Daughters of Rome Read online

“He says the same about me,” said Diana. A fleet herd of gazelles had been released into the arena below, galloping in panicked circles. Four lions came roaring one by one from a trapdoor in the sand.

  “How long have you lived in Rome now?” Marcella pondered what to call an ex-rebel without family name or title, and substituted a friendly smile for a salutation.

  “Eighteen years,” he said briefly, and turned back to Diana. “How are your Anemoi, Lady? The chestnuts I sold to the Red faction.”

  “They won at Equirria. Did you see?”

  “I avoid the races.” The gazelles were running in panicked circles now, the lions chasing them down one by one.

  “Well, Equirria was thrilling. Those wretched Blues scratched, but my Anemoi took the Greens and the Whites as easy as anything. The Whites came up from behind, but—”

  “He’s not interested, Diana,” Marcella said. Too late: a platter of fruit had already been converted into a circus track, a ripe strawberry had become the Reds, a cube of cheese the Whites, a cluster of grapes the Greens. The Briton listened inscrutably, but Marcella thought she caught a flash of amusement in the dark eyes. Well, Diana could be rather amusing in her childlike way. Still, I’d better rescue him. “So you were the one to sell her that team of chestnuts?” Marcella smiled, trying to draw his gaze. “You may regret it—she has no other topic of conversation now.”

  “—three lengths ahead in the last lap—” Diana droned on.

  “I don’t mind talking horses,” Llyn said. “What else does an old savage like me have to offer?”

  “Since you mention it,” Marcella jumped in quickly, “I’m something of an amateur historian, and I’m always interested in the truth. A view of your father’s rebellion from your own perspective—I could do justice to his reputation, if I knew what really happened.”

  “—and now the Reds are favorites for the Cerealia races, and we’re going to crush the Blues.” Finally finishing, Diana popped the defeated cube of cheese that was the Whites into her mouth and grinned at Llyn.

  The last gazelle lay dead in the arena. A lioness tore ravenous at its fallen carcass while a black-maned male stalked the sand and roared. Another trapdoor opened and a team of bestiarii trooped out with nets, tridents, short bows. They fanned out toward the black-maned male, blades glittering in the sunlight.

  “Perhaps we could speak sometime,” Marcella persisted. “I’d be greatly interested in anything you could tell me.”

  The Briton gave a slow blink and looked at Diana instead. “Why do you care so much for the races, Lady?”

  Diana tossed a grape into the air, catching it neatly between her teeth as she considered. The black-maned lion went down snarling in the arena below, taking an archer with him. The man screamed, his belly opened clear through his back by a swipe of claws, and the crowd howled. “I love the speed,” Diana said at last, reflectively—or at least as reflectively as Diana ever spoke about anything. “And the danger. The horses running their hearts out and the drivers killing themselves for a win. Don’t you enjoy it?”

  “No, I’ve seen real danger.”

  Marcella drew in a breath to ask him about that, but Diana answered first. “I haven’t. Nobody lets me. So I watch the races instead. I’d kill myself for wins too, if I could drive properly.”

  “Driving a chariot’s not as hard as you Romans make it out to be—a knack for the reins, a sense of timing. The turn’s tricky, but all that needs is practice.”

  “Really?” Diana hooked an elbow around the back of her chair, cocking her head at him, and Marcella felt a familiar tingle of anger at being shut out. Why do the most interesting men always end up talking to Diana—the least interesting girl in Rome?

  “You’ve been a long time in Rome now,” Marcella put in to Llyn, quickly counting the years. Eighteen years’ captivity—he must not have been much older than Marcella herself when he’d been brought to Rome in chains. “How much do you remember of Britannia?”

  Llyn looked at her coolly. “I’m not so old my memory’s gone dim, Lady.”

  “I didn’t say you couldn’t remember it,” she shot back. “I merely wondered if you still choose to.”

  “Every day.”

  The last two lionesses banded together, snarling and clawing, but the bestiarii worked in a team and brought them down. They vaulted atop the fallen tawny bodies, holding their sweaty arms up to the cheering crowd, and Emperor Otho leaned forward to toss silver coins into the arena.

  “I hate animal hunts.” Diana grimaced.

  “They fought bravely,” Llyn judged as the bestiarii danced off victorious through the Gate of Life and the dead lions were raked away by arena attendants.

