The Imperial Triumph Read online

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  Rome, September, AD 44

  Also by Robert Fabbri

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  ROME, SEPTEMBER, AD 44

  PITILESS WAS THE roar that greeted the condemned as they were herded, naked, onto the arena sand. Pleading for their lives – or at least for another mode of death – the ragged formation clung to one another; the whiplashes of the overseers rained down upon men and women alike, forcing them out into the open and, at the same time, drawing blood from their shredded backs that would inflame the hunger of the beasts waiting below the Flaminian Circus on the Campus Martius.

  A few final cracks of supple leather across the shoulders and haunches of the rearmost were enough to make them clear the line of the gates, which were then drawn closed as the overseers darted back inside. The fifty-thousand-strong crowd raised their volume even more as they toyed with themselves and salivated at the prospect of the coming slaughter.

  In their midst, in the imperial box, Tiberius Claudius Augustus Germanicus, Emperor of Rome and conqueror of Britannia, struggled to his feet, his head twitching so that the stream of drool hanging from his chin swung back and forth – although all those close enough to see affected not to. Claudius raised an unsteady hand, stilling the crowd so that only the wailing of the prisoners could be heard; it was ignored by all. ‘P-p-p-people of Rome; I, your emperor, in honour of the seventh and last day of the Roman G-Games, give you a foretaste of what is to come in three days’ time when I celebrate my T-T-Triumph, voted to me by the senate as a mark of distinction for my crushing victory over the c-c-c-combined tribes of B-B-Britannia.’ Claudius paused to allow the crowd time to laud his boast of military prowess, even though most of them could tell from their emperor’s unmartial appearance that it was nothing more than that: just a boast; the real fighting had been done by real soldiers. Again he raised a juddering arm and quietened the mob. ‘There, in the arena, stand some of the wretched p-p-prisoners that I took in my final victory before the gates of Camulodunum; the rest, who number in their thousands, will be paraded in my Triumph and then will either be auctioned off or exhibited for your entertainment as gladiators. Until that time let us enjoy ourselves with these miserable creatures, fit for nothing other than the jaws of beasts.’ With a flourish he gave a signal to the gatekeepers; the iron-reinforced wooden doors swung open.

  There was a communal gasp as, from the darkness within the bowels of the circus, there came a chorus of bestial bellows followed by the appearance of a dozen of the strangest-looking animals with long necks and an odd hump on their backs. Ungainly, the creatures trundled out into the open and looked around with an air of haughty superiority whilst masticating in a leisurely manner, causing the audience to fall about in fits of mirth at their appearance and allowing the condemned a brief moment of hope.

  Back in the thirteenth row, to the right of the imperial box, there was one man who found it impossible to join in the hilarity: Marcus Salvius Magnus sat with his chin upon his hands and his elbows resting on his knees; his face a study of a man wrestling with a problem. It was a problem that had plagued him for the half a moon that he had been back in Rome, having returned from Britannia to re-establish his command over the South Quirinal Crossroads Brotherhood after almost three years’ absence.

  ‘Look at those things!’ a huge man next to Magnus shouted, jumping to his feet. ‘What are they, Magnus? I ain’t ever seen anything so ugly and cumbersome in my life.’

  ‘Then you ain’t never scrutinised yourself in a mirror, Sextus. They’re camels and they smell about as bad as they look. They don’t put up much of a fight but they make people laugh.’

  ‘Too right, Brother, I’m going to love watching them rip the—’ Sextus stopped mid-sentence; his countenance took on a strained aspect, as if he were dealing with a troublesome stool.

  Having known his companion since signing up to serve under the Eagles on the same day, over thirty years previously, and then joining the same brotherhood upon their return to Rome, Magnus recognised the signs. ‘You’re thinking, aren’t you, Brother? You’re wondering how the camels are going to despatch the prisoners if they don’t put up much of a fight.’

  Sextus’ expression became even more pained. ‘How did you know?’

