by Peter Tonkin
But the breath caught in his throat. There was someone standing in the doorway. A slightly paler figure etched against the absolute darkness of the corridor. Clad in a formal toga, so white that it seemed almost to glow. The head covered. The face, the arms and legs, indeed, invisible.
And, as Antony watched, breathless, the figure began to walk towards him. There was something strange about the way the figure moved. It did not limp or stumble, but some aspect of its progress made Antony suspect that it was blind.
He remembered that there was a dagger beneath his pillow, but the figure was so strangely fascinating that he did not think to reach for it. Instead, he watched helplessly until the strange visitor was standing at the end of the bed. One arm reached up and pulled the hood back. From nothing. Above the shoulders there was darkness. Vacancy. And Antony realised with a shock which left him breathless that there had been no hand on the end of the arm that removed the hood from the place where there was no head either.
‘You know me,’ said the apparition.
The whole encounter was so strange that it did not even occur to Antony to wonder how a ghost with no head could actually speak.
‘I know you Marcus Tullius,’ he said through chattering teeth. ‘But why are you here?’
‘To tell you that you will see me again. At Actium.’
‘At Actium?’ he repeated.
‘Yes,’ the shade intoned. ‘At Actium.’
‘And what the fuck is at Actium?’ he shouted.
But the ghost was gone.
Antony sprang awake. Sat up. He was covered in sweat. The bed seemed suffocatingly warm. Although the bedside lamp was out, there was brightness coming in through the open doorway. The room was full of bright surfaces and dark shadow. A figure stood hesitantly, framed against the brightness from outside. Solid. Complete. Bareheaded. Scale armour faintly gleaming.
‘You called, general?’ said the figure. A praetorian guard.
‘No. It’s alright. Nothing to worry about.’
The soldier saluted. Vanished.
Antony lay back, his mind racing as he sought to control his breathing. It never occurred to him that the visitation was anything other than real. That Cicero had come to haunt him despite Septem’s good work disposing properly of the body. There were rumours that Divus Julius visited Brutus on occasion. But surely that was different. Cicero had been mortal. Once his spirit was carried by Charon across the River Acheron to the underworld, surely he should stay there. But Divus Julius was a God. He could come and go across the Elysian Fields and Olympus with Jupiter, Venus Victrix the founder of his family and the rest. Walk in and out of the underworld just as he wished, crossing the Acheron as easily as he had crossed the Rubicon. Able to wander the world at will, therefore, talking to whoever he liked.
But Cicero had been mortal. Cicero was dead, cremated in due form and buried. That should be the end of the matter. Perhaps he and Fulvia had kept the old fart’s head too long. Maybe it was time for it to go up in the Forum with all the rest.
Antony eased himself back beneath the bedclothes and waited for sleep to reclaim him. But just as he began to doze off a couple of errant questions seemed to pop into his mind from nowhere.
Where on earth was Actium? And what the fuck was there?
v
‘The general was specific about this, tribune?’ asked Artemidorus.
‘Yes, Septem. It’s little enough to ask when he’s giving you fifty thousand Attic drachmas,’ Enobarbus answered.
‘Promising to give them to me at any rate.’
‘Have you ever known him to break his word, Septem? Any more than you’ve ever broken your word to him?’
‘Fair enough. But it’s still asking a lot in my opinion. Where did he get a nail this length anyway? It must be well over a foot long.’
‘From a legionary blacksmith I should imagine. There are enough of them nearby.’
The two soldiers were crossing the Forum Romanum. The two day festival of Saturnalia was over, and the city consequently quiet. In the grip of a massive hangover, suspected Artemidorus. Cicero had been dead for twelve days – including the day he died. His extremities seemed surprisingly well preserved, however. But it appeared that Antony and Fulvia had had enough of playing their sick games with them. Cicero was no longer to be the guest of dishonour at their table. No longer to be the centre of attention, his opinion constantly sought, his achievements constantly mocked, his tongue all-but severed with pin-pricks and stylus wounds.
