False God of Rome E-Book

Robert Fabbri

• Herausgeber: Corvus
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Serie: Vespasian
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Seitenzahl: 670

Beschreibung

THE EXPLOSIVELY GRIPPING, 300,000 COPY BESTSELLING ROMAN EPIC SERIES, PERFECT FOR FANS OF GLADIATOR Rome, AD 34: Vespasian is serving as a military officer on the outskirts of the Empire. But political events in Rome - Tiberius's increasing debauchery, the escalating grain crisis - draw him back to the city. When Caligula becomes Emperor, Vespasian believes that things will improve. Instead, the young emperor deteriorates from Rome's shining star to a blood-crazed, incestuous, all-powerful madman. Caligula's most extravagant project is to bridge the bay of Neapolis and ride over it wearing Alexander's breastplate. And it falls to Vespasian to travel to Alexandria and steal it from Alexander's mausoleum. Vespasian's mission will lead to violence, mayhem and theft - and in the end, to a betrayal so great it will echo through the ages. THE THIRD BOOK IN THE BESTSELLING VESPASIAN SERIES

Leseprobe

FALSE GOD OF ROME

VESPASIAN III

Robert Fabbri read Drama and Theatre at London University and has worked in film and TV for 25 years. He is an assistant director and has worked on productions such as Hornblower, Hellraiser, Patriot Games and Billy Elliot. His life-long passion for ancient history inspired him to write the VESPASIAN series. He lives in London and Berlin.

Also by Robert Fabbri

THE VESPASIAN SERIES

TRIBUNE OF ROME

THE CROSSROADS BROTHERHOOD (novella)

ROME’S EXECUTIONER

Coming soon…

Published in hardback in Great Britain in 2013 by Corvus, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.

Copyright © Robert Fabbri, 2013

The moral right of Robert Fabbri to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities, is entirely coincidental.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Hardback ISBN: 978 0 85789 741 1 Trade paperback ISBN: 978 0 85789 742 8 E-book ISBN: 978 0 85789 976 7

Printed in Great Britain.

Corvus An imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd Ormond House 26–27 Boswell Street London WC1N 3JZ

www.corvus-books.co.uk

For Anja Müller, without whom this would not have happened.

Will you marry me, my love?

Contents

PROLOGUE

PART I

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IIII

CHAPTER V

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

PART II

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER VIIII

CHAPTER X

CHAPTER XI

CHAPTER XII

PART III

CHAPTER XIII

CHAPTER XIIII

CHAPTER XV

CHAPTER XVI

PART IIII

CHAPTER XVII

CHAPTER XVIII

CHAPTER XVIIII

CHAPTER XX

CHAPTER XXI

PART V

CHAPTER XXII

CHAPTER XXIII

CHAPTER XXIIII

PROLOGUE

JERUSALEM, APRIL AD 33

AN ABRUPT KNOCK on the door woke Titus Flavius Sabinus with a start; his eyes flicked open. Momentarily unsure of his whereabouts, he jerked his head up off the desk and looked around the room. The muted light of the fading sun seeping in through a narrow open window was enough for him to be able to make out the unfamiliar surroundings: his study in the tower of the Antonia Fortress. Outside the window the Temple soared to the sky, dominating the view. Its high, white marble-clad walls glowed an evening red and the gold leaf that adorned its roof glistered with sunset. Such was the scale of the Jews’ most holy building that it dwarfed the huge columns supporting the expansive quadrangle that surrounded it; they in turn made the multitude of figures, scuttling between them and back and forth across the vast courtyard that the colonnade encompassed, seem no larger than ants.

The tang of blood from thousands of lambs being slaughtered within the Temple complex for the Passover meal that evening infused the room’s chill air. Sabinus shivered; he had become cold during his brief sleep.

The knock was repeated more insistently.

‘Quaestor, are you in there?’ a voice shouted from the other side of the door.

‘Yes, enter,’ Sabinus called back, quickly arranging the scrolls on the desk to suggest that he had been immersed in diligent work rather than taking a late afternoon nap to recover from his two-day journey to Jerusalem from Caesarea, the provincial capital of Judaea.

The door opened; an auxiliary centurion marched in and snapped to attention before the desk, his traverse-plumed helmet held stiffly under his left arm. ‘Centurion Longinus of the Cohors Prima Augusta reporting, sir,’ he barked. His face was tanned and wrinkled as old leather from years of service in the East.

‘What is it, centurion?’

‘Two Jews are requesting an audience with the prefect, sir.’

‘Then take them to him.’

‘He’s dining with a Jewish prince from Iudemaea and some Parthians who’ve just arrived in the city; he’s drunk as a legionary on leave. He said that you should deal with them.’

Sabinus grunted; since being sent to Judaea ten days previously, to audit its tax revenues at the behest of his superior – the Governor of Syria, who held ultimate authority over Judaea – he had already had enough dealings with Prefect Pontius Pilatus to realise the truth of the statement. ‘Tell them to come back in the morning when the prefect is more approachable,’ he said dismissively.

‘I have, sir, but one of them is a malchus, or captain, of the Temple Guard sent by the High Priest Caiaphas; he was most insistent that the information that he has concerns something due to happen this evening, after the Passover meal.’

Sabinus sighed; although new to the province he had gleaned enough knowledge of the complex political infighting between Rome’s turbulent subjects to know that Caiaphas owed his position to Roman favour and was therefore the closest thing to an ally that he could expect to find among the mainly hostile Jewish population of this combustible city. With the city bursting with pilgrims it would be bad politics to upset an ally during the Passover that he and the prefect had both come to Jerusalem to oversee.

‘Very well then, centurion, show them up.’

‘Best you come down, sir, where we can keep them at a distance from you.’ Longinus pulled two short, curved knives from his belt. ‘We found these hidden in the clothes of the other man.’

Sabinus took the knives and examined the razor-sharp blades. ‘What are they?’

‘Sicae, sir; which would mean that he’s a member of the Sicarii.’

Sabinus looked blankly at the centurion.

‘They’re religious assassins, sir,’ Longinus continued by way of explanation, ‘they believe that they’re doing their god’s work by eliminating those they consider to be impure and blasphemers; that covers just about everybody who’s not a member of their sect. He’d think nothing of trying to kill you even if he died in the attempt. They believe that if they’re killed doing holy work then, when this Messiah who they’ve been awaiting for ages finally shows up, they’ll be resurrected along with all the other righteous dead, on what they call the End of Days, to live in an earthly paradise under their god’s laws forever.’

