'He has taken it. Without the red hair, Rome would have whispered that the child wasn't his. He was a fool to ever hope otherwise. He's too softhearted, and you took advantage of him with your little "agreement". I've made him see sense.'
If Burrus's beloved Nilla had not been sleeping in his arms, he would have snatched the sword from Albucilla and slit her belly with it.
'Where has he taken her?'
'Beyond the walls,' said Albucilla. 'Just like any other needless child. He will leave her near a tombstone, slave, and there she will be exposed.'
Drusilla laughed and laughed, and when Aemilius touched her again, she laughed some more — a ringing, delighted cry that sounded like birdsong, she thought, as she rolled in the grass with flowers and leaves in her hair.
Aemilius's voice was dulled and thick, as if coming from another room, even though he was right next to her with his warm, soft hands upon her skin.
'That feels lovely,' she said. 'So balmy and nice. Do you like it?'
He answered with that thick voice again and she couldn't determine the words.
'Kiss me,' she said. 'Or have you already? That was what my present was to be for drinking it, remember?' He kissed her hard on the mouth and she liked it. 'You're all wet inside,' said Drusilla, laughing again, until she found she couldn't stop laughing, or didn't want to stop — she wasn't sure which.
His hands were all over her and she thrilled to it. 'Look at how the sunlight catches the hair on your tummy,' she told him. Then it struck her as funny that she could see his tummy at all. 'Look at your belly button,' she said. She wanted to peer at it closely. 'It's so delicious!' She was aware of her sister Julilla crying somewhere. 'I'm all right,' she called out, hoping to placate her. Then, to Aemilius's stomach again, she cried, 'I want to eat it!' She clamped her lips to his skin, thrashing with her tongue. Then she thought she could hear Little Boots somewhere too.
She felt hot. Her garments constricted her. 'Take them off,' she moaned. 'I feel suffocated.'
Aemilius's hands were on her eagerly, clawing at her clothes.
'That's better,' she told him. 'That's so much better…' She was on her back in the grass, feeling free and alive. She spread her arms and legs and let the cool breeze reach her. 'So much better,' she murmured. 'So nice…'
Aemilius's hands were at her sex. 'Naughty,' she admonished. 'I wouldn't let anyone else do that, you know.' She felt his fingers reach inside her. 'That tickles… that tickles!'
Suddenly her brother was there with flailing fists. She heard his words distinctly. 'Bastard!' he cried. 'That's my sister, you bastard!' The nice game in the grass had become an ugly fight. Little Boots pulled Aemilius from her and was beating him. She heard Julilla's cries. Drusilla tried to direct her eyes, but she couldn't see anything but flowers. 'I don't mind,' she called out. 'I want it to happen — I'm ready for it. It's because I drank the potion.'
Her sex was filled before she knew it — then a mouth was on her mouth, a tongue tasting hers. 'Aemilius,' she murmured. 'Did you win the fight? Did you make Little Boots go away?'
Bruised and bloody, Aemilius watched the taking of Drusilla's virginity from the other side of the garden, where he cowered. Across the lawn, beneath the chestnut trees, Drusilla writhed beneath the lover she thought was him. Little Boots had been unable to bear his friend being the one to claim her, when he himself loved Drusilla so dearly. He beat Aemilius with his fists until his friend agreed to enjoy the drugged Drusilla only when Little Boots had claimed first prize.
Once, Aemilius supposed, he would have been disgusted with himself for partaking in such degeneracy. But this was the Emperor's island. Still, he found his head turning away from the incestuous scene to watch little Julilla rocking back and forth inside a rosebush. The thorns looked very cruel, and he saw that they had torn her skin. But still he found it easier to watch the girl than her older sister. Aemilius wanted the image of Drusilla he held in his mind to be unsullied by anything Little Boots did to her.
Burrus returned to the House of the Aemilii with his arms around Nilla, wanting to protect her but knowing he had failed. Dawn came, bringing the fifth day since their daughter's birth, but Nilla's eyes, when the sun's rays fell on them, were soulless. Her spirit had gone as surely as if she'd died. She drifted somewhere at the limits of Rome, calling for her child. The Nilla in Burrus's arms was a shell, alive but not living. The aged maid let them in from the street, bolting the huge bronze doors behind them.
