In the library of the Palace of the Legate, sunlight poured through the round oculus, the opening at the peak of its dome, casting a pool of light on the documents on Valerius’ brass-inlaid desk. Riffling nervously through them, he wondered, Have I somehow missed the official notice about my fate, the notice I’ve been dreading for weeks?
His slave Rufus appeared in the archway, pushing his shock of red hair away from his forehead, and announced, “I dislike having to tell you that Senator Tullius is here to see you, master.”
Valerius’ stomach turned at the thought of the man, yet he relished the feeling that he could always outwit him. He’d been doing so for years. “Let him sit and simmer while I get into my formal toga to remind him I outrank him.”
Valerius had first met Senator Tullius in the glory days when Valerius and Marcus, young teenagers, lived exultantly on their grandfather’s country estate. Tullius would visit with his cohort: a group of sour-looking men in togas, accompanied by thuggish soldiers in armor. Tullius and his group would fawn over Valerius’ uncle, Emperor Hadrian.
Later, the brothers, distressed, grilled their grandfather Verus relentlessly to learn who these men were. “They’re called Tarquin’s Council,” Verus had told them. “Powerful men who are skilled at remaining invisible.”
Tugging at his creamy silk toga to adjust its fit, and tossing a gold chain around his neck, Valerius gloomily wondered if Tullius had come with the official notice that could ruin his life.
Valerius stared, fascinated, at Tullius’ lips. They scarcely moved in his long grayish face as he droned on about the “barbarian menace.” His coiffed gray curls never bounced. Did he put some kind of glue on them?
Senator Crispus Furnius Tullius was a vain man, short of stature. His face might be called handsome, yet to Valerius it seemed somehow indistinct, like a blurry portrait: symmetrical, yet with an off-center, slightly flattened nose. The grandson of a barber, Tullius owned a business that distilled and bottled peppermint oil – one of his more savory enterprises. As ever, he had a faint scent of peppermint about him
To Valerius, the Senator seemed oblivious to everything except his own thoughts and desires. Valerius, as the brother of the Emperor-to-be, outranked him, yet the Senator gave no sign of respect. Talking continuously, Tullius only departed from his monologue to invite an occasional response from Valerius, and he would then promptly cut Valerius off to launch back into talking.
Tullius made Valerius think of a curious object he had seen in Alexandria: a little wood-and-wire model of the cosmos, in which the earth was at the center, with the sun and all the stars and other worlds rotating around it. The model had been built by the astronomer Claudius Ptolemy, and Valerius found it rather laughable. Tullius was like Ptolemy’s earth, floating in space, thinking he was the center of everything.
Abruptly the Senator changed the subject, his voice turning stern. “Severus Valerius, you’ve done inappropriate favors for the Hebrews here. You’ve relaxed some of the rules, rebuilding some of their homes and so on. You should know that these things are watched in Rome. I know you’re trying to be liked by the local population, yet you have to keep them disciplined. I’d like to report that you regret the favors you’ve done them and won’t repeat them. May I?”
Valerius nodded, even though inside he shouted a refusal. He wanted Tullius out of his sight. He smelled chickpeas and lamb cooking in Rufus’ kitchen and hoped Tullius wouldn’t ask to stay for lunch.
Keep playing dumb and prone to mistakes, Valerius breathed to himself. This as often as possible. Valerius’ strategy had long worked for him to preserve his sphere of influence, his governance of this troubled province. He liked working with the Hebrews, but he let the men of power think he had gained his office due to his family ties. He had developed the art of nodding and listening, because he’d learned that when he played dumb, men like Tullius sometimes let their guard down, revealing their intentions.
“Your brother Marcus,” said the Senator, “is serving Emperor Antoninus well at the battlefront. Important men are saying you should join him there. Of course, your brother wants you safe, yet I’ve heard he’ll soon be sending you orders to join him at the front.”
“Did my brother tell you that?” These were the orders Valerius had been dreading.
"It’s a reasonable course of action. It would be best for Rome. Wouldn’t you agree?”
Valerius froze. His anger roared inside while his face remained flat and passive. He slowly nodded.
It was now clear that these manipulative men were trying to send him into battle. If they succeeded, he would no longer be able to take care of business in Judea – and Judea needed his help!
He noted that Tullius hadn’t actually mentioned any timeframe for sending Valerius to the front. Although he knew the orders could come at any time, he wanted to believe that his brother wouldn’t summon him to battle without discussing it with him.
Tullius continued: “Marcus the Golden, your brother is called. The people are ready to like him as their Emperor. They would like him even more if his brother were a soldier fighting the Germans with him.”
Valerius nodded again, visualizing grabbing the Senator by the scruff of his neck and throwing him out of the palace doors.
