by Chris Page
His face darkened and he was silent for a long while. Twilight waited for him to continue; he knew what was coming. Finally Odo began again in a voice choked with emotion.
‘My beautiful Gina was visiting her sister with the boys for the summer on the coast at Ostia. I had taken them there myself by horse and cart and was due to pick them up after four weeks.’
‘Slave traders?’ Twilight said gently.
He nodded as tears coursed down his old cheeks at the memories.
‘They raided Ostia, killed many women, including Gina and her sister, and took all the young males away, including my two lovely young boys. I left the Tabularium immediately and searched for three years. I went to all the major slave trading cities around the coast and inland, to no avail. My two beautiful young gods were gone . . . forever.
‘Eventually I came back here, the only place I really knew, and took up residence in a small cave outside the city.’ He waved his thin arm in the vague direction beyond the Forum. ‘My needs are little and I occasionally earn some coins for food by helping pilgrims and other tourists find their way around and using my limited power to divine for water around the parched hills for farmers. Pity I didn’t know how to do it when on my father’s farm - he was always short of water. I could have been a help rather than a hindrance. That, Twilight, is really my simple story and I thank you for listening so sensitively and patiently.’
‘Not quite, dear Odo. You missed out the bit where you learned to use your limited power to disable the door locks and let yourself into the Tabularium most nights, where you study the documents you used to work on,’ the enchanter said with a smile. ‘When, that is, you’re not sleeping on a bench under the military section!’
Odo shook his head in amazement.
‘A mind-reading wizard,’ he said almost to himself. ‘If I hadn’t just heard that myself I wouldn’t believe it was possible.’
Twilight chuckled. ‘Now it’s my turn. This might take just a little longer.’
For the next seven hours Twilight recounted his life to Odo. He started as the young tyro meeting Merlin, whom he’d joined in similar circumstances as Odo had the monastery, through the effective banishment from their homes by fathers who couldn’t cope with them. Then he worked through his training period, the battles with Elelendise, and the death of the long magus at his allotted one-hundred-year lifespan.
‘Will I live to one hundred years?’ Odo asked.
‘Maybe. I don’t think your aura qualifies you as a veneficus, but as you’re already a sprightly seventy-five years old, the chances are that you’ll get there anyway, maybe even beyond.’
Twilight continued with his story. As the sun disappeared over the Seven Hills of Rome and the shadows lengthened around the Forum, he finished with his trip here and the meeting with the vile Sheik Suleiman Abdul Ra-Hulak. At the mention of the slaver’s name Odo scowled.
‘Many a time I’ve seen that fat piece of pig’s vomit presiding over the slave trades down at the river dock. I’ve thought of different ways to kill him, but he’s always so well protected by soldiers and Nubians, and my little power source, whilst it might get me through the locks of the Tabularium, isn’t enough to get past his defences. I’m not saying he had anything to do with the disappearance of my boys because they went many years before he came on the scene, but they’re all part of the same abhorrent business of trading in human misery.’
‘Before I leave Rome, I will ensure the fat sheik meets his fate. Would you like to join me to observe the occasion?’
‘I would die a happy old hermit to be present,’ replied Odo, wiping away a tear.
‘So be it. Now, you painted such a wonderful picture of all the documents in the Tabularium, I would like to see some of them. Why don’t we both transform in there and you can show me around, after which you can have your usual snooze and I’ll just read whatever takes my fancy?’
After spending a fascinating night reading all sorts of documents while Odo snored gently on the bench under the military section, Twilight left his new friend sitting cross-legged in the same place he’d found him in the Forum. Even with his great speed of reading, he could have stayed in the Tabularium for a week and still not read more than half the documents. Transforming back to the retreat where Robert of Jumieges and the rest of the visiting party were staying, he immediately bumped into the former Archbishop of Canterbury in an outside courtyard.
‘Thank goodness you’re here,’ said an exasperated-looking Robert. ‘It’s the king. He’s dead. I think he’s been poisoned!’
