Broken Vessels (volume 2 of Jars of Clay)

by Lee Strauss

Priscilla spoke up. “What should we do?”

  “We must split up,” answered her father, Saturus, “I don’t believe it is safe to meet here anymore. It’s too central. The other house groups in the city are planning to do the same.”

  “There are a couple of abandoned buildings on the southern border of my father’s property,” Cassius said. “It’s not much, but I think we would be safe there. I doubt that anyone would trouble Brutus.”

  “There’s also Father’s villa in Thurbo Minor,” Helena said. “Some of us could go there.”

  “Yes,” added Cassius. “Thurbo Minor would be a more comfortable place for you and Felicity and the baby.”

  “Won’t you come with me, brother?” Helena asked.

  “Perhaps it is not so good for us to stay together,” he said, hesitantly glancing at Priscilla as he spoke. “Just in case, you know, for Brutus’s sake.”

  “I see,” Helena said. She knew it was because of Priscilla and not Brutus that Cassius wished to remain. It was no secret that Cassius and Priscilla loved each other, and they would have been betrothed by now if it had not been for this crisis.

  “Will you send two women to Thurbo Minor alone?” Helena said.

  “We will come with you,” Secundus said, “I and Revocatus.”

  “It is decided then,” Helena said. “We will leave early in the morning, to avoid detection if possible.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  LUCIUS

  It was no secret that Lucius had gained Titus’s wrath when he’d killed Felix and it was a testament to the sadistic mind of Tullio, that he had bound the two of them together, wrist to wrist, with iron shackles for the voyage to Carthage.

  Each gladiator in training was bound to one other, and all of them were currently locked to special hooks attached to the circumference of the vessel.

  Less than a year had passed since Lucius had vomited his way to Italia in his effort to rip away his affections for Helena Vibius and to find adventure.

  He scoffed inwardly. He hadn’t found freedom in adventure or from his broken heart. When he’d come to Rome, the merchant ship’s cargo had a belly full of amphoria filled with olive oil.

  Now he and the rest of the men from the ludis were the cargo.

  Lucius was glad to have retained his sea legs, hard fought for on his original journey to Rome. He stood at the rail, with the wind on his face, breathing comfortably of the salty air. Sea birds squalled overhead, and the sun poked through the fog, erasing the early morning chill. He braced himself as the ship struck the waves, riding the rolling motions effortlessly.

  Titus wasn’t so fortunate. Again he hung his red head over the rail to hurl his dinner into the sea. Lucius was grateful for his partner’s weakened state. His life probably depended on it.

  “You’ll get used to it eventually,” Lucius said.

  Titus groaned. “And when I do I’m going to kill you.”

  Not that he and the others hadn’t tried.

  As Felix’s blood seeped into the sand, Titus raged like a wild lion, cursing Lucius and the gods as well.

  At least they had that in common.

  The guards had wrestled Titus to the ground, tying his arms firmly behind his back before escorting him to his cell.

  Lucius had been left to stare at the body laying at his feet, his sword still firmly in the man’s heart.

  Cedric had ordered the other men to take the body away, but a challenge had been served. Since that day, every man did what they could during their training sessions to try to maim Lucius, anything short of killing him, which Cedric had forbidden. Lucius would get his promised journey to Carthage.

  Titus experienced a reprieve from his seasickness, though his legs trembled with weakness. Their shackled condition allowed seating on the deck only if both men sat, but their joined arms remained in the air. Lucius had no reason to resist Titus’s inclination to sit.

  Though none of the men spoke, it was noisy. The wind slapped at the sails, sea birds squawked as they circled above the ship and the sea sloshed loudly against the hull as the vessel sliced through the waves.

  “He asked me to do it,” Lucius said. Titus tilted his head but his eyes remained shut.

  “I didn’t want to kill your uncle. I wanted him to kill me. I wanted to die.”

  Titus’s eye’s opened to slivers. “Why didn’t you?”

