I was the enemy of Rome. I was its master, but apparently also its enemy. I found it rather distasteful that men who cared not a wet slap for Rome, and who had never even visited the place, could take its name in defiance of me.
I stood at the balustrade, looking down into the crisp, frost-whitened grass of the stadium garden, built by that most loathed of emperors: Domitian, and found myself wondering idly whether perhaps history had abused that man’s reputation and that mayhap he had been in truth just a Roman trying to maintain order in a chaotic world. Certainly my peers in the wide empire would cast me as a creature lower even than Domitian, for all my good intentions. All those preening dogs of the Tetrarchy who yapped and growled, and who had declared to the world my illegitimacy: Galerius, Licinius and Daia, even the retired Diocletian and my own father. Of the whole barking pack, only my onetime friend Constantine did not drag my name through the mud, though nor did he champion it, while he vented his frustration by breaking barbarian heads across the Rhenus. Still, at least while he concentrated on that troubled border he was not challenging me over my domain.
At one end of the peaceful garden, bathed in its glittering wintry sheen, the emperor Septimius Severus had converted the apsidal curve into a small arena for private displays, and today it held a martial contest for the first time in many years. My son Romulus – the light in my darkness and the whole of my heart – sparred with heavy wooden practice swords against Ruricius Pompeianus. He was surprisingly good, holding his own despite the decades of military service his opponent could claim. It alleviated a little of my panic at the thought of my dear son serving in the military. Not enough, but a little.
In contrast to their measured, careful, even stately dance of martial skill, the real fight was going on a dozen paces along the balustrade where Anullinus – my Praetorian Prefect and the man who had propelled me to the throne in the first place – unleashed his verbal artillery in a shower of brutal barbed invective against his enemy Volusianus, the former Governor of Africa who had brought me that province and saved me from destruction at such an early stage of my career. Two men who had made me. One had lifted me up and the other had sheltered me. I owed them both a debt too large for one life. Oddly, I owed them far more than I ever felt I owed my own suppurating boil of a father. And yet they remained permanently at odds, arguing so often over so little that I spent my time wanting to crack their heads together and remind them that they were noble Romans, imperial advisors and, most importantly, grown men.
‘You are the commander of the Praetorian Guard,’ spat Volusianus angrily. ‘You may be brave and strategically minded, but the fact remains that you are little more than a glorified legionary, with no business airing his thoughts on the running of an empire. Leave that to those of us who have at least governed a province and have the faintest idea how to handle administration.’
I pinched the bridge of my nose, bitter experience telling me that listening to much more of this was going to bring on a headache of Herculean proportions. Off to my left, even with my eyes squeezed shut, I could picture Anullinus reddening and gasping with indignation.
‘Remember, Volusianus, that some of us were administering Rome and dealing with its multitude of problems even before the emperor took the purple, while your experience keeping the border safe from a few camel-humpers and working through the troubling problems of one of the richest, calmest, most well-fed provinces in the empire qualifies you at best to oversee the imperial gardens.’
I pinched tighter as Volusianus resorted to name-calling, intimating that a rather far-fetched and fanciful selection of animals had had a hand in his opposite number’s ancestry. I stopped listening at camelopardalis , walking swiftly along the balustrade away from the exchange, knowing that even the clonking and grunting and the rhythmic calls of numbered moves from the friendly combat below would be a balm after listening to my two chief advisors tearing holes in each other. Anullinus’s brother Gaius had been the governor of Africa before Volusianus, and somehow, despite the fact that Anullinus and his brother were in no way close, it seemed that Volusianus extended the blame for the mess he had been forced to put right in Africa to Anullinus himself. The Praetorian Prefect had been tarred with the same brush as his imprudent sibling, and in return, Anullinus clearly resented the importance Volusianus had managed to secure in my court in such a short time. One day they would simply kill each other, I thought sourly.
