Muses of Roma (Codex Antonius Book 1) (19 page)

Blaesus snorted. “Or because he’s kidnapping the Consular Heir! I've never been the religious sort, but you know how the Consular Family is worshiped. Perhaps he thought we’d never kidnap one of our gods?”

“Why the Consular Heir? Does he really have this cure for Dariya?”

Blaesus shrugged. “I don't know. Which is why we need to have a talk with our Centuriae.”

Lucia nodded. “He can't worm his way out—”

The inhuman screams from the crew quarters made Lucia jump. Blaesus started as well. She jumped from the pilot's chair and slid down the ladder to the crew quarters. The screams came from Kaeso’s quarters. She charged up the corridor. Inside, Kaeso was strapped to his bunk, thrashing and screaming. The Navigator stood over him, his hand on Kaeso's head.

Lucia rushed toward the Navigator. But Nestor, standing near the door where Lucia could not see him, grabbed her arm. Lucia was about to elbow him in the face when Nestor yelled, “Wait! The Centuriae wanted him to do this!”

Lucia yanked her arm out of Nestor's grip, then drew her pistol and aimed at the Navigator. “Why? He's killing him!”

The Navigator stood over Kaeso with a serene expression, unmoving, his eyes glazed.

“No,” Nestor said. “Centuriae said this would happen and not to interfere. He said he would be all right.”

The waver in Nestor's voice told Lucia he was not so sure, considering Kaeso’s awful, ragged screams.

Lucia stepped forward, put the gun against the Navigator's head. “Stop what you're doing right now.”

The Navigator blinked, then looked at her. “If I stop now, he will die.”

“What are you doing to him?”

“What he asked me to. Now I suggest you let me continue.”

Lucia looked from the Navigator's serene eyes to Kaeso, straining against the straps over his chest, arms, and legs.

“The more you distract me,” the Navigator said beneath Kaeso's shrieks, “the longer this takes.”

“Lucia,” Nestor said, “let him finish.”

Lucia ground her teeth, and then lowered the gun. “If he dies...”

“I know,” the Navigator said, then turned his glassy stare back to Kaeso.

Blaesus and Daryush now crowded the hatch to Kaeso’s quarters asking Nestor what was happening. Lucia ignored them, only watching Kaeso's agony. Every scream clawed at her heart, every thrash made her want to hold him tight, to keep him from hurting himself. If she could, she would have taken his pain and made it her own.

She was confused and helpless. She clenched and unclenched her fists around the pistol, not knowing whether to trust the Navigator or shoot him. Why was this man causing her centuriae so much pain? And why did Kaeso agree to this? Questions burned on her tongue, but she didn’t want to scream them at the Navigator for fear he told the truth, that any distraction would cause Kaeso's death.

Kaeso stopped screaming. His red face, streaked with tears, began to relax. His eyes were still shut, but he stopped straining against the straps, his whole body settling into the bunk. For a terrible moment Lucia thought he was dead, but his chest rose and fell quickly as if he'd just run a sprint.

“I want answers,” she said to the Navigator. “Now, or you're going out the airlock.”

The Navigator lifted his hand off Kaeso's forehead. “Your centuriae just did a stupid thing.” The Navigator's gaze swept the whole crew. “For all of you.”

He tried to slip past Lucia, but she grabbed his arm. “What did you do to him?”

The Navigator smiled. “I suggest you ask him when he wakes up. He'll tell you more than you ever wanted to hear.”

“When will he wake up?”

The Navigator pulled his arm from Lucia's grip and then shrugged. “Tomorrow. His body needs time to adjust to what he asked me to do.”

Lucia raised the pistol again and pointed it at the Navigator's head. The Navigator didn't flinch, only stared at Lucia with those preternatural eyes. It galled Lucia that she couldn't intimidate him, not even with a pistol aimed at his head.

“Why won't you tell me anything? You and your people just board our ship, destroy our engines, force us to take a mission that I don't know why it's so damned important for
us
to take. Now we're lost and my centuriae is strapped to his bunk after screaming his lungs out. I want answers. Who are you people?”

The Navigator sighed. “You’re not a murderer. Besides, you need me to get those engines running again.”

“One, if you read anything about my past, you know that's not true. Two, Daryush has watched you since you boarded. He’ll do just fine with the engines.”

Lucia tried to ignore Daryush in the hallway behind the Navigator, emphatically shaking his head.

