The Eagle's Vengeance

11

Perennis flicked a glance across the trio arrayed behind the freedman, a moment of puzzlement crossing his face as his eyes met Marcus’s. Cleander raised his hands in a gesture of resignation, and the praetorian’s eyes returned to him before the split-second sensation of recognition had time to sink in.

‘Forgive me, noble Caesar, for my impetuous decision to bring these men into your throne room with me. Knowing of your deep love for the men of your imperial army, Senator Albinus and these two loyal officers begged me to allow them to offer you their deepest respects in addition to their quite stupendous gift of booty from distant Britannia. How was I to resist such a heartfelt plea for them to be allowed to prostrate themselves at your feet on behalf of the senate and the legions, especially as I knew that you would be modelling your toga picta this evening? What better sight could there be for devoted officers than their emperor dressed in the very garment that celebrates the martial prowess they exercise in your name?’

Perennis bridled, his face darkening as his anger waxed full.

‘You don’t talk to the emperor, Chamberlain, you talk to me! What possible justification could you have for compromising the safety of our beloved Caesar?! These men have no official permission to enter the imperial presence, no good reason for doing so, and any one of them could be an assassin bent on murder!’

Cleander shrugged, waving an arm at the thirty or so armed and armoured men positioned around the chamber. His voice softened slightly, a note of unalloyed praise licking at his listeners’ ears.

‘Surely not, Prefect? For a start, your guards on the door were most assiduous in their searches of Caesar’s guests, and I note that you had more than the regulation number of men on duty even before you burst in with this fresh contingent of guards. I feel safer here and now than I would in the middle of one of Senator Albinus’s legions, given the famed loyalty of you and your men to our beloved Caesar.’ He paused significantly, allowing Albinus’s name to sink in. ‘And surely you recall the senator, he was most warmly greeted by the emperor earlier this year on his return from Dacia, having not only put down a Sarmatae rebellion both cruelly and without any danger of it being repeated for a generation or more, but also having saved one of Caesar’s most profitable gold mines from an upstart German prefect and his cohort of deserters, if my memory serves me right.’

Albinus bowed slightly to the prefect, his face a study in passivity, and the freedman pressed on, clearly calculating that he could not afford to allow the praetorian back into the conversation.

‘And so I entreat you to forgive me this small indulgence, Caesar. The senator and his colleagues, both men who fought alongside him with great distinction and took part in the rescue of the gold mine, represent no more threat to you than the most loyal of your guardsmen. And besides, when I saw the magnificence of the gift they have brought to you from the empire’s distant north frontier as a mark of the legions’ loyalty and love for their emperor, I knew at once that you would have me struck down as a disloyal cur were I to deny them an audience.’

Perennis opened his mouth to speak, his eyes narrowing as he began to wonder as to the exact nature of Cleander’s game, but the emperor spoke first, his voice eager as it cut the prefect off before he had a chance to speak.

‘A gift? What is it, Cleander?’

‘Gold, my Caesar. A quite startling quantity of gold.’

The freedman smiled into Perennis’s sudden consternation, smirking as the prefect’s face turned an ashen grey. Commodus nodded, although to Marcus he looked a little put out.

‘Gold, you say? I suppose an emperor can never have too much gold, although recent confiscations have swelled the imperial coffers quite nicely, eh Prefect? I was hoping for some captured barbarian weapons, and perhaps a few dozen captured slave girls.’

Cleander spoke quickly, recognising the danger in his emperor’s lukewarm response.

‘Yes, my Caesar, the prefect and his men have indeed made you richer than you might ever have expected through their pursuit and prosecution of those among us whose loyalty has not been to the empire and your pre-eminent position as its ruler. But this gift of which I speak is a fortune, Caesar, enough wealth to allow you to indulge yourself in whatever way you choose. Enough money to build you your own gladiatorial arena here within the walls of the Palatine, and to recruit the cream of the empire’s gladiators for your private entertainment. Enough to recruit a harem of beauties from every province so that you can take your pleasure with a pair of different women every night for the rest of your life …’ He paused to allow Commodus’s imagination to work on the images he was suggesting before delivering the killer punch. ‘Given the apparent weight of the consignment, I estimate that they may have brought you as much as one hundred million sesterces worth of gold.’

The emperor’s eyes narrowed as his servant’s words sank in, and Perennis stared at the chamberlain in barely disguised horror as Commodus leaned forward and gestured his chamberlain closer.

‘That much gold? And these men have marched all the way from Britannia to bring me this fortune?’

Cleander smiled slightly, calculating that he had sufficient control of the conversation to allow Albinus to speak.

‘Senator? This was after all your idea …’

Remaining rigidly at attention, the senator spoke quickly, knowing that Perennis was seething with poorly disguised fury at the sudden uncontrollable turn of events.

‘Hail Caesar! May it please you Caesar, Tribune Scaurus here was the officer who liberated this prize from the barbarians north of the wall built by the divine Antoninus Pius, utterly destroying our last remaining enemy on the frontier in the process. He brought his discovery to the attention of the imperial Sixth Legion’s acting commander …’ He paused, as if searching his memory for the name. ‘Ah yes, Camp Prefect Castus.’

