‘You made the right decision,’ I say.
‘As I said, I had one legion, just under six thousand men in total. I sent word to the legate of Asia, demanding three more. But I set off with mine straight away. We were undermanned, but able to move quickly. And we were in Thrace within the month. The False Nero and his army were last spotted near Abdera. “Spotted” is the wrong word. They sacked the city, raped the women, killed their husbands and made off with anything of value they could. I sent out scouts in three different directions, north, east and west. (The sea was south and we knew they didn’t have ships.) The scouts returned with word that the False Nero had gone east, leaving a trail of wasted fields, burnt buildings, and corpses. You should have seen it. The destruction; it was as though Xerxes’s army was heading west, not the twenty thousand thugs we eventually caught. We followed and eventually met them outside of Maronea.’
‘Why not simply overtake them and raid their camp?’ I ask. ‘Why give him the opportunity for a fight?’
‘Word is he’s a former soldier, a former Praetorian. That is –’ Cerialis smiles ‘– provided he’s not Nero back from the dead. He had scouts. He knew we were coming. He picked the ground – at least I let him think he picked the ground – and he had his men lined up and ready for a fight.’
‘Twenty thousand you said?’
‘Thereabout.’
‘Any horse?’
‘Couldn’t have been more than five hundred.’
‘And you?’
‘By then we’d met up with the Asian legions. We had just over twelve thousand.’
‘Yet it was a rout.’ I shake my head. ‘You’re a credit to the Empire.’
Cerialis acknowledges the compliment with a nod; he sips his wine.
‘How did it unfold?’
Cerlialis’s correspondence has already explained it all, but I want it again, detail by detail. Caesar’s son wants the information; the former general misses the battle and this echo is all he has.
‘Nothing dramatic. As I said, they only had five hundred horses. And our arms were far superior. We staged a line in front of his, but it wasn’t anything more than a dummy line by the time his army advanced.’ He uses a stylus and blocks of wood on his desk to show me. ‘I had most of the men move to the flank. We tore into their side, pinched them like the claw of a crab at first, until the flank overwhelmed them.’ He laughs. ‘If the False Nero is a former Praetorian, he’s not a credit to the unit. Maybe all you Praetorians are too fat on the spoils of the capital.’
‘How many did you capture?’
‘We took about two thousand alive. We didn’t have enough men to take more. We’d hoped for ransoms, but these weren’t rich men, thugs, farmers, idiots – not many with coin. We had some swear an oath of fealty to your father. The rest we sold in Pontus.’
I shake my head in disbelief. ‘What possessed them to follow this man? Is there at least a resemblance with the tyrant?’
‘I never saw him. But we interrogated his officers and a general consensus emerged. Based on what I’m told, I’d say this fake tyrant is shorter, and his hair is more red than the coppery-shade those Julio-Claudians all had.’
‘How do his men describe him? Is he . . .’ I search for the right word. ‘Inspiring?’
Cerialis shakes his head. ‘They were criminals, like I said. They wanted to rape and pillage. They didn’t care who they were following.’
‘And this False Nero may be an ex-Praetorian?’
‘That’s what his officers are saying. One in particular says he’s been with him for close ten years. He has quite a lot to say, in fact.’
‘Oh?’
‘Yes, but it is better to hear it from the horse’s mouth.’
*
We exit Cerialis’s tent and make our way to the centre of the camp. Two guards stand in front of the prisoners’ tent. Inside, it’s dark and stinks of piss. There are four cages filled with a dozen or more men. While three of the cages are large enough that a man could stand without hindrance, the third does not quite reach my waist. Inside is a man, lying on his side, with his knees tucked into his chest. His chains rattle in time with his snore. His long brown hair is tangled filth. He is alive, but worn down, as a prisoner should be before an ovation.
Cerialis kicks the cage. Startled, the filthy prisoner wakes. Cerialis squats down to the ground, so his eyes are level with the prisoner’s.
‘You see this man here?’ Cerialis points at me. ‘He is Titus Flavius Vespasianus, prefect of the Praetorians and the Emperor’s eldest son. If anyone were even considering showing you mercy, this would be the man. Tell him everything you told me and maybe he’ll save that filthy neck of yours.’
