Battle for Rome

by Ian Ross

  Castus could only squint back at him. Of course, he thought, the notary would have told them everything. Merops made a dry fluttering sound between his lips – a laugh of sorts.

  ‘Yes, your friend Julius Nigrinus has been very helpful to us. We knew of your arrival in Rome only a day or two after you entered the city, but we never expected one of your own party to approach us so soon. Your emperor should really not rely on such malleable people!’

  Castus grunted, half in anger and half in pain. He made another attempt to sit up, and got his elbow beneath him.

  ‘Calm, I said. You have time to rest before you are needed.’

  ‘Needed?’ But the eunuch was already moving toward the door. A moment later, the dim light was gone and Castus heard the grate of a lock. Groaning, he subsided onto the bed again.

  *

  Another day passed, and a night, as far as Castus could judge. They had left him water and food, and clean clothes of plain white wool, and when he felt able to lift himself upright he dressed, wincing as he discovered new cuts and bruises. He was still wearing the leather thong around his wrist with the blue stone that Ganna had given him before he’d left Mediolanum. For protection, she had told him. He smiled at the bitter irony of that, then pulled his boots on. When the eunuch returned to fetch him he was sitting on the edge of the bed, waiting.

  ‘Do not attempt to flee, or try any violent escapade,’ Merops said as he stood by the door. ‘Trust me that you are surrounded by guards, and would not leave this place alive.’

  Castus had little idea of what place this might be, although he was developing a notion. He followed the eunuch along a vaulted corridor, sunlight dropping in heavy beams from vents overhead. There were no guards in sight, but Castus caught the stir of movement in the shadows and knew that there were men all around him, slaves and soldiers, unseen watchers. They climbed a long stairway that rose into the light.

  Merops was moving quickly ahead of him, his slippers tapping at the marble floor. They were in another corridor now, with tall arched windows along one wall covered by ornate grilles that cut the sun into arcs and shards. The opposite wall appeared to be a single expanse of dark marble, polished like glass and reflecting Castus’s warped image. The eunuch turned only briefly, gesturing him to follow. At the far end of the corridor they passed through a dim chamber and emerged into a courtyard. Pillared walks surrounded a sunken garden where water streamed into marble basins.

  ‘This way,’ Merops said, drawing aside a long yellow drape and motioning for Castus to pass through into the chamber beyond. Pacing through the wide opening, Castus squinted into the blaze of sunlight from the doorway at the far end of the room. Mosaics of marble and glass shimmered across the floor. He could see a portico beyond the doors, tall fluted pillars with the sky beyond, and a single figure seated in a cane chair, silhouetted against the light.

  Castus advanced across the chamber and out through the far doors into the portico. As he approached the seated man he saw the face in profile, and caught his breath. He had suspected, but it was a shock to recognise him so easily. A face he had only known from a portrait on a coin. Preserver of His City.

  Maxentius.

  The tyrant of Rome was busy peeling an apple, paring the skin away from the flesh with a small knife. He did not look up from his work as Castus came to a halt a few paces from him. From the doorway, Merops cleared his throat meaningfully. I will not kneel, Castus thought. I kneel only for emperors, not usurpers.

  But Maxentius appeared not to expect it. He finished peeling the apple, sliced it into segments, then laid the knife aside on a circular table beside the seamless twist of skin. With a dish of fruit segments in his hand he reclined in his chair. The cane creaked. ‘A fine view, is it not?’ the tyrant said.

  The portico curved away to left and right, an arcing exedra with perfect white columns soaring upwards, and the ground fell away beyond it. Castus stared out between the pillars, and saw below him the full expanse of the Circus Maximus, the brown sand of the racetrack and the tiers of white seats rising all around it, the golden statues gleaming in the low sun. Castus knew where he was now: this was the Palatine Hill, the palace of the emperors.

  ‘Many of my advisors believe you should die,’ Maxentius said as he ate a slice of apple. ‘They would like to scourge the flesh from your back, and see you crucified in the arena. To send a message, so they say. What message would that be, I wonder?’