Perennis started again, his eyes betraying his surprise at not hearing Sorex’s name.

‘But I gave orders for there to be no operations north of the wall! All units were to hold in place until-’

‘Yes, Prefect Perennis.’ Albinus and Scaurus had considered their story with the greatest of care before leaving the transit barracks, and the senator was swift to cut Perennis off before he could take control of the situation, the urgency of his interjection spurred by the knowledge of what the praetorians would do to him if he failed to get his story out. ‘Having taken advantage of a brief opportunity to kill five thousand barbarians, and liberate this startling quantity of gold from them, that most experienced officer Prefect Castus quite correctly deemed it best if Tribune Scaurus marched it south under the guard of his two auxiliary cohorts, rather than have it fall under the control of any single senior officer. The prefect deemed it best to remove the temptation presented by so much wealth, so to speak, enough gold to buy the loyalty of the Britannia legions, and in doing so take the chance to pay homage to your imperial glory, Caesar. Tribune Scaurus and I were colleagues in Dacia, and so he thought it best to bring the gold here to Rome, into my safekeeping. At my suggestion his fifteen hundred spearmen have brought the spoils of war to your palace, Caesar, every man sworn to die in defence of their emperor, every man the veteran of a dozen battles fought in your name to bring you triumph!’

Perennis stared at him for a long moment in the silence that followed, then turned to face the emperor, either rage or a mortal fear for his own life making his right eye quiver minutely.

‘Caesar, with your permission, I feel that it would be unwise for us to indulge these fantasies any longer … I’ll have these men …’

‘Us, Prefect?’ Cleander’s voice was still soft, but it cut across the praetorian commander with more than sufficient authority to silence him. ‘You feel it unwise for us to indulge these fantasies? Surely it is Caesar’s place to determine if this gift is a fantasy. Caesar’s place, Prefect, and not yours. After all, a million aureii should prove difficult to conjure out of thin air, wouldn’t you say? It is of course your decision, my Caesar …’

Commodus spoke quickly, waving aside Perennis’s horrified protests, his eyes gleaming with the excitement of the moment.

‘Bring in this gift, Cleander, and prove that what you say is true. Prefect Perennis, order your men back to their places.’

The freedman strode back to the doors, ignoring the praetorians who had frozen where they stood at the emperor’s command, and flung them open again to reveal the startled guardsmen they had passed moments before. He called out a command in a loud, clear voice at odds with the previous softness of his tone.

‘Bring in the gold!’

The door to the room where the Tungrians waited opened in response to his shouted command, and one by one the chests were carried through it and up the wide corridor into the anteroom. Cleander stepped closer to the door guards, and Marcus barely heard his softly spoken words as he muttered a dire warning.

‘These chests contain the proof of your prefect’s treachery. Make any attempt to block their entry to the throne room and I promise you that you’ll die with him. Just not as quickly …’

Stepping back into the room, he raised a hand to point to the gold bearers’ slow procession as the first of the chests approached the doorway.

‘These boxes full of gold are carried by loyal auxiliary soldiers of the First and Second Tungrian Cohorts, Caesar, the men who captured this magnificent prize for you. And note, Perennis, they are unarmed, and represent no threat to our beloved emperor.’

Marcus, his gaze fixed on Perennis, saw the prefect’s eyes narrow again at the mention of the Tungrians, his face taking on the slightly puzzled expression of a man who knew that the word should mean more to him than it did, as Cleander continued his address to the emperor.

‘These men have proven their loyalty to you on a dozen battlefields across the northern empire, as you can see from their faces, and now they bring you the spoils of their struggles as homage to your pre-eminence among all Romans.’

As the first chest was carried into the throne room Marcus realised the brutal logic that had underlain Albinus’s selection of men to carry the gold through the city. Not only were the soldiers he had chosen among the biggest and strongest men in the two cohorts, but to a man their faces were disfigured by scars inflicted on them by their enemies in the succession of battles that the Tungrians had fought since the beginning of Calgus’s rebellion two years before.

‘That’s close enough!’

Perennis had regained something of his composure in the face of looming disaster, and stepped forward to stop the procession, drawing his sword in a rasp of iron on scabbard fittings. Cleander smiled crookedly at him, shaking his head slightly as the Tungrians lowered their burdens carefully to the throne room’s intricate mosaic floor.

‘I always thought that being the only member of the imperial court to carry a sword was a purely ceremonial privilege. After all, the days when the emperor Trajan told his prefect to use his for him as long as he ruled well, but against him if he ruled badly, are long gone, are they not? But to draw your sword in the presence of the emperor, Prefect? Who presents Caesar with the greater threat, I wonder, his loyal servants who have risked their lives to win him a fortune, or any man who dares to unsheathe a blade in his presence, no matter how elevated his position? But no matter, I’m sure Caesar knows best …’

He strode across the room and threw back the lid of the closest chest and thrust a fist into the sea of gold coins within, pulling out a handful and nodding to Albinus, who quickly opened the other boxes to reveal the treasure that filled them almost to their brims. Striding past the praetorian prefect he went down on one knee before the emperor, holding out the coins while Perennis looked on white-faced.

