Nest of Vipers

by Luke Devenish

  ‘No!’ Agrippina cried out.

  I alone saw the little thrill that took Livilla’s face.

  Drusus burst into sobs. ‘I did nothing! It was all the stupid priests!’

  ‘Courage, boy,’ said Silius, wrapping his street cloak tightly across his dining tunica. ‘All is not lost. There are means to appeal.’

  ‘They’ll kill me first!’

  A crash came from the door as the guards started battering it with a wooden ram. The household’s slaves began to shriek from everywhere in the house.

  ‘Stop it! Control yourselves!’ Agrippina shouted at them.

  Antonia gathered herself to her full dignity and strode as far as the salve mosaic that marked the spot on the floor between the atrium and the entrance hall. Her voice carried like an arctic wind in her rage. ‘This will now cease!’

  The slaves stopped their cry and the guards stopped their battering.

  ‘You will leave this house!’ Antonia commanded the men on the other side of the door.

  There was a brief silence, during which Sosia moved towards Agrippina, taking her hands to comfort her. Drusus tried to choke back his sobs. We could hear the low voices of the guards conferring outside.

  I saw Antonia’s strength falter slightly. She was as terrified as any of us but she fought hardest to cover it. She was a model to Rome, after all. ‘I am Antonia of the Julii,’ she called out again after a moment, ‘and you will tell my brother-in-law the Emperor that his family loves and honours him. If he has been fed falsehoods regarding treason, then we will refute those falsehoods with dignity – and not with arresting guards. We will see him face to face in the comfort of his tablinum, as befits his family.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Agrippina whispered to her mother-in-law.

  Antonia looked over her shoulder and gave Agrippina a small nod of reassurance to her. ‘They will not dare do this,’ she whispered.

  The front door groaned on its pivots as the guards struck it again with the ram.

  ‘You defile this home!’ Antonia screamed at the men outside. ‘How dare you insult us like this!’

  In the terror of the moment I noticed Little Boots. He gave me a look that was reckless and defiant; he was excited by what was happening and not frightened at all. I realised what he meant to do. ‘No!’ I hissed at him.

  He sprang past his grandmother and into the entrance hall.

  ‘Little Boots!’ cried Agrippina.

  I could only stare in dread, my hopes of controlling him gone. He was not a boy, and he planned to prove it to me here and now. He wanted to be the one who let in his brother’s doom.

  Antonia lurched after him. ‘Gaius – don’t!’

  Little Boots wrenched back the bolt from the door just as the guards swung the ram again. The door flew inwards, striking Little Boots hard in the face and flinging him backwards. Blood and spittle sprayed in the air.

  A bull of a man, ugly and coarse, Tribune Macro filled the hall as he entered it, taking a cursory glance at Little Boots slumped on the floor tiles. Antonia stood rigidly before him, opening and closing her mouth to speak, but finding that her words had dried up. Senator Silius rolled forward, placing a protective hand upon Antonia’s shoulder as he met Macro’s eye without fear or contempt, unassailable in his dignity.

  ‘You would break these noble women, Tribune? Is that what you intend to do?’

  Macro looked him up and down. ‘Who are you, sir?’

  ‘I am Gaius Silius, senator and general,’ he said, drawing himself up to his full height and hoping his unflattering dining tunica was well hidden beneath his cloak.

  Macro nodded to the two Praetorians who had entered behind him. The men moved past Macro, brandishing chains. ‘Then I am here to arrest you, senator and general.’

  Cries of shock came from the women. Drusus stared dumbly about him in disbelief. He was not the one the Praetorians had come for at all.

  Silius paled, but he retained his composure. ‘And what is the charge, Tribune?’

  Macro smiled. The question didn’t really need to be asked, given that the answer was the same for everyone. ‘Treason,’ he said, then adding as an afterthought, ‘and extortion.’

  Sosia threw herself into the hall, livid at the outrage. ‘You filthy scum! This man was awarded a triumph barely a year ago! This man crushed the rebellion of Sacrovir and held his own army in unbroken loyalty to the Emperor when others around him fell into mutiny. This man is owed a debt by Tiberius!’