‘They make the Zealots seem like reasonable people,’ Sabinus observed, alluding to the Jewish sect that had hitherto been the most unreasonable bunch of religious extremists he had heard of.

‘There’s no such thing as reason in this arsehole of the Empire.’

Sabinus paused to reflect upon the truth of that statement. ‘Very well, centurion, I’ll come down; go and announce me.’

‘Sir!’ Longinus saluted and marched briskly out of the room.

Sabinus shook his head; he rolled up the scrolls containing the audit of Jerusalem’s tax revenues for the past year – the cause of his earlier slumber – adjusted his toga and then followed. Although it offended his dignitas to go down to meet the Jews rather than have them shown into his presence he knew enough of their nature to take the advice of this seasoned centurion; he did not want to become the victim of some suicidal religious fanatic.

‘My name is Gaius Julius Paulus,’ the shorter of the two Jews announced in an impatient tone as Sabinus entered the Fortress’s great hall. ‘I am a Roman citizen and a captain in the Temple Guard and I demanded to see the prefect, not his underling.’

‘The prefect is indisposed so you will talk to me,’ Sabinus snapped, taking an instant dislike to this self-important, bowlegged little Jew, ‘and show me the respect due to my rank as quaestor to the Governor of Syria, the prefect of Judaea’s direct superior, or otherwise, citizen or not, I’ll have you flogged out of the Fortress.’

Paulus swallowed and ran a hand through his thinning hair. ‘Forgive me, quaestor, I meant no offence,’ he said with a voice suddenly oozing obsequiousness. ‘I come with a request from the High Priest concerning the agitator and blasphemer Yeshua bar Yosef.’

‘Never heard of him,’ Sabinus said flatly, ‘what’s he done?’

‘He’s another one of those Messiah claimants, sir,’ Longinus informed him. ‘We’ve been trying to apprehend him for sedition since he caused a riot when he arrived in the city four days ago. He threatened the authority of Caesar by claiming that he was a king; quite a few people were killed, including three of my auxiliaries. Then he pissed off the High Priest by going to the Temple and offending just about everyone he could before turning over all the money changers’ tables.’

‘What are money changers doing in the Temple?’ Sabinus asked, genuinely curious.

‘The Jews think that our money is idolatrous as it has Caesar’s head on it, so they’re allowed their own Temple currency to buy sheep for sacrifice and such like. The changers make a tidy profit on the exchange rate, as you might imagine.’

Sabinus raised his eyebrows; he was ceasing to find anything surprising about these people. He turned back to the two Jews; the second man, tall, full-bearded with oiled, black hair flowing from beneath a headdress wound about his head, remained motionless staring at Sabinus with hate-filled eyes. His hands had been bound in front of him. He was no rough, country peasant. His long-sleeved, light blue robe fell to his ankles; it was clean and seamless, expensively woven as one piece of material, the sign of a wealthy man. The fine quality of the black and white mantle that he wore draped over his shoulders added to that impression.

‘What has this man to do with Yeshua?’ Sabinus asked Paulus.

‘He is one of his followers,’ Paulus replied with ill-concealed dislike. ‘He was with him for the two years that Yeshua spent causing trouble up in Galilee. He claims that after the Passover meal Yeshua will declare that the End of Days is at hand; he’ll proclaim himself the long awaited Messiah and lead a revolt against Rome and the Temple priests. Caiaphas is asking for the prefect’s permission to arrest him for blasphemy and to try him before the Sanhedrin, the religious court; this man has said that he will lead us to him tonight.’

Sabinus turned back to the other man. ‘What’s your name, Jew?’

The man carried on staring at him for a few more moments before deigning to answer. ‘Yehudah,’ he said, drawing himself up.

‘I’m told that you are a Sicarius.’

‘It is an honour to serve God,’ Yehudah replied evenly in near perfect Greek.

‘So, Yehudah the Sicarius, what do you ask for in return for betraying the man whom you’ve followed for two years?’

‘It’s for reasons of my own that I do it, not for reward.’

Sabinus scoffed. ‘A man of principle, eh? Tell me why you do it so that I can believe that it’s not a trap.’

Yehudah stared blankly at Sabinus and then slowly looked away.

‘I could have it tortured out of you, Jew,’ Sabinus threatened, losing his patience with the man’s lack of deference for Roman authority.

‘You can’t, quaestor,’ Paulus said quickly, ‘you’ll offend Caiaphas and the priests, who’ve asked you for help in apprehending a renegade. With more than a hundred thousand pilgrims here for the Passover, Rome needs the priests’ support to keep order; there has already been one riot in the past few days.’

Sabinus glared at the squat little Temple Guard, outraged. ‘How dare you tell me, a Roman quaestor, what I can or cannot do?’

‘He’s right though, sir,’ Longinus assured him, ‘and it won’t do to refuse a request for help from the priests; it ain’t how things are done here, especially as we owe them a favour.’

‘What for?’

‘Straight after the riot that Yeshua caused they handed over the murderers of the three auxiliaries to us; one of them, another Yeshua, Yeshua bar Abbas, is almost as popular with the people as his namesake. The prefect condemned all three upon his arrival yesterday; they’re due to be executed tomorrow.’

Sabinus realised that Longinus probably was correct: he had no choice but to acquiesce to Caiaphas’ request. He cursed Pilatus for having put him in this position by neglecting his duties through drink; but then reflected that it was probably the intolerable situation in the province that had driven him to it.

‘Very well then,’ he growled, ‘tell Caiaphas you may proceed with the arrest.’

‘He requests a Roman officer to accompany us,’ Paulus replied. ‘Without one we will be lacking in authority.’

Sabinus glanced at Longinus who nodded his agreement to that assessment. ‘Very well, I’ll come with you. Where should we meet?’

Paulus looked at Yehudah. ‘Tell him.’

The Sicarius raised his head and looked disdainfully at Sabinus. ‘We will be eating the Passover meal in the upper city, there is only one staircase up to the room so it would be easy to defend and was purposely chosen as such; but later we will be meeting new initiates outside the city walls. Meet me by the Sheep Gate at the start of the second watch; I will lead you to him.’

‘Why not grab him in the street as he leaves the room?’

‘It will be quieter at Gethsemane.’

‘You let the Temple Guards take this rabble-rouser,’ Prefect Pilatus roared at Sabinus, slurring his words, ‘to be tried by his fellow Jews. Then you let his armed followers wander off to cause whatever mayhem they feel like at a time when this filthy city is crammed full of the most militant religious bigots that anyone has ever had the misfortune to conquer.’