The body of Philip I was taken back to the Royal Domain of Francia by the thousand soldiers of his escorting guard. Stiff with a pernicious poison, his face set into a rictus of disappointment brought about by the sudden terror of choking on his own bile, the sombre cavalcade filed along the streets of Rome in an opposite mood to their happy arrival a few days ago. Led by Robert of Jumieges, the senior man present, with the many courtiers and religious officials of the royal party behind and followed by the mounted soldiers, none of them knew what awaited their arrival home. It was a three-week journey during which much could happen. One thing was for certain, much blood would be spilt in the scrabble for the now empty throne of Francia by the powerful factions who would now dispute it, for there was no natural heir.
They also left behind them in Rome a fuming and frustrated pontiff, whose dream of uniting the power of Philip as emperor with his papal authority was in tatters. St. Gregory had to rethink and rethink quickly. Christendom was under grave threats from the east as well as its more usual foes, the barbarians and the upstart King of Saxony, Henry IV.
Nothing new there then.
Twilight, who turned down Robert of Jumieges’ offer to use his mind-reading and other enchanted skills to trace the king’s killer, had decided to stay on for a couple more days. From what he had learned in the Tabularium and other literature, both at home in the scriptorium and since arriving, the papacy and the throne of this fractious and enigmatic empire was always changing through the early deaths of its occupants. This was just one more example of what Odo the hermit had called the ‘skulduggeries’ that surround this great city, the methods used to get and maintain political or religious supremacy. Not for him, not for his enchanted codes; he was a tourist with another, personal agenda. One that had occurred since his arrival.
But first there were more mighty historical sites to see and, in
line with the theme of Philip’s death, he was today visiting the sarcophagi of the great and good with his new friend and guide to all things Roman, Odo the hermit.
Later that day as Odo led him down alleyways behind the Forum, the old hermit told him where they were going.
‘I told you yesterday we would visit some sarcophagi. In various forms they are all over Rome, but those we are going to see today are different. What I didn’t tell you was this is a secret place known only to a select few high in the Rome Authority. It’s permanently locked against visitors or prying eyes of all and any sort due to its importance and potential for stirring up and fermenting trouble.’
He paused and pointed to a large, windowless building.
‘The building doesn’t even have a name. Nor will you find mention of its existence in any form. I know - in my days in the Tabularium it was my job to erase all mention of it and its contents from the archives. As far as the people of Rome are concerned, many of whom walk past it every day, this building and its controversial contents do not exist.’
‘I’m intrigued,’ said Twilight, looking at the building. ‘How do we get in unobserved?’
Odo chuckled. ‘I thought I’d leave that to you. My limited power won’t work on these doors. They’re chained solid.’
‘Hold my hand.’ The old astounder smiled, looking around to see if they were observed.
‘There.’
They were inside. Odo looked around the dark, dusty interior.
‘It must be forty years since I was last in here,�
�� he said quietly. ‘And I’m prepared to bet my last ounce of power that nothing has changed or been moved since.’
Twilight waved his hand and the entire interior of the huge building was bathed in a soft light. Row upon row of dusty marble sarcophagi stretched away from them.
Odo threw his thin arms wide to encompass the contents of the enormous room. ‘Welcome to the tombs holding the bones of the ancient Caesars. This is the final resting places of those emperors who held the dominions of the Roman Empire together during its epochal years when it ruled the known world. Here lie the bones and ashes of the bright flames of the glorious arc of our Republic’s history.’
Odo paused and led Twilight to the beginning of the first row.
‘There are, with one notable exception, eighty-six sarcophagi here. Meaning ‘flesh-eater’ in Greek, sarcophagi were used as coffins for the dead of the highborn. That each one is made of marble shows just how highborn, in this case every Roman ruler since the third year BC until five hundred AD. That’s eight hundred years of ruling history.’
He stopped for a moment beside the first one and looked at Twilight, realizing that Christian chronology might not register with him.
‘Carry on, I’m aware of the placement of those dates,’ the enchanter said with a smile.