'Will you keep up this search?' she asked.
Burrus nodded.
'It will kill her. Look at her eyes.'
'It will kill her if we stop,' said Burrus.
'Then it will take both your lives,' said the old woman. She had soup ready on a little brazier in the entrance hall and she gave Burrus a cup. 'What would be the point of it, then? Both of you dead?'
Burrus tried to make Nilla take the cup in her hands, but when she would not grip it he held the soup to her mouth. The old woman nodded. 'How can we ever stop looking?' he said. 'She is our baby. She is out there beyond the city walls.'
'She is dead. Taken by foxes.'
'No,' Burrus moaned.
'Enslaved then. Found by a mangon.'
'Stop it,' begged Burrus. 'Stop it!'
'You think your pain is unique? You think no other parent has suffered this before?'
Tears coursed down Burrus's face as he pressed his lips to Nilla's hair. Nilla heard nothing of the old woman's words.
'I want to kill them,' Burrus wept. 'I'll kill them for what they've done.'
'No, you won't,' said the old woman softly. 'Your loss would only be the greater for it. Nilla might love you like a patrician but you are still a slave. Revenge cannot be yours. So you will live on together in this dishonoured house, just as the master and his slut will live on. You will all live your lives in here and Rome will never know the truth. If you slit them with a sword, Burrus, your Nilla will watch you torn to shreds by jackals.' She took the cup of soup from where he held it to Nilla's lips. 'Drink this yourself. If she cannot eat, then so be it. But you must keep your strength for her sake.'
Burrus drank the soup and the three remained where they were in silence. The old woman shuffled in her shrouds to locate something, then Burrus saw she held a little bronze statue in her hands. 'Take it,' she said. It was the figure of a child.
'What is this?' Burrus asked.
'I kept a little shrine for many years. The master's grandfather once allowed me it. His guilt, it was.'
'Guilt at what?'
'At taking the child I bore him and selling it to a brothel.'
Burrus stared at her. 'Your master sold your child?'
The old woman nodded. 'If it had been a boy, he might have raised him as part of the household. But not a girl. Just another costly mouth to feed.'
Burrus said nothing.
'I didn't take the loss well,' the old woman whispered. 'When beatings made no difference, the old master gave me that little statue. It's her genius, her soul. I placed it on a shrine and kept an oil lamp burning night and day.'
Nilla's eyes were fixed on the thing. Burrus pressed it into her hands.
'Make a shrine for your little one, as I did,' said the old woman. 'It will help you heal.'
'Thank you,' Burrus whispered. He led Nilla into the atrium and up the stairs while the old woman followed in silence. When Nilla's head was placed upon the pillow, Burrus tried to ease the little figure from her hands.
'Don't,' said the old woman.
Burrus let her sleep with it.
At the door the woman turned to him, preparing to retire to her pallet. 'The child needs a name for the shrine. You must name the lost girl. Have you thought of one?'
With shame, Burrus told her that he hadn't. She was just 'the child' to him.
'That's a pity,' said the old woman.
'Acte,' said Nilla.
They turned to look at the bed.
'Acte,' Nilla repeated, her eyes closed in sleep. 'Ou
r little girl, Acte, taken from us. Our little one… Acte.'
Thus was named the girl who would one day transcribe my history.'
The Kalends of April
AD 30
Fifteen months later: the writer Phaedrus is accused of making unflattering allusions to Praetorian Prefect Sejanus in his translation of Aesop's Fables. All copies are seized
The reckless request was unheard at first, lost among the crowd's screams for blood, but it began to grow louder as the tantalising nature of what was being asked tickled people's fancy and compelled them to add their voices. Those in the stands who could see into the Imperial box where Sejanus sat first saw the movement's potential. It was they who started the shout, insisting that the honour of raising or lowering his thumb should go to the Prefect in the absence of the Emperor. More and more spectators realised the implication — and got the joke of it — while the two helpless gladiators dripped sweat on the sand, one with the point of his sword at the other's throat, waiting to see the decision.
'Sejanus decide!' they chanted. 'Sejanus decide!'