‘The Temple Guards let them go once they’d secured Yeshua; their captain had had half of his right ear cut off and they didn’t have the stomach for a fight. I didn’t have any other troops with me.’

‘Why not?’ Pilatus’ bloodshot eyes bulged with fury, his bulbous drinker’s nose glowed red like a branding iron; droplets of sweat rolled down his saggy cheeks. Sabinus’ report on Yeshua’s arrest had, to say the least, disappointed him. His three dinner guests sipped their wine in silence as he slumped down on his dining couch and rubbed his temples. He reached for his cup, drained it in one, slammed it back down onto the table, staring at Sabinus malevolently, and then turned to an elegant, middle-aged man reclining on the couch to his left.

‘Herod Agrippa, I need your advice. The quaestor has let this rebel outmanoeuvre us.’

Herod Agrippa shook his head, swaying his hair that hung in oiled ringlets to just below his close-clipped beard, framing a thin, firm-jawed face that would have been handsome had it not been for the large, hooked nose that protruded, like a hawk’s beak, from between his dark eyes. ‘You’re right, prefect,’ he said holding out his cup unsteadily to be filled by the slave waiting on him, ‘the priests walked into Yeshua’s trap without…’ He stopped as the slave poured wine over his shaking hand. ‘Eutyches! You’re almost as useless as this quaestor. Get out!’

Sabinus stood, staring straight ahead, scowling and making no attempt to conceal his dislike for Herod.

‘In our country a man would lose his eyes for the quaestor’s incompetence,’ the elder of the two men reclining on Pilatus’ right observed, stroking his long, curled beard.

Herod threw his cup at the retreating slave. ‘Unfortunately, Sinnaces, they don’t have the same freedom here to mete out deserved punishment to idiots as you do in Parthia.’

Sabinus shot Herod a venomous look. ‘I would remind you, Jew, that I am a senator, watch your tongue.’ He turned back to Pilatus. ‘The priests offered us the opportunity to have this man arrested so I acted on my own initiative as you didn’t wish to deal with it, being…otherwise engaged.’

‘I was not “otherwise engaged”, I was drunk and now I’m even drunker; but even in this condition I would have known to bring that madman back here into Roman custody and not let the Jews have him, no matter how many fucking priests I upset. Fuck ’em all, quaestor; do you hear me? Fuck ’em all.’

‘But the priests will try him and find him guilty; it’s in their interests to do so,’ Sabinus argued.

‘They’re already trying him and are keen to pass a death sentence on him; in fact, they’re so keen to condemn him that they’ve even broken their Passover Sabbath to try him overnight. Caiaphas sent me a message asking me to come to the palace first thing in the morning to confirm their sentence before they stone him.’

Sabinus looked at his superior uncomprehendingly. ‘So what’s the problem, then?’

Pilatus sighed, exasperated; he closed his eyes and ran both hands through his hair, pulling his head back. ‘You’re new to this dump so I’ll try and explain it in simple terms,’ he said with more than a degree of condescension. ‘By your own admission, in your report, Yeshua organised his own arrest; he sent Yehudah to deliver him up to the priests because he wanted them to find him guilty, not us. Because of his popularity with the ordinary people he’s gambling that they will rise up against the priests and all the Temple hierarchy for condemning him to death as well as against Rome for confirming the sentence. In one massively naive blunder you’ve enabled Yeshua to drive a wedge between the people and the only power they respect: the priests, who owe their position to Rome and therefore have nothing to gain from a revolt.’

Sabinus suddenly saw the depth of his error of judgement. ‘Whereas if we condemned him the priests would be able to appeal for calm and expect to be listened to; and that, along with a show of force by us, should be enough to stop an uprising.’

‘Exactly,’ Pilatus said mockingly, ‘you’ve finally got there. So, Herod, I’ve got to defuse this quickly before Yeshua’s followers start rousing the people. What should I do?’

‘You must go to the palace first thing tomorrow.’

‘To overturn the sentence?’

‘No, you can’t let this man live now that you’ve finally got him. You’ve got to reunite the priests with the people so that they can control them.’

‘Yes, but how?’

‘By turning a Jewish stoning into a Roman crucifixion.’

‘This man must die,’ the High Priest Caiaphas hissed at Pilatus through his long, full grey beard. Regaled in his sumptuous robes and topped with a curious, bejewelled domed hat made of silk, he looked, to Sabinus, much more like an eastern client king than a priest; but then, to judge by the size and splendour of the Jews’ Temple, Judaism was a very wealthy religion and its priests could afford to be extravagant with the money that the poor, in the hope of being seen by their god as righteous, pumped their way.

‘And he will, priest,’ Pilatus replied; never normally in the best of moods for the first couple of hours after dawn, he was striving to keep his fragile temper. ‘But he will die the Roman way, not the Jewish.’

Sabinus stood with Herod Agrippa watching the struggle between the two most powerful men in the province with interest. It had been an acrimonious meeting, especially after Pilatus had, with great relish, pointed out the trap that Yeshua had set for Caiaphas and how he had been politically maladroit enough to fall into it.

‘To avoid an uprising,’ Pilatus continued, ‘which, judging from the reports I’ve had, Yeshua’s followers are already initiating, you must do as I’ve ordered immediately.’

‘And how can I trust you to do what you’ve promised?’

‘Are you being deliberately obtuse?’ Pilatus snapped, his temper no longer able to take the strain of dealing with this self-serving priest. ‘Because in this instance we are both on the same side. The preparations have been made and the orders given. Now go!’

Caiaphas turned and walked, with as much dignity as he could muster after being summarily dismissed, out of the magnificent, high-ceilinged audience chamber, the centrepiece of the late Herod the Great’s palace on the west side of the upper city.

‘What do you think, Herod?’ Pilatus asked.

‘I think that he’ll play his part. Are the troops ready?’

‘Yes.’ Pilatus turned his bloodshot eyes to Sabinus. ‘Now’s your chance to redeem yourself, quaestor; just do as Herod has told you.’

The noise of a raucous mob grew as Sabinus and Herod approached the main entrance to the palace. Stepping out of the high, polished cedar-wood doors, they were confronted by a huge crowd filling the whole of the agora before the palace and overflowing into the wide avenue at its far end that led up to the Temple and the Antonia Fortress.

The shadows were long and the air chill, it being only the first hour of the day. Glancing up to his left Sabinus could see, on the hill of Golgotha beyond the Old Gate in the city walls, a cross that was always left standing between executions as a reminder to the populace of the fate that awaited them should they seek to oppose the power of Rome.

