Magnus and the Crossroads Brotherhood

by Robert Fabbri

  ‘Where do we take this, Magnus?’ Marius, a tall, shaven-headed crossroads brother, asked, pointing the leather-bound stump of his left arm at a strongbox on the floor.

  Magnus shook his head at the five crossroads brothers who had accompanied him with the money from the Quirinal to the Esquiline Hill. ‘Put it back on the cart, lads; we’re leaving empty-handed.’

  The largest and most oxen-like of the brethren turned his hands over and stared at the half-eaten onion in his right palm.

  ‘It’s an expression, Sextus,’ Magnus snapped, venting his frustration on the slow-witted brother as he headed into the vestibule and grabbed his cloak from its hook. The doorkeeper performed his role with alacrity and Magnus stepped out into the drizzle-laden gloom of an overcast, but warm, May night. Pulling his hood over his head, he kicked the slave belonging to Tatianus who had been keeping watch on the handcart, shouldered him into the gutter – the man’s head narrowly missing the wheel of a passing wagon – and then walked at pace straight down the raised, ill-lit pavement, forcing other pedestrians to stand aside for him. His five brethren scurried after their patronus, placing the strongbox under a pile of rags on the cart, pushing it out into the constant delivery traffic that plagued Rome’s streets at night and shoving the filth-splattered slave back down into the gutter as they did so.

  ‘So he didn’t have it then, Magnus,’ Marius asked as they finally managed to catch up with their leader as they passed the Temple of Juno Lucina towards the base of the Esquiline and in the shadow of the Viminal.

  ‘No, he didn’t have it,’ Magnus growled, kicking at the corpse of a dog.

  ‘Then what will we do?’

  ‘We need to get on to the roof in order to break in through the ceiling. We can’t get the rope across without a Scorpion, and therefore if we don’t have a Scorpion until the night of the Ides we’ll just have to do the job then. So let’s not moan about it and find something to occupy ourselves with in the meantime.’

  ‘Right you are, Magnus.’ Marius grinned. ‘We could always stop at one of the brothels on the Via Patricius on our way back.’

  ‘No, I ain’t going to go into the West Viminal Brotherhood’s territory with this amount of cash on me; that would be asking for—’

  A cry of agony cut him off.

  Magnus spun round to see three figures hacking at the two brothers pushing the handcart whilst Sextus fought off another couple of assailants, smashing at them with ham fists; the fifth brother, who had been pulling the cart, was struggling to relieve the ever tightening grip of vice-like fingers around his throat. As one, Magnus and Marius pulled their knives from the sheaths on their belts and crashed back into the fray as more attackers materialised out of the night. Leading with his left shoulder, as if he bore a shield, Magnus cracked into the ribcage of the nearest shadowed threat, stamping his left foot down on the man’s own, fracturing many bones, as he thrust his knife forward, military-style, underarm and low, with a short, powerful jab. Blood slopped over his wrist as the breath rattled out of the assailant. Magnus twisted the knife left and then right, shredding groin muscles and drawing a satisfying howl from the core of his victim’s being, as next to him Marius punched his leather-bound stump into the mouth of his adversary, shattering teeth and pulping his upper lip as he slashed the point of his blade to his right, taking one of the men hacking at the brother pulling the cart in the back of the neck, severing the spinal column; down he went like a stringless puppet.

  Magnus wrenched his weapon free of the tangle of ripped tissue, releasing the foul faecal stench of evisceration; he thrust his dying opponent aside and spun, one hundred and eighty degrees, his forearm raised, to block the downward stroke of a new entrant into the fight. The blow thwarted, he let his arm give a little, allowing the man to close with him, before jamming his knee up between his legs, rupturing a testicle, and doubling him over with a strangled intake of breath as three more shadowy figures emerged from the crowd – watching but making no attempt to intervene – and headed directly for the cart. Magnus felt the wind of a thrown knife hiss past his right cheek and instinctively ducked in the opposite direction as a blade from behind stabbed at the place his head had been an instant before; he turned to see a squat man staring cross-eyed at a knife juddering in the bridge of his nose. A sharp flick of Magnus’ right wrist opened the man’s throat as Marius crunched his forehead into the face of one of the new attackers, crashing him back with blood spurting from his nose; with one look at his mates he turned and ran. Sextus, with a bull-like roar, picked up his last surviving assailant and hurled him after the rest who were now, suddenly, all beating a hasty retreat.

