by AM Kirkby
***
Another June came, another Vestalia; the year was almost half way through, and what had Tanaquil to show for it? There were still, sometimes, afternoons that seemed endless, moments of eternity – when she rode out, sometimes listening to a waterfall's unceasing whisper under the chatter of her women, or looking up at the still blue sky. But the year seemed to have hurried away, like the clouds of a summer shower chased away by the wind, and nothing to show for it.
Awnings had been erected in the courtyard of the Virgins' House; not much more than a length of cloth slung between poles, they swung and yawed in the breeze. The trees of the sacred grove leant over the further side of the court, shading it with their feathery leaves, but the nearer side was in sunlight. Beneath the pale yellowing fabric of the awnings, even the light seemed warmer, the air slightly dank and heavy; there was a smell of smoke from tiny hearths, just outside the tents, whose fires burned low and fitfully except where a woman fanned the flames for a moment. Women were clustered in little groups, sitting on the floor, or squatting round the little fires; some chanted prayers, uttering each syllable speedily, never changing note; one was singing a lullaby almost under her breath, so that Tanaquil never caught the melody entire, but only hints of it, odd melodic turns or fragmentary words; "father comes," "silver and gold," "princess, sleep". Another, older woman was muttering something about fire under the ground, ancestors walking, in a low voice, at the same time whispered and urgent.
But it was strangely quiet, as if the women were afraid they'd waken a child who slept. Or perhaps – despite that fragmentary lullaby which kept pulling her thoughts back to the cloying smell of milk and the clumsy nuzzling of her children at the breast – it was more like the quiet of someone tiptoeing past a dog known to be dangerous, or walking above a landslide carefully, placing each foot silently to prevent the earth shaking.
Fabia had met Tanaquil at the gate; her hair braided and piled high under her veils, she seemed to stand taller than usual. But Tanaquil thought her fires were flimsy things, compared with the fire she'd seen surrounding Servius, blazing like a pine forest fire when the resin starts to burn inside the cracking trees. That fire would bear all with it; these little fires were just about adequate to their task of toasting the wheat the women had brought.
They made their way through the tents; the grey-clad Roman women scattered like sparrows before them, heads bowed, frightened or overawed. Tanaquil and Fabia stood apart, Fabia in the pure white of her priestly dress, Tanaquil in bright scarlet and gold, even her hair sparkling with gold clasps and bells.
"Strange, isn't it?"
"What is?" Tanaquil asked.
"A whole temple given over to women. Not a man in sight."
Tanaquil laughed. "In Rome, it's strange. Not at home."
"Home?" Fabia smiled. "How long have you been in Rome, now?"
"...And Tarchna's still home? I've given up counting."
"If you went back, it wouldn't be the same."
"I know that; haven't been back for twenty years. But it's still home, and always will be... I like this, you know."
"Like what?"
"The whole temple full of women. And so quiet."
"It is rather special." Fabia spoke with pride; as a child ran past her, she put her hand for a moment on its head, and the infant stood serious-faced and still long enough for Fabia to laugh, and pat its back and send it on its way. These were her people. "The whole year is compressed into this single week, for some of them; the one week they come and make the mola salsa. - See those two there?"
There were two women, one thin, worn down with the sourness and sadness that sometimes accompanied middle age, the other, though no younger, at ease and happy within her rounded form, and yet their two faces were almost the same; the same noses, small and slightly flattened at the end; the same eyes, with lazy, drooping eyelids; the same rather weak chin.
"Livia!" - the thin one turned, and seeing Fabia broke into an unexpected smile. "Julia. Both here again this year. No babies, Livia?"
"Not this year. Maximus is old enough to leave at home now."
"She has seven," Julia explained.
"And how is Paullus treating you?"
Livia looked down.
"There'll be no more babies," Julia said, and her sister looked up at her reproachfully.
"He's looking after you?"
Livia nodded.
"And he doesn't hit her," Julia added, as if this was something that needed to be said.
Fabia smiled on them, and her smile was like a blessing, generously but intentionally bestowed, but none the less truly warm. More than mere diplomacy, Tanaquil thought; she meant it. Perhaps having never had children, Fabia had a store of unused affection to shower on these women; a side to the shrewd Vestal that she hadn't seen before.
"Give my love to little Tertia," Fabia said. A broken eye tooth showed in Livia's smile.
"I will, I will. She'll ask, you know. She always does."
"Bring her, next time."
"I will."
They passed on. On one fire, a girl who hardly looked fifteen jiggled the wheat on a griddle, and a baby on one hip. Fabia greeted her by name, found out the child was called Cloelia, squatted to kiss its sparse blond hair, passed on again.
"I remember her at that age," she said. "The same blond hair."
It hadn't lasted. It never did.
A group of women with spelt cakes and fruit and honey laid on a cloth in front of them called Fabia over, and she exchanged a few words with them, but wouldn't stay, leaving them to their meal. But at another hearth, she sat down with the women, taking the rough wheat in her hand, cracking the spiky ears and rubbing off the chaff.