“Once again,” the Navigator said, “ask your centuriae when he wakes up. I am not authorized to give you the answers you want. He is.”

Lucia stared at the Navigator. Her impulse was to shoot him in the head, be done with him, and then they could figure out the engines themselves. Maybe she'd wake Dariya to help Daryush. They could make it work.

Her grip tightened on the pistol. The Navigator must have seen her resolve, for his eyes widened slightly.
Good
, she thought.
Now he's afraid.

A groan came from behind. “Lucia, put the damn gun down.”

She half turned and saw Kaeso staring at her.

“Are you okay, sir?”

“No,” he said with a raspy voice. “But I will be. Put it down.”

The Navigator looked over Lucia's shoulder at Kaeso. “The reactivation worked, Centuriae. You can verify the terms of our deal now, if you remember how to do it.”

“I remember,” he said. His eyes glazed a moment and then refocused. He looked at the Navigator. “Good.”

“Tomorrow we deactivate it,” the Navigator said. “Agreed?”

“Agreed,” Kaeso said.

Lucia put the gun in her holster and then turned to Kaeso. Nestor was already unbuckling the straps. Her once strong, invincible centuriae looked so pale, haggard, and weak. Her worry battled her rage at not knowing what in Dis’ hell was going on.

“What,” she asked in a trembling voice, “did he do to you, sir?”

Kaeso smiled weakly. “It's a long story. I promise I'll tell you. Later.” He closed his eyes, and seemed to fall instantly into a deep sleep. His face relaxed and a bit of color returned to it.

Nestor put a hand on her shoulder. “I'll watch him.”

Lucia clenched her teeth, then said, “Let me know when he wakes up.” Then she nodded toward the Navigator. “And let me know if
he
comes back.”

The Navigator smiled. “I have an engine to repair, remember?” He turned and brushed past Blaesus and Daryush.

She left Kaeso’s bunk as well, watching the Navigator descend the ladder to the engine deck. She turned to Daryush. “Pay attention to everything he does. I want you to know those engines as well as him.”

Daryush cocked his head, as if to say he'd been doing that all along, but he nodded and hurried down the corridor to the ladder.

“Now what?” Blaesus asked. “I for one do not trust that Liberti thug.”

“Agreed,” Lucia said. “For now we play his game. But if he hurts anyone else on this ship, or sneezes the wrong way, I will kill him. No matter what the Centuriae says. Will you back me?”

“Of course. He’s the reason we’re here. He’s the reason Flamma…” Blaesus paused, blinking away tears. “Kaeso has not been himself since Menota. These Liberti have done something to his mind. They’re known for that.”

Blaesus stared at the ladder where the Navigator had descended. “I'm willing to go to Roma if it means finding a cure for Dariya. But I think whatever bargain Kaeso struck with these Liberti may have cost him too much. I would feel better doing this on our own. Without their help.”

Blaesus gave Lucia a meaningful stare, and then he walked away and entered his hatch.

Lucia went to the ladder and was about to ascend to the command deck when she stopped. She thought about what just happened and what Blaesus said. She cursed, then descended the ladder to the engine room.

She found the Navigator working at the console next to Daryush. She activated her pistol and pointed it at the Navigator.

“Daryush, please leave the engine room,” she said. Daryush sighed at the interruption, but gasped when he saw her aiming at the Navigator. He hurried out and ascended the ladder.

“I want to know what you did to the Centuriae,” Lucia said. “No more games, Liberti.”

The Navigator stared at her with blank eyes. “Ask him when he wakes up.”

“Not good enough,” Lucia said. “I know your kind. There were people like you in the Legions. People so arrogant in their power they thought nothing could harm them. It’s people like you who killed my friends during the Kaldeth Rebellion. People like you who forced me to—”

The Navigator turned back to the console. “I don’t have time for this. I need to get these engines repaired and calibrated or we’re never going home. I’m sure there’s something you could be doing on the command deck. Attend to your duties, trierarch, and stop bothering me.”

Attend to your duties.

Those words slammed into her mind again after more than ten years. It was her greatest humiliation, one she never told the
Caduceus
crew. One she tried hard to convince herself never happened. She could not blank out the image of her former centurion’s red face above her, an open grenade in his hand, his promise to release it and kill them both unless she lay there and let him finish.
Attend to your duties,
he had whispered in her ear over and over again until he was through with her.