  The tyrant appeared younger than Castus had expected; there was a noticeable similarity to his sister Fausta in his olive skin and dark eyes, the softness of his mouth. The dark stubble on his chin did little to make him appear more mature, and there was something in his hair that caught the light. Gold dust, perhaps. Castus stood stiffly, thumbs hooked in his fabric waistband, and said nothing.

  ‘Sit down, why don’t you,’ Maxentius said, gesturing to a stool. Castus eased himself down onto it, but the rigidity of his spine did not ease. The young tyrant appeared perfectly relaxed, even languid; impossible to imagine Constantine sitting there like that. Castus remembered the emperor in his tent, the night before the battle on the road to Taurinum. That focused intensity, battling with terror. Could this young man ever know such a feeling? Castus remembered that Maxentius had never led men in battle, never had to face the eve of combat.

  ‘So, you come to us from the camp of my brother-in-law,’ the tyrant said. ‘How is my dear little sister? Have you slept with her yet?’

  Castus felt the blood rush to his head. What had Nigrinus told him? His pulse was jumping in the pit of his throat, but he managed to remain silent.

  ‘My spies tell me she’s bedded half of Constantine’s court.’

  ‘Your spies lie,’ Castus said.

  ‘Really? It doesn’t surprise me. An emperor of Rome can have whatever he wants, you know. Except the truth.’

  In his mind Castus heard Nigrinus’s voice, those quiet insidious words he had spoken back at the villa beside the lake. A debaucher, who has dishonoured many women. Your wife among them, in fact… Staring at the young man sitting opposite, he felt a surge of fierce rage mounting through his body. How could this gilded youth have led the world to war, pitting Roman armies against each other?

  His gaze fell to the table, the paring knife laid beside the coil of apple skin. One lunge, and he could seize it. The blade was no longer than his thumb, but it would be enough to open the tyrant’s throat. He could do it, now, easily; there was nobody to stop him. One man, one blow, and this whole war could end… His muscles tightened, energy flowing in his limbs. Then the sudden chill of realisation: had Nigrinus intended this along? Had this whole expedition to Rome, the betrayal, the attack, been a carefully constructed ruse to bring him to precisely this point?

  No, he could not believe that. Not even Nigrinus could have arranged things so neatly. Besides, he was surely deceived by appearances; the exedra appeared empty of all but sunlight, but there were surely guards positioned in every doorway along its length. He would be watched, and any move he made would be countered instantly. Emperors are never truly alone.

  Barely two heartbeats had passed since Castus had looked at the knife, but Maxentius appeared to have changed his demeanour. As if he had let one mask drop, and assumed another. Now there was something dark and toxic in his eyes. ‘Your notary tells me that you were present when my father died,’ he said.

  Castus drew a sharp breath. Once again he sensed Nigrinus’s long reach, his subtle direction. This was the hook, he realised, that had drawn Maxentius. This was the lure that had saved Castus’s life, but might kill him yet.

  ‘Tell me what happened,’ the tyrant said. He set aside his dish of sliced fruit and gazed out between the pillars into the sinking sunlight.

  Haltingly, Castus related the story of what had taken place three years before, at Massilia and then at Arelate. Maxentius surely knew most of it already, but he needed to hear it all. As Castus spoke, the young man sat motionless. Only a muscle moved in
his jaw as Castus told him of his father’s last moments, just before he had withdrawn from the chamber to let the old usurper take his own life.

  When Castus had finished speaking Maxentius said nothing for a while, then he breathed in and hunched his shoulders. ‘It was an undignified end,’ he said at last. ‘But if what you say is true, the shame of it is not yours. You acted with honour, and I respect that. I thank you for it.’

  He raised a hand and rubbed lightly at his lips, then pressed his brow. ‘They sent me here as a punishment,’ he went on a moment later. ‘My father and Diocletian. They sent me to Rome to keep me far away from where the real business of empire happened. From Nicomedia, from Mediolanum. This city meant little to them; it was a backwater, a relic. Just a hollow stage set. Diocletian found the Roman people too rude and riotous for his tastes. But I loved it. I love it still. You see that, yes? You see what I’ve made of this city? I am restoring it to its ancient greatness. Constantine would never do as much. For him it’s just another trophy. But for me, Rome is everything.’