‘Here, my Caesar, look at these coins, and tell me if Prefect Perennis’s charge of fantasy rings true.’ He waited while Commodus stared down at the small heap of gleaming gold coins in his lap, then picked one up and peered more closely at it. ‘See how the reverse of the coin is decorated with an image of Britannia, to represent your victory over the barbarians who sought to steal the province from you. It is traditional, I believe, for Britannia to be depicted in chains after such a victory, of course, but you can overlook such an oversight, I’m sure, unless there is some deeper meaning …’ He looked up at the emperor with his face perfectly straight. ‘And now, Caesar, look at the head that adorns these coins.’

Commodus turned the aureus over in his hand, staring down at it for a long moment before his face creased in a frown.

‘But this isn’t my head.’

Cleander spoke again, his voice subtly changing tone to that of a man reluctantly revealing a distasteful truth.

‘Indeed, Caesar, and nor is it your beloved father’s. Upon a closer inspection I realised that the profile depicted on these coins seems to be that of your praetorian prefect. But I’m sure there is some rational explanation. What do the words around the coin’s rim say?’

The young emperor’s voice fell to a whisper.

‘Imperator … Fides Exercitum?’

For a moment the throne room was utterly silent, as Commodus digested the full magnitude of what had been revealed by the three simple words that circled the profile of his closest adviser.

‘Emperor?Loyalty of the soldiers?!’

The words were bellowed at the top of the emperor’s voice as he rose from the throne in a scatter of flashing gold, turning to point an accusatory finger at the recoiling Perennis who raised his hands in helpless defence, his unsheathed sword unwittingly held out before him.

‘M-my C-caesar …’

‘Emperor?! Fucking EMPEROR?!’ Commodus strode forward, putting a finger in the prefect’s face with an apparent disdain for the sword less than a foot from his body. ‘You sought to take my throne, and now you raise your sword to me?! Seize him!’

The praetorians closest to Perennis snapped out of their amazement and stepped forward, gripping the man who until a moment before had been the master of their world. Perennis allowed the sword to fall from his hand, and it clattered loudly onto the mosaic to lie unnoticed at his feet. Cleander stood in silence with a grim smile of satisfaction, watching as Commodus’s volcanic temper took hold and burst from him in an angry roar.

‘I’ll have you beheaded, here and now, you scheming bastard. I’ll have your guts ripped out while you’re still alive to watch, and then I’ll …’

‘Caesar!’

Every man in the room turned to stare at Scaurus, both Cleander and Albinus gazing in amazement as the tribune stepped forward and snapped to attention. Commodus turned slowly to face him with a blank-eyed scowl of fury, and for an instant Marcus was convinced that the emperor was about to take out his ire on the man with the temerity to interrupt his furious screams of rage.

‘Forgive my interjection, my Caesar, but I must bring a matter of great importance to your attention before you pass judgement on this man.’

Falling silent, Scaurus waited with a commendably blank face for Commodus’s reaction. Again the entire throne room seemed to hold its breath, and the emperor stared down from his dais at the lone figure standing before him. When he spoke his voice was calm, although it seemed to Marcus as though his grasp on the rage that had boiled through him a moment before was tenuous at best.

‘And who are you, that dares to interrupt your emperor? Perhaps I’ll have your tongue cut out to teach you to respect the throne a little better?’

Scaurus went down on his knees, lowering his gaze submissively.

‘Caesar, I will happily cut out my own tongue if you command it, if only you will hear me out.’

Commodus stepped down from the dais and walked with slow, deliberate footsteps across a tiled representation of a retiarius, the gladiator’s net and trident held ready to strike, producing an ornately engraved dagger from within the folds of his toga.

‘I carry this with me at all times, and have done ever since that idiot Quintianus tried to knife me on my way home from the theatre one night. My praetorians were too slow in realising that he was among them, and if he had not stopped to shout that the senate had sent him to kill me he’d have put this blade in my guts. Ever since then I’ve gone everywhere armed with the very knife that would have killed me if he’d not been such a fool.’ He paced to a halt before Scaurus with the knife raised. ‘So, tell me your story, Tribune, and believe me, if I don’t believe it merited your impudence then I’ll cut your tongue out myself!’

From his position behind Scaurus and slightly to one side, Marcus could see the emperor’s face with the knife’s blade held up before it barely inches from that of his tribune, his eyes gleaming with purpose, but Scaurus’s voice was as level as ever when he replied, without any hint of the threat hanging over him.

‘Caesar, the praetorian prefect sent one of his sons to Britannia in the position of military tribune three years ago. While serving with the Sixth Legion on the frontier the younger Perennis betrayed his legatus to a rebel leader, and sent the legion into an ambush that cost both the legatus’s life and the legion’s standard. He hoped to profit from the legatus’s death by the grant of a field promotion to command what was left of the Sixth.’

‘That’s a damned lie, Caesar, my son would never have …’

Commodus spun on his heel, turning to glare at Perennis.

‘One more word from you, Perennis, and your short remaining span of life will become very much more painful!’

He slowly turned back to face Scaurus, his tone now more questioning than threatening.

‘I am aware of the eagle’s loss, as I am aware that a tribune of the Sixth appointed by the former praetorian prefect has recently restored that legion’s honour by recapturing the eagle.’

Scaurus shook his head.

