Call to Juno (A Tale of Ancient Rome #3) (9 page)

He shrugged his shoulders. “I thought you’d like to see the temple. As a treat. You needn’t come, though, if you’re too frightened.”

“I won’t be frightened. You’ll be with me.”

He laughed, disentangling her fingers. “Go and finish your chores. I have to work.”

She delayed, tracing the scar on his cheek. The needle marks where she’d sewn his wound had almost faded. Surprising her again, he wrapped his arms around her waist and squeezed her, the side of his face against her breasts. She kissed the top of his head.

“Perhaps I want you with me because you’ve bewitched me,” he murmured.

She pulled back. “Don’t say that. I don’t use spells on you.”

He fingered the fascinum and Venus shell around her neck. “Yet you believe in magic. Look at all the charms you wear.”

She covered his hand. “All of us need protection, my Wolf. These keep me from the evil eye. You wear no bulla now you’re a man, so I need to watch out for you. I can advise you of the precautions needed should an ill omen befall you.”

He eased his fingers from under hers. “Enough. As you’re a woman, I’m prepared to accept your faith in superstition. But I don’t believe in such safeguards, nor should any soldier.” He guided her from between his legs and turned back to his desk.

She was sorry she’d spoken and lost the chance to linger with him. Yet as she walked outside to return to her washing, she also touched her amulets. In daylight she made a contract with Mater Matuta, promising that if the goddess convinced Camillus to love her, she would double her gifts. And at night, she used her body, lest pleasure instead of prayer was what was truly needed.

T
EN

From the moment she passed under the massive rock archway spanning the road, Pinna’s eyes were wide with wonder. She’d been cooped up behind the wooden palisade of the camp for too long. Now she enjoyed the descent into the valley, aware of Veii’s citadel above her, looking forward to seeing the fast-flowing water of the river below.

The cart bounced in the grooved wheel ruts of the road. Artile sat sulking beside her, unimpressed he shared his conveyance with a concubine. He clutched one of his sacred books in his arms like an anxious parent.

Pinna concentrated on the sights around her: pine saplings, and holly covering the tufa walls of the ravine. Her Wolf was encouraging new growth after years of harvesting the forests for fuel and forts.

Camillus rode his horse ahead, while Marcus, as head decurion, organized his turma of thirty knights to form an escort around them. The journey today would be perilous. The road and river were companions, running close by the wall of Veii. Too close, at times. The Roman lines were reinforced in such places but were under constant threat from skirmish and arrow fire.

At intervals, they passed large stone domes. After years of neglect, grass covered the massive Etruscan burial mounds. The abandoned tombs were a chilling sight, with their yawning, darkened doorways. Yet despite her trepidation about traversing through the cemeteries, Pinna admired the size of the tumuli. The sturdy columbaria that housed the ashes of the well-to-do in Rome bore no comparison to these splendid sepulchers.

Camillus reined his stallion to walk beside the cart and pointed to a group of statues seated above the doorway of one of the mounds—gods and goddesses on thrones. “Which deities are these?”

Artile studied the images briefly before responding. “They are not gods but ancestors.”

“You revere women?” The general’s voice echoed Pinna’s own surprise.

“The Rasenna venerate both bloodlines. Our male and female forebears protect our families and clans.”

Camillus said nothing, steering his horse to walk abreast of Marcus. Pinna was less able to dismiss the sight, turning in wonder to view the sculpture of an Etruscan woman who was considered an eternal guardian. And suddenly she couldn’t help wondering about the reputation of Veientane women. How could a mother, daughter, or sister be a heroine as well as depraved?

The sanctuary was situated near a crossroad where there had once been meetings, markets, and commerce. The area was now deserted. Smithy forges lay abandoned. Shops were derelict. The only activity was that of Roman sentries patrolling the area.