  Castus did see it. As he spoke, the young man’s face took on a new maturity, a look of sober determination completely at odds with his manner only moments before. Perhaps, he thought, perhaps this man truly could be an emperor? Was his ambition any less reckless than Constantine’s? He remembered the dying man of the Herculiani, on the bloody field after the battle outside Verona. Yes, Castus thought. Emperors are all alike. All of them bastards. But all of them had a spark of glory in them.

  ‘And now my brother-in-law is leading an army against Rome,’ Maxentius said. ‘Will he fight me?‘

  ‘He will,’ Castus told him.

  ‘And will he beat me, do you think?’

  ‘Only the gods know that.’

  ‘Ah, the gods! If only they were more communicative…’ Maxentius had that jesting air again, the slight smirk that flickered across his soft lips. It angered Castus to see it. He was speaking of life and death, and not just his own.

  ‘I’m told Constantine is loved by his troops. Why do they follow him so gladly? Why are they so eager to die in his name?’

  Because he treats them as men. ‘Constantine is a leader, a fighter. He shows himself on the battlefield, takes the vanguard. The soldiers see him as one of their own.’

  ‘And you are a soldier. Do you see him in that way?’

  For a moment Castus said nothing. Too many thoughts were wrestling in his mind, too many memories. The man he had just described had thrown himself into the thick of the fighting at Verona, endangering his own troops, heedless of those that died for him. But he remembered the night outside the praetorium in Eboracum years before, the figure raised upon a shield and wrapped in a purple cloak as the rain fell and the massed soldiers bellowed his name. Castus had been there with them, shouting along with them. They loved Constantine because they had made him.

  ‘Constantine Augustus is my emperor,’ he said. ‘I acknowledge no other. And if you mean to kill me, give the order. I will tell you nothing more.’

  Maxentius just shrugged lightly, nodding. ‘I think you will live a little longer,’ he said. ‘Tomorrow is the day of the Augustan Games. You will join my retinue, as a guest. Perhaps, if you are lucky, you will witness something of the majesty of Rome. Then I intend to send you back to your emperor, so you can tell him the truth about what you have seen.’

  *

  The noise reached him as he moved along the wide tunnel, the cavernous roaring drowning out even the crack of the guard’s hobnailed boots on the marble floor. Ahead of him, Castus saw the light increasing in intensity. Then he stepped out into the open air, and for a few moments he could only stand blinking, his senses overwhelmed.

  The great stadium of the Circus Maximus, which he had seen the day before from the exedra of the palace on the hillside above, was a crucible, alive with molten humanity. A quarter of a million people it could hold, so Merops had told him, and from where Castus was standing there appeared not an empty seat. The stands heaved, bright with the colours of the racing factions, with the flash of gold and gaudy clothing, and the noise of the crowd filled the air like thick vapour. A blinding glare came off the sand of the racetrack; sweepers moved across it like pond-skaters alone in a vast emptiness.

  ‘Come,’ said Merops, taking Castus by the arm. The tunnel from the palace had disgorged them directly onto the wide podium beside the imperial gallery; now the eunuch led Castus to one side and down a short flight of steps, the two guards stamping along behind him. Above them on the podium rose the imperial gallery itself, a pillared eminence with a pediment like a temple, where the inner circle of Maxentius’s officials and advisors were seated.

  Castus found himself positioned to the right of the gallery, beneath an awning. The men around him appeared to be functionaries of the court and senior military commanders. He sat down on the marble bench, and the two guards placed themselves to either side of him. Both were Praetorians, and neither wore weapons openly, but Castus knew they were armed. The gallery above him was ringed by a cordon of Protectores, all of them carrying spears and gilded shields. There would no opportunities to strike against the usurper here.

  He had still not fully digested what Maxentius had told him the day before. Would he really be allowed to go free, after all that had happened? It seemed too much to hope. But Castus had clung to that thought all through a sleepless night, and he clung to it now. You can tell him the truth about what you have seen. If the gods willed it.

