‘I think Dinu said something about the Cave of Mithras, but she said they should go to the basilica first.’ She was twisting her hands together. ‘She abandoned me!’
‘Oh no!’ I breathed. ‘He’ll try to take her to our land and she’ll die!’
Plecta burst into tears. ‘I will also die!’ she cried. ‘They will think I killed her and ran away. They crucify runaway slaves.’
My stomach did a somersault and my skin prickled all over.
She threw her arms around me and sobbed. ‘Alexandros, you have to find her!’
I hugged her back for a moment, mainly because I felt dizzy too. Then I gently pushed her away.
‘We’ll find her,’ I said. ‘Do you know how to find the Cave of Mithras?’
‘No.’ Plecta was shivering and her teeth were chattering. ‘We have never been north of the river before.’
‘Of course you haven’t.’ My mind was spinning like the front wheel of a bicycle doing a wheelie: it couldn’t get a grip on anything. I gently banged the side my head with the heel of my hand. ‘Think, Alex!’ I said. ‘Think!’
I tried to visualise the map of Londinium I had memorised.
I knew the bridge we had crossed went straight on to the basilica, and that the Mithraeum was down to the left, south-west from there. But when we had run away from Lollia’s fiancé we had got all confused.
But the basilica was the biggest building in Londinium, even bigger than the amphitheatre. If I could spot that, I would be able to get my bearings.
I looked around, but the Temple of Diana loomed up on our right and the trees of the narrow garden blocked my view in other directions.
‘Come on,’ I said. ‘We need to get out on the street so I can see where we are.’
At the end of the narrow garden was an even narrower alley. The alley ended at a tall wooden gate with its bar on the inside. The wooden bar had not quite fallen back into its cradle.
‘They must have come this way,’ I said. But as I started to lift the bar, Plecta stopped me with a touch. ‘My mistress and your slave changed tunics before they went, so we had better become ourselves again too,’ she said.
We turned our backs on each other and quickly switched back to our own tunics.
When I turned back I saw Plecta fixing her twisted-up hair in place with a bone hairpin. ‘If we cannot find them, will you protect me?’ Her chocolate-brown eyes were brimming with tears and her lower lip trembled.
‘Yes,’ I said with more confidence than I felt. I remembered the crucified man at the crossroads and tried not to shudder.
I lifted the beam of the inner gate, opened it a little and peeked out. It led into a busy street with men and women and litters moving both ways. When I was sure nobody was looking, I stepped out. Plecta pulled her palla over her head and shoulders. Then she followed me out, careful to step with her right foot first.
I made sure to leave the gate slightly ajar in case we needed a quick escape route later on.
The moment we stepped out onto the street, the sun came out from behind a cloud and shone down on bolts of coloured fabric and bunches of dyed wool outside the shops on the other side of the street. That explained why there were more women here than I had seen anywhere else in Londinium; this was a cloth market.
The altar of the temple and its entrance were on our right. Further along, at the end of the road, I saw a good omen. It was still raining there, and the sun made a rainbow that ended at the red-tiled roof of a building rising up above all the other buildings. It was Londinium’s great basilica. Thank you, God! I prayed.
‘Come on!’ I urged, tugging Plecta’s hand.
‘We must not run,’ she hissed, ‘or people will notice us. Only thieves and robbers run,’ she added. ‘Also,’ she said, ‘only those who are married or engaged hold hands.’
So we walked as fast as we dared, keeping our heads down.
‘Why would they go to the basilica?’ I asked as we went.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Her father goes there to do business sometimes. Maybe she wants to introduce Dinu to him.’
‘We’ve got to stop them,’ I muttered. ‘Dinu has to come back with me.’
‘Why?’ she asked. ‘Why must you go?’
‘We have to go back to our country,’ I said. ‘We both have family there.’
‘You’re lucky,’ she said. ‘You have a family.’
‘Yes,’ I said. I looked at her and felt a wave of sorrow for her hard life. I wondered how long she had to live. Her mistress would be talked about hundreds of years in the future but no one would ever know what happened to her slave-girl.
