Rome Burning (82 page)

Then a kind of turbulent roar, like the noise of aircraft, surged through everything, and then he really did wake.

At first he could not move. In the first half-stunned seconds of awareness, he began to cry, shuddering and stifled, so as not to wake Delir. His body felt weak and defenceless, and he wanted to pull the covers more tightly round himself and allow the sobs to come more freely, to comfort himself. But instead, he slid out of bed, and reached for his clothes, gathering them into a bundle under his arm.

Before turning for the door, he looked down at Delir. Asleep on his side, he seemed even more small and vulnerable than Dama had remembered, older. Very carefully, Dama bent over him and, as lightly as possible, kissed his cheek.

Then he crept out of the little house, and down the slope towards the beach. The wind scraped the remaining warmth of his bed from his skin. Dama lowered his head and lunged along into it, shivering, struggling into his clothes as he went; he pulled a waterproof jacket over everything else, drew up the hood, and tightened it. He slid down the stones onto the sand, walked straight towards the sea.

He could see a dot of light, far out in the dark. The fishermen were still working, close to the opposite island, or camped upon it.

Dama stepped into the black water. It was so cold that he could feel his blood shrinking away from the skin in protest, the dry flesh above begging to be spared. He forced each inch under the surface, gasping, until he was heart-deep in the cold, then made himself drop forward, lifting his feet from the bottom, and begin to swim.

At least the sea was calm. He’d learned to swim haphazardly as a child in Rome. Before it had been discovered he could sing, when he had still been with his mother, she had sometimes accompanied her mistress to the baths, to be on hand with scented oils, strigils, towels. Sometimes she’d been able to take him along and teach him for a little while. As a slow wave lifted him to its crest, he remembered
her, more clearly than he had for years. He never normally thought of her. And it was almost as long since he had been in the water. His body should have been strong, sturdy, but of course he was no athlete; he didn’t even have the full use of both arms. It was easiest to float on his back and kick along that way, but then the cold licked hungrily through the hood of the jacket, against his head. He knew little about the sea, nothing of where the currents would pull him, but he had known before he touched the water that he was probably killing himself. He doubted the chances could be above one in ten that this was escape, rather than suicide. There was no getting used to this cold, it fed mercilessly on him. Soon the fingers even on his better hand were blunted and foreign to him, his feet two vague and unwieldy blocks. Though his mind was still clear enough under the ongoing shock of the cold, that would go numb too, in the end. And when he pulled himself upright in the water, and tried to look back, he found the island he’d come from was lost in the dark. Even if he had chosen to, he could never find his way back now. Everything was utterly formless, featureless: he could see nothing except the surface of the water, black as oil, and the lights in the distance.

In the morning Delir woke to find himself alone in the little house. At first, of course, he assumed Dama was somewhere nearby, outside. But when his first call went unanswered, panic suddenly hooked at him, and he ran to the cliffs, scanning the rocks below in desperation, shouting Dama’s name. He searched on, praying that in a moment Dama’s voice behind him would release him. But soon the silence confirmed to him that he would find either a body or nothing. Finally, he sagged onto the stones on the beach, staring with tear-blurred eyes at the steel sea into which Dama had vanished.

He was free; when the fishermen came back he could go home. But he would have to take this failure with him. Imprisoned on the island until then, alone, all the slow patterns of survival became terrible to him: it was torture now to try and capture the patience necessary for starting fires or preparing food, while struggling with a rage of frustration
and loneliness. It was two days before it even occurred to him that Dama might possibly be alive.

A sudden jolt of dread, worse than grief, impelled Delir down to the beach. He lit a fire on the stones, signalled to the empty sea with a mirror. But he knew there was no one to see it, and it would be eighteen days before he could even tell anyone.