Caiaphas stood on the top of the palace steps with his arms raised in an attempt to quieten the crowd. He was surrounded by a dozen fellow priests; behind them, guarded by Paulus and a group of Temple Guards, stood Yeshua with his hands bound and with a blood-stained bandage around his head.

Gradually the noise subsided and Caiaphas began his address.

‘What’s he saying?’ Sabinus asked Herod.

‘He’s appealed for calm and now he’s telling them that, because of his popularity with the common people, Yeshua is to be pardoned and released from Jewish custody in a gesture of mercy at this time of Passover.’

A loud cheer went up from the crowd as Caiaphas stopped speaking. After a few moments the High Priest raised his arms, again asking for quiet before continuing.

‘He’s now asking them to return to their homes,’ Herod translated, ‘and he says that Yeshua will be freed immediately.’

Sabinus watched, knowing that his moment to act was imminent; Caiaphas turned and nodded at Paulus who reluctantly began to untie his prisoner’s hands.

‘Now!’ Herod hissed. ‘And try not to say anything stupid.’

‘That man is now a prisoner of the Senate of Rome,’ Sabinus bellowed, walking forward; behind him Longinus led a half-century of auxiliaries out of the palace, quickly surrounding the Temple Guards and their erstwhile prisoner. From the direction of the Antonia Fortress a cohort of auxiliaries marched down the avenue and formed up behind the crowd, blocking the road and any chance of escape.

‘What is the meaning of this?’ Caiaphas shouted at Sabinus, playing his part rather too theatrically.

‘The Senate requires that this man, Yeshua, be tried before Caesar’s representative, Prefect Pilatus,’ Sabinus replied in a high, loud voice that carried over the agora. Angry shouts started to emanate from the crowd as those who could speak Greek translated Sabinus’ words for their fellows. As the noise of the crowd grew, the cohort behind it drew their swords and began to beat them rhythmically on their shields.

Pilatus stepped out of the palace accompanied by a bedraggled and bruised Jew. He walked past Sabinus and, standing next to Caiaphas, signalled for silence; the shouting and the clashing of weapons died down.

‘My hands are tied,’ he declaimed, crossing his wrists above his head. ‘Quaestor Titus Flavius Sabinus has demanded, on behalf of the Senate, that I try Yeshua for claiming to be a king and inciting rebellion against Caesar; as a servant of Rome I cannot refuse such a demand. If he is found guilty it will be Rome that is sentencing him, not me, your prefect. I wash my hands of his blood for this is not of my doing, it is the will of the Senate.’ He paused and brought the Jew who accompanied him forward. ‘However, in a spirit of goodwill and to show the clemency of Rome I will, in honour of your Passover festival, release to you another Yeshua whom you hold dear: this man, Yeshua bar Abbas.’

To roars of approval Pilatus ushered the freed man down the palace steps to disappear into the joyous crowd.

‘They’ve had their sop, priest, now use your authority over them and get them to disperse before I have to massacre the lot,’ Pilatus hissed at Caiaphas as he turned to go. ‘Herod, come with me.’

‘I think that I will absent myself now, with your permission, prefect. It would not be good for a Jewish prince to be associated with this man’s death, and besides I should be entertaining my Parthian guests.’

‘As you wish. Longinus, bring the prisoner to me once you’ve softened him up a bit.’

‘So you’re the man who calls himself the King of the Jews?’ Pilatus asserted, looking down at the broken man kneeling on the audience chamber floor before his curule chair.

‘They are your words, not mine,’ Yeshua replied, lifting his head painfully to meet his accuser’s eyes; blood, from the wounds inflicted by a thorn crown, rammed mockingly on his head, matted his hair and dripped down his face. Sabinus could see that his back bore the livid marks of a severe whipping.

‘Yet you don’t deny them.’

‘My kingdom is not of the physical world.’ Yeshua raised his bound hands to touch his head. ‘It is, like all men’s, in here.’

‘Is that what you preach, Jew?’ Sabinus asked, earning an angry glance from Pilatus for interrupting his questioning.

Yeshua turned his attention to Sabinus and he felt the intensity of the man’s look pierce him; his pulse quickened.

‘All men keep the Kingdom of God inside them, Roman, even Gentile dogs such as you. I preach that we should purify ourselves by baptism to wash away our sins; then by following the Torah and by showing compassion for fellow believers, doing unto them as we would be done by, we will be judged righteous and worthy to join our Father at the End of Days, which is fast approaching.’

‘Enough of this nonsense,’ Pilatus snapped. ‘Do you deny that you and your followers have been actively encouraging people to rebel against their Roman masters?’

‘No man is master of another,’ Yeshua replied simply.

‘That’s where you’re wrong, Jew, I am your master; your fate is in my hands.’

‘The fate of my body is, but not my fate, Roman.’

Pilatus stood and slapped Yeshua hard around the face; with a vicious leer, Yeshua ostentatiously proffered the other cheek; blood trickled from a split lip down through his beard. Pilatus obliged with another resounding blow.

Yeshua spat a gobbet of blood onto the floor. ‘You may cause me physical pain, Roman, but you cannot harm what I have inside.’

Sabinus found himself mesmerised by the strength of will of the man; a will, he sensed, that could never be broken.

‘I’ve had enough of this,’ Pilatus fumed. ‘Quaestor, have him crucified with the other two prisoners immediately.’

‘What’s he been found guilty of, sir?’

‘I don’t know; anything. Sedition, rebellion or perhaps just that I don’t like him; whatever you like. Now take him away and make sure that he’s dead and in a tomb before the Sabbath begins at nightfall, so as not to offend Jewish law. He caused enough trouble while alive and I don’t want him causing more when he’s dead.’

The sky had turned grey; droplets of rain had started to fall, diluting the blood that ran from the wounds of the three crucified men. It was now the ninth hour of the day; Sabinus and Longinus walked back down the hill of Golgotha. Thunder rumbled in the distance.

Sabinus looked back at Yeshua hanging on his cross; his head slumped forward and blood oozed from a spear wound in his side that Longinus had administered to hasten the end of his suffering before the commencement of the Sabbath. Six hours earlier he had been whipped up the hill dragging his cross, aided by a man from the crowd. Then he had endured, in silence, the nails being hammered through his wrists; he had seemed barely to notice the nails being pounded home through his feet, fixing them to the wood. The savage jolting as the cross was hauled upright, which had caused the screaming of the other two crucified men to intensify to inhuman proportions, had brought no more than a shallow groan from his lips. He looked now, to Sabinus, to be at peace.