‘How old are you, Plecta?’ I asked.
‘Twelve years, eleven months and twenty days,’ she said. ‘On the Kalends I will be thirteen.’
‘Does everyone here know their exact age?’ I asked.
‘Of course. Each day we are allowed to look upon the light of day is a gift from the gods. Memento mori,’ she added in Latin. ‘Remember that you must die.’
‘Carpe diem,’ I said softly. ‘Seize the moment!’ And even though we were not betrothed, she let me hold her hand.
44
Indoor Pigeons
Remember I told you about the Tate Modern, that big art gallery by the River Thames? It used to be a power station and there is still a room called the Turbine Hall. If you want an idea of how high the roof of the ancient basilica was, go to the lowest part of the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern and then look up.
I don’t know if the dimensions were exactly the same, but it felt very similar.
London’s basilica was humongous.
There were pigeons flying around up there and everything. The afternoon sun sent beams slanting down through high arched windows. Where they hit the floor I could see it was made of coloured marble. Plecta and I stood open-mouthed. Then some pigeon poop splattered on the expensive floor just in front of us, so we closed our mouths and reminded ourselves we were there to find Lollia and Dinu.
‘Let’s make our way to the other end and see if we can spot them,’ I said to Plecta. She inclined her head in agreement. As we started towards the far end of the giant building, she took my hand again.
Holding Plecta’s hand felt reassuring and scary at the same time. Reassuring because it meant she cared about me as much as I did about her. Scary because if they couldn’t find Lollia they would torture Plecta to find out what she knew. And that would be my fault.
The basilica wasn’t too busy. I remembered that Romans tended to work in the mornings and go to the baths or relax in the afternoon. Also, I had read somewhere that business wasn’t usually conducted on days when the games were on. But maybe the citizens of Londinium hadn’t got that memo.
I could see there was a better class of person here. About a third of the men were dressed like Epapras, in cream-coloured togas over tunics with two vertical red stripes on them. I guessed it was the ancient equivalent of a suit and tie. Because they all wore the same uniform, you could easily compare one to another and tell the high-quality fabric from the cheap stuff. One guy’s tunic was so thin that you could almost see through it.
There were almost no women or children in here.
The only kids our age were standing quietly by a veiled woman while a man in a toga spoke to some men on benches. The toga man was waving his arms a lot and he kept gesturing at the woman and her kids. I guessed he was a lawyer pleading her case. There were a few other cases in session, but because the roof was so high they didn’t drown each other out. Each lawyer stood near a niche in the wall and addressed men on benches with their backs to the central aisle. There were also some raised blocks of marble, or maybe marble covered brick, with a man sitting on each one where a case was being argued. I guessed the men on the blocks were judges and the people on the benches were like modern juries. The defendants – the people on trial – usually stood to one side looking miserable.
Once we passed a pair of almost-naked men with bruises
on their bodies and metal chains around their ankles. When one of them turned I saw his back was raw and bloody where he had been whipped.
I could feel Plecta’s hand trembling in mine. She said in a low voice, ‘Runaway slaves.’
I shuddered too, remembering the crucified man I had seen at the crossroads that morning.
Suddenly Plecta’s fingers tightened on mine.
‘There they are!’ she said. ‘I see them!’
Lollia and Dinu stood by a niche in the wall facing each other, right hands clasped like when you shake hands. A golden beam of sunlight fell on them and seemed to make their blond hair glow, almost as if they had halos.
I had to admit they were a good-looking couple.
Coming closer, I saw a statue of a naked woman in the niche behind them and guessed it was Venus, the goddess of love. Four men in togas stood nearby, watching Dinu and Lollia intently. The youngest was fluffy-bearded Epapras.
‘Oh no!’ cried Plecta. ‘I think they are getting married!’
‘Where’s the priest?’ I said.
She gave me a puzzled look. ‘They don’t need a priest,’ she said. ‘They only need to hold hands and make a vow in the presence of witnesses.’
