A Mist of Prophecies

by Saylor, Steven

  The portable furnishings were gone, and Terentia wore no jewellery. Was she really in such dire straits that she was having to sell her personal possessions? I myself had fallen into debt thanks to the hardships of recent months, but it was a shock to think of a woman like Terentia facing the same hard choices.

  ‘Was she a kinswoman?’ she said.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘The woman called Cassandra. Was she kin to you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Yet you conducted her funeral. There must have been some . . . relationship . . . between you.’

  I made no reply. Terentia shrugged knowingly. The presumptuous gesture reminded me of her husband, and I felt a pang of resentment that she should assume she understood my connection to Cassandra, even if she was correct.

  ‘You must have known her as well,’ I said. ‘Why else did you come to see her funeral pyre?’

  ‘Yes, I did have a slight acquaintance with her. I asked about your connection to her only because I wanted to thank you for conducting her funeral. It’s good that someone took the time and went to the expense of giving her a fitting ceremony. And you showed good taste. Not too many musicians and mourners. It’s unseemly when they outnumber the real friends and family.’

  ‘I could hardly afford the few I did hire.’

  ‘Ah, money . . .’ She nodded understandingly. ‘And no long-winded speech before the funeral pyre. I always think that’s rather pretentious when it’s a woman, don’t you? It’s fitting to list the accomplishments of a man of the world, but if a woman’s lived a proper life, what is there to say about her, really, at the end? And if she’s led an improper life, the less said the better.’

  I cleared my throat. ‘If you came to her funeral, Cassandra must have been more than a passing acquaintance. How did you meet her?’

  Terentia pulled back her shoulders and lifted her chin. She was not used to being questioned. In the courts her husband had become famous for his penetrating interrogation of witnesses; even the strongest men quailed before the fierce onslaught of Cicero’s questioning. But in the daily course of married life, when Cicero had cause to question his wife and she had cause to remain silent – when the battering ram met the iron wall – which of them usually won that test of wills? Looking at that immovable jaw, I suspected it was Terentia.

  Her demeanour gradually shifted. Her shoulders relaxed. She lowered her head. She had decided to answer me.

  ‘If you know anything at all about Cassandra, you know that in the last few months she became something of a celebrity in society. I used the word “society” loosely, since no such thing exists at the moment – we are all adrift, waiting for tomorrow. It was my sister Fabia who – for lack of a better word – “discovered” her. Cassandra appeared one day in front of the Temple of Vesta. Fabia was the senior Vestal on duty that day, tending to the divine flame. She heard a woman wailing outside. She went to see what was happening. These days, who knows? A woman might be raped or murdered in broad daylight on the temple steps. That was how Fabia came upon Cassandra, who was in the throes of one of her prophetic spells.’

  ‘Yes, I know.’

  Terentia gave me a curious look.

  ‘Purely by coincidence,’ I said, ‘I happened to be in the vicinity of the Temple of Vesta that day. I, too, heard Cassandra. I had never seen her before. I wasn’t sure how to react. While I hesitated, I saw Fabia emerge from the temple with two other Vestals. I saw them take Cassandra inside. What happened next?’

  Terentia gave me a long, hard look. ‘My husband calls you an honest man, Gordianus, “the last honest man in Rome,” in fact.’

  ‘Cicero honours me.’

  ‘And don’t think, just because I never had occasion to formally thank you, that I’ve ever forgotten the great favour you did for my sister all those years ago when you sniffed out the truth when some of the Vestals were accused of breaking their vows. Fabia would have been buried alive if her accusers had succeeded in convincing the court that she conducted an improper liaison with Catilina. Buried alive! It still pains my heart, just to think of it. My darling half-sister was so young back then. So beautiful. There were those who actually believed she might have committed such a foul crime, but you saved her life. Cicero called on you to investigate the matter, and you proved that Fabia was innocent.’

  This was not quite how I remembered the affair. At the time, it had seemed to me that Catilina – a dissolute and charming upstart not unlike Terentia’s son-in-law Dolabella – might or might not have managed to seduce the tremulous young virgin Fabia within the very confines of the House of the Vestals. But that was twenty-five years ago, and a great deal had happened since; and if Terentia remembered one reality while I remembered another, only the gods – or Fabia herself – could have said which of us remembered the truth.