‘A sip of wine would help,’ the prisoner says. His voice sounds hollow and empty.
Cerialis snaps his fingers and a soldier swoops in with a skin of wine. He hands it to Cerialis, who hands it to the prisoner. The prisoner takes a draught.
‘All right,’ Cerialis says, rattling the cage. ‘Time to talk. Let’s start with who the False Nero is.’
‘His name is Terentius. He was a centurion in the Praetorian Guard, here in Rome.’
To Cerialis, I say, ‘A name is useful. Very useful.’
Cerialis rattles the cage. ‘And? What did this Terentius confide in you?’
‘Nero is alive,’ he says. ‘He never committed suicide. Terentius stole him from the palace and imprisoned him.’
‘And where is he now?’ Cerailis prompts.
‘Still there, I think, in some prison north of Rome.’
Cerialis looks at me and together we laugh.
As we’re leaving, I say, ‘It’s amazing the tales men will tell to impress their own men.’
XV
From Oyster to Sardine
A.D. 69
MARCUS
2 February, dawn
Off the coast of Sardinia, the Tyrrhenian Sea
Foamy white spray flies over the gunwales. I squeeze my eyes before a million drops of water hit me all at once. The bow goes up into the air and then the sea disappears and the ship falls and my stomach feels like when someone pulls a chair away as you’re about to sit. Then: crash! Another wave slams into the boat and foamy white spray flies over the gunwales.
‘Sheet in!’ a sailor yells.
‘Haaaaaaaaarrrrrrdddddd,’ another one yells.
Nero, Doryphorus and I are holding onto a rope tied to the mast. My knuckles are white. Doryphorus’s face is pale and he’s been retching for a while now. He’s already lost his breakfast and last night’s meal. Now all that comes out are yellow bubbles of sick.
We went straight from Rome to a city near the sea called Oyster. We stayed in a little apartment near the pier, and each day Doryphorus went to find a ship to take us away from Italy, while Nero and I stayed in the apartment, waiting.
Doryphorus and Nero argued a lot. They argued about money and about where to go next. Doryphorus said we need to go to Egypt for coin, but Nero wanted to find a friend of his who lived on an island called Sardine. And they argued about me. Doryphorus would whisper to Nero in Greek thinking I couldn’t understand, but I’m learning faster than he thinks. I didn’t understand everything, but I figured out enough to know Doryphorus thought they should leave me in Oyster, all by myself.
One day Doryphorus came back from the pier and said he’d found a ship that was leaving right away. We packed up our things, which wasn’t very much, and rushed to the ship.
I couldn’t believe the pier. There were so many ships, from little ones rowed by one man, to ones as big as the forum, rowed by an army. Each ship had amphorae being dragged on and off. I saw a giraffe’s head from a distance (not the body, though), and I heard a trumpet that Nero said was an elephant.
Our ship wasn’t very nice. It looked old with its yellow sail, and it stank of rotten vegetables. The captain was only wearing pants. His belly was huge and hairy; so were his arms and shoulders and back. His long, braided hair – brown
with a bit of grey – was up in a bun. It reminded me of Elsie’s. His crew looked like younger versions of him.
It was only when we were on the boat that I learned Nero had won the argument and we were sailing to Sardine. The wind was steady at first but got stronger and stronger as the day wore on. Soon the waves were big – ‘rollers’ the captain called them – and we were going right into them. The ship went up and down, up and down. It wasn’t too long before I started to feel sick.
*
It’s the afternoon when we finally see something, a green smudge in the distance, between the grey sky and scruffy blue sea.
‘What’s that?’ I ask.
‘Sardinia,’ Doryphorus says.
‘Why are we going there?’
‘To ask a question,’ Doryphorus says. ‘Nero’s brought us to a wild, lawless island to find one man and ask him a question – a question he’ll likely answer with a lie.’
‘I will know the truth of what happened,’ Nero says to Doryphorus. ‘Cassius was involved in Torcus once. He will have the answers I require. Anyway, I banished him when I was perfectly within my rights to have him killed. He is in my debt. At the very least, he owes me the truth.’
