Rome's Executioner (Vespasian) Page 16

  ‘I can only read it to both of you together or not at all,’ the old priest replied.

  ‘Then it’s not at all,’ Sabinus said, turning to leave.

  ‘Sabinus!’ Vespasian shouted, his voice so commanding that it stopped his brother in his tracks. ‘I need to hear it. You will do this for me.’

  ‘Why should I, little brother?’ Sabinus shouted back, spinning around to face Vespasian.

  ‘Because I have as much right to hear it as you have to refuse, but if it is not read out we will never know which one of us was right. So if you walk away now I swear to you, Sabinus, that all the wrongs you have done to me throughout our lives will seem as nothing to the wrong that you do me today, and I will hold a grudge in my heart against you until my grave.’

  The fire in Vespasian’s eyes caused Sabinus to pause and think for a moment. Vespasian could see that he was wrestling with an inner turmoil. He was not just resisting out of pigheadedness; he was genuinely afraid.

  ‘What are you scared of, Sabinus?’ Vespasian demanded.

  Sabinus glared at his brother. ‘Of being left behind.’

  ‘By whom? Me?’

  ‘I’m the elder brother.’

  ‘Age has nothing to do with this, Sabinus, nor does our individual ambition. It’s our duty to raise our family’s dignitas within Rome and in that we’re both equal. Whatever is in this prophesy is for both of us and we should listen to it for the sake of the house of Flavius.’

  ‘As you wish, Vespasian,’ Sabinus said eventually. ‘Let’s hope that I’m wrong and it’s just a load of meaningless twaddle.’

  ‘Thank you, brother.’

  ‘If you have decided then I will read it out to both of you,’ Antenor said placidly. Behind him the other priests sat expectantly on their chairs, gnawing on bones.

  ‘Yes, Antenor,’ Vespasian said.

  Sabinus grunted his assent.

  Antenor lifted the scroll and read out loud:

  ‘Two tyrants fall quickly, close trailed by another,

  In the East the King hears the truth from a brother.

  With his gift the lion’s steps through sand he should follow,

  So to gain from the fourth the West on the morrow.’

  Vespasian frowned and looked at Antenor. ‘So what does it mean?’

  ‘That I can’t tell you.’ The old priest rolled up the scroll and placed it back into its box. ‘We do not interpret these things, we are—’

  ‘Just conduits?’ Sabinus chipped in.

  Antenor smiled benevolently at him. ‘Precisely. Now, if you’ll excuse me I have done my duty by you and must return to Rhaskos. I have his mutton to eat.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Vespasian said, turning to go.

  Sabinus nodded his head and followed. ‘For the first time I’m happy to concede that you were right, Vespasian, there was nothing to fear in that prophecy, it did no harm to hear it and it made an old lunatic very happy because he now thinks that he’s done his duty by his god or whatever Amphiaraos is.’

  ‘I was hoping that you might be able to add something to it, Sabinus.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘The prophecy at my birth. I know that you know about it.’

  ‘Then you will know that I’m forbidden to speak of it.’

  ‘Not if you go by Father’s oath.’

  ‘But that is relevant only if one of us is unable to aid the other because of a previous oath and I don’t see you in need of help at the moment.’

  ‘There must be something that you can tell me.’

  ‘Look, I was very young, my memory of it is hazy; what I can tell you is that there was no prophecy as such, it was just the auspices that caused a fuss.’

  ‘What were they?’

  ‘I can’t tell you any more, I’m sworn against it. Anyway, I was four; I barely remember them and I didn’t understand them – just as I didn’t understand the prophecy that you were so keen to hear just now. None of these things ever makes sense unless you look back with hindsight, and what good are they then, eh?’

  ‘But surely that defeats their point; they’re not hindsight, they’re foresight so you’ve got to work out how to interpret them,’ Vespasian said as they walked out into the burning midday sun. ‘The only part that seemed to have any relevance to us was “the truth from a brother”. Would you tell me the truth if I was an eastern king?’

  ‘I certainly wouldn’t just tell you what you wanted to hear, if that’s what you mean. Anyway, I don’t see either of us becoming eastern kings; and as for all those tyrants, who are they?’