‘Stop!’ cried a voice behind me. ‘Stop that ceremony!’
I turned to see the fat bald man in a striped tunic from earlier jogging towards us. Behind him came a distinguished-looking man with silver-blond hair and two soldiers.
‘Eheu!’ cried Plecta. Alas! ‘Tertius has found us. And he’s brought Lollia’s father!’
‘Dinu, run!’ I shouted in English. ‘Head back to the Mithraeum! They’re going to arrest you!’
Dinu looked around, startled. His eyes widened when he saw me, then widened even more at the sight of two soldiers bearing down on him.
Lollia and Dinu looked at each other and then ran, still holding hands. Fluffy-bearded Epapras charged after them, his toga flapping. Plecta and I looked at each other and without a word we ran, too.
Suddenly, with a cry of ‘Pesta toga!’ Epapras tripped on his toga and sprawled onto the marble floor of the great basilica.
Plecta skidded to a halt. ‘Are you all right, sir?’ she asked him in Greek.
‘Yes,’ he groaned. ‘Only my dignity is bruised.’ He gazed up at her. ‘Your Greek is excellent,’ he said. ‘Are you by any chance from Pergamum?’
Plecta gave the downward nod for yes and I bent forward to help him up, but he waved us on.
‘Go! Go!’ he cried. ‘I’ll try to delay them for you.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ said Plecta.
I grabbed her hand and together we ran out into a massive forum.
The rain clouds had gone and it was a beautiful afternoon. We were just in time to see Dinu and Lollia weaving between market stalls towards the western exit, back the way we had come.
The stalls here were the biggest and most luxurious of any I had seen so far. Lots of them displayed those big clay jars full of wine or maybe olive oil. In fact we almost ran into a half-naked slave with a huge amphora on his shoulder but managed to dodge around him.
Once outside the forum and back on the road, we looked around for the runaway lovebirds.
Plecta pointed. ‘There they are!’
I caught a flash of Lollia’s blue palla and loose golden hair as they headed north.
‘That’s not the way to the Mithraeum,’ I said. ‘They’re going in the opposite direction!’
45
House-Tombs
Thanks to Lollia’s sapphire-blue palla and Dinu’s height, we managed to keep them in sight. They skirted the western side of the forum and then veered right to run along the imposing northern wall of the basilica. There was a kind of industrial area here, with workshops. We passed several potteries, a glassmaker and, by the smell of it, a pee-laundry.
We were still running, even though I was pretty sure we had shaken off our pursuers. Once I stepped in a cowpat and nearly slipped on my flat leather soles, but by then we were in sight of the lofty town walls and twin arched gates, so we slowed to a walk and tried to look casual. Later on I found it was Bishopsgate. In my time there would be a massive gherkin-shaped skyscraper here.
There were soldiers on guard duty, but they looked bored. One was talking to the driver of a cart coming through the right-hand gate and the other was watching some boys who were rolling a hoop near a cheese stall.
‘I don’t see Lollia or Dinu anywhere,’ I said.
‘I think they went through the gate,’ panted Plecta, ‘into the cemetery. Lollia needs the spirits of the dead to help her with her magic spells.’
‘She’s doing magic now?’
Plecta tipped her head for yes. We were walking as fast as we could without seeming to hurry. Would the soldiers stop the twenty-first century boy and possible runaway slave-girl?
They didn’t even look at us.
As we went through the left-hand gate I saw dozens of small altars under the arch on both sides of the road. A man was lighting a candle at one of them. A line of bricks in the gravel road showed where Londinium ended and its northern graveyard began. I was careful to step over with my right foot.
Then we were back out into daylight, into the cemetery. I shivered as I remembered the Greek word for graveyard. It’s necropolis, which means ‘city of the dead’.
And that’s exactly what the cemetery looked like. The road was lined with buildings that were homes for the dead rather than the living.
