Altar of Blood

1

April AD

186

‘Now then, here’s a rarity, eh lads?’

The figure who had strutted out of the night’s deeper shadows spoke with the confidence of a man who knew that he had the upper hand in whatever it was that was about to happen. Lean and hard muscled, he grinned in apparent amusement, the dagger in his right hand glinting in the glow of a crescent moon and countless stars. Insulae rose around them in rough-faced rows, lights extinguished and shutters firmly closed to keep out the sounds and smells of the Roman night, a time when robbers roamed the streets and the population’s rubbish and faeces littered the cobbles. There would be no help forthcoming for any man foolish enough to find himself alone in such a place after dark.

‘A man with money who chooses to walk through this part of the city at this time of night needs to have his wits about him, or better still a gladiator or two. He needs to have hired big men, friends, ugly men with scars and blades. Men he can depend on to scare bad people like us away, and bring him home safe.’

The robber strolled towards the lone pedestrian standing in the road before him with the easy gait of a man taking his leisure, grinning wolfishly at the tunic-clad man he and the men behind him had interrupted in his progress through the fetid streets of Rome’s Subura district, stopping a few paces from the subject of his wry monologue. More men coalesced out of the night to either side of him, stepping forward to reveal their ragged clothes and hard faces.

‘And yet here you are, unarmed and all on your own, without so much as a well-built slave to steer you clear of trouble. It’s not clever, not with you so clearly being a man with a lot to lose. Look at those shoes lads, that’s proper workmanship. Worth a gold aureus to the right man, they are. And that tunic? What sort of man walks the streets of Rome after dark on his own in a tunic with a purple stripe on it? Your purse must be weighing you down like a bull’s ball bag. And you’ll have a house somewhere a good deal nicer than this shithole, probably with a pretty little wife waiting for you to get home and see to her needs …’

A more alert man would have seen the look that momentarily contorted his would-be victim’s face, but the robber was too busy enjoying the opportunity for sport in front of his fellow gang members.

‘She’ll be expecting you home, once you’re done with whatever it is you’ve been doing down here in the slums. So it’s going to be quite a shock for her when we come through the door, isn’t it?’

He smiled into his victim’s flat expression.

‘Of course, you’re thinking that you won’t tell us where your house is …’

He gestured with the dagger, raising it to allow the other man a clear view of the weapon.

‘… but you will. Once we get to work on you you’ll tell us everything, give us anything, just to stop.’

He tapped the blade.

‘I favour the soft spot between the balls and the arsehole, personally. Half an inch of sharp iron inserted just so reduces most men to screaming agony in less time than it takes for a snuffed candle to stop smoking. You’ll tell us where your home is, you’ll shout for the doorman to let you in … you’ll do whatever it takes to stop the pain.’

Leaning forward, he grinned at the man standing before him.

‘So, friend, shall we be going? We’ve got a nice dark place where we can all get better acquainted. Some of the boys here, well, they like men like you, all clean and soft, and they’ve not had the sort of fun that I’m thinking about for so long that I think they’ll be taking turns with you for half the night before we even get round to working out where you live.’

He waited for the inevitable reaction, for the lone aristocrat to make a break for freedom, knowing that more members of his band were waiting behind their victim, but his eyes widened slightly as the man stepped forward instead, close enough for the robber to see his face in the moonlight. The stranger’s expression was set hard enough to send a shiver up the gang leader’s spine, and when he spoke, his voice, though clearly cultured, grated out a single word with a chilling intensity that raised the hairs on his assailant’s arms with a sudden jolt of fear.

‘Yes!’

He struck, the move so fast that the footpad was nose to nose with his intended prey before he had time to react, finding his knife hand captured in an iron grip, while his assailant snatched a handful of hair and then snapped his head forward to deliver a head butt that took the life from the robber’s legs. While he was still staggering at the unexpected attack’s ferocity, his intended victim stripped the dagger from his unresisting grip and whipped the blade up into his throat, arteries and windpipe opened by a single wrenching thrust to release a sudden splatter of blood down both men’s tunics. His assailant pushed the dying man at the nearest of his gang and turned away to confront the men closing in on him from all sides, raising the knife in a hand already slick with his victim’s life blood. A heavyset thug rushed in with his arms spread to grapple the stranger, only to grasp at thin air as his intended victim danced sideways out of his reach, striking expertly to slit his tunic and the wall of his gut with the blade’s viciously sharp edge. Staggering away from the fight with both hands clasping at the slippery coils of his intestines, the wounded thug obstructed the men behind him as they recoiled away from the stench and horror, and their would-be victim spun away from him in search of fresh blood. Two robbers ran at him, while a third loomed from behind their leader where he lay convulsing on the street’s cobbles as his life ebbed away, advancing on the bloodied aristocrat with his fists bunched.

Hurling the dagger at the closer of the two runners to bury its blade deep in his chest, he turned without waiting to see the result, sidestepping the advancing pugilist’s first punch and gripping his tunic, throwing his attacker off balance and counter-punching into the hapless thug’s face, breaking his front teeth. While the man was staggering backwards, his assailant took another step forward, putting him down with a trip and following through with a half-fisted punch to his throat that left him straining fruitlessly for breath through a ruptured windpipe.

‘We’ve fucking got you now!’

He straightened his body to find himself ringed by half a dozen more of the gang, eyes hard with hate as they closed around him with shuffling feet, eyes darting glances at each other as they readied themselves to attack, momentarily deterred by the stranger’s blood-soaked rage and the bodies of their comrades littered around him.

‘We’re going to fuck you up, you cunt, and then we’re going to open your guts and leave you to die here while we go and have our fun with wherever it is that you call home.’

‘Tell me how it happened again.’

Annia tensed in her husband’s arms in the bedroom’s darkness, her body turned away from his and snuggled back against his chest. Her response was no louder than a whisper, but the distress in her voice was as evident as if she’d shouted at him.

‘I’ve already-’

Julius’s interruption was gentle but insistent.

‘I know. You had to tell the Legatus the whole sorry story, and worse than that, you had to tell Marcus.’

Legatus Scaurus and his officers had been delayed in their arrival at Marcus’s house on the Viminal hill until well after dark, caught up in the myriad tasks occasioned by getting two cohorts settled into the city’s transit barracks after their long journey back from the empire’s eastern frontier. Surprised to be greeted by the First Spear’s wife rather than the lady of the house, their bemusement had turned to horror as Annia had haltingly related the story of what had happened while the Tungrians had been away from Rome. After the first initial stunning blow, literally staggering Marcus with its stark horror, his recovery had been as swift as it had seemed complete, on the surface. Taking a seat in the house’s atrium he had composed himself, taken a deep breath and then looked up at his wife’s friend, his face a stone-like mask, asking only one question.

