“But it’ll soon be dark, and I want to start off at daybreak. You mentioned things I might need to know. Will you tell me?”
Martinus frowned. “The full story would take longer than till bedtime, my son.”
“I’m a simple roadpounder. Can’t you explain enough in a few words?”
The ghost of a smile crossed Martinus’s lips. “You ask for a miracle. But I’ll try.” He pondered before he started talking.
Nonetheless Gratillonius was bewildered. He could only gather that one Priscillianus, bishop of Avela in Hispania, was accused of heresy and worse. The centurion knew that “heresy” meant an incorrect Christian doctrine, though it was not clear to him who decided what was correct and how. In a vague fashion he was conscious of the division between Catholics, who held that God and Christ were somehow identical, and Arians, who held that They were somehow different. Mithraism was an easier faith, its paradoxes a part of the very Mystery and in any event nothing that directly concerned mortals.
This Priscillianus preached a canon of perfectionism which Martinus felt went too far; fallen man was incapable of it without divine grace. Yet Martinus also felt that this was no more than an excess of zeal. Certainly it spoke against those charges of fornication and sorcery that the enemies of Priscillianus brought. There might have been no large stir had not people by the hundreds and perhaps thousands, despairing of this world, flocked to the austere new creed. As was, Bishop Ambrosius of Mediolanum got the then co-Emperor Gratianus to issue a rescript banning its adherents. They scattered and concealed themselves.
Priscillianus himself and a few followers went to Rome to appeal to the Pope. Among them were women, including two friends of the consul Ausonius. This gave rise to nasty gossip.
The Church had adopted a rule that when internal disputes arose, the final appeal would be to the bishop of Rome. Pope Damasus refused to see Priscillianus. The accused proceeded to Mediolanum, where through an official who was an enemy of Ambrosius they got a rescript restoring them to their churches.
Then they took the offensive, getting charges of calumny levelled against their principal persecutor, Bishop Ithacius of Ossanuba. He fled to Treverorum and found an ally in the praetorian prefect. Intrigues seethed. Maximus revolted and overthrew Gratianus. Ambrosius travelled north to help negotiate the treaty that divided the West.
Ithacius brought his allegations against Priscillianus before the new Augustus. Maximus ordered a synod convened at Burdigala to settle the matter. Much ugliness ensued, rumors of immorality, a noblewoman stoned by a rabble. In the end, Priscillianus refused to accept the jurisdiction of the synod and appealed to the Emperor in Treverorum.
Prelates flocked to the scene, Martinus among them. While he did not say so, Gratillonius got the impression, which later conversations confirmed, that he alone did not fawn on Maximus. Rather, he argued stiffly for what he held to be justice. When the Augustus had him at table and ordered the communal wine cup brought first to him, Martinus did not pass it on to Maximus, but to the priest who was with him; and the Augustus accepted this as a righteous act.
Ithacius saw his religious accusation of heresy faltering, and against Priscillianus pressed the secular, criminal charges of sorcery and Manicheanism. Martinus took the lead in disputing these.
He won from Emperor Maximus a promise that there would be no death penalties. However much the Priscillianists might be in error, it was honest error and deserved no worse than exile to some place where they could meditate untroubled and find their way back to the truth. Gladdened, Martinus started home. The whole wretched business had caused him to neglect his own flock far too long.
—’Wretched’ is the right word,” Gratillonius muttered.
“What?” asked Martinus.
“Oh, nothing.” Gratillonius’s glance went to a window. Deep yellow, the light that came through it told him that it was time for his sunset prayer to the Lord Mithras. Besides, after what he had heard, he needed a few lungfuls of clean air. “Excuse me if I leave,” he said, rising. “I’ve duties to see to before nightfall.”
The monks took that at face value, but Martinus gave him a look that held him in place like a fishhook before murmuring, “Duties, my son, or devotions?”
Gratillonius felt his belly muscles tighten. “Is there a difference?”
“Enough,” said Martinus. Was the motion of his hand a blessing? “Go in peace.”