Romulus executed a rather interesting manoeuvre as I watched, leaping back out of the way of Ruricius’ thrust, using his left foot to launch himself into the air and his right to change his direction of movement on the raised stones at the arena edge so that he spun and came down close to his teacher, delivering a swipe to Ruricius’ upper arm that hurt enough to make him drop his sword. Romulus laughed lightly as he picked up the practice weapon and handed it back to his appreciative teacher. Perhaps he would make a good military man. Despite my fears that my son was too mollycoddled and juvenile, always wanting to play his games, all those adventurous activities had made him strong, lithe and fearless.
I resolved to take him to the races again at the next event. Not that he didn’t go often enough. In fact, in the past month he had rather taken to the racing, showing his imperial favour to the white team – the city’s true sporting underdogs – in a manner that I found endearing. But while he enthused about the racing and now, on occasion, even socialised with some of their racers, I rarely had the opportunity to accompany him, for Rome was a beast with a thousand black mouths, all lashing out with needs to be met. And the gods knew I could hardly leave Volusianus and Anullinus to feed the beast.
My eyes strayed past Romulus to where my younger son – Aurelius – sat, painfully contorted with his deformities, wrapped in a blanket against the cold as he applauded to the best of his ability his brother’s efforts. Romulus turned with a wide grin and saluted his poor younger sibling with his sword, spinning back sharply to catch Ruricius’ blow just before it hit his leg.
Rising, my eyes caught a flash of white in the apsed viewing box across the stadium garden. My wife, who kept herself separate from me in the Severan wing, all solitude and disdain and as icy cold as the December weather could hope to become. Who had she been watching? Not I was the only clear answer, for our arranged and enforced marriage against which she had railed from the beginning had never had her feeling more trapped than now, shackled to an enemy of Rome while her father barraged me with barbed accusations. Our world was one of silent and cold co-existence, and I could see no future in which it might be me she was looking for while her father and I remained at war.
‘Domine ?’
I glanced around and found one of the palace’s senior slaves waiting patiently, head bowed in respect. I tried to recall the man’s name, but it escaped me. The staff of the Palatine palace were too numerous to keep track of, and as soon as my new villa on the Via Appia was habitable I would be moving there with my own people and leaving this place of nightmare histories and wickedness to Volusianus and Anullinus, long may they argue over it. The latter had a house down at the corner of the place, opposite the great amphitheatre and his ready access to my apartments was starting to wear on me. Where Volusianus lived, I couldn’t recall. Seemingly under my feet, from the feel of things.
I gestured at the slave. ‘Yes?’
The man moved a few paces closer, still bowed. ‘Domine, the deputation you were expecting has arrived.’
I frowned. I couldn’t remember anything on my schedule this morning, but it wouldn’t be empty. It never was. ‘Remind me?’ I prompted.
‘Ah… the Christians, Domine.’
‘Oh yes. Good. You have them in the aula regia ?’
‘Yes, Domine.’
‘How many?’
‘There are but three men, Domine. They have been checked for weapons and six of the Praetorians watch over them.’
‘Good.’ I was fairly sure I was under no threat of violence from Christians, who by their professed beliefs could not kill lest their God punish them for it. And yet I remembered those dreadful days back in Nicomedia with my friend Constantine… with Constantine when he had been my friend … in which the Christians had risen in ire and burned buildings and killed soldiers. They may claim to be so pacific that they melt in the presence of violence, but I knew them for bloody-minded, resilient and desperate creatures. I would never underestimate the strength of Christians. Even the relatively quiet and downtrodden variety we had in Rome.
‘Stay here, and when my son finishes his practice see that he spends some time cooling down in the baths rather than going straight out and cavorting with his racing friends. Let him know where I am if he needs me.’
I became aware that Volusianus and Anullinus had finally broken off their argument at this new interruption and were making for me. I held up my hand to halt them in their tracks – I had had quite enough of their bickering today. ‘I am in quiet discussion with three holy men, not running into battle against slavering Franks. If I need you, I will send for you.’