  Terentia gave me a long, appraising look, then seemed to come to some decision. She clapped her hands. A slave came running. Terentia gave the girl a whispered instruction, and the slave ran off. A few moments later I heard the rustling sound made by the folds of a voluminous stola, and a moment later Fabia herself appeared in the doorway.

  She was magnificently attired in the full costume of a Vestal. Her hair, shot through with grey now, was cut quite short. Around her forehead she wore a broad white band, like a diadem, decorated with ribbons. Her stola was white and plain, but cut to hang from her body with many folds. About her shoulders she wore the white linen mantle of a Vestal.

  ‘Sister, I think you may recall Gordianus,’ said Terentia.

  Fabia had grown older, but she was a striking woman. What had changed most was her manner. I had met her at a time of crisis, when she was young and confused and in terrible danger – and quite possibly guilty of the unspeakable crime of which she had been accused. She had survived that episode, and the travail had made her stronger. Presumably she had maintained her vow of chastity, whether she had briefly interrupted it with Catilina or not; and that sort of discipline, year in and year out, and the state of childlessness it ensured, was said to give a woman a special kind of strength. Fabia certainly looked imposing enough, standing there in the doorway, taking stock of her sister’s two visitors. Her eyes swept over Davus with hardly a pause and settled on me. In her steady gaze I saw little to remind me of the frail girl I had once assisted at Cicero’s behest.

  ‘I remember you, Gordianus,’ she said, without emotion.

  ‘Gordianus is here to ask questions about Cassandra,’ said Terentia.

  ‘Why?’ said Fabia.

  ‘I believe she was murdered,’ I said.

  Fabia drew in a breath. ‘We thought – because her mind was frail – that perhaps her body was frail as well. We thought perhaps she died of some . . . natural cause.’

  ‘She was poisoned,’ I said, trying to make my face as rigid as Fabia’s to hide the pain the words caused me.

  ‘Poisoned,’ whispered Fabia. ‘I see. But why have you come here? What do you want from me?’

  ‘You were one of the first women in Rome to befriend her,’ I said.

  ‘Befriend? Not exactly. I saw a woman in distress. When I approached her, when I heard the nature of her ranting, I sensed the truth – that she was a woman possessed of the gift of prophecy. I took her into the Temple of Vesta, where the goddess could keep her safe while the gift possessed her. I acted as a priestess, not a friend. I acted out of piety, not pity.’

  ‘Who was she? Where did she come from?’

  ‘Of her earthly origins, I know nothing. She herself had forgotten.’

  ‘But how could you tell that she possessed this gift you speak of? How could you tell that she wasn’t simply mad?’

  Fabia smiled faintly. ‘You may be wise in the ways of the world, Gordianus, especially in the ways of men. But this was a divine matter – and a matter for women.’

  ‘Are you saying that men have no access to divine knowledge? The augurs—’

  ‘Yes, the College of Augurs is made up o
f men, and for centuries they’ve passed down their own methods for reading omens – studying the flights of birds, listening to thunder, watching the play of lightning across the heavens. The sky is Jupiter’s realm, and such signs come directly from the King of Gods himself. And the men elected to the College of Fifteen likewise look for signs of the future by consulting the oracles in the ancient Sibylline Books. But there are other, more subtle ways in which the gods make their will known to us, and by which they show us the paths to the future. Many of those methods fall outside the ken of men. Only women know. Only women understand.’

  ‘And it was your understanding that Cassandra possessed a true gift of prophecy?’

  ‘When she was possessed, she saw beyond this world.’

  ‘The Trojan Cassandra heard messages from the other world.’

  ‘Our Cassandra’s gift came to her mostly in the form of visions. What she saw, she didn’t always understand and couldn’t always put into words. She herself made no interpretation of her visions; she only related them as they occurred. Often she had no recollection of them afterwards.’

  ‘I should think such a gift would be rather unreliable, producing more riddles than answers.’