Tanaquil was surprised. "They bring it unthreshed?"
"It's part of the rite."
"Hard work."
"It's meant to be."
Tanaquil looked down at Fabia, sitting in the dirt and yet quite composed, among all these women as rounded as chickens, and as distracted. She stood, alone of all the women; she would not sit upon the ground.
These were the women she never saw, the Roman women who scurried veiled across the streets, the women whose lives were lived only indoors, in dim rooms or grey courtyards. Women who always seemed bowed or stooped, and who, here, were seated, or rocked on their heels, by the firesides they never left.
Two of the women had new babies since last year; one had a new husband.
"I didn't know..."
"Publius was killed fighting the Vipienas."
"That's why you weren't here last year."
The woman nodded.
"I missed you, you know."
There would be more women with new husbands, or no husbands, next year, Tanaquil thought; if Servius had his way.
"Atia's been hunting."
"I have not." That fierce girl had to be Atia.
"You have too."
"What of it?"
"Nice girls don't hunt," the other one said with a certain amount of heat. She was pretty, with the kind of insipid, damp prettiness that doesn't last long beyond childhood.
"My brother takes me."
"Well he shouldn't. And he wouldn't if you didn't ask."
"I don't need to ask. He says I'm a good hunter."
"You say that as if you're proud of it!"
"And so she should be," Fabia said. "Anything is worth doing well. Even hunting. Even when Atia does it."
The other girl scowled.
"But make sure you're always with your brother, won't you, Atia?"
"I always am," Atia said defiantly. "Though I'm a better stalker than he is."
"I'm sure you are."
"You'd think the hares could hear her coming," the other girl said. "She's noisy enough."
"You're being unfair, Julia. A woman can be quieter than most men."
Julia scowled again.
"Well it's true. I know you can be quiet," Fabia said smoothly. "And Atia can when she wants to."
"And you have a nice smile, when you want to use it," Fabia said. "I dare say it will bring the right young man to your father's door one day."
Tanaquil was getting restive, and her tapping foot must have drawn Fabia's attention. The Vestal looked up, and met Tanaquil's eyes.
"I suppose we should be moving on."
"Oh, not yet!" two of three of the women said, and then giggled at having said the same thing almost in chorus.
"We only see you once a year," Atia said. "It's a long time to wait till next Vestalia."
"Well... just a little while. Won't you sit down, Tanaquil?"
But Tanaquil would not.
There was more talk of husbands, but this time, the question was of marriages for the older daughters; family alliances, inheritances, bargains. Who owned which fields, who voted with which bloc, who fought in the same units. And of course Fabia, the one woman in Rome with the right to bear witness, the keeper of wills and deeds, would know.
"But not Junius."
"Why not?"
"Have you seen him flogging his horse?"
"True, he's got his father's temper."
Who traded with which cities, in what goods. Who had no other sons in their families, or too many. So many bargaining chips. Well, that was true in her own family; the way they'd married off Arruns and Tarquin to the two Tullias. Even back then she knew they'd got that the wrong way round, the way Tarquin had looked at the flame-haired girl, and see what had come of it...
"I like your tibina."
She looked down; the owner of that hesitant voice was a slight woman, dressed in what was almost the regulation homespun grey, but thinner, more finely textured fabric than usual, and a lighter colour, almost like a pigeon's downy breast feathers.
"Tebenna," she said, and saw the woman look away, as if ashamed. She hadn't meant to be so severe. "I dyed it myself," she said.
The woman looked up at her again, her eyes soft. "I didn't think you would do your own dyeing. Such a great lady."
"I use madder. The best stuff comes from the wild hills past Velzna."
"It's such an intense red. How do you..."
"Dyeing it cold."
"You don't boil it up?"
"No. I macerate the roots for two weeks. Then the yarn goes in. And it stays there, another week or so."
The woman was silent, just looking greedily at the vivid red. It was interesting that it was the red that had caught her eye; most people would have noticed the gold thread of the embroidered fringes first, not the colour of the cloth.
"You should try it."
"I might," the woman said tentatively, and Tanaquil realised she'd been stupid; even if she did dye such a red successfully, the woman would never be able to wear it in public.
"You should. Wear it as an underskirt."
"I could. I will." The woman grinned like a child caught showing off.
Fabia progressed so slowly; every woman had to be greeted, newcomers introduced, children, where they had come with their mothers, kissed or patted, and where they hadn't, enquired about. It was like a diplomatic event, where what's important is not what is said, but to ensure that no one is missed out; of course, Tanaquil realised, it is a diplomatic event, a whole network of hidden influence. It was amazing that Fabia had been able to construct it within such constraints; or had she inherited it from Vestals who went before? Fabia admired each woman's work; very nice, Cornelia... Tertia, they're meant to be salty, it's not a problem... how is your littlest? He didn't have the best start... but he'll live. And Tanaquil stood stiffly, wishing she'd ever had the common touch, and knowing she didn't, and at the same time resenting the demands of such banal, ordinary women on her time.
