Iron and Rust

CHAPTER 1

The Northern Frontier

A Camp outside Mogontiacum,

Eight Days before the Ides of March, AD235

Hold me safe in your hands.

The sun would be risen, well up by now, but little evidence filtered through to the inner sanctum of the great pavilion.

All you gods, hold me safe in your hands. The young Emperor prayed silently, his mouth moving. Jupiter, Apollonius, Christ, Abraham, Orpheus: see me safethrough the coming day.

In the lamplight the eclectic range of deities regarded him impassively.

Alexander, Augustus, Magna Mater: watch over your elect, watch over the throne of the Caesars.

Noises, like the squeaking of disturbed bats, from beyond the little sanctuary of the domestic gods, beyond the heavy silk hangings, disrupted his prayers. From somewhere in the further recesses of the labyrinth of purple-shaded corridors and enclosures came the crash of something breaking. All the imperial attendants were fools — clumsy fools and cowards. The soldiers had mutinied before. Like those disturbances, this one would be resolved, and when that happened the members of the household who had deserted their duty or taken advantage of the uproar would suffer. If any of the slaves or freedmen were stealing, he would have the tendons in their hands cut. They could not steal then. It would serve as a lesson. The familia Caesaris needed constant discipline.

The Emperor Alexander Severus pulled a fold of his cloak over his bowed head, placed his right palm on his chest, composed himself again into the attitude of prayer. The omens had been bad for months. On his last birthday the sacrificial animal had escaped. Its blood had splashed on his toga. As they marched out from Rome an ancient laurel tree of huge size suddenly fell at full length. Here on the Rhine, there had been the Druid woman. Go. Neither hope for victory, nor trust your soldiers. The words of the prophecy ran in his memory. Vadas. Nec victoriam speres, nec te militituo credas. It was suspicious she had spoken in Latin. Yet torture had not revealed any malign worldly influences. Whatever her language, the gods needed propitiating.

To Jupiter an ox. To Apollonius an ox. To Jesus Christ an ox. To Achilles, Virgil and Cicero, to all you heroes …

As he made every vow, Alexander blew each statuette a kiss. It was not enough. He got down on his knees, then, somewhat encumbered by his elaborate armour, stretched full length in adoration before the lararium. Close to his face, he noticed the gold thread in the white carpet. The fabric smelt slightly musty.

None of this was his fault. None of it. The year before last in the East he had been ill. Half the troops with him had been sick. If he had not ordered the retreat to Antioch, the Persians would have destroyed them all; not just the southern force which was left behind, but the main Roman field army as well. Here in the North the frontier had been breached in numerous places. Opening negotiations with some of the barbarians was not weakness. There was no profit in fighting them all at once. Judicious promises and gifts could induce some to stand aside, maybe even join in the destruction of their brethren. It did not mean their punishment was waived, merely deferred. Barbarians had no concept of good faith, so promises to barbarians could not be considered binding. Such things could not be stated in public, but why did the soldiers not see these obvious truths? Of course, the northern soldiery, recruited from the camps, were little better than barbarians themselves. Their comprehension was equally limited. That was why they could not understand about the money. Since Caracalla, the Emperor who may have been his father, had doubled the pay of the troops, the exchequer had been drained. Veturius, the treasurer appointed by his mother, had taken Alexander to the fiscus. There had been nothing to see except rank after rank of empty coffers. As Alexander had tried to explain more than once on various parade grounds, donatives to the army would have to be extracted by force from innocent civilians, from the soldiers’ own families.

A rush of light as a hanging was pulled back. Felicianus, the senior of the two Praetorian Prefects, marched in. No one announced him and no one closed the curtain. Through the opening, past the Prefect, flew innumerable tiny birds. They darted everywhere around the chamber, flashing bright yellow, red and green as they passed through the band of light. How many times had Alexander told their keepers about the trouble and expense in collecting them? At every dinner when they were released to hop and flutter about entertainingly one or two were lost or died. How many would be left after this?

Felicianus swiped with futile aggression at those that veered and banked near his head as he walked towards the pale gleam of the twin ivory thrones. The Emperor’s mother was seated there in the gloom. Granianus, an old tutor of Alexander’s, now promoted into the imperial chancery, stood by Mamaea, whispering. The secretary of studies was always to be found by the side of the Empress, always whispering.

