The Last Sacrifice (15 page)

“There’s a head inside,” Castinus said. “A human head.”

Damian stopped halfway through the beginning of a yawn. He snapped his mouth shut with an audible click of teeth.

“There was a message with it,” Castinus said.

“A human head,” Damian repeated, almost stupefied at the unexpectedness of it.

Castinus made a motion to pull it out.

“I’ll believe you,” Damian said sharply. Why would Castinus think he’d want to see a human head at this hour—or
any
hour? There was a reason Damian had avoided military service. Unlike most Romans, Damian saw nothing agreeable about severed body parts—especially the possibility of his own.

“This message,” Damian said. “Dare I hope the head was intended for someone else?”

Castinus shook his head.

Damian took a deep breath. In his business, any number of people could have been responsible for sending a head with a message.

“Tell me then,” Damian said without enthusiasm.

Castinus smiled and blinked. “The message says that the head belongs to the man executed in the arena in place of your brother, Vitas.”

Damian became very still and attentive
. In place of Vitas.

“It says Helius has discovered that Vitas is still alive,” Castinus continued, “and that Helius has started pursuit of Vitas and intends to have him captured or killed.”

Vitas? Still alive?
Damian put up a hand to silence Castinus. He needed to think.

Who had delivered the head during the night? And why? Was the message true? Who was close enough to Helius to betray this information? What was the motive?

“Anything else?” Damian finally asked.

“Just the head and the note,” Castinus said. “Could it be true? That Vitas escaped the arena and is still alive?”

Damian saw that Jerome’s impassiveness had disappeared. That Jerome was staring hard at Damian, as if wondering too about Vitas.

“It’s true or it isn’t,” Damian said. He was thinking aloud, speaking more to himself than to Castinus. “If Vitas is dead, this is just a cruel hoax and something I should ignore. If Vitas is alive and hasn’t sent word to me for help, obviously he doesn’t need it. In that case too, I should just ignore the note.”

“What about Helius?” Castinus said. “If Vitas is alive and Helius has begun pursuit . . .”

“Whatever Vitas did to escape proves he can outsmart Helius at any time. I’m not worried about that.” Damian smiled. “What about that? Vitas, still alive. If that’s the case, I’ll bet Helius is ready to do anything to keep Nero from finding out.”

It was time for Vitas to place some trust in the Jew. He took a deep breath.

“My name is Gallus Sergius Vitas. I once served Nero as one of his trusted advisers. On Venus—only four days ago, yet it feels like a lifetime—in defense of my wife, I tried to strangle Nero. I was unsuccessful. In the prison, after I was beaten across the face, a man visited me and helped me escape. The dye in my hair was to ensure I would not be recognized.”

Vitas did not want to tell John the purpose of that beating. Or what price the man had paid to help him escape.

“I am truly sorry for your troubles,” John said.

Vitas sensed the truth in this man’s compassion and appreciated it, but did not show it. This would be weakness.

“Your wife,” John said. “Did you prevent Nero from—?”

“Yes,” Vitas said quickly. Then realized how quickly he’d said it and how much the intensity of his anger reflected the fear and worry he didn’t want to face.

Vitas rubbed his eyes with one hand, took a deep breath. “I was told that Nero did nothing to her.”

And,
Vitas thought,
I’m clinging to that belief as if it were driftwood and I were drowning.

“She’s still in Rome?”

“Yes.” Another deep breath. He thought of how Helius had visited him in the jail cell and made a bargain with him. Could Helius be trusted? Vitas had no choice but to believe it. “I need to go back. To take her away from there. I had just learned she carries our first child and—” Vitas started to lose control over his emotions and stopped.

John smiled, as if sensing he needed to help Vitas. “This does not sound like a typical Roman marriage of convenience and politics.”

“No.” Vitas smiled in return. “She’s a Jew. A former slave. And she made me move worlds until she agreed to marry me.”

“She’s a Jew,” John said.

“You’re making a generalization that your own people are bullheaded?”

John snorted. “Perhaps. What I meant, however, was that it is very difficult for a Jew to marry a Gentile.”

“Ah,” Vitas said. “Believe me, that came up. But as a follower of the Christos, she tells me that through the Christos, Jew and Gentile are the same, as are free men and slaves. That even from the beginning, God’s people have been defined by faith, not ancestry.”

“You, then, follow the Christos?”

“I’ve agreed to keep my heart open.”

“Perhaps on this voyage,” John said, “you’ll let me tell you what I know of the Christos.”

