Muses of Roma (Codex Antonius Book 1)

by Rob Steiner

  Nestor stared at his hands. His eyes suggested he struggled with the same dilemma as Kaeso. Kaeso didn't know if he believed Nestor's story, but he would have believed anything said by the Nestor he knew fifteen minutes ago.

  “Remember last year,” Kaeso said, breaking the silence, “that courier job for Salisius?”

  Nestor, Lucia, and Blaesus looked at each other and then at Kaeso.

  It was supposed to be simple job: pick up a small package of kriat tusk powder from Salisius's covert lab in the mountains of a moon orbiting the Lost World of Titanus, then transport it to a Roman patrician vacationing on a beach on Titanus. Kriat tusk powder was illegal on Titanus due to its narcotic effects, so Salisius couldn't very well mail it to the patrician.

  There were no landing sites near the lab, so Kaeso landed Caduceus at the foot of the mountain nearby. Lucia volunteered for the hike up the mountain path to Salisius's lab, and Nestor offered to go with her. On the way Lucia broke her leg in a fall off a ledge, where she caught a branch and hung on for her life. Below her was a hundred foot drop where she would have died if she let go.

  “Do you remember what Nestor did?” Kaeso asked Lucia.

  She nodded.

  “He climbed down that rocky hill without a rope and pulled you off that ledge,” Kaeso said. “Blaesus, remember two years ago when you caught the furies pox on Concentus?”

  Blaesus paled. “How could I forget?”

  “Nestor stayed in the quarantine zone with you on the planet until you recovered.”

  “Where,” Blaesus said, grinning at Nestor, “he caught the pox himself. I returned the favor by entertaining him while he recovered.”

  “I would’ve recovered much faster if not for your polemics on the virtues of Republican rule,” Nestor said, smiling back at Blaesus.

  “My point,” Kaeso said, “is that we do know each other. Nestor has had ample opportunity to cause us harm, through not only his actions but inactions too. But as long as I've known him, he's only risked his life for us all. He didn't have to risk death to climb down that hill and pull you up, Lucia.”

  “I ordered him not to,” Lucia said quietly. “Just shows he doesn't know how to take orders.” A small grin tugged at the corner of her mouth.

  “And he didn't have to listen to your complaining, Blaesus,” Kaeso said.

  “I was a model patient,” Blaesus said, his chin up. Then he shrugged and said, “I may have uttered a mild criticism here and there, but I was very brave overall.” When Nestor snorted, Blaesus frowned. “I had black pustules covering my entire body for a week. Let that happen to you, Centuriae, and see how well you stay calm.”

  Nestor said, “I appreciate what you’re doing, Centuriae. What you said of me can also be said of you. You've risked life and pain for us as well.” Nestor looked from Daryush to Blaesus to Lucia. “We all have secrets, but that does not change who we are. My secrets have never prevented me from doing my duties as a member of this crew. It won't now. All I’m giving you now are options.”

  Blaesus sighed, and looked from Daryush to Lucia. Daryush simply shrugged, while Lucia rolled her eyes.

  “So what do we do?” she asked.

  Tension seemed to leave the room, and the crew turned to Kaeso as if he was about to brief them on another job. It was the happiest feeling he’d had in a long time.

  Don’t begin to consider staying, you fool. You’re not a centuriae.

  A shadow fell over Kaeso’s heart just as he was getting used to connecting with his crew again. Umbra was where he belonged. Umbra was what he was good at. You’ll get these people killed if you keep leading them.

  Lucia, Blaesus, Daryush, and even Nestor turned to him expectantly, waiting for his orders. Their expressions said they still trusted him to get them through anything.

  What will happen when I abandon them?

  He shook those thoughts from his mind. He had too much to do to submit to his doubts right now. Ancilia never doubted their abilities or the mission. It was time he remembered what he was.

  “First,” Kaeso said, “we get the engines running. Daryush, you've worked with the Navigator. Can you do it without him?”

  Daryush's eyes grew wide. He licked his lips, then gave a slow shrug.

  “Can any of us help you?” Kaeso asked. “We can't get to Terra much less anywhere else until those engines work.”