The spymaster and spy had just finished nailing his hands to the Senate house door. Aptly enough, thought the Centurion, in exactly the same place the Second Philippic had been nailed. The speech that Cicero wrote and published - but never gave. The one that really declared open war on Antony.
And now they were to dispose of his head.
The weather was oppressive, as it had been gathering during the two days of the festival. Icy northern sleet-laden winds swinging round to a warmer but wetter and more unstable southerly. Thick, dark clouds sat low above the city, threatening a downpour that had not started yet. But the usually bustling Forum was quiet enough to allow the two soldiers to hear a rumble of distant thunder. The late-morning light had a strange, yellow tinge. Which only added to the horror of the Forum itself. Horror which, to be fair, had become almost commonplace during the last couple of weeks. It was difficult to count the number of stakes at one glance, thought Artemidorus. You had to stop and number each one of them. They were arranged in rows in front of the Rostra. They stood as high as a tall man. The bases that held them erect crudely fashioned of raw wood. Their uprights scarcely better, chopped to rough points, just sharp enough for the neck-section of a severed head to be jammed firmly down upon them. The dead faces somehow looking skywards as though hoping the gods might yet show mercy. Most of their lower jaws were sagging as though the silent mouths were emitting one last never ending scream.
The number had started at seventeen but there were many more than that now. The first heads spiked were unrecognisable, for the crows had been at them. Their eyes had gone within the first few hours. The soft parts of their cheeks, lips and noses next. Their temptingly lolling tongues. The easy-to reach tit-bits of their ears after that. Some enterprising crows had even managed to break into one or two skulls and scoop out beakfuls of brain.
But none of the birds had bothered to be so adventurous with the later heads. The increasingly glutted creatures had been content with eyes, cheeks, lips and noses. Voiding their bowels even as they ate in a hopeless attempt become light enough to fly. So that the heads, already subject to the indignities of removal and spiking, were further insulted by being eaten and then covered with bird-droppings. Even so, as the two soldiers marched across the all-but deserted Forum, they were confronted with birds so heavily gorged that they could no longer take to the air. Instead they hopped and squawked, like chickens with their wings trimmed. As they came closer to the foul creatures, Enobarbus aimed one or two murderous kicks in their direction while the pair of them walked through the forest of spikes with their strange fruit and disgusting denizens.
***
‘On the front of the Rostra itself?’ Artemidorus persisted. ‘Not on a spike?’
‘It’s what the general wants,’ answered Enobarbus. ‘He was very specific. And, to a certain extent, you’re the one to blame. He’d never have thought of it if Fulvia hadn’t almost pushed her finger in through his forehead in the first place.’
‘Well,’ said Artemidorus, ‘at least if we do what’s ordered these foul crows will find it almost impossible to dig out his eyes and mutilate his face.’
‘Talking of which,’ asked Enobarbus. ‘How is Ferrata?’
‘Lost his left eye,’ answered Artemidorus. ‘Antistius says he’ll never see out of it again. He’s making an eye patch to protect it and stop it getting infected in the short term. He may want to take out the eyeball. Replace it with a round stone if we can find one the right size. The cheek
is still a mess, but apparently it will heal better than we feared at first. And as Ferrata says, he can always grow a beard.’
‘Puella? Over Mercury?’
‘As much as she’ll ever be. But back to normal in all other areas.’
‘Good. The rest of the crypteia?’
‘As normal. All still up in Quintus’ villa keeping sharp and raring to go.’
‘I have some information about that. But let’s get this done first. I’ll hold while you hammer.’
‘I’m not too happy about this,’ admitted Artemidorus.
‘And yet you didn’t hesitate to do the damage in the first place...’
