by Ian Ross
Passing through the entrance hall, they led him between the hulking flanks of barrack buildings, the quarters of the Scholae, and down long colonnaded walks. To either side spread ornamental gardens, courtyards, statues and monuments. The morning clamour of the city faded, and the only sounds were footsteps on marble and mosaic, and the plash of the water fountains.
Finally, at the far side of a shaded courtyard, the two guards led Castus into the vestibule of what he took to be the main audience chamber. An official met him there, an admissionalis with a jewelled brooch the size of a dinner plate securing his cape. The air smelled strongly of incense, and the hush had an added heaviness, as if the walls were padded with velvet.
‘Excellency,’ the official said, inclining his head. ‘The Most Sacred Augustus will receive you in half an hour, during the First Audience. After that you will be granted a private interview with His Clemency. You recall the protocols of approach to the Sacred Presence?’
‘Of course,’ Castus said in a gruff mumble. He recalled all too well the turgid formality of the imperial court. He recalled too the last time he had been ushered into the presence of the emperor: that terrible day in Rome, when he presented Constantine with the news of his son’s death, and narrowly avoided the same fate himself. Surely it was madness to have returned, even on imperial orders?
As he waited, he looked around him at the others in the vestibule: many peered back at him in frank curiosity, but his scarred and weathered features, and his expression of glowering distaste, caused them to avert their eyes quickly. Castus felt his mood of unease shifting to angry black resentment. Marcellina had been right; he should never have come here.
A boom from the inner chamber as the doors swung back, and the sonorous voice of the herald echoed from the high ceiling. Castus joined the other men as they filed through the doors and into the vast audience chamber. The purple drapes still hid the dais and the throne in the apse at the far end. In silence they assembled, and waited once more, as the incense wafted around them.
Then a word of command, the drapes rose, and there was the emperor seated upon the high throne, flanked by guards. At once the whole assembly dropped to kneel on the marble floor. The words of the imperial acclamation rang out; Castus just mumbled them in the back of his throat.
For what seemed a very long time, he stood in a daze of anticipation and discomfort. At last he heard his name and titles called, and strode forward. Eight long paces, and he saluted and dropped to kneel once more. There was no word from the throne. He got up again, one hand flat on the floor to help him rise. As he did so, he risked a glance upwards, and his breath caught. Constantine sat rigidly, his face a whitened mask beneath the heavy jewelled diadem, but the paint could not hide the hollowed cheeks and sunken eyes. He could have been an embalmed corpse.
Returning to his place at the rear of the hall, Castus waited through several lengthy droning speeches, most of them panegyrics of praise for the emperor’s justice and generosity, and pleas for assistance from the representatives of various provinces and cities. His mind fogged; the incense in the air made him want to sneeze. Then, at last, it was done. The emperor stood upright, raised his right hand in benediction, two fingers extended, then turned to leave. As he did so, Castus caught the glance that Constantine sent in his direction. The very slightest nod. As the renewed chants of praise rang from the assembly, the drapes fell once more.
‘This way, if you please,’ a sibilant voice said. Castus turned – the figure at his elbow was a eunuch. ‘The emperor will see you now.’
Letting the rest of the crowd drain from the hall behind him, Castus followed the eunuch through a side door and down a narrow passage. A pair of Protectores made a perfunctory effort at checking him for concealed weapons. Then one of them pulled aside a damask curtain and opened the door beyond.
The emperor of the Roman world was sitting at the far end of the small chamber, in a whitewashed apse with windows that looked out over the Bosphorus. Eunuchs fussed around him, wiping the caked cosmetics from his face with dampened cloths. Constantine waved them away as Castus entered, then took a gold cup from the table beside him and drank deeply.
‘That’s all I do these days, you know,’ he said. ‘Sit in that hall and listen to strangers telling me how wonderful I am. It’s exhausting. After a while I start to wonder whether I might not be so wonderful after all. Then again,’ he said, fixing Castus with a narrowed gaze, ‘I’m sure that you, for one, would agree with that assessment.’