  Daryush nodded again, then patted his chest to indicate he could do it.

  “And our Umbra friend?” Blaesus asked. “He won’t be happy when he wakes up. Does he have any secret god-like powers we should know about?”

  “He's not a god,” Kaeso said. “He's just a man.”

  “Considering the stories you and Nestor just told us,” Blaesus said, “I'm not taking anything for granted.”

  “Technology and the Muses give him certain advantages,” Kaeso said, “but he can be hurt and killed. And to answer your first question, we'll have to wait until he wakes up.”

  Lucia said, “We should figure it out now.”

  Her grim face told Kaeso what she had in mind. Kaeso's reactivated implant gave him many of those advantages he just mentioned to Blaesus, but it also came with rules. Number one, he could not harm a Vessel, nor allow a Vessel to be harmed if he could prevent it. His implant's punishment for violating that rule would make the concealment protocols seem like a minor headache.

  “We will keep him locked up if we have to.”

  “But how can we trust him,” Lucia asked, “especially after what I did? I’d hold a grudge.”

  “He’s a Vessel,” Kaeso said.

  When she shook her head in confusion, he forgot that simple declaration had no meaning to Lucia.

  “Vessels will do anything the Muses want them to. The Muses don't think as individuals. Their intelligence comes from the combined thoughts of every virus cell in their strain throughout the universe, no matter how far apart they are. They could care less about an individual Vessel. If they decide that it’s more important for the Navigator to help us—despite the fact you shot him—then the Navigator will cheerfully help us.”

  “If they don't want him to help us?” Lucia asked. “We keep him locked up, he could still pass information to them. They’d still know where he is. I'm sorry, sir, but I don't think we can trust him even if he says he’ll help.”

  Kaeso knew Lucia was right, but he also knew he could never allow them to throw Galeo out the airlock. It was partly because of the implant, but Galeo was also an old friend and former mentor. He wouldn't kill Galeo just because he didn’t trust him, not while he had a shred of honor left in him.

  “We keep him locked up, and that’s final. Once the engines are fixed, and we find a nice remote planet in the outback, we'll dump him off there. Satisfied?”

  Lucia hesitated, but then nodded.

  “All right,” Kaeso said. “Daryush, you will get those engines running. Lucia, help him if he needs it. Nestor and Blaesus, you two and I will figure out how in Hades we're going to get the Consul's son off Terra.”

  “And then?” Nestor asked.

  Kaeso paused. “Can we agree the best thing right now is to get the boy?”

  The Greek nodded slowly, keeping his gaze locked with Kaeso’s.

  “Then we concentrate on that for now.”

  Nestor frowned, but didn’t say anything.

  As his crew hurried off to their tasks, Kaeso felt like he had a purpose and a mission. A mission that did not make him feel used, and potentially discarded afterwards. He was working for himself and his crew, just as he had before.

  And the comfort of that role disturbed him.

  29

  Ocella was staring into the darkness, her back against a plastic wine barrel and the boy leaning against her, when she heard a scrape at the door. She sat up, and Cordus awoke with a start. When the door opened, she squinted against the light from the hallway. A large man stood in the door, his silhouette blocking most of it. Two other men stood behind him, their hand
s resting on the pistols in the holsters around their chests.

  “The domina wants to see you,” said the man in the door.

  She had no idea how long she and Cordus had been in the room, but she knew it was hours. She was hungry and had a terrible urge to urinate. She assumed Cordus felt the same.

  She stood on cramped legs and then helped Cordus up.

  “Just you,” the man said.

  Cordus looked up at her, his eyes wide.

  “It’ll be fine,” she assured him.

  Cordus's face said he didn't believe her. She turned to the man in the door. “Can you at least take him to the bathroom? Otherwise he's going to piss all over your domina's wine.”

  The man frowned at her. Then he turned to the man behind him and nodded to Cordus. The man brushed past the larger man and grabbed Cordus's arm. Cordus yanked it free and said, “I need no assistance walking.”

  Ocella hid a smile.

  “So sorry, highness,” the man said, then grabbed his arm again and pulled him from the room. Ocella jumped forward, but the man in the door put a hand on her chest.