Pressed into the shadows of the Imperial family's box, I held my breath, waiting to see what would come. Sejanus remained in his chair, watching the crowd, his face a mask. But the corners of his mouth were twitching. He was electrified by what was being asked of him. I felt a hand brush my ear. Startled, I turned. My domina, by whose ivory chair I was crouching, smiled at me.
'What will he do?' Livia purred in my ear. 'Play the Emperor and play into their hands? Listen to them. They want him to reveal his desire.'
My heart seemed to beat louder than the crowd's calls. She was talking to me in confidence again: I could scarcely believe it. 'Because they love him, domina?'
She laughed at me. 'Poor Iphicles, you've been in the dirt for far too long. They hate him, you idiot. They loathe him.'
'Then why are they shouting for him?'
'To hand him the rope with which to hang himself.' My domina 's hands were pressed together as she muttered into the air, 'Take it, Sejanus! Take the pretty rope!'
Sejanus stood and the crowd roared its approval. 'Look now, Iphicles,' Livia hissed to me, her eyes bright with fire. 'Look how his doom comes!'
Sejanus raised his hand high and the gesture was seen for what it was: a plea for silence. The roar ebbed as people held their breaths, in awe of what might happen next. When the arena was hushed, Sejanus regarded the gladiators below for a long time.
'Spare him!' came a voice from the crowd. 'He fought bravely! Spare him, Prefect!'
Sejanus raised his eyes to the crowd.
'Here it comes!' Livia thrilled.
'No one but the Emperor or the gods,' declared Sejanus, 'may decide a gladiator's fate.'
A murmur swept through the stands. Would Sejanus declare himself the Emperor-in-waiting?
'The Emperor is not here,' Sejanus boomed, 'so we must leave it to the gods.' Livia's face fell as Sejanus took an aureus coin from his tunic. 'Chance is the god!' He tossed the coin high in the air. Livia left her seat before Sejanus caught it.
' Domina?'
'I am cold. I wish to go home.'
'But domina — '
'Attend me.'
I scurried to fetch her palla, throwing it around her shoulders as she strode to the exit. She had no interest in whether the coin let the fallen gladiator live or die.
'So he didn't take the rope,' I said as we left. 'Are you really so surprised? When does Sejanus ever put a foot wrong?'
'Quite often, lately.'
I was astonished. 'Not in any way that I've heard.'
She sneered. 'Like I said, Iphicles, you've been prone in the dirt too long. He should have played to the crowd. He should have hanged himself. His response was too sensible.'
She wasn't speaking a drop of sense to me. 'Do you know Sejanus at all?' I asked.
She didn't hear my words. 'Martina will have to up the dose,' she muttered. 'He should have been acting far more recklessly than this. It's embarrassing.'
'Martina?' I spluttered.
'If it weren't for her, I'd be flat on my bed with your dummy prick still inside me.'
I flushed with shame. ' Domina… '
She waved her hand, dismissing the episode. But when I made to follow her to the litter, she cut me short. 'Who said you could leave? Go back to the box and be a slave. I have no more use for you.'
I dropped to the ground. 'Yes, domina.' I watched her depart, my heart soaring. At least she was sharing things with me again, however small.
When I returned to the Imperial seats, I took my place among the other slaves. Lygdus was there. In my joy at Livia's thaw I felt pleased to see him. It had been more than two years since we had interacted in any way. I had barely seen him since Nero's arrest; I didn't even know to which household he had been reassigned.
'How goes it?' I asked. Our disagreements were all in the past, as far as I was concerned now.
The look he gave me was haunted and I was shocked by the pain I saw in his face.
'Lygdus?'
He wouldn't speak.
I felt a surge of pity. I sat down where he crouched and placed my arm around his bulk. 'You must move on from Nero's fall,' I said. 'It has been too long. Your master is exiled. Look only to what is ahead.'
'And what is that?' he asked. 'Little Boots?' A tear rolled down his cheek.
I couldn't answer. I did not know. The resurgence of my domina had reminded me that, for a slave, taking actions that had not been ordered was a crime. The prophecies could not be my concern now.