"Such mean lives," she complained to Fabia later. "They're all so small, so hesitant, so limited."
"You don't see what I do," Fabia said. "They live their lives through small braveries; and it's the tiniest daring that costs them the most. Every small liberty has to be fought for, over and over again."
"And they are still not free."
"Each woman fights for the single small thing she wants the most. It concentrates the mind wonderfully, you know."
"I'm sure it does."
"You can waste your life pursuing so many choices; to go to this city, that one, hunting, feasting, to pursue this lover or that one. And at the end, what have you achieved?"
"Quite a lot, as it happens. Or is Queen of Rome nothing?"
"That's not what I meant."
"So you fight all your life for the right to wear a single shred of brightness."
Fabia nodded.
"Why don't they rebel?"
"Could you, if you'd not been brought up to it?"
"You did."
"No. I simply took another path."
"No man has any power over you."
"No. But I live under other constraints."
"My freedom isn't absolute."
"Can I ask you something?"
Fabia gave her a very direct look; she wasn't fooled. To ask that meant that Tanaquil was going to ask her something that was at the same time important and confidential; that she wanted an answer, and a confidence, and no questions. "Of course."
And she knew, instantly, that she couldn't ask Fabia; that however much she lied, said it had happened to one of her servants, blamed another man, in another city at some past time, Fabia would speculate, would somehow tease out the truth of what had happened with Servius; would use it against her, or to extort some favour. Even if Fabia didn't use it, the possibility that she might would always be there, and that, Tanaquil couldn't bear.
"This day is so important to those women," Fabia said. "The one day for some of the younger mothers that they can be apart from their children. For others their only day of freedom from a jealous husband. The only day they have to themselves."
"And they spend it making cakes."
"But they make cakes for the goddess, they bake them in the temple, they have all day to do it. Their minds are clear as a deep pool. Life is relentless; the baby cries, the children grab, and men impose their desires or jealousies, there's harvest to be done, bread to be cooked, and dust that's no sooner swept away than it starts to accumulate again. And for one day, nothing."
"A rest day. Not so important."
"A day of emptiness. A day of one, single, simple task. It's then you can understand the gods."
"Women can always understand. It's men who are always looking for the next weapon, the next war, the next trade. They never step back from it."
"Do you?"
Tanaquil wondered.
"I tried to teach Servius prophecy once. But he..."
She didn't like the sound of his name in her mouth.
"Not a success?"
"He wants to take, only to take. He doesn't understand it's a dance."
Life kept serving her dishes that spoiled. First Tarquinius, who'd lost his youth, and his talent, and her love, and in the end his life; and then she'd hoped for a new beginning with Servius, and that failed, too.
"Can I ask you one thing?" Fabia said, and Tanaquil feared that the Vestal had guessed the truth.
"In all this twisting and turning, are you sure you know now what you want to do? Do you know what you want to achieve? Or are you sometimes just playing the game because you don't know how not to?"
"Sometimes," Tanaquil said, "sometimes."
"So..."
"Sometimes... you have to take a step back before you can move forwards. And sometimes..."
"Yes?"
"Sometimes the gods speak, and..."
Fabia's eyes were soft, encouraging, and for a moment Tanaquil felt close to tears, and worse, close to telling Fabia everything for which, although she knew she had no guilt, she blamed herself; she understood what the Roman women saw in their mother Vestal.
"...sometimes you wish they hadn't."
"I don'
t really understand," Fabia said. "The gods don't talk to me. Though I walk pretty close to them, every day; I feel them there, but they don't speak."
She reached out, taking Tanaquil's hand in both of hers.
"You're lucky to hear them," she said; then, "Shall we go?"
Under the great wooden beams of the roof the sanctuary stood dark except for a slash of faint light across the floor from the eastern doorway. In the huge stone hearth, the embers glowed darkly, and the colours changed, from black to dull red, from dull red to black,like the breathing of some huge and dreaming beast. Sporadically there was a flash of orange, as the blackened face of the log fell away to reveal the still burning heart; and then it slept again.
And there in the back of the shrine, hardly visible through dark and drifting smoke, was the huge goddess, no human figure but the ancient trunk of a tree, with thick layers of white paint crowning it, and dribbled down its deeply etched and gullied sides. How ancient, how very ancient it was; it came from Troy, how many generations ago? There had been five kings of Rome, and fifteen kings in Alba before that, four hundred years or more; and before that, how many generations of kings in distant, now abandoned Troy?
"You feel it?" Fabia asked.
A dark silence, like ripples spreading from that ancient source. Not her gods of fire and thunder, spring and river, her gods hidden and bounded, but something richer and deeper and darker, like the tree that would never leaf again, and the fire that never blazed.