‘It’s cold,’ said Lucius.
‘You’ll soon warm up,’ Macro replied. ‘A bit of marching does the job. Ain’t that right, Cato? Come on, Lucius, chin up, shoulders back and stride out, just like I taught you.’
The appeal to his nascent military aspirations was all the encouragement the boy needed, and he let go of his father’s hand and trotted a few paces ahead, settling into a march, head held high, as he imagined himself at the front of a column of soldiers like Macro and his father.
‘He’s a fine boy,’ Macro said just loudly enough for Lucius to think he was overhearing a remark not directed at him. ‘He’ll do you proud one day.’
‘I’m sure he will.’ Cato smiled back. ‘I’m certain of it.’
As the stable boy led the small procession down into the Forum, the mist closed around them, cold and clammy, muffling the noises from the mule and cart. Buildings lost form and became obscured masses of shadow looming up on either side, and the handful of people abroad drifted past or across their path like ghosts. Lucius dropped back, glancing anxiously from side to side. They passed between the Palatine and Capitoline hills, and the familiar odour of the great sewer closed in around them until they reached the curved end of the racetrack and began to climb the Aventine Hill, emerging from the mist. Lucius started to relax and marched ahead again as they entered a slum area of crumbling apartment blocks packed closely together. The sounds of people stirring – babies wailing, cries of early-morning passion, the clatter of pots – crowded in from all sides as the light strengthened overhead and clearly delineated the lines of roof tiles against the sky.
Ahead lay the Ostian Gate, guarded by a section from the local urban cohort, soldiers in name only. Macro’s expression wrinkled in distaste as he saw them leaning against the stonework either side of the arches, their spears propped up beside them. The optio in command stepped forward and raised his arm.
‘Halt!’
The stable boy reined in the mules and the cart ground to a halt. Cato and Macro made their way round it, leaving Petronella and Lucius to watch the back of the vehicle.
‘What’s your business?’ the optio demanded.
‘What business is it of yours to question mine?’ Macro growled.
‘No need for the surly attitude, friend.’ The optio spat to one side. ‘What’s in the cart? Goods?’
‘Personal baggage.’
‘There’s a lot of it . . .’
‘I own a lot of personal baggage. What of it?’
‘There’s a toll for carts and wagons passing through the city gates. Double if they are carrying goods. So that’ll be two sestertii, friend.’ The optio held out his hand.
‘When did this toll come in?’ Cato asked.
‘Got the orders yesterday. Maybe you missed the announcement? I’d encourage your friend here to stop being difficult and pay up.’
Cato regarded the optio for a moment. He was a thin man, well into his forties, with thinning hair and half his teeth missing. His uniform tunic was frayed and stained and there was rust on the hilt of his sword. There was an opportunistic cockiness in his demeanour that instantly made Cato suspect he was lying about the toll. It was common enough for members of the urban cohorts to top up their pay by demanding bribes or threats. As long as they weren’t too egregious about it, most of the inhabitants of the city endured it rather than cause trouble they might regret. Cato was conscious that his son might observe what was going on and that this was an opportunity to teach him a lesson about authority and the abuse of it.
He addressed the man clearly. ‘What is your name?’
The optio’s jaw tensed. ‘What’s it to you?’
‘My name is Quintus Licinius Cato. I am a member of the equestrian order and a former tribune of the Praetorian Guard. My friend here is a former centurion of the Guard. Neither of us has heard of this toll you speak of. Let me make something clear to you. If we pay and I later discover that no toll has been authorised, I will report the matter to my friends in the Praetorian camp and we will come and find you and exact a toll of our own. One sestertius for every heartbeat you delay us . . .’
The optio stepped aside and waved his arm towards the gate, calling, ‘Let them pass!’
Cato nodded to the stable boy, and the cart rolled forward, the sound of hooves and wheels on cobbles echoing harshly off the stonework on either side and overhead as it went through the arch. Outside the city wall lay a sprawl of simple huts and shelters where some of Rome’s teeming masses had spilled out. No more than a hundred paces away there was a rise, and Cato ordered the boy to stop there so that they could make their final farewells.
