Rule of God

VIII

Domitian was rudely awakened in the dead of night by another nightmare of Minerva warning him that she could no longer protect him. He bolted upright in his bed, dagger clutched to his chest, which was covered in sweat. He felt a trickle down his cheek, gingerly touched it with his finger and saw blood. He jumped out of bed, ran to the brass mirror and in the candlelight saw the festering ulcer on his forehead that he had been scratching.

“Minerva!” he cried out, pleading before the statue of the goddess. “Would this be all to befall today!”

He stared at his fading reflection in the mirror. His prophesied hour of doom at 9 o’clock this day was all of nine hours away. How was he supposed to breathe in the meantime? If blood must be spilled on this day, the day that he had dreaded his whole life, Domitian concluded, then perhaps Jupiter would accept another sacrifice in his place. Perhaps an innocent prophet would do, as he had used up most of the vestal virgins.

Yes, it was his only hope now.

Domitian splashed water on his face, dabbed his forehead with a towel and then pulled a cord to summon his chamberlain. By the time he had picked up his dagger from the floor next to his bed and placed it safely back under his pillow, he heard a knock.

“Enter,” Domitian said as Parthenius walked in.

“Your Highness,” Parthenius said cheerfully, pretending as if this midnight rousing was common and that the day ahead would be like any other.

“I need that astrologer we arrested,” Domitian told him. “Not the one from Germania. The other one.”

“Which one, Your Highness? There are so many in custody.”

“The Armenian, I think,” Domitian said, irritated. “I want him to stand trial so I can pass an impartial and just sentence this morning. Prepare an executioner for 9 o’clock.”

“But, of course, Your Highness. I will have everyone assembled in the throne room.”

“No, the basilica. I will have Jupiter and Minerva at my back as I dispense divine justice.” He then handed his wooden tablet with a list of names to Parthenius. “And I want every name here rounded up so they can all be executed at the same time.”

He watched the door close behind Parthenius and then collapsed back on his bed, dagger clutched to his chest, lying very still until he could hear only his own uneven breath praying to Minerva.

It was well past midnight when Athanasius left the ship at the port of Ostia, made his way across the piers and found a taxi on the Appian Way. There was lightning across the sky, and Athanasius had heard there had been quite a lot of it lately in Rome, and that it had spooked Domitian and therefore all of Rome with him.

“The Apollo Inn,” he told the driver and settled back into his open-air carriage, trying to control his concern about Helena’s fate since he had been gone. The only message he received from Virtus in Ephesus was that everything was in motion here in Rome with regards to Domitian, and that was days old.

Nothing about Helena.

He wanted her out of Rome before everything went down and the decades-in-the-making business of September 18 would finally be over. She would be safely out of the picture so that Domitian or Ludlumus had no leverage over him before they were both killed.

His path was fixed. God forgive him, if that were possible at this point.

But he could not allow himself to consider life after Domitian, or contemplate the hope of his Christian allies of a Christian world — despite their savior’s own words that his kingdom was in heaven, not on this earth. Nor even his own hope of a life reunited with Helena, of the freedom to think his own thoughts, to write as he wished, to maybe settle down and have children in this seemingly God-forsaken world.

No, he could not allow such hopes to occupy his mind, any more than he could allow the fears if he failed.

He could only focus on the task at hand — exposing the Dei and assassinating Domitian in one fell swoop. Two birds with one stone cast at Rome.

And he was that stone.

He couldn’t feel. Couldn’t waver. Couldn’t look back.

Still, he wondered how Gabrielle and the others were doing.

No, he had to put thoughts of her and the poor souls in the caves away. He had to focus on Domitian as a lifeless corpse, a god fallen.

He had to focus on killing a god, and in so doing giving all Rome hope.

The taxi turned down a hill and then a wide, well-lit boulevard to reach the Apollo. It boasted a lively tavern on the street, and a courtyard leading to an entrance to the rooms above in the back.

“This is it,” he said to the driver, holding out payment, his hand trembling ever so slightly.

“Ask for Venus,” the driver said, motioning to the whorehouse next door. “You won’t regret it.”

Athanasius watched him move down the road and pick up some sailors who could barely hold themselves upright. The taxi then headed back to the piers.

Athanasius walked around the back through the gate into a courtyard with fountains and fire pits, and then inside the small room with a counter. He ignored it and headed up the stairs to room 34.

There was Virtus, looking distressed. Behind him was a woman, a nursemaid in a smock, covered with blood. And there was another woman in the bed, moaning, clutching her stomach. Blood was running across her body. Athanasius immediately ran to her bedside.

The woman’s face was contorted by pain, but it was clear that it was Helena.

Athanasius sank to the floor beside the bed.

Virtus closed the door behind him and spoke in a low but urgent tone. “She’s been stabbed.”

“I can see that!” Athanasius barked. “Helena! Helena!”

She opened her eyes. “Athanasius, it is you? You’re alive. You cannot see my shame.”

“Who did this to you, Helena? Tell me.”

“No, Athanasius, let me die. Leave me!” she wailed, while the nursemaid put a hand over her mouth to quiet her.

“How could you let this happen?” he growled at Virtus.

“She did it to herself, to kill the child.”

Athanasius stared at him. “What child?”

“The one growing inside her belly. Domitian’s child.”

Helena looked like she had died, and Athanasius tried to shake her when the nurse pulled him away. “She’s still breathing. She’ll survive. So will the child. She missed with the knife, but the cut is deep.”

Virtus said, “We can only pray for her now. There is much to discuss but so very little time. Everything is happening so fast.”

But Athanasius was furious. This was a disaster, and he hadn’t yet stepped foot in Rome. Helena was pregnant with Domitian’s child, and she had tried to take its life along her own. Now this nursemaid and others were involved, and what was supposed to be a quiet reunion had turned into an unfolding tragedy.

Athanasius could hardly speak. Still, Virtus was right. There was no time. The wheels of fate were in motion, and if he didn’t roll with them, he would be ground to dust. “Let her sleep. But if things go badly, she needs to be ready to leave with me on the Sea Nymph later today. Now let’s go find the identity of Mucianus’s successor in the Dei.”

Virtus paused. “You are chasing ghosts, Athanasius.”

“No, Virtus,” Athanasius told him, whipping out his sword. “I know where Ludlumus lives. We will take him and make him talk.”

“That’s the thing,” Virtus said, stammering, and Athanasius could feel the bad news coming. “Ludlumus is dead.”