A Song For Nero

by Tom Holt

  One of the Greeks nodded so furiously I thought his head'd come off. 'He was an evil shit, that Nero. He had the right idea, killing himself like that.'

  'I don't agree,' Lucius Domitius said (and I thought, hello). 'No, a quick, easy death like that — too good for him. They should've caught him and strung him up by the balls outside his own palace gate, and let the crows peck his eyes out.'

  Nobody disagreed with that. 'Would've served him right,' said one of the Spaniards, 'the things he done.'

  'Only murdered his mother, didn't he?' said one of the Italians. 'Only had his own mother put to death, like she was a criminal or something. A man who could do something like that—'

  Lucius Domitius shuddered. 'Doesn't bear thinking about,' he said. 'Though, mind you, she was an evil bitch as well, or so I've heard. Still, that doesn't excuse what he did, does it?'

  'Oh, pure poison, that Agrippina was,' said one of the Athenians. 'No doubt about it, she'd have done him in if he hadn't got to her first.'

  'She'd have done the world a favour, then,' Lucius Domitius said sharply. 'And anyway, it doesn't matter that she was a vicious, scheming bitch. Doesn't even matter that she'd have killed him if she'd thought of it first. She was still his mother, and there's absolutely no excuse.

  'Oh, I don't know,' piped up one of the Greeks. 'What about Oedipus?'

  Confused silence. 'How do you mean?' I asked.

  'Oedipus,' the Greek repeated. 'His mum did in his dad, so he killed her. It's in plays and everything.'

  'You mean Orestes,' one of the other Greeks said. 'Oedipus was the one who killed his dad and screwed his mum. Though they do say Nero did that, as well.'

  Lucius Domitius sighed again. 'I wouldn't be surprised at anything that bastard did. Though I don't know why he'd have wanted to. She was no vase painting, so I've heard.'

  That stopped their conversation dead for a while, and I was just about to try changing the subject when someone said, 'Well, I never heard where he murdered his father, but they do say he did in old Claudius, and wasn't he his uncle or something?'

  'Great-uncle,' Lucius Domitius said, 'though technically he was Nero's father, since he married Agrippina. She was his niece, you see.

  'What, Nero's niece? I thought she was his mother.'

  'No,' Lucius Domitius said patiently, 'she was Claudius' niece.'

  'And he married her? Dirty old bastard.'

  Lucius Domitius shrugged. 'Well, they see things differently, the Roman nobility. But yes, I don't see how Nero couldn't have been in on Claudius' murder. Mind you, he was only, what, sixteen, seventeen at the time, but that doesn't mean much in those circles. And Claudius was a good emperor. At least, he wasn't so bad.'

  Everybody laughed at that. 'Give us a break,' someone said. 'Claudius was a real vicious old sod, executed people right, left and centre. Whoever done him in, he had it coming.'

  'That's right,' someone else said. 'He let those advisers of his, ex-slaves the lot of 'em, go around killing people for their money. And didn't he ever get through wives at a hell of a rate? Best you can say for Claudius is, he was better than the bloke before him.'

  'Yeah,' said one of the Egyptians, then he added, 'Who was that? I can't remember.'

  A Greek laughed. 'Caligula, you clown. You know, the nutso who thought he was a god. I reckon he must've been the worst of the lot.'

  'Apart from Nero,' Lucius Domitius said firmly 'Nero was the worst.'

  Everybody nodded again. 'He was the pits, Nero was,' said a Spaniard.

  'Glad you agree,' said Lucius Domitius. 'For instance, you take taxes.'

  A Greek frowned. 'Actually,' he said, 'you're wrong there. Taxes weren't so bad in Nero's day, in fact they were lower, at least out our way. I remember, because my dad was on the local board in our village, and he said Nero actually lowered taxes from what they'd been before. Still,' he added, 'that's neither here nor there.'

  'Exactly,' Lucius Domitius said. 'After all, what good are lower taxes when the price of everything keeps going up all the time? Like when Nero was in power.'

  'Did they?' One of the older men lifted his head. 'I don't remember that. In fact, they went down when Nero came in. I know that because there was a drought in our district about that time, and the government stepped in and fixed the price of grain. Still,' he added, 'I don't suppose that was any of Nero's doing.

  One of his advisers, more like.'

  'Bound to have been,' someone else agreed. 'Don't suppose Nero knew what was going on in the empire from one day to the next. All he cared about was writing poetry and playing the harp. What sort of emperor is that, I ask you?'

