Mistress of Rome

  “Like this? Hey, we’re both left-handed. What are the odds?”

  ROME

  “—so he’s sitting on his judge’s chair in the courtroom”—Paulinus’s hands sketched a quick picture—“and a pleb woman is swearing up and down that the inheritance should go to her and not to the plaintiff because he isn’t her son and heir, as he’s claiming. And the Emperor asks her, ‘Is this the truth?’ and she nods, ‘Yes, Lord and God,’ and he says, ‘Good, then you can marry him. Right now, on the spot, and the inheritance will be shared between you.’ ”

  The Vestal Justina smiled, her eyes crinkling. “And what did she say?”

  “She fell to her knees begging to be let off. So the Emperor judged that the plaintiff was her son after all, and the inheritance went to him.” Paulinus shook his head. “And do you know what he told me later? The Emperor, I mean. He said it was a trick he’d stolen from the legal records of Emperor Claudius. Claudius himself couldn’t have pulled it off any better. That woman’s face when he proposed she marry her son—”

  Justina laughed, and Paulinus felt rich. She didn’t laugh often. Smiled a good deal, slowly and quietly, but rarely laughed. He settled back in his chair with a sigh.

  “Tired?” She looked still and cool in her white robes, blending against the pale marble walls.

  “I’m always on the run these days.” He smiled at her. “I wouldn’t mind a day in your position—sitting still in a white room watching a flame.”

  “Oh, it’s a bit more than that. But it is peaceful.”

  She was peaceful. He’d gotten into the habit, these past months, of dropping in on her. The Imperial investigations of the Vestal Virgins were officially closed, but he still visited every few weeks, just to talk to Justina. To sit in the public room, in full view as any Vestal must be when speaking to a man, and speak for a while in quiet voices about nothing very important. “I’m to be married,” he said suddenly.

  “I’d heard something of it. A girl from the Sulpicii family?”

  “Yes. Calpurnia Helena Sulpicia. The Emperor is hosting our betrothal feast as soon as the augurs find an auspicious date. She’s a widow—quite young, though, no children.”

  “Is that all you can say of your future wife?” Justina asked.

  “I hardly know her. She seems pleasant, though, and I’ve got to marry someone.”

  “Do you?”

  He shrugged. “If I stay unwed much longer, people will start thinking I prefer boys.”

  “Quite a few soldiers do.” The cool voice was amused, and he shot her a sideways glance. For a priestess, she was prone to comments of distinct worldliness.

  “My friend Trajan does,” Paulinus said ruefully. “He says men are easier than women. He’s probably right, too, but it’s not the way for me. I’ll marry Calpurnia Helena Sulpicia, and have sons.” He looked at her. “Did you ever regret it—not marrying?”

  She blinked. “Well—no, I was—I never even thought about it. I was, well, nine years old when I was chosen. I certainly wasn’t thinking about marriage then. And then the Vestals swallowed me up, and I never looked back. Anyway, Vestals do marry sometimes. After they’ve served their thirty years and retired.”

  “Really?” It was his turn to be taken aback.

  “It doesn’t happen often—it’s considered bad luck to wed a former Vestal. But our former Chief Vestal was planning to marry when she retired. She was executed instead.”

  Paulinus looked Justina straight in the eye. “She should have waited, instead of taking him as a lover.”

  “Oh, he wasn’t her lover. They’d known each other for years, but she never broke her vows.”

  “The Emperor handled the case himself. Do you think he would have convicted her without ample evidence? You don’t know how careful a jurist he is.”

  “You don’t know how seriously Vestals take their vows.” Her voice cooled.

  Paulinus opened his mouth—and reminded himself it was impolite to argue with a priestess. “I would never wish to impugn the Vestals.” Carefully.

  “And I would never wish to impugn the Emperor.” A crooked little smile tilted her mouth. “Let’s not argue.”

  LEPIDA

  A. D. 93

  PAULINUS’S proposed bride was no threat at all to me. Lady Calpurnia Helena Sulpicia was as sturdy as a pony, with square hands and a snub nose. A year older than me, too. I’d worried considerably that I’d lose my stepson to some sly sylph of a fifteen-year-old, but this ample widow was not worth worrying about. I’d met her on a handful of occasions but had never spoken with her for long. Now the year had turned, however, and it was Lupercalia and the Lupercalia festival was a time for lovers, so the augurs had finally fi xed a betrothal date for Paulinus and his little pony of a bride.