Castus clamped his jaw and said nothing. From this distance, and in clear daylight, he could once again recognise the emperor he had known for so many years. But the marks of age were plain to see: the slackened flesh webbed with wrinkles, the drawn tension around the jaw. Constantine had removed his golden cape and heavy jewelled headgear, but he still appeared to be wearing a wig, dyed in dark russet and threaded with gold.
Another sip from his wine cup, then the emperor inhaled sharply and stood up, peering at Castus with his jaw jutting. ‘How long’s it been?’ he said.
‘Ten years, majesty.’
‘Feels like it, eh? It shows, too. You look like an old man! Can you still swing a sword?’
‘I’ve never had any difficulties with that.’
‘Hmm,’ Constantine said through his nose. Clasping his hands at the small of his back he stalked around the room. Castus remained standing as the emperor circled him.
‘I remember the last time I saw you,’ Constantine said. ‘You do as well, I’m sure. We’ve had our disagreements, you might say.’
Disagreements, Castus thought. A fine way of putting it. After their last meeting, the emperor had ordered him imprisoned on a charge of treason – a charge Castus had narrowly avoided. He had hated Constantine then, and had never been able to excuse him for condemning Crispus and Fausta and then covering up his crimes.
‘Such things are in the past,’ Constantine said quietly, as if he had read Castus’s thoughts. ‘The river of time washes away everything in the end, does it not? I trust that sufficient years have passed for any dishonour to be forgotten. Yours… or mine.’
Castus felt his neck stiffen. It was as close to an admission of guilt as the emperor was ever likely to give him. But the dead stay dead. Nothing could be forgotten, nothing forgiven, and they both knew it.
‘I’ve travelled a long way to get here, majesty,’ he said. ‘What do you want of me?’
Constantine returned to face him, standing barely an arm’s length away. The emperor was wearing perfume, but Castus could smell the reek of old wine-sweat rising through it. ‘Very well,’ Constantine said with a brief smile. ‘I need an experienced military commander. Somebody who understands soldiers, and soldiering. I believe you may retain a sufficient sense of duty to consider my proposal.’
A proposal then, not an order. Castus gazed back at the emperor, into his harried eyes, and realised that Constantine was nervous. Was he worried that Castus would refuse? He could do that, yes… but how easy it would it be to turn down the master of the world?
‘Sit, why don’t you?’ Constantine said. He clicked his fingers, and one of the eunuchs lingering at the margins of the room hurried to bring a folding stool and set it beside the table in the apse. The emperor returned to his chair, and Castus sat opposite, fists braced on his knees.
‘What do you know of the situation on our eastern frontier?’ Constantine asked, swirling the wine in his cup.
‘I’ve been avoiding current affairs, majesty.’
Constantine pursed his lips. ‘The Persians, you know, have long been testing our resolve. Their young king thinks himself my equal, and longs to reverse the terms of the treaty his grandfather agreed with Galerius. He goads me… Already he’s arranged a revolution in Armenia, the overthrow of our allies there. This impious whelp has dared to persecute Christians in his domains, when he knows that all followers of Christ are under my protection!’
He banged the cup back down on the table, his e
yes blazing and the colour rising to his cheeks. Castus remembered the emperor’s fits of anger well.
‘As you know, I have always been a lover of peace,’ Constantine said, calming himself. Castus suppressed the urge to smile. No living man, surely, had been less pacific. ‘But some things cannot be endured. I have decided, with a heavy heart, that these provocations cannot be allowed to stand. The glory of the Roman name, and the glory of God, demand action. In the early summer of next year, therefore, I intend to lead a full-scale military campaign against the Persians, to humble their ambitions and liberate the believers from their oppressions.’
‘You intend to lead it yourself?’ Castus asked quietly.
‘Of course! We may be old, you and I, but we are not decrepit!’
Castus shrugged. The emperor was three years older than him, but he could make no argument.
