“As you wish, sire.”
Saluting again, Lucius hurriedly took his leave before the fickle emperor could change his mind. As tribune, his military accoutrements had been made specifically for him and thereby normally, unlike other legionnaires, his to keep. Since he had no desire to do so, he would pass his outfits along to Andronicus, minus his gladius and sword. He only hoped Andronicus would be pleased with his promotion.
Only one thought was uppermost in his mind right now. He had prayed to his mother’s God, and He had answered. Was it just a coincidence?
Another thought followed quickly on its heels. Would Anna now finally see him as a man and not an avenging warrior of Rome?
A sense of someone watching her made Anna glance up. Lucius was standing in the doorway of the peristyle studying her. Her heart leapt in her chest and then settled into that furious rhythm that she had come to associate with being in his presence.
He smiled and she relaxed slightly. It was the first time she had seen him without his military paraphernalia. Even without the fitted chest piece, his blood-red tunic fit tautly across his broad chest and shoulders.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
Smiling, she motioned around at the garden. “I was just helping to remove any weeds that have dared to show themselves in this beautiful garden.”
He came toward her and her heartbeat began racing again.
“I see my mother has been busy,” he told her. “The atrium now no longer looks like I am walking into the Pantheon.”
She studied him to see if he was angry, but his expression was more one of curiosity.
“Do you like it?” she asked.
“The murals are exquisite.”
Anna agreed. They were painted by a Jew named Joshua whom Leah had found at their first meeting of the Christians they had attended. He had left Jerusalem when the persecution of Christian Jews had become too severe to remain. Leah had been pleased that they were able to help each other.
Lucius came closer, picked a flower from the bush behind her and placed it behind her ear. He allowed his fingers to slide down her cheek, his eyes dark and intense. Anna swallowed hard at his bold look.
“There are servants to tend the garden,” he remonstrated.
She stepped away from him and saw his instant frown.
“I know,” she agreed, “but it seems a shame to allow such ugliness to mar such a beautiful garden. I feel compelled to remove them.”
She grinned, but he didn’t reciprocate. Instead, he took the weed that was in her hand, a spindly thing with a small blue flower.
“Even a weed can be beautiful.”
The look he gave her made her think that he was somehow referring to her.
He continued. “All of the beauty in this garden and yet this one lone weed stood out from among it. The beauty here you take for granted after a while. The weeds you notice because they are different, set apart.”
That was something she had certainly never considered. Perhaps being a weed in the garden of life was not such a bad thing. Still, she couldn’t help remembering Leah’s broken voice when she told her son that her husband had no longer wanted her. If a woman as beautiful as Leah could be rejected, how much more so someone as lacking in beauty as Anna herself.
Lucius glanced behind her and stopped suddenly. His eyebrows lifted in surprise. “What happened to the fanum?”
Anna felt that Leah should be the one answering such a question. The small worship sanctuary had been relegated to a mere sitting alcove.
Lucius swept by her, turning and fixing her with a cautious eye. “What have you done with the statue of Jupiter?”
Anna took a deep breath. “Your mother had it removed.”
He frowned. “It was the god my father chose as his patron god.”
“I believe your mother found it offensive,” she told him softly.
He looked from her to the column that had once held the statue but now held a potted fern.
“I see.”
Shrugging, Lucius moved to sit on the edge of the pool that was fed by the fountain. “There is something I’ve been meaning to ask you.” His face softened as he studied her. “How have you managed to forget what your father did to you and forgive him?”
Forget? She would never be able to forget the things her father had done to her. She seated herself on the marble bench that Leah had placed inside the small trellis structure that had been used as the fanum.
“I haven’t forgotten anything,” she disagreed quietly. “The human mind forgets nothing, but forgiveness is also a choice of the mind. I have chosen to forgive my father, just as my heavenly Father has chosen to forgive me.”
He plucked a dry bougainvillea leaf from the ground and crunched it with his fingers. “That is something I can’t do.”
“Lucius.” He looked up at the use of his name, as she so rarely used it. “Your father had power over you for so much of your life while he was alive. Don’t let him have that same kind of power over you in death.”
His eyes darkened with anger. “What are you saying? My father doesn’t control my life.”
“No,” she agreed. “Your anger does. You are so angry at your father that it spills over onto everything and everyone you touch.”
He slowly rose to his feet and she wondered if she had gone too far. Despite being free of his military uniform, he looked to be a very dangerous man.
“If you don’t learn to forgive,” she continued, “the peace you are searching for will forever be elusive.”
“You sound like an oracle,” he told her snidely. “Pray, continue. This is most enlightening.”
Something she had heard at one of the fellowship meetings made sense to her now. Perfect love casts out fear, and she loved Lucius enough to want to see him happy. That love gave her courage, made her no longer afraid to speak her mind. Without the power of Christ he would never be free of the anger that drove him.
“And now you’re angry at me,” she said regretfully.