‘How?’

Julius clasped her tighter, stroking her tear-stained cheeks.

‘I need to hear it again. I need to know every detail, because I need to know what he’s going to do, once he’s thinking straight again.’

Marcus had listened to Annia recount the events of the previous year in grim silence and, when her tale was done, had stood without speaking, walking out into the Roman night.

She was silent for a moment.

‘And if I tell you? If I scoop all that … shit up and pour it over myself one more time?’

‘We’ll never speak of it again. Not that we’ll need to.’

Annia sighed.

‘No. The little one will remind us every time we look at him.’

‘So …?’

She sighed again, and then began to tell the story that had shattered their friend’s life once again.

The circle of men tightened, the biggest of them spitting imprecations at their intended prey.

‘I’m going to cut off your prick and stuff it into your fucking mouth!’

‘No, you’re not.’

All eyes turned towards a heavyset, bearded man walking up the street, his voice grating harshly in the night air despite the matter-of-fact tone of his roughly accented Latin.

‘All you’re going to cut are your losses. Now get out of my sight before this all gets much worse for those of you who are left alive.’

The big man turned to face him, reckoning the odds as the newcomer stopped six feet from him, flexing muscular arms and clenching his fists. In the background the choking sounds from the robber frantically struggling for breath through his ruined throat ran to their natural conclusion, and he fell silent. A series of sobs and groans from the darkness of an insula’s deeper shadow, into which the gutted member of the gang had staggered after incurring his horrific wound, told their wordless story of his plight.

‘Or what?’

‘Or we take your ears.’

The robbers spun to face a new threat from behind them, a pair of men with daggers and the look of knowing how to use them. The older of the two grinned at them and waggled his knife at the nearest of the robbers with a smirk.

‘My mate here’s from Dacia, see, and everyone knows those barbarian bastards are cannibals. He’s got a fondness for ears, see, and you’ve all got ears, which means he’s got a hard-on like a donkey’s meat stick at the thought of it.’

The gang’s new leader shook his head in amazement.

‘What the fuck …?’

His incredulity was cut off by a third voice, so hoarse from a lifetime of shouting at soldiers that it was little better than a harsh whisper. Its owner stepped up alongside the bearded man, the moonlight revealing a spectacularly battered face, as he raised a massive, scarred fist and grinned happily at them.

‘First we’ll beat you dumb fuckers senseless, then we’ll cut you up badly enough that none of you will ever get a woman to look at you again without showing her the weight of his coin first. Or you can fuck off. Now.’

He watched impassively as the robbers vanished into the street’s shadows, stepping forward to look at the blood-spattered aristocrat with a slowly shaking head.

‘Sorry to have spoilt the fun, little brother, but you looked to have bitten off more than you could get in your mouth. And now you’ve spilled some blood let’s have you away home, shall we?’

Marcus nodded silently and turned away, looking down at the dead man whose throat he’d punched in before nodding and lifting a hand in recognition of the fact that his friends had saved him from the gang’s violent revenge. The man with the battered face impassively watched him head back down the street the way he’d come, speaking to the bearded soldier next to him without taking his eyes off their friend.

‘What are we to do with him, Dubnus? I know he’s always been reckless, but this?’

His comrade nodded slowly.

‘He’s out of his mind with it, Otho. Your saw his eyes, not a flicker of emotion. Come on, and bring those idiot watch officers of yours with you. Knowing our luck he’ll find another gang round the corner and we’ll have to do the whole bloody thing again before we get him home.’

They followed the lone figure at a sufficiently close distance to deter any further attack, Dubnus watching his friend walking through the darkened streets with a troubled expression.

‘Look at it through his eyes. His family murdered, him forced to run as far as the Wall and find his feet as an officer in the biggest tribal rebellion for decades while the emperor’s men hunted him like a dog, fighting in Germania, Dacia, Parthia, and now …’ He shook his head in evident disbelief. ‘And now this. You have to wonder how much more he can take without losing his mind completely.’

Otho laughed mirthlessly.

‘You think this looks like he’s sane? You’re his closest friend, but even you can’t believe he’s got a firm grip on himself.’

Dubnus grimaced.

‘Since the first day I met him he’s always been as taut as a loaded bolt thrower. I hoped he’d find some peace once we’d settled accounts with the men who slaughtered his family, but this …’

His comrade nodded.

‘He’ll keep on finding ways to provoke men to attack him, so he can put them down and take their lives to no good purpose. And soon enough he’ll go too far, and find himself in shit too deep for you and me to pull him out of. Are you willing to die alongside him?’

The big Briton shrugged.

‘He may be blinded by his rage, but he’s still my brother. And yours. Uncle Sextus may be a long time gone, but I still live by the rules he gave us. If one of us is threatened then it’s a threat to all of us. So if my brother Marcus chooses to throw himself up the palace steps with a sword in his hand I’ll be there to fight and die alongside him.’

Walking behind them, the older of the two soldiers leaned closer to his comrade, muttering in his ear.

‘Well, I fucking won’t.’

The Dacian Saratos looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

‘Is cow’s shit you talk. You make promise to soldier called Scarface, before he die. You promise to guard he life with you life.’

When Sanga remained silent he opened his mouth to renew the discussion, only to close it again as Otho growled at them over his shoulder.

‘You two belong to me, you pricks. The Prince here,’ he gestured to Dubnus, ‘gave you both to me, which means I own the pair of you. And if I say we’re going to take on every stinking guardsman in the city for the sake of that man, you’d better not be stupid enough to question my order. When he comes back to us from the dark place his mind has gone to, he’s going to find me, and Dubnus, and you two, guarding his back. And that’s all there is to it.’

‘We made the mistake of thinking that because you’d been ordered to the east by the emperor’s chamberlain, then we were under the throne’s protection. And it all seemed safe enough, for a few weeks. There were always one or two of Cotta’s men around the place, just keeping an eye out for us, and the local gang knew to keep their distance for fear of what he’d do to them if they didn’t.’

Annia stopped speaking, and after a moment Julius prompted her.

‘And then?’

‘It was on the day of the Agonalia holiday to Janus, in Januarius. I was cutting up onions in the kitchen and looking out of the window when the gate banged opened and Cotta’s man came staggering back through it as if he’d been thrown. For a moment I thought it was the gang that used to control this street, come for revenge after the way Morban and his men treated them last year, but then a Praetorian walked through the gate and I knew that it was something worse than that.’

She was silent again for a moment.

‘I hurried out into the garden to find half a dozen of them, armed and armoured and led by a centurion. At first I couldn’t work out why the Guard would have taken any interest in us, unless they’d come for revenge on Marcus for what he did to their prefect, but then I saw him.’