Lucius hugged Macro and Petronella in turn, and she lifted him off the ground and kissed him on the cheek, tears glinting in her eyes.
‘You’re crying,’ said Lucius. ‘I’m sad. But I’m not crying, see?’
‘That’s because you are a brave little soldier.’ She forced a smile, kissed him again and lowered him to the ground. ‘Be good for your father.’
‘I will.’
She turned to Cato and stared at him, struggling to find the words to express her gratitude to her former master for setting her free to marry Macro. In the end she threw her arms round him and buried her face in his shoulder.
‘You’ve been good to me, master. Thank you. I shall never forget.’
Cato could not help chuckling as he eased her back. ‘Petronella, it is I who should be thanking you for raising my Lucius. You’ve been as good as a mother to him.’ A shadow passed across his mind as he recalled his dead wife. Julia Sempronia had been the daughter of a senator. Beautiful and intelligent, she had turned her mind towards plotting against the previous emperor and had died of an illness while Cato was campaigning in Britannia. Her treachery towards Emperor Claudius had been matched by a more personal betrayal of her husband, and the knowledge of her affair with another plotter still scarred him. ‘Better than a mother,’ he corrected himself. ‘For that I will always be grateful.’
Petronella shook her head with embarrassment and retreated, and Cato turned to Macro, his heart burning with painful regret at their parting. Macro stared back, his eyes twinkling.
‘Lad, when I first clapped eyes on you, I thought you were the biggest waste of space ever to have joined the Second Legion. You proved me wrong. You’ve been the best of soldiers, the bravest of fighters and the most loyal of friends. It’s going to be a hard parting. I’ll try not to worry about you now that you won’t have a proper soldier at your side to keep you out of trouble.’
Cato laughed. ‘I’ll have to manage by myself then.’
Macro regarded him sternly and nodded. ‘You’ll manage.’
He placed his hands on Cato’s shoulders and impulsively drew him close and held him tight.
‘Take care, my lad,’ he said tenderly.
‘And you, brother,’ Cato replied, patting his friend’s back.
They drew apart and Macro turned to take Petronella’s hand while Cato hoisted Lucius onto his shoulders and stood on a weathered block of stone beside the road. The cart rumbled forward again just as the first rays of sun stretched over the hills to the east and flooded across the landscape, bathing it in a warm, rosy hue. The shadows of the stable boy, the mules, the cart and Macro and Petronella stretched across the uneven ground to their right as they headed down the road towards Ostia. A short distance ahead the road dipped down to pass between some trees, and the cart and those with it slipped out of sight until only a faint swirl of dust marked their passage, and then they were gone.
‘Will we see them again?’ asked Lucius.
‘I don’t know, son.’ Cato turned away to face the city gates. ‘I don’t know. All we can do is hope that one day we will.’
Chapter Nine
‘She’s waiting for you inside.’ Apollonius indicated the praetor’s quarters opposite the entrance to the courtyard around which the port officials had their stores and offices. There were hundreds of clerks, merch
ants and sea captains milling around while they waited for port charges and import tariffs to be calculated and paid, and export licences checked. Apollonius had come to find his commander as soon as Claudia Acte and her modest retinue had arrived in Ostia. Cato had been busy supervising the loading of his baggage onto the cargo ship Seneca’s staff had chartered for the crossing to Sardinia. Persephone was to sail to Olbia with imperial dispatches before turning south and making for the province’s capital of Carales.
Cato was not in the best of moods, having had to field the protests of Rhianarius before Apollonius turned up. The shipowner had spotted him from the quay and demanded to know why Cato had not contracted one of his vessels. The answer was simple enough, Cato responded. When he had reached Ostia, the port’s procurator had advised him not to choose Rhianarius’s shipping company as there had been a few complaints. Cato started describing them. The shipowner had beaten a hurried retreat before any other potential customers overheard Cato’s harangue.