He sighed heavily. He came and sat next to her on the bench, and the small alcove suddenly seemed much smaller than before. Smiling wryly, he told her, “I’m not angry with you. I asked, after all.” He scraped his hand back through his dark hair. “I just don’t know how to do what you have done. I don’t know how to forgive. And now, knowing what I know about my mother and father, it makes me even angrier.”
“Your mother forgave your father and was able to move on with her life. Despite her illness, she is happy.”
He caught her look. “And you?”
Was she happy? Not entirely. Although with Leah’s generosity she would never have to worry about how to take care of herself, she still didn’t know what to do about her own future. A part of her wanted so much to believe that her future included the man sitting beside her, but that was wishful thinking. She looked away.
“I am content.”
“Which is not the same thing at all,” he said drily.
She decided to change the subject. “When do you have to leave again?”
He accepted her change of subject with a lifted brow. “I don’t. I asked to be relieved of duty and the emperor has released me.”
Surprised, she smiled widely. “Then you will be able to spend more time with your mother!”
“That was my intention,” he agreed.
Claudius came into the garden, searching. He spotted them in the arbor and came to them.
“Tribune, there is a woman here to see you.”
Frowning, Lucius rose. He glanced down at Anna. “I will talk further with you later.”
Claudius watched him leave, a worried frown puckering his brow.
“Something is bothering you, Claudius?” she asked.
“It’s the Lady Valeria.”
Curious, Anna crossed to the doorway of the peristyle and glanced into the atrium. A woman had her arms wrapped around Lucius’s neck, and she was the most beautiful woman Anna had ever seen. Her dark hair was intricately woven and braided with pearls atop her head. Her dark eyes were lined with kohl, her lips painted pomegranate red. The first thing that entered Anna’s mind was that she was seeing the Queen Jezebel of the scriptures in living flesh. Ashamed of the thought, she pulled back and headed for the door that led to her bedchamber.
She tried to deny the pain she felt deep inside, but it came upon her in waves. The weeds in a garden might attract attention, but they were callously pulled up and discarded anyway. It was the beauty that everyone wanted to see.
The pain she couldn’t stop, but she ruthlessly denied the tears that were threatening. It was time to stop living in a dreamworld where everything was perfect. Life just didn’t happen that way.
She closed the door to the bedroom behind her and stood looking at the apartment’s accessories. She had grown used to all the trappings of wealth, forgetting the life of hardship she had left behind.
Curling up on the sleeping couch, she fought to bring her feelings of inadequacy into subjection. She was a child of Elohim, and He had created her perfectly in the image He meant for her to have. To envy others was a sin. It was the same as saying that Elohim had made a mistake, and that was impossible. The scriptures said that Elohim Himself had knit together each person. A calmness settled over her, dislodging feelings that she felt certain came from the evil one.
She needed to let go of her hidden dreams and open her mind and heart to where the Lord was leading her. And right now that seemed to be caring for Leah.
Chapter 13
Lucius took Valeria by the wrists and gently but firmly set her away from him. He had seen Anna standing in the doorway, the hurt on her face plainly visible, and had almost growled with frustration.
Valeria’s mouth pursed out into a pout. “This is the reception I receive after coming all this way to welcome you home?”
Lucius wasn’t fooled for a moment. “I take it you have heard that the emperor wants me to sit in the senate.”
One dark brow lifted in a supercilious arch and she stepped back, sweeping an all-encompassing look over him as though studying her prey. It was an odd thought to have about one of the most beautiful women in Rome. Valeria was a favorite of the emperor and most of the wealthy men in this city. At one time, even he had been pulled into her web of deceit. She had perfected the art of looking innocent and had fooled many a man. There was nothing even remotely innocent about her.
Unlike Anna, who was completely opposite. Anna was like a breath of fresh air after suffering through the scents of the polluted Tiber. Her very touch could send his pulse rate thundering, something Valeria had never been able to do.
“You make it sound as if that’s the only reason I came to see you,” Valeria rebuked softly.
“Isn’t it?”
She pointedly looked around her. “Aren’t you going to offer me a seat?”
Lucius sighed inwardly. He and Valeria had parted ways long ago and he had no desire to run with her company again. Palestine had changed him in some subtle way. Or was it Anna? Or maybe even his mother? Or even Elohim?
That thought brought him up short. It occurred to him that the things his mother had taught him had stayed with him through the years and seemed to be returning to him now in an ever-increasing pressure to submit.
He had never thought to get involved with a woman, especially not a Jewess. His father had made it his goal to erase every semblance of his Jewish blood from Lucius’s veins. Anna was right. His father could no longer control his life unless he allowed it.
“Lucius?”
Drawn from his reflections, he blinked at Valeria. “What?”
“You haven’t heard a word I’ve said.”
It was clear she found this unacceptable behavior. Men usually hung on her every word, hoping for some tidbit of favor.