Pinna held her breath when she realized that, to reach the sanctuary’s gates, they must pass along a section of the road that ran flush against the city’s perimeter. The tufa blocks were enormous, each one as tall as a man and as wide as a giant. There was no mortar between them. Thick, impenetrable, timeless. Panic seized her as she spied the Veientane’s own sentinels on watch. The wagon driver urged the donkeys to a trot, while the escort of knights clustered around the cart, shields raised to ward off any arrows. No missiles were fired, though. She exhaled in relief as the party passed through the wide portal into the temple grounds, leaving the horsemen of the turma to station themselves around the boundary.

The serenity inside was a shock. Its greenness. After being surrounded by the wasteland around the camp and the stridency of military life, a place of calm and verdure was difficult to absorb.

A three-cell temple dominated the triangular enclosure. Its pediment was resplendent with the figure of a horse with winged shoes among gods and heroes. Pinna tilted her head to scan the roof decorations with medusa faces backed by fluted shells.

Camillus and Marcus stood some distance from the temple portico studying the complex. They were dressed in armor, hands resting on their sword hilts. She hoped the gods would not be offended by the sight of burnished bronze in a place of peace.

Artile beckoned to the general. His pale face was animated as he pointed to four statues on the roof ridge of the temple. The figures were perched on high pedestals, greater than life size, wondrous. “I’ll call the deities by Roman names so you can better recognize them. The sun god, Apollo, stands accosting Herculeus for catching the golden hind of Diana. Mercurius and Latona witness the confrontation. These votives were created by Vulca, the Veientane sculptor who crafted the statue of your Jupiter riding his quadriga atop the Capitoline temple in Rome. On the commission of the Etruscan kings who once ruled you.”

Camillus ignored the barb. “Granted, the tyrants were fond of monuments. At least Rome was spared their tyranny when the Republic was formed, even if their buildings remained.” He pointed to the pediment. “Who is the god accompanied by the leopard?”

“Fufluns. The Greeks call him Dionysus. The god of wine and regeneration. He is brother to Apollo but is wild and primal compared to the reasoned temper of the god of light and healing.”

Pinna marveled again how Rome and Veii shared the same divine rulers. Yet at the mention of Fufluns, she was confused. The god of wine was Liber. She didn’t know him as brethren to Apollo.

Marcus gestured toward a large rectangular pool at the side of the temple. “What’s the purpose of this basin?”

“The waters have curative qualities. Both Apollo and Minerva are deities who are purifiers and healers.”

Camillus fixed his eyes on the pond. Pinna thought of the back pain he hid every day. She wished he would take advantage of the chance to be rid of it.

The priest was studying the general. “Perhaps you should seek its salutary benefits given your constant headaches, Furius Camillus. And the old injury to your leg.”

Pinna held her breath. Her Wolf had first gained fame when, as a young warrior, he’d continued to fight a battle with a spear embedded in his thigh. Many remarked on his valor but never his slight limp. He hated to be seen as weak. And he never complained of it aching.

Camillus tensed and swiveled around. “What soldier removes his armor when a foe lurks on the door step?”

Marcus directed attention back to the pantheon, rubbing the scar that puckered the skin at the corner of one eye. “So Minerva is worshipped here also?”

“Yes, this sanctuary is hers, but many divinities share the space in harmony. Apollo is among them. His mantic powers are channeled here. It’s a place for prophecies.” He turned to the altar at the opposite end of the sanctuary. “Let’s ascertain if Aplu concurs with my interpretation. And that I have not incurred Uni’s anger.”

The men moved toward the wing-shaped altar next to the sacrificial pit that connected the quick with the dead. A soldier emerged from one of the service buildings, restraining a pig by a leash. Pinna did not follow after them. As a woman, she knew better than to expect to be present at a blood sacrifice. She was glad to be spared the sight of the holy butchery.

The sun had burned away the cool edge to the early morning. Ignoring the squeal of the beast as Artile conducted his ceremony, Pinna wandered through the sanctuary, inspecting the large votive statues. She stood in front of Minerva. With an owl perched on one shoulder, the deity held a broad shield. The concubine bowed her head, finding it strange to stand on level ground with a goddess.