Alexander returned to his devotions. What you do not wish that a man shoulddo to you, do not do to him. He had had the phrase inscribed over his lararium. He had heard it in the East from some old Jew or Christian. An unwelcome thought struck him. He raised himself on to his elbows. He looked for the court glutton. Alexander had seen him eat birds, feathers and all. It was all right. The omnivore was in a corner beyond Alexander’s musical instruments. He was huddled with one of the dwarves. Neither was paying any attention to the ornamental birds. They were staring blankly into space. The mutiny seemed to have drained all their vitality.

‘Alexander, get up, and come here.’ His mother’s voice was peremptory.

Slowly, not to appear too craven, the Emperor got to his feet.

The air was thick with incense, although the sacred fire burnt low on its portable altar. Alexander wondered if he should tell someone to get some fuel. It would be terrible if it went out.

‘Alexander.’

The Emperor turned to his mother.

‘The situation is not irretrievable. The peasant that the recruits have clad in the purple has not arrived yet. His acclamation will attract few supporters among the senior officers.’

Mamaea was always good in a crisis. Alexander thought of the night of his accession, the night his cousin-brother died, and shuddered.

‘Praetorian Prefect Cornelianus has gone to fetch the Cohort of Emesenes. They are our people. Their commander Iotapianus is a kinsman. They will be loyal. The other eastern archers also. He will bring the Armenians and Osrhoenes.’

Alexander had never liked Iotapianus.

‘Felicianus has volunteered to go back out to the Campus Martius. It is brave. The act of a man.’ Mamaea lightly ran her fingers over the sculpted muscles of the Prefect’s cuirass. Alexander hoped the rumours were untrue. He had never trusted Felicianus.

‘The greed of the troops is insatiable.’ Mamaea addressed her son. ‘Felicianus will offer them money, a huge donative. The subsidies to the Germans will end. The diplomatic funds will be promised to the soldiers. And they will want those they believe their enemies.’ She dropped her voice. ‘They will demand Veturius’ head. The treasurer must be sacrificed. Apart from the four of us, Felicianus can surrender anyone to them.’

Alexander looked over at the glutton. Among all the court grotesques, the polyfagus was Alexander’s favourite. It was unlikely the mutineers would demand the death of the imperial omnivore.

‘Alexander.’ His mother’s voice brought him back. ‘The soldiers will want to see their Emperor. When Felicianus returns, you will go out with him. From the tribunal you will tell them you share their desire for revenge for their families. You will promise to march at their head against the barbarians who killed their loved ones. Together you will free the enslaved and exact awful vengeance on those who inflicted such terrible sufferings. Give the soldiers the proper address of an imperator: fire and sword, burning villages, heaps of plunder, mountains of enemy corpses. Make a better speech than you did this morning.’

‘Yes, Mother.’

Felicianus saluted, and left the tent.

It was monstrously unfair. He had done his best. In the grey light of pre-dawn he had gone to the Campus Martius. Clad in his ornamental armour, he had ascended the raised platform, stood and waited with the troops who had renewed their oaths to him the night before. When the mutinous recruits had emerged out of the near-darkness, he had filled his lungs to address them. It was never going to be easy. Latin was not his first language. It had made no difference. They had given him no chance to speak.

Coward! Weakling! Mean little girl tied to his mother’s apron strings! Their shouts had pre-empted anything he could have said. On his side of the parade ground, first one or two then whole ranks had put down their arms. He had turned and run. Pursued by taunts and jeers, he had stumbled back to the imperial quarters.

With the Prefect Felicianus gone, Mamaea sat as immobile as a statue. Granianus tried to whisper. She waved him to silence. The small birds fluttered here and there.

Alexander stood, irresolute. An Emperor should not be irresolute. ‘Polyfagus.’ The fat man lumbered up and waddled after Alexander to where the food was set out. ‘Amuse me, eat.’

Alexander pointed to a mountain of lettuces in a basket. The glutton started to eat, his jaw chewing steadily, his throat bobbing. He ate with little enthusiasm.

‘Faster.’

Using both hands, the omnivore stuffed the green leaves into his mouth. Soon there were none left.

‘The basket.’

It was made of wicker. The polyfagus broke it, and began. Although piece by piece it disappeared into his mouth, he was not attacking it with anything like his customary relish.

Alexander wished he could be free of his mother. But there was no one else. No one else he could trust. He had trusted the first wife they had given him. Yes, he had trusted Memmia Sulpicia with all his heart. But then her father Sulpicius Macrinus had plotted against him. The evidence produced by the imperial spies had left no doubt. The frumentarii of Volo, the Spymaster, had been thorough. Even before Sulpicius was tortured, there had been no doubt. His mother had wanted Memmia Sulpicia executed as well. Alexander had been firm. They had not let him see his wife, but he had commuted her sentence to exile. As far as he knew, she was still alive somewhere in Africa.

