Marius mules xv, p.28
Marius' Mules XV, page 28
‘Not that you’d hear, since you were busy arguing with Decimus Brutus and trying to ruin the evening.’
‘Fronto, you are a marvel. Do you really think I am so careless to get into such an argument with Brutus in public? I provoked him deliberately, and within earshot of Aquila, to try and trigger a reaction. Looks like I succeeded, too. While I used one Brutus to start it all, they were busy with the other Brutus, probably trying to draw him into their plans.’
‘Gods, but the way your mind works is horrifying, Octavian.’
The younger man grinned and raised his cup of wine in salute.
‘Any other little surprises you have planned you’d like to tell us about?’
‘Only that I dropped a little powdered camellia sinensis into Caesar’s wine to give him a headache and send him home.’
Fronto’s eyes widened. ‘You did what?’
‘I know that leaf gives him headaches. I wanted to observe his enemies so I needed him gone, since they were hardly going to speak their mind with him around. The camellia was extremely expensive. Came all the way from India via Parthia. Maybe when we conquer them it will be cheaper, eh?’
His blasé manner was astonishing. Fronto shook his head and turned, marching away. He didn’t want to hear any more of the young nobleman’s machinations, else he might be tempted to plant a punch in his face. He came to regret that decision swiftly, as he rounded a corner and found Acilius Labeo waiting for him. With a sigh, knowing he was not going to get away with it all night, he ratcheted a smile up onto his face and approached the world’s most tedious senator.
The party lasted two more hours, and without further incident, for which Fronto thanked Fortuna, though he was aware that all incidents he had encountered had been Octavian’s doing, not that of luck or fate. He spent an hour of that time listening to Acilius Labeo waxing lyrical about Caesar’s plans and what part he might have in them, given that Fronto was so involved and blah, blah, blah, blah.
When the last guests had been ushered out, giving their warmest thanks and congratulations to their host and hostess for a very enjoyable evening, with some unexpected entertainment, Lucilia began her post-party tasks, directing the slaves in their work. Fronto, however, found himself staying out of the way in one of the house’s lesser rooms, sharing a jar of wine with Galronus and Salvius Cursor.
‘I hear more and more rumours of plots, you know?’ Galronus said between sips. ‘It’s common talk across the city, now. That and Spurinna’s prediction.’
Salvius leaned back, cradling his cup. ‘I’ve been thinking on that. It’s odd that any plot could be so openly suspected and yet not be uncovered. I wonder whether Caesar’s enemies might not have been a little devious and sown seeds of plots all over the place. With so much suspicion it is harder to pin down the truth, after all.’
Fronto nodded. ‘Good point. Well, we have plots against Caesar that may be fictitious, but I think we have to assume there’s a core of truth in there. We have people we know stand against him. Cimber, Aquila and Sulpicius Galba at the least. I would be tempted to add Cassius Longinus to that list, too. And we cannot rule out Cicero, for all that he seems to have gone quiet. And we have a collegium that I simply cannot fathom. Someone wealthy, and probably of the equestrian class, is paying them. But although they’re watching us all when they can, they’re not killing Caesar’s men any more. Yet they do seem to be training and preparing. What for? Who controls them? It’s frustrating.’
‘When does Caesar sail, again?’ Galronus asked.
‘Three days after the Ides of Martius,’ Salvius replied. ‘And he’s assigned me to command his bodyguard once more, but only on campaign. He still refuses to have an armed guard in the city, which is far too short sighted.’
‘Then it’s down to us. To his friends,’ Fronto said. ‘We have to hold off all danger and keep him alive. In a few days it will be the Ides of Februarius. In a month or so’s time, Spurinna’s prediction will have been proven or disproven. If Caesar is still alive then, his allotted date has passed. And then three days and he will be heading east with the army, where I doubt he will be in danger, other than from the Getae and the Parthians. One month and three days. That’s all. Can we keep him safe that long?’
‘We will,’ Salvius yawned. ‘We have to. Anyway, I’m for bed. See you in the morning.’ With that, he rose and left the room. Fronto sat in silence for a long moment, Galronus opposite, the two men staring down into their cups. After a while, with only silence laid like a blanket upon this side of the house, Fronto looked up.