  ‘Perhaps Sejanus does succeed in becoming Emperor and the other three are his successors.’

  ‘Then what relevance would the prophecy have to us in those circumstances? We’d be as dead as these,’ Sabinus said, pointing to the long row of statues that lined the path to the colonnaded walkway.

  ‘Well, I’m glad to have heard it even though it does seem to make no sense,’ Vespasian muttered.

  ‘What was that all about then?’ Magnus asked from the shade of the colonnade.

  ‘Nothing, it seems,’ Sabinus replied.

  ‘Where’s Rhaskos?’ Vespasian asked.

  Magnus grinned and pointed to the sleeping form further along the colonnade. ‘Gone to receive a message.’

  Sabinus looked up – and then stared in disbelief. A huge ginger-haired brute of a man, with a missing left eye, was walking towards them.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Vespasian asked, ‘you look like you’ve seen a ghost.’

  Sabinus turned away as the man passed and waited until he was out of earshot.

  ‘That’s exactly what I have seen.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Vespasian asked, thinking that his brother was rambling.

  ‘That man,’ Sabinus replied pointing at the receding figure, heading out of the complex towards the coast. ‘Remember I told you about the pirate attack on my way here?’

  Vespasian and Magnus both nodded.

  ‘Well, he was the trierarchus. He should be dead; the ships were only thirty paces apart, I saw him get an arrow deep in his left eye.’

  Magnus was unimpressed. ‘You must’ve been mistaken. Perhaps he had a brother.’

  Sabinus shook his head. ‘No, that was him, all right; you saw how his left eye was missing?’

  ‘He must have survived then,’ Vespasian said, ‘and his crew brought him here for healing.’

  ‘It couldn’t have been far, I suppose,’ Sabinus conceded, ‘no more than a few days. But even if he did survive the journey I saw enough of those wounds in Africa to know that there is no way that he could have been healed.’

  ‘Perhaps there is more to this place than we thought,’ Magnus said with a trace of reverence in his voice.

  ‘More than meets the eye, you mean?’ Vespasian quipped.

  ‘Don’t laugh, Vespasian,’ Sabinus said quietly. ‘If they can heal a man who should be dead then there must be real power here, a power older than Mithras, and it should be taken seriously.’

  CHAPTER VIIII

  BY THE TIME they got back to the ship it was early evening and too late to sail. Rhaskos had slept most of the afternoon away but had not looked at all refreshed upon waking. He had refused to tell them what reply he had received from Amphiaraos; all he would say was that he had been spoken to in his dream by the Hero and that he was now contemplating the meaning of the message. Whereas that morning they would all have found some amusement in the situation, now even Sabinus was taking Rhaskos seriously; not because they believed in the curse but because they were curious to see if the slave fever would disappear through Amphiaraos’ intervention.

  After a mild night lying on the open deck beneath a swathe of stars, thickened by the early setting of the moon, Vespasian awoke to a turquoise dawn sky feeling refreshed. He had been lulled asleep by the gentle sound of water lapping against the hull but now this had been replaced by a more strident sound: waves breaking on the rocky cove. He felt the shi
p swaying beneath him and sat up immediately; a cool breeze blew in his face.

  All around him the ship was coming to life. Half of the forty-man crew were bending the main- and foresails on to their respective yards, then furling them ready to be hauled up the masts, whilst the rest were preparing to weigh the fore and aft anchors. Rhaskos moved around the deck like an excited hound, barking at everyone and baring his teeth and growling at the slightest error or sign of slacking, such was his anxiety to be under way as fast as possible.

  ‘What do you make of that, sir?’ Magnus asked, giving Vespasian a thick cut of cold pork and a cup of well-watered wine. ‘A fucking wind, eh, who’d have thought it? What a weird place.’

  ‘That was some strange stuff we saw yesterday,’ Vespasian agreed, biting off a hunk of pork. ‘Where’s Sabinus?’

  ‘Ah well, he’s a bit too busy to be joining us for breakfast, if you take my meaning,’ Magnus replied, pointing towards the bow.

  Vespasian turned to see his brother leaning over the side, convulsing violently.

