Death of an Empire (52 page)

Even two months after the death of Aetius, Ravenna still seethed with fear, excitement and gossip. During those weary weeks before the New Year, the emperor had kept himself alone, preferring the company of Heraclius and his servants to that of the members of the court, whom he distrusted and feared. Every man and woman was a possible threat to his throne and his life.

Even the guards had been drawn into the after-effects of the execution of Aetius.

‘I swear that the general was unarmed when he entered Valentinian’s room. The knife in his hand was far too big to hide in his toga or in his boot. Besides, why would the emperor lock himself in a room with someone he hated and feared?’ The soldier who spoke was Optilia, a captain in Valentinian’s guard.

‘Don’t ask me!’ a burly Goth snapped, his green eyes glowing in the lamplight of their quarters. ‘The general wouldn’t kill an unarmed man. Aetius was hard, but he wasn’t a dog. I think . . .’

‘Don’t say it!’ Aetius’s son-in-law Thraustila had entered the guardroom and overheard Optilia’s conversation with the Goth. To speak treason aloud in this climate of fear was crazy.

‘We’ve already been soaked in the blood of our general and I’d prefer not to be bathed in our own, so keep your mouths shut,’ the Hungvari nobleman went on. ‘There are plots and rumours everywhere I turn. Valentinian has cut off his own right hand to make his left hand stronger, but I think he’s risking everything on a lie.’

‘His lie, most like!’ Optilia retorted.

‘Maybe. Someone will eventually call Valentinian to account, but it won’t be me.’

Optilia and Thraustila looked at each other, but neither man said anything further.

This conversation was repeated, in one form or another, all over Ravenna. Meanwhile, the empress Licinia Eudoxia kept to her apartments and avoided her husband. Her behaviour was so pointed that the dogs of gossip suggested she was afraid that the emperor could turn on her. In fact, the empress expected reprisals for her husband’s murderous action, and she worried that her children could be killed in any struggle for the throne.

Valentinian did not fear his wife, but nor did he trust her to remain true to his interests. Because Valentinian lacked vision, he had expected his life to return to its normal luxurious and pleasure-loving pattern after Aetius was removed from the equation. All too late, Valentinian discovered that every action has its opposite reaction, and the entire court was watching him closely. His enemies had multiplied, so the dangers to his person had trebled.

‘You must act, my lord,’ Heraclius pressed him. ‘Flavius Petronius Maximus remains your most potent enemy and he is waiting to take your throne as soon as he can have you removed.’

Valentinian rounded on the eunuch with reddened, angry eyes.

‘I’ve had enough of your insinuations, Heraclius. If I execute Petronius, then the people will be sure that I’ve gone mad. The latest reports tell me that King Geiseric and his Vandals are massing near the border in the north. For the sake of all the gods, Heraclius, I must have some generals left alive. Are you going to defend the Empire? Or do you expect me to become a military leader so late in life? I need Petronius, else I’d remove him summarily.’

‘You cannot trust either Petronius or your wife. They’d have you killed without a moment’s hesitation.’

‘Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!’ Valentinian screamed, bustling Heraclius out of his rooms and locking the door behind him.

The eunuch might have been trying to bolster his reputation
and the position of his protector, but he was very close to the truth.

In the New Year, Valentinian demanded that the court should move back to Rome, so while Myrddion and his companions were still in the mountains the court transferred back to the city of Romulus along the Via Salaria, leaving the empress, Placidia, Gaudentius and Flavia behind in Ravenna. Flavia’s husband Thraustila and his friend Optilia accompanied the Praetorian Guard to protect the person of the emperor.

Valentinian distrusted everyone, but especially he feared the scions of Aetius, or those who had married into his family. By keeping Thraustila close to him, he was following the old adage of keeping your friends close, but your enemies closer. He judged, rightly, that Thraustila lacked the support or the patronage to attempt assassination in Rome, where his ancestry was hated. Rat-like, Valentinian argued with himself late at night when his fears of murder drove him to the edge of madness.

He’s a Hun, and the people of Rome hate them and would tear them to pieces, Valentinian thought desperately. It’s in Thraustila’s best interests to keep me alive.