Drusus regarded himself disconsolately, half-naked before the mirror while the slaves stood around him quietly, proffering choices of clothes. He supposed he had to believe that the web of scars across his left cheek, and the ones under his chin and at the corner of his mouth were invisible to other people, as everyone told him, but to him they still seemed disfiguring and vulgar. There was no sign his nose had ever been broken; it had been set, and had healed as straight as before. The grid of hard white scars on his hand was certainly visible, left not by the attack itself, but from the surgeries to repair the damage. The hand was sound enough now, but he had a weakened grip, and the beginnings of arthritis. There was sometimes a ringing in his left ear; he was convinced he was slightly deaf there. His consciousness of all these things was never far from the surface, but it was redoubled now that at last he was in Rome again.

He selected a dark blue tunic, motioned to the slave to drape over it a blue pallium bordered with green.

‘It’s a pity you have to go to the Colosseum,’ said Lucius fretfully, behind him.

Drusus rolled his eyes as the slave knotted and pinned a white fascalia around his neck.

‘I think it’s dangerous,’ complained Lucius.

‘Well, I assure you, I don’t feel remotely like going, and except for Uncle Titus, nobody wants me there. But it would be ridiculous for there not to be Games and it would be ridiculous for me not to be there. The only reason you can get out of it is because you’re an embarrassment.’

Lucius looked at Drusus’ reflection with wide-eyed, anxious hurt, forcing from Drusus the familiar, irritable
twinge of pity for him. His father was too easy and exposed a target for the load of bitterness within him.

‘There, never mind,’ he said roughly.

‘I suppose at least you like the Games,’ suggested Lucius timidly.

Drusus sighed. ‘Not in this company,’ he muttered.

A car came for him from the Palace. Drusus, feeling stripped and raw to any slight, thought it insultingly old and plain. There was a reception to get through, before they went to the Colosseum to celebrate Faustus’ resumption of duties. Drusus steeled himself for it.

He was aware of the driver watching him. He knew he was being watched wherever he went. Even in his father’s house on the Caelian, there were guards and supposed slaves who had not been there before, and who were never far away from him.

The party was centred in the gallery where the painting of Oppius Novius subduing the Nionians had once hung. Drusus looked for it, but was disgusted to see it had been removed, doubtless out of tact towards the sensibilities of Marcus’ new wife. Not only that, but it was the new portrait of Noriko, commissioned for the wedding, that hung there now. Faustus stood below it and beamed benignly at his guests. The ring of State was on his finger.

Drusus wondered where the original painting was, and if there was any chance he could have it. He sighed, wandered further into the room and, looking for a drink, encountered Varius. They were both unpleasantly startled; Drusus recoiled a little and Varius reacted with a restrained twitch of aversion, but looked at him squarely. Drusus felt a humiliating desire to flee mingled with a quiver of masochistic power. He hated the knowledge that his life had hung on Varius’ action, but it occurred to him that Varius would be no happier at having saved him, or having to see him.

‘Varius!’ he said, forcing a defiant friendliness into his voice. ‘Are you coming to the Games?’

‘No,’ said Varius, shortly.

‘What a shame. Marcus looks well, doesn’t he? It must be a weight off his shoulders.’

‘Perhaps.’

Marcus was in the centre of the room with Noriko, self-possessed and professionally good-humoured, surrounded by people, and noticing everything. He caught Drusus’ eye for a fraction of a second, smiled, and thereafter continued to observe him quietly without seeming to do so. Stupid old fool, Drusus thought, looking back at Faustus, who gave him a wave and a confused smile. Why bother with this? Can’t you see you’ll be an irrelevance? Marcus will be running everything.

‘No progress catching that fanatic?’ he asked. Varius looked past Drusus impatiently, his teeth gritted. Drusus felt a little glow of perverse triumph. He took a drink from a waiter and continued pleasantly, ‘Well, I suppose sometimes there’s nothing you can do.’

‘Drusus,’ said Varius calmly. ‘You seem to think that because of what happened in Sina, or because you’re not in prison or dead as you deserve, I must pretend I don’t know what you’ve done, and what you are. You can go and sit in the Colosseum with people for whom that’s true – for now. But I have nothing to say to you, and you are nothing to me.’