Sabinus passed through the cordon of auxiliaries who were keeping the small, mournful crowd of onlookers away from the executed men and saw Paulus, standing with a couple of Temple Guards, gazing up at Yeshua; a bandage around his head was spotted with blood from the wound to his ear. ‘What are you doing here?’ Sabinus asked.

Paulus seemed lost in his own thoughts and did not hear him for a moment, then blinked repeatedly as he registered the question. ‘I came to check that he was dead and take his body for burial in an unmarked tomb so that it doesn’t become a place of pilgrimage for his heretical followers. Caiaphas has ordered it.’

‘Why were you all so afraid of him?’ Sabinus enquired.

Paulus stared at him as if looking at an idiot. ‘Because he would bring change.’

Sabinus shook his head scornfully and pushed past the malchus of the Guard. As he did so a group of two men and two women, the younger one heavily pregnant and carrying an infant, approached him.

The elder man, a wealthy-looking Jew in his early thirties with a dense black beard, bowed. ‘Quaestor, we wish to claim Yeshua’s body for burial.’

‘The Temple Guards are here to claim it. What claim do you have on his body?’

‘My name is Yosef, I am Yeshua’s kinsman,’ the man replied, putting his arm around the shoulder of the older of the two women, ‘and this woman is Miriam, his mother.’

Miriam looked pleadingly at Sabinus, tears rolling down her cheeks. ‘Please don’t let them have him, quaestor, give me my son so that I can take him back to Galilee and bury him there.’

‘My orders are that he is to be buried before nightfall.’

‘I have a family tomb, just close by,’ Yosef said, ‘we will put the body there for now, then move it the day after the Sabbath.’

Sabinus looked back at Paulus with a malicious smile. ‘Paulus, these people have the claim of kin over the body.’

Paulus looked outraged. ‘You can’t do that; Caiaphas demands his body.’

‘Caiaphas is Rome’s subject! Longinus, have that hideous little man escorted away from here.’

As Paulus was manhandled away, protesting, Sabinus turned back to Yosef. ‘You can take the body; Rome has finished with it.’ He turned to go.

Yosef bowed his head. ‘That was a kindness that I won’t forget, quaestor.’

‘Quaestor,’ the younger man called, stopping Sabinus, ‘Rome may be our master now, but be warned, the final age is approaching and Yeshua’s teachings are part of it; a new kingdom will rise, new men with new ideas will rule and the old order will start to fade.’

Recollecting the Emperor Tiberius’ astrologer, Thrasyllus, two years previously predicting the coming of a new age, Sabinus stared at the young man; he recognised him as the man who had helped Yeshua with his cross that morning. ‘What makes you so sure of that, Jew?’

‘I come from Cyrenaica, Roman, which was once a province of the Kingdom of Egypt; there they await the rebirth of the firebird. Its five-hundred-year cycle is coming to an end; next year the Phoenix will be reborn in Egypt for the last time and all things will begin to change in preparation for the End of Days.’

PART I

CYRENAICA, NOVEMBER AD 34

CHAPTER I

‘HAVE YOU GOT it?’ Vespasian asked as Magnus walked down the gangplank of a large merchant ship newly arrived in the port of Appolonia.

‘No, sir, I’m afraid not,’ Magnus replied, shouldering his bag, ‘the Emperor is refusing all entry permits to Egypt at the moment.’

‘Why?’

Magnus took his friend’s proffered forearm. ‘According to Caligula it’s on the advice of Tiberius’ astrologer, Thrasyllus; not even Antonia could get him to change his mind.’

‘Why did you bother coming, then?’

‘Now that ain’t a very nice way to greet a friend who’s travelled fuck knows how many hundreds of miles in that rotting tub at a time of year when most sailors are tucked up in bed with each other.’

‘I’m sorry, Magnus. I was counting on Antonia getting me the permit; it’s been four years since Ataphanes died and we promised to get his gold back to his family in Parthia.’

‘Well then, another couple of years or so ain’t going to make much difference, are they?’

‘That’s not the point. Egypt is the neighbouring province; I could have made a short diversion to Alexandria on my way home in March, found the Alabarch, given him Ataphanes’ box and made the arrangements for the money to be transferred to his family in Ctesiphon and still be back in Rome before next May.’

‘You’ll just have to do it some other time.’

‘Yes, but it’ll take much longer going from Rome. I may not have the time; I’ve got the estate to run and I plan to get elected as an aedile the year after next.’

‘Then you shouldn’t go making promises that you can’t keep.’

‘He served my family loyally for many years; I owe it to him.’

‘Then don’t begrudge him your time.’

Vespasian grunted and turned to make his way back along the bustling quayside through the mass of dock-workers unloading the newly docked trading fleet. His senatorial toga acted as an intimidating display of his rank, ensuring that a path was cleared for him through the crowd, making the hundred-pace journey along the quay to his waiting, one-man litter an easy affair.

Magnus followed in his wake enjoying the deference shown to his young friend by the local populace. ‘I didn’t think quaestors were normally treated with this much respect in the provinces,’ he observed as one of the four litter-bearers unnecessarily helped Vespasian onto his seat.

‘It’s because the Governors always hate it here and rightly so, it’s like living in a baker’s oven but without the nice smell. They tend to spend all their time in the provincial capital, Gortyn over in Creta, and send their quaestors here to administer Cyrenaica in their name.’

Magnus chuckled. ‘Ah, that’ll always help people to respect you, the power of life and death.’

‘Not really, as a quaestor I don’t have Imperium, no power of my own. I have to have all my decisions ratified by the Governor, which takes forever,’ Vespasian said gloomily, ‘but I do have the power to procure horses,’ he added with a grin as a dusky young slave boy led a saddled horse up to Magnus.

Magnus took the animal gratefully and threw his bag over its rump before mounting. ‘How did you know that I’d be arriving today?’

‘I didn’t, I just hoped that you would be,’ Vespasian replied as his litter moved forward, passing a theatre looking out over the sea. ‘When the fleet was sighted this morning I decided to come down on the off-chance, as it’s probably the last one of the season to arrive from Rome. Anyway, it’s not as if I had anything else worthwhile to do.’

‘It’s as bad as that here, is it?’ Magnus raised a wry eyebrow as the slave boy began fanning Vespasian with a broad, woven palm-frond fan on a long stick.

‘It’s terrible: the indigenous Libu spend all their time robbing the wealthy Greek farmers; the Greeks amuse themselves by levelling false accusations of fraud or theft against the Jewish merchants; the Jews never stop protesting about sacrilegious statues or some perceived religious outrage involving a pig, and then the Roman merchants passing through do nothing but complain about being swindled by the Jews, Greeks and Libu, in that order. On top of that everyone lives in fear of slave-gathering raids by either the Garamantes from the south or the nomadic Marmaridae to the east, between here and Egypt. It’s a boiling pot of ethnic hatred and the only thing that they hate more than each other is us, but that doesn’t stop individuals throwing money at me to rule in their favour in court cases.’