‘As you may know, my son rules in Antioch, as Caesar of the East. My second son, Constantius.’
Your third, Castus thought.
‘He is a fine boy, and has passed the age of manhood, but he has little experience in command, and little knowledge of the complexities of military affairs, or of discipline.’
Constantine paused, glancing at Castus. ‘Your own son is there too, I think,’ he said. ‘Sabinus? He serves with the Protectores Domestici, does he not? My officers speak well of him.’
Castus felt a jolt in his blood. He had not known that Sabinus was in Antioch; his last letter had come from Egypt. The chance to see him again, perhaps even to serve beside him, was a potent lure.
‘But our eastern army is not in the best condition, and has not been for many years,’ Constantine went on. ‘As you know, the former emperor Licinius withdrew the best troops from the eastern frontier for his battles against us at Adrianople and Chrysopolis. Few of those men returned. In recent years I’ve been obliged to stiffen the Syrian field army with detachments drawn from the Danubian legions. But much remains to be done, to prepare for war.’
A training and administrative job then, Castus thought. Hardly a glorious task. ‘What position would I hold?’ he asked.
Constantine sat upright, squaring his shoulders. ‘I propose,’ he said, ‘to promote you to the rank of Magister Equitum per Orientem.’
Master of Cavalry in the East: not a title that Castus had heard before. The emperor was quick to notice his uncertainty.
‘It’s a traditional post, one of many I’ve lately revived. You would not command merely the cavalry, but the entirety of our military forces in the eastern provinces. Your only superiors would be the Caesar and the Praetorian Prefect of the East, his eminence Flavius Ablabius. Your task would be to inspect the state of the troops and their officers and prepare them for the coming campaign, and you would have full authority to make any improvements you decree.’
Castus peered out of the window, considering. ‘What about after that?’
‘I intend to travel to Antioch in mid May of next year,’ the emperor said, ‘and take command of the army, with my son Constantius as deputy. At that time you could either choose to lay down your own command, with full honours, or continue to serve in an advisory capacity. Either way, you would be promoted to the Senate of this city, with proconsular rank. I would grant you permission to remain on your estates if you so chose, although your family would of course be ennobled for posterity.’
Nodding slowly, Castus drew a long breath. For so many years he had believed the army was behind him. Only memories remained, whether bitter or sweet, to console him for all he had lost. The chance to relive those days, to know once more the life of the legions, the authority of high command – and with his son beside him too – was intoxicating. But it would be a hard job: caretaker for another man’s army, with all the gritty work of marshalling men and equipment, and none of the glory. Misgivings fought with temptation.
‘Why me?’ he said at last. ‘I’ve been out of the army for years, and you’ve got other senior commanders in your service still. What about Gratianus, or Polemius? What about Saturninus?’
Constantine sniffed, shrugging. ‘Gratianus proved unworthy of high office,’ he said sourly. ‘I appointed him commander of the forces in Africa, but he disgraced himself with corrupt practices. Polemius is a decent soldier, but he lacks initiative. And Saturninus was grievously injured in the recent Gothic war on the Danube. A lance wound to the, uh… to the groin. He still lives, though in great pain, and he is barely a man. No. You, Aurelius Castus, are the one I choose for this task.’
But there was more to it, Castus knew. The commanders he had mentioned had been friends of his at one time, but there were plenty of other officers, younger men, in the army. Already he could guess the truth. The emperor needed a man free from connections, somebody from outside the circles of power. Either that, he thought, or nobody else wanted the job.
‘You hesitate?’ Constantine said. ‘I don’t blame you.’ He sat forward in his chair, meshing his fingers beneath his jaw. ‘You can believe what you like about me,’ he said. ‘And about past events as well. I’m not asking you to do this for my sake, but for the sake of the empire we both serve. For the undying glory of Rome. This will be my last campaign. If I survive it, I intend to be baptised in the holy waters of the River Jordan, just as our saviour Christ was baptised. Then I shall await death in a state of purity. But I need a victory. And for that I need an army that can fight, and win. So I’m offering you a last command as well. A last chance for us both, eh, before we meet our end?’