One of the guardsmen had nodded to the centurion, looking pointedly at the house, and the officer had promptly barked out an order, pointing at two of his men and telling them to search the building.

‘He was dressed and armed like the other praetorians, but he wasn’t one of them, that was obvious from the way that the men around him were careful not to get in his way, or even touch him. He might have been wearing their uniform, but he was clearly their master. He stepped forward and looked me up and down with those dead eyes, drinking in every detail of my body with a single long glance in a way I used to see occasionally in the brothel when a particularly depraved client came looking for enjoyment. He was like a racehorse trainer assessing a potential purchase in the sales ring, calculating whether the beast would repay his investment. I met his eye for a moment …’

She shivered in her husband’s arms.

‘I knew exactly what he was looking for. Something to spoil. Something pure and untouched, that he could ravish and leave soiled. It would have been better if he’d found what he was looking for with me, the gods know I’ve been used often enough for one more not to have made any difference, but perhaps something in my face put him off. I knew only too well the sort of man he was, and my disgust must have been obvious. And then he saw Felicia, and that was that.’

In her mind’s eye Annia conjured up an image of her friend as the younger woman had emerged from the house with the ghost of a quizzical smile, clearly shaken by the soldiers’ unexpected appearance.

‘Can I help you … Centurion?’

The detachment’s officer had deferred to the man in the midst of their armoured throng, instantly confirming Annia’s suspicions as to his identity. Stepping forward with a grin, he’d pulled off his helmet to reveal his true identity, nodding to the mistress of the house as his gaze devoured her body in one long sweep from head to feet.

‘Your forgiveness for this intrusion, madam. My chamberlain told me that a famous gladiator was recently buried here, and as Rome’s most devoted follower of the sport, I was naturally drawn to pay homage to his memory.’

Felicia had bowed deeply.

‘No apology is needed when so eminent a man honours my home with his presence. And you have me on the horns of a dilemma, Majesty. On the one hand your desire to pay your respects to a great man is not one that I can in conscience obstruct, even without consideration of your exalted status, but-’

The emperor had laughed in a conspiratorial manner, leaning closer to her.

‘That nonsense about not burying the dead within the walls of the city?’

He’d waved a dismissive hand.

‘He won’t be the first great man to have been honoured with interment inside the city, and I see no reason why this shouldn’t be an exception to the rule. The man buried in your garden was the champion gladiator when I was a younger man, and I took great inspiration from his exploits.’

A wistful tone had crept into his voice.

‘Someday I hope to emulate his achievements …’

He’d turned away from the amazed women, pointing to the mound of earth under which the gladiator had been buried, after his last, climactic fight in the Flavian Arena.

‘Is that his last resting place?’

Not waiting for the answer he’d walked across the garden to stand in silence before the grave, the Praetorians casting knowing glances at his back and eyeing up the two women while they waited in silence for him to rouse himself from his reverie. At length he’d turned back to face them, wiping a tear from his cheek.

‘Truly inspiring. For such a master of his art to be buried here, so close to the palace, is quite inspiring. And so convenient.’

The emperor’s gaze had returned to Felicia, and Annia’s heart had sunk as she saw that same cold-eyed appraisal play across her friend’s face and body once again as he stepped closer to her.

‘So handy for me to come and pay my respects whenever I feel minded. And whenever I feel the need to honour you, my dear, with my presence in your bed.’

Felicia’s eyes had widened in shock, but before she’d been able to speak, Commodus had continued in the same light, conversational tone.

‘Oh I know, I’ve heard all the half-hearted objections so many times. You’re a respectable married woman, but your husband is away doing my bidding, a very long way away, and here you are, with your own needs. And besides, what woman could fail to be honoured by the prospect of coupling with Rome’s first citizen? And in case that fails to persuade you, consider this …’

He’d leaned closer, speaking quietly in her ear, though not so softly that Annia hadn’t heard every word, just as she had little doubt he had fully intended.

‘There is, of course, the inevitable consequence of rejection to be considered. Your emperor, it has to be said, is not a man for whom the word “no” is acceptable. Having been somewhat overindulged from an early age, it would be fair to say that my ill-temper can be quite prodigious upon being faced with a refusal.’

He’d turned to look at Annia as he spoke, his expression as empty as before although a bestial look had crept over his face, as if in reality he hoped for nothing more than to see through the threats he was muttering in her friend’s ear.

‘Your companion here looks a little … used … for my tastes, but I’m sure she would make an entertaining diversion for my bodyguard. If you provoke me to it, I’ll have them fuck her until she bleeds, here, where her cries of protest and pain can be heard by your neighbours. And then there are your children to consider. It was a boy for you, my dear, and a girl for your friend here, if I’m correctly informed?’

Felicia had nodded, a look of horrified resignation starting to settle on her pale features.

‘It would be a shame for their young lives to be snuffed out in the brutal manner that might be required to cool one of my rages. Now, what else did Cleander tell me …?’

A pair of guardsmen had emerged from the house, one pushing the boy Lupus before him at the end of a stiffened arm, the other shepherding the German scout Arabus, left behind by Marcus to protect his wife and child, at the point of his sword.

‘Ah yes, that’s it. The German and the boy from Britannia. I’ll prove just how serious I am, Madam, by the simple expedient of allowing you to choose which of these two shall live to see the sun set tonight.’

‘Surely you can’t be serious-’

He’d nodded solemnly, his blank-eyed certainty silencing her in mid-sentence.

‘Serious? Oh but I can. Deadly serious. Long experience of these matters has proven to me that a practical demonstration is so much more effective than any number of threats, no matter how serious they might be in nature.’

He’d nodded to the centurion who, without any change in expression, had drawn his dagger and walked across to the pair of captives.

‘So, Madam, choose which of these two should die and which should live.’

Felicia had looked over at Annia with an anguished expression, shaking her head slowly.

‘I can’t.’

‘But you can. And you will. Because if you don’t I’ll just have them both put to the sword and then, just to reinforce the lesson, I’ll make you choose between your own child and your friend’s daughter in just the same way.’

Annia had looked across the garden at the pair of captives to find Arabus staring back at her with a weary, knowing look, nodding at her in acceptance of his fate. Knowing that a choice had to be made, before Commodus followed through with his threat to their children, she had spoken out loudly, staring hard at Felicia in an attempt to persuade her to see the only way out of the situation.

‘Arabus.’

Felicia had started at the man’s name, looking first at Annia and then turning her head to stare helplessly at the German.

‘Yes.’

Commodus had grinned, nodding delightedly.

‘Yes? Yes is no good to me. You have. To say. His name.’