“Your brother shall be Emperor when Antoninus dies, and Antoninus seems to be on his last legs now. Yet unfortunately Marcus, too, has been in poor health, so if he is to take office, the question of who would succeed him is urgent.”
There’s that rumor again. It surprised and alarmed him. He’d recently heard from soldiers returning from the front that Marcus’ health was not good. Marcus was poetic, philosophical, not as robust as Valerius, yet his body had always been supple and sinewy. As young men they took pleasure in reaching exhaustion in their racing and javelin throwing, grinning and encouraging each other.
“Well, he’s not ill now, is he? The question of who would succeed him is not really very urgent, is it? I hope not.”
Tullius shrugged. “Dum vita est, spes est. While there’s life, there’s hope. However, there’s something else for you to consider. Some of us would be pleased if you, Severus Valerius, not Marcus, were actually next in line to be Emperor after Antoninus passes on.”
Valerius shifted uncomfortably and said, “I have heard as much.”
“Yet if I know you, Valerius, you really have no such ambition. Is that right?”
Angry, defiant, Valerius kept a stony face. When he was young, he had turned down Marcus’ offer for him to be anointed co-Emperor with Marcus. He often regretted the fit of vanity in which he’d refused the offer. Now, it was becoming clear to him that he could be a good Emperor, perhaps even better than his brother. Yet he would never allow himself to take office through the plotting of men like Tullius.
A dark thought crept into his mind. These men – are they planning to kill Marcus?
Tullius continued in his monotone: “Unfortunately, we can’t do much now to make that happen. You’re far down the line of succession. One of Marcus’ lovely twin sons, Commodus and Titus, would be bound to succeed him. That would fulfill the people’s expectations, to have a natural son inherit the throne, and it would serve the cause of your family’s name. Your brother agrees, as does his wife Faustina, who of course is about to become Empress, adding even more to her power and prestige.”
It didn’t sound like they were plotting to remove Marcus soon. He wondered about Faustina, his childhood friend, and what she really desired. The rumors about her dissolute behavior in Rome were getting worse. Had she really changed so much since their childhood days?
“I want whatever Marcus and Faustina want,” said Valerius, hoping this would get him off the hook. What he really wanted was for Marcus to be Emperor while he himself took the underrated office of Prefect of the City of Rome. Marcus knew that he’d been interested in that position for decades.
As Prefect, Valerius could get rid of some of the corruption in the Senate. In his mind, he’d been developing many interesting ways he could thwart the men who consider themselves invulnerable. He could work with the handful of Senators that were honest, such as his childhood friend Senator Gaius Metellus, whose bright conversations he missed. He could also keep an eye on Faustina.
Tullius laughed. “Severus Valerius, you’re a good and simple man. I’m glad you have no lust for power. I’ve learned that you even enjoy pretending to be a centurion at the garrison several days a month.”
“That’s true,” he said, while his thoughts seethed. You don’t know me, Senator. I am a patriot, and I’m determined to get rid of you and your ilk. I’m looking for ways to undercut the entire hidden system. I should be appointed to go to the Capitol. Then, I could undermine men like you who make too much money from the war as well as profit from the ongoing ruin of Judea. That’s probably the best way for me to help Judea. I wish my brother were more interested in rooting out graft, instead of endangering himself in fruitless, endless battles.
Tullius went on, “I’ve also learned you’ve been unable to apprehend some Hebrew vandals who broke into the Jupiter temple.”
“My investigation is in full force. An arrest is imminent,” he said, in spite of the fact that he had no idea yet who invaded the temple. He added, “There’s no further sign of any serious new revolt.”
Tullius nodded. “You’d better make an arrest soon. If the insurgency gets worse, we’ll fill Jerusalem with troops, enforcing the laws we’ve been neglecting – the laws that ban Hebrews from the city altogether.”
“That won’t be necessary, Senator.” Why do I feel such a nurturing instinct towards these Hebrews? They certainly don’t know how to look out for their own best interests.
“Well, if it does become necessary, the very first thing I want you to do is see my man Aspergus. He can help you plan strategy.”
Aspergus. He was a lawyer, and Valerius didn’t like lawyers. What did he have to do with Hebrew insurgents? Aspergus’ face was always creased with a false smile. His patrons included aristocratic Roman merchants, government bureaucrats and even a few generals. Was there already a conspiracy to persecute the Hebrews even more? He would have to investigate.
Valerius only said, “I seek to serve.”
“Fine, fine,” said Tullius. “But you better make an arrest soon. You’re likely to be called up for military service before long, and it would be best for your reputation, and your family’s, for you to be seen as effective and tough against these no-good rebels. As for your military service, I shall pull strings to make sure your brother’s wish is done, so that you’re dispatched to the German battlefield to show your valor.”
