Nest of Vipers

by Luke Devenish

  Livia could only shake her head. ‘You will be well again, when all this unpleasantness has passed us by. You will be renewed, Antonia, I can feel it.’

  Antonia’s smile was sad. She didn’t believe it.

  ‘Now, rest,’ said Livia, rising. ‘I will visit you again very soon.’

  Antonia drifted into the state of being neither asleep nor awake. She only vaguely heard the sounds of Livia’s departure, made with heartfelt wishes for Livilla’s continued good health. Antonia was just getting ready for Somnus to take her fully when she lurched back to consciousness. Livia had returned and was bending over her. Livilla was not in the room.

  ‘What is it?’ Antonia said.

  Livia was playful. ‘I have a confession to make.’

  ‘A confession?’

  ‘Yes.’ She leaned closer. Her mischievous look was like a girl’s. ‘You see, I know why Livilla has been such a rock of strength for the family throughout these trying times. But you mustn’t tell her that I know.’

  Feeling weak and ill, and wishing only to sleep in peace, Antonia struggled to indulge her old friend. ‘But what reason would there be, Livia?’

  ‘Because she is blessed with a strong, noble man in her life,’ Livia whispered. ‘Because she is so in love …’

  Our ears were pressed to the door, straining to determine the words from among the moans.

  ‘But what are they saying about him?’ Lygdus asked, wide-eyed. ‘I heard his name – didn’t you?’

  ‘I think so,’ I said.

  ‘Nero. He said Nero’s name to her.’

  On the other side of the door Tribune Macro penetrated my domina with impressive vigour.

  ‘If he’d just stop pounding her like that, maybe the bed would stop squeaking and we could listen properly.’

  As if this complaint had embarrassed them, we heard the sounds of the lovers changing position. My domina was now astride Macro and the bed ceased moving with quite such vitality. We pressed our ears harder. Nero was indeed being discussed.

  ‘Oh my gods!’ Lygdus blurted out as he heard it. He barely stifled a cry. The lovers fell abruptly silent inside my domina’s suite. We sprang away from the door.

  ‘You fool!’ I hissed. ‘You’ve alerted them.’

  We threw ourselves to the floor, waiting for the second when my domina would fling open the door in rage. But nothing came. We heard the bed begin to squeak again. Lygdus raised his head.

  ‘Don’t risk it,’ I whispered. ‘Please!’

  Lygdus was hell-bent. ‘They’re discussing Nero. Macro has heard something of what his fate will be and he’s telling the domina of it.’

  ‘Lygdus – no!’

  He was upright again with his ear at the door. Too fearful, I remained where I was, watching intently as he listened to a conversation I could not hear.

  ‘She’s sobbing,’ Lygdus whispered. ‘She’s crying in there.’

  ‘It’s the way he penetrates her,’ I said. ‘It makes her do that. I think she’s grateful.’

  ‘She’s distraught. She’s begging him to intervene.’

  ‘It’s their lovemaking again.’

  Lygdus went white. ‘She’s pleading for Nero’s life.’

  I sat upright. ‘Lygdus, come away right now.’

  He shook his head, listening. ‘No. No!’ he gasped, clamping his hands to his mouth.

  ‘Stop it – they’ll hear you now for sure!’

  He lurched from the door, flapping uselessly around the room.

  ‘Oh gods,’ I muttered, ‘you’ll bring the carnifex upon us.’

  ‘He’s been condemned!’

  ‘Lygdus –’

  ‘Sejanus has ordered it – Sejanus has ordered it. Not the Emperor himself, but his Prefect!’

  I thought of Livia’s hints about her scheme involving Martina and ‘upping the dose’. ‘Calm down, I’m begging you.’

  Lydgus sank to the floor, gripping me by the hands. ‘He’s to be killed in exile. It’s not done yet but it’s imminent. Imminent, Iphicles!’

  Somewhere inside me a little voice urged caution. ‘Listen,’ I said. ‘There’s something not quite right about this.’

  He almost laughed. ‘There’s nothing quite right! Nero’s going to be executed – and not on Tiberius’s orders but Sejanus’s. The Prefect’s acting like he’s Emperor! What can possibly be right?’

