Queen of the Night (3 page)

The leader of the abductors, drenched in sweat, the mask still firmly on his face, stared around.

'We have done what we had to.' He looked at his companions. There were twelve in all, and he counted them carefully making sure no one had been forgotten. 'Now we must wait,' he ordered. 'Those who are not of us may go.'

Some of the men left; those remaining squatted down, staring up at their leader.

'You must stay there.' He left the cavern and walked down the long, ill-lit gallery stretching into the darkness. He knew his visitor would be waiting for him there. He saw a torch move and paused. He must go no further. A figure stepped out of the darkness, a woman swathed in robes. He could smell her perfume.

'Did it go well?' The voice was soft but carrying. 'Were there any problems? Was anybody hurt?'

'There were no problems.' The leader felt as if his face was steaming hot beneath his mask; he wished he could take it off, but he knew the rules. 'The girl has been taken,' he continued. 'She is safe. We await the ransom.'

'Good.' The voice echoed. 'But I asked you, was anybody hurt?'

'She was with a man,' the leader replied. 'We heard them talking. He tried to resist but we pushed him to the ground.' 'You did not kill him?'

'No,' the leader replied. 'That was your order, no one was to be hurt.'

'Who was it?' the voice asked.

'An actor,' the leader replied. 'He tried to play the hero.' 'Leave the actor to me,' the voice whispered. 'I shall take care of him.'

On the same night as the attack at the Villa Carina, Lucius Pomosius, former veteran of the ala, the wing of cavalry attached to the Second Legion Augusta, left the latrines in the Street of Abundance, which ran off the main thoroughfare stretching down to the Colosseum. He stared drunkenly at the graffiti of crude election slogans painted on the wall of the alleyway, eerily illuminated by spluttering torches. Above these was a picture of Mercury in winged greaves, his helmet similarly winged, in one hand a spear shaped like a penis, in the other a bag of gold. The little god's cloak billowed out whilst his finger pointed to a place further down the street. Lucius tapped the painting, smiled and, one hand trailing the walls, made his way down towards the House of the Golden Cupids with its garish sign of two erect phalluses either side of the doorway.

Lucius paused. He really had drunk too much! He leaned against the wall and glanced back down the alleyway. He was certain he had been followed, and despite the wine had a pricking suspicion that he'd been watched ever since he'd left the upper room of the Lucia Gloriosa tavern where he and the other three surviving members of Vigiles Muri, the Guardians of the Wall, met every month. Tonight they'd gathered specially to discuss the brutal death of old Petilius, found on his bed with his throat slit, his belly cut and his penis slashed off and pushed into his hand. 'Awash in his own blood' was how Decurion Stathylus had described it: 'Floating on a sea of billowing scarlet.' Stathylus always liked to embroider his tales, but then he was a warrior-poet, a bard who liked to sing about his beautiful former mistress and remind them all of their days in Britain. How they'd manned the Wall and stared out over that sea of desolate grassland which stretched and billowed under lowering grey skies. Ah yes, those were the days!

Lucius stared at the graffiti chalked on the far wall: 'He who doesn't invite me to dinner is a barbarian.' He wished he hadn't been invited tonight. He had not wanted to discuss Petilius' gory death. It evoked memories of that night along the Wall when the Picts had been trapped and massacred. The night of their bona fortuna, as Stathylus liked to describe it. There had been a dozen of them then, but war, as well as the passage of the years, had depleted their number. Death was to be expected, but not Petilius', not dying like that! Who'd want to butcher a lecherous but harmless old man? Petilius was ugly and mean, and even the common whores haggled hard when they saw that miserable face, yet he'd been killed and castrated in a manner reminiscent of the Picts. Could there be some dark thread winding its way back into the murky past? Lucius secretly conceded there might be, but he didn't want to reflect on it. He didn't want to remember. He didn't want to invoke the ghosts!

He wiped the sweat from his face and stared up at the narrow strip of sky between the overhanging buildings. He wished he was back on the Wall, away from the Vigiles, his comrades, away from the stink and the memories. He looked down the street at the pool of light before the House of the Golden Cupids. Should he take a cubicle downstairs where he could listen to the moans of the girls busy with their customers, or a private room upstairs?

'Sir?'