The emperor had never really understood the way ordinary people thought or felt. Thraustila’s pride had been wounded, for his father-in-law had died ignominiously and no one had been punished for the murder. According to the beliefs of the young man’s people, Aetius’s shade was unavenged and could never rest peacefully in the grave.

Likewise, Optilia fumed inwardly that his master had died while he had been standing guard. He was certain that Aetius had been unarmed, so the general’s death had been doubly shameful. By Optilia’s exacting standards, Valentinian had forfeited the right to loyalty and Aetius’s murder had now become an affront to the guard’s manhood.

Had Valentinian considered the feelings of others, perhaps he
might have decided that taking Optilia and Thraustila with him on the journey to Rome was a risky decision. But Valentinian saw the world through his eyes alone, and not with his mind and his heart, thus rendering him blind in a world of sighted enemies.

As soon as Valentinian departed, Licinia Eudoxia began to suffer from fearsome nightmares and terrifying suspicions. She believed that her husband had rejected her, while she feared Petronius Maximus more than she could express in words. Shortly after the suicide of his wife, the senator had spoken to Lady Flavia and expressed his dislike of Licinia Eudoxia, telling the red-haired beauty that he blamed the empress for complicity in the rape of his wife. Licinia Eudoxia would never trust Lady Flavia, who rushed to tell her of Petronius’s enmity. But Licinia Eudoxia was not surprised that Petronius was seeking to find another scapegoat for the death of the lady Lydia. The empress was an easy target, especially if Valentinian died.

But even more than Petronius, the empress knew that she had cause to fear the heirs of Aetius. Flavia had been quick to swear her allegiance to the throne, but Eudoxia was nobody’s fool. Flavia was Aetius’s daughter and had inherited her father’s cold-blooded intelligence.

‘Aetius was loyal to you, your majesty, I swear! My father knew that he was too old to rule, so he would never have raised a hand against your husband. My brother is married to your daughter, so our families are tightly interwoven. A blow against one is a blow against all.’

Eudoxia was not deceived by Flavia’s assurances. The girl might be married to a nobleman in Valentinian’s guard, but she was still Aetius’s daughter. Self-willed and careless, Flavia took every opportunity afforded by her husband’s absence from Ravenna to surround herself with her own court of thoroughly disreputable persons, including handsome actors, freed gladiators, and gamblers,
and was too fond of muscular young men to maintain a reputation for respectability. The empress’s lips curled with barely concealed contempt.

Then, out of fear and doubt, Licinia Eudoxia made a dire and foolish error. She wrote a letter to Geiseric, trusting in the ambitions of the barbarian king.

‘Should you be prepared to save me from the treasonous actions of those persons closest to the throne, then I will promise my daughter Eudocia to your son Huneric, in a marriage that will bind our houses together. I ask that you understand my womanly fears for my husband, Valentinian, who has been manipulated by unscrupulous men. Should he perish in Rome, I will know that he has been murdered, and I will need the support of your strong right arm to survive such treasons.’

Eudoxia paced her apartments after the letter was irrevocably sent, and she finally came to a decision. ‘Call my daughters, Placidia and Eudocia, to join me at once, and then start packing their possessions for a journey,’ she instructed her guard. ‘You may tell them that I expect us to be on our way to Rome by noon tomorrow.’

And then, even though her daughters begged her to reconsider her decision, Eudoxia had her way and they were gone from Ravenna within twenty-four hours. Rome was a pit of sin and danger, but Licinia Eudoxia would be safer in a city that was so terrified of treason and violence that doors were always kept locked and barred. There she would be kept apprised of the entire political situation. In Ravenna, the empress was starved of information, and therefore vulnerable to attack from within the depleted court.

Gaudentius and Flavia attended the empress’s court the evening before she left for Rome. Brother and sister had dressed in their best finery and Eudoxia noticed, with a pang of jealousy, that Flavia’s gems rivalled her own.