  Magnus suppressed an exasperated sigh. ‘A lucky guess, and the answer is that they can’t.’ He pointed down onto the arena floor as two oblong holes appeared to reveal the tips of ramps leading up from the dank cells below. ‘But here come some things that can.’

  Whether or not the score or so of the sleek cats, some spotted, some black, growled with hunger as they emerged into the light could not be heard beneath the rapture of the crowd and the terror of the victims as they viewed the animate instruments of their deaths. Only the camels seemed unconcerned by the appearance of such ruthless hunters – the camels, that was, and Magnus who furrowed his brow and lowered his head, running his fingers through his thinning hair.

  ‘You’re missing this, Brother,’ Magnus’ neighbour to his other side shouted over the din, nudging his shoulder with the leather-bound stump of his left arm and pointing to the victims. ‘They’re pissing and shitting themselves.’

  Magnus sucked the air through his teeth and shook his head. ‘Nah, you enjoy it, Marius, I just ain’t got the heart for it today. I’m not in the mood to be entertained, not when I’ve got to work out how to get us out of this fix.’

  ‘Why did you come then?’

  ‘Because I can get a lot more thinking done here rather than back at the tavern with that old bastard, Servius, continually nagging me to come up with a solution in quick time.’

  ‘Well, he is in charge of the brotherhood’s finances so you can’t blame him – whooa, look at that, they’ve surrounded the humans and left those strange things alone – and we have to address the situation without putting up what we charge the local traders in the neighbourhood for our protection.’

  Magnus grimaced as the crowd’s noise reached a crescendo and Sextus, to his other side, started masturbating with vigour. ‘I know, Brother; and it was me what made the purchase that got us into this mess so it’ll be me that sorts it out; I just need time to think.’

  Marius punched his stump in the air. ‘Oh yesss! They’ve split the pack up; they’re running all over the place.’ The crowd made a communal low noise of awe. ‘It just took her face right off with one bite; lovely! Ohhh, and look at that, those two are fighting over that fat bastard.’ Marius burst out a short laugh. ‘You’ve got to see this, Brother; they’re ripping them apart and the strange things are starting to get very distressed, by the looks of it.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah.’

  ‘Look, Magnus, it weren’t your fault that soon after you made what we all thought was a very good deal in purchasing that batch of Germans on your way back from Britannia, Claudius announces that he’s going to be selling off all the captives from Britannia here in Rome immediately after his Triumph.’

  ‘But I should have seen it coming. The price of household slaves has plummeted; and as for gladiators, you can’t get even half the amount that I paid for those Germans with a view of selling them on to one of the training schools when I got back here. Prime specimens, ten thousand sesterces each and I’ll be lucky to get three, thanks to that drooling fool flooding the market. That’s a loss of almost a hundred thousand.’

  ‘They’ve gone for one of them, them … what are they, Magnus?’

  ‘Camels, Brother, camels.’

  ‘Well they’ve got one down and that’s sent the rest into a stampede around the … gods below, they just trampled that cripple; you’re missing the best show of the whole games.’

  But Magnus was not interested, nor had h
e been for the entire Roman Games. He had received a crushing blow upon entering the city with what he thought were a dozen superbly built potential gladiators, only to find, a few days later, that the emperor intended to auction off over ten thousand captured Britons, more than half of them warriors, in Rome, rather than sending the greater amount for sale in the markets around the provinces. The move had deflated the city slave-market to such an extent that many of the slave-dealers had gone out of business or been forced to move to the fringes of the Empire where the disastrous effect of Claudius’ policy was little felt.

  For Magnus, however, that was not an option and he was left with a dozen healthy men of fighting age who were not only unsaleable, without taking a massive loss, but were also very hungry; unless he wanted their worth to depreciate even more he was forced to feed them copious amounts of fodder every day. It was not the situation that he had expected to find himself in when he had bought the slaves from his friend Vespasian’s parents’ estate at Aventicum in the lands of the Helvetii in Germania Superior on his way home. The sale had been forced by the death of Vespasian’s father three years before and the subsequent removal of his mother, Vespasia Polla, back to the house of her brother, Senator Gaius Vespasius Pollo, in Rome. Vespasia had decided to liquidate her assets and had sold off the entire estate; Magnus had purchased the slaves for a relative pittance of a deposit on the understanding that he would pay the balance upon his arrival in Rome. And thereby lay the problem: he was a client of Vespasia’s brother, Gaius Vespasius Pollo, and it would be unthinkable not to honour a debt to his family.