  “The lions or the gladiators?” Marcella smiled.

  “Oh, the lions.”

  “Can an animal be brave?”

  “Of course they can,” said Diana at once.

  “But how would a lion know the meaning of courage?”

  “Why does one have to know the meaning of courage to be brave?” Llyn ap Caradoc countered.

  “Does it count as courage if you’re just cornered?”

  “Yes,” Diana and the Briton said in unison.

  “You’d know better than I, Diana.” Marcella couldn’t resist aiming a little jab at her cousin. “You do spend half your life with animals, after all. Quaint.”

  “Whatever you say.” Diana took a swallow of wine as the Gate of Life rumbled open again and the purple-cloaked gladiators came out for their fight. “I just don’t like to watch animals die.”

  Llyn watched the gladiators fling their cloaks aside, pairing off. “I don’t like to watch men die, Lady.”

  “Oh, gods’ wheels, call me Diana. Everyone does.”

  “Briton!” Emperor Otho’s beaming voice cut across the cheerful tumult of the box to Llyn. “Come, bend that savage expertise my way and choose a fighter for me to back. I’ve lost the last two wagers to Salvius here, and I’m determined to fleece him.”

  “Of course, Caesar.” Llyn rose, bowing politely, and came forward to lean on the rail beside the Emperor. He might be taller than Otho, Marcella noted, and broader too—but he was still outshone by the Emperor’s dazzling presence. Half a moment’s scrutiny of the fighters in the arena below, and he pointed out a Briton with a wiry beard. “That one.”

  “He’s half the size of the others! Why did you pick him out?”

  “I always bet on Britons, Caesar.”

  “Rather sentimental of you,” Marcella noted.

  Otho wasn’t listening. “A hundred denarii, Salvius!” And he threw down a handful of coins.

  The gladiators fell on each other. Marcella wrinkled her nose, turning her head away before the blood could start to fly, but the great Caratacus’s son watched intently, hands locked around the rail as his eyes tracked the fighters back and forth across the sand. Diana wandered up beside him, a cup of wine in hand. “I thought you didn’t like watching men die.”

  “I don’t.” Following the wiry-haired Briton as he jabbed savagely at a nimble Greek with a trident. “But I’m used to it.”

  The Briton went down on a quick strike from the Greek, dying slowly with a blade through his lung. The Emperor turned ruefully back to Llyn. “Not a very good choice.”

  “I didn’t say he was a good choice, Caesar,” Llyn said. “I said I always bet on Britons.”

  The glint came back into Otho’s eye—the glint that always reminded Marcella of the hard streak behind his charm. The hard streak that had successfully pulled off a coup over the bodies of Fortuna knew how many rivals . . . But Otho at last decided to laugh, and flipped a coin at Llyn. “Well said.”

  Llyn’s arm flashed up and he backhanded the coin spinning over the railing into the arena. A gladiator darted to scrabble it out of the sand, and Llyn saluted him.

  “I suppose you don’t have gladiators in your own country,” Marcella said. “Perhaps you might tell me—”

  “No,” Llyn ap Caradoc cut her off
. “I don’t care to discuss those days, Lady. With anyone.”

  “Don’t blame you,” said Diana. “Look, the elephants—I think they just dance to pipes and don’t get killed.”

  Absently she passed Llyn her wine cup. Just as absently he took a swallow and handed it back. Diana’s hovering suitors looked at the Briton, resentful, and Marcella felt her own lips flattening into a sour line. I try to start up an intelligent conversation with a man, just for information’s sake, and Diana still has to grab all the attention. If she’d been the one to bat her eyes at Marcus Norbanus earlier, I’ll bet he wouldn’t have excused himself so early.

  The Emperor soon declared the day’s festivities at an end, a flashing god in an entourage of mortals as he led the procession back toward the palace. The praetor with moist hands descended on Diana—“My dear young lady, I do hope you will look favorably on my suit! When can I speak with your father?” Marcella enjoyed Diana’s protests as the praetor bore her off. She turned to claim Llyn ap Caradoc’s attention now that he was free, but he had already seized his cloak and was taking the opportunity to disappear into the throng of guests.