  We held our breaths to see what would come from this outcry. Bleeding on the floor, Little Boots began to cry.

  ‘Are you his wife?’ Macro asked.

  ‘I am Sosia Galla, wife of Silius and mother of his children.’

  A second length of chains was produced by the men. ‘Then I am here to arrest you too,’ said Macro. ‘You were in league with the rebel Sacrovir as man and wife – you profited from his rebellion. The charges are the same – treason and extortion.’

  Agrippina gave a piercing scream, gripping her hair in her hands. Then she ran across the atrium to the wall where the wax masks of her ancestors rested in alcoves.

  ‘Mother!’ cried Nilla.

  Agrippina pressed her lips to the wax image of Germanicus. Then she snatched up the sword she kept hidden behind his mask.

  ‘Mother, no!’ Nilla screamed. ‘It is not our time for this –’

  But Agrippina was deaf to her daughter as she advanced slowly upon Macro, her face black with hatred, the sword clutched in her fist.

  Flamma came in from the garden, still wearing his straw hat and with his feet brown and bare from where he had been lazing in the afternoon sun while instructing Burrus in his sword practice. Agrippina turned and saw the gladiator and the slave-boy following behind him. Livilla saw Flamma too, and astonishment marked her face. She had never encountered him before and had no idea who or what he was. All she knew was that this was a man of obvious and considerable strength.

  Flamma held Agrippina with his eyes, and with an almost imperceptible movement of his head he signalled ‘no’. Her lower lip trembling, Agrippina stayed where she was, but her arm that held the sword lowered slowly to her side before her strength left her entirely. Drusus was able to catch his mother before she fell and struck her head on the tiles. The two youngest girls rushed to Agrippina’s side, trying to rouse her. Flamma stayed in the atrium just long enough to determine that his mistress was unhurt, before he retired again, taking Burrus with him. The boy-slave looked over his shoulder just once to catch eyes with Nilla. She nodded to him that she was not frightened or hurt.

  Livilla took in the entire scene with amazement. I saw the quick, loaded look she cast at Macro, who had not moved a muscle or barely blinked an eye.

  ‘Well, then,’ he said finally to the room.

  Silius and Sosia were dragged out the front door and into the street by the guards. There they found a mob awaiting them.

  ‘It’s them! Look, it’s them!’

  Silius’s cloak fell open as the Praetorians bound his hands, exposing his lurid dining tunica. The jeers were exultant.

  ‘Look what he’s wearing!’

  The mob’s attendance had been paid for by Sejanus, of course.

  In all this horror and disgrace Little Boots moaned pathetically in a heap, his face crushed and bloody from where the door had struck him. I confess that at that moment I hoped he would be scarred by it for life.

  Sejanus returned home, feeling weary and drained. He closed his eyes as his slaves removed his bronze cuirass and boots, and when they made to remove the rest of his garments he made no argument. He liked them to admire his nakedness, enjoying their envy. He opened his eyes as his undergarments were removed and saw the large Laconian dog in the atrium, waiting patiently with its head on its paws.

  Sejanus was thrown, recognising the animal.

  ‘It belongs to a visitor, domine,’ said the steward.

  Sejanus knew who the visitor must be.

>   The steward bowed. ‘She arrived, wishing to speak to you when you returned. Because she is the Emperor’s daughter-inlaw I knew you would never object to me admitting her – or her dog.’

  ‘Of course not,’ said Sejanus, betraying nothing.

  ‘She is waiting in the tablinum.’

  ‘And where is my wife?’

  ‘The mistress Apicata is at the baths with her maids.’ Then, as if it were of no account, the steward added, ‘She is not expected for some hours yet, domine.’

  Sejanus met the eyes of his steward, but the man hinted at nothing. His face was a servile mask. The steward clapped his hands and a fresh tunica was pulled over Sejanus’s head.

  ‘Has the Lady Livilla been given wine while she waits for me?’ Sejanus asked as the tunica was tugged down his chest and torso.

  ‘Of course, domine.’

  With Sejanus properly dressed, the steward and the other slaves bowed and peeled away to the corridors that led from the reception rooms. Sejanus strode across the atrium towards his curtained study at the other end, watching the loyal dog by the wall. Scylax lifted his head.