  “My dear, what a very interesting gown,” I greeted her as she entered my hall dressed for her feast at the palace. “Blue? Such a bold choice, with skin like yours.”

  “Thank you, Lady Lepida.” Her voice was placid. “Could you check the clasp of my bracelet? It’s come loose.”

  I bent over the clasp. Her sapphires were bigger, bluer, and better than mine—I’d worn blue for the banquet, too. “It’s not loose at all.” I searched her face, but the wide hazel eyes were innocent as a child’s. No one would ever write odes to her gemlike gaze. I loosened the clasp of my stola to show a little more shoulder, arching my neck. “Paulinus will be late, of course. He’s so taken up with his duties.”

  “I’m sure he is.”

  I was about to launch another attack—on her hair, this time; an unremarkable mouse blond for all that it was tied up in knots of jewels—but I heard the uneven footfall behind me and turned to face Marcus.

  “Lady Calpurnia.” He smiled, kissing her hand. “I’ve just received a message from Paulinus; he’s tied up in guard duties and says he’ll meet us at the Domus Augustana.”

  Calpurnia nodded. She didn’t seem disappointed, which displeased me. How much more fun it would have been if she’d fallen madly in love with him. I could have dropped a few hints here and there about his feelings for me, tortured her for months with the uncertainty of it all . . .

  “Father!” Sabina skimmed in from the atrium. “Father, you forgot to let me fi x your tunic.”

  “So I did.” He bent down, allowing her to adjust the crisp folds. “Do I pass muster now?”

  “Perfect.”

  “Your daughter, Senator?” Calpurnia turned toward Marcus, not me.

  “Yes. Vibia Sabina, meet Lady Calpurnia Helena Sulpicia.”

  Sabina showed her gap-toothed smile. “I’m very pleased to—”

  “Curtsy, Sabina,” I snapped. “You’re eight years old; you should know better.”

  “Lepida,” said Marcus coldly, “she’s nine.”

  “Well, if rudeness isn’t adorable at eight, then it’s not adorable at nine, either.”

  She curtsied. I saw her eyes shut for a moment, dizzyingly. “If you’re going to have a fit, have it upstairs,” I ordered. “I won’t have you embarrassing our guests.”

  “Lovely to have met you, Vibia Sabina,” Calpurnia said as my daughter sidled out. “I look forward to seeing you again.”

  “Now that that’s over with—” I pulled my ice-blue palla up around my shoulders. “Shall we go?”

  Calpurnia and Marcus looked at me. I knew the expression on Marcus’s face quite well: cold, hooded scorn. Calpurnia’s square face held disapproval. Who did they think they were? I ignored them on the ride to the palace, twitching the curtains of the litter aside and watching the plebs celebrate Lupercalia outside. Always such fun, with the wilder men racing about in loincloths cracking whips, and lovers stumbling from dark corner to dark corner. Last Lupercalia I’d had four men clamoring for my festival favors, and they’d made me a bet I couldn’t take them all on . . . I had them all and two to spare! More fun than this Lupercalia looked to be. Marcus was already droning about Senate business, and Calpurnia was encouraging him.

/>   The lights of the Domus Augustana blazed, drawing us in. Domitian usually hosted formal banquets at the new palace with its massive state rooms and extravagant fountains, but Paulinus had the honor of being feted at the Emperor’s own private palace. Slaves leaped forward to take our cloaks; jeweled freedmen drew us down glistening passageways to the triclinium, which had been transformed into a vision of orchids and laurel and dazzling crystal and solid-gold dishes. For Paulinus, the Emperor had spared no luxury. He had even forsaken his usual plain tunic for a gold-embroidered purple robe worth more than a month’s grain shipment from Syria.

  “My friends!” Domitian came toward us, his ruddy face beaming. “Delighted to receive you. Marcus”—a friendly nod—“Lady Lepida”—a kiss to the cheek(!)—“the lovely bride”—a press of Calpurnia’s hand. “You are all welcome!”

  “So pleased,” murmured the Empress, all emeralds and silver at his side.

  “Sorry to keep you waiting.” Paulinus strode through the doors, still shrugging the folds of his lawn synthesis into place.