He smiled suddenly, and in his eyes Castus caught a strange yearning. It was almost hideous to behold, but he realised that the emperor was alone, totally alone here at the heart of his power. Could it be, after so long, that Constantine considered him to be a friend?
With a dull shock of surprise, Castus found that he pitied this man.
‘And what if I refuse?’
The emperor tightened his lips, his expression darkening. Clearly he was not used to men speaking to him so frankly. Then he grinned. ‘You’ve already come all the way here,’ he said. ‘If you had any intention of refusing, you’d have stayed at home with your wife!’
III
‘Consider, then, free will,’ the voice said from within the curtained doorway. ‘Do we truly possess it, when our liberty is constrained by, ah… by external forces, by the threat of violence or the demands of law? In the union of soul and body we are capable of choosing both evil and good actions, but – ahem – as Plato says in the Timaeus, our spirits perceive the ideas implicit in true being…’
Castus leaned a little closer to the curtain, frowning. The language was Greek, but the accent was the Latin of the western provinces. Yes, he thought, he knew that voice: this was surely the place he sought.
Three hours had passed since he had landed at the harbour of Rhodes, and he had spent all that time asking questions and following vague directions. The two marines who had escorted him from the liburnian galley Neptune doubtless wondered what their newly appointed strategos thought he was doing. They stood idly in the shade of the market portico, hardly bothering to conceal their disinterest. One of them was shaking a pair of knucklebone dice in his palm.
‘Wait here,’ Castus told them, and pushed aside the curtain.
The room beyond was dim and dusty, and still resembled the storage chamber it must once have been. Rows of benches were drawn up facing the far wall, most of them empty. Four youths, sullen-looking boys in their teens, sat slumped on the remaining benches, a couple scratching idly at the tablets in their laps, the rest staring into space with an attitude of truculent boredom. Castus stood in the doorway and said nothing. Flies whirled in the sour air.
‘So, what we call freedom,’ the voice went on, ‘is merely the power of obeying our true nature, and from that obedience all good actions must proceed…’
The man at the far end of the room was wiry and grey, a threadbare philosopher’s cloak flung across his shoulders. His beard was ragged and his hair had receded to a w
ild fuzz around his bald scalp. He spoke with a halting, distracted air, his free hand rising and falling, his gaze darting about the margins of the room. For several long heartbeats he did not notice Castus at all.
‘And so, just as the soul has exchanged the peace of eternity for the fast-flowing river of time, we can – ahem – choose to direct and discipline our intellect towards a union with the Absolute. As Lucian says of Demonax, the free man is he who lives without hope and without fear, and only the free man can be truly happy…’
Castus shook his head, smiling. He had first encountered Musius Diogenes over thirty years before, in the legion fortress at Eboracum. The former schoolteacher had been a conscript to the Sixth Legion; he had never been the most eager of soldiers, but he was stubborn and courageous, and had a sharp mind. Castus had employed him for many years, first as his secretary and then as the head of his military staff. Diogenes had taken his discharge at the first opportunity, intending to set up a school of philosophy, and since then Castus had received only a few brief messages from him, sent from Nicomedia, Tarsus and Ephesus. The last one had come from Rhodes, but that had been over a year ago. Yet here he was.
‘Our master, Plotinus,’ Diogenes said, clearing his throat once again, ‘expands on this last point in the ninth book of the fifth Ennead…’ He paused as he noticed Castus standing at the back of the room. Awakened from their torpor, his students turned on their benches and peered, startled. Castus was plainly dressed, but his broad military belt and brooch, the gold torque at his neck and the silver eagle-hilted spatha at his side proclaimed his status.
‘But that, I think, can wait for another day,’ Diogenes said quietly. ‘Away you go now, and tomorrow be sure to tell the absentees that they must attend!’