The assassin signalled for a girl to come over, paid his bill and walked across the terrace, an unassuming man who drew no attention to himself. At the door, he looked back for a moment at the two still at the table. The ugly old man and the handsome youth sat in a companionable silence, all unsuspecting as they listened to the shrill shouts of the women and children unloading the boat and the heavy slop-slop-slop sounds of the wheels of the watermills on the far bank.
As he stepped outside, it started to rain. The assassin pulled up his hood and set off north up Mariners' Street. 'Magnificent.'
'Thank you very much,' said Ballista.
Julia laughed. 'Actually, I was referring to the political cunning of Cledonius.'
'That is rather deflating.' Naked, Ballista walked down the steps into the sunken bath and sat in the warm water. As the water stilled, he heard the storm outside, rain drummed on the roof and, somewhere in the house, the wind slammed a shutter or door. 'I thought you had told Isangrim's nurse to take him to visit the children of one of your endless cousins and had given the rest of the slaves the evening off so that we would be completely alone, so that you would have complete privacy to take care of your husband's needs.'
Julia was on the other side of the room, pouring drinks, putting some food on a plate. She smiled over her shoulder. 'I might force myself to do that later, but first I want to use this rare moment of privacy to make sure that my barbarian dominus understands the intrigues that surround his latest command.' She turned, the drinks and food temporarily forgotten.
'As ab Admissionibus, Cledonius cannot be away from the emperor. As he could not take this command on the Euphrates himself, he was determined that no other leading politician should hold it. Acilius Glabrio's candidate, Pomponius Bassus, may be a self-satisfied fool, but he is a great nobilis. Things were going badly for Cledonius when Macrianus spoke in favour of Pomponius Bassus, and all the creatures of the lame one fell over themselves to agree.'
Ballista watched as she paused, thinking. She was wearing a thin white cotton robe, held together with a sash. The lamps on the table behind her shone through the material. He could see the outline of her body. She was naked beneath the robe.
'Piso is a bankrupt; Macrianus owns him. There are many rumours, most of them disgusting, but no one knows for sure just what hold Macrianus has on Maeonius Astyanax.' She shook her head to dismiss such distasteful speculations. Ballista admired the way her breasts moved, full and heavy but firm.
Perhaps I really am the thick northern barbarian so many Romans take me for, an irrational slave to my appetites, thought Ballista. Julia was trying to explain something very serious, something which could affect the success of his mission, maybe his life itself, and all he was thinking about was her body. Ballista smiled. No, he may have spent half his life in the imperium, but he was not completely irrational. He could give his mind to two things at once, and she did look good.
'Then your Danubian friend Aurelian proposed Tacitus. That was no better in Cledonius' eyes. So he started talking about important men entrusted with big armies, about taking troops from the imperial field army. There was no need to say the word — after the last twenty years, treachery is on everyone's mind. So, when finally he proposes a less grand figure in the court — sorry, my love — with a smaller force, all the consilium rush to agree, and you, my Dominus, are back off to the wars.'
She picked up a large silver plate and two crystal goblets of watered wine and brought them over to Ballista. As she crouched next to him, the robe fell open, exposing her legs. She reached forward to pass him a drink. The robe was tight over her breasts. Ballista looked at the dark circles of her nipples. She smiled and walked round to the steps.
'Cledonius has got what he wants. No rival will lead this expedition. But he has alienated two groups of important men. So how does he win back their favour? At the next meeting of the consilium, he proposes that the two crucial men, Acilius Glabrio and Aurelian, are appointed legates. Magnificent, but now you are saddled with two ambitious young deputies who will be at loggerheads. And make no mistake: Gaius Acilius Glabrio hates you. He despises you for your origins, but he hates you for the death of his brother Marcus.'
She was standing very still. Outside, the wind was battering fretfully at the house. The loose shutter or whatever it was banged again. Julia looked sharply at her husband. 'Your friend Aurelian… he drinks too much, he has a savage temper… mark my words, he will not come to a good end.' Ballista said nothing. Somewhere in the far reaches of the house the wind tugged at the unfastened shutter: rap-rap-rap.
