Emperor's Knife

by Emperor's Knife (retail) (epub)

  None that Oclatinius would answer, Silus thought. ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Silus, Daya, go and report back to me as soon as it is done. Atius.’ He looked at the big Arcanus’ broken hand and shook his head. ‘Just go home.’

  * * *

  The Esquiline Hill was quiet. It was the opposite side of Rome to the Tiber, where much of the trade arrived in the city, and was mainly a high-class residential district, with well-tended public gardens and baths, as well as the fine houses of the rich. The vigiles patrolled occasionally, looking out for fires and people up to no good, but as they were far more likely to find both these problems in the centre of the city amongst the narrow streets and insulae, they were seldom seen.

  There were two main ways into a domus in Rome. The frontage of the house facing the street had a narrow doorway, leading to a vestibule and then the atrium. Either side of the front door were shops, using the valuable street frontage to make money. In the case of Titurius’ house, the shops either side were a jeweller and a perfumier. Both were shut up tight, but they did not connect to the domus in any case.

  The door to Titurius’ domus was thick wood with metal crossbars that would put up a good resistance to a strong man with an axe. It would be impossible to enter quietly that way.

  The other entry point was the wall of the peristylium, climbing into the open-roofed enclosed garden, and Daya led Silus to a street that ran along the back of Titurius’ domus. The wall was smooth, stuccoed, and ten feet high, but Daya was light and agile. She found handholds and footholds in cracks, and shinned up the wall like a monkey. Once she was on the roof, she dropped a rope down for Silus, and he scaled the wall, walking up it as he hauled himself upwards.

  They paused on the tiled roof for a moment, looking down into the garden, confirming it was empty, then dropped silently down off the roofed colonnade. The peristylium had a number of rooms leading off it – kitchens, storerooms and some small bedrooms for the slaves. Silus and Daya moved through the shadows cast by a half-moon and slipped into the first bedroom. Two female slaves were sleeping together on a straw mattress, covered by a single sheet. The two assassins drew their knives, and in perfect synchrony clamped their hands over the slaves’ mouths and slit their throats.

  They repeated this twice more, with two male slaves in the next bedroom, and two more female slaves in the one after that. Silus tried to remain dispassionate about these brutal murders of innocents, but his heart was racing, from the fear of being caught, of waking the household, and at the guilt for his actions. Daya seemed to have no such compunction, brutally efficient as always.

  The next small bedroom held an older man, and his mattress was feather instead of straw. Silus presumed this was the steward. He had his arms around a young woman, another of the household slaves, he presumed. In moments, they were dead too.

  That left just the two porters and the family. They approached the main part of the house.

  * * *

  Tituria swung her legs out of her bed, and walked to her bedroom door, clutching her doll in her hands. She hesitated, then opened the door and padded out. She wore a short wool tunic, but her feet were bare, and the floor tiles were cold on her soles. She passed her brother’s door, paused to hear his deep breathing, then continued on to her parents’ bedroom.

  She heard the sound of her mother crying, and unable to break her lifetime’s habit, she opened the door a crack and peered through with one eye, even as a voice at the back of her mind reminded her how much trouble her curiosity had created for her this night.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ sobbed Autronia. ‘What did I do wrong?’

  ‘Nothing, dearest,’ said Titurius, putting his arm around her shoulders. ‘It’s politics, I’m sure.’

  ‘The Empress said the bed was uncomfortable. That mattress was stuffed with goose down! And why did the Emperor leave? Did the food make him ill?’

  ‘I don’t know. I think Cilo upset the Augustus quite markedly. Maybe they left because of his speech at dinner.’

  ‘But that wasn’t our fault.’

  ‘Well, it was a little.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Tituria’s father looked sheepish. ‘Cilo asked me to invite both him and the Emperor, so that he could plead for reconciliation between Antoninus and his brother.’

  ‘You knew?’ gasped Autronia. ‘This disaster was planned?’

  ‘I had to, my love. My duty is to Rome. I was trying to avoid a civil war.’

  ‘And have you?’