Turning my back on their disapproving faces I made my way through the private rooms of the palace, out across the immaculately tended and crisp white peristyle garden that separated my temporary residence from the public rooms of state, and in through one of the twin rear doors of my audience chamber. The aula regia was three storeys high yet a single room, designed by that same damned emperor Domitian to impress his guests. Constructed of a dozen different-coloured marbles and with the finest painted walls in the city, it dazzled in the light cast by the high windows that surrounded it. At the lowest level, each alcove held a statue of a great emperor, the ones who had eventually become unpopular being replaced by their successors as time progressed. Augustus and Vespasian, Trajan and Marcus Aurelius scoured the room with coloured marble eyes, and the nearest of the twin alcoves? They held myself, of course, and the man with whom I had come so far only to find a broken bridge between us: Constantine.
In one of their rare subjects of complete agreement, Volusianus and Anullinus had urged me to pull that statue down and replace it with someone less hostile to my realm. But I somehow couldn’t pull down his statue. It would be like admitting defeat. Like admitting that we were enemies and there was no healing the open wound that divided us. Indeed, there were as many statues of him in the city as of me. I was never a great one for self-aggrandisement, and I had commissioned many likenesses of my old friend when he and my sister married, hoping that my brother-in-law and I would create a new Rome together.
An impossible dream.
As the guard at the entrance quietly closed the door behind me and I looked back and forth between those two statues, my gaze also fell upon the side door to the Palatine basilica. I had not entered that room since the awful reading of entrails less than a month ago – was that all it was? I could not go in – just the thought made me shudder. I could hardly wait to move out of this place and into my new villa. Even as I put on my most imperial mask and walked benevolently towards the deputation of Christians, I promised myself I would spare an hour later to hound my master builders for a completion date.
‘Good morning, gentlemen.’
Normally I would have entered the room with my lictors and attendants, my guards, my advisors and even a musician who would provide the fanfare before the proclaiming of my many titles. But the Christians were a strange, mistrustful lot and treating them to a little show of munificence in the form of more personal attention seemed a cheap way to build bridges.
The three men bowed deeply and I allowed a little genuineness into my smile at that. A gesture of respect. Their sort would never worship an emperor, but so long as I had their respect and their loyalty, they could babble to their Judean god as much as they liked.
‘Greetings, Imperator. We are truly grateful for your time in this matter.’
I nodded an acknowledgement and settled into my seat as the three stood before me like some parody of the Capitoline triad. The two Praetorian guardsmen at my shoulders shuffled slightly as they tensed, ready for any trouble from these odd cultists. But as I looked into the men’s eyes I saw no malice towards me. Just hope… and a little too much zeal if I am honest. The one at the centre of the triad, the Jove figure in my own little private joke, was the speaker and clearly the senior. I gestured to him.
‘I understand you crave an imperial boon?’
Jove glanced at Juno and Minerva to his sides and I had to fight to stifle a chuckle as I imagined the two serious Christian clerics in women’s garb. I kept my visage austere while the leader replied.
‘As Your Majesty will be aware, the Church of our Saviour in the city has a long and proud history of supreme pontifices that stretches back to the noble and holy Peter, whom the damned tyrant Nero brutally murdered.’
I had to hand it to the man. He had just stated the power of his claim and the centuries-old lineage of his cult while insulting the emperor of the time and all without actually saying anything that might give me reason for offence. After all, Nero was a damned tyrant. And he did murder their first senior pontifex. I saw Minerva by his side – all wisdom of course – nodding his agreement.
‘I am aware of this,’ I replied. ‘I am also aware that the great Diocletian ended the line of your high priests some six years ago now. I forget… did he have the last one burned or crucified?’ It was an offhand question. Cruel, really, but I didn’t like being played by this man and I felt the need to shake him and put myself on top again. He recoiled slightly. My words had hit him just as I had intended.
‘Both, Your Majesty. As well as the hook and the sword. He died hard for what he believed. For what we all believe.’
‘All?’ I prompted with a raised eyebrow.
‘All Christians,’ sighed the man, aware that he was losing his edge. Good. My turn.
‘And because Diocletian has retired and I rule in Rome, and because you know, as does everyone, that I hold little regard for his successor, and most of all because I have stopped the persecution of your sect in my city, you think I will change things?’
The man nodded and cast his gaze downwards meekly. I smiled. Back in command, I could afford to be generous.
‘You wish to reinstate the supreme pontifex of your cult without bringing down imperial anger?’