Julia laughed. 'You realize this is why I had to come out east. It was not that I was worried the Persians would kill you in Arete but that you would have no idea what was happening in the consilium when you got back to Antioch.'
She undid the sash and let her robe fall. 'And now all that is said' — as she raised her hands to untie her hair, her breasts lifted. Ballista gazed hungrily at her large, dark nipples, flat stomach, flared hips, her shaven delta — 'I think it is time that you took care of your wife's needs.' She stepped down into the water, waded over to him and straddled his lap. Rap-rap-rap went the shutter. 'I do not think you appreciate the risks that I run for you. Over a year without a man inside me — there is not a doctor in the imperium who would not agree that such abstinence is very bad for a woman's health.' She tipped her head back and laughed. 'Although I am sure that many a doctor would be prepared to help a girl in such a predicament.' She leant forward and kissed him, her tongue sliding into his mouth, her breasts flattening against his chest. Rap-rap-rap.
'Wait a moment. I cannot concentrate with that row going on.' Ballista slid out from under her, running his hand across her slick, wet breasts, the nipples hard against his palm.
'Do not be too long.' She smiled.
He draped a towel round himself and picked up a small lamp. He left wet footprints on the marble floor.
Outside the bath rooms, the house was in darkness. Ballista stood in the main living room listening. There was the sound — rap-rap-rap — it was coming from somewhere in the slave quarters. This was a part of the house that he did not know at all well. He had only set foot in it once, when he had first been given a tour of the whole property. It was a rabbit warren of short, windowless corridors and tiny cells. Once, as the sound receded, he had had to retrace his steps. Eventually, he found the open window, at the end of a corridor up under the eaves.
The rain stung his face when he stretched far out to grab the wildly swinging shutter. Far below, the road ran like a river. The fitful wind blew great gusts of rain one after another down the road.
When he fastened the window, for a moment everything seemed unnaturally quiet. Then other sounds emerged: small creaks and scratching sounds. Suddenly, he thought he heard a footstep. He smiled. It was just an old house cooling as the warmth of the day died out of it, moving gently in the face of the wind. In his small circle of lamplight, he started to head back.
Before he reached the tepidarium, he nipped out the lamp. Quietly, he looked round the door. Julia was lying back, her shoulders and arms supporting her floating body. Her breasts broke the surface of the water. She looked superb. He watched for some time before he walked in, dropped his towel and stepped down into the bath.
V
Leaving Julia asleep, warm in their bed, Ballista dressed and walked to the stables. He saddled Pale Horse and led him out into the night. He rode alone through the empty streets. It was dark, at least three hours before dawn. The rain had eased off but the wind still ripped through the alleys of the potters' quarter.
Once, the northerner thought he heard something. A clink of steel on stone? He reined in, pushed back his hood and sat motionless, listening, hand on hilt, looking all around. Nothing. He could hear nothing but the wind itself buffeting his ears. He could see nothing except the empty, windswept alley. Ballista smiled to himself. Any more of this and he would become as nervous as Demetrius. Of course it was eerie
to ride through deserted streets that usually teemed with men and animals. And he was tired. His smile broadened. Julia had seen to that. Allfather but she had tired him out. He could have chosen worse for a wife.
A gentle pressure from his thighs set his mount in motion again. He left his hood down. Jumpy or not, it was worth cold ears to be able to hear properly.
Always blessed with a good sense of direction, Ballista pulled up in a narrow alley. The walls here looked uncared for, damp, the plaster peeling. He got down from his mount and hammered on an inconspicuous door. The lantern hanging over it squealed as it swung in the wind, its light glinting off puddles and the rivulet that ran down the middle of the alley.
The door opened, throwing a yellow rectangle of light. The head of Gillo, Aurelian's manservant, peered out, squinting into the darkness.
'Ave, Dominus. Ave, Marcus Clodius Ballista.' He smiled, snapped over his shoulder for a boy to take the dominus' horse, and gestured for the northerner to step inside.