Valerius relaxed a little. “Before long” didn’t mean “now.” If he ended up leaving Judea, he would have time to groom his vice-Legate Carolus to protect the people here.
“If anything should happen to you at the front, the gods forbid,” Tullius said, “don’t worry. Your brother would probably want your money and holdings to be bequeathed to the good causes you and he support – free bread for the common people and so forth. We’d probably build a little temple in your memory too. Your sacrifice for the Empire shall not be in vain. You’d make your family look heroic if you happened to die on the battlefield. Do you understand that?”
Valerius nodded again. Tullius probably had soldiers lined up at the front ready to stab him in the back. Strange how the Senator could make a threat and ultimatum sound so sweet.
“And if the worst should come to pass, we’ll also put your face on a handsome gold commemorative coin.”
Somehow Valerius felt little solace imagining his own dead face on a coin.
Normally Valerius wouldn’t return to the garrison for another week. Yet he couldn’t stand to stay in the palace now. These toxic moments with Tullius filled the place like a poisonous cloud, and the scent of peppermint seemed to linger.
Going to his chamber, he quickly changed into a plain tunic and trousers, then summoned his guards. They tramped with him through the winding streets to the fortress, a colossal stone rectangle overlooking the Temple Mount.
Disguising himself as a man of lower rank six or seven days a month and staying at the garrison was not something he had to do. Yet he loved calling himself Centurion Valerius Claudius Cato and living with the officers and enlisted men instead of with the courtiers and sycophants of the palace.
He loved patrolling the city, observing the lives of merchants and carpenters and vintners and slaves, quietly intervening when he could correct some injustice. And he always looked forward to spending time with Flavius, although he wouldn’t let him know that.
Valerius had known Flavius Lucidaro for six years, ever since Flavius was transferred here from the Legions in Gaul. A blond from northern Italia, he was tall and wiry and quick to laugh, as well as hot-tempered, which caused problems, such as it had at the recent Jupiter temple break-in when had pointlessly harassed an innocent group of Hebrew workers. His mind would jump to negative conclusions too quickly even for Valerius, who had often been told he himself was too pessimistic and gloomy.
Flavius was the only soldier who knew that Valerius was Legate of Jerusalem and brother of the famous Golden Man, the Emperor-in-Waiting, Marcus Aurelius.
Flavius had told the eighty men under his command a cover story about Valerius: that he was a centurion from the Alexandria Legions, in training for a Jerusalem assignment. Valerius wondered if any of the men suspected who he really was. As Legate, he tried to keep his face obscured; he only went out in ceremonial garb when he couldn’t avoid it, such as to the religious ceremonies that required him to do nonsense like burn a sheaf of wheat at the feet of a statue. He didn’t like to be ogled by the masses.
He’d come to know almost all of Flavius’ eighty legionaries personally, and most of them seemed to like him. Maybe it was because he listened to their problems.
Arriving at the garrison, Valerius quickly donned his centurion’s armor and ordered Flavius to assemble a ten-man squad. Valerius joined them and they went on patrol in the streets.
As Valerius rode in silence, his heart was a cold lump in his chest. He couldn’t stop thinking about Senator Tullius’ urging him to consult with the sleek lawyer Aspergus in case of a Hebrew uprising. Aspergus was not known as a strategist or planner. He was a sycophant, a man with “connections” – and to Valerius, such a man had little worth. Valerius also fumed to remember Tullius’ sweetly worded threat to have him killed on the battlefield.
Now he knew how the condemned men in the stockade must feel.
Finally, he shook off the feeling. He would prevail and not let himself be sent to the killing fields.
Tullius didn’t know Severus Valerius Verus at all. Now, though, he would learn what Valerius was capable of.
It was time for Valerius to act.
After a few hours patrolling the hilly, crowded streets and byways while thoughts and plans against Tullius rolled around in his mind, Valerius approached the garrison again, returning there with the squad. The walls of the garrison were twenty-four feet high and three feet thick. Looking at it, Valerius keenly felt why the Hebrews resented the fortress. It was an intrusion wedged into their ancestral home. Rome had leveled hundreds of houses and shops to make room for the garrison, and there were rumors of new plans to level hundreds more for new buildings.
If I had a home, he thought, I’d fight for it, like the Hebrews do. A man has to defeat those who would take away his life and liberty. Just as I shall defeat Tullius.
He admired the Hebrews for their tenacity. They were the most intelligent and principled of all Rome’s subject people – more so, perhaps, than Romans themselves. The Hebrews no longer had a king, and their rabbis were in exile in a small village outside the city. The Romans were in charge now, and Valerius took that responsibility personally. He regarded the city as a brilliant, rebellious woman who’d been put into his safekeeping. To get her to behave, he had to treat her with both respect and cunning. No easy task.
At least the large uprisings had come to an end. Now there were only exasperating annoyances. He recalled the frustrating day when someone sent a flock of geese squawking across the plaza in front of the Circus Maximus in the middle of the Floralia festival, pulling at the hems of women’s gowns and eating everything in sight.
Frustrating or not, he loved Jerusalem. The idea that he might be transferred to the German front would have been unsettling even if it hadn’t been combined with Tullius’ subtle death threat. If he couldn’t get out of that transfer, he’d need to have men with him who would have his back. Men like Flavius.
“Flavius,” he said as they neared the fortress, “I may be transferred to the northern battlefields. I just learned that it’s a real possibility.”
“Take me with you,” said Flavius. “I’m dying to get out of this town. The enemy keeps disappearing here! I’m ready to grab some German by the beard and show him what a Roman is.”
“Flavius, have you ever thought that my brother, when he takes the throne, could stop this constant warfare?”
“Hmpf. I suppose he could, couldn’t he? Never occurred to me. He could just squelch the whole thing, couldn’t he? He could bring the troops home and have them repair the rutted roads that keep breaking wagon axles. He could give decent food to all those poor people that line up by the Tiber waiting for the bread boats. I saw my aunt and uncle in that crowd once.”
“Yes, he could do all that and more.”
“He could just buy the barbarians off. Give them land and so on. But then they’d just start battering at us again.”
“Maybe not, Flavius, if we made them citizens and settled them properly.”
“Yet what would Rome do without a war? We’d get flabby and lazy and grouchy. We’re a land of conquest, after all. We always have to be conquering somebody.”
Outside the fortress gates, Valerius dismissed Flavius and the others, and they raced into the garrison like children out of school, intent on shucking their uniforms and hitting the streets.
Rufus, his redheaded slave, was waiting at the stalls to take his horse and armor. Dismounting, Valerius noticed a woman’s face in the jostling crowd, a face that stood out, gray eyes alert, crimson scarf tied around her head in the native fashion.
She was tall and slim, her posture upright, her blouse and long skirt simple, in rich dark colors. He was surprised to feel his heart racing at the sight of her. Even in motion, she seemed quiet, calm, deliberate. All around her, people were oblivious to her, crowding and shoving each other, and he thought it strange they could do that, as if she were just some ordinary person.
He strained to see her, yet she slipped out of sight.
He recalled the woman he’d seen the day before, the one who snatched the unconscious boy out of his grasp when the oxcart turned over. Could this be her again?
Craning his neck, his pulse throbbing, he caught sight of her as she went down a side street. “Rufus,” he cried, “hold my horse!”
Running through the crowd and around the corner, he was just in time to see her slipping into an alley. The alley soon split into several directions, and he took a branch which opened onto a narrow road.
He stared in disappointment at the street, empty except for a few pigeons that scrambled out of the way of some goats being nudged along by an old man with a hooked staff. The man looked up at him, mouth open, cowed to see an armored Roman. Valerius fumed at himself, How could I make the wrong decision about which way to turn?
Back at the horse stalls, Rufus was still waiting. Valerius stripped off his armor, which rattled on the stone floor. Scooping it up, Rufus put it on a wooden rack.
“I was glad to see you chasing a lady, sir,” said Rufus, winking. “Proves you’re not a total hermit.”
You are a Gaul,” Valerius said, annoyed. “You think everyone is motivated by romance. I was not chasing her.” Feeling his normally strong voice tremble, he was dismayed by the romantic longing and frustration that pulsed fiercely inside him.
Rufus nodded. “Oh, yes, sir. Yet still, it was good that you were disguised as a centurion instead of wearing the toga of the Legate of Judea while you were out in the streets not chasing her.”
Rufus could be vexing. Valerius retorted, “My disguise is necessary for my job, Rufus.”
“Of course it is, sir. Without your disguise, you’d be mobbed by petitioners, and well-wishers, and not-so-well-wishers, and slaves like me begging for their freedom, as I do every day. Free me today, sir?”
“No, Rufus. Not today,” he said, weary of Rufus’ cajoling.
Rufus shrugged. “Had to ask.”
It was a good thing for Rufus that Valerius was so fond of him. The man was insufferable on some points, especially about his freedom. Valerius wished he could free Rufus, but he couldn’t. Yet. Not until the thing Valerius longed for happened – a thing he had almost given up on.
“Anyway,” Rufus went on, “disguising yourself as a legionary is hardly the way to pursue a Hebrew lady. Why not return to the palace, don your cloth of gold, and simply command her to come to you and fall in love with you?”