The Praetorian volunteers had turned up shortly before and boarded at once. Cato had promoted Pelius and Cornelius to the rank of centurion, as he would need reliable officers when he reached Sardinia. They were dressed in civilian tunics and cloaks and carried their uniforms, armour and kit in large bags loaded across a small team of rented mules. It was likely that their absence from the Praetorian camp had already been noticed, but by the time Burrus or Seneca learned the truth about the volunteers, it would be too late. If all went well, they would reach Sardinia unchallenged, and if the emperor’s advisers attempted to recall the men, Cato was sure he could avoid or delay the need for any response long enough to complete his mission.
He shifted his gaze to the columned entrance and the five covered wagons parked end to end nearby, guarded by several of the emperor’s German bodyguards. ‘If that’s what I think it is, there won’t be room on the ship for all her personal baggage and other effects.’
‘I’d like to see you tell her that.’
Cato glanced at Apollonius as they strode across the courtyard and weaved through the crowd. ‘Have you met her then?’
‘Briefly, while I was waiting outside the praetor’s office. I told her I was there to escort her to the ship. She cut me off and told me to be silent while she dealt with the praetor.’
‘What’s the problem?’
‘Apparently she felt he had dishonoured her by not having the streets cleared in advance of her retinue. He said he had received no instructions from Rome concerning the protocol for receiving her.’ Apollonius laughed. ‘Her response to that might be described as magnificent hubris. She is a head shorter than the praetor and somehow still managed to look down at him while she berated him for not treating her according to her station.’
‘Her station?’ Cato cocked an eyebrow. ‘From what I understand, she was born a slave and taken into Seneca’s household as a plaything the moment she was old enough for anyone to admire her looks. Even if she was later given her freedom and became the emperor’s mistress, that still doesn’t cut it on the social status front.’
‘I know. She’s quite a character. And she behaves as if those German brutes are there to protect her rather than make sure she doesn’t slip away. Our Claudia seems to believe that she, rather than Agrippina, is the empress. From what I heard in Rome, she’s been badgering Nero to marry her for the past year. All the fine gifts he showered her with weren’t enough. She wanted to sit beside him on her own throne. But she overreached herself when she persuaded Nero to ask the Senate to declare that she was of noble birth. I saw for myself how that played out when the senators and the mob turned on her at the races the other day. She wasn’t best pleased. Nor were Nero and his advisers. Hence the decision to pack her off to Sardinia and keep her out of sight.’
‘Do you think it will be a permanent exile?’ asked Cato.
‘Nero’s a young man. I’d lay good money on him having moved on to a new mistress within the month.’
‘So we’re going to be stuck with her.’
They entered the praetor’s headquarters and Apollonius led Cato upstairs and onto the balustraded walkway that overlooked the courtyard. In the middle was a wide balcony with tall doors leading into the praetor’s office. As they entered, Cato looked round and saw that the room was large, airy and well lit. A harassed-looking man in a linen tunic was trying to concentrate on the waxed tablets spread out on his desk. A woman was sitting on a couch against one of the side walls. In front of her was a low table on which rested a finely patterned glass jug and a platter of small pastries, none of which seemed to have been touched.
The woman turned her gaze towards Cato and his companion. Her eyes were dark as ebony and her skin was pale, almost white. Her hair was fine and blond and unstyled, unlike almost every other woman of note in Rome. It had been cut even shorter than when he had seen her in the imperial box at the chariot races, so that it looked boyish. Her face was full, with a snub nose and fine lips. She wore a plain blue stola of a shimmering material; silk most likely, thought Cato. Her arms were slender, as were what he could see of her legs. Her sandals were also blue, with an emerald on the top of each. The stola was sheer enough to reveal a full bust but no obvious curve of the waist above her hips. His overall impression was that while she was undeniably pretty, she did not strike him as the kind of beauty an emperor would consider defying the Senate and people of Rome to marry. Not that Nero had the backbone to see it through.