  ‘Lygdus, please just listen to me. That’s not what I mean –’

  But he silenced me with a look so sincere my heart broke. ‘Thank you, Iphicles. For all you have done for me in the time we have known each other.’ He stood up again. ‘Despite our fights you have been a true mentor to me. A father, as you say. You helped me gain confidence and courage and strength.’

  I was thrown. Why was he saying this? ‘Our adventures together have only just begun, Lygdus,’ I told him. ‘We will live on our wits as a team for years more to come – we’ll outlive the whole of Rome.’

  Lygdus shook his head, now smiling at me. But his eyes were bright with tears. ‘Our time together is done, Father.’ He stooped to kiss my head. ‘Goodbye.’

  ‘Wait!’

  But he was running down the hall.

  Suddenly the truth of this whole, strange scene was revealed to me. I saw what it was that had felt so wrong. I guessed the workings of my domina’s plan. ‘Wait, Lygdus!’ I cried as I struggled to get to my feet. ‘Wait, Lygdus! Wait!’

  But he was gone from me.

  Antonia lay tormented for many hours by the ‘confession’. She had felt bewildered by its unlikelihood at first, but when Livia had insisted, Antonia had seen that it was very much the truth. Her daughter Livilla had taken the Prefect Sejanus as her lover. This was, Livia believed, a happy little secret that had been kept from Antonia’s knowledge only out of embarrassment. The Praetorian Prefect was not her social equal, of course, so she wanted it hushed.

  But when Livia had gone, Antonia had been left to deplore her friend for being so blind to the implications. This was not some girlish indiscretion on Livilla’s part. The appalling ramifications of the affair took the breath from Antonia’s chest.

  Livia had made Antonia a gift of the hitherto unseen element that united her family’s tragedies. A macabre pattern emerged. It was there, she now realised, in her son Germanicus’s death. It was there, too, in her son-in-law Castor’s demise. There it was again in Agrippina’s decline, with the fall of her friends having fanned the flames of her madness. And there it was, too, in Nero’s disgrace, followed so soon after by Drusus. Now that she had learned that poor, deluded Livilla actually believed herself loved, the common element to all these sorrows was revealed as starkly as the sun. Sejanus stood to profit from her family’s destruction. Sejanus, Antonia now knew, had ensured that not one of the letters she had written to Tiberius was received.

  Cold rage empowered Antonia. She sensed the shadow of her former self flitting across the walls, taunting her for the years of ignorance. She had once been called Rome’s most revered matron. What matron would let this ever come to pass?

  Antonia forced herself upright. She placed her feet on the floor. Her head span with the effort, but she determinedly stood, catching her breath for a moment. She took her first steps in many weeks as she went to her clothes chest, flinging it open to pluck out the first warm garment she saw.

  She fell still as she heard Livilla moving around in the room next to hers. She waited. Livilla returned to her own bed and Antonia resumed dressing in careful silence.

  She knew what must be done – and done without her daughter knowing of it. She needed an ally she could trust, someone young and resourceful, blessed with physical strength.

  As Antonia stole from her room into the darkened house beyond, she realised that she knew just such a person.

  Burrus pressed his lips to Nilla’s ear. ‘Wake. Please wake!’

  Nilla stirred but tried to cling to the comforts of Somnus.

  ‘My love, please
wake,’ Burrus whispered, insistent. ‘It is important.’

  She felt the dreams slipping from her fingers, leaving grief in their wake. The loss of Acte lifted her to consciousness again, kissing her just as Burrus kissed her cheek. It never left her, the pain, but sometimes in her dreams she could escape it.

  ‘Leave me be, Burrus …’

  ‘No, my love. You must come with me.’

  ‘Leave me. Let me sleep.’

  Burrus lifted her in his arms. ‘Ssh,’ he whispered. ‘Don’t make a sound. Red-hair and his whore must not know of this.’

  ‘Know of what?’

  He kissed her into silence, taking her from the room and down the stairs. A draught of wind from the street swept her hair.

  ‘The door is open?’

  ‘Yes, love.’

  ‘Who is here?’

  Antonia stepped forward from the shadows, embracing Nilla tightly.

  ‘Grandmother?’

  ‘I shall not stay here long,’ said Antonia. ‘I’m going on a journey that will save the lives of your mother and your brothers, if I succeed.’