  Magnus looked around. No one else threatened them and the crowd had begun to disperse, none of them wishing to get involved in a matter that was plainly not of their concern. On the ground dead, amongst the bodies of six of their attackers, lay two of his brethren; a third knelt, coughing drily as he massaged his bruised throat. ‘Are you all right, Postumus?’ Magnus asked, hauling the brother up as Marius restrained a bellowing Sextus from chasing after their attackers.

  ‘Just about, Magnus; and you?’ Postumus wheezed.

  ‘I think so.’ As he drew breath, Magnus suddenly turned and rushed to the cart; the rags had been brushed aside. ‘Juno’s puckered arse!’ he cursed as he stared at the empty bed of the cart. ‘The bastards got it; they must have known what we were carrying.’ Marius and Sextus joined him, both still panting hard; they looked forlornly at where their strongbox had been. A groan from the ground distracted Magnus; he glanced down to see the man with the shattered mouth trying to crawl away. Catching him by the collar, Magnus cracked his head down on the paving stone, knocking him unconscious.

  ‘Here, lads,’ Magnus snarled, holding the limp body up, ‘get him on the cart and cover him with rags. Let’s get to our tavern before the Vigiles turn up and try to prevent us from asking matey-boy here a few very tricky and painful questions, if you take my meaning?’

  The questions were far less tricky than they were painful; in fact, they were very simple and remarkably few.

  ‘I’ll ask you again,’ Magnus said in a convivial manner, smiling down at the prisoner and patting him in a kindly fashion on the cheek. The man wriggled in fear at the sight of a red-hot poker in Marius’ gloved hand as he hung naked, suspended by his ankles, from a ceiling beam in a room deep in the rear of the tavern building that served as the headquarters of the South Quirinal Brotherhood. ‘Who do you work for and how did you know what we were carrying?’

  The man’s eyes widened as Marius grinned at him over Magnus’ shoulder, showing him the glowing iron and repeatedly raising his eyebrows in ill-concealed anticipation. His swollen mouth, however, remained sealed as he struggled against the rope binding his wrists behind his back.

  ‘Tch, tch.’ Magnus shook his head in exaggerated disappointment as if he were a grammaticus having received the wrong answer from his most promising pupil. ‘I’ll tell you what: I’ll ask you the questions for the third time, just in case you misheard before. Who do you work for and how did you know what we were carrying?’

  The prisoner shook his head, screwing up his eyes.

  Marius made a show of putting the poker back into the mobile brazier that, along with an oil lamp on a table next to it, lit the chamber. Sextus’ bulk lurked in the shadows by the door, under which flickered the dim light from the adjoining corridor; Postumus stood behind the prisoner to prevent him from rotating.

  ‘Perhaps he’s lost his voice,’ Magnus mused, scratching his chin. ‘Why don’t you check, Marius?’

  ‘Right you are, Magnus.’ He withdrew the poker, its tip now orange. Within an instant the stench of burnt flesh was accompanied by a piercing shriek that brought a happy smile to Magnus’ face.

  ‘His thigh doesn’t look too nice but I can’t hear anything wrong with his voice,’ Magnus observed, turning back to Sextus, ‘can you, Sextus?’

  ‘What’s that, Magnus?’

 
‘I said: can you hear anything wrong with his voice?’

  ‘Er … no, Magnus; it sounded fine to me.’

  ‘I thought so. What about you, Postumus, did you hear anything wrong?’

  ‘It sounded sweet to me, Brother.’

  ‘In which case it’s time to stop being nice. Hold the gentleman’s buttocks apart for him, would you?’

  Postumus grinned with genuine enjoyment at the prospect. ‘My pleasure, Magnus.’

  Magnus squatted down and thrust his face close to the prisoner’s as Postumus pulled his legs apart. ‘Now listen, you piece of rat shit. I’m in a very bad mood and I don’t give a fuck how much or for how long I hurt you. Two of my brothers are dead and a lot of my money is missing so I’ll do whatever it takes to redress those facts. Answer my questions and Marius here won’t use your arse as a scabbard for his poker.’

  Still the man shook his head, his eyes bulging at the sight of the glowing terror coming towards him.

  ‘That’s a silly decision.’ Magnus nodded at Marius. ‘Just in the crease and then, Postumus, squeeze.’