The boat suddenly pitches downwards and Doryphorus starts to retch again. I turn away so I don’t have to see his grey tongue.
*
We keep sailing until the island doesn’t look like an island anymore, until the smudge is so long and wide and green with trees it looks like there’s no end in either direction. Then the captain shouts out orders and the ship comes to a halt and a little rowboat is lowered into the water; it hits the sea with a splash.
‘All right,’ the captain says, screaming over the wind. He bends down and unties the rope we’ve been holding on to. ‘This is where you go it alone.’
Doryphorus is furious. ‘What? You were to take us to shore. That was the agreement.’
‘I’m changing the agreement. The sea’s too rough and I am not being shipwrecked in Sardinia. Plus, the island’s cursed and bandits rule. If I ordered my men to shore, I’d have a mutiny on my hands. I’m giving you a rowboat instead. A fair deal, I think.’
‘And how are we to leave?’ Doryphorus asks.
‘The fuck if I care.’
*
The sailors help all three of us climb down a rope ladder. Doryphorus goes first. A wave pushes the tiny craft into the side of the ship just as he’s putting his feet down. He slips and collapses in a heap in the bottom of the boat. Nero goes next. He takes a few steps on the rope ladder before Doryphorus takes him in his arms. I go last. Doryphorus doesn’t help me at all, but gets the oars ready instead. I slip on the ladder and fall. My legs dip into the sea and my chest hits the gunwale.
‘Hurry, boy,’ Doryphorus says.
I wiggle and kick my legs again and again until I’m up and into the boat.
Doryphorus starts rowing us to shore. The waves help. We go fast for a bit, with a wave, but then it disappears and we slow down again. Then another wave comes and we speed up. Each time the boat rocks back and forth, and it feels like we might tip over.
Nero is lying on the floor of the rower. I’m beside him until Doryphorus yells, ‘Get to the bow, boy, to even out the weight.’ His eyes are wide with fear.
The waves keep sending us towards the shore.
‘Sardinia has a certain smell this time of year, doesn’t it?’ Nero says.
A wave twice the size of any so far grabs our boat and sends us hurtling towards shore. The bow starts to aim away from shore, inch by inch, and the boat starts to tip . . .
And then the boat goes over and I’m in a rush of white foam, spinning and tumbling in every direction. I need to breathe badly and my chest is burning and just when I’m about to open my mouth underwater, the wave stops and I can fling my head up and out of the water and suck in a long, huge breath.
I flail my arms around hoping that’s how you swim – but I know it will be no good and I’ll sink like a stone and die right here. But my feet touch something. Sand. I can stand! With the water only up to my bellybutton. I smile and start to laugh – not believing my luck – but then I feel the sea sucking me back. That big wave that brought me in wants to suck me back out. Neptune isn’t done with me. I know that if the wave sucks me out to sea I’ll drown. So I start running towards shore. But my legs are underwater, so they’re heavy and slow, and the sand slides away under my feet with each step and I don’t go anywhere. I run as hard as I can, flailing my arms forward too, but I don’t move. Neptune’s wave keeps trying to suck me out, but I keep running away from it. But then Neptune’s had enough and the sucking stops and I hear the roar of a wave. I look over my shoulder and I see another wall of water coming towards me, churning white foam as fast as a horse can run. With the sucking done, I can start to move forward again, towards shore, but the second wave hits me – SMASH – and white foam is everywhere; it slams me into the sandy sea floor and then sends me somersaulting.
When the second wave is done with me, I figure I’ve drowned and maybe drowning isn’t so bad because it doesn’t hurt, but I open my eyes and see the sun. I realise I’m not dead; I’m lying on the beach. Foamy surf laps my side. I look out to sea and see the ship heading south. It looks quiet and peaceful.
I want to cry out in celebration, but immediately I start to retch water I must have swallowed. When I’m done, I put my head down on the sand.
I doze for a while, not really sleeping, but I keep lying there collecting my energy, until I feel a poke, something hard stabbing my shoulder.