  ‘Her visions required interpretation, if that’s what you mean. Not a suitable job for your College of Augurs! But if a person listened to her closely, and if that person already possessed a genuine sympathy for the divine world—’

  ‘A person like yourself,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, I was able to make sense of Cassandra’s visions. That was why I arranged for her to come here, to Terentia’s house, on more than one occasion.’

  ‘And did she always prophesy?’

  ‘Almost always. There was a method that helped to induce her visions.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘If she sat in a still, dark room and gazed at a flame, almost always the visions would come to her.’

  ‘And before or after, you would give her food and drink?’

  ‘Of course we would,’ said Terentia. ‘She was treated as kindly in my house as any other guest.’

  ‘Even though you had no idea of who she really was or where she came from?’

  ‘It was her gift that interested us,’ said Fabia, ‘not her family history or the name she was born with.’

  ‘And when Cassandra delivered these prophecies, what did you make of them?’

  The two sisters exchanged a searching look, silently debating how much they should tell me.

  Fabia finally spoke. ‘Cassandra had many visions, but there was one in particular – a recurring vision of two lions battling one another over the carcass of a she-wolf.’

  ‘How did you interpret this vision?’

  ‘The she-wolf was Rome, of course. The lions were Pompey and Caesar.’

  ‘And which of them killed the other and ate the carcass?’

  ‘Neither.’

  ‘I don’t understand. Did they split the she-wolf between them?’ I imagined the Roman world split permanently between two factions, Caesar ruling the West, Pompey ruling the East. ‘One world split between two Roman empires – could such an arrangement ever last?’

  ‘No, no, no!’ said Terentia. ‘You misunderstand. Tell him, Fabia!’

  ‘The vision ended with a miracle,’ said Fabia. ‘The she-wolf sprang back to life, and grew until she towered over the lions, who gave up fighting and meekly lay down together, licking at each other’s wounds.’

  ‘What did the vision mean?’

  Fabia began to speak, but Terentia was too excited to remain silent. ‘Don’t you see? It’s the best possible outcome! Everyone assumes that Caesar and Pompey must come to blows, that one of them must destroy the other, with Rome as the prize. But there’s another possibility – that both sides will come to their senses before it’s too late. It’s one thing for Romans to shed the blood of Gauls or Parthians, but for Romans to kill Romans – it’s unthinkable. Such madness offends the gods themselves. Cicero knows that. It’s what he’s been trying to tell both sides all along. They must find a way to settle their differences and make peace! That’s what Cassandra’s vision foretold. For the moment Rome appears paralysed and helpless; but the she-wolf only sleeps, and when she wakes she’ll show herself greater than either Caesar or Pompey. They shall be awed by her shadow, and there shall be a reconciliation between the two factions.’ Terentia smiled. ‘It’s my belief that Cicero himself will broker the reconciliation. It’s the real reason the gods guided his footsteps to Pompey’s camp. Not to fight – we all know my husband is no warrior – but to be on hand when the two sides finally do meet, and to make them see the madness of their ways. There shall be peace, not war. Every day I look for a messenger to arrive with a letter from my husband bringing the glorious news.’

  Fabia walked to her side and laid her hand on Terentia’s shoulder. The look on both their faces was transcendent.

  I took a deep breath. ‘How did you learn of Cassandra’s death?’

  ‘She died in the marketplace, didn’t she?’ said Fabia. ‘People saw. People recognized her. News travels fast in the city.’

  ‘Yet neither of you came to my house to pay your respects.’

  They both averted their eyes. ‘Well,’ said Terentia, ‘she was hardly of our . . . I mean, as you yourself pointed out, we didn’t even know her true name, much less her family.’

  ‘Yet you came to see her burn.’

  ‘An act of piety,’ said Fabia. ‘The burning of the body is a holy rite. We came to witness that.’

  I lowered my eyes, then looked up at the sound of another voice from the doorway.

  ‘Aunt Fabia! I was wondering where you’d gone. Oh – I didn’t realize you had company, Mother.’