  “Don't be stupid,” he said. “He's going to the bathroom, like you asked.”

  “Make sure your dog doesn't hurt him, all right?”

  The man grunted, then said, “Let's go.”

  The man led her up the stairs, through the kitchen, and out the back door. It was night, and the city lights made the sky glow orange beneath a canopy of clouds. Her captor took her to a van with its engine running, its side door open. Gaia Julius sat in the passenger’s seat with her window down.

  “We’re going for a ride, Ancile,” Gaia said.

  Ocella stopped. “Not without Cordus.”

  “He’ll be fine. Get in.”

  When Ocella didn’t move, Gaia said, “I’d rather not force you.”

  Ocella jerked her arm free and smashed her elbow into the face of the man holding her. He stumbled back, blood spurting from his broken nose. She kicked the other man in the crotch, and he fell to the ground gasping. The third man drew a jolt gun and jabbed the prongs into Ocella’s chest. White-hot pain screamed from every nerve in her body. Her muscles seized, and the world turned black before she fell to the ground.

  Ocella came to slowly. She felt the fire in her muscles before she even opened her eyes. She blinked away the cloudiness over her vision.

  She was in the van strapped to a heavy wooden chair that was bolted to the metal floor. She was completely naked. Her arms were fastened to the armrests, and her ankles to the base of the chair. A surge of fear banished Ocella’s grogginess. She jerked at the straps, but they did not give.

  “Good, you’re awake.”

  The Julii matron sat on the floor next to Ocella, tapping on a tabulari in her lap. The flat device showed a column of streaming numbers on the display’s left side, and a human outline on the right.

  Without looking up, Gaia said, “It's a wonder you've survived this long, dear. You're being tracked.”

  It confirmed Ocella’s own suspicions, but she did not want to take the Julii matron’s word without proof.

  “How?” Ocella asked with a hoarse voice.

  “Your implant was my guess.”

  Ocella frowned. Scaurus’s device, coupled with Cordus’s talents, should have deactivated her implant. She had not been able to access it since that day. How could it still produce a signal?

  “But when I tried to deactivate it myself,” Gaia continued, “I found it was already dead. Nevertheless, you’re emitting a signal similar to an implant’s.”

  Ocella tried to keep calm and not let the van’s leering driver bother her. His eyes wandered over her body from his rearview mirror.

  “We were careful leaving the Consular Palace,” she said. “And even if we had trackers in our clothes, we destroyed them the moment we left the palace.”

  “Your clothes were clean,” Gaia said. Then she wrinkled her nose. “Of trackers, at least. No, the signal I’m picking up is either on your skin or inside you. The chair you're sitting in will tell me where it is.”

  “You could have told me this earlier,” Ocella growled.

  “I was about to before you assaulted my men,” Gaia said. She put a small web of wires over Ocella's head that reminded her of the webbing Scaurus had used to deactivate her implant. “Of course, I wasn't sure how you'd react to getting strapped naked to a chair. Not to mention the discomfort of this procedure.”

  “I’d have reacted better if I didn't think your goons were about to rape me.” Ocella eyed the driver again, who continued to stare at her with hooded eyes.

  “Ah, forgive me,” Gaia said. “We had just finished buckling you in when you woke up. Tiberius, hand me the blanket.”

  The man in the front passenger seat handed Gaia a rough blanket, which Gaia draped over Ocella. The driver’s eyes in the rearview mirror looked disappointed as he turned back to the road.

  “Satisfied?”

  Ocella ignored the question. “What are you going to do?”

  “We had to remove your clothes to ensure they were not tracked. We did the same to the boy.”

  Ocella gave an involuntary jerk in her straps. “If you hurt him—”

  “He's in a bath right now. We took his clothes while he soaked, and he’ll get a fresh set once he’s done. He's rather enjoying it, so relax. I assume it’s been a long time since his highness’s last bath.”

  Gaia turned back to her tabulari and moved some sliders. “Now we need to find that tracker. Unless you'd prefer to tell me where it is.”

  “If I have one, I have no idea where it is.”