  Titurius looked glum. ‘I doubt it. Now, I think it’s just best to keep our heads down, and hope the storm blows out above us.’

  Tituria pushed the door open wide, and her mother and father looked up at her, surprised.

  ‘What is it, darling?’ said Autronia. ‘Bad dream?’

  Tituria pressed the rag doll to her mouth, and shook her head, eyes wide and brimming with tears.

  ‘What then? What has upset you?’

  ‘I’ve been bad.’

  ‘I’m sure it’s nothing awful, darling.’

  ‘Why don’t you go back to bed, and cuddle your dolly, and we can talk about it in the morning.’

  ‘I went into the Emperor’s bedroom.’

  Autronia and Titurius went quiet.

  ‘You did what?’ asked Titurius, voice low.

  ‘I wanted to see what you had done to it, Mother, so I sneaked in while you were all at dinner.’

  ‘Did the Emperor see you?’

  Tituria nodded, not daring to speak.

  ‘He came in and found you there?’

  She shook her head, swallowed. ‘I hid under the bed when he came in.’

  Titurius knelt in front of her, put his hands on her shoulders. ‘Tell me exactly what happened.’

  ‘I stayed quiet, and he didn’t notice me. Then someone else came in.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘It was the Empress. The Augusta.’

  Autronia’s hand flew to her mouth. Titurius’ face was as white as a freshly fulled toga. ‘Go on.’

  ‘They got on the bed together, and they… did things.’ Now the words came out in a rush. ‘I could hear them, and the bed rocked a lot. Then they stopped. And I was going to wait until they fell asleep so I could escape, but then I sneezed, and the Emperor saw me, and I ran, and he chased me, but the Empress told him to stop, and I ran to my room, but I wanted to tell you, Father, because you always know what to do, and I’m so sorry…’

  She dissolved into tears, and Titurius grabbed her and held her tight. But only for a short moment. He pushed her away, held her by the shoulders at arm’s length, looked into her eyes sternly. ‘It was an accident, darling, I understand that. But we are going to have to leave Rome now. Tonight. Go to your room and get what you need for a journey. Only absolute essentials, clothes, hairbrush, dolly. Autronia, you start doing the same. I’m going to send the porter to Geta for help. If Antoninus is after us, Geta is the only person in Rome we can turn to. Go now, Tituria, quickly.’

  Tituria fled to her room, a feeling of doom pressing down on her. She pulled out a couple of dresses, a practical tunic, a couple of pieces of jewellery and some pots of make-up. She looked around for her hairbrush, then remembered she had left it on her father’s desk in his study. She knew that they were in a hurry, and it was all her fault, but she was sure she had time to fetch it. She ran lightly, still barefoot, still clutching her doll, to the study, and looked around in the gloom for a moment. She spotted it on the edge of the desk when she heard voices approaching.

  Her father had instilled a terrible dread into her, and her immediate thought was that it was murderers come to kill them all. She rationalised that it was stupid, that it was probably a couple of the slaves, but she decided to err on the side of caution, and she nimbly squeezed herself into the vase she had used in the past as a hide to spy on her father.

  She immediately identified the voices as her father and the night porter. She thought about revealing her presen
ce, but she decided she was in enough trouble already without her father finding her hiding away yet again. She was ready to go; she could wait until they left, grab the hairbrush, and then fetch her other belongings that she had got ready without holding anyone up.

  ‘Take this message directly to the Imperial palace on the Palatine,’ her father said, and she heard him scuffling on the desk for his wax tablet and a stylus. ‘Make sure you go to the Emperor Geta’s wing, not the Emperor Antoninus’. Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes, master,’ said the porter.

  ‘Put it in the hands of Geta’s personal guard. No one else.’

  ‘Yes, master.’

  There was a pause as Titurius scratched out a message, then handed it to the porter. Then he gave a sudden gasp, and Tituria heard the tablet fall to the floor.

  ‘Who are you?’ asked Titurius, voice full of fear.

