by Peter Tonkin
‘Get down!’ ordered Artemidorus, dismissing all speculation from his mind. He did not pause to see his order obeyed. Instead he turned and slammed the full length of his body against the nearest tree trunk. Shielding himself with the solid wood as he looked back across the wide road. There, in the black alley between two lofty patrician villas opposite, a shape flickered and was gone. Half body. Half shadow. But there for just long enough.
Artemidorus saw a tall figure dressed in a long, hooded cloak. Just like the one he had worn when executing Gaius Amiatus. As the attacker moved, there was the gleam of weapons at belt level. But Artemidorus hardly noticed these. For he was focused on what the stranger was holding. In the heartbeat before he slid it under the cloak and vanished. It was a small, heavily reticulated, powerful-looking bow. Like a strange variation of the Parthian equipment he had seen earlier. Of a design the spy had never come across before. Halfway along its length, reaching back past the string and a little forward of the bow’s grip itself, was a long lateral guide-piece. In the flash of movement it was impossible for Artemidorus to be certain of its composition or design. It might be wood or metal. It might be a tube or an open groove. There was no doubting its function, however. It was designed to give the short darts the weapon fired more range, more power and much more accuracy.
‘Did you see that?’ asked Quintus, appearing silently at his shoulder. ‘That was a sôlênarion. Byzantine design, I’d say.’ He held up the dart he had pulled from the tree. It was short but heavy. It looked dangerous. Powerful. The solid arrowhead was made of sharpened steel. ‘Armour-piercing,’ he added grimly. ‘Nasty!’
Artemidorus nodded. Trying not to imagine what the first of these had done to the doorkeeper’s shoulder.
Quintus continued, ‘I have several coming in the supply I told you about. We’ll see how effective they really are, eh? In the hands of a proper soldier rather than some fly-by-night sicarius dagger-man.’
‘We picked him up in the subura,’ added Ferrata, appearing at Artemidorus’ other shoulder. ‘Must have been following us since. Friend of yours?’
‘Not that I recognised.’
‘Well,’ said Ferrata grimly. ‘The list of your enemies is a long one. It’d take one of Caesar’s new weeks to go through it all.’
‘If word of our mission has slipped out, there are twenty-three names pretty high up,’ said Artemidorus. ‘Starting with Brutus, Cassius, the Casca brothers, Decimus Albinus, Trebonius…’ His voice tailed off. ‘Though this feels more like the work of someone particularly underhanded and treacherous. And rich. Able to hire professional killers at a whim. Someone like Minucius Basilus.’
‘Basilus and twenty-two others there, then,’ allowed Ferrata as the three of them turned and walked back to Venus. And Hercules. Who was lying protectively on top of her. ‘And there’s also the gang leader of the man you killed yesterday. Don’t know the corpse’s name but he was apparently right-hand man to a nasty piece of work they call The Gaul. Thinks of himself as king of the streets. Used to run with Titus Annius Milo. Took over the gang when Milo was banished for killing Clodius Pulcher on the Appian Way then died at Compsa, what, four years back?’
‘I thought Milo and Cicero were friends. Why would his replacement want to kill Cicero?’ Artemidorus thought of the raging mob from which he had rescued the senator.
Ferrata shrugged. ‘Allegiances shift. Caesar was popular. With the gangs as well as the plebs. Cicero sided with his murderers. And Cicero promised to defend Milo in front of the Senate. Said he would get him forgiven and recalled. Pardoned. Reinstated, even. But he never did. And, talking of shifting allegiances, there’s that treacherous green-eyed demon of yours. That Cyanea.’
‘Cyanea!’ the name hit Artemidorus with an impact like a bolt from the Sicarius’ Byzantine bow. He actually staggered back a step. ‘But Cyanea is dead.’