  “Hmm,” Gaia said, returning to her tabulari. “In that case, please relax your muscles. This won't hurt as bad as the jolt gun but it's not going to be pleasant either. Shall we begin?”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  “Not if you want live,” Gaia said. She moved some sliders on the tabulari keyboard, and the human outline on the screen began to pulse green.

  Ocella ground her teeth as a burning sensation began at her scalp. It felt like a thin, hot line moving down her head, neck, and torso. Above and below the line there was no pain, but everything that line touched was on fire. It crawled down her abdomen and legs. Gaia was right that the pain was nothing like the jolt gun, but Ocella wished it would end soon. When it reached the tips of her toes, she exhaled with relief.

  Then the line moved back up her feet. She tensed her already aching muscles as the line of pain made the return trip up her legs, torso, and then head. She relaxed a bit when it stopped at her scalp.

  Ocella glanced at the tabulari display on Gaia’s lap.

  “There,” Gaia said. “The tracker is on the back of your neck. On the skin.”

  A purple dot pulsed on the neck of the human outline.

  “How?” Ocella said.

  She had ensured she was clean of trackers when she left the Consular Palace, and once again when she and Cordus discarded their clothes after they escaped. Scaurus had ran his own scans to ensure they were not tracked. Someone in the crowds Ocella and Cordus passed through over the past three weeks must have attached the trackers.

  “Lean your neck forward,” Gaia said. When Ocella did so, Gaia's cold fingers ran up and down the back of her neck. Ocella felt something no larger than a fingertip blocking Gaia’s touch. Gaia scratched at the spot, and a layer of adhesive peeled off the back of Ocella’s neck.

  Gaia held the tracker in front of Ocella. It was a piece of clear plastic, with no visible circuitry. It was the most sophisticated Roman tracker she’d ever seen.

  “This little thing was sending Muse-based signals,” Gaia said. “Did you give this to them?”

  “Absolutely not,” Ocella said, her mind racing.

  How could the Romans have created something like this so soon? Cordus assured her the Romans did not possess any Muse-based com besides that which exists between one Vessel and another. Did they get it from the Ancilia they captured? Ocella felt sic
k, her nakedness forgotten. It tore Ocella apart to know she had doomed her former colleagues on Terra. They did what they thought was right, just as she did for years before she met Cordus. But keeping Cordus away from any organization controlled by a Muse strain was far more important than the lives of several dozen Ancilia. At least that’s what she kept telling herself.

  “Then how did they get it?” Gaia asked, still holding the tracker before Ocella.

  “I don't know,” Ocella answered truthfully. “Look, I don't care what you do to me. Just don't give the boy to the Romans. Or to Umbra. I have money.”

  Gaia laughed. “Do you think I need money? My family may be social outcasts, but we are still quite wealthy.” Her smile melted. “If you don't want me handing the boy over to the Romans or to Umbra, then who should I give him to? I certainly can't adopt him.”

  Ocella studied her. It was time to see just whose side Gaia Julius was on. “Scaurus said you could be trusted.”

  Her left eye twitched, something Ocella would have missed if she had blinked. “Scaurus. Should I know that name?”

  “He was Prefect of the Praetorian Guard twenty years ago.”

  “Ah, yes,” Gaia said. “I haven't talked to him in years. How is he?”

  “Dead.”

  Gaia's left eye twitched again. “Unfortunate. He was a Roman patriot. What happened?”

  “It’s a long story, but he said you were...of like minds when it came to the Romans and the Liberti.”

  Gaia folded her arms. “If Scaurus said we were “of like minds”, then he must have explained what our similar opinions were, did he not? Because I’m confused as to why the former Prefect of the Praetorian Guard would mention my name to you.”

  “I'd be more comfortable talking if I was out of this chair,” Ocella said. “You found the tracker.”

  Gaia smiled and leaned forward. “Tell me more about Scaurus and I'll consider it.”

  “He was a Saturnist,” Ocella said.

  Gaia raised an eyebrow. “Well, that is surprising, considering the level he reached within the Guard. So he accused me of being a Saturnist, is that it?”