  Lollia beat her way through the crowd in her flashing silver tissue and claimed Marcella’s arm. “For once, my honey, I’m the one with the news.” She was smiling, their last quarrel during the dress fittings apparently forgotten. “Ride with me and I’ll torture you with it.”

  “What news?” They settled into Lollia’s litter—much bigger and more ornate, now that she had married into the Imperial family.

  “It’s your husband,” Lollia said as the litter rose swaying and the bearers swung down the street. Marcella couldn’t help but remember the last time they’d ridden in a litter together, when they’d been spilled out by a mob and had to run for their lives. “I heard Lucius backslapping with the Emperor’s officers. The Emperor offered him a post here in the city, but he angled for one in the upcoming campaign instead.”

  “As what?” Marcella snorted. “Paid mooch?”

  “As observer to the battle.” Lollia waved a vague hand as the litter joined the slow procession crawling back through the palace grounds. “Message running and so forth. Whatever it is that observers do during battles.”

  “Knowing Lucius, it won’t involve getting his hands dirty.”

  “At least this gets him out of your hair, doesn’t it? I thought you’d be happy.”

  “I suppose.” Observer to the battle, though . . . much more my line than Lucius’s. He only bothered observing anything that would boost him up the ladder to a higher post.

  “Thank the gods war is men’s business.” Lollia shuddered as their litter was set down at last, at the marble steps mounting toward the gardens of the Domus Aurea. Lamps glowed like golden bubbles and slaves were already streaming out with rosewater foot baths in silver ewers. “All the mud, the legionaries, the danger—”

  “And the chance to see history,” Marcella mused. “The clash of an emperor and a usurping emperor, armies deciding the fate of Rome—how wonderful to see all that.”

  “Wonderful?” Lollia eyed her a little oddly. “It’ll be men dying, thousands of men on both sides. It will be horrible.”

  “At least it will be real.” Suddenly irritated, Marcella cast a glance over Lollia’s jewels, her powdered skin, the wine cup in her hand. “Some of us prefer real life to parties and wine.”

  “I wasn’t the one who didn’t want to get my hands dirty helping plebs during the flooding,” Lollia said tartly.

  “Yes, you were very keen on that as long as you could get away from your husband for a few hours and take your pet Gaul with you. Very admirable, Lollia.”

  “He is not a pet!” Lollia tugged her hand out of Marcella’s arm and flounced off as they were ushered into the vast triclinium. Marcella felt no urge to call after her. The mere sight of her cousins exasperated her these days. Even her sister—there was Cornelia now, lurking long-faced by a column. Couldn’t she even try to smile?

  Marcella took a goblet of wine from the nearest slave, trying to stifle her sourness. It was a beautiful night, after all. Emperor Otho’s usual exotic crowd: senators, praetors, consuls, and their wives all mixed together with actresses, astrologers, charioteers, courtesans, even a star gladiator or two from the day’s games. Too many guests for formal dining, and they all mixed in the gardens where gilded braziers kept away the chill of early spring and half-naked slaves in gold tissue circulated with cups of warmed wine and trays of dainties.

  “These Imperial parties are all the same.” Diana’s voice came unexpectedly at Marcella’s elbow. “Ever notice that?”

  “It’s rather beautiful.”

  “Yes, but it’s always the same.” Diana rubbed a hand down the marble nose of a horse rearing, massive and statue-carved, out of a bank of jasmine. “The food is delicious, the wine is expensive, the people are beautiful, and the conversation is witty.”

  “They aren’t all beautiful.” Marcella watched a portly senator wheeze past in one of the short embroidered tunics Otho had made fashionable—not a forgiving fashion to the elderly. “And they aren’t all witty, either,” she added as she heard the tail end of a particularly labored epigram from another guest.

  “So what’s the point of it all?” Diana turned to the statue of the horse and scrambled lithely up, seating herself sideways on its marble back. Her airy white skirts caught the cool evening breeze and billowed about her knees, and she swung her feet freely, ignoring the stares.

  “Diana,” Marcella said crossly, “get down from there. Do you always have to be the center of attention?”

  “Don’t care if I am or not.” Diana leaned down to accept a cup of wine from an Imperial slave too sophisticated to look startled. “I just do what I want.”

  “How nice for you.”

  “Diana!” Tullia hissed, bustling over with curls bobbing. “Get down! Do you realize how people are staring?”