‘I’m having doubts, my old friend.’
The Remi frowned. ‘What about?’
‘I am Caesar’s man. I’m loyal. I’ll no more plot against him than I will you, but sometimes, somewhere deep down, I find myself agreeing with these men. With Aquila. With Decimus Brutus. With Cicero. Every time Caesar talks to me about his plans, I come away comforted and reassured. But we both know that’s how Caesar works. If he wanted me to believe the sky was green, he could persuade me with little effort. And then I come home, and I hear things, and I sit alone, and I start to wonder whether I’m wrong. Whether I’m being fooled. Caesar is certainly capable of it.’ He leaned forward. ‘Galronus, what if they’re right? What if Caesar really does seek a crown? What if all these explanations we’ve been spun are just obfuscation to stop us seeing what he’s really doing? Because every day he becomes more powerful, and every day there is less opposition to him. Gods, but most kings I know of actually have less power than Caesar does right now. There’s only really the question of succession, and then he might as well be wearing a crown.’
Galronus shrugged. ‘We have a saying in the north. ‘You can call it anything you like, but if you get wet, it’s still rain.’
Fronto rolled his eyes. ‘Utter bollocks. What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘It means that whatever you’re led to think, the reality will show itself in the end.’
‘So you advocate waiting to see if he gets crowned?’
‘What other choice is there? You either take a stand against him like these others have, or you stand by him and hope. That’s all there is.’
‘It must be very simple living in that Remi mind of yours.’
Galronus shrugged. ‘Complication is overrated.’
‘Do you remember Verginius? My old friend?’
The Remi snorted. ‘Hard to forget. Him and his friends gave us a bit of trouble at the end.’
Fronto nodded. ‘Verginius was always a good man. Not at the end, of course. But in his soul, he’d always been the better of us. He was so republican it might as well have been tattooed on his forehead. He hated the very idea of monarchy. To him, Sulla and Marius were curses. And upon a time, I was no different.’
‘Yes you were.’
‘No I wasn’t. But I changed. He didn’t. Back at the end, when we were facing off and only one of us would make it, he said things. He’d vowed to bring down Caesar and prevent a repeat of the civil wars of Marius and Sulla. He failed, of course, and guess what? We had a civil war. But Verginius was obsessed with Caesar having used us both and left us to die. He begged me to join him and turn on Caesar.’
Galronus just nodded, watching Fronto intently, silent.
‘I said no, of course. I told him how the senate had turned on both Caesar and me. I told him how I’d seen the alternatives. That Pompey was a monster behind a smiling face.’
‘I remember, Fronto. I was there for that conversation.’
‘Not all of it. He ranted for a while, yes, about what Caesar had done, what he was capable of, what he would do. And I’m not wholly sure he was wrong. And I’ve spent years avoiding thinking about that quarry in Tarraco. About that conversation, but the more these events are building, the harder it is to avoid it.’
‘What did he say to you, Fronto. In that quarry, at the end. What did he say?’
Fronto sighed. ‘He demanded that I take on his vow. Begged me. Told me he could never rest until it was fulfilled. And I can imagine that he’s still out there, a lemure in the night, a restless spirit, unable to go because his vow is unfulfilled. Maybe he’s somehow still influencing all this.’
‘Fronto that’s just fantasy.’
‘Maybe. But he was like a brother to me once. We were family. I owed him so much.’
Galronus put his cup down. ‘You said yes, didn’t you?’
Fronto sagged back into his chair. ‘What else could I do? At the time it was a comfort for a dying man I still loved like a brother for all we’d been through. I said yes. I said his vow was my vow.’
‘Shit, Marcus, that’s bad.’
‘I know. Years now, that’s been hanging over me. I vowed to kill Caesar. But I can’t. And I know that breaking that oath might damn me to a nightmare world in the end, too, just like him. But how can I not?’
Galronus closed his eyes. ‘I’d always wondered what you said to him at the end. I’d never have believed you’d say yes, though.’