  “Felix said he was old and had lived his life, and I was young and could live another day. I wasn’t convinced until Cedric mentioned Carthage. I thought I would like to see it one more time before I embrace death.”

  “Is your heart sick for your home?”

  Lucius allowed a soft moan. “Yes. And a girl.”

  Titus smirked. “Of course. Our problems always lead back to a woman. What’s she like?”

  Lucius rubbed his eyes with his free hand allowing an image to float to his consciousness. “She’s beautiful of course. She has long chestnut colored hair that waves down her back and over her soft shoulders. Her eyes are like sapphires, her skin creamy like goats milk.”

  Titus burst out in hearty laughter, frightening the birds that had landed on the deck by their feet. “You sound like a poet! I can see why you need to see her again before you die.”

  He stared at Lucius. “So why did you leave?”

  Lucius let out a heavy breath. “She was my master’s daughter, and recently betrothed to be married.”

  “Oh to the gods,” Titus said. “Why do all the beautiful enticing women belong to another? I’m sorry for your sad tale. Do you think you will see her? Now that she is another man’s wife?”

  “I don’t know,” Lucius said.

  After a moment of quiet Titus muttered, “It’s my fault Felix died.”

  Lucius remembered their story about Titus’s ill-fated affair.

  “If I hadn’t gotten involved with a senator’s wife…” Titus choked on his words, swallowing hard. Lucius looked away. There was something disturbing about seeing a grown man turned gladiator on the brink of tears.

  “My arm is sleeping,” Lucius said, changing the subject. “We need to stand.”

  Though not overtly friendly, Titus had stopped threatening to kill Lucius and the next two days were relatively uneventful. On the third day, while chained to the rail, Lucius spotted land.

  He hadn’t guessed how seeing Carthage would affect him. The rolling terracotta hills dotted with rows of dark green olive trees, the hundreds of ships in the cove, the majestic brightness of Byrsa Hill. He imagined the spices of the Forum, and the sweet taste of grapes plucked from the vine.

  He felt a happiness that hurt.

  Would he see his family there? Could he get word to them somehow?

  And what of Helena? Perhaps he would spot her in the stands of the coliseum in Carthage. Would she recognize him from afar?

  Did he really want her to?

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  CASSIUS

  Cassius wiped his sweaty hands on his tunic, taking a deep breath and whispering a short prayer before entering his father’s office.

  He’d never defied Brutus before—that had been Gordian’s job. Cassius was the good son. He hated to make his father angry, and worse, to disappoint him.

  He took a tentative step inside. “Father?”

  “Yes,” Brutus’s sonorous voice reached him. “Come in.”

  Brutus was leaned over, reading a scroll that was rolled out over the length of his desk. Cassius thought he looked like an ancient withered tree bent in the wind.

  A dry patch in Cassius’s throat caused him to clear it. He was unsure how to start.

  “You’ll be happy to know the numbers keep improving,” Brutus said. “I’m importing to Rome in great quantities now. The quality of our olives is gaining a reputation abroad. And with the coming games, things are sure to keep getting better.”

  “That’s wonderful, Father, but I didn’t stop in to discuss business.”

  Brutus finally looked at him. “Then wha
t is it? Spit it out.”

  This was it. The moment for truth. “I have news regarding Helena and myself—a decision we have made.”

  Brutus sat back in his chair, his bushy eyebrows narrowing. “What kind of decision could you make without consulting me first?”

  “We’ve converted to Christianity.”

  Cassius didn’t know what he expected—anger sure, disappointment. Expulsion perhaps, but not silence. Brutus said nothing; he just returned to his books.

  “Father?”

  “Cassius, I’m a busy man. Stop wasting my time. You and your sister are not Christians. That would be ridiculous.”

  “But, we are.”

  Brutus tossed his stylus onto the open parchment, unconcerned by the spittle of ink it caused. “We may live in North Africa, Cassius, but we are Romans. Christianity is not the way of Rome. It is a phase. I will forgive it, now let me be.”