Claudia Acte glanced at Cato before addressing Apollonius. ‘Is he the one you were talking about?’ Her accent was neutral, but there was no hiding the hard twang of those raised in the Subura district.
Apollonius forced himself to keep a straight face as he responded in a deferential tone. ‘My lady, this is Prefect Quintus Licinius Cato, newly appointed commander of the garrison in Sardinia.’
Cato frowned. ‘I can speak for myself, thank you.’
Apollonius glanced sidelong at him and the corners of his mouth lifted in the faintest of smiles as he whispered, ‘She’s all yours . . .’
Claudia pointed at Cato. ‘Then you’re the man in charge of the boat taking me to Sardinia. I’ll thank you to make sure my baggage is safely loaded. I can assure you that if any of my possessions are damaged by your oafs, I’ll hold you responsible.’
Cato felt indignation flaring up inside his chest. He opened his mouth to respond, but she continued before he could get a word out.
‘Another thing. I want you to make sure we have some decent wagons to carry me and my belongings when we reach the island. Those that brought me here were little better than broken-down farm carts. I felt every rut we passed over. So you’ll find me something decent, and arrange for cushions for me to sit on, is that clear?’
Cato swallowed and took control of his temper. ‘Madam, I am a soldier, not a shipping clerk, and I—’
‘I don’t care what you are. Just do as I say, and do it now.’
He glared back and she raised her eyebrows.
‘Well? What are you waiting for? Stop standing there like the town idiot and get on with it.’
He glanced at Apollonius, who was looking at his boots, hiding a smile. The praetor risked a brief raise of his head; he caught Cato’s gaze and rolled his eyes.
Cato sucked in a breath and responded as calmly as possible. ‘I will see to your baggage personally. Meanwhile, my friend Apollonius will attend to your every wish until I send word that we are ready to sail. Will that be satisfactory?’
Apollonius looked up abruptly. ‘What?’
‘Now if you will forgive me?’ Cato bowed his head politely.
‘Very well, you are dismissed. But don’t take too long. I don’t know how much longer I can bear the privations of this place . . .’
Cato strode out of the room. He heard Apollonius beg her indulgence then hurry after him. They walked along the balcony without uttering a word until they had reached a safe distance, then Cato stopped and turned to his companion. Both men were silent f
or a beat before breaking into spontaneous laughter.
‘Good gods . . .’ Cato spluttered as he struggled to recover. ‘I never thought I’d ever feel sorry for Nero. But this?’
‘I know. A suspicious man might think he secretly paid the mob and the senators to undermine her.’
It was a startling possibility, Cato reflected. It would mean that she had a hold over her lover that he dared not challenge openly. From his observations of Nero it was clear that he was a fickle and weak-willed individual, but to be so suborned by a woman that he promised one thing to her face while plotting to do the opposite behind her back . . . That smacked of cowardice of the lowest kind, if that was his game. To have such a man running the Empire was unnerving.
‘She must have some redeeming qualities,’ Cato suggested.
‘Oh, I’m sure she does.’ Apollonius nodded. ‘What she may lack aesthetically she might make up for in technique. Such women can play a man like a flute, if you see what I mean.’
Cato shook off the distasteful image his companion had conjured up. ‘Well, we’re stuck with her and her charming German friends for as long as it takes to escort them to her estate. You keep her occupied while I see to her baggage.’
‘Occupied?’ Apollonius winced. ‘I’m sure the praetor can do that job just as well.’
At that moment the praetor emerged onto the balcony. Glancing round with a stricken expression, he caught sight of them and hurried over. ‘For pity’s sake,’ he hissed, ‘get her out of here! Whatever it takes, just do it.’
‘How much is it worth?’ asked Apollonius.
The praetor examined his face to ensure the offer was genuine. ‘Fifty sestertii.’
‘Denarii,’ Apollonius countered.
Cato did a quick mental calculation: over two months’ pay for a legionary.
‘Twenty denarii, then.’
‘You there!’
The three men turned to see Claudia standing on the threshold of the balcony.
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