‘Where does it leave me?’
Galronus chewed his lip for a moment, and finally sat back. ‘Neck deep in the shit. And upside down.’
Chapter Nineteen
The senate’s latest meeting had not improved Fronto’s mood at all, as far as Galronus could see. He was starting to worry about his old friend. One thing he’d always admired about Fronto was his purpose and his certainty. Rarely did he dither on anything of remote importance. Sometimes his actions were planned, and sometimes they were spur-of-the-moment reactions, but they were rarely worried over. This problem was gnawing at him, though, and he couldn’t tell anyone about it, other than Galronus, of course. He’d not even mentioned it to Lucilia, for she would only adopt the worry herself, then.
And Fronto had fretted over it all morning, after raising it last night. He’d worried about it all the way to Pompey’s Theatre and the temporary senate curia there, and he’d worried about it during the tedious opening stages of the session. He’d been uncharacteristically quiet.
In fact, the only thing he had said during the entire sitting, leaning close to Galronus and muttering quietly, was ‘if we have many more of these meetings, even Jupiter’s going to be looking up to him. Venus will be building a temple to Caesar instead.’
Though, in fairness, he had a point. Every time the senate sat these days, the main order of business seemed to be finding new honours and roles to heap on Caesar. Galronus had foolishly assumed that unless they made him king, there was nowhere higher he could really go than dictator for life. Then today had happened.
Cornelius Balbus had stood, cleared his throat, and proposed new business. ‘As you may be aware, Marcus Urbinius Victor passed away a few days ago, may the gods grant him peace. This, of course, leaves only one censor for the whole republic, and his new colleague needs to be selected. I would propose that the office be granted to Caesar, for as consul and dictator, the duties of the censor would naturally complement his current roles and give him a wider access to the tools of state.’
‘I can think of a number of problems with that,’ called another voice, and they’d all turned to see Aquila standing, a black eye and a reddened nose evidence of his recent fight.
‘Oh?’
‘You know it is not the senate’s job to elect the censors. That is the task of a centuriate assembly.’
‘But we can advise, replied Cornelius Balbus with a conciliatory smile. I doubt that any recommendation made with the backing of the senate would be refused in the assembly. It would be little more than a formality.’
‘And the law,’ Aquila snapped, ‘states that no man can serve as a censor twice. Caesar was elected censor some sixteen years ago.’
‘Seventeen,’ Balbus smiled with ease. ‘But as dictator, it is within his power to amend that law and allow the appointment.’
Galronus had shifted his attention to Caesar, who was seated on a curule chair at the far side of the room, facing the seated senators, as though this was his meeting and they had been asked to attend. The dictator’s expression was entirely unreadable.
‘Then why not go all the way,’ snarled Aquila, ‘and let him change the law so that the censor can be elected directly by the senate?’
‘I don’t think we need go that far,’ Balbus laughed. ‘We are in the business of saving and preserving the republic, not corrupting it.’
Aquila was too incensed to respond, blustering for a moment, and by the time he had recovered, the senate were in general nodding. ‘How you can say that with a straight face and not be struck by Jove’s own thunderbolt, I cannot imagine,’ he said, and with that sat, glowering.
‘Censor for life,’ a senator called from across the room.
‘For life,’ others shouted.
‘To preserve the sanctity of political appointments,’ Cornelius Balbus said, eying Aquila, ‘the title should perhaps be changed. Perhaps something like “Prefect of Public Morals”, he smiled.’ Aquila snorted, but remained in his seat.
‘And Pater Patriae,’ another senator called.
Father of the country, Galronus sighed, rolling his eyes. He knew Caesar had been something of a womaniser in his time, and there were several rumours of illegitimate children, but father of a country was pushing it.
‘Shall we take the vote?’ Balbus called.
‘Is there any point?’ Aquila threw a barbed reply. ‘I can count on one hand the people who would vote against anything in this room.’
‘A vote, then.’
Galronus had watched as these two honours were heaped on the great man’s shoulders, a small gaggle of unhappy senators gathered together watching with distaste. But that was not the end of it. Cornelius Balbus having already done far too much, now Gaius Oppius stood in the silence that followed, brow and lip still miscoloured.