“I’m sorry. I have a lot on my mind.”
Her face cleared of the frown that showed the subtle wrinkles she took so much care to hide.
“Ah, yes. I heard about your mother.”
He might have known. There was no way around it. He would have to invite her in until her curiosity was satisfied.
“Please, come into the peristyle and let’s catch up on old times.”
A soft hand laid across his forearm kept him from moving forward. “Actually, I came to invite you to go with me to the Marcellus theater. They are showing a few Greek pantomimes and I thought it would be entertaining.”
Lucius wrinkled his nose. The stories told through music and dancing had never really appealed to him, but before he could decline she continued.
“I know you prefer the performances of histories by people like Ovid and Catallus, but they are so dreary and boring. I thought after spending so much time in Judea you might enjoy some lighter entertainment.”
“I appreciate the thought, Valeria, but I am committed for this afternoon.”
That was certainly no lie. He had committed to spending as much time with his mother as he could. He hadn’t missed the telltale signs that her health was deteriorating. The physician that Petronius had recommended had been unable to help. He had suggested that his mother had a clot of blood in her brain. Lucius didn’t even want to know how he had come by that prognosis. More than likely through the vivisection that Levi had so thoroughly denounced.
Since it was illegal to cut on a dead body, many physicians took the bodies of people who hadn’t yet passed on and cut them open to study their insides. Usually, gladiators from the arena, but there was also the illegal confiscation of bodies left at the temple of Asclepius or soldiers who had fallen on the field. Lucius shivered. He couldn’t decide which was worse, cutting on a live body or a dead one.
Valeria’s narrowed eyes told him that she didn’t believe him. “Maybe another time then.”
He wasn’t about to commit himself. “Maybe.”
A banging at the front door interrupted their standoff. Claudius went to answer it but Lucius stopped him with a raised palm. “I’ll get it, Claudius.” He looked at Valeria. “You should probably hurry if you are going to make the first performance.”
She gave him a frosty smile. “Of course.”
They walked to the door together. Lucius opened it to find Andronicus on the other side.
Andronicus looked from one to the other, taking in the situation at a glance. He smiled at Valeria.
“Hello, Valeria. I haven’t seen you in some time.”
The smile she gave Andronicus was full of warmth. “Hello, Andronicus. Congratulations on your promotion.”
Andronicus turned a surprised look on Lucius in question, but Lucius merely shrugged. The heavens alone knew where Valeria got her information.
“Thank you. I didn’t mean to interrupt,” he told them. “I can come back another time.”
Valeria gave Lucius an unfriendly look. “Not at all. It seems our business is finished.”
She passed Andronicus, leaving a drifting scent of fragrance in her wake. They watched as she climbed in her litter and disappeared from view.
“Why is it,” Andronicus asked, “whenever Valeria leaves a room I feel as though I have just missed being struck by a cobra?”
Lucius grinned. “My thoughts exactly.”
Andronicus shook his head. “Anyway, I wanted to come and thank you.”
Lucius stood aside to allow him to enter. He didn’t pretend not to know what his friend was talking about.
“I wasn’t certain whether you would be pleased or not.”
“I go away for a short time and come back to find I have been promoted to tribune. What’s not to be pleased abo
ut?”
Lucius motioned for him to have a seat in the atrium and for Claudius to bring them something to drink.
Andronicus studied Lucius closely, his lips pressing tightly together. Taking a deep breath, he told Lucius, “I will miss you, my friend.”
“As I will you.”
“It has been an honor to serve with you. I will miss our companionship.”
Lucius took the tray Claudius handed him and set it on the cedar table beside him. He thanked Claudius and handed Andronicus one of the silver goblets of wine.
“You know you are welcome here anytime. Please don’t make yourself a stranger.”
Andronicus took the proffered cup. “I’m being returned to Jerusalem.”
Surprised, Lucius frowned. “Why?”
“The unrest there is growing and Nero knows that I have developed a network of spies.”
It bothered Lucius that he wouldn’t be there to have his friend’s back. They two had been a formidable foe wherever they were sent. Andronicus was more like a brother than anything else.
“Take care, my friend.”
“Always.”
Lucius changed the subject. “Perhaps you will see Tapat.”
Andronicus threw him a sly smile. “Perhaps. At least, if I have anything to say about it. I thought perhaps I could take a message to her from your mother.”
Stepping beyond the bounds of friendship, Lucius warned him, “Don’t hurt her, Andronicus.”
Their glances collided, each searching and finding hidden messages.
“It was not my intention. Does your mother know where I can find her?”
Lucius set his goblet aside. “Let’s go and find out.”
Lucius glanced up from studying his accounts in the bibliotheca to find his mother standing in the doorway. Surprised, he set down his stylus and pushed the pot of inkblack aside.
“Mother? Is something wrong?”
She glided into the room with the grace he always associated with her. Even with her body half paralyzed, she walked like a queen.
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