'Nero was a good master — kind, even,' I said. 'But the domina is running things now. Bask in her mercy as I do. I was very wrong to take charge, but the domina forgives me. Surrender your will to her, son — surrender your mind. She will forgive you too. Embrace the ignorance you discarded. Be the pet again. I know in my heart that this is best for us slaves.'
Lygdus's eyes were red. 'You called me son?'
I was caught out — a slip of the tongue. But I had revealed what had long lived inside my heart. My love for Lygdus made me embrace him. 'Once I was like a father to you, son — let me be that father again.'
He looked away, but the nod, when it came, told me he had now accepted things.
Megalesia
April, AD 30
One week later: Jesus of Nazareth is crucified in Judea for aspiring to be King of the Jews
Albucilla was quietly thrilled that Ahenobarbus's younger sister had come to her. Having no sisters of her own, and with all her family hooked on the Gemonian Stairs, she wanted nothing so desperately as to belong to the House of the Aemilii. And now here was Domitia treating her as if she did. Nilla, Ahenobarbus's legitimate wife, had been ignored.
Albucilla drew her arm around her frightened 'sister-inlaw'. 'You must tell me what has upset you, Domitia, and how I can help.'
'No one can help. I am trapped by it.' Domitia began to cry.
'Trapped by what? What has happened to you?'
'This marriage,' Domitia said bitterly. 'It is obscene. Not a marriage at all.'
Albucilla was alarmed. 'Is your husband starving you? Is that why you look so thin?'
'Of course not. I'm thin because I have no appetite for food.'
'Oh Domitia.'
'My sister Lepida's marriage was bad. Her husband ignored her — and worse, he ignored their little girl. I prayed that when my own union came, it would never be with so loveless a husband. My sister is a widow now and she's never been happier. And here I am imprisoned in my own corner of wedded hell, and it's a thousand times worse than hers ever was.'
Albucilla thought she'd guessed what Domitia seemed reluctant to say. 'Your husband — is he… unable to consummate?'
Domitia looked up with a start. 'Of course not. He got that over with on our wedding night. He did his duty and he continues to do it. Even when I weep, he still goes through with it. He knows what's expected.'
Albucilla was lost. 'What is it, then? What does he
do to you that's so bad?'
'It's what he does to himself.'
'Ah.' Convinced she had the answer now, Albucilla wondered what Domitia would think if she knew of the pleasure she and Ahenobarbus gained from pain. Domitia was plainly an innocent. She had not received the benefit of an education at Capri. 'As long as he only hurts himself,' Albucilla said to her gently, 'no harm can really come from it. And he promises never to try that stuff on you.'
Domitia stared at her like she was simple. 'Try that stuff on me? It is my stuff. He wears my clothes, Albucilla — all my gowns and shoes. He wears my underthings and even my veils. He tries them all on and parades about. He treats me with kindness, constant kindness, but my wardrobe has become his property.' She sniffed at her stola. 'Every single thing I wear smells of him!'
Albucilla wanted to laugh. 'He's — he's a transvestite?'
'If that's what it's called, then yes, that's what he is.'
'Oh Domitia, you've got off lightly,' Albucilla beamed at her. 'So many wellborn wives end up with real monsters for their grooms.'
'I don't think you understand,' Domitia began to say.
'Of course I do. So he puts on your clothes? Let him. What harm does it do? I bet Rome is full of such secretive men.'
'You don't understand,' Domitia said again, with an edge to her voice. 'He is Drusus, the second son of Agrippina, who is locked up in a prison without charge. His older brother, Nero, is already an exile and his younger brother, Little Boots, is a captive on the Emperor's island.'
Albucilla was silent.
'My husband is the son of a damned house, the House of Germanicus — damned by Sejanus. My sister believes it is a marriage blessed by Veiovis, but she is wrong. It is devoid of glory. The marriage was meant as a warning to Drusus, a humiliation. I am the daughter of a traitor, and the message meant for my husband was that I am all he is worthy of — a traitor's seed.'
Albucilla couldn't believe this was possible. 'No, Domitia, surely — '
'Nilla was given the same message. Why else force her to marry my idiot mute brother?'
'Ahenobarbus is a good man — ' Albucilla began.
Domitia raised a hand. 'There is another message in the marriage, and it's meant for me, the traitor's child.'
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