  'I was just going to say that,' Lucius Domitius said. 'Mucking about enjoying himself, dressing up in silks and prancing about on a stage when he should have been doing something worthwhile. Do you know, there wasn't a single war while he was in charge? Pathetic. And he was proud of it too, the gutless coward. Boasted about it, while the soldiers had nothing to do all day but loll around the barrack yard playing dice.'

  'Shocking,' said an Italian. 'Still, that all changed when Vespasian got in. He really sorted out those Jews, didn't he?'

  'And the British,' a Greek pointed out. 'Killed thousands of 'em, the savages.

  There was always plenty to keep the army busy while he was around.'

  'No wonder the taxes had to go up, then,' I said. 'Got to be paid for, wars.

  'Yes,' Lucius Domitius admitted, 'but at least he didn't go spending it all on building fancy palaces and temples and all that shit, like Nero did. He was obsessed with all that stuff, art and architecture and rubbish like that. No wonder he couldn't afford to fight any wars.

  'Yeah, it was all right if you were a painter or a plasterer,' an Italian pointed out. 'Like my uncle, he did plastering and fresco painting, that line of work. Very comfortable, he was, in Nero's time. But he didn't like doing it, he said, not working for that arsehole. It made him feel guilty, he told me, all the time he was doing it.'

  'No wonder,' Lucius Domitius said. 'And don't forget, it was Nero who started the Great Fire, just so he could get rid of the old slum buildings and put up poncy new ones.

  'That's right,' said a Greek. 'That was him, that fire. Him and the Christians.'

  An Egyptian nodded. 'They were in it together,' he said, 'or so I heard. Nero gave 'em all torches and sent 'em out setting light to people's roofs while they were asleep. They like doing that sort of thing, Christians. It's because they're Jews.'

  'And slaves,' added a Greek. 'Slaves or ex-slaves, the lot of 'em. It's time something was done, if you ask me.'

  Lucius Domitius picked up a knife and started slicing leeks. 'What really put the tin lid on it for me,' he said, 'was the hypocrisy of the bastard. Just as soon as the fire'd died down a bit, he was out there on the streets, directing the fire crews, heaving buckets of water, as if he cared what happened to people. And all the time, he'd started the bloody fire himself. I don't know how somebody could behave like that.'

  'Well, he was wrong in the head, wasn't he?' a Greek said. 'Must've been.

  Otherwise, he wouldn't have done all that dressing up and singing in public.

  Rotten voice he had, too, though my dad always said he played the lyre well. He heard him once, actually, that time he came to Greece. But he couldn't sing any better than our old cat.'

  'Your dad?'

  'Nero.'

  'Oh, right. Actually,' whoever it was went on, 'I heard he used to make all the senators go to the theatre and listen to him caterwauling, and as soon as they were inside, they'd lock the doors so they couldn't leave, not till he'd finished.'

  'I heard that,' someone said. 'By all accounts, there were people asleep and having fits and heart attacks, right there in the stands, and nobody was allowed out for any reason. What a bloody farce.'

  'Too right,' Lucius Domitius chimed in. 'I mean to say, what a disgusting way to treat Roman senators. Absolutely no respect.'

  Several of the men sniggered. 'Fu
ck the Roman senators,' one of them said.

  'Respect? Come on, this is rich bastards we're talking about here, the men who own all those huge estates right across the world, with slaves working them so free men can't compete and get forced off the land. I should know, or why do you think I'm here and not back home, pruning my vines? They get no sympathy from me if they had to sit through a boring concert or two. Them and Nero, they deserved each other, is what I say.'

  That made them laugh. 'Pity he didn't scrag more of them, really,' said a Spaniard, 'or we'd all be better off. Should've done the lot of 'em in, and nobody'd have missed them. Not that I'm saying murder's right, of course, but you've got to admit it, there's some people are better off dead.'

  'Couldn't agree more,' Lucius Domitius said. 'Nero, for one.'

  'What the hell was all that about?' I asked him the next day, as soon as I got the chance for a quiet word. 'Have you gone off your head, or something?'

  But he just smiled and went on slicing onions. 'Quite the reverse,' he said. 'I don't think I've been this sane for years.

  'Funny idea you've got of sane,' I muttered. 'Saying all that stuff about yourself like that.'