‘That was different.’ Artemidorus moved the hammer and the long grey nail into his left hand, reached into his wallet and pulled out the mysterious golden fascinus. ‘For once I feel like I need more than just Achilleus’ hands over me offering protection!’ he said showing the golden good-luck charm to Enobarbus.
‘Where did you get that?’’ asked the Tribune.
Artemidorus explained. Then, ‘Why?’ he asked.
‘It’s just that Lucius Flavius Felix says he’s lost one just like it. Down near Cicero’s villa in Formia too.’
Artemidorus was silent for a moment. Then he said, ‘Felix. I must ask him about that when I get the chance.’ There was another pause as the secret agent re-ordered his suspicions. Perhaps Popilius Lenas was too obviously a murderous thug too confident that he had an unassailable lead, too tightly focussed on getting Cicero’s head and the twenty-five thousand Attic drachmas to bother setting an ambush. Perhaps Lucius Flavius Felix was just too much of a good thing after all, always there when it mattered. Always watching his back – unasked.
Winning his trust with unexpected assistance in unimportant matters; planning to betray him when things got important. Just as Cyanea had.
‘You hold,’ he said after a moment more. ‘I’ll hammer.’
Enobarbus held Cicero’s head, level with his own, against a square of solid wood on the front face of the Rostra. Then, twisting his shoulders uncomfortably, he stepped back while fighting to keep the head in place. Artemidorus placed the point of the huge nail exactly in the middle of the indentation his slingshot had caused. Drew in an unsteady breath – not least because Cicero’s eyes were open and watching him while the mouth lolled as though the great orator was just about to speak. He struck the head of the nail with the crude hammer Antony had selected for the job. Two gentle taps and the nail’s point vanished. Half a dozen more and the shank of the nail pierced the softness of that miraculous brain. Until the point came hard up against the back of Cicero’s skull. Artemidorus could feel it – almost see it. The sharp metal scraping against the inner eggshell-curve of bone. He took one last, deep, shaking breath, and drove the nail through and into the wood behind Cicero’s head. Once. Twice. Three times. Until the grey head of the nail was only just protruding from Cicero’s forehead like the eye of the Cyclops balefully regarding Odysseus.
Enobarbus let go. Stepped back. Artemidorus stood rooted to the spot. The head remained solidly in place. The staring eyes transfixing the lawyer’s murderer. Seeming to watch the entire Forum. The strange light flickered, making the dead head seem to blink. The thunder snarled, nearer this time. As though the lawyer was clearing his throat to speak.
Artemidorus looked up at the lowering sky. ‘Time to go,’ he said. ‘Before Jupiter starts with the thunderbolts.’
‘You think he’ll be aiming at you?’ asked Enobarbus.
‘I wouldn’t lay odds against it,’ answered Artemidorus, turning to go as the first huge raindrops came down like a deluge of slingshots. ‘What information?’ he asked.
‘What?’ asked Enobarbus.
‘You said you had some information for me and the crypteia. That you’d tell me after we’d finished with the head...’
‘Oh. That. Yes. Antony has a mission he wants you to prepare for. You won’t be able to undertake it for a couple of months yet, but he wants you ready to leave the moment it’s safe to sail.’
‘Sail? Where to?’
‘Alexandria. He’s concerned that when he and Caesar start their invasion of Macedonia and Greece to confront Brutus and Cassius, he’ll be leaving his flank and his lines of communication open to naval assault. Especially when he gets the far side of Greece and follows the Via Egnatia down to the coast. Past Thessalonkia. He wants you to go and convince Queen Cleopatra to send the Egyptian navy to watch his back.’
‘Cleopatra. He wants me to negotiate with Cleopatra.’
‘He’ll give you more details in the new year. And the authorities, commissions and funds you’ll need. You do seem to have risen in his estimation quite considerably recently. Possibly because Caesar thinks pretty highly of you too. He’s even talking of making you a tribune.’
