Nest of vipers eor-2

by Luke Devenish

  The young midwife shrank into the wall.

  'Open it,' said Antonia. 'Open the foul thing.'

  The young midwife froze. Her senior colleague stooped with creaking joints to retrieve it, trying to look as if she felt no fear. 'Could it hold a blessing, Lady?'

  Antonia snatched the thing from her and Livilla wailed. 'I won't let you see it, daughter,' said Antonia, 'but I must read it to know who would wish us ill will.'

  'Are you sure it's not a blessing?' said the old midwife again.

  Antonia dug her nails under the curl of rolled lead. The tablet bent easily in her fingers and she smoothed the abhorrent thing in her palm.

  'Tell me what it says,' moaned Livilla.

  'It's indecipherable…'

  Livilla threw herself from her bed and snatched the tablet from her mother's hands.

  'Livilla!'

  'It's written backwards…'

  'Oh help us, gods,' cried Antonia, feeling weak.

  'A mirror — where's my mirror?'

  Fearful and bewildered, Lygdus picked up the polished silver disk that Livilla used to study her complexion. ' Domina…'

  Livilla plucked it from him and held the tablet to its surface with shaking hands. Legible words were revealed in the reflection. White-faced, Antonia read them with her daughter. By Veiovis, may the child of the slut Livilla lose its eyes and its ears and its mouth and its head.

  Only Lygdus, young and strong, had the speed to catch his mistress as she slipped forward. He stopped her swollen belly from striking the ground. But the effort of saving Livilla tore open his wound, causing fresh blood to spill down his leg, before it was lost in a greater flood. Livilla's waters broke around him, gushing to the floor from her loins.

  When the tortures of labour went on to claim her, so did the irrationality of terror. With every stab in her guts she begged the goddesses who guided her — Venus, Diana and Juno — to tell her who had invoked the god of deception and lies to curse her so cruelly. When, after an hour of this, she claimed that Venus had given her the answer, no amount of appalled dissuasion from Antonia could shift Livilla's conviction. Lygdus had done it, Livilla screamed — he had found the curse tablet under her bed only because he had placed it there. The eunuch had invoked Veiovis to curse her for his castration.

  By the second hour of her agony Livilla was only persuaded not to crucify Lygdus by Antonia's desperate proposal of a lesser punishment. For every contraction that gripped Livilla's womb, Lygdus received a stroke of the nail-studded whip. In short time his screams were louder than hers, which became a comfort to Livilla in her fear.

  None found this punishment more difficult to observe than the guilt-ridden young midwife.

  The two Praetorians on duty opened the doors to such a shocking scene that they rushed into the room with their swords drawn. Agrippina ran in behind them with a sharp scream, leaving Sosia and Claudia to stare after her in confusion. Tiberius was sprawled on the floor, struggling to get up from where he had fallen, as Consular Senator Gallus gripped him around the knees, sobbing like a child. The guards were so alert to assassination attempts that Gallus was only just saved from being cut to pieces by Tiberius himself.

  'Wait!'

  The men halted with their swords raised.

  'The fool has lost his reason but he's not trying to kill me,' said Tiberius. 'Get off, Gallus,' he winced, kicking at the senator.

  Gallus let go, realising that his show of supplication had nearly been the death of him. 'Caesar,' he stammered. 'I… I meant no harm.'

  'You caused it anyway — just get out.' Tiberius saw Agrippina standing behind the guards with a look of dark disgust on her face. He knew it had nothing to do with Gallus and clambered to his feet.

  The Consular Senator tried to exit backwards, bowing as he went, but he struck a lampidarium, nearly pulling it down before Agrippina's quick actions steadied it. She kept her eyes hard upon Tiberius. Gallus's tears started again and he crawled out of the reception room weeping noisily. There was a stunned lull in his wake, and then the guards made it clear they wanted an explanation. Agrippina realised that Charicles, Tiberius's physician, was also in the large room, seated in a chair with a scroll in his lap, and quite unperturbed by any of it.

  'The idiot Gallus thinks he's the target of a plot,' Tiberius addressed the guards like boys. 'Villains are attempting to smear him, he claims. All rubbish, of course. Gallus is deluded with self-importance.'