Felicia’s face had turned to face the emperor’s with a sudden hardening of her expression, her voice soft in the silence.

‘Arabus.’

While his face had been suddenly beatific, exultant in his breaking of her will to his own, the emperor’s command to the waiting centurion had been issued in a matter-of-fact tone that told both women how accustomed he was to ordering the death of his subjects.

‘Kill the German.’

She felt Julius shake his head behind her, his voice incredulous despite already knowing the story’s outcome.

‘They put an innocent man to the sword? Just like that? There was no hesitation? No sign of-’

‘Remorse? None. It didn’t feel like the first time the order had been given. The bastard cut poor Arabus’s throat with his dagger and then wiped the blood off on Lupus’s tunic.’

‘Would you know any of them if you saw them again?’

‘Only the centurion. He had a scar through one eyebrow and down his cheek.’

Julius thought for a moment.

‘And then?’

‘And then? They took Arabus’s body and left, leaving a man on the gate to make sure we didn’t try to escape. We heard nothing for two days, then on the third they came back. And that filthy bastard took Felicia to her bedroom, forced her to lie with him and left her sobbing on her bed with his seed in her belly. He came back three times in less than a week, before he tired of fucking an unresponsive victim and moved on to whoever it was that was next in line for his attentions.’

‘And that was all?’

‘If you can call something like that “all”, yes. When he failed to come back the fourth time we thought that it was over, that she might be able to reclaim her old life, and never tell Marcus of the indignities that had been forced on her. Until she missed her monthly bleed.’

Her husband was silent, and Annia stared into the room’s darkness for a moment before continuing.

‘I know what you’re thinking, Julius. You’re wondering why she didn’t get rid of the baby while it was still unformed.’

‘I-’

‘An abortion? How could she? She was a doctor, Julius, sworn to care for her fellows and never to knowingly do harm. She could never have murdered an innocent child, and that’s all there was to it. She planned to have the baby and then have it adopted, find a family without children who longed for such a gift and pass the infant to them. We would never speak of it again, and Marcus would never be any the wiser.’

‘She’d have kept it from him?’

Annia laughed softly at his incredulity.

‘I’d have kept it from you, if the emperor had chosen to put his child in my womb. Look at what’s resulted from him discovering the truth! What sane man takes to these streets at midnight dressed in no more than a tunic? If she’d lived it would have been better for him never to have known, never to have the scars of his family’s destruction reopened.’

‘If she’d lived?’

‘We thought her delivery would be simple enough, after the ease with which she had the first one, but the baby was too big, and refused to turn, and when she called for help it was too long coming. The doctor who attended her was no better than a butcher. He got the baby out by cutting her open, but she lost too much blood. She died in my arms, her eyes wide with the pain, and as she slipped away she made me promise to care for the child. I swore an oath, Julius, an oath to raise the baby as my own.’

He wrapped his arms more tightly about her.

‘And what else were you to do?’

Silence fell over them.

‘What happened? Is he wounded?’

Dubnus shook his head at the question, shepherding Marcus into the walled garden with an arm around his back, physically supporting the Roman while the man who had been waiting for them closed the gate. The smell of herbs and fragrant blooms was strong in the warm air, a vivid counterpoint to the iron stink of spilled blood from his gore-streaked tunic.

‘He took on a dozen street robbers with nothing more than his bare hands.’

The Briton raised a hand to forestall the veteran’s anxiety as Cotta stared aghast at the gore caked across the Roman’s tunic and body.

‘It’s all other men’s blood, but he’s pretty much burned himself out in the doing of it.’

Cotta sized up the man whose long-dead father had employed him to educate his son in the fighting skills of the legions from the age of ten, assessing his exhausted posture and blank, empty eyes. He snapped out a command at one of the retired soldiers who formed the tight-knit company of men he had brought to the Tungrians’ close family on their arrival in Rome the year before.

‘Fetch me the hot water from the kitchen, and all of the towels! Here, let’s get him onto that bench.’

The younger man sank gratefully onto the seat, his body trembling with reaction to the mayhem he had visited on the street robbers. Cotta stood over him in silence, staring down at the man he had tutored in the use of blade and point as a boy, when Cotta himself had only recently retired from legion service.

‘Get that tunic off.’

Taking the garment he passed it to Dubnus with a meaningful glance.

‘Be better if this went onto the fire, I’d say. The less evidence of this night the better, if the Urban Watch come asking questions.’

His man returned with a pail of water warmed over the kitchen fire and took the bloody garment away for incineration, and the former centurion knelt in front of his friend, wetting a towel and working at the drying blood that coated Marcus’s face and limbs.

‘How many did he kill?’

‘There were three corpses on the cobbles when we left, and another man trying to stop his guts from falling out without the wits to know that he was already dead.’

Cotta shook his head, putting a finger under the Roman’s chin and lifting his head to stare into the half-closed eyes.

‘And why? You’ve no idea, do you? If one of those street scum had got lucky and stuck you with a blade, you could be dead now, and for no better reason than you’re filled with rage you can’t turn on anyone who actually matters.’

He worked with water and towels until his friend’s body was completely clean, then wrapped him in a military cloak and handed him a beaker.

‘Wine and warm honey. Once you’ve got that down your neck you can eat this bread. And no arguments.’

Acquiescing to the commanding note in his former trainer’s voice, Marcus drank deeply, nodding slowly in response to Cotta’s harangue.

‘I know … it was pointless … stupid … but …’

‘You couldn’t help yourself.’

The Roman nodded, drinking deeply again, shivering with reaction to the night’s events.

‘No.’

The veteran looked down at his former pupil for a moment.

‘And is that it? Or are you going to be stupid enough take it to the streets again tomorrow night?’ Marcus looked back at him with an expression of pure misery. ‘I’m serious, boy. Tonight was the easy one, with no one out there any the wiser to the fact that a lone aristo out after dark on his own could be anything other than easy meat. By tomorrow morning the word will be out there, and you’ll not only get yourself killed but lead these men into the same trap. Is that what you think you owe them, a meaningless death in a city that’s not even their home?’

The younger man shook his head slowly, and Cotta dropped into a squat to look into his eyes, grimacing at the pain in his knees.

‘No. You owe them better, and you know it. Swear vengeance on the men who killed your wife by all means. I’ll sacrifice alongside you, and make common cause with you, but you’ll hold that vengeance for the right time, and not waste it in a meaningless slaughter of men who never had any part in Felicia’s death.’

Marcus nodded wordlessly, leaning his head forward onto Cotta’s shoulder. The veteran took a gentle grip of the hair at the back of his former pupil’s head and pulled it away from him until he could stare into the younger man’s eyes.