  'I enjoyed it,' he replied. 'It set my mind at rest. All these years, you see, I've had this nagging feeling at the back of my mind that I must've done something wrong, something really bad. Now it seems like I didn't, and the worst that could be said of me is I made a lot of Roman senators listen to music.

  Quite good music, some of it, though I say so myself.' He flicked the sliced onions into the pot and wiped his knife on his sleeve. 'So finally,” he said, 'I was able to make up my mind, about what I want to do.'

  'Oh, really,' I said. 'And what's that, then?'

  'Simple,' he said. 'I want to go home.'

  For a moment or so, I couldn't think what he meant. 'Home?'

  He nodded. 'That's right,' he said. 'Home. Where I come from, where I was raised. I've been thinking about it a lot, and I'd really like to see Rome again before I die.'

  You could've knocked me down with a grape skin. 'Tell you what,' I said, 'if you go anywhere near Rome, you might just get your wish. Especially the dying part.'

  He shrugged. 'So what?' he said. 'Big deal. Oh, think about it, will you, Galen?

  Ever since we've been going round together, since that night in Phaon's cellar, we've been half a step ahead of the hangman every inch of the way We've been in half the condemned cells in the empire, and every time we manage to scrape out by the skin of our teeth, straight away we're being hunted down for something else.' He shook his head, like he couldn't believe it. 'And you know what?' he went on. 'The crazy part of it is it's all for little stuff, trivial little offences, thieving and swindling, or even stuff we didn't actually do, chickenshit stuff, and all so bloody unnecessary. Dammit, Galen, if I'm going to spend the rest of my life dodging a horrible death, I might as well do it back home where I belong as in some filthy alley in Pannonia or Cyrenaica, or some other place I've scarcely even heard of. And if I'm going to be strung up on a cross or torn limb from limb, why can't it be for something worthwhile? Like being who I am, for example.'

  I was stunned, no other word for it; it was like someone had just bashed me over the head with a big lump of lead pipe. 'You're crazy,' I said. 'You can't go back there. You're a wanted man, for God's sake.'

  'Sure,' he said, 'in Italy And Pergamum and Raetia and Lusitania and Illyricum and Liburia and Pamphylia and Bithyma, and now Sicily as well.' He laughed, though I couldn't see what was so damned funny 'You know,' he went on, 'it's got so that Rome's probably the safest place in the world for me right now After all, I'm already dead there. That's got to be an advantage.'

  Well, what was I supposed to say to that? Still, there was nothing to be gained from losing my rag with the idiot, so I just said, 'Well, you've changed your tune, haven't you? You're the one who's always shit-scared of being recognised wherever we go.

  'I know.' He nodded. 'But it was this last time, when we were in that cell in Sicily, I finally realised. And it's all thanks to you, of course, you and your brilliant schemes and your sideways career moves. Thanks to you, it's even more dangerous not being me than it is being me. And then, when I thumped that soldier — you remember, that big, ugly bastard in the stores — I didn't plan on doing it, it just suddenly seemed the obvious thing to do, and I did it, and it worked; and you know what? I wasn't afraid. Ten years ago, I'd never have dared, I'd have been frozen with fear, trying to take on a trained soldier half a head taller than me.' He could see I'd lost the plot some time back, because he went on, 'It's simple, really I'm not afraid any more, because suddenly I think I know who I am. And I don't mean who I was, I mean who I am now Isn't that something, Galen? I knocked out that huge great bruiser with just one punch, and he never knew what hit him.'

  I guess he was making some kind of point, but buggered if I knew what it was.

  After all, I was the one who'd put down the other guard, when we were leaving the cell, and I'd been absolutely terrified every single moment. And I knew exactly who I was, and it didn't make me feel any better at all. Quite the opposite.

  'Look,' I said. 'This is all very well, and if you've managed to achieve inner peace, bloody good luck to you. Right now, though, what I'm mostly concerned with is how the hell we're going to get you off this ship before it docks at Ostia. Unless, of course, you want to spend the rest of your days slicing onions.'

  He grinned. 'Is that so?' he said. 'I was sure you must've solved that problem before you sold me to the ship's captain, because otherwise you wouldn't have done it, would you? I mean, nobody'd be so recklessly stupid as to do something like that without figuring out a completely watertight plan first.'

  'All right,' I said, 'spare me the brilliant sarcasm. There are times when you've just got to think on your feet, that's all. Or would you rather be back in Sicily dodging soldiers?'