‘Dead? No such luck. She was too much for me and my men. I’ll tell you about it sometime. But no. She walked away. Left one or two bleeding in her wake. Killed both of the poor bastards who untied her, hoping to take first turn. Slit their throats from ear to ear. And set fire to Basilus’ house as she went. Never seen anything like it. Hope I never see anything like it again, either. Nemesis – and then some. She could be one of the Friendly Ones reborn, that one. She’s still out there somewhere. And she won’t rest quiet ’til you are well and truly lying cold and stiff on your funeral pyre. And she’s standing beside it with a flaming torch and a great big happy smile.’
III
i
‘Shouldn’t the general be here for this?’ wondered Enobarbus.
The tribune was not really expecting an answer. He was simply thinking aloud. But Artemidorus spoke up anyway. ‘He wasn’t present for the original interview, when the boy told us what he had heard. Confirming what I overheard Brutus admit to Cassius as they ran out of the Curia. Before we realised what he must also have seen. Let’s hear what the boy says now. He can note down what he tells us as he speaks. He knows the shorthand invented by Cicero’s secretary Tiro. And he’s a secretary to the Senate after all. He should be able to think, talk and write at the same time. Then we can take him or his notes to the general when we know exactly what went on.’ He emphasised the point by holding up the bundle of wax tablets he was carrying. On which Adonis was going to write down all the details he promised to reveal to them. Now that they had rescued his sister and restored her to him. After a lengthy and extremely careful return journey from the life-saving pine grove on the Quirinial. The rest of the contubernium were in the triclinium dining room or in the simple bathhouse that Spurinna had added to the rear of his Equestrian villa.
‘Will the details matter, though?’ mused Enobarbus.
‘I think they will. And I think we’ll see that even more clearly when we discuss what we learn with the others. At the very least we can get some sort of a sequence established. Maybe start roughing out a plan of campaign. We know General Antony wants every one of the murderers killed in the fullness of time. But what the boy tells us could well give us some kind of list. In order.’
‘Who dies quickest. Who lingers longest. That sort of thing?’
Artemidorus nodded. ‘We certainly need some kind of strategy beyond the general’s decision that he wants Gaius Trebonius and Decimus Albinus to die first. But despite what the Lady Fulvia says, we can’t just go rushing all over the empire randomly slaughtering any murderers we happen to meet, trusting in Tyche or Fortuna to guide us. But, on the other hand, if we take the boy straight to Antony and he gives a full, detailed, report…’
‘…as we’re hoping he will. To us, at least…’
‘…there’s a good chance the general will simply explode. You know what his temper’s like. Especially at the moment when he’s being pulled every way at once. Everyone trying to second guess him. Even though he’s the only man in Rome who can stop us going straight into another civil war, Libertores against Caesarians. Stabbing him in the back in the meantime. Dividing the Senate, not that that takes much effort. Cicero being… well, Cicero. And, as you observed when we had just dispatched that rabble-rouser Gaius Amiatus, he needs peace and quiet to be established as quickly and securely as possible. So he can go out and spread some harmony and goodwill. Not to mention farms, smallholdings and sestertii. Here in Italy first. And then further afield. Perhaps as far afield as Egypt. Which is also a major part of the problem.’
‘Cleopatra?’
‘Cleopatra.’
As they talked, the two soldiers walked through the atrium of the augur and haruspex Spurinna’s villa and entered the little cubicula room where Adonis was happily reunited with his Venus. He was seated behind a solid little table. She was curled contentedly in his lap. Exchanging an embrace which was, perhaps, more intimate than was usual between siblings. Even ones as beautiful as these. The moment the two men entered, the young woman jumped out of her brother’s arms. Stepped back. Stood. Dimpled chin raised. Expression set. Dark blue ey
es speculative. Tiny red spots burning on the exquisite curves of her cheekbones. The loose tunic Trebonius’ man had given her still did surprisingly little to conceal her other, equally exquisite, curves.
‘Go to the slave quarters at the back of the house,’ Enobarbus ordered. ‘Ask for a young man there called Kyros. Tell him what you need in the way of clothing, food and drink and he will arrange for you to have it.’
Brother and sister exchanged a glance. ‘It’s all right,’ said Adonis. ‘They have looked after me well. They will do the same for you.’