  “Never mind, never mind.” Domitian threw a friendly arm around Paulinus’s shoulders, and I wondered if the rumors were true—if he really was going to name Paulinus his heir. Last year a prefectship, this year an heiress, next year an Empire . . . Certainly Domitian was closer to my stepson than to anyone else in all Rome. Emperor Paulinus Vibius Augustus Norbanus . . . incest laws or not, I would marry my stepson if he became Emperor!

  “Well?” Domitian said good-naturedly as Paulinus hesitated over Calpurnia’s hand. “Kiss your betrothed!”

  Calpurnia offered up her cheek. Flushing, Paulinus bent down and brushed it with his lips. His eyes flickered toward mine, and I shaped a mocking kiss at him. He flushed and looked away.

  “Paulinus.” Marcus stepped forward. “Good to see you, boy. It’s been too long.”

  “Father.”

  They stepped toward each other, eyes not quite meeting as they hugged. Paulinus stepped back as if he had been burned, dull color rising high in his cheeks.

  I giggled.

  We’d barely arranged ourselves on the silk-cushioned couches before a stream of food and music and entertainers flooded in. Sugar-glazed fruit heaped high in silver bowls, whole roasted peacocks with their vibrant tail feathers still in place, honey-brushed pork stuffed with sage and rosemary and gobbets of its own flesh. Drummers danced before my eyes, and sweet-voiced choirboys from Corinth, and lithe brown acrobats climbing toward the ivory ceiling on each others’ shoulders. Slaves shoved food onto our plates as soon as we cleared them, and Domitian roared at us to eat up, eat up. He gestured with the peacock’s crispy, feathered neck, grease spots already staining his priceless purple robe, and I realized he was drunk. Old Falernian flowed around us like the Tiber, and as the heat gathered under my skin it seemed entirely natural to let my hair loosen and my stola slip off one shoulder. Now this was more like Lupercalia!

  The Emperor was telling stories of Paulinus’s bravery, shouting out that here was the best friend a man ever had, and he’d have the whole world know it. Paulinus was glassy-eyed, matching the Emperor goblet for goblet. Calpurnia’s cheeks were flushed, her gown crumpled as she sprawled uncomfortably across her couch. The room was too hot and there was too much food and too much wine, but the music soared in a bright ribald stream and the Emperor loomed over us like a vast bloated god, so we shoveled food into our mouths and poured wine down our burning throats and coughed out bursts of hysterical laughter.

  Marcus sat cool and chill beside me, and as I glanced over at him dizzily I saw that his eyes weren’t on the Emperor or his son, but on the Empress. The Empress, equally cool and chill on the end of her couch, and gazing right back at him. There was something important about that tense speculating gaze, but the room was spinning around me and everything was hilarious and I couldn’t stop laughing at Calpurnia’s broad perspiring face. I tossed down another goblet of wine, half of it slopping over the mosaics, and flopped over on my back to laugh up at the ceiling. My stola slipped off the other shoulder, baring my breast, and Paulinus’s glazed eyes fastened on it.

  “A betrothal ring for the bride!” Domitian roared. “Paulinus, don’t tell me you haven’t given it to her yet? Here, let me.” He fumbled for Calpurnia’s shrinking hand and shoved a sizable ruby onto the wrong finger. “Betrothed! Time to kiss her again, Paulinus. No, no, not like that!”—as Paulinus planted a smeary peck on Calpurnia’s lips. “I suppose I’ll have to do this for you, too”—and the Emperor kissed Calpurnia, teeth mashing against her lips. Her muffled squeak disappeared into the mocking drumroll of the musicians.

  “Caesar,” the Empress said sharply, speaking for the first time all evening. “You’re frightening the poor girl.”

  “Frightening?” The black Flavian eyes narrowed. “What would you know about kisses? Cold as an icicle—wouldn’t melt in a volcano, you scheming frozen—”

  The Empress rose from her couch, not a hair out of place. “Thank you for a delightful evening,” she said at large. “Marcus, Lady Lepida. Prefect Norbanus, Lady Calpurnia. Good evening to you all.”

  “That’s right,” the Emperor muttered as she drifted out. “Get out of here—frigid scheming bitch—” He beckoned a pageboy violently, and I watched with hazy eyes as he emptied a packet of little crushed leaves into the wine flagon. “What’sat?” I giggled.

  “Herbs—Indian, I think—” He downed an explosive mouthful. “Makes—makes colors—Paulinus, here—and Calpurnia—”

  “I don’t want any,” she said distinctly.