  A series of loud orders from Rhaskos through a speaking-trumpet caused the fore-anchor detail to start to heave on their cable. As the anchor – a small boulder – cleared the water the stroke-master began his monotonous beat and the slaves started to back oars. The ship eased gently away from the cove then, as the aft-anchor cable tautened, began to swing round. The huge quinquereme came parallel to the shore and Rhaskos shouted through his trumpet again. The aft-anchor detail heaved hard on their cable and the anchor lifted from the seabed; below on the oar-deck the slaves, as one man, reversed stroke and the ship started to glide forward. Once the aft anchor had been secured on deck another series of shouts caused the mainsail hands to start hauling on a halyard, raising the yard aloft. When it was in position six men clambered up the rope ladder on the mast and made their way, three on either side, along the footropes of the yard. At another signal from Rhaskos they released the brails, unfurling the sail that flapped in the wind until its sheets were tallied. The wind snapped the sail taut, the drumbeat from the oar-deck accelerated and Vespasian felt the ship lurch forward.

  ‘Thanks to our Mother Bendis for this wind,’ Rhaskos called to the sky as the crew went forward to deal with the foresail.

  ‘Shouldn’t it be Amphiaraos you should be thanking?’ Vespasian asked, walking over to him at his position between the steering-oars.

  ‘No, this is Bendis’ work,’ Rhaskos replied with a grin and shouted another series of orders through his trumpet.

  The yard was hauled up the forward-raked foremast and soon the foresail was set and the ship put on another turn of speed.‘What makes you so sure that it wasn’t Amphiaraos?’ Vespasian continued when Rhaskos’ attention was again free from nautical matters.

  ‘Because the dream that he sent me was so fanciful I can’t understand it and so I haven’t done what he suggested.’

  ‘You still believe that the ship is cursed then?’

  ‘Without a doubt.’

  ‘So why have we got a wind?’

  The old trierarchus smiled; there was a self-satisfied glint in his eye. ‘Because whilst I was communing with the Hero yesterday, as insurance I had my crew sacrifice the third ringleader to Bendis, under the mast. They cut his body in two and placed a half on either side of the ship then walked between it with the sails to purify them and themselves. The Macedonians do the same sort of thing with a dog but we find a human much more potent.’

  Vespasian raised his eyebrows slightly; Rhaskos’ religious fervour had ceased to amaze him. ‘Well, it seems to have worked,’ he conceded, ‘but what about the slave fever, has that gone?’

  ‘No, we’re still cursed in that respect; over a quarter of them are suffering from it now.’

  ‘So why don’t you do whatever Amphiaraos told you in your dream?’

  Rhaskos shook his head mournfully. ‘Because it seems so ridiculous, and it would be suicide.’

  ‘Suicide?’

  ‘Yes. Perhaps I should have more faith in the Hero but I just can’t bring myself to do what he suggested.’ He looked at Vespasian apologetically. ‘I dreamt that I took a slave by the hand and in return for his oar I gave him a sword.’

  The breeze and the stroke-master’s beat remained steady; the day wore on. The extreme heat had diminished with the arrival of the wind and conditions on deck were much improved. On the oar-deck, however, the fever was spreading gradually and the slave-master had been forced to abandon the lowest level of thirty oars on each side, operated by single slaves, leaving just the middle and top rows working, both operated by pairs of slaves. The resulting loss of speed irked Rhaskos, who kept up a constant stream of entreaties to his various gods.

  Keeping a mile or so out to sea, the ship slid past the bay of Marathon and on down the Attic coast. After two days they crossed the Saronic Gulf to the Peloponnese, weaving through the numerous trading vessels making their way to and from the port of Piraeus in one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world.

  Early in the morning on the fifth day they approached the strait between the southern tip of the Peloponnese and the island of Cythera. Vespasian and Magnus were leaning on the bow-rail watching the dry coastline pass by, so clear through the pure air that, even at a distance, individual trees could be picked out on its hills. Sabinus joined them, looking pale and none too steady on his feet although he had not been sick for a couple of days now.

  ‘We’ll be making the crossing to Italia soon,’ Vespasian said, idly turning his attention to a couple of distant trading ships some three miles ahead. ‘What happens when we get to Ostia?’