Ballista handed his cloak to Gillo, who hung it on a peg in the shabby corridor. From peasant stock, the young general Aurelian had never tried to conceal his lack of money. Those who liked him said his continuing impecunious state pointed to his financial probity — no soldier ever became rich honestly on what the Res Publica paid him. For those who did not care for him, it was an ostentatious sham — for sure, no peasant could keep his nose out of the trough. There were dark stories of millions hidden away.
A wave of warmth and noise washed over Ballista as the door to the main room was opened.
'Ah-ha, here he is. Better late than never.' The strong Danubian accent of Aurelian rang out. 'Come in, come in. You know everyone? The esteemed ex-consul Tacitus? My young friends Mucapor and Sandario?' The face visible between the close-cropped hair and beard was flushed. There was a dark-red spot on each of Aurelian's prominent cheekbones. It was hot in the room, and everyone was dressed for hunting, but Ballista noticed the wine cup in his friend's hand.
'Indeed I do, and I am not late.' Ballista stepped forward with his hand out. 'Marcus Claudius Tacitus, it is good to see you again.' The older man turned his heavily lined face to the newcomer, shook his hand, then embraced him. Close up, Tacitus looked all and more of his fifty-five years. The dour, big-nosed face itself was cleanshaven but luxuriant whiskers ran together into a beard underneath the chin.
'It is good to see you, Ballista.' The Danubian accent was less pronounced than Aurelian's. The older man's family had been landowners there, time out of mind. The two men in their twenties, both again from the lands around the Danube, greeted Ballista with wide smiles. Sandario's made him look even more dashing. Unfortunately, Mucapor's did not have the same effect; it made him look even more of a simpleton.
'Drink!' Aurelian bellowed. 'Eros! Where in Hades has that little Greek bugger got to? Eros, bring drinks for our guests.' Aurelian's slave secretary kept his eyes down as he gave Ballista a cup of wine and topped up all the others, except Tacitus, who quietly put his hand over his cup.
'Food!' Aurelian was in tearing form. 'Ballista, I know how you northern barbarians eat. I told Gillo to buy more food than one could imagine. Help yourself.' The young general gestured with his cup to a table at the back of the room, which did indeed appear to be laden with food. Aurelian grinned at Ballista. Everyone in the room got the irony that, for most of the inhabitants of the imperium, the men from the Danube were almost as much barbarians as the Angle from the far north beyond the frontiers.
'My dear Tacitus,' Aurelian said in a slightly more respectful voice, 'you are eating nothing. And I specifically told Gillo to buy all the lettuce he could get his hands on, knowing it was your favourite vegetable.'
Tacitus, who was actually solemnly eating a piece of dry bread, which he dipped now and then in some olive oil, took his time in replying. 'Only in the evenings. Lettuce helps you sleep, cools the desires of the flesh. Last night, I admit, I ate a great deal of it. Usually I read myself to sleep but, obviously, not yesterday, it being the night after the day of the kalends — any fool knows that would bring terrible bad luck.'
To hide his smile, Ballista busied himself filling a plate with food: some cold pheasant, ham, cheese, bread, a little of the lettuce. Aurelian was no fool, but he ought to be careful teasing Tacitus, for the older man was no fool either. They made an odd couple. The elder was a circumspect, kindly man, abstemious, almost ascetic, in his habits, much given to superstition, while the younger, 'hand-to-steel', was impetuous, even hot-headed and — possibly Julia was right — altogether too keen on drink and food. It said a lot that they got along well. The very presence of the two puppies Sandario and Mucapor showed how the military men from the Danube stuck together. Ballista knew enough Roman history to know that it was only in the last generation that these Danubians had come to the fore in the army. Really, it was only in the last twenty-one years, since Maximinus Thrax had seized the throne.
Ballista had to suppress a shudder at even thinking the name of the long-dead emperor. He could not help picturing the great white face, the terrible grey eyes. Ballista remembered the final threat — 'I will see you again' — as the emperor died at his hand. All that was long ago. And it was a long time since Ballista's sleep had been disturbed by the unquiet daemon of the late and unlamented Maximinus Thrax.