The next day, while patrolling the Kaldethian forests, she slit his throat while he urinated behind a tree, and left his body in the woods for the planet’s native carnivores to devour. Her century always suspected her, but never had any proof. Many of the women and men in her squad had approved. They had suffered the same way, and gave her knowing smiles.

Attend to your duties.

Lucia raised her pistol and shot the Navigator.

Ocella stood across the street from the house of the Julii matron. Once again she hid in an alley, for the grimy clothes on both her and Cordus would stand out among the finer dressed residents of the Caelius Hill. She watched slaves, better dressed and fatter than most Roman citizens, walk in and out of the house’s back entrance. Some carried grocery bags while others carried rakes and auto-shears for the vast garden within the home’s walls. It was quite a luxury to have such a large property on the wealthy Caelius, but then the Julii had been wealthy since Roma’s founding. They had fallen far in social status among the other patricians after Marcus Antonius deposed Octavian Caesar, but they had at least retained their wealth.

Ocella told Cordus to hide behind a large trash bin, and then she trotted across the alley to the Julii back entrance. A large private lictor guarded the entrance, his massive forearms folded over his equally massive belly. He wore a red tunic over white pants, with a pistol holstered in a shoulder strap under one of his arms. He stared at Ocella from beneath a wide-brimmed white hat as she ran toward him, and did not move when she stopped in front of him.

“I'd like to inquire about work,” Ocella said. “I'm good with gardening.”

“The
domina
does not hire citizens for the garden,” the bored lictor said. “She has slaves for that.”

“I'm also a good cook,” Ocella continued. “In fact, my recipes for jellied sardines are the talk of the Capitoline. Please tell the
domina
that a gardener cook with recipes for jellied sardines is at the door.”

The lictor frowned. “I told you, the
domina
does not hire citizens. Now leave, beggar, before I get annoyed.”

Ocella was getting annoyed herself. Her former Umbra contacts had assured her that the coded phrases would get her through the doors of the Julii household. Obviously this idiot had never learned the codes, or he had forgotten.

“Please tell the
domina
, or at least her head slave, that a woman talented in both gardening and cooking is at the door seeking work. My jellied sardines—”

The lictor sighed, unfolded his arms and tried to give Ocella a backhand slap with one beefy hand. Ocella ducked beneath the slap and put all her weight behind a punch to the lictor's chest. His eyes bulged and he gasped for air. He doubled over and reached for his pistol. Before he could grab it, Ocella pulled it from his holster (where the fool had not fastened it) and aimed it at his head.

“Call your
domina
,” Ocella said, “and tell her what I told you.”

The lictor nodded, holding his hand up, gasping. She gave him a moment to collect his breath and then cocked the pistol when she thought he took too long. He thumbed his collar com and said, “Memnio, it's Desitus.”

“What?” a man with a Germanic accent said over the com.

“There's a woman here wanting work as a cook or gardener,” Desitus said in a strained voice.

Ocella cursed under her breath at the lictor for mixing up the code’s order, and she wanted to hit him in the face with his pistol.

“The
domina
does not hire citizens, Desitus, you know this.”

“She’s insistent.”

“I prefer gardener,” Ocella said loudly so Memnio could hear, “but I am also a cook. My jellied sardines are a delicacy on the Capitoline.”

Seconds passed, and she began to think this Memnio didn't know the codes either. She was about to call out again when Memnio's voice returned.

“I said the
domina
does not hire citizens.” Memnio paused. “But you might find work at the Aeneas Cafe. They have their own garden and always need good cooks.”

“Where is the Aeneas Cafe?” Ocella asked.

“Via Rumina, two blocks east.”

“Thank you, sir.” Ocella backed away from the lictor, still aiming his gun at him. The lictor glared at her with murderous eyes.

“Can I have my gun back?”

“Pick it up at the Aeneas Cafe,” she said.

She turned and trotted across the alley back to Cordus. He saw the gun and gave her a questioning look. Ocella threw it in the trash bin behind him. She scanned the alley behind her to ensure they weren’t followed and then motioned him toward the Via Rumina at the other end of the alley.

It was midday but the dark clouds forming above threatened rain and storms. Most of the well-dressed patricians strolled down the sidewalks with umbrellas. Ocella still felt conspicuous in her dirty clothes, but there was no avoiding it. It was only a two-block walk, but two blocks was enough for a stray patrician to recognize Cordus. She couldn’t eliminate a nosey patrician as easily as a drunken Legionnaire.