  Cicero’s daughter, Tullia, had suffered the misfortune of inheriting her father’s looks rather than her mother’s, and had grown from a spindly girl into a rather plain young woman. The last time I had seen her had been at her parents’ house down in Formiae the previous year, while Cicero was still trying to decide which way to jump. She had been pregnant then and just beginning to show. The child had been born prematurely and had lived only a short while. A year later Tullia appeared to be in good health, despite her slender arms and wan complexion.

  Unlike her mother, Tullia wore several pieces of costly-looking jewellery, including gold bracelets and a silver filigree necklace decorated with lapis baubles. Despite the drastic economies the war had imposed on the household, I suspected that young Tullia would be the last member of the family called upon to make personal sacrifices. Cicero and Terentia had spoiled both their children, but Tullia especially.

  ‘Actually,’ said Terentia, ‘my visitors were just leaving. Why don’t you escort your aunt back to the sewing room, Tullia, while I show them out?’

  ‘Certainly, Mother.’ Tullia took her aunt’s hand and led her from the room. Over her shoulder Fabia gave me a long, parting glance in lieu of a farewell. Tullia’s parting glance was at Davus, who reacted by shuffling his feet and clearing his throat.

  I began to move towards the door, but Terentia restrained me with a hand on my forearm.

  ‘Send your son-in-law on to the foyer,’ she said in a low voice, ‘but stay here a moment longer, Gordianus. There’s something I want to show you, in private.’

  I did as she asked and waited alone in the room, gazing at the pastoral landscapes on the wall. A moment later she returned, carrying a scrap of parchment. She pressed it into my hand.

  ‘Read that,’ she said. ‘Tell me what you make of it.’

  It was a letter from Cicero, dated from the month of Junius and headed From Pompey’s Camp in Epirus:

  If you are well, I am glad. I am well. Do your best to recover. As far as time and circumstances permit, provide for and conduct all necessary business, and as often as possible write to me on all points. Good-bye.

  I turned the scrap of parchment over, but that was all there was to it.

  I shrugged, not knowing what sh
e wanted from me. ‘He advises you to recover. I take it you were unwell?’

  ‘A trifle – a fever that came and went,’ she said. ‘You’ll notice he doesn’t even wish me a speedy recovery or the favour of the gods or any such thing. Merely, “Do your best to recover.” As if reminding me of a duty!’

  ‘And he charges you with conducting necessary business—’

  ‘Ha! He expects me to run a household – two households, my own and Tullia’s – on a budget of thin air! Just to make ends meet, I’m selling off the best furniture and the finest pieces of jewellery handed down from my mother—’

  ‘I don’t understand why you showed me this letter, Terentia.’

  ‘Because you know my husband, Gordianus. You’ve known him from the bottom up. You have no illusions about him. I’m not sure you like him I’m not even sure if you respect him – but you know him. Do you detect in that letter one shred of love or affection or even goodwill?’

  Perhaps it’s written in code, I wanted to say, knowing from experience that Cicero was prone to such tricks in his correspondence. But Terentia was in no mood for jokes. If she had mustered the courage to bare her soul to me of all people, I knew she must be in genuine distress. ‘I hardly think it’s for me to say what Cicero felt when he wrote this letter.’

  She took the letter from me and turned away, hiding her face. ‘The tensions in this household – you can’t imagine! For months on end; for years, really. Fighting over what’s to be done with young Marcus – his father insists he’s to be a scholar, in spite of the fact that all his tutors say he’s hopeless. And now the boy’s off to fight, though he’s barely old enough to wear a toga. And Dolabella, choosing to side with Caesar and carrying on with Antonia behind our backs – my husband could hardly stand the mention of his name even before this trouble began. How he hated the marriage! And when Tullia lost the baby, the pain we all felt was unbearable. But I could tolerate anything, stand any trial, if only I knew that Marcus still—’ Her voice caught in her throat, and she shook her head. ‘The hard fact of the matter is, Marcus no longer loves me. He didn’t love me when we married – no woman expects that at the outset of an arranged marriage – but he came to love me, and that love grew and lasted for years. But now . . . now I don’t know what’s become of it. I don’t know where it went or how to get it back. Too much squabbling over money, too many fights about the children, the bitterness of the times we live in . . .’