Sejanus

38

I was lucky: the house in Poplicolan Street had been sequestrated when I'd been charged with treason, but it hadn't been sold or even had the contents auctioned, and with the Wart's formal pardon tucked into my mantle-fold I could move in straight away. Bathyllus and Meton, too. Maybe it would've been easier to have stayed in the Suburan flat for a few days, but I couldn't do that to the poor guy. He'd suffered enough, and he was pining for his set of matching skillets.

I spent the time catching up. Lippillus was back at work, and now his hair had grown to cover the scars he was ugly as ever. We split a jar of my best Falernian while I filled him in on what he'd missed, and I even got a smile from Marcina. Agron's wife had had a baby girl while I was on Capri, and the big guy was over the moon. When Perilla got back on the twenty-third we went down to Ostia together and the kid was sick all over her best mantle. She didn't seem to mind. Yeah, well. At least Agron had the sense this time to keep his mouth shut. His wife had probably had a word with him before we arrived.

Otherwise I didn't go out much. They were pulling down Sejanus's statues and hacking his name off monuments all over Rome, and that I didn't want to see if I could avoid it. The bastard was dead and burned; killing him again in effigy just seemed pointless and spiteful. I thought a lot about Livia, too. Sure, she'd've been pleased we'd won in the end, but I wondered if she'd known about Gaius. Probably, almost certainly; but then the old girl was no Tiberius, she was more of an Agrippina. Livia was a cold bitch, but she also had the capacity for personal hate, whether she recognised it in herself or not. And what better way to destroy the reputation of the Julians forever than to make their last representative emperor and have him do it for her?

I didn't want to think about Gaius. I didn't want to think about him at all, or about what the future held. I certainly didn't want to see him again. Maybe Thrasyllus was wrong, but the cold finger at the base of my skull told me otherwise. Six years from now Rome wasn't going to be a pleasant place to live.

We were just finishing lunch, Perilla and I, when Bathyllus came into the dining room to say we had a visitor.

It was Lamia. I was surprised he was still alive, let alone mobile. The guy was a walking skeleton, and his hand when I shook it felt like a thin gloveful of bones. He had the look of his namesake, the witch who sucks children's blood in the stories.

'My congratulations, Corvinus,' he whispered: his voice was almost gone, now, too. 'Arruntius's also, although he's out of Rome at present. I'm sorry, I should have come before. Perilla, my dear. Delighted to see you again.'

I had Bathyllus manoeuvre him onto a couch and help him lie. Beside the dining table he looked like a full-sized version of these silver reminders of death that cheerier guests sometimes dangle at parties.

'Some wine for the governor, Bathyllus,' I said.

'No. No wine. The doctor forbids it. And soon no longer governor, either, even in absentia.' Lamia bared his teeth in a rictus grin. 'The emperor is doing me the honour of appointing me City Prefect. Although I doubt if I'll live to take up office.'

I didn't say anything, nor did Perilla. Even polite noises would've been out of place.

'Well. To the purpose of my visit.' Lamia coughed: the sound was hollow. 'Besides conveying the congratulations and thanks of my colleagues, naturally. I came to tell you the news, if you haven't heard it already.'

'What news?'

'Livilla is dead. Suicide.' He made a vague gesture with his hand. 'At least the official version is suicide. She poisoned herself, I understand, leaving a note for the emperor. An apology and — so it is said — a confession of some kind?' The question was in his voice and his eyes.

There was no reason not to tell him. He'd know soon enough, anyway.

'She and Sejanus murdered Tiberius's son,' I said.

'Ah.' He nodded. 'Yes, that would explain things.' He didn't sound too surprised, but then maybe nothing did surprise a man who was dying slowly himself. 'How was it done?'

I gave him the details, as far as I knew them. No doubt the Wart had already got Drusus's doctor Eudemus. And Lygdus; but I tried not to think about that.

'Then we've made a clean sweep.' He grinned again. 'Cleared the nest out. And the credit, my boy, is entirely yours.'

I shifted on my couch. 'A clean sweep?'

'You didn't know that either? About Sejanus's children?'

I felt Perilla stiffen. Oh, Jupiter! Jupiter, no! 'What about the children?' I said. There were three of them, two boys and a girl.

'They were executed,' Lamia said. 'Two days ago, by order of the senate. The mother committed suicide.' He paused. 'A genuine suicide. We had no quarrel with her, and she and Sejanus had been divorced for years, of course; but she seemed to find it necessary.'

My brain had gone numb. I said, and heard my voice saying from very far away: 'The daughter couldn't've been more than twelve. A virgin. The law doesn't allow the execution of a virgin who's also a minor. Your bloody senate knows that.'

Lamia had the grace to drop his eyes. 'The law was not broken, Valerius Corvinus. The executioner…remedied matters before he strangled her.'

Perilla gasped. I looked at her. Her whitened knuckles were pressed hard against her teeth, and I could see blood between them.

Gods. Oh sweet, suffering gods. The bile rushed into my throat, and I forced it down.

'Get out,' I said softly. 'Get your stinking, fucking broad-striper carcass out of my house. Or I swear to you, Lamia, I'll kill you where you lie.'

He was staring at me, the eyes bright in his skull-like face. 'But we had to do it, my boy,' he said. 'We couldn't let them live. Not Sejanus's children.'

Bathyllus was standing frozen with the wine jug in his hand. I didn't dare speak, I only pointed. Bathyllus helped the old man off his couch and led him to the door. There, Lamia turned.

'It had to be done,' he said. 'For the good of Rome.'

When he'd gone I went over to Perilla's couch and lay down with her. We hugged each other for a long time, and I let her sob herself quiet against my shoulder while I stared into nothing.

The credit is entirely yours. We had to do it, for the good of Rome.

The good of Rome. Oh, Jupiter. The kid hadn't been Marilla's age, and she'd died for the good of Rome…

There was nothing I could do, not now. Tomorrow I'd get Bathyllus to check the sailings to Piraeus. It was nearly the end of the season, but there would be something. If necessary I'd get the Wart to lend me a fucking warship: he owed me that, at least, and he'd probably do it just to be rid of me. We could sell the house through an agent. Palatine properties sold easy, and I knew I'd never want to see Rome again. Not ever.

Marilla…

Her father would get the Rock, that was certain: even these days it was the statutory penalty for incest, unless the guy had clout, and Marius had no clout left with Sejanus gone. And now the god-rotting senate had found a new taste for blood they'd vote him it nem. con. Sure, she still had family in Spain, but after what she'd said about her uncle I'd fight that to the death. Further.

'Hey, lady,' I said gently. Perilla stirred. She'd stopped crying now, but her face was still pressed hard into my tunic. 'How does Valeria Marilla sound for a name?'

There was no answer. I hadn't expected one; not yet, not this early. We'd have to give it time. Maybe lots of time.

It wouldn't lay all the ghosts, sure; but then I doubted if anything ever would.