He turned away. Drusus gulped resentfully at his wine. Marcus moved into the space Varius had left and asked, politely and inevitably, ‘How are you getting on in Canaria?’

‘Fine,’ muttered Drusus. He felt a film of sweat coating his skin at being this close to his cousin. Marcus stood there looking so polished and civilised, and his presence made Drusus’ nerves replay treacherously the sensation of his bones cracking under those fists. His mended hand clenched painfully.

‘You haven’t met my wife.’

Noriko inclined her head, decorously gave Drusus her hand, and said nothing. She was dressed in the freshest of Roman fashions, her hair gathered up into a lovely mound of loops and braids, hanging in long ringlets down her back. With her dark hair and creamy skin she reminded Drusus just a little of Tulliola. He smiled at her wistfully, suddenly moved. Startled, Noriko smiled back.

*

‘Are you sure I can’t get you to come?’ said Marcus to Varius, later.

‘I don’t like the Games. And I don’t like your cousin. I’m not Imperial, I can get out of it.’

‘Then how are you going to celebrate the Emperor’s return to power?’ asked Marcus, with veiled irony. ‘Are you seeing your family?’

Varius smiled. ‘I celebrate by avoiding them. They’ve found someone they want me to meet. Again.’

‘You could,’ suggested Marcus. Varius’ face went still, closed. ‘I’m sorry,’ said Marcus hastily. ‘Stupid. You don’t want to. Don’t do it, of course.’

Varius looked down and Marcus thought he would change the subject. But at last he muttered hesitantly, ‘Maybe it’s not as bad an idea as it was.’ He hadn’t looked up. ‘But it’s still not good.’

‘Then of course you’re right,’ said Marcus. More darkly he added, ‘No one can force you.’

Varius glanced at Noriko, who was behaving faultlessly. ‘Things are bad?’ he murmured.

Marcus also turned to watch her. ‘My parents’ marriage was perfect whenever there were people watching them.’ He looked back at Varius. ‘It’s not her,’ he said. And he went back to join his wife.

The weather was bad for Faustus’ celebrations. They had hoped for a blue summer day; instead the city was wrapped in rain. Varius drove out of the city on the Via Ostiensis, into the countryside between Rome and Acilia. He knew the way by heart, although this was only the fourth time he’d ever travelled it. He had had no say in Gemella’s place of burial, of course. He hadn’t been there, her funeral was long over by the time he was out of prison. Not that there was anything wrong with the quiet necropolis along a minor road that her parents had chosen.

He sat in the car for a little while, prevaricating, and hoping the weather would clear. The rain only thickened, and finally he emerged into it, shoulders raised, irritable that the day should be so dismal. But he poured half a cup of wine onto the earth of her grave, and drank the rest
standing over it, and stayed there long enough to miss what happened that day at the Colosseum.

*

Lal suddenly pulled away, pushing back the covers and sitting up. She said, ‘I can’t.’

Sulien sprawled back on the pillows. ‘What is it?’ he asked quietly, trying to sound patient, harmless.

Lal was hunched forward on the edge of the bed, her face in her hands. When at last she answered her voice was a blurred, shamed mumble. ‘We’re not married,’ she whispered. ‘It’s wrong.’

Sulien lay silent for a while. ‘Lal,’ he said at last. ‘It’s hardly
murder
, is it? When you think of all that’s happened, all the killing, how wrong can it be?’ He sat up and stroked the tumbled hair away from her neck, pressed his mouth to the warm skin, dragging the kiss across the pulse, whispering, ‘How wrong can this be?’

In his arms Lal seemed to stiffen and relax at once, helplessly, tension and languor rolling through her in waves. ‘I don’t know.’

Sulien gathered her closer. ‘This isn’t hurting anyone,’ he murmured into her hair. ‘This is the opposite …’ He slid his hand inside her dishevelled dress, stroking down from her throat, drawing splayed fingers across the nipple. He could feel her breast strain against his hand with her breath. For a second she softened so totally that he worked to pull her down again onto the bed. But she dragged herself free, panting.