‘Not so, Caesar. The eagle that now parades before the Sixth is a replica, carefully fabricated to match the original’s exact specification, but no more the genuine article than the man who discovered it. The eagle’s “discovery” was planned by the praetorian prefect, and simply intended to undo the damage done by his son, of whose treachery and death he was informed by an anonymous letter written by a senior officer in the army of Britannia.’

Commodus narrowed his eyes, leaning close to Scaurus and speaking softly in his ear.

‘And you have proof of these accusations?’

Scaurus nodded slowly.

‘I do, Caesar. The centurion standing behind me not only witnessed the original act of betrayal, but he also killed the prefect’s son as punishment for his treachery. I therefore felt it fitting to send him north of the Antonine Wall when rumours emerged that the eagle was being held in a barbarian fortress, and at the cost of many good men’s lives he managed to recover it along with an item which, while somewhat gruesome, provides provenance for the eagle. If I may, Caesar?’

Commodus nodded, and Scaurus turned to gesture to Marcus. Under Albinus’s disbelieving eyes the young centurion crossed to the last of the chests, thrusting his arm into the gold and searching for a moment before pulling out the eagle that had been rescued from The Fang. He stepped forward and knelt before Commodus, holding up the battered golden standard in both hands. Distracted, the emperor handed his knife to a guardsman and took the eagle, holding it up to the lamplight.

‘It looks genuine enough, even if it’s perhaps a bit too battered to be the real thing. But this alone is not proof, it could easily be a fake.’

Scaurus bowed his head momentarily in acknowledgement of the emperor’s point.

‘Indeed Caesar, on its own this is not enough to prove my case. But as I said, that isn’t all that Centurion Corvus here managed to rescue from the barbarians.’

Marcus paced across to the first chest and dug his hands into the coins, pulling a heavy bag from within the treasure’s depths. Reaching into its open neck, he held up the preserved head of his dead birth father.

‘This is the head of the Sixth Legion’s legatus, Gaius Calidius Sollemnis, Caesar, hacked from his dead body on the same afternoon that the eagle was lost. Senator Albinus can doubtless stand witness that this is indeed his head. Forgive the smell of cedar oil, I had the legatus’s head preserved in it until very recently, and it is rather pervasive.’

The senator nodded slowly, unable to take his eyes from the grotesque object before him.

‘Indeed I can, Caesar. He was a family friend. Thanks to these men he can now be accorded some measure of peace, and burial in his family’s plot.’

Albinus stared at Scaurus for a moment, and Marcus read a hard edge in the glance that had not been there before. The emperor took the head from the young centurion, sniffing with distaste at the aroma rising from it.

‘All of which is very touching, but you still haven’t proven that this is really the Sixth’s standard.’

Scaurus nodded.

‘In that case Caesar, allow me to present the definitive proof.’

He reached into his toga. Half a dozen men tensed, hands on the hilts of their swords, only to relax when he pulled out nothing more threatening than a pair of writing tablets.

‘Here is the proof, Caesar.’ He held up one of the notepads, its exterior battered and discoloured by a dark-brown stain. ‘This tablet is a record maintained by the Sixth Legion’s standard bearer, a man of great diligence who wrote a painstaking description of his eagle, noting its every little scratch and dent, before he died in battle fighting to his last breath in its defence. You will note that the tablet’s exterior is stained with his blood. And this — ’ he held up the second tablet, its wooden case crisp-edged and without blemish ‘- this is the sworn testimony of a Sixth Legion centurion, a man who knew the standard bearer better than any other man alive since they were brothers, that this tablet belonged to his sibling, and that the notes inside are an accurate description of the eagle. If I may?’

He reached out a hand towards the eagle, pointing to a deep score on the underside of its left wing, then opened the stained tablet and read from the notes scratched into its wax.

‘Scratch, two inches long, incurred in battle against the Batavian traitor cohorts. Vengeance delivered.’

Commodus nodded slowly, passing the eagle to Cleander.

‘Well now, it seems that the tribune here has indeed earned the right to interrupt his emperor, at least on this occasion. Chamberlain, you are hereby instructed to have this eagle refurbished and returned to the Sixth Legion, and to remove any stain from the legion’s records connected with its loss. It seems that Legatus Sollemnis was the victim of yet more of the former praetorian prefect’s poisonous ways …’ He paused, a peculiar smile crossing his face. ‘But before you do, I’ve an idea. You, come here.’

He beckoned a praetorian guardsman standing by the throne-room’s door with a spear held upright in his hand. The soldier, long conditioned to instant and unquestioning obedience, strode across the room and snapped to attention, his eyebrows rising as Commodus reached out and took the spear from him. The emperor held out a hand while he considered the weapon’s long wooden shaft, staring closely at the point where its iron head was connected to the wood.

‘Sword!’

The soldier obeyed promptly, unsheathing his spatha and presenting it to the emperor hilt first. Commodus took the sword and held the spear out in front of him, raising the spatha and hacking down at a point just below the base of the long iron blade to send it clattering to the floor, leaving a clean stump of wood where the spearhead had been attached. He nodded in satisfaction, holding the sword out to its owner.

‘Nice and sharp, just like a soldier’s sword should be. Dismissed!’