‘Until we stop being useful to them at any rate,’ said Venus cynically. Her voice velvety and deep. Like the purr of a contented panther. ‘Or until we cease to satisfy them,’ she added.
‘We’re not all like Gaius Trebonius or Minucius Basilus,’ said Artemidorus gently. ‘No one will do anything to you here…’
‘Though if you talked like that in most houses,’ added Enobarbus, ‘you’d lose some skin off your back for it. Whether your master was aroused by the sight or not.’
Venus shrugged and vanished. Artemidorus placed the tablets on the table in front of Adonis. ‘Now,’ he said. ‘To business…’
ii
Artemidorus glanced across at Enobarbus as Adonis sorted out the pile and opened the first wax tablet. Both men had been intimately involved in the ill-fated attempt to keep Caesar alive on the Ides. One as spymaster, the other as spy. Both, like Antony, had been on the steps of Pompey’s Curia, when the murder was committed. Still fighting their losing battle against Brutus, Cassius, Decimus Albinus, Trebonius and the rest. Artemidorus had been the first man into the deserted chamber after the horrified senators and the jubilant, blood-smeared Libertores had run out. The man who had seen the terrified Senate Secretary Adonis slipping away from the scene of the crime.
It was Artemidorus who actually discovered the body, therefore. Lying like a garish pile of soiled washing at the foot of Pompey’s statue. Gold and purple liberally splashed with darkening crimson. Who trod in the lake of Caesar’s blood as he made sure the recently deified god was actually dead. Ensured that the folds of his torn toga covered his legs in a decent manner. And covered his head in the proper religious form. Particularly important as Caesar had been Pontifex Maximus, the chief priest of the city and its burgeoning empire.
Artemidorus was also with Antistius when the physician carried out his post-mortem examination of Caesar’s body, cataloguing the number and severity of the wounds. Discovering, ironically, the list of suspected murderers that Artemidorus himself had given Caesar on the way to the Curia. Unopened and unread, still in the fold of his sleeve he used as a pocket.
But neither the spy–centurion nor the spymaster–tribune had been in the Curia to witness the deed. As far as they knew, no one had yet given exact details of who did what and when during that momentous incident. Even Brutus and Cassius themselves had been unable to recall the exact sequence, blinded and confused as they were by a heady mix of terror and elation. There were almost as many versions flying around the city as there had been men with bloody daggers.
It might have seemed incredible to Artemidorus and Enobarbus that so many should have seen the same thing and yet perceived it and remembered it differently. But then they had both spent many years sifting through the various reports of their secret operatives. No two ever quite the same. And both had served enough time with Caesar in Egypt, Gaul, and in those parts of the empire to which the civil war had taken him, to know that his published versions of these adventures often differed radically from their own memories. What Adonis was going to tell them, therefore, was the first actual blow-by-blow reconstruction of precisely how Caesar had met his end. And the promise of it seemed, to Artemidorus at least, simply breathtaking.
‘We were outside,’ he said brusquely. ‘We saw for ourselves what passed between Gaius Trebonius and Co-consul, General Mark Antony.’
‘And you need not bother to detail the comings and goings of Caesar’s golden curule chair as he was rumoured to be coming and then not coming and then coming again,’ added Enobarbus.
‘Tell us what happened as clearly as you can from the moment Caesar entered…’
Adonis picked up the long bronze stylus he would use to make his notes in the firm-set wax of the first open tablet. ‘Caesar entered hurriedly,’ Adonis began, as he began to make his shorthand notes. ‘Led by Decimus Albinus. By the hand. As though Caesar were a child. Albinus released Caesar and moved away as he came to the dais where his golden chair was standing. With a small work table just beside it. He was dressed in his gold-patterned tunic and his purple toga. He was wearing his royal-red caligae boots. And a golden coronet fashioned to look like a victor’s laurel wreath. He was carrying papyrus scrolls, wax tablets. And a long bronze stylus just like this one.’ Adonis held the stylus up. Its sharp point gleamed wickedly.
