‘It is a small world indeed,’ Arria heard the governor say. ‘How fares your brother, Oppius?’
‘My brother Brutus is well, Dominus.’
‘When is the next pit night?’
‘Not until after the kalends of April, I fear. Only after the Artemisia Games would Brutus even dream of purging his stock.’
‘How go your brother’s...predictions for those games, Oppius?’ asked the governor.
Oppius smirked. ‘Quite well, or so I have heard.’
The governor bent to Oppius’s ear and whispered something Arria could not hear. They stopped outside a doorway and the governor turned to address his women. ‘It seems Oppius is willing to part with his most valuable slave after all.’
Vibia clapped her hands together. ‘Oh, Father, thank you!’
‘Do not thank me yet, my sweet,’ he said. ‘First we must see if she accepts the rules.’ The governor stepped before Arria and stared down his crooked nose at her. ‘As a member of our domus, you must obey the commands you are given, conduct yourself with dignitas at all times and never attempt escape. Do you think you can do that, Arria?’
Arria cast her eyes to the floor and nodded. A cold, thick finger lifted her chin. ‘Is that any way to address your new Dominus?’
She braced herself for a blow that did not come. ‘No, Dominus.’
‘Now tell me, do you agree to the rules?’
Arria felt sweat streaming down her brow. When had the house become so warm? It was as if the fires of Hades themselves were warming it.
‘Yes, Dominus,’ she said.
‘Then it is done,’ pronounced the governor. ‘The weaver is ours!’
‘Hazah!’ shouted Vibia.
The governor grinned, then opened the door and motioned everyone inside.
Arria nearly gasped as she beheld the huge painting. It occupied the whole of the far wall, which in truth did not seem a wall at all, but a gateway to another world. At the far end of the painting, two snowy-robed women lingered cheerfully amidst a field of flowers so bright and real that Arria could almost smell their perfume.
But a kind of horror was taking place just beyond them. A chasm had opened up in the earth. A crumbling fissure of rock led into a dark realm, where a giant naked man wearing an expression of fevered lust reached upwards. A third snowy-robed woman was falling towards him, terrified.
‘The Rape of Persephone,’ the governor pronounced in Greek. He slid Arria a look and she felt a knot tie itself up in her throat. This was no mere display of art. This was a warning.
‘It is wondrous,’ remarked Oppius. ‘A masterpiece.’
‘In this domus, we appreciate works of art,’ said the governor.
‘Arria is well placed with you, in that case,’ said Oppius. ‘She will weave you very fine carpets.’
‘I am sure she will. And we will ensure her well-being in exchange for her efforts.’ Still smiling, the governor gripped Arria by the arm so hard that she nearly shrieked. ‘Follow the rules, Arria,’ he said sweetly, his fingers bruising her flesh. His black eyes flickered. ‘Lest you be cast into Hades!’ He released her arm and laughed, and everyone else in the room laughed, too—everyone except Arria.
Chapter Nineteen
Many days later, Arria discovered the source of the heat that permeated the governor’s house. She was just finishing the hundredth row of her newest carpet when Atticus burst into the weaving room.
‘Tonight there will be a banquet,’ he announced. He began to pace, shaking his head and worrying his thick brown hair. ‘The governor says he wishes to make an announcement, so there will have to be plenty of wine. He wants boiled ostrich with mint, though the Goddess Diana only knows how I will procure fresh mint after last night’s freeze. There must also be pomegranates, though they will stain everything in sight, and pickled dormice and those damned Amarna figs...’
‘What kind of an announcement?’ asked Arria.
He waved his hands distractedly. ‘Oh, something about the future of the Empire. The real problem is where I will find musicians. And dancers! Snows of Olympus, the governor will want dancers...’
Arria blinked, held her breath. The future of the Empire? Had the Emperor been murdered, then? Overthrown? Had there been an invasion? A slave rebellion? Atticus ceased his pacing and cut her a look. ‘What is the matter, Arria? You look as if you have seen a ghost.’