‘And if that’s not enough to keep you from throwing your life away, I’ll remind you that there’s something altogether more precious than any thought of revenge. Your son.’

The younger man stared back at him, tears welling in his eyes.

‘Exactly. Do you want Appius growing to manhood without ever having known his father, even if your friends manage to spirit him away to safety with every praetorian, urban watchman and gang member hunting for them?’

‘No. I owe him — them — better than that.’

The veteran soldier nodded.

‘Yes you do. So when that bastard Cleander summons you and Rutilius Scaurus to the palace, and gloats over your agony like the animal he is, will you hold back your anger or will you buy his life at the cost of your own, and that of the Legatus?’

‘I won’t enjoy the rank of legion legatus for much longer, Centurion Cotta, any more than you’ll be a centurion.’

Cotta leapt to his feet with as much dignity as his knees allowed, saluting crisply, but Gaius Rutilius Scaurus waved a dismissive hand.

‘No formalities, please Cotta, not at this time of night and under these circumstances. How is he?’

Marcus stood, saluting his senior officer.

‘I’m tired, sir. It’s been a trying day.’

Scaurus nodded, his face an expressionless mask.

‘Trying is one word I might have used. Devastating is another. Go to bed, Tribune, and sleep as long as you need to. And when you wake, come and see me to discuss the last of Centurion Cotta’s questions. I expect we’ll be called to the palace tomorrow, now that Cleander knows we’re back and has allowed a day for your wife’s death to sink in. He’ll be wanting to see your face, I expect, and see what havoc his machinations have wrought on you.’

Marcus looked at him for a moment and then nodded, saluting again reflexively as he turned away and walked into the house.

‘You think he’ll be able to resist the temptation to smash the bastard’s windpipe?’

Scaurus shrugged.

‘For one thing it would be a brave man who’d give him the chance. I fully expect the chamberlain to conduct his interview with us, when the invitation comes, from behind a wall of Praetorian armour.’

‘And if he doesn’t?’

‘In that eventuality, Centurion, I expect that both the chamberlain and I will have significant grounds for nervousness. Not that I intend to lose any sleep over it.’ He turned away, stopping and turning back as something occurred to him. ‘Oh, and I’ll be needing an escort in the morning, I’m planning to visit a professional man and I’ll need enough muscle to make sure we’re not disturbed.’

‘Will you not be taking that big German lump Arminius with you?’

Scaurus shook his head solemnly.

‘He tells me that he has a more important task to perform. I’ll take Lugos along with me, if only to get a professional medical opinion as to the state of his leg, but the presence of a few of your rougher-edged veterans would be useful, I suspect.’

‘Arabus died instead of me, Arminius. He died like a slaughtered animal, choking on his own blood.’

The big German sat opposite the boy Lupus in the house’s atrium, close enough to reach out and take the young man’s hand had he felt it appropriate, but something deep within him instinctively recognised that the time for comforting the child that they had left behind on sailing east for Parthia was gone, along with the child himself. The sword-armed soldiers Scaurus had set to guarding the house stared stolidly out into the morning’s sunshine, knowing better than to intrude in such a sensitive moment. Not only was the boy the orphaned grandchild of one of their own, considered a child of the cohort and welcome at any Tungrian campfire or barrack, but the German slave’s disregard for his apparent position among them was well known, as was his implacable temper when he was gainsaid.

While Lupus struggled for self-control, Arminius looked for what was left of the boy he’d left behind the previous year, marvelling that so much could have changed in the still-familiar face in such a short amount of time. Harder lines in the jaw and cheeks spoke of the onset of manhood, something in which he would have quietly exulted under different circumstances. Swallowing his own sorrow for the teenager’s distress, he forced a note of harshness into his voice.

‘A lesson to be relearned, then.’

‘A lesson?’

The German nodded into Lupus’s hot stare.

‘Arabus did what was right, offering his own life to protect yours, knowing how much more living you have left to do. Just like Antenoch.’

The boy pursed his lips and nodded.

‘They both died because I was not strong enough to defend myself.’

‘They both died because they loved you enough to give their lives to keep yours intact. They both died because they were honourable men who knew what they had to do. And they both died because their time had come to die. Have I not told you this before?’

Lupus nodded slowly.

‘But Arabus-’

‘Arabus knew what he had to do. There were wolves in the house, wolves who demanded a life, and he knew that his was the life they must take. He was man enough to offer it, and for that we should both hold his memory in high esteem for the rest of our days. And now you tell me this story with the wounded pride of a man who feels he should have done something to save his friend. Except, Lupus, you could have done nothing, because you are not yet a man.’

The boy looked at him with eyes suddenly hard, and Arminius smiled slowly back at him to draw the hurt from his words.

‘Understand me, boy. You may be close to manhood but you cannot consider yourself as a man until I have finished helping you to become a man.’

The boy protested, his voice raised indignantly.

‘Not a day has passed without my exercising with my sword and spear. My body is getting stronger-’

Arminius shook his head, raising a finger to his lips.

‘Marcus is still asleep — do you want to wake him and have him discover that my master has gone to take some share of revenge for his wife’s death without him? A man can make such a point without once raising his voice. What I speak of is more than your muscles, or how tall you’ve grown. You will possess great strength, given another few years, and perhaps even be tall enough to look me in the eyes, but true manhood comes from more than the body the gods have seen fit to gift you. True manhood is in here, Lupus …’

He tapped his forehead.

‘True manhood is measured by whether the man is worthy of the term. I will train your body and make you strong, give you skills with spear and sword that will make you a great warrior.’ He leaned forward to stare into his pupil’s eyes. ‘Becoming a man, however, will be a different matter.’

The half-dozen people waiting for a consultation with the doctor were suitably respectful when they saw the purple stripe that adorned the latest arrival’s tunic, while the size of the party accompanying him spoke volumes as to his significance in the city’s complicated social structure. While the man himself was clean-shaven and bore no obvious scars, the fact that he was a serving officer was obvious, not least from the size and demeanour of the men accompanying him.

The first member of his party to come through the door was a stocky figure dressed in a military tunic with cropped hair, scarred arms and an evident disdain for the waiting-room’s occupants, but if his appearance gave the clients a momentary frisson of apprehension, the man following him was altogether more disquieting. Built to an entirely different scale, he was forced to duck through the door, and as he limped across the room to join the soldier, the waiting patients watched his progress with wide eyes, mesmerised by his slab-like muscles and long, plaited hair. Their master entered next, to general and evident relief at both his civilised appearance and the likelihood of him preventing any unpleasantness on the part of the hulking barbarian, but the three men who completed the party quickly reinforced the initial impression. Hard-bitten soldiers to judge from their short hair and beards, they clearly regarded the citizens present with a mixture of distrust and open curiosity. A tense silence fell upon the room as the new arrivals looked about them, with the sole exception of the equestrian who was evidently the head of this close-knit familia, apparently too deep in the scroll he was reading to pay much attention to the goings-on around him.