  * * *

  They decided to leave the family until last – they were the least threat. So they bypassed the bedrooms at the main part of the house which were near the triclinium and tablinum, and went straight for the rooms off the atrium. It was not hard to find the off-duty porter. He was snoring as loud as a thunderstorm. He did not stir when Silus slipped into his room, and thrust the dagger through his heart. The sleeping doorkeeper never even woke.

  They circled round the atrium in opposite directions, checking rooms, until they converged by the front door.

  ‘Where’s the other porter?’ hissed Daya.

  The night porter should have been sitting in the vestibule just off the atrium, guarding the front entrance. It would not have been surprising to find him dozy or even asleep. The chances of him being required to perform his duties as a nightwatchman or doorman were remote in such a nice area, in a well-protected house, at that time. But not to be there at all – that was odd.

  ‘Maybe he is having a piss,’ suggested Silus.

  ‘Well, the front door isn’t open, so he hasn’t gone out that way. And look, there is a chamber pot, so he doesn’t have to leave his post.’

  ‘Let’s head back into the main house. He must be there.’

  They retraced their steps back through the atrium, and heard sounds from the main bedroom, drawers being opened and closed hurriedly. Silus approached the half-open door and glanced in.

  ‘It’s the wife,’ he whispered to Daya.

  ‘I can hear someone asleep in the bedroom next door,’ she said. ‘I think it’s the son.’

  ‘I’ll deal with the wife, you take the son, meet you back here.’

  Daya nodded and eased herself into the adjacent bedroom. Silus entered the room before him.

  Autronia had her back to him. She was letting out sobs and muttering to herself as she pulled clothes out of a drawer and threw them over her shoulder.

  ‘Titurius, what have you done? What have you done? Letting that man into our house. Letting him threaten our family. And Tituria, why couldn’t you keep your nose out of everyone else’s business for once in your life.’

  Silus approached silently, dagger drawn. He was within a foot of her and ready to strike when she turned. The wig she had in her hand dropped to the floor. Her shoulders sagged in acceptance.

  ‘Please,’ she whispered. ‘Not my children.’

  Silus took a quick step forward, pushed her backwards over her dressing table, hand over her mouth, and thrust his dagger expertly through her ribs into her heart. He held her, looking into her terrified eyes, until she was dead. Then he eased her to the floor, and stepped back outside.

  Daya was already there, wiping the blood from her dagger.

  ‘The boy’s dead,’ she said.

  ‘And the wife,’ he replied.

  ‘Just the porter, the father and the girl to go.’

  Voices reached them from the tablinum. Silus nodded towards it, and together they crept to the study. Inside, they could see the father, Titurius, scribbling on a wax tablet.

  ‘Where’s the girl?’ hissed Daya.

  ‘Probably hiding,’ whispered Silus. ‘We finish these two, then we find her, burn this place to the ground and get out of here. I’ll tell you something, Daya, I’m getting tired of this shit.’

  ‘Keep your focus. Get the mission done. If you want a change of career, you can talk to the boss about it after.’

  He smiled at her, and she smiled back, and for a moment his heart skipped a beat. Then he gripped his knife tight, and stepped into the tablinum.

  Titurius and the porter turned together as they entered, and Titurius let the tablet fall to the floor with a clatter that was deafening in the deathly quiet of the domus.

  ‘Who are you?’ he asked, tremulous. The Arcani did not answer. Blades drawn, they advanced on the two men.

  The porter, a large, dark-skinned Numidian, let out a roar and charged at Daya, who was nearest him. She took a step back, sat down hard with her foot up into the porter’s midriff, and tossed him over her head. He clattered across the floor, and Daya sprang to her feet, whipped around and advanced on him as he struggled to regain his feet.

  Silus moved forwards, blade out and low. Titurius reached behind him onto the desk for a weapon of any sort. His fingers touched the stylus, grasped it. It was made of bronze, its point sharp. As Silus came within reach, Titurius whipped it round, stabbed it down hard towards Silus’ neck.

  Silus reacted quickly, ducking and rotating his body to the side. The stylus stuck into the muscle in his upper arm. He grunted in pain, slashed out with his knife. Titurius jumped sideways, away from the desk, edging towards the door. Silus circled, keeping himself between his prey and the exit.