‘The future of the Empire?’
Atticus smiled dismissively. ‘I am sure it will just be announcement of the next war, dear. The governor’s wife is Emperor Trajan’s sister, after all. She tends to be the first to know these things.’
Oh, just the next war.
Arria remembered the soldiers who had arrived in the marketplace so many months ago. They had not been allowed to say where they were going, though they had not seemed to be in a hurry. Soldiering was a profession in Rome and Roman soldiers had to fight in order to receive their pay. The Roman beast needed to feed, lest it wither and die.
Arria sighed. ‘Shall I plan to help in the kitchen, then?’
‘Oh, no!’ Atticus cried. ‘The governor wishes for you to be put on display.’ His eyes studied the rug hanging from Arria’s upright loom. Arria was weaving the figure of a woman this time, but had completed only the head and shoulders so far. The face that had emerged from the threads was familiar, yet mysterious. Her almond eyes were set wide, her cheeks long, her lips large with the fullness of youth. And yet she was neither young nor old, neither Roman nor Greek. There was something eternal in her otherworldly face, as if she had existed since the beginning of time.
‘Cleopatra?’
Arria shook her head. ‘I will give you a hint—she is the most beautiful woman living in the world.’
‘And that is...?’
‘My mistress, Vibia Secunda, of course.’
Atticus grinned. ‘Of course!’ He gave her a conspiratorial wink. ‘Now I remember why I like you.’ He studied the bruises that lingered on Arria’s arm. ‘I am sorry for those. We must think of a way to hide them.’
Atticus disappeared and in moments returned with a dusty black tunic and matching shawl which he tossed in her direction. ‘The tunic is fine linen and will make you presentable and the shawl will cover the bruises. Go to the boiler room and get them washed. I will retrieve you in the third hour so that we may set up your loom. Hurry. There is little time to waste.’ And then he was gone.
Arria had only a vague idea where the boiler room was, for she spent most of her days inside the weaving room alone. She took her meals in the kitchen, where busy cooks treated her kindly, but paid her little mind. When she needed to relieve herself, she simply visited the house’s latrine, which was served by running water piped in directly from the city’s aqueduct.
In the short time she had served in the governor’s household, life had been remarkably easy. Almost suspiciously so. There was no one to tell her to work faster and no one to slap her head when she paused to take a rest. There was no one at all really, unless she counted Atticus’s busy comings and goings.
The only real visit she had received was on her second day, when Vibia had brought Arria a parchment image of the goddess Artemis, whom Vibia called Diana. ‘Do you see the almond-shaped eyes?’ Vibia had asked, batting her lashes. ‘Is it not a perfect likeness of me?’
‘Yes, Domina,’ Arria lied. In truth Vibia had small, bead-like eyes and an unfortunately large, bent nose that resembled her father’s.
‘You must not tell me what you are weaving,’ she had said, though she had all but commanded it. ‘I want to be surprised.’
In the mornings, Arria presented herself in the kitchen and was offered barley with milk. She worked all day in a warm room with a high glass window through which sun shone down on her face. In the evenings, she was given bread with fried onions and chickpeas. Sometimes even eg
gs.
It was as if Fortuna had smiled upon Arria at last. Life in the governor’s household was warmer, more peaceful and more comfortable than anything she had experienced before, even as a free woman.
And yet Arria was miserable. She felt the bars of an invisible prison closing around her: the prison of forgetting.
While she sat in her warm room, she tried to picture Grandmother, Epona and all the women in Oppius’s workshop labouring in the bitter cold. She had vowed not to forget them, but she feared that with each passing day their misery faded just a little in her mind.
Mostly, she longed for Cal. Sometimes after dinner, she wandered through the domus’s vast gardens, seeing him everywhere. His hands were the feathery ferns that tickled her thighs, his arms the gnarled oak boughs, his legs the pillars of stone.