After a moment, the doctor’s assistant appeared through the door that led to his consulting room, noting the new arrivals with a raised eyebrow. Upon his call for the next patient, concerted efforts were made by the waiting room’s other occupants to encourage the aristocrat to take their turns with the physician, although whether this generosity was born of respect for his rank or fear of his companions was not entirely clear. In any case the efforts were to no avail, as he simply smiled and gestured for the next patient to accompany the doctor’s assistant, happily reading his book while the room slowly emptied as each of its occupants saw the doctor and left until, an hour or so later, only his party was left. Pulling a face at the unexpected lack of any further custom, the doctor’s assistant ushered him through the doorway, on the sensible assumption that he was likely to be the only one of the party with the wherewithal to pay for such expensive services, moving hastily aside as both the stocky soldier and the giant followed. The doctor looked up from his chair, gesturing to one on the other side of his desk.

‘Good day to you, sir. Please do take a seat.’

The aristocrat sat down, inclining his head in thanks.

‘And good day to you, Doctor.’

The medicus smiled approvingly at the reply, couched as it was in the same language that he had used for his greeting. It might have been hundreds of years since the first Greek doctors had abandoned their home country and claimed Rome for their own, but a gentleman still spoke to his physician in the language of the greatest civilisation the world had yet seen. Clearly this was an individual of some substance, despite the rather villainous appearance of the men who had accompanied him into the surgery. He drew breath to enquire as to what might be the malady on which his esteemed client sought counsel, only to find the man before him speaking somewhat out of turn.

‘You’ll have to forgive me, by the way, I’ve taken the liberty of posting a pair of my men on the street outside to deter any new clients from attending upon you for the time being. I will of course compensate you for the lost custom entailed, but I thought the precaution essential given that I’m here not with regard to matters of my health, but instead to clear up a rather sensitive matter.’

He fell silent and looked at the doctor with what might, under other circumstances, have been taken for a severe expression but which, the doctor was swift to decide, was understandable enough if the man was about to present him with the painful evidence of the pitfalls of a debauched lifestyle.

‘Is it …?’

He raised both eyebrows and inclined his head to indicate the man’s crotch. To his surprise the patient laughed tersely and shook his head.

‘Indeed no, although I can see how my previous comments might lead you to assume that I’ve dallied with the wrong sort of lady. No, Doctor, my visit is to do with something entirely different. A question of childbirth, as it happens. But before we speak of that matter, I’d appreciate your opinion as to the state of some wounds my companion here incurred in the course of our duties in the east, a few months ago.’

He gestured to the hulking giant waiting silently beside the ex-soldier who was apparently guarding the door in the absence of the doctor’s assistant, who had failed to return to the room having summoned the patient and his associates.

‘Come forward, Lugos, and show the doctor here your leg.’

The medicus studied the scars that pitted the massive thigh muscles before him, consulting a book from his shelves before voicing an opinion.

‘I can’t claim to be any sort of expert on the matter of wounds incurred on military service, but what I see here would appear to be a pair of arrow perforations to the upper leg that seem to have been expertly treated, presumably by a legion’s doctor, and which, given the time required, seem to have healed as well as might be expected for such intrusive damage to the muscles involved.’

He switched from Greek to Latin.

‘I noticed that you limped as you crossed the room — do you have any residual pain from the wounds?’

The giant looked at the man who was presumably his owner with a look of bafflement.

‘Forgive me, Doctor, my colleague here is from Britannia, and still finds our language a little difficult to understand on occasion.’

The equestrian spoke slowly to the subject of their discussion.

‘Does it still hurt?’

The big man shook his head, his voice a deep rumble.

‘No. Only a little stiff.’

The doctor nodded sanguinely.

‘To be expected. Letting blood from around the wounds will reduce the stiffness, I diagnose. I’ll be happy to perform the procedure.’

He sat back with a smile.

‘And the other matter? You mentioned childbirth? Perhaps we might start with your name, sir?’

The equestrian nodded equably.

‘My name, Doctor, is Gaius Rutilius Scaurus. I was until recently the commander of the Third Gallic legion, but now I am little more than a private citizen awaiting his next imperial duty. I have been away in the east, with my colleagues here, fighting the Parthians and restoring the emperor’s rule over those parts of the empire that were disputed by our enemies.’

The doctor inclined his head respectfully at his client’s evident eminence.

‘Then you are to be congratulated, sir. How might I be of service to so celebrated a client?’

The man before him fixed him with a stare of uncompromising directness, clearly intent on communicating the seriousness of whatever it was he wished to discuss.

‘As I said, it is a matter of an unresolved debt, I’m afraid, a debt incurred to yourself during a matter of childbirth.’

The doctor nodded slowly, his expression becoming suitably grave.

‘I think I know the matter in question, Rutilius Scaurus. A childbirth early last month?’

‘Yes, not far from here on the Viminal hill.’

‘Indeed. In truth I’d written the debt off, in the light of the lady’s unfortunate demise.’

He paused, looking at Scaurus with the expression of a man intent on setting the right tone for their discussion.

‘In which case, Doctor, I may bear the resolution you had given up hope of receiving. All you have to do is ask, and I will pay you out the sum owed, plus a consideration for your lost custom this morning.’

‘Ah …’

The medicus thought for a moment, then smiled with evident gratitude.

‘In which case I will be happy to accept twenty-five denarii for my services that fated evening and declare the slate to be wiped clean.’

‘You’re sure? A gold aureus will suffice?’

The doctor nodded magnanimously, and Scaurus reached into his purse, placing a single coin on the table before him.

‘Then the account is paid.’

He stood, looking down at the doctor with that same serious expression that might have been mistaken for a glare under other circumstances.

‘Paid from my side, that is. Having accepted my gold in return for services which, it seems, were never offered freely, there remains the question of the way in which you discharged your responsibility to your patient.’

He raised the scroll he’d been reading in the waiting room.

‘A responsibility made very clear by the writings of the imperial physician Galen. There also remains the other question, as to what should be the reckoning for your evident shortcomings. How, to be blunt, you are to make amends for your errors and failures that cost a dear friend of mine her life.’

The doctor started, sweat beading his forehead.

‘You took money, Doctor, for attending the birth of a child to the wife of a good friend of mine. In the course of which my friend’s wife died.’

The other man looked up at him, his face reddening.

‘She died because she left it too long to call for me. It’s not my fault if my clients hold off seeking help in order to save themselves money.’