  “DRINK!” The Emperor thrust the goblet into her hand so half the wine slopped over her expensive gown, and she drank. I reached over to wrest the cup away, feeling Marcus’s disgusted eyes as I drained the dregs. Old Falernian, with something bitter at the bottom.

  “Good,” the Emperor panted. Sweat crowned his forehead. “Feels, feels—good—hot in here—music—SOMEBODY FETCH ME ATHENA!” he shouted.

  Warmer all of a sudden. Mosaics twisting and swirling like they were alive. My body grew hot and loose.

  “Oh, gods, I feel sick.” Calpurnia half fell off the couch and vomited by a rosy marble statue of a bathing Artemis.

  I felt a quick rustle on the couch next to me as Marcus rose. “I think I’d better take Lady Calpurnia home, Caesar. She isn’t well.” He cupped a hand around her elbow, lifting her up. “Paulinus—”

  But Paulinus sprawled panting and flaccid across the couch, his pupils swallowing up his eyes. “Y’re beautiful,” he mumbled to me. “Y’re beautiful—”

  “Good night,” said Marcus, and he dragged out the reeling Calpurnia.

  Paulinus’s curls were moving. Twining around like snakes. I put out an interested finger, pulling back before I could be bitten. He rolled over and seized my wrist, attacking my shoulder and throat with his mouth.

  “ATHENA!” the Emperor roared, and I looked up over Paulinus’s shoulder to see Thea gliding through the door in apricot silk, at first pinprick-tiny like at the end of a tunnel, and then suddenly looming huge. The stone at her throat had grown into a vast black mouth. As Paulinus fumbled with stupid fingers at the clasp of my stola, the Emperor grabbed hold of Thea’s arm, so hard his fingers left white marks on her flesh. “Drink,” he whispered, forcing the goblet against her teeth. “Drink—we’ll see what kind of goddess you are—” and as she choked on the wine he kissed her, eating her with his teeth and his hands.

  My stola ripped, and Paulinus was a panting, sweating beast on top of me. I raked my nails, drawing blood that shifted colors in my eyes. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the Emperor doing something to Thea, Thea half-clothed and turning her head away on the cushions . . . Paulinus was hot hard invading flesh above me, diamond drops of sweat falling from his face, his eyes two dark pits, his mouth a square agonized hole. I rolled my eyes dizzily to look at Thea, crushed under a panting sweating beast of her own, and her eyes snapped open and met mine.

  Eyes locked while our
bodies writhed. The world cleared around Thea’s face; Thea’s white, hating face not two feet away. Blood on her lip, her hair a tangle of sweat and silver chains, her eyes dilated by the drug. Hated her—hated her—a leap of answering loathing in her eyes—speared down by hard male flesh, both of us, or we’d have leaped for each other’s throats. Rocked and pinioned, we still reached out, clawing across the space. Her fingers crushed mine, trying to break bone, and I sank my nails deep into her knuckles and neither one of us would look away. Her eyes were the last thing I saw before the colors crashed in around my head.

  I’M going to be sick again,” Calpurnia wailed, stumbling against Marcus’s crooked shoulder.

  “Then go ahead and be sick,” he told his prospective daughter-in-law. She retched, lurching against the doorway, and Marcus steadied her. “Here, into the atrium. Fresh air will clear your head.”

  “I—I should get home—”

  “Sit first.”

  She staggered into the atrium and collapsed onto the first bench, cradling her head. Marcus called a slave, sent for a flagon, and pushed a goblet into her hand. “Drink.”

  “No more wine, I can’t—”

  “It’s water, not wine. Sip slowly.”

  She drank. Four hours ago, she had been a fresh-faced young girl in a new blue dress; now she was a wine-stained mess with her tangled hair descending down her back and an earring missing. She looked down at herself, flushing as she brushed at a vomit stain on her hem. “Oh, gods, I look like—”

  “Never mind. How do you feel?”

  She drank again. “My head feels like Vulcan’s own anvil.”

  “That should pass. You threw up most of the drug.”

  “Thank you—for getting me out of there.”

  “You looked a trifle overwhelmed.”

  She shuddered, and Marcus thought of her shocked face as the Emperor’s mouth bore down on hers, all wet sharp teeth. “Is he always like that?” she burst out.