  The red-hot tip was placed between the man’s buttocks as Postumus pushed them together. Smoke rose to the hiss of burning hair and skin and, after a moment’s delay, the prisoner issued a scream that made his last effort seem pathetic in comparison; on it went, rising in timbre and getting rougher as it grated, drying in his throat.

  At Magnus’ nod, Marius withdrew the object of torment and pressed it back into the brazier; the prisoner started to hyperventilate.

  ‘He’s going to have to be careful how he sponges his arsehole for a few days,’ Magnus opined, peering at the damage before squatting back down and grabbing the prisoner’s chin. ‘Now how would you like that done to your scrotum, maggot? I can assure you that we’ll all enjoy watching and listening.’

  The man’s chest heaved and tears rolled down his forehead; his swollen lips drew back to reveal shattered teeth. ‘Se … Sem …’

  Magnus put his ear closer to the man’s mouth. ‘Who?’

  ‘Semp …’ He struggled for breath for a couple of moments. ‘Sempronius.’

  The name came out as a wheeze but it was clearly audible; Magnus’ face darkened. ‘Sempronius,’ he growled, chewing on the word. ‘He of the West Viminal Brotherhood?’

  The prisoner nodded feebly, his eyes closed.

  ‘How did he know about the cash?’

  ‘I don’t … I … I don’t know; he just …’ He winced and spat some blood from his ruined mouth; a globule rolled into his nostrils. ‘He just told us to track you back from the house on the Esquiline and attack you as you neared our territory so we’d not have so far to go with the box.’

  ‘So he knew about the box?’

  The man nodded, his eyes still closed.

  Magnus stood, his face set grim. He paused for a few moments in thought and then wrenched the glove from Marius’ hand, pulled it on his own and grabbed the iron from the fire. ‘As you’ve been a good boy and answered the questions as best you can I’ll make good my promise: Marius won’t use your arsehole as a scabbard for his iron.’ He pushed Postumus aside and, brandishing the searing bar in his right hand, he exposed the man’s anus with his left. ‘But I will!’ With a jerk he forced the poker into the sphincter and thrust it, with the palm of his hand, as deep as it would go. With a howl that would have drowned out both the previous ones combined the prisoner convulsed, almost doubling up, so that his face stared, eyes brim with horror, over his scrotum, directly at Magnus for an instant, before slumping back down, swinging limply, dead from shock, pain and horrific internal injuries.

  ‘Cut him down, Marius,’ Magnus ordered, heading out of the room, ‘and then dump him on the West Viminal’s border; you can use Sextus and Postumus for the job.’ Magnus walked through the door and then put his head back round. ‘And make sure that the poker is pulled out a bit and clearly visible. I want Sempronius to know exactly what I think of him.’

  ‘Your tame senator sent a boy round,’ an old man with gnarled fingers and a sagging throat said, not taking his eyes off the scroll that he was perusing in the light of two lamps.

  Magnus took a seat next to him at the table in the corner of the tavern with the best view of the door through the fug of the crowded room. ‘Which one, Servius?’

  ‘Which boy? I don’t know, I didn’t ask his name.’

  ‘No, you old goat; which senator?’ Magnus took the cup and wine jug brought to him by the man serving behind the bar. ‘Thanks, Cassandros.’

  Servius looked up, his eyes awash with milky patches. ‘Oh, the older one.’

  ‘Senator Pollo?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And?’

  Servius looked back at his scroll. ‘It’s no good, Magnus; I’ll be blind before long. Already everything is vague and dimming.’ He shook his bald head and placed the scroll down on the table. ‘I didn’t want to disturb you whilst you were … in conference but the senator is very keen that you should attend his salutatio in the morning and then accompany him to the Senate House; his nephew, Vespasian, has a job for you.’

  ‘What sort of job?’

  ‘The boy couldn’t say but Senator Pollo said that you were to keep the next three days or so free.’

  ‘Three days?’

  ‘Or so.’

  Magnus kicked the nearest stool. ‘Shit! Just when things are getting busy.’