He turned quickly. The shadowy woman, hair veiled, wrists clinking with bracelets, moved closer. 'Sir, is it custom you want?'

Lucius shook his head, trying to clear the wine fumes. The woman's perfume was fragrantly sweet. She was dressed in gold-edged linen robes. He glimpsed sparkling eyes ringed with kohl, smiling lips parted in a sweet smile. A soft hand caressed his cheek. He grabbed her, and she seemed to melt into him. Lucius started in agony, his hands falling away.

He stared in shock at the woman, who'd stepped back, leaving the dagger deep in his belly. He staggered forward, falling to his knees, and tried to grasp the dagger, but his head was jerked back and a shearing-sharp blade slit his throat.

'They used to call those the Polluted Fields.'

Claudia, sitting on the top of the grassy knoll, moved a little deeper into the shade of the sycamore trees. She munched on a hunk of mushroom bread, took a sip of watered wine and dabbed her mouth with a napkin, then stared again at the desolate heath below her stretching either side of the Via Nomentena leading up to the Colline Gate. The view was almost hidden by the heat haze which had descended on Rome during that late summer's afternoon. The Via was now empty of carts, travellers, journeymen and merchants; even a cohort of infantry which had come plodding out through the city gate had decided to shelter in the shade of some lime trees.

'They still look polluted to me.'

Claudia turned and nipped the arm of her companion, Murranus, Victor Ludorum, Champion of the Games, wearer of the victorious laurel wreath.

'You're not even looking!' she accused.

The gladiator's smooth-shaven face broke into a smile which made him look even more boyish and mischievous.

Oh, Murranus! Claudia reflected. He looked so handsome in his dark blue tunic, long legs sprawled out as he sat with his back to an ancient holm oak. He stared at her, green eyes full of mischief as he scratched his close-cropped red hair and ran a muscular hand over his face, searching for the beads of sweat coursing down over the high cheekbones. His determined mouth and strong chin were now slack as he relaxed under the influence of the weak wine and the strong sun.

'You've got a square face today,' she teased, using her fingers to demonstrate. 'Your eyes don't look so large and your mouth isn't so fierce, your lips-'

'You enjoyed kissing me.' He stretched forward.

'I always do! Ah no!' Claudia playfully pushed Murranus back against the tree. He stuck his tongue out at her, and she felt her throat constrict and the tears well. For a moment, for the briefest of moments, the playful gesture had reminded her of Felix, her brother, but that was all in the past. Felix was dead and life had gone surging on. The man who had murdered him then raped her, the ghoul who had haunted her dreams with his hard voice, that purple chalice tattooed on his wrist, had paid for his crime. Murranus had seen to that, taking the miscreant's life with his sword in the arena before a roaring crowd. Justice done, vengeance savoured. In the purple-draped imperial box above the arena, Constantinc, Helena and all the court had watched whilst the crowd bayed like a pack of savage dogs over that man, her enemy, dying on the sand below.

Claudia glanced away, turning her head as if to catch the breeze. Murranus studied her closely from under heavy-lidded eyes: her black hair, that sweet face, those sharp eyes. Was her skin olive or light ivory? He could never tell, but that was Claudia, she could change so quickly. She'd been an actress, part of a troupe, a very good one, wandering the roads of Italy. Eventually she'd returned to Rome to live with that scoundrel of an uncle Polybius, his pretty plump wife Poppaoe and all the lords and madams of Rome's underworld who made the She Asses tavern near the Flavian Gate their home, the centre of their lives. In a sense it was Murranus' home too.

He picked up the wine flask-Ind sipped the tasty juice. Claudia had brought him to this desolate spot, far away from the tumult of the tavern, so they could talk before the autumn games began. He just wished she wouldn't show that streak of stubbornness when they argued. Claudia could be so obstinate and yet so secretive! Only recently, during the last two weeks, had she grudgingly told him about her work for the Empress, as well as her dealings with the powerful Christian priest Sylvester. Murranus had pointed out that if he was in danger in the amphitheatre, she was exposed to even greater peril in the marbled gardens and stinking alleyways of Rome. They had argued so fiercely, yet all he wanted now was to stretch across and gather her in his arms. He wanted her to relax, to be passionate, not so precise, so organised. There she sat in her sensible dark green tunic with her sensible walking sandals firmly tied, the thongs fastened and secure. She wore little jewellery; only a ring on her finger and a graceful silver chain round her neck. Her thick hair lay neatly clipped at the nape of her neck, a parasol placed close beside her in case it grew too hot. Even the leather satchel in which she carried their meal was precisely positioned, the straps neatly folded, while the food she and Poppaoe had packed was spread in an orderly manner upon a linen cloth: the mushroom bread, the pot of herb and garlic pate, the sesame biscuits. Oh yes, that was Claudia, so precise! Murranus coughed and, leaning over, tickled the nape of her neck.