‘And you take it, I hope?’

‘I didn’t at first but I do now. I remember being shocked when my uncle told me that he took bribes while he was Governor of Aquitania, but now I understand the system better and realise that it’s expected of me. And anyway, most of the wealthy locals are so unpleasant it’s a pleasure to take their money.’

‘Sounds much like Judaea judging by Sabinus’ descriptions of it,’ Magnus mused as they passed into a crowded agora surrounded by dilapidated ancient temples dedicated to the Greek gods and overlooked by civic buildings cut into the hill above.

‘It’s worse, believe me,’ Vespasian replied, recalling his conversations with his brother upon his return from the East, concerning the utter ungovernability of the Jews. They had overlapped for two days in Rome before he had sailed for Creta at the end of March. ‘There you only had to deal with the Jews; they could be kept in line by their priests and by offering them small concessions. But here if you were to offer a concession to one group, then every bastard would want one until you’d find your-self giving the whole province away and hauled up in front of the Senate, or worse, on your return to Rome. That’s why I give nothing away to any of them unless I’m well paid for it; that way the other factions can’t complain that I’ve showed any favouritism because they know that I was bribed. Surprisingly, that seems to make it all right for them.’

‘I’ll bet that you wish you were back in Thracia,’ Magnus said, admiring the exertions of the slave boy who was managing to keep a constant flow of air moving around his master and maintain his footing despite the bad state of repair of the paving stones; the city had seen better days.

‘At least we had some decent troops to threaten the locals with. Here all we’ve got is one cohort of local auxiliary infantry, made up of men who are too stupid to earn their living by thieving; then there’s the city militia, which comprises men too stupid to be an auxiliary; and finally an ala of local auxiliary cavalry, who are meant to protect us from the nomads, which is a joke because most of them have camels.’

‘What’s a camel?’

‘It’s like a big, brown goat with a long neck and a hump on its back; horses hate the smell of them.’

‘Oh, I saw some of them at the circus once; they made people laugh but they didn’t put up much of a fight.’

‘They don’t need to – according to the cavalry prefect, Corvinus, they can run all day across the desert; our cavalry hardly ever get near them.’

They passed through the city’s gates, guarded by marble lions to either side, and started the gentle eight-mile ascent to the city of Cyrene, set on the limestone plateau above. Vespasian sank back into a maudlin silence, contemplating the futility of his position in this part of the combined province of Creta and Cyrenaica. During the seven months he had been there he had achieved nothing, mainly because there was hardly any money to achieve anything with. For centuries the wealth of Cyrenaica had been in silphium, a bulbous-headed plant with a long stalk, whose resin was much prized as a rich seasoning and as a cure for throat maladies and fever; the meat from animals that grazed on it was also sold at a premium. It grew along the dry coastal plain – the Cyrenian plateau being more conducive to the cultivation of orchards and vegetables. However, in recent years the crop had mysteriously begun to fail to the point where it was no longer fed to livestock, thus killing off the meat industry; and over the last couple of years the quality of each crop had deteriorated no matter how intensively it was farmed.

Vespasian had tried to persuade the local farmers to produce other crops, but the thin nature of the soil and the paucity of rain on the plain, combined with the farmers’ fervent belief that if enough gods were sacrificed to on a regular basis the silphium would return to health, had thwarted him. Consequently the tax revenues were drying up as those with money hid it away and spent very little buying goods from those with even less. With very little money in circulation, grain, imported from the more fertile neighbouring provinces of Egypt and Africa, had reached sky-high prices as a consequence of greedy speculation by the merchants who controlled the trade. They had all denied it, when he had called them into his presence to explain themselves, and had put the blame squarely on the reduced amount of grain being received from Egypt in the past year; yet there had been no mention of a failure of the Egyptian harvest. The result was that the poor, whether Greek, Jewish or Libu, were always on the verge of starving and civil unrest was a constant threat.

Without sufficient troops to quash an uprising among the almost half a million population of Cyrenaica’s seven major cities, and without the authority to act in his own name, Vespasian had felt impotent and frustrated throughout his tenure of office. This feeling was now compounded by the Emperor Tiberius’ refusal to grant him an entry permit to the imperial province of Egypt, a province so rich that senators were allowed to visit it only with express permission from the Emperor himself; to do so without would be a capital offence.

Chiding himself for falling into a self-pitying reverie, he turned back to his companion trotting along beside him. ‘Did Sabinus finally manage to get himself elected as an aedile?’

‘Yes, just,’ Magnus replied. ‘But as your brother always says: just is good enough. Although he was relieved that he wasn’t contesting the praetor elections until next year – all those positions were filled by the sons of Macro’s cronies.’

‘So we’re back to having a Praetorian prefect who interferes with politics, are we? You would have thought Macro would have learnt a lesson from his predecessor’s untimely demise. I can’t imagine that’s endeared him much to Antonia: she believes that meddling in politics is the prerogative of the imperial family and, specifically, herself.’

Magnus indicated to the litter-bearers.

‘Don’t worry about them, they don’t speak Latin,’ Vespasian informed him, ‘and the boy’s a deaf mute.’

‘Fair enough. Well, since you left in March some strange things have been happening; Antonia’s getting quite concerned.’

‘I thought that she didn’t tell you anything other than what to do.’

‘No, I get most of the inside gossip from your uncle, Senator Pollo; although she does occasionally let things slip, afterwards, if you take my meaning?’

‘You old goat!’ Vespasian smiled for what felt like the first time since he had arrived in Cyrenaica, enjoying the unlikely and unequal sexual relationship between his old friend and the most formidable woman in Rome, his patron Antonia, sister-in-law to the Emperor Tiberius.

‘Yeah, well, that doesn’t happen so much these days, I’m pleased to say; she’s getting on a bit, you know, sagging somewhat. Anyway, she’s concerned about Caligula’s relationship with Macro, or more precisely Caligula’s new relationship with Macro’s wife, Ennia, which Macro seems to be encouraging.’

Vespasian smiled and waved a hand dismissively. ‘Caligula’s had his eye on her for some time; he’ll no doubt tire of her, he’s notoriously insatiable. Macro’s just being sensible about it; he’s well aware that if he makes a fuss about it now he’ll be in a very precarious position if and when Caligula becomes emperor.’