  With a fold of his plain white citizen’s toga covering his head, Magnus crumbled a flour and salt cake over the flame of the small fire that was kept continuously burning on the altar of the Crossroads’ lares, embedded into the tavern’s exterior wall. The upkeep of these shrines was the original reason for the formation of the brotherhoods all over the city, centuries earlier. In the intervening time, however, the function of the brotherhoods had expanded to looking after the interests and welfare of the local community, for which they received remuneration from the locals commensurate with the amount of protection they needed. Their word, therefore, was law in the area in which they held sway.

  As the crumbs flared in the flame, Magnus muttered a short prayer to ask the gods of the junction of the Alta Semita and the Vicus Longus to hold their hands over the area. That done, he raised a bowl and poured a libation in front of the five small bronze figures that represented the lares, promising the same offering that evening should they keep their side of the religious bargain. Pulling the toga from his head, he patted the brother, whose turn it was to tend the fire, on the shoulder before heading off down the wakening Alta Semita, with the first indigo glow of dawn to his back and with Cassandros and a bearded, betrousered easterner, both of whom carried staves and sputtering torches, to either side.

  It was but a short walk to Senator Gaius Vespasius Pollo’s house and, although Magnus arrived there just shy of sunrise, there was already a goodly crowd of the senator’s clients waiting outside for admittance to his atrium in order to wish a good day to their patron, receive a small largesse, enquire if there was any way that they could be of service to him that day and, perhaps, occasionally take advantage of the symbiotic relationship and ask a favour of the senator themselves.

  ‘Cassandros and Tigran, you stay here.’ Magnus did not care for order of precedence and pushed his way through the crowd to the front door, leaving his two companions waiting on the fringe of the gathering. No one objected to his progress as all were aware that this battered ex-boxer, although low on the social scale, was high in their patron’s favour.

  As the sun crested the eastern horizon, bereft of yesterday’s clouds, bathing the Seven Hills in a spring morning glow, the door was opened by an exceedingly attractive youth with blond hair, the length of which was countered by the shortness of his tunic. Magnus was first through the door.

  ‘Magnus, my friend,’ Gaius Vespasius Pollo boomed, not getting up from the sturdy chair set in the centre of the atrium in front of the impluvium with its spluttering fountain. He brushed a carefully tonged ringlet of dyed black h
air away from his porcine eyes glittering in a hugely fat face.

  ‘Good morning, sir; er … you require a service, I believe.’

  ‘Yes, yes, but I’ll talk to you about it later. In the meantime my steward will give you a list of Jewish requirements and customs.’ Gaius gestured to a slightly older version of the youth on the door who bowed his head to Magnus. ‘Oh, and he’ll also have one of my lads read it for you seeing as you, well, you know.’

  ‘Can’t read,’ Magnus said, his confusion plain upon his face.

  ‘Indeed,’ Gaius replied, already looking to the client next in line.

  ‘Philo!’ Magnus exclaimed as he walked beside Gaius, processing with his two hundred, or so, clients accompanying him down the Quirinal. ‘You mean the brother of Alexander, the Alabarch of the Alexandrian Jews?’

  ‘The very same,’ Gaius puffed; although he had set a sedate pace he was already sheened with sweat. His jowls, breasts, belly and buttocks wobbled furiously to different rhythms beneath his senatorial toga as he waddled behind Cassandros and Tigran with their staves at the ready to beat a path for him should the way become too crowded.

  ‘What’s he doing in Rome?’

  ‘He’s been here since the start of the sailing season. He’s heading an embassy of Alexandrian Jews to the Emperor to complain about the way Flaccus, the Prefect of Egypt, handled the riots between the Jews and the Greeks in Alexandria last year.’

  ‘I saw them, I was there with Vespasian, stealing Alexander’s breastplate from his mausoleum for Caligula because Flaccus refused to hand it over.’

  ‘Of course you were; so you know what the riots were like, then?’

  ‘Well, according to Philo, they were an outrage because, how did he put it? The Jews were scourged with whips by the lowest class of executioner as if they were indigenous country dwellers, rather than with rods wielded by Alexandrian lictors as was the entitlement of their rank.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Yes, that was his main complaint. Forget the fact that his sister-in-law had to be put out of her misery by her own husband because she had been flayed alive and had no chance of survival, or that gangs of Greeks dragged Jews off to the theatre to crucify them and then set fire to the crosses. No, he was more concerned about the etiquette of beating and how some of his acquaintances were not accorded the dignity of the rod, as he put it. An arsehole, as far as I could make out, and a pompous one at that.’