Ballista sipped his wine. It was red, as was to be expected from Aurelian, made into conditum, warmed and spiced, just the thing for a cold morning following hounds.
Aurelian reverted to a topic that he had clearly been pursuing before Ballista's arrival. 'So the legionary, having seduced the wife of the man in whose house he was billeted, gets away with it. No discipline at all, and another bloody provincial who hates the army. If it had been down to me, I would have made an example of the bastard. Followed the lead of Alexander the Great. Find two saplings. Bend them down to the ground. Tie one of the legionary's legs to each. And let the trees go. Rip the bastard in half. A very public warning of what the men can expect if they flout discipline. Let them see what they are going to get before they do it.' Aurelian grinned. Ballista often found it hard to tell when his friend was being serious or was playing up to his nickname. 'Why the fucker could not just use one of the brothels like everyone else, I do not know,' Aurelian continued. 'It is not as if there is a shortage of brothels in this town.'
'They should all be closed,' said Tacitus. The other men looked at him. Was he joking? He had a reputation for strong self-discipline, but the brothels were so much a part of daily life that only the most radical of philosophers would consider getting rid of them. Even stern Cato had thought that a young man should use them in moderation. 'And the baths, the theatre, the hippodrome, and the amphitheatre — they should all be closed. After the disgraceful riot in the hippodrome, the Antiochenes should be punished. Take away their pleasures for a time; that would teach those shifty little easterners a lesson.' Tacitus' audience were spared further ways of instilling backbone into untrustworthy orientals by the arrival of Antistius, the other manservant of Aurelian, dressed in the embroidered coat of a huntsman, who announced that the horses were ready.
Outside, the night had grown worse. The wind still tore down the alley, and it had started to rain again. Before they had cleared the potters' quarter, let alone crossed the Kerateion, the Jewish quarter near the Daphne Gate, the little party was thoroughly bedraggled and wet. It was as well that torches carried by the servants Gillo and Antistius stayed lit, though they flared and guttered wildly, for the wind had blown out many of the lanterns that hung outside the shops. 'I will tell you what would happen if I were in charge.' Aurelian pushed back his hood to bellow at Ballista. 'I would liven up those bloody Superintendents of the Tribes. On a night like this, you would not find a single one of the epimeletai warming his arse by the fire or ramming his wife in bed. Oh no, the buggers would be out here getting soaked to the skin doing their job, making sure these storekeepers obeyed the law and kept their lanterns alight.'
; 'You could make an example of a couple of them,' Ballista shouted back over the storm. 'Something fitting the crime. Maybe burn one or two alive.'
'Hmm.' Aurelian grinned and pulled his hood back up.
The streets got wider but steeper as they entered the expensive part of the Epiphania district known as the Rhodion, the rose garden. The houses here were bigger, with wide grounds, often encompassing a whole block. There were fewer shops. There were even fewer lanterns. But the rain was letting up. The gatekeeper at the south-east postern was expecting them. Even at this hour he was civil, and in violation of the law he opened the gate. Obviously he had been bribed in advance. They dismounted and, one by one, led their horses through.
Outside, they remained on foot. The path Aurelian pointed out was precipitous. In single file they set off, leading their horses. To begin with, the walls of the town were close on their left, the ravine of the Phyrminus River at a similar distance on their right. Then both curved away, and the path climbed up through stands of trees, mainly firs, with some ash and wild olive. Progress was slow, the path steep. All except the servants used the boar spears Aurelian had given them as walking sticks. The horses laboured.
Over his own breathing, Ballista listened to the wind moving the trees above their heads, the sibilant sound of the leaves, the creak of the branches, a magical sound that reminded him of the sacred groves of his distant homeland. He noticed that the light of the servants' torches was turning a pale yellow. The rain had ceased some time earlier. The sky had gone from black to deep blue to a delicate azure. Scattered black clouds raced low over their heads and away to the south-east, tattered remnants of the night's storm. It was nearly dawn.
Suddenly they came out into the open on the crest of Mount Silpius. They halted, men and horses getting their breath back, stretching out from the hunched postures of climbing. Aurelian said that they should wait there for the huntsman and the hounds.
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