‘Perhaps, but your uncle thinks that there’s more to Macro’s behaviour than just being polite, he reckons that he’s trying to ingratiate himself with Caligula because he wants something from him if he does become emperor.’

‘As Praetorian prefect he’s the most powerful person in Rome outside the imperial family; what more can he want short of becoming his heir? Caligula may be a lot of things but he’s not stupid.’

‘That’s what’s worrying Antonia, she doesn’t understand what he’s aiming for; and what she doesn’t understand, she can’t control, which pisses her off considerably.’

‘I can imagine, but I wouldn’t call that very strange.’

‘No, the strange bit is the other person who Macro’s cultivating,’ Magnus said with a conspiratorial look in his eye. ‘Herod Agrippa. He used to be a friend of Antonia’s and used to borrow money off her but he never paid her back, thinking that because he was a favourite of Tiberius and a good friend of his son Drusus – they were educated together – he was owed a living. However, when Drusus died he fled Rome and his debts and went back to his homeland, Iudemaea.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘Fuck knows, but close to Judaea, I should think, as he’s Jewish. Anyway, he soon had to leave there, debts again, and then spent his time pissing off every petty king and tetrarch in the East demanding a position of power or a loan just because he’s the grandson of Herod the Great. A couple of months ago he returned to Rome and managed to wheedle his way back into Tiberius’ favour. According to your uncle he’s organised an embassy of Parthian rebel noblemen to come to Rome next year; they want Tiberius to help them depose their king. As a reward Tiberius has made Herod Agrippa tutor to his grandson Tiberius Gemmelus.’

‘So what makes it strange that Macro and he should be friends?’

‘Because while Macro is trying to ingratiate himself with Caligula, he’s at the same time snuggling up to Herod, the person who has the most influence over another possible heir, Gemmelus.’

‘So he’s backing both chariots?’

Magnus grinned and shook his head. ‘No, sir, it would seem that he’s backing all three. Herod Agrippa has another contact, a very good childhood friend of his who was educated alongside him and Drusus: the third possible heir from the imperial family, Antonia’s son Claudius.’

The sun was beginning to dip in the west and the sea sparkled bronze below as Vespasian and Magnus passed under Cyrene’s principal gate into the lower city. The litter-bearers had to force their way through scores of beggars – refugees from the failed silphium farms hoping to receive alms from newly arrived merchants before they tired of being importuned by the countless destitute now obliged to rely on charity.

‘I’m getting to really hate this place,’ Vespasian commented as he pushed away supplicating hands. ‘It just rubs my face in the fact that my family’s standing in the Senate is very low; only the most insignificant quaestors get sent here.’

‘You drew it by lot.’

‘Yes, but only the insignificant quaestors go to the ballot; the ones from the great families get the plum jobs in Rome. Sabinus was lucky to draw Syria last year.’

Magnus kicked away an overly persistent old crone. ‘I’ve got a letter from Caenis in my bag, hopefully that’ll cheer you up; you certainly seem to need it.’

‘It’ll help,’ Vespasian shouted back over the torrent of abuse that Magnus was receiving from the floored crone, ‘but I don’t think that I’ll feel cheerful until after the sailing season starts again in March and my replacement arrives. I need to get back to Rome, I need to feel that I’m making progress rather than festering in this arsehole of the Empire.’

‘Well, we’ve got four months to kill, I’ll keep you company. To tell you the truth, when Antonia failed to get your Egypt travel warrant I told her that I’d still come anyway to bring the bad news. Things are a little too hot for me at the moment in Rome; your uncle is going to smooth it all over while I’m away.’

‘What did you do?’

‘Nothing, just a bit of business looking after the interests of my Crossroads Brotherhood; I’ve left my second, Servius, in command, he’ll look after things.’

Vespasian knew not to pry into Magnus’ underworld life as the leader of the South Quirinal Crossroads Brotherhood; protection and extortion were the primary business of all the Brotherhoods. ‘You’re welcome to stay but there isn’t much to do.’

‘What about the hunting; what’s that like here?’

‘It’s not up to much close to the city, but apparently if you go south for a couple of days you might find some lions in the foothills of the plateau.’

‘It’s your birthday in a few days; we’ll kill a lion to celebrate,’ Magnus suggested.

Vespasian looked at his friend apologetically. ‘You go and celebrate by yourself, I’m afraid that I can’t. I’m not supposed to leave the city unless it’s on official business.’

Magnus shook his head. ‘I can see that this is going to be a very dull few months.’

‘Welcome to my world.’

‘What are the whores like?’

‘I’m told they’re nice and old, just as you like them, but rather sweaty.’

‘Now come on, sir, don’t mock, it’s not out of choice; I just do as the good lady tells me. And, as I said, it doesn’t happen much nowadays.’

Vespasian smiled again. ‘I’m sure that Quintillius, my clerk, can procure something suitable to make up for that.’

The street opened out into the busy main agora of the lower city.

‘What’s going on there?’ Magnus pointed at a large crowd of mainly Jewish men jeering at a tall, broad-shouldered young man standing on a plinth attempting to address them. Next to him stood a young woman carrying a one-year-old girl-child; a three-year-old boy squatted at her feet looking fearfully at the crowd.

‘Another Jewish proselytiser, I expect,’ Vespasian replied with a sigh. ‘There seems to have been an influx of them recently, preaching some new sort of Jewish cult. I’m told that the elders don’t like it, but as long as they don’t cause any trouble I leave them alone. The one thing that I’ve learnt here is that it’s best to keep out of Jewish affairs, they’re impossible to understand.’

Unimpeded now by beggars, the litter-bearers made good progress along the lower city’s wide main thoroughfare, lined with the old and tatty, but still imposing, two-storey houses of the richer merchants, and they soon started the short ascent to the upper city.

Heartened somewhat by the prospect of reading Caenis’ letter, Vespasian turned his thoughts to his lover whom he had not seen for over seven months. Still a slave in the Lady Antonia’s household, she would be thirty in three years’ time and he lived in hope of her being freed upon attaining that age, the youngest allowed by law for the manumission of slaves. Although it was against the law for a man of senatorial rank to marry a freedwoman, he hoped to take her as his mistress as soon as she was able to make decisions in her own right. He planned to set her up in a small house in Rome with the money that he was quite quickly accruing from the bribes and gifts that naturally came his way from provincials anxious to have the favour of the highest ranking Roman official in the area. Now that he had put his scruples to one side and was taking the bribes he hoped that by the time he got back to Rome he would have enough not only for a house for Caenis but also for himself and the wife he must soon take to fulfil his duties to his family. A series of letters from his parents, now living in Aventicum, in Germania Superior, where his father had purchased a banking business, had impressed upon him the need to produce an heir for the security of the family.