“I’ve read the letters circulating about him,” Vitas answered. “More truthfully, listened to them as Sophia read them to me.”

Vitas thought of all the hours that he had been content just to be near Sophia, listening to her voice. He’d known each moment how fortunate he was and now, away from her, knew even more how much he loved her.

“And?”

“And I will have many questions for you,” Vitas answered. “But frankly, my other questions are more compelling for me.”

“The scroll,” John said with a nod.

“I don’t even know the author of it, because I don’t know who arranged my escape and the voyage on this ship.” Vitas took another experimental breath, deeper than the one before, stretching the skin and muscles across his back. “The person or persons behind it are naturally cautious, as Nero would kill them and their families for their treason.”

Remember Piso!
That had been a clear-enough warning in the ambiguous scroll. Less than two years earlier, as Vitas well knew, a well-known and popular senator named Gaius Calpurnius Piso had led a conspiracy against Nero with many other Romans of prestige. Eighteen of the forty-one prominent Romans implicated in the plot were killed by Nero, including Nero’s former adviser, Seneca.

But beyond the warning was the implication: to mention Piso was to obliquely suggest a new conspiracy to assassinate Nero.

This injustice inflicted upon you by Nero is an injustice you must endure for a greater cause.

With his escape, Vitas had become part of that conspiracy. But Vitas would not know friend from enemy unless he found all the answers in the scroll.

“You ask me what the scroll says about you?” Vitas said.
The pieces are scattered in such a way that only you will be able to put them together. . . . The remainder of this letter is locked, but you will find the key nearby.
“In one way, nothing. It does not mention your name, or that you and I would be on this ship together.”

“In another way?”

“I think I know why the writer of the scroll arranged our journey together,” Vitas said.

Slowly, Vitas reached inside his tunic for the scroll. He’d been fighting the realization over the last few minutes but could no longer deny it.

His pain was gone! The agonizing pain that he’d quickly learned would accompany each of his movements no longer afflicted him. He’d moved his arms to eat, reached up to touch his hair, taken deep breaths. All without pain.

Vitas stood, scroll in his right hand.

Still no pain!

“Who are you?” he asked John again, wondering if he’d managed to keep the awe out of his voice. The cessation of pain had to be a coincidence. Or somehow John had suggested something in such a way that Vitas believed it possible and thus made it so.

“What answer does the scroll give to that question?” John asked in return, showing he either did not understand why Vitas had asked in such a manner or did not want to acknowledge the awe.

Vitas wasn’t prepared yet to believe the pain was totally gone. Instead of telling John about it, Vitas took the scroll and tore away the section in Latin. There was no need for John to see the suggestion of treason in it. Since Vitas had memorized the words, he crumbled the Latin portion and threw it into the sea.

“This,” Vitas said, handing John the remainder of the scroll. “Can you read that?”

John unrolled more.

“Hebrew.” John lifted his eyes to Vitas. “But you guessed that, didn’t you? That’s why you need to trust me.”

Vitas nodded. He would ponder his lack of pain later and test his body more. For now, it was enough that two of his hunches about the scroll had been right: The symbols were Hebrew.

And John was the key to the lock.

Hora Quarta

The prostitute named Livia stood in front of a door on the top floor of a squalid apartment building. Rooms like these were the cheapest of the cheap. No water. No toilet facilities. Cooking was not allowed. Sometimes, apartments like this simply collapsed.

“Kaeso!” she said. She knocked on the door. “Kaeso!”

Moments later, a male voice inside answered. “Go away.”

“It’s Livia.”

The door swung open. Kaeso grinned broadly and opened his arms. “Livia!”

Kaeso wore a tunic that had obviously been thrown on in a hurry. He was short and broad, with a face to match. It looked like he’d once taken a sword to the face. A thin scar ran diagonally across his forehead and continued below his eye, down his cheek. His grin showed broken teeth, and the smell of beer on his breath managed to assail Livia despite the competition of all the other stenches.

She stepped backward, away from the doorway. “I only see you. Not a fat purse like you promised.”

“Livia,” he scolded like an indulgent husband. “Live with me. You’ll be taken care of.”

“I see no money.”

“Believe me, in a month or two, I’ll have all the money you can spend.”

“I believe no one.” Livia tossed her hair. “I’d rather go back to Ostia.”

“Livia!” Now Kaeso pleaded, stepping farther away from the door to follow her. “You’ve come all this way. Don’t go.”