  Tears filled Nilla’s eyes. ‘Oh Grandmother, yes!’

  Antonia embraced her again.

  ‘Let me help you,’ Nilla begged. ‘What can I do?’

  ‘Will you give me something that is precious to you?’

  ‘Anything,’ Nilla said. ‘What do I have left to give?’

  Antonia looked to the strong, young man who had cradled her granddaughter so tenderly down the stairs. ‘Your loyal slave,’ she said. ‘Give me Burrus.’

  With Macro gone, Livia found me quietly crying in the corridor.

  ‘Oh, Iphicles.’

  ‘I am so sorry, domina,’ I snivelled, trying to stand. But my legs failed me and I couldn’t rise.

  ‘Look at you.’

  ‘Please, domina. Just leave me here,’ I wept.

  But she would not. Livia knelt on the floor where I lay. ‘Here, now.’ She lifted my head. ‘Poor slave.’ Tenderly, she placed me in her lap and began to stroke my hair as a mother might.

  After a while I asked, ‘Was it a lie that Sejanus ordered Nero to be killed?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Livia. ‘Nero has not been condemned.’

  ‘The lie was told for Lygdus to hear?’

  ‘And no one else.’

  ‘Why, domina? Why do that?’

  ‘Oh, Iphicles. And here I thought you’d gathered your wits once more.’

  I began to cry again. Of course I knew why. ‘To prompt him into action … That’s what it was for.’

  ‘Much better,’ she said. ‘Now your wits have returned.’

  ‘Oh, my poor son,’ I sobbed. I knew what Lygdus’s fate would be.

  ‘Ssh,’ she murmured softly. ‘The sacrifice of a child is nothing when one possesses a great destiny. I, too, will know this pain, Iphicles.’

  She began to hum a lullaby.

  ‘Domina … will you ever call me Attis?’

  ‘But you are not that god any more. If you ever were.’

  ‘Not Attis? Am I a god at all?’

  ‘Of course you are.’ She continued to hum.

  ‘Which god?’ I asked, looking deep into her nightblack eyes. ‘Which god am I, domina?’

  She smiled at me. A mother’s smile. ‘I am surprised you have not discovered it by now.’

  Armilustrium

  October, AD 31

  Four days later: the condemned prophet

  Stephen is stoned to death by a mob led by

  Saul of Tarsus

  The dozens of naked minnows stared in stunned and fearful silence as Antonia progressed through the gardens with only a slave to accompany her. This slave, they all realised, was the same slave they had thrown from the cliffs to drown. Burrus regarded them with contempt, marking each and every face for vengeance.

  At the far end of the terrace, staring out to sea, the Emperor knocked over his cup. The contents spilled to the ground.

  ‘Curse it,’ he muttered.

  Antonia picked it up. ‘It is a curse. This drink does you no good, Caesar.’

  He leaped to his feet. ‘It cannot be …’

  ‘Yes, it is.’ She embraced him. ‘I am your old friend Antonia here to visit you.’

  He basked in the warmth of her kisses. ‘Oh, my friend – it is so good to see you again.’

  She let him go and stood facing him sadly.

  ‘What is it? Why are you here to see me?’

  ‘I’m here in warning …’

  From somewhere Tiberius heard the honking of the geese.

  ‘Sejanus has enacted a conspiracy,’ Antonia said, ‘and its victim is you.’

  The honks became a goddess’s voice, from so far away. ‘The matron’s words alone are heard, the addled heart is ringed …’

  He touched the Imperial ring on his ringer and knew that Antonia was his saviour.

  Tiberius watched as Antonia poured the last of the Eastern flower into the water far below. There was no more left. The island was now rid of it.

  ‘How do you feel?’ she asked him.

  ‘Frightened,’ he said with unvarnished honesty. ‘I have tried this before, you see – and I have failed.’

  ‘You did not have a friend to help you. Now you do.’ She began to lead him away from the cliff and back to the green of the garden, where the minnows stood staring from the grass. ‘Is frightened all you feel, Caesar?’

  ‘Fear is much of it,’ said Tiberius, ‘but it is not all, no. I feel resolved.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘And inspired. By your loyalty and dignity, Antonia.’