  ‘You are the only slave attending your mistress?’

  Scylax wagged his tail.

  ‘You grow ever more prized, then.’

  The dog returned his head to his paws.

  Sejanus flung the curtain aside, both angered and aroused by Livilla’s risk-taking. ‘You are reckless,’ he whispered.

  The room was empty.

  ‘Livilla?’

  An empty goblet stood on a side table next to a jug of wine. Most of the contents had been consumed. He saw the young maid Calliope dart across the courtyard beyond the room. She froze when she saw her master, but she was already frightened by something else, it was clear.

  ‘Get to the kitchens,’ he called out to her.

  The girl scurried into the shade.

  ‘Wait.’

  The girl froze again. Sejanus left his study, descending the row of steps that led into the peristyle garden. Calliope visibly shook as he approached her.

  ‘You tell your mistress anything – anything at all – and I will know about it, girl, understand me? Then I’ll kill you for it.’

  Calliope nodded, her teeth knocking together in her mouth.

  ‘Only I will ever win – not my wife and certainly not her slaves.’

  Calliope’s teeth clinked like pebbles.

  ‘Go.’

  The girl fled.

  When Sejanus entered the sleeping room he shared with his wife, he found Livilla lying face-down upon the bed, with cushions beneath her sex to raise her rump for him. He tore the fresh tunica from his body and spread his fingers at her rear, savouring the heat of her lust for him. ‘Stay silent, my love,’ he murmured. ‘Stay as still as a tomb.’

  Livilla made no noise at all as he claimed her. Why would she? The love she gave her god was as silent as it was sacred, and she relished its continued secrecy. It inflamed her, even though she gained such perverse pleasure from risking exposure. And Livilla’s knowledge that her enemy, Apicata, also slept in the very place she now defiled was almost as heartwarming as the knowledge that the little coffin with its decapitated doll still rested undiscovered beneath the bed.

  As Sejanus reached his climax, a tiny voice kissed the air near Livilla’s ear.

  ‘One would-be queen knows hunger’s pangs when Cerberus conducts her …’

  Startled, she turned her head to see who’d spoken. There was no one else there. Sejanus fell spent at her side. The voice had not been his – it was a woman’s tongue, a voice from far away. Livilla did not feel frightened, only puzzled. What had been meant?

  Movement at the door distracted her as Sejanus sank into sleep. It was Scylax. Half-pinned beneath her lover, Livilla wouldn’t risk waking him by shifting herself. She stretched her arm to the edge of the bed and wiggled her fingers. Scylax padded up to her and began licking her hand.

  Livilla drifted into sleep, tickled by the hungry dog.

  Vestalia

  June, AD 24

  Two months later: Emperor Tiberius

  Julius Caesar Augustus refuses, without

  explanation, all requests to award a

  triumph to General Publius Cornelius

  Dolabella, victor over Tacfarinas

  The sun was warm, the breeze sweet and fresh and clean. There were swallows in the sky, spiralling high and free in the blue. The clamour at his feet was inconsequential in such loveliness, on such a perfect day, when he was feeling such wellbeing and relief as he took his place in the chair upon the summit of the Arx. Silius held himself proudly, straightening his back against the hard wooden board. As the boys pushed the cord through, threading it under his chin and then out through the board again, Silius smiled indulgently at them. He was not distressed, he wanted them to know; he was not in despair. The day was too pretty for it.

  The cord tightened almost at once, yet Silius barely noticed, distracted by the boys’ whispers. ‘You mean to offend me?’ he asked them. ‘Humiliate me, lads? My great achievements were my only crime. My success has brought me here – nothing less than that. I’m flattered by what it’s given me.’ He went to add more but found he couldn’t. His larynx was crushed. No matter.

  The Temple of Capitoline Jupiter stood in serene splendour to his right; to his left and in front of him, as far as his eyes could see, Rome spread out like a tiler’s mosaic. The long white strip of the Gemonian Stairs ran from his feet down the slope of the Arx, reminding Silius of a German stream bobbing with broken ice. The limbs and heads and torsos of those who had sat in the chair before him were like pebbles in this stream; the dogs that feasted upon the carrion were like frogs.