'Oh magistral' he teased. 'I'm only a poor Frisian. Why do they call these the Polluted Fields?'

Claudia turned, grinning over her shoulder. She moved further back to sit beside him and pointed down the hill to the round, squat towers jutting up from the earth.

'That's where they were buried alive.'

'Who?'

'The Vestal Virgins, maidens sworn to be chaste and virginal in the service of the Goddess Vesta and the state. Any Vestal charged with unchastity was sentenced to be buried alive. They were, and in fact still can be, brought here and sealed for forty days in one of those underground chambers with a small quantity of food and drink. The Goddess Vesta would decide whether they lived or died; they always died.'

'And?'

'Over two hundred years ago, during the reign of Domitian, the Senior Vestal Virgin was accused of immorality. Three of her sisters were also condemned, their lovers being beaten to death. Anyway,' Claudia brushed at her face, 'the Senior Vestal was paraded through Rome and brought to one of these specially prepared underground chambers. As she was descending the steps, her robes caught on a snag. The executioner offered her his hand, but she drew away in disgust.' Claudia shook her head. 'People are so strange. If everyone in Rome guilty of crimes against chastity was brought here, you wouldn't be able to see a blade of grass for the dense crowds.' 'And?' Murranus asked.

'Even in death,' Claudia laughed, 'people can act the snob. Wealth and privilege are still more important than that final act. It's a strange world we live in.'

'The Empress has sent for you?'

'No she hasn't!' Claudia faced him squarely. 'But I think she will. You've heard about the kidnappings?' Murranus nodded.

Claudia held up her hand. 'Five cases in the last month; that's what made me think of wealth and privilege and the dangers it brings. The sons and daughters of wealthy Roman senators and generals snatched from their gardens, litters and baths.' Claudia shrugged. 'Mercury the Messenger told me this morning that the most recent kidnapping took place last night. Antonia, the sixteen-year-old daughter of Senator Carinus, was abducted from a party in the gardens of her father's villa in the Alban Hills. Ah well,' she continued briskly, 'that's another reason I brought you here.'

'What, to be kidnapped or buried alive?'

Claudia threw a piece of grass at him. 'The arena! Murranus, you're now the Victor, you have to retire, you cannot-'

'I-'

'You cannot!' Claudia's eyes, like her voice, turned flinty hard. 'Murranus, you'd make an excellent bodyguard for some rich family. You could start your own business, form your own cohort.'

Murranus groaned inwardly, yet at the same time he was deeply flattered by this delightful young woman's affection and concern for him.

'I know what you are going to say, Murranus,' Claudia edged closer, 'but it isn't true. You are not just a killer. You have a soul, you are kind, fair and sometimes very, very funny, especially when you drink. Uncle Polybius regards you as a son; Poppaoe adores you, as does everyone else at the tavern. Even Narcissus the Neat.'

Murranus laughed at the mention of the most recent addition to the company at the She Asses tavern. A Syrian, a former slave, Narcissus now wanted to start his own funeral business with the help and support of Uncle Polybius.

'Are you worried about Polybius?' Murranus asked.

'Don't change the subject. Yes, I am always worried about Polybius and his constant schemes to get rich quickly. He's even thinking of becoming a Christian to win the favour of the priests, not to mention that of Presbyter Sylvester. But Murranus…' Claudia began to gather the food together, neatly folding the linen cloth. She glanced up. 'I saw a fresco on sale in the flea market near the She Asses. It depicts a gladiator, a bestiarius, whose enormous penis is a ravening wild animal. The penis, a dog with gaping jaws, is part of the gladiator's own body yet it has turned furiously against him. He is about to slay the beast which is threatening him; in doing so he must castrate himself.'