2
The squadron entered Augusta Treverorum by one of two paved ways passing through a gate in the city wall. The gate was a colossus of iron-bound sandstone blocks, more than a hundred feet wide and nearly as high, with twin towers flanking two levels of windows. Behind it, structures well-nigh as impressive showed above roofs closer to hand, basilica, Imperial palace, principal church; and approaching, the men had noticed an amphitheater just outside that was like a shoulder of the hill into which it was built.
Facades reared grandly over streets, porticos gleamed around marketplaces, where people in the multiple thousands walked, rode, drove, jostled, chattered, chaffered, exhorted, quarreled, postured, pleaded, vowed, were together, were alone. Feet clattered, hoofs thudded, wheels groaned, hammers rang. The noises were a veritable presence, an atmosphere, filled with odors of smoke, food, spice, dung, perfume, wool, humanity. Litters bore a senator in purple-bordered toga and a lady—or a courtesan?—in silk past a Treverian farmer in tunic and trousers, a housewife in coarse linen carrying a basket, an artisan with his tools and leather apron, a porter under his yoke, a guardsman on horseback, slaves in livery and slaves in rags, a pair of strolling entertainers whose fantastical garb was an extra defiance of the law that said they must remain in that station to which they were born—
Gratillonius had seen Londinium, but it could not compare with this. Abruptly Ys seemed tiny and very dear. He got directions and led his soldiers in formation, giving way to nobody. Before their armor the crowds surged aside in bow waves and eddies.
Space was available at the metropolitan barracks. Maximus kept a large household troop and a substantial standing army. Their cores were legionary regulars, drawn from border garrisons as well as from Brittania. However, more men, auxiliaries among them, had departed for the South with Valentinianus. Thus total Roman strength in Gallia was much reduced. Echoing rooms and empty parade grounds, in the midst of civilian wealth and bustle, roused forebodings in Gratillonius. The Mosella had only about a hundred miles to flow from here before it met the Rhenus, and east of that great river laired the barbarians. Many were already west of it.
He made arrangements for his men. Several whooped joyously when they recognized acquaintances from Britannia, and everybody was chafing to be off into town. “Keeping them taut won’t be easy,” Gratillonius warned Adminius. “Temptations right and left, starting with booze and broads, leading on toward brawls.”
The deputy grinned. “Don’t you worry, sir,” he answered. “Ill let ’em ’ave their fun, but they’ll know there’s a ’and on the tether.” He cocked his head. “If I’m not being overbold, maybe the centurion’d like ’is own bit o’ fun? I’ll soon find out where that’s to be ’ad.”
“Never mind,” Gratillonius snapped. “Remember, I want you reporting to me regularly at my lodging.”
He proceeded alone to the government inn where he would stay. Temptation—aye, he thought, it simmered in him too; and he realized he had been thinking in Ysan, while certain of his wives stood before him, unclad and reaching out, more vivid than the walls and traffic around.
The room he took was clean and well furnished, if a little time-faded. He unpacked and got busy. First he must notify the palace of his arrival. He had already prepared a note to that effect—writing never came easily to him—and now tied it together with a commendation that Bishop Arator had given him. The letter was embarrassingly fulsome, but explained his not coming sooner and, well, should do his career no harm. Escape from the curial trap—
After he was finished in Ys, if ever he
was—
He didn’t want to pursue that vision. Hastily, he sought the manager of the house, who dispatched a messenger boy for him.
As Gratillonius then stood wondering what to do, a uniformed centurion entered from the street, stopped, gaped, and shouted his name. “Drusus!” he roared back at the stocky form—Publius Flavius Drusus of the Sixth, whose unit had side by side with his fought its way out of a Pictic ambush. They fell into each other’s arms, pounded each other’s backs, and exchanged mighty oaths.
“I’m staying here too,” Drusus explained, “waiting to deliver a report. Since we won his throne for the Augustus, my vexillation’s been stationed at Bonna. Reinforcement for the Fifth Minervia. The war whittled that legion pretty badly, not so much through casualties as because most of it stuck with Valentinianus. The Germani got so uppity that at last we made a punitive expedition. I’ve been sent to tell how that went; pretty good. Come, we’ve daylight left, let’s go out on the town.”