  ‘We’ve got to get the priest to Antonia,’ Sabinus replied weakly, leaning against the rail, ‘and then we wait.’

  ‘For what?’ Magnus asked.

  ‘For Macro to tell us how and when to get Rhoteces to Capreae.’

  Magnus looked alarmed. ‘Hold on a moment, there’re two things in that sentence that I don’t like the sound of: Macro and Capreae. Why’s this the first that I’ve heard mention of them?’

  ‘Yes, Sabinus,’ Vespasian said, equally as alarmed, ‘why haven’t you told me about Macro’s involvement before?’

  ‘Oh, so he’s told you about taking Rhoteces to Capreae then, but you just didn’t bother to mention it to me, did you?’ Magnus sounded aggrieved.

  ‘That’s because you don’t have to come.’

  ‘Are you going?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well then, so am I. And what’s Macro got to do with this?’

  ‘Antonia’s using him as our route to Tiberius,’ Sabinus replied. ‘In return she’ll commend his loyalty to the Emperor and recommend that he uses him to replace Sejanus. It’s an alliance of convenience.’

  ‘Well, it don’t sound too convenient to me,’ Magnus grumbled. ‘The last time we saw Macro he was trying to prevent us getting out of Rome; I tried to take his head off and he left a dagger in Vespasian’s leg.’

  ‘Magnus is right, Sabinus; and he would have got a good look at us both.’

  ‘Yes, and I don’t suppose he’ll be too pleased when he gets a good look at the two of us again, if you take my meaning.’

  ‘Well, I doubt that Antonia’s going to change her plans just because you’ve had a difference of opinion with Macro,’ Sabinus said dismissively. ‘Anyway, he’s working with us now so I’m sure that he’ll be happy to put the past behind him – if you ask him nicely and give him his dagger back, that is,’ he added with a thin smile.

  ‘Very funny, Sabinus,’ Vespasian snapped, ‘but I don’t intend to get that close to him.’

  ‘You might not have a choice,’ Magnus said darkly and stomped off to the other end of the ship to where Sitalces was sitting with Artebudz and Drenis under the awning.

  Vespasian swallowed hard; he did not fancy coming face to face with Macro but it seemed that it was going to be unavoidable. Contemplating the problem, he turned his attention back to the two distant ships and watched with interest
how they were forced to tack with the wind, zigzagging to negotiate the narrow strait between the island and mainland. Even at its reduced speed the quinquereme was slowly overhauling them as it made the passage on a straight course, under oars.

  ‘Do you have any more surprises in store for me, Sabinus?’ Vespasian asked after a while. ‘It would be nice to know now whilst there’s still time to think about them.’

  ‘I’ve always told you whatever you needed to know at the time,’ Sabinus replied testily.

  ‘No you haven’t, you’ve only told me what you thought I needed to know. If we’re to work together effectively we need to share everything because it’s impossible to make the right decisions without all the information. You weren’t aware that I had come across Macro so you didn’t think it important to tell me that his interests and ours are now aligned.’

  ‘You should’ve told me that you’d come across him in the first place.’

  ‘He was trying to arrest me on the Aemilian Bridge four years ago; the way I saw it he was just another Praetorian doing his duty. I would have mentioned it if I’d known that he’s now changed sides.’

  ‘So I’ve told you now; what difference does it make?’ Sabinus snapped, hating being lectured to by his younger brother.

  Vespasian fought to retain his temper. ‘The very fact that Macro has got to where he is in the Praetorian Guard shows that he is a man of ruthless ambition and not one to let bygones be bygones. He will have his revenge on me if he sees and recognises me, there’s no doubt about it. The question is whether his desire for revenge will interfere with whatever plan we put into place to get Rhoteces in front of the Emperor.’

  ‘He would be a fool if it did.’

  ‘You might think so, but pride is blind. I left him sprawling in an undignified heap in the dust; he may well think that the slight to his dignitas is too much to bear and use the opportunity to stick a knife between my ribs, just to make himself feel better, even if it jeopardises everything else.’

  Having met the man Sabinus could see that his brother’s hunch might not be so far from the truth. ‘You could be right, I suppose,’ he conceded. ‘We’ll just have to try and keep you away from him.’