Yet she did.

Kaeso took a step, and his tunic tangled around his legs. “Livia!” He hopped a few times, trying to adjust his clothing. “Livia!”

Livia reached the top of the steps and looked down.

She nodded to both of the men waiting partway up the steps. Damian and Jerome.

Abruptly, she turned back to Kaeso, moving several paces back toward his apartment. She allowed him to clutch her, then spun sideways, so that she was facing the steps again and Kaeso could not see Jerome approach.

Kaeso buried his face in her hair. “Livia!”

His moan of joy lasted only until Jerome grabbed his shoulder and smashed a fist into his face.

“Let me say that you were very convincing yesterday,” Helius told Chayim.

“I’ve brought you what you need,” Chayim answered, holding a scroll. He never felt comfortable around Helius. This time was no different. “You can let both of them go now.”

“Not so fast.” Helius stroked his chin. He was standing in the shade of a tree, in the same courtyard where Chayim and Leah and Hezron had faced him the morning before. “Let’s talk about your performance. I’m intrigued.”

“Hezron says the letter has dozens of references to the writings of our prophets. That unless you think like a Jew and thoroughly know the language used in the writings of our prophets, it’s difficult to make sense of it. A casual reading by a Roman or anyone else without that knowledge may well lead to a grotesque interpretation.”

“The girl is certainly attractive,” Helius said. He reached into the tree and pulled down a pomegranate. “I’d like to know how you so completely convinced her you are a believer. After all, it was what, two days ago that you joined their cult?”

Chayim held up the scroll. “You’ll read, for example, references to a thousand-year reign in the letter from the Jew on Patmos. Hezron makes it clear that . . .”

Chayim paused and unfurled the scroll. It was difficult to concentrate with the general unease he felt in the presence of Helius and the added foreboding that came with the apparently casual questions about Leah. Helius never asked anything without purpose.

“Here,” Chayim said, and read from the scroll.
“‘The thousand years is prophetic hyperbole and contrasts sharply with the three-and-a-half-year reign given to the Beast. It is emblematic of the enduring vindication of the martyrs who die on account of the Lamb.’”

Chayim looked up. “Hezron references nearly a dozen times that our prophets used this number as a symbol of limitless or inexhaustible measure.”

Chayim returned his gaze to the scroll.
“‘The Lord God revealed through his prophet Moses that he would show love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments. Obviously this does not mean that God will stop showing love to the one thousand and first generation.’”

Noting Helius’s impatience, Chayim nervously skipped ahead.
“‘Hebrew prophets also use hyperbolic language to reveal the eternal significance of earthly events. An example of this form of prophetic hyperbole can be seen in the writing of the prophet Ezekiel concerning the siege of Jerusalem by the ancient Babylonian empire. Ezekiel prophesied that the destruction would be so great as to never be equaled again. The point was not that more Jews would die in this siege than in any other time in history or in the future. Rather, only hyperbolic language could fully capture the eternal significance of God’s wrathful judgment on his people for their idolatry.

“Here is how all of this relates to the Patmos letter. Just days before he was
crucified, the false prophet Jesus of Nazareth used the same language of ultimate destruction to prophesy a coming judgment on Jerusalem. This Revelation of John is merely an elaboration on Jesus’ prophecy.’”

“Enough! Set aside the interpretation and answer my question about the girl!” Helius’s voice became sharp. He stepped out of the shade of the tree, the pomegranate almost hidden in his hand. “I want to know how you fooled the girl so completely. In these times, Christians are often afraid to trust anyone, even others who claim the same faith. How did you do it?”

Why was this so important to Helius?

With trepidation, Chayim explained. Soldiers bursting into the meeting. How he had accepted arrest along with the other Christians. How he had engineered their freedom.

“Ingenious,” Helius said. “But why should I be surprised? The way you arranged to look like her rescuer again shows the same deviousness. What woman wouldn’t fall in love with a man who released her from the arena prison? Especially a handsome young man like you.”

“You gave me a task,” Chayim said. “Infiltrate the Christians and find out the meaning of the letter. I did this to serve you.”

Helius snorted. He ripped open the pomegranate. “You made one mistake, my friend.”

Chayim’s heart rate increased. Mistake? In the courts of Nero, survivors did not make mistakes.

“You needed her trust to succeed,” Helius said. “But it’s obvious to me that you want more than an interpretation of the letter. You want the girl. You weren’t acting when you told her father you had feelings for her. Am I right?”