He waved the bemused soldier back to his place by the wall, contemplating the denuded spear shaft for a moment before walking across to Cleander and taking the eagle back from him.

‘Knowing how the military does love to make everything with more than one purpose, I’d imagine that this standard fits quite neatly …’ The emperor slotted the eagle’s hollow base down onto the shaft, nodding in satisfaction. ‘There, just as I thought, a perfect match. So, Perennis …’ He walked across to the disgraced prefect with the spear held lightly in one hand. ‘All this time I’ve treated you as a man whose only concern was with his duty, and with the good of the empire, and, in return, all this time you’ve been plotting to murder me and replace me on the throne. You had a dynasty in mind as well, didn’t you, with those two boys of yours in command of the Pannonian legions? A nice quick march down through Italy and you’d have had half a dozen legions to back up your claim alongside your freshly purchased legions from Britannia. I’ll have them both killed, of course, and the only pity is that you won’t live to see it happen. Cleander?’

The freedman stepped forward, his face expressionless despite the scale of the triumph he had engineered over his rival.

‘Caesar?’

‘Send parties of fast horsemen to summon this traitor’s sons back to Rome, in their father’s name mind you. Let them believe that he’s taken the throne, and doubtless they’ll provide conclusive evidence of his treachery. Once they’re detached from their legions, they are to be killed and buried where they’ll never be found.’ Cleander bowed and turned away to do his master’s bidding. ‘Oh, and Cleander …’ The emperor’s servant turned back with a knowing look.

‘Caesar?’

As Marcus watched, the same strange smile crept back onto the emperor’s face.

‘Call for the Knives. Have them come to me here.’

‘As you wish, Caesar.’

Commodus turned back to the disgraced prefect with a flourish of his improvised standard.

‘And so, Perennis, the wheel turns full circle. You recruited my Knives to do the dirty work necessary to maintain the empire, and now I will unleash them upon your family. Your line will be expunged from existence with the same thoroughness you ordered them to use with the Quintili clan, the Aquila brothers and-’

‘Aquila!’ Perennis’s eyes were locked on Marcus, wide with sudden recognition. ‘It’s him! He’s Aquila! He’s the son, the only survivor. He’s different, older, but it’s him, I know it!’

In the depths of his terror at impending death he had latched on to the name of Marcus’s family and finally made the connection that had evaded him moments before, belatedly recognising the Tungrian centurion standing before him. Tearing an arm free from his captors he pointed an accusatory finger at Marcus, his voice close to hysteria.

‘He served in the Guard, before his father sent him to Britannia to save him from imperial justice, and he murdered the men I sent to arrest him and return him to Rome.’

Commodus turned slowly to look at the young centurion, who stared rigidly at the wall behind Perennis.

‘Really? You’re trying to tell me that an equestrian officer serving in the army of Britannia is the son of a senatorial family you liquidated three years ago? Let’s put that claim to the test, shall we?’ The emperor addressed Marcus, who stiffened his body as a sign of respect. ‘So, Centurion, what is your name?’

Marcus spoke without hesitation, knowing that he could end up dying alongside the man who had ordered the deaths of his family if he failed to convince the emperor of his assumed identity.

‘Caesar! Marcus Tribulus Corvus, Caesar!’

‘And where were you born?’

‘Here in Rome, Caesar, in the Caelian!’

Commodus pondered.

‘I see. And how did you come to be serving in an auxiliary cohort? Wouldn’t the son of a member of the equestrian class be better off taking a position with one of the legions?’

Marcus creased his lips to simulate a gentle but uncontrollable amusement, lowering his voice from the harsh bark he had used to answer the emperor’s previous questions.

‘My father, Caesar, served with the same cohort when he was my age. It was his opinion that it would be more character forming for me to be exposed to the rougher elements of the army.’

Commodus smiled.

‘Did he, indeed? Fathers have a habit of wanting what they believe to be for the best for their sons, even if their opinion sometimes runs counter to what their sons might prefer. My own father, may the gods rest his departed spirit, insisted that I study with a succession of tutors when all I really wanted was to learn how best to wield a sword.’

Encouraged by his wistful smile, Marcus chanced one last comment.

‘Whereas for myself, Caesar, training with weapons always came before the classroom.’

The emperor nodded absently, turning away even before the young centurion’s sentence was complete, gesturing to Marcus with a hand.

‘Men like this are what have driven the empire to the successes it has achieved, sons of Rome happy to serve in the most arduous of conditions to secure our frontiers. And you, Perennis, have the temerity to traduce this man’s good name by comparison with that of a known traitor!’

Nostrils flaring as he involuntarily sucked in a lungful of air, Marcus fought his instinct to leap upon the emperor, as Commodus unknowingly repeated the false accusation that had seen his entire family slaughtered out of hand. Just as he was about to surrender to the overwhelming urge to snap out a hand and crush the emperor’s windpipe, the big man turned away, hefting the improvised legion standard in one hand as he strode back towards Perennis, the anger swelling in his voice as he neared the cringing prisoner.