“I’m supposed to report, like you,” Gratillonius demurred. “I’d better be here when they call me.”
Laughter rattled from Drusus. “Your heels will freeze if you just sit waiting, old buddy. I thought today I’d finally gotten my summons, but no, they told me there the Emperor was suddenly too busy again. You’ll be lucky if you’re called inside this month. And if the word happens to come when you’re out, no sweat. Everything’s scheduled hours and hours in advance, because whenever some backlog of state business can get handled, there’s so much of it. Enjoy while you’ve got the chance. I’ll go change clothes and be right with you.”
Gratillonius sat worrying till his friend returned, and asked as they went forth: “What’s happened? Maximus didn’t allow this kind of shillyshallying in Britannia.”
“Not entirely his fault,” Drusus replied. “You remember how he always oversaw as much as possible personally. Well, he’s the same now that he wears the purple. And it worked for a while. Name of Christ, how we sliced through Gratianus’s ranks! But being Emperor is different, I guess. He keeps getting interrupted by new problems.”
“Why does he want a direct account of a border clash?” Gratillonius wondered.
“M-mm, don’t quote me. I could get in trouble.”
“I wouldn’t do that to you, Drusus. D’you imagine I’ve forgotten that day in the rain? All the puddles were red.”
Hand squeezed shoulder. “I remember too. Well, nobody’s told me anything officially, understand, but when a smell comes downwind I can usually tell whether it’s from a rose or a fart. After Gratianus died—and he was murdered, make no doubt of that, murdered when he’d been promised safety at a feast with an oath on the Gospels—” Drusus glanced about. They were anonymous in a throng of people intent on their own lives. “Maximus put the blame on his cavalry commander, but never punished the man…. Anyway. While negotiations were going on afterward, Maximus got the Juthungi to invade Raetia. He had connections to them. Pressure on Theodosius to make a settlement. Valentinianus is only a kid, under the thumb of his mother. But her Frankish general in his turn got the Huns and Alani to harry the Alemanni so close to the Rhenus that Maximus had to move troops to that frontier.
“Which is why I’m still posted yonder, and the Augustus is anxious about whatever the barbarians may be up to, and why. They’ve gotten a taste of playing us Romans off against each other.”
Gratillonius raised a dam against the words that rose in his throat. What was this fellow saying about their Duke, the man who rolled midnight back from the Wall?
Gratillonius told himself that a commander could not always control what his subordinates did, and statecraft unavoidably had its dirty side, and Drusus was a solid sort who might be misled but who should be heard out before any arguments began. “Well, however that is,” he said, “why aren’t things better organized here? It doesn’t sound a bit like Maximus. Can’t he get competent officers any longer?”
“It’s the Priscillianus mess,” Drusus answered. “Before then, we had a pretty smooth mill running. But since that rift spread this far—”
He paused before he sighed and added, “I don’t understand any miserable part of it. This town’s full of jabber about the First Cause, the Sons of God and the Sons of Darkness, Spiritual Man, mystical numbers, and I don’t know what else, except I was there when a man got knifed in a tavern ruckus that started over whether or not the age of prophecy is over. I think Priscillianus has to be wrong when he says men and women should stay apart, never get together. If that is what he says. I don’t know. But why all these fights about it? I wonder if Christ in Heaven isn’t weeping at what they’re doing in His name. Sometimes I almost envy infidels like you.”
They had wandered down toward the river. Through an open portal they saw the bridge across it, and vineyards and villas beyond. A fresh dampness blew off it. Leaves blazed with autumn. Gratillonius remembered Bodilis reading to him a poem Ausonius had written in praise of this stream; the author had sent her a copy. Like a girl-child playing with her hair before a mirror, fisher lads sport with shadowy shapes underwater. Suddenly laughter welled up in him and he pitched away the cares of the world. They’d climb back onto him soon enough. “Not our department,” he said. “How about we find us a place where we can have a drink and swap brags?”
3
Four days later he was in the presence of Maximus Augustus, but as a prisoner.