‘Yes, Majesty.’
My eyes rose at the sound of a gentle click to see a side door open and admit a single figure. Zenas. The praetor in command of my Urban Cohorts and an unabashed Christian himself, he had unrestricted access to all the public areas of my palace, and much of the private wing too. No great shock that he might show up for this particular meeting. In fact, I had been quite surprised that he hadn’t been there waiting with them.
‘Do you even need such a man?’ I asked. ‘If your sect has survived these past six years – and even grown, if I am to believe my advisors – without one, why do you need him?’
The third of the triad – Juno, of course – now spoke. ‘In the absence of a supreme pontifex, Marcellus here has been tending to his duties.’ He gestured to the man in the centre. Naturally. He was the leader. I was enjoying toying with them.
‘So despite the ban on your post and the execution of your predecessor under proper Roman law, you, Marcellus, have been a hidden high priest, defying imperial authority?’
Marcellus was looking a lot less like mighty Jove now as his eyes took on a wild look. I laughed lightly and gestured with both hands to encompass the entire triad. ‘I jest with you. Am I to understand that you would wish this secret priest to be ratified and to be able to lead your cult in the open air without fear of persecution or prosecution?’
The men on either side nodded hopefully, while Marcellus himself kept his face lowered, all respect. I looked up at Zenas, who was standing silently at the side of the hall, almost a direct copy of the great Trajan who loomed in cold marble behind him. An accident? I wouldn’t put it past Zenas to stand there on purpose, acquiring an air of ancient nobility from the long-dead hero emperor behind him.
‘What say you?’
Zenas frowned. ‘Domine?’
‘You are familiar with the problems of governance in my city, being one of my most senior officers, but you are also aware of these men and the needs of their sect, since you are one of them, are you not? What say you to this Marcellus?’
Zenas padded across the room towards me, stopping equidistant between myself and my visitors. ‘Marcellus has carried out the duties of the Roman Pope very efficiently in the absence of an official incumbent. He is popular in our community. I would give him my support.’
I nodded. In fairness, I had intended to say yes from the start, but a show of consideration always makes a decision look more thorough. I knew little about their cult’s workings and cared even less, but I did want them on my side. And I wanted peace.
‘Very well. I agree to your request. You may crown – or invest, or whatever it is you do – this man as your high priest, with the blessings of the emperor and freedom of worship in my lands.’
I held up my hand in a gesture of benevolence as the three men smiled in relief. ‘I would like a few moments of your new pontifex’s time in private, if I may. He will join you in the courtyard shortly.’
Summarily dismissed, the other two Christians glanced nervously at their new chief priest, clearly worried that I planned to throw them out and then crucify the man in their absence. Marcellus gave them reassuring looks and told them he would meet them outside. To add weight to his words, Zenas stepped protectively close. Still unhappy, the other two priests left the room and walked out into the winter sun.
I waited until the door clicked shut and I was alone with just the new Christian Pope, my Urban Cohort commander and half a dozen Praetorians. Then I rose and stepped down to face Marcellus, lifting his chin so that his gaze met mine.
‘I am pleased that you have come to me to ratify this officially, Pontifex Marcellus. Know that I am no enemy of your faith, for all I cannot fathom its point.’ I allowed my light tone to darken and take on an air of threat. ‘Know also that I will not tolerate unrest or discord in my realm, whether it comes from cobblers, chandlers or Christians. I do not know what your role entails within your Church but I hereby add to your burdens the following task: keep your people content and peaceful. You can call yourself what you wish and pray however you like as long as your Christians are also Romans and they cause me no trouble.’
My somewhat rocky but generally peaceful history with that peculiar sect began in earnest that day and for all the difficulties I might encounter, for now all was good.
The new Christian leader was escorted from the room, bowing as he went, and my eyes slid again to the statue of my adversary, all cold marble stoicism in his alcove. Constantine would have known better than I what to do here. His family had prepared him for this strange sect. In a huff with myself, I pulled my gaze back. Maybe I should have let Volusianus and Anullinus, my warring twins, tear down that statue after all.