Odo tapped the ornate carved marble side.
‘In here lie the bones of the Emperor Augustus, the title conferred by a grateful senate upon Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus after forty-four years of rule.’ At the far end of the sarcophagus was a marble head sculpture of the emperor. He tapped the head. ‘Some have heads of their subject carved and mounted on the top, and some will have him - for they are all males - in full battle armor as part of a battle scene carved on the side.’
Odo moved on down the line of elaborately carved marble.
‘Tiberius, Gaius Germanicus - better known as Caligula - Claudius, Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius . . .’
As he named each emperor in turn, Twilight followed, putting deeds, events, treachery, battles, and assorted gossip he’d read to each of them.
Odo stopped by a rather plain marble box with a curly bearded head carving. ‘Hadrian, who, I believe, was responsible for building a great wall across the north of your country.’
A few names further and he stopped again. ‘Caracalla, who co-ruled with Geta for just one year from 211 to 212.’ Odo turned to Twilight. ‘There are two other examples of co-rulers a little further on, but don’t ask me how they managed it. Seems an impossible situation to me. Some of these lasted less than a year, and in one year there were no less than four of them!’
‘Here’s one after your own heart,’ Odo said, tapping a semicircular box heavily engraved with ornate carvings. ‘The philosopher warrior Julien. Known as Julien the Apostate due to his mission to establish paganism as the dominant Roman faith over Christianity. When he died on the battlefield, Roman paganism died with him.’
Reaching the end of the first line, Odo looked back. There was just a single line of footprints in the thick dust on the floor they had just walked through. His footprints. He raised a quizzical eyebrow at Twilight.
‘Venefici cast no footprint or shadow, carry no odour nor excrete any bodily waste,’ the old astounder said by way of explanation.
For the umpteenth time since they had met, Odo found himself shaking his head in wonder at the abilities of his magical friend. He started back down the next row, pausing at a particularly heavily carved box.
‘This is probably the most famous one of all and my personal favourite,’ he said reverently. ‘The Emperor Constantine I ruled from 324 to 337 and established that great Byzantine city, Constantinople, in the east where there is now so much trouble.’
Twilight thought of the rulers he’d been involved with. The tenuous links with King Arthur, Dux Bellorum, through Merlin, Alfred the Great and their battles together against the marauding Viking, Edward the Confessor, Harold, William the Conqueror, and, until yesterday, Philip I of Francia. Compared to the searing deeds of the owners of the bones in these boxes, with the possible exception of Alfred, his kings were minnows in a sea of leviathans, specks of faintly glowing dust against the flaring nimbus of these mighty stars.
They came to the last box. Placed on its own on a high plinth, it was a different shape than the others, being long and thin.
Odo crossed himself before it and turned to Twilight with tears coursing down his cheeks.
‘I mentioned one exception,’ he said quietly between tears. ‘And although I consider myself, like you, a nonbeliever of any faith, I cannot withhold my tears in its presence.’
Out of respect for his companion Twilight did not use his power to see inside the box. After a short while Odo sniffed and then reverently touched the long, thin, unadorned marble above his head and began to talk again.
‘Following the demise of the mighty Roman Empire led by those wonderful emperors whose sarcophagi we have just seen, the next four centuries saw a myriad of small, mainly warlord-led state and mini-kingdom squabbles that occasionally broke out into major battles. Gradually, the invading barbarians receded behind mountainous far eastern barriers, and the great fight began to polarize between the two mighty faiths. On the one side there were the Muslims, a word meaning those who submit and known, in fighting terms, as Saracens. Led, in the beginning, from the Caliphates of Damascus, and later Baghdad, their great war symbol was called Zulfiqar, the mighty two-handed curved sword also known as ‘The Cleaver of Vertebrae.’’
Odo paused to gather his thoughts.
‘And on the other side the Christians, whose spiritual base was that magnificent seat of empire, Constantinople, named after my favourite Caesar and known as ‘the New Rome.’ Their great symbol was the Holy Lance, a huge spear believed to be adorned at its tip by the very nails that had once pierced the hands and feet of Christ on the cross and said to guarantee its owner perpetual triumph . . . In this marble box rests the Holy Lance.’ There was a long silence between them.