And his heart was the dark garden pool into which she stared, unable to discern the bottom. She could not let herself believe that she would never see him again, though each day it seemed more likely. Did he even know where she was? Did anyone? She imagined the months passing and then the years, until all that remained was the memory of his smouldering eyes and the knowledge that a magnificent, honourable man had wanted her once.
She concocted elaborate plans of escape. In her fantasies, she pillaged the governor’s lamp for its loose change, then slipped past the door guards like a ghost. With her newfound riches, she purchased a horse and cart and sent her family on their way to a new life. She somehow managed to free Cal and his fellow gladiators, along with all of Oppius’s women, and they rode off together towards freedom.
It was a beautiful dream: if only she had the courage to make it real. Any day now, her new brother or sister would be born and her mother would make the long, terrible trek to the rubbish heaps outside Ephesus. Meanwhile, Arria laboured in her warm, sunny room, where the world outside seemed like some very bad dream. She was like a fly caught in honey.
‘Some of the cooks do not like going to the furnace, but I do not mind it,’ said a young woman, inspecting the clothes Arria had been given to wash. ‘Come, I will take you there. The fire is due for a feeding.’
They crossed the garden and arrived at the top of a dark staircase. ‘Careful now,’ the young woman said and, as they descended the stairs and stepped into the dimly lit room, Arria instantly understood why many avoided it. A small hole in the ceiling let in a little bit of daylight, but most of the shadowy space was lit by an eerie red glow emanating from a large metal door.
‘Welcome to Hades,’ said the woman. As Arria’s eyes adjusted to the light, she noticed that the metal door sealed the entrance to an oven-like structure flanked on one side by a tall stack of wood. On the other side there was a large metal container that appeared to be full of boiling water.
The woman lifted several dripping garments from the container with a long wooden pole and wrung them, then placed them in a basket that she handed to Arria. Lifting a large pitcher, the woman poured more water into the laundry container and dropped Arria’s clothing in.
With the same wooden pole she slowly opened the metal door and tossed in a piece of wood from the stack. ‘Feeding the beast,’ the woman said grimly. Arria peered into the furnace and beheld its dancing flames. Just beyond them, she saw a large open space populated by a forest of brick columns.
‘Some call that place the hypocaust, but I call it the Elysian Fields,’ said the woman with a mischievous grin. ‘Is that not very poetic?’
Arria smiled. ‘You mean the part of Hades where heroic souls pass eternity?’
‘The very same,’ she said, then lowered her voice. ‘But there is a deeper meaning to the name. This is where Dominus sends disrespectful slaves to be punished. They arrive with heroic souls and depart with obedient ones.’
The woman was smiling at her own wit, making Arria think that she had not yet endured such a punishment herself. ‘And how far do the Elysian Fields stretch?’ Arria asked.
‘Why, beneath every room in the house. The heat seeps through the floors. It is how the house stays so warm.’
Arria could only nod her head in wonder. The boiler room was a gateway to the domus’s smoky underworld and also its source of heat. Arria pictured Persephone falling into the dark, hot pit.
‘Let us depart,’ said the young woman, shutting the metal gate. ‘Lest we become ghosts ourselves...or raisins!’
* * *
By that afternoon, Arria had washed and ironed her clothes and been judged by Atticus to be a fine representative of the governor’s domus. ‘Just think of yourself as a conversation piece,’ he reminded her.
Her loom had been set up in a corner of the atrium slightly removed from the main hall and she had been positioned with her back to the pool, giving passers-by a direct view of her work. She did not have to look at anyone, thank the gods. She only had to stand tall and work steadily as the guests observed her as they might a new piece of furniture, or a freshly carved statue.
‘After the Vesta prayer, you should retire to the servants’ quarters,’ Atticus explained. ‘We can move the loom tomorrow.’
* * *
Thus, at the evening hour, Arria took up her shuttle and began her hundred and first row. Soon the most important people in Ephesus were passing her by in waves of cloying perfume.