“She’s a Jew,” Chayim said, trying to keep his answer light as he lied. “You know I have more . . . exotic tastes.”

“I know you Jews stick together. And no matter how you might try to live differently here in Rome, your own blood is still Jewish. So it forces me to wonder what you truly have in mind for her.”

This was not something that Chayim dared to reveal to Helius.

“No answer?” Helius asked, the sharpness in his tone gone. He picked at the seeds of the pomegranate. “You wouldn’t care if I ripped her apart as I did this tender fruit?”

“You wanted the letter interpreted,” Chayim said. “I have the document here for you.”

“Ah, so you do care. That’s valuable for me to know.” Helius paused. “If I went to her now and explained that you were working for me all along, that would matter to you?”

“No,” Chayim said. “What would it matter what she thinks? I’ve got the translation as you requested.”

Helius shrugged. “Wait here. I’ll send for a slave to escort her here to the courtyard. With you right here to watch her face as I tell her the truth. That you had arranged for her arrest so that we could use her as a means to bargain with her father, the famous but reclusive rabbi who hates the Romans so much he would never help us for any other reason.”

Helius waved for a slave to join them.

Chayim thought of Leah’s face as she learned of his betrayal. Knew Helius was not bluffing. Knew that Helius, in fact, would enjoy watching her pain. And enjoy watching him squirm.

“All right,” Chayim said. “You are correct. It does matter to me what she thinks.”

“It’s more than that, isn’t it?”

It was. Chayim slowly nodded.

“Good,” Helius said. “I just wanted to be clear on this.” Helius discarded the pomegranate. “Now, tell me more about the letter that the Christians call the Revelation.”

Eleven
hundred and eighty-one.

Vitas was in deep thought, standing at the railing, not far from where John had given him the bread and cheese earlier. John was sitting cross-legged nearby, dipping a stylus into a pot of ink and writing on parchment.

Occasionally, whenever his mind returned to the present, Vitas marveled at how little pain movement brought him. But each time, he would return to the puzzle that he could not solve.

Eleven hundred and eighty-one.

How could this represent whoever had committed a dangerous act of treason to make the arrangements to place him on the ship?

Eleven hundred and eighty-one.

Vitas frowned at a sudden lurching of the ship. The wind had been at his back, and now the ship had turned, placing the breeze across his face.

At the ship’s unexpected movement, low shouts came from among the crew at the rear of the deck.

“Unusual to tack with such favorable winds,” John said.

Vitas turned. He’d been so deep in thought that he had not noticed the Jew’s approach.

“I’m not a sailor,” Vitas answered, “but even I find this strange.”

He glanced at the outline of the island looming only miles away now. Buildings dotted across the hillsides were visible as tiny white spots.

His attention was diverted when John offered him a rolled-up papyrus. “My translation of the Hebrew into Greek.”

“Thank you,” Vitas said.

“I’m sorry it took so long.” John handed Vitas the scroll and with a smile held up his hands to show ink on his palms. “My fingers are not as nimble as they were in my youth. The movement of the ship was an added difficulty.”

Vitas nodded, but his mind was on the scroll he held, not on John’s apology.

“I’m glad you are able to read Greek,” John said. “I often write in Greek, although I tend to think in Hebrew, especially regarding spiritual matters. My habit of thinking in Hebrew made it easier to translate the scroll for you.”

“Thank you.”

John gave Vitas another of his gentle smiles. It occurred to Vitas that a subtle shift of authority had taken place. Vitas was treating John as a father or elder statesman. Something about the man made such respect natural.

John said, “The words, I think, are clear. You may not find their meaning quite as transparent.”

Without ceremony, Vitas unfurled the scroll and began to read John’s translation:

You know the beast you must escape; the one with understanding will solve the number of this beast, for it is the number of a man. His number is 666. You have fled the city of this beast, from the sea it came and on the sea you go. North and west of the city of the second beast, find the first of five kings who have fallen. (The sixth now reigns, and the seventh is yet to come.)

“That’s it?” Vitas said. “Nothing more?”

“The beginning should be simple for you to understand,” John said. Behind them, the crew still shouted back and forth. “You know the name of the Beast.”

“I know, of course, gematria,” Vitas said. “Who in the world does not, except those who cannot read?”

Gematria. Vitas thought of the graffiti he’d seen during a walk in the markets a few days earlier, which had made him smile because he, too, was a man in love.

It had been a Greek inscription on a wall: