‘Before you go, you and Romilius,’ he rapped out, ‘you’ll do me the favour of searching this pretty tigress thoroughly ... and I mean thoroughly, lads....’
Convulsed with horror, Fanina leapt up to the head of the bed. When she had her back to the wall, she shouted to the two Praetorians as they slowly advanced towards her, their eyes hot with lust, their big, hairy hands ready to seize her:
‘The first man to touch me ...’
‘You’ll tear his eyes out, as you did to poor Casselius,’ jibed Sejanus.
‘Yes, I’ll tear his eyes out!’
She did not have time to say another word. The two men suddenly made a dive for her, one on either side, seized her by the shoulders and flung her down headlong on the spotless furs.
Screaming with rage and fear, almost beside herself, feeling her reason giving way, Fanina fought, bit and scratched, but to no avail. The two men let their thick fingers roam all over her body, pummelling her, poking bawdily at her, turning her this way and that and laughing coarsely the while; and little by little they stripped her, as a fruit is peeled, of the last vestiges of cloth that covered her nakedness.
Then, as she lay on her face, arms outstretched, as naked as the day she was born, Gryllus gave her a great slap on the behind and said with a laugh:
‘Mission accomplished, master! I found nothing.’
Shaken with violent sobs, Fanina felt a final wrench, then a burning sensation round her neck. With a sharp tug, Romilius had torn from her the precious box she wore round her neck on a gold chain: the box containing the counter-poison pills Locusta had given her.
The guard handed it to Sejanus who opened it mechanically, glanced at its contents, sniffed them, then dropped it on the ground, saying:
‘We’ll talk about that later.’
The door slammed. Fanina looked up. Romilius and Gryllus had gone and were clattering down the stairs, laughing uproariously. She was alone with Sejanus.
Chapter Eleven
With her eyes starting out of her head, Fanina watched Sejanus bolt the door, then slowly and deliberately take off his clothes.
Becoming once more aware of her own nakedness she seized one of the bear-skins, wrapped it round her and hurriedly clambered back on to the far end of the bed. Panting for breath, she looked about her in despair. Apart from the bed, a small table, a stool and a brazier, the vast whitewashed room was empty. The door was bolted.
She could not reach the one and only window without having to pass Sejanus.
Sejanus, stark naked and hot eyed, was slowly running his tongue over his red, fleshy, womanly lips as he moved towards her.
He was drawing nearer. Her back cold with sweat, paralysed with fear, Fanina was unable to tear her eyes away from that gaunt, brown soldier’s body covered with scars, so different from Vindex’s supple, slender frame, and that sinewy chest whose thick black covering of hair, glistening like a raven’s wing, stood out in sharp contrast to his clean-cut limbs from which every trace of hair had been removed.
With set face, half-open mouth and fixed expression, he came on towards her, the very incarnation of desire. He wanted her, he was going to take her, and in all reasonableness, she could not stand up against him.
‘Don’t take another step, Sejanus!’ she cried.
He hesitated a moment.
‘So you recognized me, did you?’ he said in a thick, almost stifled voice.
He was surprised to hear her speak his name; surprised, but not enough to make him change his mind. This was no time for explanations, he reckoned. He would question her later, but now he wanted her and nothing else mattered.
‘What do you want to know?’ she cried again, wild with fear. He shook his head slowly without taking his eyes off her, as he came on still, deaf to her questions and intent on his purpose. He stretched his arms out to prevent her from escaping and placed one knee on the bed.
She went on in piteous tones:
‘Question me, Sejanus! ... I’ll tell you all you want to know! I swear I will!’
‘Later ... later,’ he murmured.
Kneeling on the bed he came still closer and put out one hand towards her. Flattening herself desperately against the wall, she stammered:
‘Not that, Sejanus! Not that, I beg you! Spare me that, by all the gods! You can’t force me ... you can’t make me ... it isn’t worthy of you....’
‘You are beautiful, too beautiful!’ he whispered.
He was close to her now, a slim bronze statue with hard, knotted muscles, facing her. Tiny droplets of sweat hung in beads on his forehead.
They looked at each other, as if to exert some mutual fascination, to impose their conflicting wills on each other.
How was she to tear herself away from the disturbing attraction of those bright blue eyes standing out against his smooth, dark face, and of his mouth, swollen with desire, which made her forget the gaunt lines of his cruel jaw, like that of a beast of prey?
Suddenly he reached out and his hand caught hold of the spotless fur Fanina had wrapped round her; with one brisk tug he threw aside the last barrier that stood between them.
She was at his mercy. Convulsed, she felt his hands brush her bare bosom, then slide down to her hips to pull her towards him. She gave a sudden lunge and threw herself at him in an attempt to make him topple over so that she could escape to the other side of the room.
She fell with a sobbing groan, for he had caught her in full flight, had thrown her down and held her crushed beneath his body.
She heard herself moan:
‘Not you! I am not yours! It’s not you I belong to!’
She belonged only to Vindex! She must keep herself for Vindex! Buried in this voluptuous heap of brilliantly white furs that stifled her cries and weakened her defence, she fought madly, twisting and turning like a snake to escape the interminable, unbearable caresses he was lavishing upon her.
She moaned as she went on fighting him. Now she knew he would not violate her. Sejanus was not one of the brutes who had tried to rape her the night she had lost Vindex. He wanted to take her with her consent, and she felt herself weakening.
Why did he not stun her to have her in his power! That way he would have spared her the remorse she knew she would never cease to feel. But he was going to take her when she had become submissive and was drunk with the pleasure they would give each other. Only a miracle could tear her from those burning lips, so gentle yet so firm, from that mouth which with such skilful, tireless persistence was bending her to his inexorable will. Her mind still rebelled, cursing the body that no longer obeyed her. The irresistible attraction of that firm, compact and brutal body over her weak naked flesh would prove too much for her.
Worn out by the nervous strain of her long hopeless struggle, she knew she could not resist him much longer. This was what she was waiting for with her whole being, overwhelmed by desire that tortured her frustrated senses, overcome by the intoxicating caresses Sejanus was the first to bestow on her, and which, even before he had taken possession of her, had already lifted her to the peak of pleasure.
The name of Vindex had sprung to her lips as if to offer up her joy to him, although he had not been its cause.
‘No! No!’ she cried again.
No, she would not betray Vindex ... she would not betray him ...
She was still swearing to herself that she would not betray the man she loved when, unable to resist any longer, she rather gave than abandoned herself to the man who, through his devilish skill in the ways of love, had opened up a completely unsuspected world of pleasure to her.
Afterwards, she wept.
Chapter Twelve
With her thick golden hair dishevelled, contrasting sharply with the mat whiteness of the soft furs she lay upon, her face buried in her hands, her shoulders heaving with uncontrollable sobs, Fanina cried and cried.
She was choking with shame. Why was she not dead? Why had the gods given her so weak, so vulnerable a body, so easily forced into s
ubmission?
She hated herself.
She wheeled round as if stung. Sejanus’s fingers, creeping stealthily between her body and the furs, were once again wandering over her bruised breasts. Furious, she growled:
‘I hate you!’
The commander of the Praetorians lay beside her, a living bronze statue, with his short curly grey locks flattened on his bare brow, and gave an amused laugh.
‘Any man lucky enough to have had the delicious opportunity to observe you a few moments ago would not have suspected that you harboured such unkind feelings towards me,’ he whispered.
Rolling over on to one side to be closer to her, he went on sarcastically:
‘Long experience has taught me how short a pretty woman’s memory is. And that is why I shall not be cruel enough to repeat to you the very flattering words you said as you gave yourself to me so willingly and with a passion I had hardly dared hope for.... But why, alas, as soon as the last cry of pleasure has died away, must you become spiteful again, and ready to tear my eyes out if I am not careful?’
Trembling and distraught, Fanina sat up. Clothed only by her hair, that hung down her body in thick, shining waves, hands tense and fingers bent back ready to tear at him with their sharp nails, she faced him.
Leaning on one elbow, he watched her with a disturbing expression; his irony was giving way to wonder, and to the desire rising again within him. Once again, Sejanus’s voice began to lose its hard clarity. It grew hoarser, almost faltering.
‘Everything about you seems to indicate that I was a pretty poor lover,’ he said as he slowly sat up. ‘But the night is not yet done, my pretty tigress, and the day to come may well have many many more delights in store for us ... I can still redeem my honour, and by Hercules, I intend to do so! ’
They eyed one another, she fiercely, on the defensive, ready to repulse the dangerous assault she sensed was about to begin; while he watched her, his mouth dry, with a connoisseur’s eye for her delicious curves, her fascinating undulations, the adorable colour of her young body half hidden beneath those thick locks of pure gold, savouring her in advance, imagining all the delectable caresses with which he would overwhelm her in order to have her at his mercy once more.
‘You are lovely, very lovely,’ he whispered. ‘That body, those legs, that wonderful hair ... and that face ... the face of a woman whose image pursues me without my being able to remember where I met her.’
This time Fanina knew just how dangerous this older man was to her, this man whose amorous technique, both subtle and brutal, had enslaved her. In order to protect herself, to prevent herself succumbing to his caresses, which she knew her sensual body could not resist, she repeated softly to herself all the invectives she had mentally hurled at him that first time they had met in the Triumphal Way, when she had felt herself grow faint with shame and helpless rage beneath his rapacious stare.
Straightening imperceptibly, Fanina brushed aside from a face livid with fury some of the stray locks that had fallen over it, in order to let him see her withering glance.
Then he spoke, in a strangled voice:
‘It’s you!’
And suddenly the expression of the all powerful commander of the Praetorian Guard changed. He stared at her with a blanched face.
‘You!’ he repeated.
He leapt off the bed like one gone suddenly mad, then staggering, retreated hastily to the middle of the room.
‘It can’t be!’ he stammered.
Still unable to catch his breath, he murmured:
‘Fanina!’
The vision of the priestess dressed all in white, whom his sacrilegious eyes had stripped of her clothes in the Via Triumphalis, had suddenly come back to him. In this fascinating stranger, whom lie had found it impossible not to enjoy before subjecting her to detailed questioning, he had just recognized the innocent, pure little vestal virgin, as she had reacted beneath his lewd stare; the little vestal whose tragic fate the entire Empire knew.
‘The dead vestal! The dead vestal!’ he panted, crushed by the inexpressible dread that had seized him.
Their roles were now reversed. Now it was Sejanus who trembled before Fanina. It was the proud, shameless seducer, whose conquests and amorous exploits were too numerous to be counted, who now stood naked before the woman he saw as the ghost of the little vestal who had been buried alive in the Field of Evil-doers; he found himself completely at a loss to know how to act.
Their roles had been reversed too suddenly for Fanina to get her bearings, or to decide how she should behave. Once again she had been taken unawares. Everything always happened too swiftly in her life. Now she was no longer the loser, and she must adopt a different attitude. Masking her perplexity and indecision behind a smooth, cold, impenetrable expression she reached out for one of the huge white furs that lay about her, and calmly covered her naked body.
Wild eyed, Sejanus followed her every gesture as if the most insignificant were capable of triggering off some terrifying prodigy. Tiberius’s tough, implacable henchman, who on his own admission held the greatest of all empires in his hand, had become nothing more or less than an unfortunate wretch, terrified by an inexplicable apparition which was beyond his comprehension. He stood there appalled by the enormity of the sacrilege he had committed, he, the elect of the gods, by gratifying his lubricious desires on the phantom, or rather the reincarnation, of a servant of Vesta who had been consigned by the pontiffs to the terrifying divinities of Darkness and Death.
He appeared to be out of his mind. Hastily snatching up the tunic he had thrown to the ground, he wrapped it clumsily about his loins, still repeating:
‘The dead vestal! The dead vestal! I am doomed!’
Still Fanina said nothing. Everything had been too unexpected, too unhoped for. Although she still remembered the indescribable panic she had caused in Brazen-beard’s garden, she had grown so used to being hunted that she could not get used to her new state, that of a phantom before whom the boldest quailed like frightened children. She still did not know how she could best make use of this dramatic turn of events. Sejanus stood trembling before her: she must press home her advantage. Tightly wrapped in her white fur, with her long hair thrown back, staring intently, she stood up.
This was more than Sejanus could stand. He backed towards the door, leant against it, fumbled feverishly with the bolt behind his back, then in a flash was off down the stairs.
As she stood on the bed, Fanina listened intently ... she could hear Sejanus rushing about like one demented through the ground-floor rooms. Doors slammed, furniture fell to the floor. Then she heard Gryllus’s coarse voice, followed by Romilius’s, shouting confused orders interspersed with foul oaths.
Fanina’s mind worked like lightning. She must escape, and quickly, very quickly!
She could hear the tramping of iron-clad shoes, and vague sounds of shouting seemed to come from all sides, but she was unable to recognize Sejanus’s characteristic voice in the tumult. Then at last Fanina heard the beat of hooves over the cobbles. They were bringing horses. The huge door of the great house creaked, followed by the thunder of galloping hooves — a single horse closely followed by others at full gallop. Once again the door creaked and slammed to with a thunderous roar. Hands on her palpitating bosom, Fanina still stood listening.
Sejanus had fled. She had heard a horse galloping away, followed by two or three others at the most. So there must be thirty men at least still there. Perhaps they too would take fright when they saw her. Fanina began to devise a plan: if the Praetorian Guards did not recognize her, she would tell them who she was. They would be terrified and let her go. After that, she would see. ...
Fanina’s eyes scanned the room. First, she must dress. The humble ragged tunic she had been wearing when she arrived had been torn to shreds by the two soldiers who had stripped her so brutally. She could hardly wander out into these unknown parts draped in a white bear-skin. Sejanus’s white linen shirt and peacock-blue cape lay on the
ground. She had no choice. Dropping the enveloping fur, Fanina picked up the clothes and walked over to the door. There was still an indescribable din coming up from the courtyard, then Romilius’s loud voice rang out again:
‘By the guts of Hercules!’ he thundered. ‘What on earth are you all pestering me for? I don’t know any more than you do! Go on, move off! Men of the watch back to your posts! The rest of you hack to bed and keep your mouths shut too, if you don’t want your ribs tickled with the flat of my sword!’
The last sentence had echoed at the bottom of the stairs. Romilius was about to come up, along with the other brute, Gryllus, who said:
‘I wonder what’s up with the chief ... if you imagine it’s easy to control the men when the chief behaves as if he had just fallen from the fifth floor on to his head!’
Struggling feverishly with the shirt, Fanina tried to get it on as fast as she could, but the more she struggled, the more hopelessly entangled she became, and still she could not get her head through the neck opening.
The heavy tread of the two Praetorians up the stairs drew nearer.
‘What do you imagine happened?’ Romilius asked.
‘I’ve no idea. I’ve been with the chief for over twenty years, and I’ve seen him in all sorts of situations. When he’s fighting, he’s Mars the Avenger in person. In bed with a little bit of fluff he could pass for Jupiter, I’m telling you. A real stag! He always rises to the occasion, does the chief. To tell the truth, I really wouldn’t have known it was him just now. It’s as well you sent a couple of men after him, or he would have gone off all alone as if he’d gone barmy.’
‘But you don’t think it was that pretty little thing who got him into such a state, do you?’
The two Praetorians had reached the landing outside the door and Fanina had just managed to get her head through the opening of Sejanus’s shirt. Red and breathless, she was trying in vain to draw in the waist of the outsize garment that flapped about her like a shapeless sack that tripped her up and whose sleeves completely covered her hands.
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