News had exploded through the city. The Emperor, who had promised clemency for the Priscillianists, was rehearing the entire case. Bishop Ithacius withdrew as prosecutor. It was said that he feared the wrath of such powerful colleagues as Martinus and Ambrosius.
Earlier, the bishop of Mediolanum had come back this far north, ostensibly to see the bones of Gratianus returned to Italy for burial, actually to attend the first trial. Maximus refused him a private audience but received him in consistory, where he in his turn declined the Emperor’s proffered kiss of peace and accused the latter of being a lawless usurper. Maximus responded in the course of proceedings with a denial that Valentinianus was his equal; if nothing else, the boy-Emperor and his mother were known to have strong Arian leanings.
Though Ambrosius had since gone home, the qualms of Ithacius were natural. In his place, Maximus appointed Patricius, an advocate for the treasury. Did the Augustus want the property of the heretics?
Gratillonius found a military tribune who was a reliable conduit of information, rather than rumors. What he learned about the goings-on within the Church perturbed him less than what he learned about Maximus. How long must he hang around this cursed city? Most of his time he spent sightseeing, or talking with chance-met men. They were a varied lot, many of them trading up and down the rivers or overland. There grew before him a vision, clearer than ever, of the Empire, how vast it was and how troubled.
The detachment came for him toward evening, when he had lately returned to the hostel after a day’s ride in the hinterland. A vintner had hailed him and invited him home for a cup and a gab; there the pretty daughter of the house smiled upon him. Now he sat in the common room prior to supper, more content than he had been, thinking back over the small experience. The door opened. Four soldiers in combat gear tramped through, and at their head a centurion.
“We seek Gaius Valerius Gratillonius, of the Second Legion Augusta,” that man announced.
“Here he is.” Gratillonius’s heart leaped up as fast as his body.
“In the name of the Augustus, come.”
“At once. I’ll just outfit myself—”
“No. Immediately.”
Gratillonius stared into faces gone hard. A prickling went over his scalp. “Is something wrong?” he asked.
The centurion clapped hand to sword. “Silence! Come!”
Household staff gaped, shrank aside, and saw their guest depart surrounded by armed men. Folk outside likewise fell silent as the group strode down the streets to the basilica.
Guarded gates led to a cloistered courtyard where dus
k was rising: for the sun had gone below the outer walls. Light still glowed on the upper courses of brick and red sandstone that made up the great building within, and flared off glass in its windows. Numb, Gratillonius accompanied his escort into this citadel of his hopes, past several checkpoints and thus at last to the audience hall where the Emperor was.
The soldiers clanked to a halt and saluted. Gratillonius did too. That was his old commandant there on the throne, the same Hispanic hatchet features and lean body though purple be wrapped around and a golden wreath set above. He hardly noticed the splendor of the room or the several councillors who sat or stood beneath their master.
The officer waited for the Imperial nod before reporting that he brought the person required. “Ah, Gratillonius,” Maximus said low. “Step forward. Let us look at you.”
The King of Ys posed for what seemed a long while, until he heard: “Know that we have been told such evil of you that we have ordered your arrest. What have you to say for yourself?”
Despite foreknowing he was somehow in danger, Gratillonius felt as if clubbed. “Sir?” Breath sobbed into him. He braced his knees, gave Maximus eye for eye, and declared, “My lord, I have served you and Rome to the best of my ability. Who’s spoken ill of me?”
Maximus straightened and clipped, “Your own men, Centurion, your own men. Do you call them liars? Do you deny having trafficked with Satan?”
“What? Sir—my lord—I don’t understand. My men—”
“Silence.” Maximus nodded at a pinch-lipped person in a drab tunic. “Calvinus, read the report.”
That one took up a set of papers and began what soon became a singsong, like a chant to his God. It developed that he was high in the Imperial secret service. His agents were everywhere, in every walk of life, with instructions to keep alert for anything the least suspicious and follow it up until they had sufficient clues to warrant full investigation. As if across a sea, Gratillonius heard how his legionaries, innocently talking in barracks and around town, had spoken of him. There was no need to interrogate any of them; all were ready to boast about their leader and about the wonders of Ys.
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