‘I went with my father to Germania ten years ago or so, along with half a dozen legions, and I remember vividly the victory parade after we’d crushed the Marcomanni. There was an eagle bearer out in front of his legion, one arm in a sling, the other holding his eagle held proudly in the air, and my father walked up to him and put a hand on his shoulder, turning back to me with a proud smile. “This is my sort of soldier, Lucius,” he said, “a man who will fight to the death for his eagle even when the enemy swarm all round him.”’

He paused, turning a circle to show his improvised standard to everyone in the throne room.

‘You see, this eagle bearer, despite the fact that his right arm had been broken, fought on and flattened half a dozen of the barbarians with his standard, swinging it to dash their brains one at a time. But that wasn’t all he did, was it Perennis? I’m sure you can recall the story?’

The prefect’s voice quavered as he answered.

‘Caesar?’

‘I think you know exactly what I’m referring to, don’t you Perennis? That noble standard bearer also made full and savage use of this!’

The emperor flipped the standard over, showing them the shaft’s shining metal butt-spike, a polished iron cone designed to both prevent the weapon’s wooden shaft from splintering and to provide some threat if its bladed head was lost.

‘Of course the spike’s normally not much use for anything when compared with the blade. The Greeks used to call it a sauroter, a lizard sticker, but as that standard bearer proved, you can kill a man with a lizard sticker, if you’re sufficiently brutal-’

He pivoted and stamped forward with a loud grunt, forcing every last ounce of his strength into the standard’s shaft as the iron spike punched into Perennis’s lower gut with a wet thump, blood spraying to either side of the praetorian as the spear tore out through his back to transfix him. Perennis gasped reflexively, looking down in horror at the wooden shaft protruding from his body, and his eyes rolled up as he slumped forward. Commodus released his grasp on the standard with a theatrical wave of his bloodied hands, turning away as his disgraced adviser staggered forward a few steps and sprawled full length across a mosaic representation of a secutor’s armoured body, in a slowly spreading puddle of his own blood, his voice rising in a high-pitched whimper of distress.

‘You’ve ordered the deaths of enough people, Tigidius Perennis, so the least you can do is meet your own end like a man.’ The emperor barked out his last command as he headed for a small door to his private quarters on the far side of the chamber. ‘He stays there until he dies. And any man who decides to end his suffering prematurely is to die in exactly the same manner.’

The men left in the chamber stared at each other, their eyes drawn to the praetorian prefect as he lay panting on the tiled floor, his hands fretting at the spear shaft that was skewered through his groin.

‘Well now, who could have predicted that this would have gone quite as well as it did?’ Cleander turned back to his companions with a broad smile. ‘My only serious rival dying with a spear though his guts and me with a hundred million sesterces in gold to play with. That and having had the pleasure of witnessing you, Tribune, risking your life quite recklessly in order to restore the honour of a man you never knew. Quite amazing …’

He turned back to Perennis, smiling sadly down at the dying man.

‘As for you, Tigidius Perennis, I’m afraid that I’m going to have to honour Commodus’s orders with regard to your eventual death. Praetorians, clear the chamber!’

The guardsmen standing around the room barely hesitated before their discipline overrode their astonishment, and at a barked command from the centurion commanding the detachment they stamped to attention and filed from the room, leaving the four men standing around the writhing body of the dying Perennis. Cleander tipped his head to the door through which they had entered.

‘You too, gentlemen, and you can take your soldiers with you. The gold obviously remains here.’

Scaurus and Albinus exchanged glances, the senator shrugging and turning for the door with a gesture to his companions to follow him. They walked back through the palace in silence behind a praetorian who had been detailed to guide them to the gate, and emerged from the Palatine’s vastness onto the steps overlooking the Great Circus, the race track’s sand gleaming palely in the moonlight. Cotta and his men were waiting patiently at the foot of the wide marble stairway, and the retired centurion took the steps two at a time as he hurried to join his patron. The guardsman turned away and walked back up the last half-dozen steps, leaving the party standing in momentary silence.

Albinus addressed Scaurus.

‘I’ve a bone to pick with you, Tribune, and I neither require nor appreciate an audience of goggling soldiers.’

Scaurus nodded at the senator’s barely restrained fury, then turned to the troops standing around them.

‘You, Chosen Man. Take these men to the bottom of the steps and form them up to march. We’ll have to make our way back to the barracks the way we came in, and the Subura will be no less lively than it was before.’

Cotta and Marcus eyed each other for a moment, the veteran looking his younger counterpart up and down with a slight smile, as if he were calculating the odds, while Marcus simply spread his arms slightly and opened his hands, tilting his head and raising his eyebrows. Albinus, missing the exchange in his self-righteous anger, put a finger in Scaurus’s face and launched into a furious tirade.

‘You’ve betrayed my trust, Rutilius Scaurus! You provoked the anger of an emperor which could have all too easily spilled over and seen me dead alongside you, and as for that fool’s trick with the eagle …’

The tribune stared back at him with eyes suddenly as hard as flint, and Marcus realised that Albinus was about to get another unpleasant shock.

‘Words failing you, Senator? You’re speechless with wonder that I might take a risk to rescue the honour of a dead man?’ He took a pace closer to the bigger man, his face set in lines of anger equally as hard as those on Albinus’s face. ‘Take a good look at yourself, Decimus, or are you back to being Clodius Albinus now that I’ve offended your dignity? A man of your class died in Britannia at the start of the rebellion, betrayed and left to take the blame for the loss of his legion’s eagle, and if you can’t see the honour to be gained in restoring his reputation then I can only pity you.’

