollen robe. Unceremoniously and with open indifference, the still-seated Carus continued to chew his leathery bacon as he listened to the ambassadors’ flowery greetings and protestations of their desire for peace. Then he stood up, and pulled off his cap. Underneath it, his head was almost totally bald. “Unless your king Varanes pays proper tribute,” he told them bluntly, “I’ll leave Persia as denuded of trees as this head is of hair. Just tell him that. Now get out of my sight.” The ministers backed away, bowing. Persia, they knew, was about to be as humbled as they had been.

  Three days later, the threat was ended. Carus lay sick, pallid and sweating on his camp cot. At his side was his son, Numerian and his guard captain Diocletian, a hardened soldier who had shared Carus’ service on the Danube and who had a close bond with the emperor. “I’m dying, Diocles,” said Carus, using the soldier’s family name. “Take care of my sons.”

  “Yes, lord,” said Diocletian. “Trust me, I shall.” Outside the pavilion tent, a violent rainstorm was thrashing the canvas and the rumble of heavy thunder reverberated from time to time. “Going out with a bang, eh?” Carus grimaced weakly as he gripped his old comrade’s hand. It was his last jest.

  The tent walls flickered in the lightning flashes and the guttering oil lamps were frequently extinguished by blasts of cold air that shook the pavilion. As a slave re-lit several of the lights, Diocletian saw his emperor had slipped away into his long sleep. “Be at peace, my friend,” he muttered, releasing his hand from the dead man’s and pushing the eyelids closed. Numerian, less accustomed to death, looked on in dismay at his father’s body. He backed away, stumbled on a rug and blundered into the slave who was re-lighting the lamps, knocking one to the floor. The oil pooled on the carpet, the flames caught, licked the fringe of a silken hanging and in seconds the pavilion was afire. The emperor’s body was rescued, but the accident sparked more than a blaze. It ignited a disaster.

  Despite the best efforts of Numerian, who assumed his father’s crown, rumours ran rife that Carus had been struck by lightning. The superstitious soldiery believed this was a bolt from gods angered by Carus’ campaign and they boiled into a state of near-mutiny. A delegation led by the legion’s First Spear met the new emperor to tell him they all were in danger. The Tigris should never have been crossed, the gods would smite them all if they continued. “This, Caesar, is the final limit of Rome’s boundaries,” they told Numerian, who was suddenly uncertain about his hold on power. Under pressure, the young man nervously capitulated to the legions’ demands. To the astonishment of the Persian cavalry scouts who watched, the victorious Roman army turned in retreat, marching away from an empire that was helplessly waiting to be claimed.

  The long, slow trudge back to the west took eight months before Numerian and his disheartened troops crossed the Bosphorus into Europe and the young emperor spent most of the march in a closed litter or in the semi-darkness of his tent, as his eyes had been badly burned by sunlight. Diocletian still acted as his guard captain, but Numerian’s father-in-law Lucius Flavius Aper had taken over as his prefect and mouthpiece, bringing from the guarded, off-limits tent the edicts he claimed came from the young emperor. Diocletian viewed him with suspicion, especially when the prefect unexpectedly declared that the emperor was ailing and must not be disturbed by anybody.

  Matters came to a head soon after the army reached the European continent. Diocletian turned to his centurion friend Galba. “The Boar,” he said, referring to Aper by his nickname, “is hiding something. I’m going into that tent to see just how sick the emperor really is.” With a file of legionaries behind him, the guard captain pushed aside the sentry and entered the pavilion. Numerian lay on his cot, dead. Diocletian thought fast. The emperor may have died of natural causes, but he seemed to have been dead for hours. Aper must be bidding for the throne. “Follow me,” he ordered his soldiers. “You two stay here. Let nobody in.” The file of soldiers jogged through the way camp and found Aper near the horse lines. “Seize him,” Diocletian ordered. “Take him and chain him, keep him away from everybody. Wait for my next orders. Sound assembly.”

  Within a half hour, the legions were in formation, and Diocletian stepped up onto the parade podium. He upturned his face to the sun and swore an oath in ringing tones that could be heard across the whole parade ground. “In the view of Sol, I swear that I make a true and honest testimony. In no way and at no time have I ever plotted against my emperor, and what I am about to tell you truthfully happened, as Sol is my witness of this. May he blind me if I lie.” He looked to his left, and in stern judicial tones, commanded his praetorians: “Bring me that murderer.”

  They paraded Aper, bewildered and clumsy in his chains. “This man,” Diocletian declared loudly, “murdered our beloved emperor Numerian and tried to conceal his crime while he plotted to steal the grass crown. He must die.” A whisper ran through the rear ranks as his message was conveyed, then a hush fell. Not one person in the watching thousands moved or made noise. Before Aper could speak any word of defence or explanation, Diocletian unsheathed his stabbing sword and in a single, swift motion thrust it up under the condemned man’s ribcage. The chained prisoner dropped to his knees, and looked in wide-eyed surprise at his stooping killer, who had not released his sword and whose face was brought close as a lover’s to his.

  Diocletian pushed Aper sideways, still not releasing the sword’s hilt, and the dying man’s eyes closed as if in tired resignation. He vomited a gush of oxygen-bright blood and fell away from his murderer, who lowered the man, still impaled. Aper died in moments. Diocletian straddled the body,
put a foot onto the bloodied tunic and jerked his gladius free.

  The assembly maintained its utter stillness as the self-appointed judge and executioner wiped his blade on the dead man’s shoulder. He turned to the assembly, opened his arms wide, then turned to point as he shouted: “Numerian is dead in that tent, at this man’s hand, but I have now avenged him. I have killed the boar!” He was punning on ‘aper’ which means ‘boar,’ and on Aper’s nickname, but was also dramatizing a well-known prophecy made years before, that he would kill a boar and become emperor.

  A centurion standing at the side of his cohort did as he’d been prompted earlier, and bellowed: “Diocletian for emperor!” The chant rumbled through the ranks, rising louder. Diocletian let the shouting continue for more than a minute, then raised his hand for silence. “If it is the will of the gods and of you, my comrades, I will accept,” he said. He looked up again at the sun. “It seems we have the blessing of Sol. The gods are with us. I shall lead you to more glory.” As swiftly and easily as that, a new emperor was created.

  XI. Massalia

  By imperial order, the legate Carausius was to leave Rome, and make his way to Gaul and his new command, but the gods had more in store for him before he exited the city. He had considered going by road; it could be a swifter journey. Hadn’t the emperor Titus once covered an astonishing 500 miles in 24 hours to get to the bedside of his dying brother? That wasn’t likely for Carausius; it would be a sore trial for his battered body, as even the best raeda carriages, with their three horses and padded leather interiors, provided at best a jolting, jarring experience even on the paved military roads. A sea voyage would be longer, somewhat more dangerous, but easier. He was mulling the decision as he limped along the Via Nova to meet an administrator who had been recommended to him as a good choice for intelligence gathering and internal security.