Scaurus stood up and leaned forward, placing his bunched fists on the table and staring down intently into the doctor’s face.

‘Her companion sent a man to your house shortly after dark, by which time she’d been in labour for 12 hours, more or less. And you arrived when, exactly?’

‘Soon enough!’

The hard-faced aristocrat shook his head slowly.

The runner deduced your location by talking to your slaves, then tracked you down to the house of a friend where you had just started dinner and delivered the suitably worded and urgent summons to your patient’s bedside directly to you. He waited, at your instruction, and accompanied you to the lady’s house three hours later. By which time you had consumed enough wine to have made you less than steady.’

His answer was a terse laugh.

‘I’d like to see you prove that. And where’s this runner, for a start-’

He fell silent as Scaurus gestured to Cotta, who opened the consulting-room door to admit a vaguely familiar man who had been waiting outside.

‘Here. And the fact you don’t recognise him seems like something of a giveaway. But let us consider the facts. You tried to turn the baby and then, when that was a failure, you cut the lady open in order to conduct a caesarean birth, performing the operation with sufficient butchery that she died shortly afterwards. You were drunk-’

‘No!’

The doctor had surged out of his chair, but froze when he saw the expression on Scaurus’s face, then sank back into a sitting position. When he resumed, the equestrian’s voice was cold.

‘You waited three hours to answer your patient’s call for help, and by the time you arrived at her house you were too drunk to operate safely. You killed the lady, as surely as if you’d handed her a cup of hemlock. Had you been working for nothing, helping a patient in distress, I might have seen fit to let the realisation of your incompetence be your punishment.’

Silence fell over the room as the doctor stared down at the gold coin before him.

‘But you weren’t working for the public good, were you? You expected payment. You harassed the dead patient’s friend for the money every day for a week, and when she wouldn’t pay you, you gave coin to some aged crone to put a curse on her.’

He dropped a thin folded sheet of bronze onto the table in front of the doctor, shaking his head in disgust.

‘My men found it pushed into a slot that had been gouged out of the mortar in the wall that surrounds her house, and after that it wasn’t hard to find the witch who’d placed it there. She retracted the curse quickly enough, of course, when the alternative became clear to her. Indeed she very promptly replaced it with one directed to yourself.’ He tossed a second bronze wafer onto the table before the doctor. ‘I believe it suggests that you turn your instruments on your own body, which I found rather instructive. Funny how we take inspiration from the most unlikely of sources, isn’t it?’

Turning away from the sweating physician, he walked to the other end of the room before turning back to face the object of his ire.

‘My travels to the east took me to Nisibis, a city with a substantial population of Christians, and while I’m sworn to the service of Mithras, I’m not above talking to followers of other religions, if only to understand what motivates them. I soon enough realised that they’re not all that different from we followers of the one true faith, especially in the area of their beliefs about retaliative justice. The one phrase they have that really struck me the first time I heard it was their idea of “an eye for an eye”. If you wrong me, the same wrong should be visited back upon you. How do you find that concept, Doctor?’

The medicus looked up at him in disbelief.

‘You can’t-’

‘No indeed, I can’t. The obvious repercussions might well lead to an equally harsh penalty being visited upon me, were I to be implicated in your murder. But that’s of no concern, because I don’t intend killing you. I’m going to leave that to you. After all, you’re the expert in the field of inflicting death.’

The doctor shook his head slowly.

‘You expect me to … kill myself?’

Scaurus pursed his lips and shrugged.

‘It may seem a little outlandish, I suppose. But let’s consider the facts, leaving aside any debate as to whether you were responsible for your patient’s death. Or rather one simple fact. You see, the good lady in question was married to a young man who has been blessed and cursed in life. Blessed with quite remarkable skills with a blade and having been born as Marcus Valerius Aquila, the son of a family wealthy enough to develop that talent, but equally cursed by the destruction of that family on false charges of treason. So now he’s forced to live under an assumed name, as Marcus Tribulus Corvus, a wanted man, while the emperor who condemned his family to death uses their rather grand villa on the Appian Way as his country palace.’

The doctor shook his head with a horrified expression.

‘Why … why are you telling me these things?! Stop it, I don’t want to-’

‘You don’t want to know because it makes you party to a felony that could see you executed if you don’t promptly inform on the man. Don’t worry, it won’t come to that.’

He stared at the doctor until he was sure the other man wasn’t going to open his mouth again.

‘So, to continue my story, my friend was just starting to find a place for himself in the sun again, with the love of a good woman, when you managed to undo all that by bringing about the death of his wife. I didn’t bring him with me today because, to be frank, I’m not sure I could have kept him from killing you as soon as he laid eyes on you. Which would have been temporarily satisfying for all of us, but also a little self-defeating in terms of the consequences. So, as you can see, I’m actually doing you a favour in allowing you to choose the way you’re going to leave this life, once you’ve written a note explaining why you’re doing it in order to obviate any responsibility that might cling to myself and my colleagues. You can slit your wrists if you like, we’ve all the time needed to make sure you do the job right. Or perhaps a swift-acting poison would suit you better? I’m sure you’ve something suitable in your medicine pots. So, either you choose, or I will.’

He looked down at the doctor in silence for a moment.

‘Making sure that you’re dead before we leave isn’t going to do the lady’s husband much good, obviously, since it won’t bring her back, but it will stop him brooding on yet another person he needs to bring to bloody justice. It’s a long enough list without adding your name to it. And besides, nobody wants to spend the rest of their short span of days looking over their shoulder for the man who’ll end it for them, do they? Were you to have avoided death today you’d only have spent the rest of what’s left of your life dying small deaths a dozen times a day, every time someone caught your eye or jostled you in the street. This way really is so much kinder. So, what’s it going to be, Doctor?’

Scaurus took a sideways look at his subordinate as the two men sat waiting for their summons into the imperial chamberlain’s presence. Marcus kept his gaze fixed on the mural on the room’s far side, the painted figures illuminated by the soft glow of the late afternoon sun through a window above their heads, his lips twitching into a humourless half smile.

‘Don’t worry, Legatus. I’m not going to tear Marcus Aurelius Cleander’s throat out. Not today.’

The older man returned his own stare to the painting before them, grimacing at the artist’s representation of two lines of men facing off across an open piece of ground with half a dozen bodies strewn between the two forces.

‘I’ve often wondered just who advises these artists as to what happens in a battle. Anyone who’s never served the empire could go away with the impression that it’s a big game of push and shove, and that we all walk away afterwards.’

The two men stared at the bloodless scene in silence until Marcus turned his head to look at his superior.

‘Cotta told me what you did to Felicia’s doctor this morning …’

Scaurus shrugged, his smile bleak.