  'You know,' he went on, ignoring me and laying into the last onion, 'if it wasn't for wanting to see Rome again, I'd be perfectly happy staying put on this ship. I mean, I've got enough to eat, somewhere to sleep, and I expect they'd give me a new tunic when this one falls to pieces. Oh yes, and they seem to like me, and we've been on this boat three days and nobody's tried to kill me. What more could you possibly ask out of life? Except a chance to go home,' he added.

  'That's the one little bit that itches. It's like a nail working up through the sole of your boot; the further you go, the worse it gets.'

  'I'm not listening,' I said.

  'Big deal,' he replied, 'you never listen. You talk instead.' He slashed at what was left of the onion like he was a Thracian cavalryman cutting off someone's head. 'God almighty, am I ever tired of your incessant bloody talking. It'd be different if you ever, just once in a while, said something worth hearing. Even if it was only twice a year, Kalends of March and Ides of September, something like that. But you don't, you just drivel.' There were tears running down his face, but it must've been the onions. 'You know,' he went on, 'I've travelled the world with you, I've seen men whose skins are black with the heat and blue with woad, I've seen deserts and forests and oceans, and everything, every bloody thing, was drowned out in a sea of your never-ending chatter.' He spun round, and his knife was level with my throat, though that was just coincidence. 'I could've heard music or listened to philosophers or storytellers in the markets. Instead, I got you. And you know what? Because of you, I've kept silent. I haven't sung, I haven't played. When I was sixteen years old I used to walk along composing poetry under my breath, I chewed my food to an iambic rhythm, I even dreamed in metre, and when I woke up there'd be little shards and snippets of pure, clean hexameters left in my mouth that I'd have lost by the time I opened my eyes. And then,' he said, scowling at me, 'you came along. Through some horrible error, some ghastly case of mistaken identity, your brother — the only person I ever loved in my whole life — your brother died and I got you instead. Wonderful.' He threw the knife across the galley; it clatter
ed on the decking. 'I got you, and your constant hum of dogshit driving everything out of my mind, every verse and every tune, until —bloody hell, until I stopped listening to me and started listening to you instead. I tell you what, Galen. If the Senate and People of Rome wanted to make me suffer like nobody's ever suffered before, all they had to do was shackle me to you for ten years; only I did it for them. And all this time, I've been keeping you alive, saving your useless neck over and over again because he would have wanted me to. I'm rotting in hell, Galen, and hell is you. Do you understand that? Are you actually listening to me, or are you allowing your attention to wander?'

  You could've pulled out my spine and shoved it up my bum, and I wouldn't have noticed. It was like I'd bumped into some nutter in the street, the sort who follow you around screaming at you and won't go away And the sheer bloody ingratitude of it — I tell you, if we'd been alone somewhere, out in the open where nobody could see, I'd have smashed his teeth down his neck, even though I'd have had to stand on something to reach.

  'You finished?' I said.

  'More or less.'

  'Fine,' I told him. 'You know what, Lucius Domitius? You're an arsehole. You're a selfish, ungrateful, stupid arsehole, and if it wasn't for the fact that Callistus died for you, I'd turn you in to the captain, and me with you for being such a bloody fool as to look after you all these years.' Oh, I was angry all right. 'You saved my neck, did you? Fuck you. You wouldn't have lasted a day on your own. They'd have caught you and pulled you apart, bit by bit, you'd never have had a chance to starve in a ditch because you aren't capable of fending for yourself. Well,' I said, 'that's all right. If you want us to go our separate ways, let's do it. I'll take care of me, and you can look out for yourself. Starting with getting your useless bum off this ship. You think you can do that, all by yourself?'

  'Sure,' he replied. 'And I can do it without making everything ten times worse, which is more than you can say I laughed. 'Really?' I said. 'Is that right? Let me tell you something, Roman. All over the world there's thousands and millions of slaves, and you know why they stay slaves, instead of just slinging their hook and going home? It's because they haven't got any choice. It's because it's bloody difficult and dangerous, a slave running away, and they only hang around because they know that if they try and make a dash for it, they're going to get caught and strung up on a cross, and they're going to die painfully Now, if you're so much smarter than all those thousands and thousands of poor bastards who never even had a chance, you go ahead and you do it. But you're so thick, you can't pick your nose without sticking a finger up your ear. You try it, you're a dead man. As if I cared.'