  Silius lifted his eyes and gazed with fascination at his city, filling his heart with its streets and temples, its forums and gardens, its theatres, mansions and slums. He saw now that there were swirls and patterns he had never seen before among the seven teeming hills he thought he knew like he knew his own hands. It was as though a god’s hand had formed the design, and not a million petty men across a thousand violent years. The city was divine indeed from this lofty view, and it comforted Silius, seated as he was so near to the gods. The boys began to twist the cord tighter, enjoying their task – once, twice and again. No final words allowed? No matter.

  Silius had said all he had to say; there was nothing left to his life’s great experience but simply being. He was content with that. He had earned it, he felt. He had devoted his life to fighting for Rome, and it was good to know with certainty that he had devoted himself to something so worthy. He had done his duty, everyone knew, and Rome was destined to endure even when those who had built and loved and glorified it perished, one by one, right up to the very greatest.

  He took what air he could before the cord prevented him and he felt his windpipe crush. He could still see, he could still hear, but the cord bit deep and his head fell forward on its own. He looked again down the stairs. The dogs were waiting for him now, wagging their tails and calling. He smiled indulgently once more and tried to reach out his hands to make them come closer. But he couldn’t move. No matter. It was enough to see their happy looks, their licking tongues, their excited dancing.

  He felt his vision fade, and with it his pain, before the cord was loosened abruptly. The boys pulled it from his throat and in surprise he went to place his hands at the wound before recalling, again, that movement was beyond him. His throat throbbed and his pain and vision rushed back. Confused, he tried to shout out, ‘It isn’t done yet, fools – I’m still here, aren’t I? The job isn’t finished.’ Then he guessed that this was the new procedure. Executions had changed from the days of the Tarpeian Rock.

  When the boys waved the hook in front of him, Silius felt gratitude. An extra moment of life was a treasure still, a gift from the skies. When they drove the barb deep into his belly and up through his ribs, he smiled as his head lolled to and fro in mockery of their inept cruelty.
‘You want agony?’ he smirked at them. ‘You should see what the Germans do. This is a picnic by the Tiber in comparison.’

  They pulled him from the chair. Silius wanted to tell them that he would have come willingly; they could have saved their sestertii on such expensive grapples if they’d simply asked him to take his place on the stairs with the other traitors. But he was glad to be guided if it gave him another moment of rest, contemplation and joy.

  The warmth of the sun was his again as they dragged him down the stairs by the hook – the blue of the sky, the tumult of swallows.

  The tide of barefoot women washed down from the hills like rain. Their hair unbound, their stolae coarse and undyed, they were Vesta’s penitents, ready to sweep out her temple and package her dirt safe from thieves. From each patrician home more women trickled from the doors, adding to the stream, swelling the numbers to a torrent. Voices rose to the heavens in song. The Temple of Vesta in the Forum threw its doors wide to receive them, as the virgins within began passing out brooms, standing aside as the first of the women began to sweep. The sacred flame of the goddess crackled and waved; Vesta was welcoming.

  Sosia moved through the flow of female devotion. She was part of them, yet not; a patrician, but no longer one of their class. She strode with dignity against the tide, cutting a tiny, narrow path. The way opened before her; behind, her path was swallowed by the mass.

  Sosia’s hair was loose, her feet were bare and her stola was of the roughest, greyest wool. She was no different to any other woman in the street on this sacred day except in her purpose. Vesta had been denied to Sosia, as had all the other gods. Sosia’s home was no longer hers; her husband and her children had been taken from her. She was without possessions – without slaves, even. She had been forbidden to hold money, or to beg for it, or to throw herself upon the kindness of friends. She was a non-person; no longer patrician, no longer privileged and no longer Roman. She was to leave.

  As she made her progress towards the Servian Wall, women recognised her. Some stopped and stared, fear marking their faces in the moment of recognition before they looked to the ground. Others clutched at her clothes or touched her arms, whispering words of compassion as they passed. One woman kissed her hair. But Sosia walked on, her eyes dry of all tears until she found the one face she searched for.