Albinus sneered at him, shaking his head in angry bemusement.

‘You can just call me Senator when we meet in the street, Tribune, and make sure you pay me the appropriate respect if you don’t want me to set Cotta and his men on you and pay you out for this disrespect with a good beating. Not that you’ll be walking the streets of Rome for long, once the emperor’s favourite freedman realises just how much gold you took from those chests to make room for the eagle and Gaius Sollemnis’s head.’

Scaurus smiled coldly back at him.

‘Is your indignation the product of your loyalty to the throne, or simply piqued pride that I took more gold than you managed to slide into your purse back in Dacia when we recovered the Albinus Major mine from Gerwulf and his Germans?’

Albinus shook his head, a superior smile playing across his lips.

‘You’ve no way of proving that accusation, Tribune!’

The smile faded as Scaurus raised an eyebrow at him.

‘Don’t I, Senator? Are you sufficiently sure of that to gamble your life on it? When you ordered me to surrender the records of exactly how much gold we’d recovered, did you ever stop to wonder if I might not have guessed what your reaction to that much gold would be?’ Albinus stared at him in silence. ‘Yes, I kept a copy. In fact what I gave you was actually the copy, while the original stayed nice and secure in my campaign chest. It’s very proper, marked with the mine’s official marks, which I’m sure a man as intelligent as Cleander will have authenticated in next to no time, while what I gave you had some small but import-ant imperfections incorporated. I’ve a most resourceful standard bearer in my First Cohort, a man with an avarice that’s the match of your own, if not quite so highly born, and he has a deft touch when it comes to doctoring the records, whether they be those of his century’s burial club or the official documentation of an imperial gold mine.’

He grinned at the senator, nodding his head at the other man’s sudden consternation.

‘I made sure that the little clues he left were subtle, nothing that would stand out to a cursory inspection, of course, but enough to see you condemned as a thief on a grand scale if ever a hint of your sordid little embezzlement were to reach the wrong ears and prompt a proper review of the paperwork. I’d imagine that it wouldn’t take very much to work out how much gold you kept back for yourself by comparison with the original documentation I can provide to the Chamberlain if the need arises. Speaking of whom …’

Cleander had appeared at the head of the stone stairs, and stood looking at them quizzically for a moment before stepping lightly down to join them, leaving a pair of spear-armed praetorians staring down at them disapprovingly.

‘You seem a little perturbed, Senator? Have the events of the evening not played out to your expectations? I have to say that I’m very content with life now that my only rival for control of the palace has been dealt with so harshly. I know this emperor well enough to be sure that he’ll be turning to me for guidance in Perennis’s absence, guidance I’ll be more than happy to turn into the exercise of imperial power once our new relationship has settled down. He does so love to spend his energies on the seduction of maidens and practice with his sword, fondly imagining himself as a notorious gladiator rather than the ruler of the civilised world. By simply being reluctantly willing to shoulder my Caesar’s unbearable burden I’ll achieve just as much control of the empire as that fool Perennis expected to achieve with all of his manoeuvring and plotting.’

He smiled beatifically down at them.

‘And now I think it’s time for you to take yourself off home, Senator, secure in the knowledge that you’ve done your duty to your emperor and averted the threat that was hanging over him as long as the previous praetorian prefect was at his side.’

Albinus nodded with more respect than Marcus had seen in him earlier, gesturing to his companions to accompany him.

‘We’ll renew this discussion elsewhere. It probably isn’t fitting for the steps of an imperial palace in any case.’

‘Just you, Senator, and your bodyguard of course. The tribune and I will stay a moment longer before he goes on his way.’

Albinus arched a disbelieving eyebrow, but found something in Cleander’s level gaze that stilled any complaint he might have made, and he turned away down the steps with a wave to Cotta. The bodyguard stared for a moment at Marcus and then nodded at him.

‘We’ll meet again, I expect, Centurion Corvus.’

Marcus met his gaze and inclined his head in return.

‘Indeed, Centurion Cotta. Perhaps we’ll provide each other with some sport, the next time our paths cross.’

Cotta barked a laugh over his shoulder as he followed Albinus down towards the street and his waiting men.

‘Oh, I have little doubt of that!’

Cleander smirked at Scaurus.

‘You need to keep your attack dog on a shorter rope, Tribune. He seems to be filled with the desire to tear out the throat of anyone and everyone that gets close enough to him.’ He stepped closer to Marcus, looking him up and down as if he were examining a finely bred chariot horse. ‘You’re a fascinating specimen, Centurion … Tribulus Corvus, was that what you said your name was?’

Marcus snapped to attention.

‘Centurion Marcus Tribulus Corvus, First Tungrian Auxiliary Cohort, Chamberlain!’

Cleander nodded.