The divinity’s skirts were almost hidden by overgrown fennel, its yellow flowers bright against the green. Pinna smiled. The herb could season her Wolf’s dinner as well as soothe his aches. And it was said a plant growing at the feet of a statue was even more potent as a medicine. As she broke off some branches, her attention was drawn to a trench next to the sanctuary wall. There were hundreds of small votives heaped within. Each was inscribed with a prayer in peculiar writing. Some were broken—shards of spent promises. They must have been dumped there by the priests to make room for new ones to be offered to the gods.

As Apollo was the god of medicine, most of the figurines were formed in the shape of body parts: toes, hands, even a phallus for one who sought to cure his impotence. She noticed a swaddled baby. Had the infant been ill, or was the gift an invocation to bear a healthy one? A strange shape caught Pinna’s eye—a replica of a womb. Had this woman been barren? Did she seek succor in childbirth?

Laying aside the fennel, she sat cross-legged on the grass to inspect the grotesque figurine. Her thoughts returned to the brothel. The hollow looks of some lupae were not just because of the misery of their profession. The pimp would force them to abandon their infants on the Esquiline for the crows and dogs. And in the yards of some lupanariae, the vegetables were sustained by a rich compost of dead babies.

When she was a whore, Pinna had been thankful she’d not borne a child. As an emaciated night moth plying her trade outside the city wall, she rarely experienced her courses. Over time her womb pain told her she was barren. But now she wanted to bear her Wolf’s son. The yearning to be a mother was a deep ache within her.

Camillus’s voice broke through her thoughts. The men had returned to the steps of the temple. “Well, priest, tell us the answer to appeasing the gods, since you claim Apollo has sent a favorable omen.”

Pinna rose and crept closer.

The soothsayer walked over to the pool. “Do you know how this basin is full of water when there has been no rain?”

“Get to the point, priest.”

“Before you razed our crops, our fields were verdant even in drought. The Rasenna know how to harness the power of water by irrigating dry land or draining swamps.”

Camillus sat down on the step of the portico, removing his conical hide helmet and placing it beside him. “Go on.”

The Veientane once again drew their attention to the healing pool. “This basin is fed by an underground channel running outside the wall. There are many of these cuniculi that crisscross our fields underground. Our engineers have also carved vast galleries from rock to divert the Cremera River to avoid flooding.”

The general leaned forward. “All very enlightening, but what has this to do with the portent at Lake Albanus?”

The haruspex smoothed his eyebrow. “If I tell you, will you let me travel to the holy spring at Velzna? I do not relish being your servant forever.”

Camillus laughed. “Don’t try and bargain. Tell me now, or those soft hands of yours will soon be caked with dirt and your back striped by a whip.”

Artile’s voice was thick with resentment. “The waters of the lake have inundated Latium. Where once there were fields, there are only floodplains. Mater Matuta is the Latins’ ancient goddess. She has been neglected by Rome. You need to placate her. Draw off the waters and disperse them so that they no longer flow into the sea. You will also please Neptunus, the god of water. The land of Rome’s allies will be made arable again. And the goddess of the dawn will give her blessing for Rome to conquer Veii.”

Pinna gasped, astounded. Mater Matuta was more powerful than she had ever dreamed.

Camillus tapped his ring. “That’s all very well, but how is that to be achieved?”

“The Veientanes are not the only among the Rasenna who know the secret of hydraulics. Knowledge can be bought. And skills taught.”

The general shook his head. “It’s not so simple. We need to convince the Senate first.” He stared beyond the sanctuary to the enemy wall, then studied the soothsayer. “You must satisfy the Curia of your prescience.”

The haruspex panicked. “You expect me to go to Rome!”

The general addressed Marcus. “Escort him to your family home. Your father is the current prefect. You must convince him the Senate should listen to the priest. Aemilius, in turn, might manage to persuade my brother Medullinus.” He picked up his helmet, then descended the stairs to place his hand on his officer’s shoulder. “Draining Latium territory will take many weeks to complete. We can’t waste time waiting for the delegation to return from Delphi only to reveal the same solution. If we act now, Mater Matuta will be placated and Veii may yet fall by spring.”

“Under the command of another general. It’s not fair, sir.”

Camillus’s expression hardened. “If only I had more time. I would see this finished.”