She clutched Cordus's hand as they walked onto the street. In Ocella's previous cover as a Praetorian, she had patrolled streets like these during her investigations of potential traitors among the patrician ranks. But she never noticed until now—with a grumbling stomach—how many gourmet food shops were interspersed among the high fashion clothing boutiques, jewelers, and fine porcelain stores. The scents of roasted pistachios, honeyed cakes, and even imported teas made her mouth water. Cordus wasn’t faring well either, for he craned his neck at each little food store and cafe they passed.

Most patricians on the street tried their best to ignore the beggar mother with her son. Some wrinkled their noses and gave them a wide berth. So far, no one seemed to recognize Cordus.

Ocella found the Aeneas Cafe two blocks from the alley just as Memnio said. The cafe had polished oak doors, colorful potted flowers arranged in front of the windows, and an austere glowing sign above the door without dancing images like the other businesses along the street. It was small, classy, and crowded with people sipping their drinks from porcelain cups as they read scroll pads.

She passed the front entrance and went around the block to the alley behind the cafe. Its supply entrance was blocked by a truck from which men were unloading crates of bottled drinks. They gave her passing glances as she and Cordus approached the door, but continued pulling crates off the truck without saying a word to her.

She drew Cordus aside and bent down to whisper in his ear. “This should only take a few minutes. Hide behind the trash bins.”

“I know the procedure,” Cordus said in the same whisper. “Keep out of sight, run to our rendezvous if someone attacks me.”

Ocella smiled, then nodded. “I suppose you're the evasion expert by now.”

“I am having the time of my life.”

She couldn't tell if he was joking or serious. His eyes gleamed, and a slight grin tugged at the corners of his mouth. She was glad to see his old excitement for this “adventure” return after the business at the Temple of Empanda.
Excitement, but now tempered by brutal reality,
she thought.
He might just survive this.

Ocella walked through the supply door and into the kitchen. A woman stood at a counter chopping carrots, her back to Ocella. The woman wore a gray smock and apron, and Ocella almost dismissed her as a slave, but noticed she wore expensive leather shoes and figured her for the cafe’s owner.

“Excuse me,” Ocella said, “I was told I might find work here. I'm an exceptional gardener, and I also cook. My jellied sardines are considered a delicacy on the Capitoline.”

Without turning, the woman asked, “Do you have references?”

Ocella hesitated. “I don't have a list with me, but I can get you one later.”

The woman turned around and looked at her shrewdly. She was in her early fifties, with elegant cheek bones, dark hair, and a Roman patrician’s olive skin. She wasn’t wearing makeup that Ocella could see, but the woman's skin and lips had the glow that only came from an expensive salon.

“What makes you think I'm the owner of this cafe?”

“I'm sorry,
domina
, I assumed—”

“I'm joking,” the smiling woman said. “I'm Gaia Julius Rutila, the owner. You are?”

Ocella bowed, surprised to meet the Julii matron in a kitchen chopping carrots. “I am Vibia Minius.”

The matron put down her knife and wiped her hands in a towel. “So, Vibia Minius, can you tell me why I shouldn't have you killed?”

There was movement behind Ocella. She turned to see one of the men who had been unloading the truck pointing a pistol at her. The other man held Cordus just outside the door, his hand over the boy's mouth. Cordus's eyes bulged and he grunted as he fought against the man’s arms. Another man came from the cellar door behind Ocella, patted her down, and took the pistol from her coat pocket.

Ocella turned back to Gaia Julius, and licked her lips. She had known this would be a dangerous tactic. Gaia Julius had been an Umbra contact for almost twenty years, since she became head of the Julii after her father’s death. She obviously knew that every Umbra Ancile on Terra had been killed, and she must’ve had a good idea it was Ocella’s fault. Would Gaia seek revenge?

But Gaia’s Umbra connections were not the reason Ocella sought her help. Ocella heard rumors about the Julii when she was under cover in the Praetorians. Rumors that they were Saturnists, the same as Scaurus. Nothing was ever confirmed, and Scaurus himself never revealed to Ocella whether the rumors were true. He was protective of Saturnist members, even with Ocella.

Gaia Julius was the only choice Ocella had left. Without her, Ocella and Cordus were dead anyway.

“You know who I am,” Ocella said slowly. “I assume that makes me valuable.”