  “Let them,” Diana grinned.

  “Showing your bare legs in public like a slave girl—the idea!”

  Diana reached down and peeled off her gold-strapped sandals, hanging them over the horse’s marble ear. “Go away,” she advised Tullia, “or I peel off the rest.”

  “Oh, Domina,” a half-drunk tribune chortled, draping an arm over Tullia. “Please stay!” A drunken chorus went up.

  “Gaius!” Tullia slapped the tribune away and huffed off. Diana lay back against the horse’s marble neck, her pointed face tilted up at the stars. “Are you making wishes?” Marcella couldn’t help but ask. A wild little thing perched on a statue—so beautiful. So beautiful she can get away with anything.

  “I’m wishing things would change.”

  “They have changed. The moment Piso and Galba died, things started to shift. Didn’t you feel it?”

  “Things changed for Cornelia, maybe.” Diana’s eyes were still fixed on the sky overhead. “For Lollia. Not for me.”

  “Then change them,” Marcella said over one shoulder, wandering off. “At least you can.” Nothing had changed for her either, but it never did. No matter what I try to do about it.

  “I just heard Lucius is to accompany the army north as an observer!” Cornelia came to grip Marcella’s arm. “Is it true?”

  “Yes.” Marcella shrugged. “And don’t bother being angry at me just because Lucius works for Otho now—you know he’ll toady up to anyone who can advance his career.”

  Cornelia brushed that aside. “It could be terribly dangerous. Aren’t you worried?”

  “Oh, it won’t be so dangerous as all that. Lucius never puts himself in harm’s way if he can help it. Besides, Otho won’t have far to march, since Vitellius got farther south than anyone anticipated. The two armies will meet somewhere up north, and there will be a battle, and that will be that. Otho’s taking eight thousand men, so I imagine he’ll win.”

  “So many?” Cornelia sounded sharp. “I didn’t realize.”

  “This is Nessus!” Domitian dragged up the
plump young astrologer in his symbol-spangled robe, oblivious to Marcella and Cornelia’s frowns. “I recommended him to the Imperial steward when the Emperor was looking for astrologers to tell fortunes for his guests—Nessus, my Marcella here doesn’t believe me when I say you’re never wrong! Tell her fortune for her, that will do it—”

  The young astrologer had quick bright eyes and a ready professional smile—a smile that blinked a little as he bowed over Cornelia and Marcella’s hands. “Ah, my good ladies. Always a privilege to read such lovely palms.” A certain amount of mystical chanting ensued, to Marcella’s amusement. “Lady Marcella, you should prepare for a long journey, and very soon! And Lady Cornelia,” Nessus continued, taking Cornelia’s unwilling hand. “Your heart may now be broken, but rest easy! A man comes to heal it. Now, if you will excuse me, I hear the fates calling.” His eyes flickered over Marcella and Cornelia for just an instant, and then he disappeared speedily into the throng.

  “You see?” Marcella smiled at Domitian. “Charlatans always know a cynic like me when they see one. ‘A long journey’—couldn’t he have come up with something a little more original?”

  “Nessus isn’t a charlatan! He said I’d be a great general and a prince of Rome and—”

  “I’ve had my stars read a dozen times,” Cornelia broke in, bitter. “Not one of them ever told me I’d be a widow. And now I’m supposed to rejoice because supposedly a new man is coming along?”

  “If you were a widow, I could have you.” Domitian’s fingers dug hungrily into Marcella’s arm again as Cornelia gave a blind shake of her head and moved off. “All to myself.”

  “I doubt there’s room in your cradle for me,” said Marcella.

  “I’m not a child!” he flared. “Don’t ever call me that!”

  More wine as night fell; more golden globes of light being lit under the sculpted trees. Otho still held court, a brilliant sun surrounded by lesser moons. Nessus read more palms, making plump rouged matrons giggle. Lollia stood dutifully with her new husband, and Diana still sat high above everyone on her marble horse, rather like the goddess in her moon chariot up in the sky overhead. Gaius came to squawk at her for a while, but a troop of acrobats had just begun performing in the atrium to the rhythm of a dozen drums, and Diana cupped a hand to her ear as if she couldn’t hear Gaius’s complaining. He went off muttering.