The two men walked silently into the shelter of the part-built Basilica Julia. The usually crowded half-constructed common rooms were sparsely populated. The makeshift law courts almost empty. The day after Saturnalia, thought Artemidorus. The day the greatest lawyer of the age had his head nailed up on the Rostra. The trivial observations serving to stop his mind whirling out of control with surprise and speculation. Alexandria. Cleopatra. Watching Antony’s back. He turned. Looked back across the rainswept Forum to where Cicero was still watching him from the front of the Rostra. Watching them all, he thought. Just as he always had in life.
‘Oh, and there’s one more thing,’ said Enobarbus. ‘I don’t understand it myself and I have no idea how important it is.’
‘Oh?’ said Artemidorus, dragging his eyes away from Cicero’s steady, accusing gaze. ‘What’s that?’
‘On your way out to Alexandria, the general wants you to stop off on the coast of Greece. Go to a fly-speck of a place called Actium. And find out just what the fuck there is there.’
THE END
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
All the major events in Cicero Dies! happened very much as described. Even the more outrageous ones such as the fates of the unforgiveable Minucius Basilus (the ‘baddy’ in all three of the Caesar’s Spies stories so far because of the sadistic predilections recorded against him – Gaius Trebonius and Cicero’s brother Quintus - by the classical authorities) and the unfortunate Philologus. The classical authorities rather present Cicero himself at the end of his life as frightened, confused and hesitant. I have tried to show how the decisions he made might have been rational and sensible ones - dictated by circumstances far beyond his control; given that the story is told from the point of view of the man commanded to kill him. Cicero was not killed by a slingshot however – he was beheaded (at some length) by Popilius Lenas who famously told Antony he would use his bounty to have a statue made of himself resting his foot on Cicero’s head. Which amused Antony so much that he doubled the bounty. Fulvia did stick pins (and probably a stylus) through Cicero’s tongue before his head and hands were displayed in the Forum.
My major source for the historical events was Appian though I also consulted all the other classical historians whose works illuminated the earlier books in this series, leaning rather more heavily in this instance on the Works of Cicero himself. Of more modern authorities, I must acknowledge (amongst others too numerous to name),Trollope’s Life of Cicero (especially Volume 2), Robert Harris’ Dictator, Sir Ronald Syme’s classic The Roman Revolution, Augustus by Adrian Goldsworthy, Patricia Southern’s Mark Antony A Life, Rose Mary Sheldon’s unique and seminal Intelligence Activities in Ancient Rome, Richard Foreman’s excellent Augustus books and, less predictably perhaps, the wonderful Life of Caesar podcast put online by Cameron Reilly and Ray Harris which I cannot recommend too highly – to those Ancient Roman buffs of a robust disposition.
Road to War
Peter Tonkin
Sharpe Books
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ITALY
I: The Proscribed
i
Three men were hurrying through the streets of Rome late one afternoon early in Februarius. The year was 712 ab urbe condita, since the founding of the city. Two years, less a month and some days, since the murder of Gaius Julius Caesar. A few scant weeks since the dead dictator had formally been nominated Divus Julius, Julius the God, an official State Deity by the Senate.
The Consuls for this year – confirmed on the kalends of Januarius, the first day of last month – were Marcus Aemilius Lepidus and Lucius Munatius Plancus and the year would be known by their names, though everyone in the Republic knew the real power lay with the Triumvirs Mark Antony, the murdered god Caesar’s friend and colleague, and young Octavianus his adopted son and heir.
Octavianus who called himself Julius Caesar Octavianus, Divus Fili, son of a God, these days and, like Antony, would stop at nothing to avenge his divine father’s death. On those directly involved, their supporters, associates, family, and friends.
The weather that day was wet and bitter. The afternoon was darkening unnaturally early, filling Rome’s streets and alleys with thickening shadows. But the interiors of tabernae taverns, shops and public buildings were bright with lamplight, which spilled into the gusty overcast, so it was still possible to make out some details as the little group hurried from one bright doorway to another.