  'And why would that be?' Agrippina asked. Charicles glanced up from his scroll. There was a look of defiance in Agrippina's face. 'Because he married your former wife?'

  The past year's experiences had taught Tiberius that the best way to deal with his headstrong widowed daughter-in-law was to seize the advantage from her early. He lurched forward and kissed her on the forehead, placing his arms around her broad shoulders. In the room outside, Sosia and Claudia stared in disgust. The sheer unexpectedness of this gesture disarmed Agrippina long enough for Tiberius to dismiss the guards. He reached into the folds of his robes and pulled out some aureus coins.

  'Gallus's union with my former wife Vipsania is something Rome celebrates,' he said, tossing the coins to the Praetorians and waving them out of the room. 'But if this has inflated his sense of self then perhaps it can't be helped. Vipsania is a fine woman, after all, much admired.'

  This was an invitation for Agrippina to bring up Tiberius's cruel divorce of Vipsania prior to his marriage to Agrippina's late mother. But she saw it for the trap it was and went straight to the point of her visit. 'My sons,' she said. 'I wish to speak to you about Drusus and Nero.'

  'Do you seek my advice on some matter?'

  The Praetorians closed the doors on the conversation and on Sosia and Claudia outside. Only the physician Charicles remained in the huge room with them.

  'I seek an explanation,' said Agrippina.

  Tiberius kissed her on the forehead again, embracing her tightly and pressing his lips to her skin. 'My poor daughter-inlaw,' he said at last. 'Your grief has left you slow in recognising the benevolence of my actions.'

  Agrippina reeled from his breath as rage stuck in her throat. She forced herself not to react. 'You are right,' she said. 'My grief for your adopted son is unending — I will never be rid of it, and nor will I wish to be.'

  'Nor I,' said Tiberius, unblinking in his smile. The odour of him was sour in the air.

  'Together we are united in our devotion to his sons,' said Agrippina. 'We want them to live with those who love them most.'

  'Of course we do.' Tiberius made a movement to suggest he was going to kiss her again and Agrippina tensed in his arms. Then he playfully released her but remained standing next to her in unpleasant intimacy. 'I have a new idea,' he said.

  She waited.

  'We'll knock holes in the walls that separate your house from Castor's.'

  'Castor's house is this house — Oxheads.'

  'No, no, no,' said Tiberius. 'Castor and his household are entirely separate.'

  'The buildings are connected. It is all one.'

  'Is it?' Tiberius considered this as if the layout of the Imperial family's homes had never been revealed to him. 'Perhaps you're right. Then your house will be connected, too. We should have done it long ago, when Germanicus was still alive. We're one family, after all. As soon as your sons are moved into their new rooms in Castor's house this afternoon, we'll set the slaves to work on your walls. Then it won't feel like the boys have moved away from you at all, Agrippina. It'll feel like your house has expanded. All that extra space.'

  He placed an aged and withered arm around her shoulder again, and it felt to Agrippina like his skin was alive with worms. Tiberius returned his lips to her hair, breathing in her perfume for a moment as he nibbled at her. She willed herself to swallow her rage again.

  'When Nero turns fourteen, I will commend him to the Senate,' said Tiberius. 'I will propose that he is given the privilege of seeking the quaestorship, too, five years before the legal ag
e, and the priesthood of Jupiter. I will ask the Senate to mark these honours with generous donatives to the people, naturally. Rome will think quite well of Nero as a result — don't you agree, Agrippina?'

  She knew he was dangling her son's future before her like a jewel. Any objections she held could only seem baseless now. 'He will be popular,' she said.

  Agrippina heard her friends' voices rise in some unseen commotion on the other side of the doors.

  'Yes, he will be,' said Tiberius. He raised his lips from her hair and placed his hands at his side. He made no signal that Agrippina should go, but neither did he say another word. Agrippina just looked at him, boring deep into his eyes. She thought she saw the glow of triumph within them. She imagined braying, mocking laughter.

  She turned on her heel and walked swiftly to the door. It was only as she was about to slap her palms on the bronze panels to summon the guards that Tiberius spoke again.

  'He'll be betrothed as well. Nero, I mean. To my granddaughter Tiberia, Castor and Livilla's girl. She's very pretty. What do you think, Agrippina?'