‘I propose that the month of Quintilis be renamed in honour of its most illustrious son. Gaius Julius Caesar being born then, it is my proposal that henceforth that month be known as Julius.’
‘Oh be reasonable,’ snorted Sulpicius Galba from where he stood shoulder to shoulder with Aquila.
‘I am perfectly serious,’ Oppius replied. ‘And if you or your friend there feel like arguing the point, I would happily batter the idea into his face once more.’
‘A vote,’ someone called.
Galronus had watched with disappointment, though with little surprise, as the rest of the session unfolded. Other, lesser, honours were granted Caesar as the session went on, and the portion of business that did not centre around the dictator came at the end, as though it were tagged on as an afterthought, a small amount of work on the actual business of state. The lictors of several of the more important and sensible attendees made sure that as the session ended and the senators left the building, Oppius and Aquila were kept well apart, for fear of the pair returning to their fist fight in public and cheapening the name of the senate in the people’s eyes.
Galronus had walked with Fronto, whose face looked bitter, as though he’d been sucking on pepper. He was not at all happy with what they had just witnessed.
‘Cornelius and Oppius should not have done that,’ Galronus said quietly.
‘Caesar should not have let them,’ Fronto rumbled. ‘He sat there like the master of all he surveyed and said not a single word in the entire session. Just sat there and watched the senate falling over itself to ingratiate its members with Caesar. What a piss-poor show it was. I almost voted against it on principle, not that it would have made much difference.’
Galronus nodded quietly. He was right. One could only blame the senators so much for kissing the feet of the man who all but ruled Rome alone. Eventually, the blame had to rest with Caesar for accepting all this madness. He was going too far, and everyone seemed to see that but him.
The Remi’s eyes swivelled to take in Caesar’s exit from the building. His lictors had come first, and then the man himself, toga wrapped around him, eyes glinting, chin high. He looked regal. Galronus had known plenty of chiefs, kings even, back in his own land, and they had looked far less regal than Caesar.
‘Stop that man,’ someone called, and Galronus’ gaze snapped this way and that, looking for anyone putting the dictator in danger. Foolish, really, since no one would get near him past his lictors, and the gathered senators, and because he had immediately assumed it was Caesar who was in danger, he had been looking the wrong way. He saw men flock to Caesar’s side, and even an archer would have had trouble landing a shot between them all. Caesar was so permanently surrounded by people, he had no need, really, of an extra guard.
Galronus turned and saw what was really happening.
From the steps of a temple, four men had burst at a run. Galronus was moving immediately, Fronto too, as well as many others, though most had also assumed it to be a threat to Caesar and had been late to spot the real danger. The four men seemed to be making directly for Gaius Oppius, who had now turned and realised what was happening.
Galronus was running now, along with the rest, but Oppius had been out ahead of everyone, on his own, and an easy target. Galronus and Fronto pounded across the open road, their togas unwinding and falling away like some discarded rag as they ran on in belted tunics alone. As the four men descended on the senator, Galronus realised with some surprise that they were not as a group intent on violence, for three of them were trying to grasp at the fourth and pull him back, though they were failing, as he kept running and pulled from their grips.
He was out ahead and now had a length of timber held tight, yanked from the folds of his tunic.
Fronto was shouting, little more than incoherent curses really, and other lictors and private guards were moving to intercept the man, but they wouldn’t be quite fast enough. Nor would Fronto and Galronus. The other three assailants had realised they couldn’t stop their companion, and also that tough men were on the way, and had pulled back, moving off towards that temple’s steps.
Galronus felt torn. Everyone was moving to intercept the attack, and no one seemed interested in the three who were now retreating. But something caught Galronus’ eye. He knew one of those men. One of the three now heading back to the temple was a man he’d recently seen in that grisly warehouse up near the burial pits. That was too much of a coincidence to ignore, and too much of an opportunity to overlook, given that the enemy were now having to meet elsewhere, and that he and Fronto had lost track of them.