‘Yes, that was it. Tribulus Corvus …’ He looked at Scaurus with an amused expression. ‘I believe that a tribulus is a military invention scattered in large numbers across ground where a cavalry attack is expected, a neat little device of sharpened iron that presents a spike uppermost to pierce a hoof and instantly render a horse lame. A very military name, and in that case surely one that stretches back a fair way in the city’s history, and yet I am told by men who ought to know that there is no record of any such clan title. I watched the centurion closely during that entertaining audience with the emperor, and on two occasions I could swear that I saw him barely restrain himself from leaping first at Perennis, and then at our beloved Caesar, by what appeared to be supreme self-control. So, are you simply an attack dog, Centurion, or are you perhaps something infinitely more dangerous?’

He regarded them both for a moment in silence.

‘I find it impossible to believe that you, Tribune, would do anything to bring jeopardy to your emperor, and you clearly trust the centurion here, and yet I’m finding it hard to avoid the conclusion that Tigidius Perennis was in fact correct when he pointed the finger at this young man and named him as the outlawed son of a senator who was executed for treason three years ago. And if that’s the case — ’ he raised a hand to Marcus as if to forestall an assault by the stone-faced centurion ‘- if you really are Marcus Valerius Aquila, then having successfully found a place to hide for the rest of your days on the empire’s frontier, what would be a sufficiently strong lure to bring you back to Rome? Revenge?’ He raised his hands to the night sky above them. ‘If so, then how lucky you are to have had the gods grant you the pleasure of watching the man who sentenced your family to death writhe with a spear through his guts, even if it was wielded by hands other than your own. And having met the emperor, you will now be clear that he had little part in your father’s condemnation and murder, or in any other part of running the empire for that matter.’

He waited until Marcus responded, nodding reluctantly.

‘Excellent. In which case all is well. Perennis is thwarted, the gold he sought to use for his own ends is restored to the imperial treasury, his demise has doubtless satisfied your desire to see him suffer in return for the suffering he inflicted upon your family, and you two gentlemen can return to your cohort and renew the centurion’s anonymity. I’m sufficiently grateful to you for bringing this matter to my attention to keep the truth of your parentage to myself, and to allow you to return to the shadows from which you came. I will even overlook the small matter of exactly where the gold displaced from those chests to accommodate the eagle and Legatus Sollemnis’s head might have got to. After all, I’m sure that your journey here wasn’t without its expenses.’

Scaurus opened his mouth to respond, but before he could speak the chamberlain raised a hand.

‘However, it’s clear to me that you both possess some rare qualities that might sit well in the service of the throne, at least while I’m consolidating my grip on the city. Two men such as yourselves, backed up by two cohorts of battle-hardened men with no existing political allegiances? Yes, Tribune, obviously I had you investigated as well. It’s an old name, they tell me, and once a proud one, now simply struggling to survive with no ties to any of the major families. All in all, I’d say that your continued presence in Rome might well be the answer to my most fervent prayers. So I won’t hear of your leaving for Britannia until I’ve extorted one or two trifling favours from you. And gentlemen, just in case you miss my meaning, I used the word extort then in the full sense of its meaning. This really isn’t a request in which you have any choice.’

He turned away, calling back over his shoulder.

‘I’d return to your barracks if I were you, and take some time to show your men the sights of the city. You’ll be earning the corn you consume, and the gold you spend …’ He turned back and winked at Scaurus, who met his gaze unblinkingly. ‘Yes, you’ll earn them both when I finally decide to which of my many problems you’re the best answer.’

Tribune and centurion watched as he walked away up the steps and disappeared back into the palace. After a long thoughtful pause Scaurus spoke, clapping a hand to Marcus’s shoulder.

‘Well now, Centurion, if you’re an attack dog then I’d say it’s time to get you back to your kennel. It seems we’ll be here a while longer, and after all that excitement you’re probably feeling as much in need of a bath and a quiet period of reflection in the Mithraeum as I am. Blood spilled in that fashion has a habit of seeping into the soul as well as the pores.’

Marcus nodded.

‘Indeed, Tribune. Although I’ll be praying to Our Father to grant me the opportunity to shed the blood of the other men I intend to see dead before I leave the city myself, rather than watch another man spill it for me.’

Scaurus shrugged, turning to walk down the steps to where their men were waiting.

‘I don’t know. It isn’t every man that can say they’ve had their vengeance delivered by an emperor.’

Marcus stared out over the Circus’s massive stadium before replying.

‘That’s true, sir. But if I’m to find peace from my father’s ghost I have to deal with his killers myself, not stand by while other men put them to the sword.’

The tribune turned back and looked quizzically back up the steps at him.

‘It’s not as if you even know whom you’re dealing with, beyond the name under which they do the throne’s dirty work.’

The young Roman shrugged.

‘I’ll know soon enough, Tribune. There are men in this city who know their names, and they’ll have one simple choice to make, to either aid me or obstruct me. And if they fear what the “Emperor’s Knives” will do to them if their betrayal is discovered, they’ll soon enough learn to fear the consequences of refusing me a good deal more. Tomorrow I’ll bathe, and make my peace with our god, but once that’s done I’ll be a servant of another god until this matter is dealt with and my family’s honour is avenged.’

He looked out over the sleeping city, clenching a fist and answering Scaurus’s questioning look with a single word, his voice harsh with his pent-up fury and eagerness to carve a bloody path through Rome, to hunt down and kill his father’s murderers.

‘Nemesis.’