  'I think we'll be lucky if her mother allows her even to attend the wedding,' said Agrippina. 'What if there's a mist she might catch cold from?'

  Tiberius erupted in laughter, throwing his head back. When it ended, there were tears on his cheeks. 'Livilla's obsession with illness extends to poor Tiberia, it's true,' he said, wiping his face with his hands, 'but like all good daughters-in-law, Livilla will see the sense in following a father's advice. There will be a wedding day, mist or no mist. I'll give thought to betrothing Drusus too.'

  He paused again, looking at Agrippina with a paternal smile. Then his gaze lost focus. He saw her but no longer saw her, as if she had already left the room. 'Charicles?'

  The physician looked up from his scroll at the other side of the huge room.

  'Do I have unpleasant breath?'

  'It is possible, Caesar…'

  'What should I do about it?'

  'Chew ginger. And then drink perfume mixed with wine. I will arrange it for you.'

  Agrippina slapped her hands against the heavy plated doors. The Praetorians pulled them open from outside and she stumbled into the corridor, unable to choke back her sobbing. Sosia and Claudia rushed to her, trying to tell her something as the doors closed again. But Agrippina didn't hear them as she sank to the mosaic floor, her body wracked with grief for her murdered husband, her murdered mother, her murdered father, her murdered brothers and her tiny daughter too — all lost, all dead, all taken from her far too soon. She wept for her loved ones and she raged in her heart against Tiberius for what she believed was his part in so much misery.

  When no more tears were left, Agrippina allowed herself some comfort in the cold floor tiles. They were sobering somehow. They brought her back to the present again, to what she must do in her husband's name. She saw there was a pattern in the floor — one she had never noticed before.

  'Look,' she whispered to her friends, 'dancing skeletons. It's a reminder to enjoy life, since death can come so easily.'

  Sosia gently lifted Agrippina's head from the floor. Agrippina looked up then and saw me waiting for her.

  'Lady,' I said. 'I have good news for you.'

  'Do you?' she said. 'It will have to be something very special for me to consider it good, Iphicles.'

  I stood aside and let her see.

  The tiny girl was clothed now, but she still held tightly to her boy-slave's hand.

  'Mama,' Nilla said. She let go of Burrus and ran forward to hug and kiss the woman she had believed she would never see again. The slave Nymphomidia, Burrus's own mother, wept at her son's side, as Sosia and Claudia now joined in too.

  But Agrippina had no more tears left to give. She clung to the daughter she had long thought drowned, whispering her name. 'Agrippinilla… my Agrippinilla,' she said softly. 'My little Nilla.'

  The steward had a smile to split his face in two as Castor returned home from a long morning at the magistrate's courts, accompanied by his nephews Nero and Drusus. Agrippina's reaction at the slave market still weighed heavily upon Castor as he lifted his feet before crouching Lygdus. The young eunuch began removing their leather street shoes, his every movement agony from where the nailed whip had scourged him. He was dressed in a fresh scarlet tunica, to better hide his new wounds.

  'What is it? You look odd,' Castor said, conscious of the pain behind the eunuch's movements.

  Lygdus lingered over his master's liberated feet and saw that the abscess on his master's arch was no better. He cast a glance at the grinning steward, Pelops. There was an understanding in place among the slaves about all that had happened today. 'My back is stiff, domine, that is all,' Lygdus lied.

  The steward grinned all the more as Lygdus began rubbing a salve on Castor's sore foot. 'There has been happy news while you were away, domine,' Pelops said.

  'Happy?'

  There was a scurry of movement in the atrium beyond the entrance hall, a flap of women's gowns. Castor looked past Pelops and saw that most of the household slaves were assembled in the light-filled central room, kneeling on the floor and looking through to him expectantly.

  'What's the matter with everyone?'

  Tiberia popped her head into the hall. 'Please come inside, Father — we're all waiting for you.' She cast a quick smile at Nero, but the smile he returned was for politeness only.

  Lygdus gave a whimper at having to rush his one and only pleasure — sponging perfumed water over three pairs of bare feet. Castor didn't wait for the slave to dry him. He walked into the atrium after Tiberia, leaving wet footprints behind him as all the servants bowed to the floor.