  Cassius couldn’t allow Brutus to discount this. “Father, I have been baptized. It is not a phase.”

  Brutus considered him. “You know the emperor has just passed a law that makes Christianity illegal. Would you go to prison for this? Would you allow your sister to?”

  Cassius swallowed. “Yes, Father, I would.”

  “You will not!”

  His father stood and stormed around his desk with shocking speed considering he used a cane. He stood nose to nose with Cassius—it was a response closer to what Cassius had expected. He braced himself, should his father strike. He could smell the tea on Brutus’s breath, see the map of deep lines that marked his ruddy skin. His eyes were wrinkled, half-shut in his anger, yellowing and bloodshot.

  “I am the pater familias! Would you publicly humiliate your own father?” His face grew purple. “I forbid it!”

  Cassius stepped back. “I am sorry, Father.”

  “Sorry? You must not be sorry; you must recant!”

  Cassius shook his head. His heart was heavy for the grief he knew he was causing his father. If Brutus would just ask him one question about Jesus the Christ he would tell him everything. Why he converted and how his life had changed.

  He waited, but Brutus didn’t ask a single question. When Cassius refused to renounce his faith, Brutus stumbled back to his desk, slowly reclining into his chair.

  He refused to look Cassius in the eye or say another word. Cassius slipped out of the office, wondering if he’d done the right thing.

  Later that night, Cassius rose to pray for his father. Out of his window he could see the moon rise, and he had just poked his head out to breathe the fresh night air, when he saw a shadow moving stealthily along the villa. He recognized his father’s broad sloped shoulders and the way he dragged his cane. Brutus stopped and tugged on his gray beard and Cassius knew his father’s intention was to beseech his gods, Jupiter and Minerva.

  Brutus reached into a small satchel, filling his hands with its contents. Cassius knew they were beans. Brutus tossed one at a time over his shoulder. This was the ransom offered to the ghosts, something Cassius knew that Brutus did often, a ransom offered to Marcellus, his dead brother.

  His father moved to another statue and faced it. Mania, goddess of death. He offered the remaining beans as a sacrifice.

  There was only one reason his father would do this. Brutus feared death. He knew someone was going to die.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  TATIANA

  The carriage ride over the cobblestones jolted and knocked Tatiana about, adding fuel to her foul mood. Her tall blond wig barely fit the height of the carriage and she had to constantly adjust it, holding it in place. Just another one of life’s many annoyances. Nesta couldn’t help casting glances at her mistress’s sour face.

  “What are you looking at?” Tatiana snapped.

  “I’m sorry,” Nesta whimpered.

  “Just-don’t-look-at-me.”

  Tatiana’s encounter with Helena in the Forum days before still irritated her. Helena was always flaunting something. She had the best doll, the handsomest brothers, an attentive father who even rescued her from that loathsome Vincentius! While her own father gave her, no sold her, to a man who was old enough to be her grandfather.

  Now Helena had a son. A son!

  Why were the gods so unfair? Why did they seem to hate her so? Another jostle of the carriage and Tatiana’s hands rushed to her headpiece. She cursed the driver.

  Finally they came to a stop outside of her villa. Tatiana allowed the driver to assist her as she got off, keeping one hand on her wig. She grabbed a section of her toga with her other hand to keep from tripping and blew through the atrium like a storm.

  She was about to dash to her chambers, rip off the ridiculous wig, and throw herself down onto her bed for a good cry when she heard strange male voices coming from the tablinum.

  Moving closer to appease her curiosity, Tatiana peeked in the doorway. She recognized them as men from the senate. They were speaking of the impending games and the arrival of the emperor, and how each of them could use the coming event to their own advantage.

  Boring, Tatiana thought, until she heard the word, Christian. For some reason, she cocked her head and listened, picking up portions of the conversation as their voices rose and ebbed.

  “….General Hilaranius is concerned that there is a shortage for the games… he has commissioned a search…anyone who has information on the whereabouts of Romans who have converted…large reward…”

  Large reward.