‘Disappointed you weren’t there to watch him die? We all take revenge in our own ways, and I knew that mine was likely to be a good deal more subtle than yours, and less likely to invite the attention of the city authorities. Whether we like it or not, our only outward reaction to this outrage has to be one of stoic acceptance of the fates that the gods visit upon us. And besides, your wife was a friend of mine too.’

A tunic-clad slave crossed the chamber and stopped before them with a bow.

‘The Chamberlain will see you now, gentlemen. Please follow me.’

As he led them towards the door that led into Cleander’s office, he spoke softly over his shoulder, a hint of caution in his voice.

‘I gather you’ve been away for a year, Legatus, in which case I should advise you that the chamberlain has come to favour open shows of respect in his audiences with supplicants such as yourselves. A bow, perhaps, or-’

Scaurus nodded tersely.

‘The power does it to them all, given enough time. And I do not consider myself to be that man’s supplicant …’

Ignoring the slave’s raised eyebrow, he led Marcus into the audience chamber past a pair of armed Praetorians who closed the doors behind them. Seated before them, on the far side of a desk large enough to have served as a bed for two people given a mattress, the imperial chamberlain was writing on a sheet of paper, intent on the words he was inking onto the smooth, pale surface. He spoke without looking up, the quill tracking across the silky smooth surface without interruption.

‘One moment, gentlemen.’

Scaurus stared hard at him for a moment before snapping to attention, his example swiftly followed by Marcus, and waiting impassively while the man who effectively ran the empire completed his message, passing it to his letters slave for folding and sealing.

‘For immediate dispatch to the governor of Germania Inferior.’

The slave bowed respectfully.

‘And to be carried by a different messenger to the other letter, Chamberlain?’

Cleander smiled glacially, with very little humour evident.

‘I think so. Best not to risk the two being mixed up.’

He looked up at Scaurus, sitting back in his chair in silence for a moment.

‘It has become customary for the granting of an audience with the imperial chamberlain to be acknowledged by some small show of respect, Legatus.’

Scaurus nodded.

‘Your appointments secretary was good enough to suggest it to us, Chamberlain.’

‘And …?’

‘I chose to ignore his suggestion.’

Cleander grinned broadly, lounging back in his chair.

‘And that’s what I like about you, Rutilius Scaurus. No pretence, nothing but the most blunt of opinions stated in such a matter-of-fact way that only the most irascible of men could take offence. And trust me, a year of governing this empire on behalf of a man like Commodus has been more than enough to make me irascible.’

He opened his arms to highlight the fact that the three men were alone.

‘Under which circumstances I would have at least expected some appreciation of the fact that you have my undivided attention? No bodyguards, no Praetorians to stand between us …’

‘Nobody to overhear whatever it is that you want from us this time? Besides, we know you well enough. Were we to offer you violence your revenge would be spectacular in both reach and method.’

The chamberlain smiled again, shaking his head in an affectation of sadness.

‘Cynical, Legatus. But true enough. So, to business.’

He reached for a waiting sheet of paper covered in script, dipping his quill into a small gold pot of ink and signing it.

‘You are hereby discharged from the rank of legatus, with the heartfelt thanks of a grateful emperor for having managed to quell the threat from the Parthians and secured the status of our colony of Nisibis.’

Looking up from the paper for a moment, he nodded soberly.

‘A job genuinely well done, by the way. I read your report of the battle you fought with the King of Kings’ son and his allies, and it seems as if you provided the man with the most salutary of military lessons. I also noted that this young man’s diplomatic efforts seem to have resulted in a fresh lease of life for the current holder of the Parthian throne, one way or another, which is very much to the liking of the men who advise me on these matters, given his age and disinclination towards war. All in all, an excellent result.’

Scaurus nodded tersely.

‘However …?’

Cleander nodded.

‘Indeed … however. In the short time between your arrival in Antioch and your departure for the border with Parthia, you seem to have caused no small degree of upset among the men of the senatorial class with whom you interacted.’

He waited for Scaurus to comment, and when the soldier showed no signs of doing so a hint of irritation crept into his voice.

‘You managed to completely alienate the outgoing governor, for a start. And a man like Gaius Domitius Dexter isn’t going to take that sort of embarrassment sitting down. I spoke to him a week or so ago, and it’s safe to say that you’ve made yet another enemy to add to your long list. An influential enemy.’

Scaurus shrugged.

‘A venal man, Chamberlain. A man whose theft from the imperium was breathtaking not only in its monetary value but the degree to which it weakened a strategic frontier. He deserved every embarrassment I could heap on him.’

Cleander shrugged equably.

‘Indeed he did. Just be warned, Rutilius Scaurus. And that’s before we come to discussing the apparent murder, at least if Domitius Dexter is to be credited with having the truth of it, of a young broad stripe tribune by the name of …’ He looked down at a tablet. ‘Ah yes, Lucius Quinctius Flamininus. You’d be more than a little perturbed, Rutilius Scaurus, had you been present in any of the interviews I’ve been forced to endure with that young man’s father, given the depth of his righteous anger towards yourself and your tribune here.’

Nodding to himself as if he’d just recalled an important detail, he turned his attention back to the paper before him.

‘Which reminds me, Tribulus Corvus, or whatever it is that you’re calling yourself these days, you too are discharged from your position as a military tribune, thanks from a grateful throne, etcetera, etcetera. I commend you for your role in the Parthian matter, and I recommend that you never allow Flamininus the elder’s men to corner you on a dark street.’

Putting the quill down he looked at the two men before him with an expectant expression.

‘Nothing to say, Rutilius Scaurus? No protest at having your rank stripped away after having done such a fine job in the east?’

Scaurus shook his head, his features impassive.

‘It wasn’t my rank, Chamberlain. It belonged to the empire.’

The chamberlain raised a sceptical eyebrow.

‘Oh how very noble. And these Britons you’ve dragged halfway across the empire and back again? How sanguine will your reaction be if I reassign them to a new tribune? Some ambitious young man with a career to build and somewhat less concern with how he might do so than you when it comes to the preservation of his men? After all, there’s always a war brewing somewhere, an opportunity for such a man to make his name at the expenses of a few thousand soldiers’ lives …’

He looked at Scaurus for a moment.

‘Does that prospect not concern you, Rutilius Scaurus?’

The subject of his scrutiny shook his head.

‘Nothing lasts forever, Chamberlain. If you’ve chosen to retire me then I shall simply have to make the best of it. If …’

‘If indeed. You’re a perceptive man, Scaurus, I’ve never denied that, even whilst cursing your gift of causing upset among the richest and most influential men in Rome. I do have something in mind for you both, and for the men who follow you, although you might find yourself wishing I’d decided to let you idle away the rest of your life.’