‘This is the weaver of the beautiful carpets,’ she heard Vibia remark several times. ‘She is ours.’
Arria wondered if she was supposed to be content. She had become a member of the most distinguished domus in all of Ephesus, after all. She had warmth in her limbs and food in her belly and even a small measure of status. She was no longer just a faceless slave shivering in a crowded workshop. She was a ‘conversation piece,’ an artist.
So why did it feel like the gods were punishing her? Why did it feel like they had dangled the carrot of happiness in front of her and then snatched it away, laughing? She loathed this painted prison. She feared that she had stolen the only little bit of life she would ever have—the only bit of love—and now she would slowly forget it.
Chapter Twenty
‘Do not respond,’ Cal whispered in her ear, then plunged himself into a shadowy alcove.
‘Cal?’ she said, her voice cracking. He watched her turn.
‘Do not look at me! Face your loom. Do it now.’
Arria returned to her position, facing the array of taut vertical threads. He could see her chest rising and falling with her breaths. ‘You must not draw attention to us,’ he explained. ‘If Brutus sees me here it will be ten lashes.’
Nor could he even dream about the consequences if the governor caught them together. The man was twisted, or so Cal had learned by observing his dealings with Brutus. Though the governor rewarded the gladiators for obeying his commands, resistance was met with torturous punishment. His only softness, it seemed, was the love he had for his daughter. Cal prayed that softness translated to Arria, his daughter’s newest acquisition, though he feared the worst.
Arria was moving her fingers over the vertical warp strings as if testing a harp. She paused, stared at her hands, whispered, ‘Is it really you, Cal?’
He murmured a yes, scarcely believing it himself. When Brutus had announced that Cal and several other gladiators had been requested at the governor’s domus that evening, he had been overcome with joy. ‘It is I.’
He watched her body convulse with a sob. He wanted to throw his arms around her and hold her close. He wanted to crush his lips down on hers and tell her how much he had missed her. But she was not his any longer, not even for a kiss.
‘By what miracle did the gods send you here? On this night?’ She addressed the question to her strings. Her voice was low, incredulous.
‘I am often summoned to such gatherings—especially before games. The Artemisia Games begin in ten days, as you know.’
‘Are you alone?’
‘I came with s
everal of my brethren. We are called “conversation pieces.”’
She emitted a small noise, then kicked her thread basket behind her and scolded herself audibly for the mistake. Clever woman. The ‘mistake’ gave her an excuse to turn around and she stole a long look at him.
It was the worst thing she could have done, because when he looked into her flickering brown eyes, the temple of resolve that he had spent hours building began to crumble.
‘I fear that I may be dreaming,’ she said. He wished she would not look at him like that. Like she wanted him still. Did she not realise they could never be together again? That even this stolen moment risked both their lives?
‘I feared I would never see you again,’ she said. ‘I feared...’
A couple arrived at the door, and Cal retreated to the shadows as the doorman directed them past Arria towards the dining hall. Cal noticed that Arria’s hands were trembling as she wove.
When the couple was finally out of earshot, Cal continued. ‘I have not fought since the New Year and Brutus refused to bring you to me without a victory to reward. When I learned that you had been sold to the governor, I—’ He stopped himself and remembered his resolve. ‘I was very happy for you.’
‘Happy for me?’ She twisted once again, craning to see him.
‘Do not turn to look at me!’ he snapped. She hung her head and returned to her loom. Anguish gripped him. ‘Yes, I am happy for you. To have a place in such a fine domus, plenty of food and rest. Heat. It is more than many could ever hope for. It will be a good life for you.’
‘Cal—’
‘Shh, do not say it. Return to your work.’ He feared her words: they had the power to unleash the creature of desire that was twisting and writhing beneath his skin.
‘Have you not missed me?’ she whispered.
An older woman draped in fine linen sauntered up behind her. ‘What is it that you are weaving, dear?’
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