  Behind him, Daya kicked the supine porter in the face. His head snapped back, hitting the floor and stunning him. Before he had a chance to shake it off, Daya was on him, straddling his chest, plunging her knife down into his neck repeatedly.

  Titurius looked like a cornered animal, eyes darting around desperately for any escape, any help.

  ‘Please,’ he said. ‘Spare my wife, my children. If I have wronged Antoninus or Geta, let the punishment fall on me alone.’

  Daya, back on her feet, walked up beside Silus. Blood coated her blade.

  ‘I’m sorry, it’s too late for that,’ she said.

  Titurius’ brow creased in anguish. ‘No,’ he whispered.

  ‘It’s time to finish this.’ She took a step forward, arm raised to strike the final blow. Her arm came down.

  But Titurius was no fat, idle senator who had never known exercise. He practised regularly with the sword, spent time lifting weights in the gymnasium, sparred and boxed with trainers. As the blade descended, he ducked inside the arc, reached forward with both hands and grabbed Daya by the neck.

  She brought her knife down again, but she no longer had the right angle, his firm forearms restricting the amount of motion she could achieve. She made small ineffectual stabs as she tried to gasp air. Silus moved to intervene, but Daya’s back blocked him. He moved to go round the desk to attack Titurius from the other side, but before he got there, Daya found purchase with her feet. She drove Titurius backwards, and he crashed into a large vase, which toppled sideways and smashed on the floor. She continued the momentum, the skilled little fighter using her speed and her opponent’s own weight to drive him backwards. As his back thumped into the solid wall, his hands came away from Daya’s throat.

  She thrust upwards.

  Her wickedly sharp dagger sliced up through guts, into liver, slicing major vessels. Titurius clutched her as he bled out, dropping to his knees, then slumping face forward.

  Daya stepped back, and the eyes of both the Arcani were drawn to the wreckage of the smashed vase.

  Later, when Silus looked back on what happened in the next few moments, it was not a blur. His senses were heightened with excitement and fear, and he could remember every little detail. There was a smell of fresh blood in the air. Titurius’ last gasping breaths were the only sounds. The walls of the room were decorated with large abstract diamond
patterns on a background of vibrant red. The floor was a fine mosaic of scenes of hunting, deer and boar, chased by men on horseback with spears. The smashed vase was terracotta, painted in the red-figure style of Ancient Greece with a black background, though it was no longer possible to make out the subject of the painting.

  And sitting among the wreckage, a little girl was staring at her dying father with wide, terrified eyes.

  It was Tituria, the last surviving member of Titurius’ family. But it was also Sergia, his daughter. It was Hortensia, Plautilla’s child. It was every little girl who had died in Caledonia of hunger or disease or the sword.

  His heart stuttered in his chest. Time seemed to stop, and yet the moment was too brief for deliberation, for conscious rational thought. He looked at the little girl, and her danger bit deep into his soul, bringing out a father’s instinct to protect, no matter what the cost.

  Daya took a single step forward with her knife raised.

  ‘No!’ cried Silus, and as the knife descended towards the little girl’s exposed neck, he threw himself at Daya.

  His superior weight and the surprise of his attack knocked her off her feet, and she sprawled forward, face down. She was instantly on her feet, facing him, dagger pointing at his guts. Her eyes blazed with fury.

  ‘Wait,’ said Silus, blade in his right hand pointing down, left hand extended, palm up.

  ‘Traitor,’ she hissed, and lunged at him. He danced back as she swung, once, twice, rapidly reversing across the small room until his back was to the far wall. She feinted, thrust, and this time he defended himself, fending her knife away with his own.

  ‘Stop this. Please.’

  His chest felt like there was a stone slab pressing down on it, and it was not fear or fatigue but anguish.

  ‘Don’t make me do this.’

  ‘She must die. There must be no survivors.’

  Daya thrust once more, and this time, he let the blade pass by his body, before trapping her wrist against his side with a strong forearm. With the fist that clutched the knife, he punched her hard in the face, snapping her head back, stunning her. She staggered back two steps, blood pouring from her nose.