Finally, Twilight spoke.
‘And your fear is that Zulfiqar, the Cleaver of Vertebrae, and this Holy Lance will come together in a mighty conflict?’
‘The enmity between the two great faiths has been festering for hundreds of years. With the gap between them ever widening due to the similarities of their origins, hatreds are once again spilling over. Our civilizations are facing some of the bloodiest encounters in history, and this time we do appear to have strong leaders at our head like they have. Strong leadership is a signal for war.’
Odo waved his hand in the direction of the sarcophagi.
‘Zulfiqar, the Cleaver of Vertebrae, and this Holy Lance are more than symbols. Both were said to carry the blessings of their individual founding gods, Mohammed and Jesus, and men would gladly and proudly die for them. Like beacons of pure light held aloft at the front of every marching, charging, or retreating battle formation, and in a world still teeming with seething masses of pagans belonging to neither side but ready to seize any opportunities the conflict might offer, these two mighty weapons represented the future of each sprawling alpha civilization. It’s Hope. I fear those two great symbols will soon be held aloft in all-out war again. This box will be empty soon as the Lance is taken to reinforce the hearts and minds of its followers.’
That afternoon Odo and Twilight sat invisible on the high, circular roof of the San Angelo Castle overlooking the Tiber River. One of Rome’s most famous landmarks and the first sight far-off travellers saw of the city, the castle, built by Emperor Hadrian, had since become the guardian of the riches of the pope. Its treasury rooms deep in the centre of the castle held untold amounts of gold, silver, and jewels accumulated by the various greedy pontiffs over the centuries.
But Odo and Twilight were not here for that. Their attention was focused on the activities on the riverside wharf below.
The slave market.
Bobbing around the river wharf were a number of swift-sailing, many-oared galleys with th
ree of them carrying the high, dragon-headed prow of Viking vessels. Twilight remembered Olaf Tryggvason, the red-haired chieftain and second in command to the Viking jarl, Guthrum. The berserker had growled that he learned Latin in order that he would not be cheated by the ‘whore mothers’ who dealt in the ‘trell’ trade, his word for slaves.
Odo pointed to the boats.
‘Those are the vessels that rob and plunder the coasts of mainly the Africas in search of slaves, then bring them back here for sale. It was the pirates and corsairs on such a craft that killed my wife and stole my two boys all those years ago.’
They watched as a long line of black male slaves were herded out of a makeshift wooden building on the wharf that served as a sort of holding pen. Fettered together by a chain throat collar and tied at the ankles so as to allow only short steps, they were pushed and kicked up a series of steps to a viewing stage. With their shiny, ebony skin stretched over well-muscled bodies and a defiant but melancholy dignity etched on their faces, each was carefully scrutinized by a group of buyers standing on a parallel stage. Some even stepped over to the slaves and began to feel various parts of their bodies as if they were buying a horse and needed to ensure it was sound or endowed sufficiently as to meet their requirements.
Odo pointed out one young, overweight little man wearing a blue silk turban strolling arrogantly between the slaves, squeezing and groping them at will. Following his every step closely, two huge, jet-black Nubian protectors watched every move, ready to pounce should anyone threaten him.
‘There are no prizes for guessing whose son that little puff ball is. He oversees the buying of slaves for his odious father, your friend the Sheik Suleiman Abdul Ra-Hulak. He’ll be around here somewhere as well.’
‘He’s in that building over there drinking coffee,’ said Twilight, nodding toward a single-story, red-tiled building. ‘His sedan chair is out the back guarded by four of the Nubians.’
They watched as the sheik’s son bid furiously on all the slaves. He bought pretty much every one of them, and they were herded into carts with sturdily fixed wooden cages built in. Once full the horses were whipped up and they rumbled off, the black slaves clinging to the sides of the cages as yet another strange world passed before their weary eyes.