The lady snorted. She made even that outburst seem dignified. “Yes, you are quite the wanted woman. You and…the boy. The question is: to whom do I give you?”

She raised her right palm. “On one hand, the Romans would be quite appreciative if I handed over the Consular Heir and his kidnapper. Imagine that. It would return my family to its rightful place among the Roman elite. A thousand years is a long time to be treated like
cac
on the bottom of a slave's shoe.”

Ocella stared at the Julii matron, her body and mind a tightened coil.

Gaia Julius raised her left palm. “Or I could give you to our Liberti friends. They would be most grateful, considering you had every one of their associates slaughtered. They took that rather poorly, I might add. I'm sure they would give me a suitable reward”—her eyes gleamed—“and you a suitable punishment. Especially with the current hostilities.”

“What hostilities?”

Gaia arched an eyebrow. “You don’t know?”

“We’ve been on the run for three weeks. We’ve stayed away from any—”

“War, my dear. Roma attacked Libertus yesterday.”

Ocella blinked. “Attacked? That's impossible.”

But with a sickening realization, Ocella knew it
was
possible.
She
had made it possible. Umbra’s only defense against a Roman assault was to kill it within the Roman government before the idea could be implemented. The attack was her fault.

Ocella swallowed the bile rising in her throat. “Is Libertus fighting back? The Romans haven't...”

“No, the Romans have not bombed the planet,” Gaia said, “but they’ve set up a blockade, and according to the newscriers, it’s going rather splendidly for the Naves Astrum.”

Ocella shook her head. That didn’t matter right now. She forced herself not to worry about something she couldn’t control.

Even though it’s your fault.

Through clenched teeth, Ocella said, “The boy is important.”

“Of course he is. He’s the Consular Heir.”

“You have a third option.”
If she is a Saturnist, she’ll know what I mean.

Gaia stared at Ocella, her face revealing nothing. Her eyes flitted from Cordus to Ocella.

“You know what he can do,” Ocella continued. “Neither the Romans nor the Liberti should have him. Get him off-world.” She swallowed. “Give me to whomever you want.”

Gaia Julius stared at her a moment longer, then sighed and returned to her carrots. “Put them in the cellar.”

The man behind Ocella jabbed her with the pistol and pointed her to the cellar door behind her. She glanced at the man, then at Cordus. The boy no longer struggled, but the man behind him still held Cordus’s arms in an iron grip. He stared daggers at Gaia Julius's back.

“Julii coward,” Cordus growled.

Gaia Julius stopped cutting and turned to Cordus, the knife still in her hand. “Sire,” she said sweetly, “it's been a long time since we last saw each other. You were five or six, but it was at the wedding of my niece Sephilia to one of your cousins. Titus, I believe. Or should I say, “almost” wedding. Young Titus backed out just before the ceremony after last-minute pressure from your father. After all, it wouldn't do to have an Antonii marry a Julii. The shame and embarrassment my beloved niece felt as she stood at the podium waiting for her groom was…well, it was like she'd been flayed alive. Socially speaking, of course.”

Gaia Julius held up the knife and inspected its edge. “Because, obviously, an actual flaying would hurt much, much worse.”

Cordus's jaw clenched, but he maintained his defiant stare. Ocella tensed, ready to leap if Gaia Julius made any move toward Cordus. The man behind Ocella seemed to feel her tension, and he pushed the pistol further into her back.

Gaia Julius looked from the knife to Cordus. She bent down so her eyes were even with the boy’s. “Sephilia drowned herself in the Tiber two days later. I've been quite upset with the Antonii ever since. So do not provoke me,
sire
.”

Gaia Julius turned around and resumed her chopping. The man holding Cordus pulled him toward Ocella, while the man with the pistol pushed Ocella again toward the cellar stairs.

The stairs were ancient and worn, as if they were hewn from the rock when Romulus was king. She descended into the dark, dank cellar with the gunman and Cordus behind her. The gunman touched a pad on the wall, and ceiling globes illuminated the rough stone corridor. The gunman told her to go left and then had her stop at a wooden door with iron bands. He opened the door and motioned her in. Ocella entered a room filled with plastic wine barrels. The man holding Cordus shoved the boy into the room, then slammed and locked the door. The only light in the room came from the crack beneath the door, which disappeared once the gunmen went back upstairs. Ocella and Cordus stood in the center of the room holding hands in pitch-blackness.