They soon reached the street of King Battus in the upper city; at its eastern end was the Roman Forum, beyond which stood the Governor’s Residence – a much more modern building that had been purpose-built by the Romans one hundred years previously after Cyrenaica had become a Roman province.

Vespasian’s litter was set down in front of the Residence and, brushing off his bearers’ attempts to help him, Vespasian stepped down, adjusted his toga and mounted the steps.

Magnus followed, grimacing at the quality of the four auxiliary guards beneath the portico as they brought themselves haphazardly to attention. ‘I see what you mean,’ he commented as they passed through the doors and into a large atrium with clerical staff working at desks down one side, ‘they’re a fucking shambles; not even their mothers could be proud of them.’

‘And they’re among the best from the first century,’ Vespasian replied. ‘There’re a couple of centuries who can’t even dress themselves off into a straight line; the centurions are getting through vine-sticks at an incredible rate.’

Before Magnus could express his opinions on the effectiveness or otherwise of beating discipline into sub-standard soldiery, a well-groomed, togate quaestor’s clerk approached them.

‘What is it, Quintillius?’ Vespasian asked.

‘There’s been a woman waiting to see you for three hours now; I tried to get her to make an appointment to come back at a more suitable time but she refused. She said that as a Roman citizen it’s her right to see you as soon as you return. And also that it’s your duty to see her as her father was your uncle’s clerk when he was a quaestor in Africa.’

Vespasian sighed. ‘Very well, have her shown to my study. What’s her name?’

‘That’s the odd thing, quaestor, she claims to be a kinswoman of yours; her name’s Flavia Domitilla.’

‘And it’s now a month and a half since he went southeast and he promised me that he wouldn’t be gone more than forty days.’ Flavia Domitilla sobbed into a silk handkerchief, then dabbed her eyes carefully so as not to smudge the thick line of kohl that outlined them.

Whether she was genuinely upset or just using her feminine wiles to the full, Vespasian could not tell, nor did he very much care; he was transfixed by this elegant and immaculately presented young woman. Tall with curved hips, a thin waist and high, rounded breasts, her body was sumptuous. Her intelligent, sparkling, dark eyes, a slender nose and a full mouth were framed by a mound of high-piled black hair with braids falling to her shoulders on either side. Apart from a few slave girls he had not had a proper woman since he last saw Caenis; and Flavia Domitilla was undoubtedly a proper woman. Her clothes and jewellery spoke of wealth and her coiffure and make-up told of the time that she had to enjoy it; she was exquisite. Vespasian stared at her, inhaling her feminine scent, heightened by the heat and augmented by a delicate perfume, as she whimpered softly into her handkerchief. He felt the blood pulsing in his groin and, to cover any embarrassment, adjusted the folds of his toga, grateful, for the first time since arriving in the province, to be wearing the garment. In an effort to tear his mind away from carnal thoughts, he raised his eyes to study her features. Other than a slight roundness of the face he could make out nothing that would suggest a close kinship; however, her name was irrefutably the feminine form of Flavius.

Suddenly realising that he had been too busy admiring her to take in what she had been saying, he cleared his throat. ‘What was his name?’

Flavia looked up from her handkerchief. ‘I told you; Statilius Capella.’

‘Oh yes, of course; and he’s your husband?’

‘No, I’m his mistress; haven’t you listened to anything?’ Flavia frowned. ‘His wife is back in Sabratha in the province of Africa; he never takes her on his business trips, he finds that my charms work much better on his clients.’

Vespasian could well believe it; they had certainly worked on him and, dizzy with desire inflamed by her sensual scent and ripe body, it was as much as he could do to keep his hands clamped on the arms of his chair and concentrate on what she was saying. ‘And what was his business again?’

Flavia looked at him exasperated. ‘You’ve just been sitting there staring at my breasts, haven’t you, because you’ve evidently not heard a word I’ve said.’

Vespasian opened his mouth to deny the accusation – he had been staring at more than just her breasts – but thought better of it. ‘I’m sorry if you think that I’ve been inattentive, I’m a busy man,’ he blustered, his eyes involuntarily resting again for a moment on the magnificent swell of that part of Flavia’s anatomy.

‘Not too busy to sit and stare at a woman’s body rather than listen to what she has to say. He’s a wild-beast master; he procures animals for the circuses in Sabratha and Lepcis Magna. He was making a trip out into the desert to try and get some camels; they don’t put up much of a fight but they look funny and make people laugh. We don’t have them in the province of Africa but there’s a tribe here that does.’

‘The Marmaridae.’

‘Yes, that sounds right, the Marmaridae,’ Flavia agreed, pleased to have his full attention finally.

‘So your er… man has gone to try and buy camels off a tribe that doesn’t acknowledge Rome’s hegemony in the area because we’ve never been able to defeat them in battle as they’re nomadic and almost impossible to find?’

‘Yes, and he should have been back five days ago,’ Flavia added, quivering her bottom lip.

Vespasian bit his, trying to banish thoughts of where that lip might go. ‘You should hope that he hasn’t made contact with them.’

Flavia looked at him in alarm. ‘What do you mean by that?’

‘Because they’re notorious slavers; they take whomever they can find and sell them, hundreds of miles away in the south, to the Garamantes, who apparently have massive irrigation works that enable them to grow crops down there; it’s very labour intensive.’

Flavia burst into fresh tears.

Vespasian fought to resist the urge to comfort her, knowing that once he touched that body he would be lost. ‘I’m sorry, Flavia, but it’s the truth. He was absolutely mad to go out there. How many men did he have with him?’

‘I don’t know for sure, at least ten, I think.’

‘Ten? That’s preposterous; there are thousands of Marmaridae. Let’s pray that he hasn’t found them and that his water hasn’t run out yet; how much did he take?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Well, if he doesn’t turn up in a couple of days then I’m afraid you’ll have to fear the worst. If he’s gone southeast then the first place that he can get water – if he hasn’t taken a local guide to show him where the wells are hidden – is the oasis at Siwa just before the Egyptian border; that’s over three hundred miles away and can take between ten and twenty days to get to, depending on the conditions.’

‘Then you’ll have to go and find him.’

‘Find him? Do you have any idea how big an area we’re talking about and how many men I’d have to take just to ensure that we’d get back?’

‘I don’t care,’ Flavia snapped. ‘He’s a freeborn Roman citizen and it’s your duty to protect him from slavery.’