  He had been back in the city for nearly half a month now but had kept low so that the senator was not aware, yet, of his return; but he knew that this state of affairs could not go on and that in the morning he could delay it no longer: he would have to attend the dawn salutatio of his patron. Senator Pollo would, doubtless, enquire as to the whereabouts of the hundred thousand sesterces that was owing to his sister and Magnus would have to tell him the unpalatable truth. It was a situation that could lead to a disastrous rupture between Magnus and his patron who had, in the past on many occasions, used his influence to stop the full force of the law from falling upon Magnus and his brotherhood.

  And as the unfortunates down in the arena were ripped to shreds and devoured for the delectation of the people of Rome, Magnus just could not bring himself to enjoy the spectacle; such was the weight he felt at the prospect of explaining that he had not got the money nor would he be likely to have it in the near future. With a sigh, he decided upon his course of action. ‘Come on, lads; let’s get going back,’ he shouted, getting to his feet and barging past Sextus who was grunting his relief and leaving splattered stains on the back of the cloaks of the man in front and his wife. ‘We’ve got work to do.’

  ‘But it’s a public holiday, Brother,’ Marius protested.

  ‘Which is for the public; but we’re not the public, we’re the South Quirinal Crossroads Brotherhood and we shit on the public and do things in our own way, and today, just now in fact, I’ve decided to call a meeting that will convene in a couple of hours.’

  Marius looked longingly at the action in the arena. ‘But it’s the mutilations next.’

  Magnus pointed at where Marius’ left hand had been severed. ‘I’d have thought that you would have had enough of mutilations. Now come on and do as I say. I want to talk to Servius before I address the rest of the brothers.’

  ‘One of the traders from further down the Vicus Longus is here to see you, Magnus,’ a gnarled old man with milky eyes informed him as he entered the tavern that served as the headquarters of the South Quirinal Crossroads Brotherhood situated on the sharp junction of the Vicus Longus and the Alta Semita. ‘I told him to wait by the back door.’ He gestured with a blind man’s vagueness to a man sitting in the far corner of the bustling parlour, hazy with the smoke from a cooking fire behind the bar.

  Magnus squinted at the man; it was too gloomy to make out his features. ‘What does he want, Servius?’

  ‘Normal: a favour.’

  Magnus sighed. ‘Not now, I’ve got too much to think about.’

  ‘I know; we’re deep in shit but that doesn’t mean that we neglect our duties to the neighbourhood. If it got around that you’re not looking after your own then Sempronius and those West Viminal cunts will be all over us within days; you know how much he would love to expand his brotherhood into our patch. And Primus, his new number two, is very hungry to prove himself.’

  Magnus slumped down onto the chair opposite his counsellor and second-in-command. ‘You’re right, Servius; but first I need a drink.’ He signalled to the brother serving behind the bar who acknowledged him with a nod. ‘And whilst I have one I want you to have messages sent to all the brothers to assemble here in a couple of hours. Before that we’ll meet this trader; what’s his name?’

  ‘Quintus Martinus.’

  ‘Marcus Salvius Magnus, I come to you as the patronus of the brotherhood of the area in which I live, in the hope that you can prevent me from being wronged.’ Quintus Martinus wrung his hands, ingrained with dirt and covered in burn scars, and lifted his head so that he looked directly into the dark eyes of Magnus and then into the sightless orbs of Servius; both were sitting, cups of wine in hand, behind the desk in the back room of the tavern, used for transacting brotherhood business. ‘I have always paid you my dues on time and in full and never before have I required a service from you; so now, after twenty years under your protection, I beg you to grant me this one favour.’