The omnivore spluttered, and reached for a pitcher.

Much the same had happened with his second wife, Barbia Orbiana. He had not been fortunate with his fathers-in-law.

The polyfagus took a huge draught of wine.

It might have been very different if his father had lived. But he had died before Alexander was really old enough to remember him. Then, when he was nine, they had told him Gessius Marcianus, the half-recalled equestrian officer from Arca in Syria, had not been his father at all. Instead he was the natural son of the Emperor Caracalla. But by then Caracalla too had been dead for a year or more. This unexpected turn in Alexander’s paternity had revealed that the newly reigning Emperor Elagabalus was not only his first cousin but his half-brother as well. It had been given out that their mothers, the sisters Soaemis and Mamaea, had committed adultery with Caracalla. And then Elagabalus had been prevailed upon to adopt Alexander. Not many a boy had three fathers publicly acknowledged before he turned thirteen, with two of them worshipped as gods, and the last just five years his senior.

Five years his senior, and perverse beyond measure. Mamaea had tried to shield Alexander from Elagabalus and his courtiers, both from their malice and their influence. Alexander’s food and drink was tasted before it was brought to the table. The servants around him were individually chosen by his mother, not drawn from the common pool in the palace. It was the same with the guards. Droves of experts in Greek and Latin literature and oratory had been hired at vast expense, along with men skilled in music, wrestling, geometry and every other activity considered suitable to aid the cultural and moral development of a princeps. None had been selected for his light-heartedness. After his accession, many of the intellectuals had remained at court, like Granianus moving to positions in the imperial secretariat. Their augmented status had not instilled any increase in levity.

While his cousin-brother reigned, Mamaea had kept Alexander safe. Yet despite all her efforts, dark stories of depravity and vice seeped from the intimates of Elagabalus. Alexander remembered how, all at once, these whispered stories had appalled and excited him. Elagabalus had cast off any decency, cast off the restraint of his mother. A life of dinners, women, roses and boys, of futile pleasure on more pleasure; a hedonistic Pelion heaped upon Ossa; a life which put the imaginations of Epicureans and Cyrenaeans to shame. Think of the freedom, the power. Like a diligent warder, Mamaea had shielded Alexander from the chance to experience such temptations. But she had not shielded him from the end of it all.

A dark night, torchlight reflected in the puddles. Two days before the ides of March. Alexander was thirteen, standing in the Forum with his mother. Shadows shifting on the tall columns of the temple of Concordiae Augustae. The Praetorians handed their victims over to the mob. Both were naked, much bloodied. Elagabalus, they dragged with a hook. It entered his stomach, curled up into his chest. Soaemis, they hauled by her ankles, legs obscenely apart. Her head banged on the roadway. Most likely they were already dead. Mamaea watched the final progress of her sister, a journey she had in part orchestrated. Alexander had wanted to go back up to the palace and hide. No, at a signal from his mother the Praetorians had hailed him Emperor, and formed around him to take him to their camp.

Alexander cast around to get rid of the image. All types of cold food were presented to his gaze: watermelons, sardines, bread, biscuits. There was a mound of snowy-white imperial napkins. Alexander tossed one across. ‘Eat this.’

The polyfagus caught it, but did not begin to eat.

‘Eat!’

The man did not move.

Alexander drew his sword. ‘Eat!’

Mouth hanging open, the polyfagus was panting.

Alexander flourished the blade at his face. ‘Eat!’

A change in the light. A waft of air in the perfumed stillness. Alexander swung round.

A barbarian warrior stood in the opening. He was young, clad in leather and fur, lank long hair to his shoulders. His sudden appearance defied all explanation. In his hand he carried a naked blade. Alexander became aware of the sword in his own hand. Then he remembered. He had long known this would happen. The astrologer Thrasybulus had told him. Somehow he found the courage to raise his blade. He knew it was hopeless. No one can fight what is ordained.

When his eyes adjusted, the barbarian was visibly surprised. Somehow it was evident he had expected the chamber to be empty. He hesitated, then turned and left.

Alexander laughed, the sound high and grating to his ears. He laughed and laughed. Thrasybulus was wrong. He was a fool. He had misread the stars. Alexander was not fated to die at the hands of a barbarian. Not now, not ever. Thrasybulus was no more than a charlatan. If he had been anything else, he would have seen his own fate, would have known what the next day now held for him. The stake and the faggots; let him burn slowly or suffocate in the smoke.