How can that bitch have acquired a ruby the size of a pigeon’s
egg? the empress thought savagely, even while she framed aloud the graceful words that denied permission for the children of Aetius to accompany her. I swear she sleeps with wealthy tradesmen and Asians. She’s a trollop! As my father would have said, the fruit doesn’t fall far from the tree. I’d have to be crazed to welcome these two serpents into my entourage. I’d never sleep in peace.

Her courtesy never wavered, but neither Gaudentius nor Flavia was deceived. Their brief period of influence was over. Although spring was coming, they felt a shiver through their veins.

March

To Flavia, Beloved wife.

Hail! I hope this scroll finds you well. The messenger who brings this greeting cannot read, so destroy the scroll as soon as it is read. For safety’s sake, perhaps you should destroy the messenger as well, but I leave this decision to you, sweet one. Be aware that Optilia and I are now the emperor’s guards. I have forgotten neither your tears, nor the dishonour that was laid on your noble sire’s name after his death. Do not be afraid for me, for I have entered into a pact with the noble senator, Flavius Petronius Maximus, who has promised to reward us with gold in exchange for our loyalty. I will say no more, for I do not wish to imperil you.

I am in daily expectation of receiving a purse that shows the senator’s regard, so I shall dispatch this reward in a strongbox with another messenger.

Look for word from the Campus Martius.

Trust to my honour, wife, and wait until I join you in Ravenna.

Farewell, and know that I love you.

Thraustila,

Son of Thraustilius,

Lord of the Hungvari, and your husband.

As spring stirred flowers to life, the journey north to Ravenna became a pleasure of unfolding vistas of beauty for the healers. They marvelled at the difference between these gentle lands and the sterile, depleted fields of the south. Wild flowers grew in drifts under the burgeoning olive trees and the sea breezes lifted the travellers’ hair and cooled their faces as the horses moved ever closer to Ravenna. Pisaurum passed in a blur of fine new buildings, fishing fleets and fertile fields. Ariminum was larger still, for it lay at the end of the Via Aemilia that ran through the fertile valley of the Padus river all the way to the Via Iulia and thence to Massilia and Gaul. Both cities had become wealthy from trade, for they dispersed the wealth of the eastern Padus to the south and to Rome. Myrddion had already experienced the wide plains of the north, but Cadoc and Finn could now see that Italia was more than one great city and was far richer than they could have imagined, given the nature of the subura of Rome.

‘You can see with your own eyes, friends, that Italia isn’t dead, even if Rome is dying. These lands could still spawn greatness, if Rome didn’t persist in sucking all the wealth out of it.’

‘It’s a pity, master,’ Finn replied, although Myrddion could tell that his friend was so preoccupied with his new happiness that he wasn’t really concerned with the fate of anything, or anyone, other than those whom he loved.

As the party approached Ravenna, the landscape gradually changed. The healers were in no particular hurry, for they had learned that the court was back in Rome and the threat of imminent
danger had been removed, but when they reached the swamplands they were soon forced to set a brisker pace. Although the road ran above the lowlands and the brackish water that lay in every hollow, mosquitoes, wasps, crickets and gnats made their days and nights painful until Myrddion ground up some herbs that he added to their basic unguent mix. Once this cream was rubbed into their skin, the women were no longer driven demented by the clouds of insects that had previously covered every inch of exposed flesh with itching, bleeding bites, but the discomfort was still sufficient for Myrddion to urge the horses forward at speed to escape their small tormentors.

Flavia and Gaudentius were lazing on eating couches watching several nubile young women doing something disconcertingly erotic with two large snakes and wild flowers. Unlike his sister, Gaudentius was amused by the women’s gyrations and wasn’t pleased when a stranger with long, greying plaits interrupted their entertainment with a message from Rome.

Flavia’s heart sank to her bowels. Earlier, Thraustila’s letter had terrified her because of the implications that were buried in the text, so she had ordered the messenger to be strangled immediately. But she still worried that the hapless man had shared the scroll with someone who could read. Now, as the new messenger looked at her sideways out of black eyes and opened his mouth to speak, she was certain that her husband had placed them all in peril out of some sense of misplaced loyalty. Thraustila had always been a sentimental idiot.