  Castor laughed. 'What a lot of silliness — what's got into you all?' Then he saw. The two midwives were among the servants. They rose before him, presenting a bundle in fresh, white linen. It was a baby.

  'Your son has been born, domine,' the senior woman announced. She placed the boy upon the marble floor at Castor's feet.

  A rush of emotion overcame Castor in the surprise. 'I have a son?' He stooped to lift the child, formally accepting the boy, and all the household slaves burst into applause. Lygdus and Pelops joined the throng. The baby stirred and opened his eyes, grumbling a little at the noise. His eyes were perfectly formed, as were his ears, his mouth and his head.

  'The Lady Livilla's labour came early — and very fast,' said the senior midwife. 'It lasted barely three hours. One of the easiest births we've attended, domine.'

  The younger midwife kept her eyes hard on the floor. Antonia had commanded that no mention was to be made by anyone of what else had occurred. Not that the guilt-ridden midwife would have mentioned it anyway.

  'Where is Livilla?' said Castor, transfixed by the baby.

  'With the Lady Antonia, resting,' said the senior midwife, 'but she waits for you, domine.'

  Castor cradled his son. 'You weren't expected to come today,' he whispered to the little bundle, 'but I'm so glad you did.'

  The young midwife risked raising her eyes in Lygdus's direction, but the beaten eunuch didn't notice her. Weakened by his ordeal, he pressed his back against the wall. The midwife saw that he left a smear of blood behind him.

  'I have a baby brother now,' Tiberia whispered to Nero, whose feet were still wet too. 'Aren't you happy for me?'

  Nero made the appropriate face.

  'His name will be Gemellus,' Castor announced to his nephews. 'He'll be as a brother to you.'

  The household slaves applauded again, repeating the name.

  'Welcome, Gemellus!' Drusus shouted above the noise.

  Castor moved into the middle of the room, with Tiberia and the boys behind him, while the servants surged around them to give praise.

  On the periphery Lygdus echoed the cries of the others as he detached himself from the group, keeping one eye on the entrance and edging further along the wall. Only Pelops looked away from the baby for a moment when he thought he heard the sound of the front door pulling closed.
But the hall was empty; he told himself he was hearing things. Why would anyone wish to depart the house on such a happy day for their master?

  Tiberius strained to write by lamplight, but the glow was so poor that the letters ran together under his hand. He finished the pen stroke and then couldn't even discern whose name he had added to the list. He knew the name in his head — of course he did — but did the scroll match? He held it closer to the flame, squinting to bring the letters into sharper focus as he took another sip of his draught. The effects of the Eastern flower let his mind knit together again, however briefly, and he saw that his writing was just legible.

  Tiberius did not intend reading from the list himself tomorrow. That task was beneath him and he deemed it too painful. Instead, he would listen in silence, just as he had when all the earlier lists had been read out by whichever toady of the moment stepped up to serve his Emperor. Tiberius didn't care which fawning senator claimed the task — all that mattered was that the names be read out loudly and correctly. Tiberius hated to be responsible for an innocent man being accused of treason. Or, more precisely, he hated to be responsible for a loyal man being accused.

  The scroll was too close to the lamp and the papyrus caught alight. Tiberius clutched it in his hands, not comprehending what was happening. The names were illuminated beautifully. Then the flames met his fingers and still he didn't drop the burning paper. He just read and reread his favourite's name.

  'Gallus… dear Gallus,' he whispered. Then he felt the pain of the fire and cried out.

  Sejanus flung the study door open and a gust of air blew the oil lamp out. He planted his boot on the flaming papyrus scroll, extinguishing it. Tiberius was left staring and dazed.

  'Are you hurt, Father?'

  Tiberius tried to focus on Sejanus's face, confused at who this was. 'Is that you, Castor?'

  'Are you hurt, Caesar?' Sejanus said, with an edge.

  'No, boy,' Tiberius said, realising it was Sejanus. Then he saw the lamp was out. 'Look at that — the best omen I know.'

  Sejanus regarded the old man with deep love and indulgence. Tiberius was sixty-one but seemed so much older. Years of consuming opiates had made him haggard. His health was still sound, but his mind drifted badly at night.