This would all end well. The Emperor knew it. Alexander had faced death, and he had not been found wanting. He was no coward, no mean little girl. Their words could no longer hurt him. He was a man.

Along with the barbarian, the last of the servants seemed to have vanished. Even the dwarf was gone. The pavilion was empty except for his mother on her throne, Granianus beside her, and Alexander himself with the polyfagus. Alexander did not care. Elated, he rounded again on the latter. ‘Eat!’

There was a sheen of sweat on the man’s face. He did not eat, merely pointed.

Three Roman officers now stood in the doorway, helmeted, cuirassed. The leading one was holding something in one hand. Like the barbarian, they waited until they could see in the gloom.

‘Felicianus has returned.’ The speaker threw the thing he carried. It landed heavily, half rolled.

Alexander did not have to look to know it was the head of the senior Prefect.

The officers drew their weapons as they moved into the tent.

‘You too, Anullinus?’ Mamaea’s voice was controlled.

‘Me too,’ Anullinus said.

‘You can have money, the Prefecture of the Guard.’

‘It is over,’ Anullinus said.

‘Alexander will adopt you, make you Caesar, make you his heir.’

‘It is over.’

Alexander moved to his mother’s side. The sword was still in his hand. He was no coward. There were only three of them. He had been trained by the best swordsmen in the empire.

The officers stopped a few paces from the thrones. They looked around, as if taking in the enormity of the actions they were about to commit. The raking sunlight glanced off the swords they carried. The steel seemed to shimmer and hum with menace.

Alexander went to heft his own weapon. His palm was slick with sweat. He knew then his purchase on courage had been temporary. He let go of the hilt. The sword clattered to the ground.

One of the officers snorted in derision.

Sobbing, Alexander crumpled to his knees. He took hold of his mother’s skirts. ‘This is all your fault! Your fault!’

‘Silence!’ she snapped. ‘An Emperor should die on his feet. At least die like a man.’

Alexander buried his head in the folds of material. How could she say such things? It was all her fault. He had never wanted to be Emperor; thirteen years of self-negation, boredom and fear. He had never wanted to harm anyone. What you do not wish that a man should do to you …

The officers were moving forward.

‘Anullinus, if you do this, you break the oath you took before the standards.’

At his mother’s voice they stopped again. Alexander peeped out.

‘In the sacramentum did you not swear to put the safety of the Emperor above everything? Did you not swear the same for his family?’

His mother looked magnificent. Eyes flashing, face set, hair like a ridged helmet, she resembled an icon of an implacable deity, the sort that punished breakers of oaths.

The officers stood, seeming uncertain.

Could she stop them? Somewhere Alexander had read of the like.

‘Murderers are paid in just measure by the sorrows the gods will upon their houses.’

Alexander felt a surge of hope. It was Marius in Plutarch; the fire in his eyes driving back the assassins.

‘It is over.’ Anullinus said. ‘Go! Depart!’

The spell was broken, the thing now irrevocable. Yet they did nothing precipitous. It was as if they were waiting for her last words, knowing they would receive no benediction, instead nothing but harm.

‘Zeus, protector of oaths, witness this abomination. Shame! Shame! Anullinus, Prefect of the Armenians, I curse you. And you, Quintus Valerius, Tribune of the Numeri Brittonum. And you, Ammonius of the Cataphracts. Dark Hades release the Erinyes, the terrible daughters of night, the furies who blind the reason of men and turn their future to ashes and suffering.’

As her words ended, they moved. She stilled them with an imperious gesture.

‘And I curse the peasant you will place upon the throne, and I curse those who will follow him. Let not one of them know happiness, prosperity or ease. Let all of them sit in the shadow of the sword. Let them not gaze long upon the sun and earth. The throne of the Caesars is polluted. Those who ascend it will discover for themselves that they cannot evade punishment.’

Anullinus raised his sword. ‘Go! Depart!’

Mamaea did not flinch.

‘Exi!Recede!’ he repeated.

Anullinus stepped forward. The blade fell. Mamaea moved then. She could not help raise her hand. But it was too late. Alexander looked at the severed stumps of her fingers, the unnatural suddenness of the wide red gash at his mother’s throat, the jetting blood.

Someone was screaming, high and gasping, like a child. Anullinus was standing over him.

‘Exi!Recede!’