  Magnus took him to be in his late forties by his appearance but guessed that the sallow skin, white hair and gaunt expression were the result of a hard life of constant work and struggle rather than age and he was in reality ten years younger; he indicated to a chair. ‘You may sit, Martinus, and ask your favour.’

  The trader smiled in gratitude as he took a seat. ‘My thanks, patronus. My problem is with the landlord of the tenement block where I live with my family and have my chainmaking business, on the corner of the Vicus Longus and the Chainmakers’ Street.’

  Magnus was instantly uninterested, but refrained from showing it. ‘He’s putting your rents up?’

  ‘No, patronus, just the opposite: he told me today that he’s evicting us with three days’ notice.’

  ‘One could consider that generous.’

  Martinus shrugged. ‘I suppose so; it could have been with immediate effect.’

  ‘Why’s he doing it? Are you behind on your rent?’

  ‘No, Magnus; business is good at the moment. With all the prisoners here for the Triumph the price of chains and manacles is going up.’

  ‘I’m pleased to hear it. So why is he evicting you?’

  ‘He hasn’t told me.’

  Servius took a sip of his wine. ‘There’s no reason why he has to give an explanation.’

  ‘I know,’ Martinus agreed.

  Magnus tugged at one of his cauliflower ears that, along with his broken nose, were testament to his time as a boxer. ‘What’s this man’s name, Martinus? I’ll send a couple of the lads to have a quiet word with him.’

  ‘That’s just it, patronus, I don’t know.’

  Magnus frowned as if questioning what he had just heard. ‘You don’t know what?’

  ‘His name, Magnus. I’ve never known it since he bought the property from the previous landlord a couple of months ago. He communicates with his tenants by sending a slave round with a message.’

  ‘And the slave won’t divulge his master’s name?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘What about the other tenants in the block?’

  ‘No one knows his name and we’re all being evicted.’

  Magnus paused for a few moments’ reflection, uninterested no longer. ‘Why would he want to do that, I wonder? He’s doing himself out of all the income from the block. Getting rid of you alone I can understand, Martinus, in that he may well have found someone who would be willing to pay more for your busin
ess premises. But getting rid of all the tenants living there, that’s a different matter.’

  ‘We think that he wants to tear the building down and put up a new one.’

  Servius shook his head slowly, staring vacantly at the wall behind Martinus. ‘He wouldn’t do that; no landlord in his right mind would rebuild a block that hasn’t fallen down of its own accord. Why go to the expense if you don’t have to? Mind you, I’ve heard that there’ve been two similar incidents in our area in the last month but in those cases the tenants went quietly, without coming to us, so I didn’t bother you with it, Magnus; but I’d be interested to know if there is a pattern.’

  Magnus refreshed his cup. ‘Well, if we’re going to find out then the first thing we’ve got to do is ask that slave as politely as we can just who his master is, if you take my meaning? Servius, have a couple of lads stake out the place and grab him next time he appears.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘If I’m too late to prevent your eviction, Martinus, I’ll ensure that you have an alternative.’

  Martinus rose. ‘My thanks, Magnus, you’re a fair man.’

  Magnus gave a grim chuckle as Martinus left the room, closing the door behind him. ‘That’s the first time I’ve ever been accused of being fair – have you ever heard anyone call me that, Servius?’

  ‘No, Magnus, plenty of other things, but never that.’

  ‘So, Brothers,’ Magnus concluded at the end of his explanation, ‘that is the situation. Whilst the price of slaves remains so depressed I have no choice but to go to Senator Pollo and ask what he will accept in lieu of the debt or whether he could see his way to postponing payment. Either way, I’ll have to come up with a lucrative money-making scheme very shortly, which I will.’ He looked around the faces of the fifty or so brethren to see if he could spot any signs of discontent at his leadership. Although he had not admitted that the predicament was his fault and had blamed the emperor’s policy, he was more than aware that the brighter of the brethren would construe that he was rash to buy slaves so soon after the conquest of a new province, no matter how good the bargain could have proven to be.