‘Even before Caesar reached the dais on which his seat and table had been erected, the whole front row of the Senate, and many others beside, were on their feet hurrying towards him. They reached him as he stepped up onto it and prepared to sit. As Secretary to the Senate, I have to be able to name all the important Conscript Fathers, for sometimes in the heat of debate, the Father of the House forgets to name the next speaker he calls upon. I certainly knew most of the men coming forward, though towards the end there seemed to be almost a hundred of them milling around at the back.’ His eyes opened wide and he frowned as he directed his intense gaze upon his two interrogators.
‘My position as secretary was on Caesar’s left, on the floor of the Curia and therefore below him,’ he explained. ‘Half a dozen paces distant, beside the keepers of the water clocks. My head perhaps level with his waist. While I was seated at any rate. And I was a pace or two behind him as well. But I could see quite clearly.’ He lowered his gaze and his sharp-pointed stylus, making his notes on the wax in front of him as he spoke. ‘The first senator to approach him was Lucius Tillius Cimber, who caught at the hem of his toga even as he was sitting down and arranging his scrolls and tablets. Piling most of them on the little table so he could attend to them during the debates, as he often did. But as soon as he had done this, Caesar half rose. A group of senators gathered round, supporting Cimber, though he had not yet begun to plead his case. The sheer weight of numbers seemed to make Caesar sit back again. Cimber rose to full height then and began loudly to plead for the return of his brother Publius Cimber, who had been exiled by Caesar. He kissed Caesar’s hand, then his forehead, leaning down over him while the others crowded round. The Casca brothers, Publius Casca and Gaius Casca, were the closest. Then Marcus Brutus and Gaius Cassius, then Decimus Albinus, Pontius Aquila, Minucius Basilus…’
‘Very well,’ interrupted Enobarbus. ‘You need not tell us who was in the queue. Tell us what order they struck in. That will be sufficient for our needs, I think. For the moment at least.’
Artemidorus nodded in silent agreement.
‘So,’ said Adonis. ‘Caesar was sitting down again, as though overwhelmed by Tillius Cimber’s kisses and demands. In the meantime, the group of senators I have just named closed around him. All at once, Caesar struggled to get up, spilling some of his scrolls and tablets onto the floor of the dais. As though suddenly alarmed by the crowd of senators and their demands.
‘Then it began. Cimber abruptly grabbed a firm hold of Caesar’s toga and pulled with great strength. This moved the heavy folds of material across Caesar’s shoulder and laid bare the left side of his neck. Right across to the shoulder joint of his left arm. And his chest, down to the neckline of his tunic. Caesar made things worse for himself by pushing upwards, calling, “Ista quidem vis est! This is violent assault!”
‘At the same time, Cimber called, “Quid te amicorum exspectas? What are you waiting for, friends?”’
The boy looked down, falling silent as he wrote rapidly on the wax of the tablet.
iii
After a moment, he continued to speak. ‘Publius Casca produ
ced a dagger then. His was the first of many that suddenly appeared. He had it hidden beneath his toga. Most of the others did too, but some of them had daggers hidden in writing cases. Publius Casca struck for Caesar’s unprotected throat from behind his left shoulder. Aiming for the section of Caesar’s neck uncovered when Tillius Cimber pulled his toga aside. I saw it clearly from where I was seated. Though I rose to my feet almost at once. As Caesar himself was still trying to do. Because of Caesar’s sudden movement, Publius Casca missed. His arm went right across Caesar’s shoulder. His elbow was almost in the crook of Caesar’s neck, beneath his ear. The golden coronet Caesar had been wearing was knocked off by this. But Casca’s dagger hardly scratched Caesar’s breast. Seeing the dagger, Caesar must have understood the full danger then. He caught Casca’s right wrist and stabbed his stylus completely through the forearm.’ The boy held up his own stylus, its nib now caked with wax, but still looking almost as sharp as Artemidorus’ pugio dagger.
‘Publius Casca screamed out at that,’ Adonis continued. ‘Even as Caesar shouted, “Contemptus Casca! Contemptible Casca! What does this mean?”