I look up. Beyond the glare of the sun, I see a handful of men surrounding me – ten, maybe eleven – with long beards, fur, carrying long axes and clubs and spears.
I retch one last time before they pull me up by the hair.
*
The walk through the forest is long and slow, all shadows and slivers of sunlight. Overhead the birds chirp, chirp, chirp. The bandits didn’t bother tying me up; one of them threw me over his shoulder, without a word. His wet vest of wolf hide stinks of smoke and salty fish. With each step – up and down, up and down – my head and belly swirl and spin and I’d retch if I had anything left in my belly. I can stare at his backside; or, if I curl my head back, the line of bandits walking behind us. I think I can see another body over another bandit’s shoulder. I hope it’s Nero. He’ll know what to do.
Soon there are voices ahead and then I can hear the hiss of a fire and the hammering of metal. We step out into a clearing splashed with sunlight.
‘What’s this?’
A hand pats my arse.
‘Drift wood,’ my captor says.
I’m taken into a hut. Inside, the bandit drops me behind a cage made from branches tied together. The floor isn’t a floor at all, but sand. More bandits come in and two more bodies are dropped beside me. Nero and Doryphorus. I tell myself everything will be OK because Nero is here. My chest untwists a little.
The bandits walk out.
Nero says, ‘Marcus?’
‘Here,’ I say. ‘I’m here.’
Nero asks for Doryphorus and he says he’s here too.
‘Well,’ Nero says, ‘that was good fortune, wasn’t it?’
Doryphorus says, ‘Good fortune? Are you mad? They’re going to roast us alive.’ To me, he says, ‘You think our blind leader is Jupiter himself, but believe me boy, he is mad. He’ll be the death of both of us.’
Nero pushes himself up off the sand and sits cross-legged. He tightens the rag around his eyes. Doryphorus crawls over to the branches and starts shaking them, looking to see if any are loose.
‘Nonsense,’ Nero says. ‘We were tired getting to shore. I could barely stand. It was useful to have men carry us.’
‘And how do you know this is where we wanted to go? How many camps are there on this godsforsaken island? A dozen? Two dozen? There could be hundreds.’
‘Keep faith, Doryphorus.’
‘Faith? You’re blind, we’re being hel
d captive, and we don’t have a coin to our name. How can you keep faith?’
‘Apollo favours me,’ Nero says. ‘Or maybe it is simply habit. I’m not sure frankly.’
Doryphorus flops onto the dirt and puts his head in his hands. ‘You’re mad.’
From the back corner of the hut, from the shadows, we hear a voice.
‘Do you know the date?’
A man who’d been lying down in the sand sits up. His rusty beard is very long. I whisper to Nero, telling him there’s another man in the cell. ‘Yes,’ Nero says, ‘I gathered that.’
The man asks again, ‘The date. Do you know it?’
Nero says, ‘The second of February.’
‘And the year?’
Nero says, ‘It is the eight hundredth and twenty-second year since the foundation of Rome.’
The man gapes. ‘By Hercules!’
Nero asks, ‘How long have you been here?’
‘A week tomorrow and it will be three years.’
‘Who are you?’ Nero asks.
‘Ulpius,’ the man says, ‘Marcus Ulpius Traianus.’
*
Nero and the prisoner talk for a while. Nero asks all sorts of questions, mainly about his life here in the camp.
Nero asks, ‘Who is in charge? What’s his name?’
‘Kortos used to be in charge. The large, black-bearded man who dragged the boy in here. But a few months ago another man arrived in the camp. He was bigger and stronger than Kortos, which I wouldn’t have believed unless I saw it myself. He displaced Kortos. You know how bloodthirsty bandits do this: they fight with knives until one of them says uncle. Now he’s in charge.’
‘His name?’
‘Spiculus.’
Nero laughs, slowly at first but then he laughs so hard he falls to his side and grabs his ribs.
‘You see, Doryphorus,’ he says. ‘One must keep his faith.’
*
As the afternoon ends and the sun sets, the prisoner tells us his story. We sit quietly and listen.
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