  Tatiana didn’t have any money of her own. Surely with a large reward she could make her life easier somehow. Perhaps even escape from her husband. She deserved it, didn’t she? Hadn’t she suffered enough?

  But could she really turn in her childhood friend for money? Well, they weren’t exactly friends anymore, and what did Helena expect when she gave up the way of Rome? Look how she showed absolutely no enthusiasm for the games or the emperor’s visitation when they last spoke. Helena only seemed intent on thrusting her son into Tatiana’s arms, once again throwing her good fortune into Tatiana’s face.

  Surely she deserved the reward. Perhaps the gods allowed her to hear this bit of news in order to provide her some kind of goodness for all her years of faithful ritual to them.

  Besides, they wouldn’t execute a woman of Helena’s stature, and when it came right down to giving her life for this Jesus, Helena wouldn’t go through with it. She’d recant; Tatiana was sure of it. Besides, Brutus wouldn’t let her.

  She had nothing to lose.

  Tatiana let a week pass, and her desire for escape had only increased. A chance meeting with Brutus in the Forum was a good omen from the gods. At first Brutus was reluctant to tell her the whereabouts of his daughter, but Tatiana had a way with men. A flirtatious stroke on the arm, an innocent batting of the eyes, she urgently needed to see her oldest friend, you see, on female matters.

  Brutus relented. Helena and her slave had gone to his villa in Thurbo Minor.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  HELENA

  A knock on the door was followed by the intrusion of three soldiers who pushed their way into the villa and interrogated them.

  “Are you a Christian?” the lead soldier asked her. She spoke clearly, yes.

  He repeated his question to Felicity, Secundus and Revoticus, to which they all answered, yes.

  The officer eyed the baby, who had started to whimper. Helena picked him up.

  The officer said, “You are under house arrest. Though you may have brief visitations, you will not leave until we escort you to your next destination.”

  Helena was perplexed as to how they had been so quickly discovered, since all the while they had met in the middle of Carthage they had managed to elude detection, and Thurbo Minor was quite a distance from the city.

  The small group complied peacefully. Guards were stationed outside at all the exits. Secundus called them together for prayer. Only God knew what was to become of them now.

  Cassius and Pricilla arrived later that evening w
ith the bread and wine. Helena prepared the table where the small group would enter into communion, lighting three candles that represented the three crosses on the hill.

  The villa at Thurbo Minor was much smaller than her home in Carthage, but shared much of the same décor. The first thing Helena did after their arrival was to ask the men to remove the idols, which they were more than happy to do.

  Cassius set the decanter of wine in the center of the table, while Pricilla set out the goblets. The round white loaf of bread rested on a platter.

  “I am astounded that you have been discovered so quickly,” Cassius said. “And it was my idea to send you here. I’m so sorry, Helena.”

  “It is not your fault or responsibility,” Helena said. She placed a hand over her heart to calm herself. “If the Lord had wanted to conceal us, it would’ve been done.”

  Secundus and his slave Revocatus joined them for communion, along with Felicity who was holding the baby Antonius.

  Cassius took the lead. “Brothers, sisters, the Lord Jesus, on the night that he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, ‘This is my body, which is given up for you. Do this in remembrance of me.’”

  Each of them tore off a piece of the bread as the loaf was passed around among them. Helen took the token of her Lord’s broken flesh and ate it. She felt overwhelmed by his sacrifice, and tears of gratefulness trailed down her cheeks.

  Cassius poured wine into all the goblets and handed them out. “In the same way, Jesus took the cup of wine saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood; whenever you drink it, do this in remembrance of me.’”

  As Helena drank the wine, she saw an image of her own blood dripping onto sand. She shivered against the fear that crept up her spine.

  They rose quickly afterwards to say goodbye; the guards had warned them beforehand that their visit must be kept short. Helena was thankful that her brother and Pricilla hadn’t been with them when the guards had arrived to arrest them. They were safe for now.