Sejanus

35

I poured us some more wine while we waited. It was excellent stuff, Caecuban, from the same cellar as Livia's, but well watered: Tiberius might've been able to hold his own in the Rhine messes thirty years back, but he obviously had to go carefully now.

'You like the view?' he said. He might have been a dinner-party host showing his guest the property, instead of the most powerful man in the world interviewing a condemned traitor.

'Yeah,' I said. I hadn't really been looking after it had first registered. Now I did. The gods must have a view like that, from the top of Olympus. 'It's fantastic.'

'I had this loggia built specially. We're a thousand feet above the sea, and on a good day I can see almost to Naples. Birds fly level with the windows. I could reach out and touch them.' His lips twisted. 'Even wring their necks. Up here it's easy to think I'll live forever, but of course I won't. In another six years I'll be dead. Or five years, eight months and sixteen days, rather.' I looked at him, but he wasn't joking. The hairs stirred on the back of my neck. 'Don't spread that around, by the way. It's a secret.'

'Uh, yeah,' I said. 'I mean no, I won't. I promise.'

He wasn't listening. He was still staring out over the sea. I didn't dare speak.

'I won't regret giving Capri my death,' he said at last. 'She's done me proud. You know the story of why Augustus bought her?'

I shook my head.

'He was visiting the town when a dying oak tree in the market-place budded. The superstitious old beggar took it for an omen and exchanged the island with the Neapolitans for Ischia. They had much the better bargain, but they had the sense to keep their mouths shut.' Tiberius chuckled. 'Well, perhaps I shouldn't mock. Perhaps Augustus was right, superstition or not. He certainly lived far past his time. And in this air even the goats reach a ripe old age. If I'm to beat him — as I will — then I need all the help I can get. Perhaps even the Divine Augustus's.'

'What about Rome, sir?' Gods! This had to be the wine talking. Watered or not, Caecuban and raw nerves were a dangerous mixture.

Tiberius fixed me with an eye as cold and bleak as a boiled sturgeon's.

'What about Rome?' he said. 'I'll never see her again, nor do I have any desire to. Rome's a stinking sewer populated by sewer-rats. Or do you think I owe her any more blood and sweat than she's had from me already these sixty years past?' He paused. Then, when I didn't speak: 'Go on, man! I don't ask rhetorical questions and I expect straight answers. What about Rome?'

'There've been…uh…rumours.' Oh, Jupiter! 'About the way you spend your time here. Sir.'

'Oh, yes. The rumours.' The yellow teeth flashed in a snarl. 'That I indulge my depraved tastes with a constant round of perversions. That I live on aphrodisiacs and bugger painted children in the open air.' I said nothing: I hadn't known that he knew. 'Fools can believe what they like. I've never cared about their opinion. And so long as my writ runs and I hold the empire here' — he held out a clenched fist — 'I'll take Capri and slander over Rome and the petty squabbles of her fawning lickspittle senate any day. In the end I'll be judged on my actions and not on wineshop rumours. And if I'm not then the future can go and fuck itself. Clear?'

'Clear, sir,' I said. I was still sweating.

'Good.' He raised his wine cup. 'Now. There must be more in that jug still, even though it is mostly water. We'll drink damnation to slanderers, timeservers and hypocrites. Well-intentioned meddlers, too.'

I poured. There was a knock on the door and an elderly man with a beard came in. He glanced at me, then away.

'You wanted to see me, lord,' he said. His Greek was quiet and sibilant.

'Valerius Corvinus.' Tiberius sipped his wine. 'Thrasyllus of Alexandria. The wisest man in the world.'

'Hardly that, lord.' Thrasyllus smiled and nodded to me.

'Rubbish. If you aren't then who is? You were right, my friend, and I apologise.'

'Right about what?' They were still speaking Greek.

'About Gaius.'

'Ah.' Thrasyllus sat down in a chair with his back to the Bay of Naples. 'Of course I was. I had to be. But apologies are unnecessary, especially from emperors.'

'I didn't bring you here just to apologise.' Tiberius motioned towards me with his wine cup. 'Go on. Tell him.'