  Now a redoubled roar went up from the stalls, and Castus jerked his gaze around to the left. Between the pillars at the front of the imperial gallery, Maxentius had appeared. Gone was the lounging young man Castus had seen on the exedra: the figure standing above him in the sunlight wore armour of gilded metal, flashing as he moved. On his head was a jewelled diadem, and cradled in his arm was a golden sceptre capped with a translucent blue-green orb. Rose petals showered down around him in the sunlight.

  ‘Emperor Marcus Aurelius Valerius Maxentius Augustus,’ the herald cried, ‘Everlasting! Pious son of the deified Maximian Augustus! May he be praised always and happily throughout the entire world for his victories!’

  Raising his right hand, two fingers extended, the tyrant of Rome acknowledged the massive acclaim of his people.

  Trumpets rang out from the far gates of the stadium, and the first ranks of men paraded out into the light. But these were not athletes or gladiators, not racing chariots and teams of horses. These were troops, armed and armoured for battle with their standards before them. ‘Maxentius Augustus!’ the crowd chanted. ‘Maxentius Augustus!’

  The majesty of Rome, Castus thought. This is what he had been meant to see: not the vast multitude of the city’s people assembled for the games, but this display of military might. The column of marching men was thousands strong, and moved with fierce discipline. The Praetorian Guard took the lead, then came squadrons of Numidian light cavalry on their prancing horses. After the Numidians were the Horse Guards, men and mounts clad in glittering scale armour, every lance with a streaming pennant. Another two cohorts of the Guard, and then came the legions. Castus watched them as they passed along the far side of the track. The herald on the platform below the podium was crying out the names of the units. The First Legion Valeria Romuliana. The Second Legion Valeria Martia. Not names Castus recognised. These would be the newly raised troops, he realised, the men from Africa and southern Italy. Sure enough, many of them had no body armour, and their march lacked the regularity of the Praetorians. But they appeared spirited enough. They looked like soldiers.

  On and on the column extended. There must be twenty thousand men at least, Castus estimated, and they would only be a fraction of the tyrant’s full army. The head of the column had reached the curve at the far end of the track, and Castus stood to watch them as the lead units marched back up the length of the stadium and drew to a halt before the imperial gallery. Now his eye began to detect the gaps in the formation, the ragged step and the fray
ing lines. They had been well drilled for this display. But how well they would stand up in battle might be another story.

  For a moment he thought the volley of screams from his left, beyond the podium, were some new surge of popular fervour. Then Castus smelled the smoke, and saw the black smudge rising against the sky. All around him men were leaping to their feet, craning over the seats to try and see what was happening. Up in the gallery, the Protectores had moved forward at once to screen the emperor with their shields. Below them in the stalls the crowd rippled and flowed as panic drove through them.

  ‘The stands are on fire!’ said the guard to Castus’s right. He jumped forward, clambering down over the seats in front of him. At once Castus sensed another man sliding into his place.

  ‘So it begins,’ a voice said in his ear. Castus locked his body, forbidding himself to turn. He would recognise that dry hiss anywhere.

  ‘You did this?’ he whispered from the side of his mouth.

  ‘Friends of mine,’ Nigrinus whispered back. Down on the sand, the assembly of troops was milling in confusion, some of the new recruits breaking ranks. The Praetorians were still standing firm, Castus noticed.

  ‘Listen to me,’ Nigrinus hissed in his ear. ‘Our mission was betrayed. I did what I had to do, to limit the damage.’

  ‘Pudentianus?’

  ‘More use to us dead than alive.’

  Castus was holding his breath, not daring to move but wanting more than anything to turn and seize the notary by the throat. Now he felt something pressing into his back, sliding down into the sash that bound his waist.

  ‘See that this reaches Constantine,’ the notary breathed. ‘If it’s discovered, we are both dead men. Understand?’

  Slowly Castus lowered himself back into his seat. The object that Nigrinus had given him was digging into the base of his spine, not a slim tablet or a scroll but something hard and knotted. Smoke was billowing out across the racetrack, threading between the ranks of the soldiers assembled on the sand. He said nothing, and a moment later the notary was gone.