My dad is buried in Brompton Cemetery, where there are lots of similar house-tombs, called mausoleums. The difference between this cemetery and Brompton Cemetery was that there were no trees here, only a few little shrubs. I suddenly realised why I kept seeing carts full of wood. Once there had been vast forests of ancient oak trees surrounding London, but three hundred years of heating bath houses, burning bodies and offering up burnt sacrifices had used up all the wood for miles around.
No trees meant there was nothing but mud and weeds around the tombs, apart from little bumps where cremation urns stuck up out of the ground.
Unlike Brompton Cemetery, which is usually deserted when I go there with Gran, I could see movement everywhere. Beggars huddled by a house-tomb close to where the great wall of the city rose up on my left. Mourners stood around a smoking pyre a hundred metres to the north-west. Feral dogs prowled about too, looking for something to eat. Wheeled traffic moved both ways on the road, which I found out later was called Ermine Street.
Then I spotted Dinu peeping out from behind a mausoleum on the right-hand side of the road. The top of the mausoleum had a painted stone sculpture of a lion devouring a stag.
Instead of ducking out of sight or running away as I expected, Dinu beckoned us over.
Plecta and I looked at each other and jogged along a footpath beside the road, in order to avoid cowpats, donkey dung and several mule-drawn carts heading our way.
‘Dinu!’ I hissed when I we reached the lion tomb. ‘What are you doing?’
‘She told me to keep watch,’ he said. ‘You were right. She is witch and doing something like magic. Are they still chasing us?’
I shook my head, then asked, ‘Can you actually understand her?’
‘Little bit,’ he said. ‘When she speaks Latin. Is not so different from Romanian, you know.’
I looked around for Lollia but couldn’t see her. Then Plecta pointed and I caught a glint of her fair hair. She was sitting on the ground behind a grave marker near a bush.
I tiptoed towards Lollia, trying to be as quiet as I could. As I got closer I heard her speaking in a strange sing-song voice, like when people talk to a baby or a pet. Her head was bent over something, but I couldn’t see what it was.
Curiosity drew me closer. Plecta followed, as silent as a ghost.
When I was finally close enough to see, I managed not to gasp in horror.
Lollia held a little beeswax figure of a pot-bellied man. He had copper needles in his eyes, mouth and tummy button, lik
e a voodoo doll.
She was using her ivory leopard knife to cut off his feet.
46
Roman Voodoo
‘She made that figure yesterday at midnight,’ Plecta murmured in my ear. ‘We did it in a graveyard near us.’
It was strange to think Plecta and Lollia had been awake under those stars too. Doing black magic.
‘Do you do it too?’ I asked quietly.
She tipped her head back for no. ‘I kept watch. Magic frightens me. She summons spirits of the dead to be her messengers. She does not want to marry Tertius the brewer.’
‘Is that wax doll supposed to be him?’
‘Yes,’ said Plecta. ‘She found some of his hairs, though he does not have very many, and put them in. Also pits from olives he had eaten and dregs from the bottom of his wine cup. She is trying to make him sick so she will not have to marry him.’
‘Why did she tie a twig to his back?’
‘That is not a twig. I think it is someone’s finger bone.’
Lollia must have heard me gasp. Her head jerked around and she looked up at us. She reminded me of a blue-eyed leopard disturbed in the middle of devouring its prey.
Then she turned back to her singing and sawing.
At that moment I realised that Lollia was not like the Mean Girls at my school. She was a creature from another time, another world, another mindset.
I shuddered.
Plecta murmured in my ear. ‘When she made that figure she also chanted a summoning spell to bring a new betrothed. This morning when we heard that a beautiful boy was looking for a blue-eyed girl with ivory knife she was convinced her magic had worked.’
‘Me,’ I breathed.
‘And then Dinu,’ said Plecta. ‘She is convinced she has power.’
Once again I shuddered. Solomon Daisy had said his time portal was non magia, sed scientia. But I wondered: did magic and science ever attract each other, like magnets?
Suddenly all our heads went up at the sound of a man’s voice calling out, ‘Lollia, are you here?’
The Time Travel Diaries Page 13