Thrasyllus shot him a quick glance, then stroked his beard.

'Everything?' he said.

'Don't be a fool! No, not everything. Just the bare facts.'

The old Greek hesitated. 'If you think it's wise, lord,' he said, 'then certainly, but…'

'Do what you're bloody well told!' Tiberius snapped. 'I take full responsibility. Corvinus here has to know what he's asking of me.'

'Very well.' Thrasyllus turned to me. 'Gaius will be the next emperor. Within the next six years. Not for long, fortunately. Four years after his accession the lord's nephew Cl-'

'Stop!' Tiberius held up a hand. 'That's enough. Well, Corvinus?'

I was staring at the two old men in shock.

'How do you know?' I whispered. 'Jupiter, how can you know?'

'Thrasyllus told me years ago. Before Drusus died, in fact.' Tiberius was watching me closely. 'He had it from his charts. I didn't believe him then, and later I didn't want to. Especially when he told me what kind of emperor my grandson would be, and how he would die. If allowing Sejanus to have his way would spare the empire that' — he spat the word — 'then I was ready to give him his chance. He could be no worse, and the end would've justified the means. However…unpleasant these might appear at the time.'

'Lord, you cannot cheat the stars,' Thrasyllus said softly. 'Sejanus has to fall. Has fallen already, in heaven's eyes.'

'I realise that.' Tiberius was still watching me. 'You think I don't? But I would still try, even now. Corvinus, if I'd known what you were going to tell me I would have ordered Macro to throw you over the cliff unheard. I still would, if I thought that killing you would do me or the empire the barest scrap of good.'

I was shivering, and the hairs stood stiff on my neck.

'Lord, you cannot cheat the stars,' Thrasyllus repeated. 'Not even you can do that.'

'No.' Tiberius's eyes hadn't left my face, 'So now, my friend, you know just what you're asking of me. I'm going to do exactly what you want me to do; I'm going to destroy Sejanus, root and branch, and the responsibility for what follows will belong to you and to the people who sent you. I won't see the result personally, of course, and nor will Thrasyllus, but I wish you and Rome joy of it.'

The soft tap on the door sounded as loud as a hand-clap. I jumped.

'Come in,' Tiberius said calmly. It was the German slave who'd been with the emperor when I arrived. 'Ah, Sigmund. You talked to Macro.'

'Yes, sire.' The German drew himself up. 'The attacker was a slave of Vescularius Flaccus.'

'Good. Thank you. Tell Macro to make sure Flaccus is confined to his rooms until further notice, with no visitors permitted. Then go and ask my grandson Gaius Caesar if he will favour us with an interview.' He turned back to me. 'Flaccus, by the way, is one of my oldest and closest friends. I love him dearly. If it interests you we are now at the start of a witch-hunt, here and at Rome. Several years ago I let Sejanus root out the Julian sympathisers, because there can be only one power in the state. Now I am going to smooth Gaius's path for the same reason by destroying Sejanus's party, completely and utterly. Flaccus is the first. I will be asking both you and my heir presumptive to supply other names. Be thorough. I expect a full list, and if you're in any doubt then include.' I said nothing; I couldn't have spoken. 'You needn't be present at the family gathering; your contribution is already made, and the rest is private business. Needless to say, however, I am grateful and I will give instructions for you to be properly accommodated.' His upper lip lifted. 'Not here, naturally, that wouldn't be wise. In one of the empty villas along the coast. In fact…' He paused. 'You're married, aren't you? To the Rufia girl, if I remember rightly?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Then give Sigmund her address. Only Sigmund, no one else.' It was an order. I swallowed. 'You'll be staying on Capri as my guest until this business is settled and she may as well join you.'

'For how long, sir?' I asked.

'Thrasyllus?'

'The calculations are already done, lord.'

'Really?' Tiberius smiled thinly. 'You surprise me. The date?'

'October the eighteenth is the most propitious.'

'Two and a half months away.' Tiberius turned back to me. 'Plenty of time for a holiday. And you'll miss the summer heat of Rome, Corvinus. You really are a very lucky young man. Now go, please. Quickly, before I change my mind and have you killed.'

I went.