  She smiled at him. ‘They are two things I will go to my pyre still possessing.’

  Tiberius squeezed her hand then looked about him for the Praetorian he trusted. ‘Tribune.’

  Macro came forward. ‘Hail, Caesar.’

  ‘You understand your orders?’

  ‘I do,’ said Macro. ‘With Caesar’s permission I will depart for Pontia right now.’

  ‘It is nearly November. The seas there will be treacherous.’

  ‘Time is imperative,’ said Macro, ‘and the Prefect’s treachery is worse.’

  ‘The gods bless you, Tribune. Free my grandson. Bring him here, where he’ll be safe.’

  ‘It will be done, Caesar.’ Macro saluted again and left.

  When Antonia was satisfied that Tiberius was resting comfortably, she turned her eye to the assembled minnows. ‘So then,’ she began. ‘This is how you appear before your Emperor? Stark naked?’

  Little Boots resented her opprobrium. ‘It is how he orders us to appear,’ he replied.

  Antonia slapped him in the face. ‘It is not how you appear before your grandmother.’

  Shocked, Little Boots clutched his cheek.

  Antonia strode to where Drusilla and Julilla cowered near Aemilius. ‘Face me,’ she demanded. Cringing, the girls stepped forward and Antonia gripped them viciously by the ears. ‘Put on your clothes! You have the blood of the divine Augustus in your veins – how dare you disgrace it?’

  The girls fled inside the Emperor’s villa.

  Antonia turned to the rest of the children. ‘If you are to be fit company for your Emperor and me, then not only will you be attired with decency and humility from this day forward, but you will also be attending school.’

  Clutching his throbbing cheek, Little Boots’s look to his friend Aemilius was one of genuine horror.

  The eleventh day before the Kalends

  of November AD 31

  Two days later: the nascent cult of Christ

  proclaims Stephen its first martyr

  Staring out to sea from the island’s best vantage point, high up on the rocks, Lygdus saw a ship on the horizon. He watched its progress for a moment before he knew with certainty what sort of vessel it was: an Imperial trireme. The day had come. Resolute, he picked his way from his perch and along the beach and up the path again towards the island’s single dwelling.
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br />   Tending the vines in a wide straw hat, Nero read the expression on the eunuch’s face and discerned what the news was without Lygdus even needing to say it. ‘So then.’

  Lygdus could only nod, anxious of what he might do if he spoke. His emotions were in danger of overwhelming him.

  Nero took off his straw hat. His face showed no fear.

  Lygdus fell to one knee. ‘Give me your courage, domine,’ he pleaded.

  Nero touched his shoulder and made him rise again. ‘Courage brought you here in the first place, Lygdus. If you had not heard Macro’s pillow-talk and acted with true courage by coming to Pontia, I would not have had the luxury of acceptance. To know your own fate in advance is a gift in situations like this. It has let me prepare for it.’

  ‘But it is wrong.’

  Nero didn’t disagree. But in the long months spent alone on this island he had learned one true thing about himself: he was his mother’s son. ‘I have no fear at what is ahead, only gratitude that this waiting will end.’

  ‘Oh domine –’

  Nero shook his head. They had spoken of what the final moment must be and it could not include tears. Side by side, they left the vines and entered the small villa. Two swords lay in readiness before the wax mask of Nero’s murdered father.

  ‘Thank you, domine,’ Lygdus whispered, ‘for the privilege of being your slave.’

  ‘You were never my slave,’ said Nero. ‘From the beginning you have been nothing less than my friend.’

  As the two friends took the swords in their hands, the faintest refrain of a song kissed the air: ‘The one near sea falls by a lie that comes from the gelding’s tongue …’

  It came too late. The words fell unheard.

  The Imperial trireme had docked at Pontia’s tiny wharf. Macro waited at the prow, watching the progress of two of his men as they made the return trek from the lone villa. They were distressed; he could tell it from a distance.

  ‘Where is he?’ Macro demanded of them when they reached the dock again. ‘Where is the Emperor’s grandson? We have come here to free him.’

  The Praetorians saluted. ‘We must report a tragedy, Tribune. Nero is dead, along with a eunuch. They have fallen on swords.’

  ‘But Nero was alive! We saw him tending the vines on the hill as the ship neared the dock.’