Valerius placed his hand on her shoulder and turned her face to him. He brushed the tears from her cheek with his fingers. ‘Poor Julia, caught between two horrible, frightening men. No wonder you’ve been so sad lately.’ And poor Father, so determined not to appear weak that he couldn’t allow the people he loved to know how much he cared for them. ‘I have to go now. Look after Olivia for me.’ He bent down and kissed her on the forehead.
Four slaves carried the chair and made good time through the centre of the city and across the Pons Vaticanus to the west bank of the Tiber. Trees lined the pathway from the bridge to the circus and, among them, men stacked wood for the bonfires that would light the guests home at the end of the night. To his right, he passed the curious Meta Romuli, the narrow pyramid that marked where Romulus was said to be buried. Ahead loomed the walls of the circus, which was grander, but not greater, than the mighty Maximus on the other side of Rome.
The chair men set him down and he arranged to be picked up by the bridge at the second hour after dark, when Nero’s invitation stipulated the evening would end. An imperial aide conducted him along a narrow, tiled corridor to the far end of the circus. Other guests were arriving, but not as many as he would have expected for an event like this. It was obviously to be a select gathering, and he wondered again why he’d been invited. He noted three former consuls and any number of senators and their wives, most of whom were pleased to look down their noses at him. But a few recognized him as a Hero of Rome and he exchanged bows with the elegant patrician Laecanius Bassus, who had just taken over the consulship from his deadly rival Regulus.
Eventually, a crowd of close to a hundred gathered in the grand hall which opened out on to the imperial and senatorial boxes. Valerius accepted a cup of wine and retired to a corner where he wouldn’t need to make polite conversation with people he didn’t know. He’d been standing there for a few minutes when he detected a sweet scent in the air and felt a malevolent presence at his side.
‘I’m surprised you are not showing off your trophy, my hero. Surely this would be just the occasion to impress people with the Gold Crown of Valour?’ Rodan wore a broad smile and made no attempt to disguise the mockery in his voice. His ego, never buried too deep, was as inflated as a startled puffer fish. Rodan was pleased with himself and that didn’t bode well for someone.
Valerius ignored him and Rodan nodded absently. ‘The Emperor and lord Torquatus are grateful for your efforts.’
A simple statement which contained no overt threat. So why did it carry the chill of a dagger point rattling across a skeleton’s ribs?
Before Valerius could react a fanfare sounded, and Nero, in a toga of imperial purple and with a gold laurel wreath clinging to his sparse hair, descended the broad staircase with Poppaea Augusta at his side. He smiled benevolently at all around him, but his wife’s face displayed nothing but coldness and indifference. She might have been walking through an empty corridor for all the attention she paid to her surroundings. Valerius knew Fabia enjoyed Poppaea’s company, but he felt an instinctive dislike for the Emperor’s wife. She created a barrier around herself that was as impenetrable as a legionary testudo and her eyes hinted at a capacity for petty cruelty. She glanced towards him and he noted a flash of recognition before the emotionless mask returned. Suddenly the room felt a much more dangerous place. Servants appeared with golden platters of food and the aristocrats fell like carrion birds on dishes of roasted song thrush, delicately fried tongue of lark and flamingo, and white-fleshed moray eel. As the wine flowed, the atmosphere became more intense and expectant, and the chamber filled with heat and noise. Valerius slipped away from Rodan and found his senses swamped by a sea of scarlet faces, bulging, intense eyes and ceaseless, self-important conversation. He allowed his mind to return to the pool with Ruth and it was a few moments before he realized the room had gone quiet and Nero was speaking. He was talking about Christus.
‘… the weak and the gullible follow a charlatan cast out by his own people; the so-called Son of God brought to earth. A common criminal tried and found guilty under Roman law at the instigation of a Judaean council too timid to bring him to justice themselves.
‘And now they are among us, yes, perhaps even among us here, burrowing into the very foundations of the Empire like rock-worms eating away at the stones upon which Rome is built. These followers of the man Christus would tear down our temples and cast out our gods, but I… will… not… allow… it. They believe they are hidden from us, but our eyes are upon them. The man they revere claimed he could perform miracles, and they believed him. He promised them eternal life, but to achieve this eternal life they must first be willing to experience death. I rule Rome and I, not this Christus, will grant them their wish.’
At his final words the great doors at the far end of the room were thrown open and Nero and Poppaea led the way out to the viewing platform which looked along the length of the circus. Valerius held back, but Rodan appeared beside him and took his arm. ‘Oh no, my hero,’ he said cheerfully. ‘The Emperor has ordered a special place set aside for you. Think of this as a lesson as much as an entertainment.’
Reluctantly, Valerius allowed himself to be led to the front of the great curved balcony that dominated the western end of the arena. The soft, ethereal haze that heralded dusk was settling over the city, but it would not be dark for another hour. Ahead of him the circus stretched away for five hundred paces, a narrow oval of hard-packed sand split by a central spine with a turning post at each end and an enormous carved stone obelisk in the centre. To his right was the lavish imperial box where Nero whispered into Poppaea’s ear. Away to his left were the seven bronzed dolphins of the lap counter. Tiered stands overlooked every yard of the circuit and the track on either side of the spine appeared so narrow it was difficult to imagine four- and six-horse chariot teams overtaking each other, but Valerius had seen the Reds and the Greens matched wheel to wheel at the corner. Today the spectators were to be treated to a different spectacle.
The near end of the circus, between the closest turning post and the curved platform, had been turned into a separate arena by a twelve-foot fence of metal bars. As he watched, Praetorian guards herded a huddle of terrified prisoners into the centre of the open space. There must have been close to twenty of them, more men than women.
‘Only six or seven of them are followers of the Judaean,’ Rodan whispered. ‘The rest are condemned criminals, but it is the example that matters, don’t you think? Do you see anyone you recognize?’
Valerius froze. What did he mean? He frantically studied the men and women, but they were massed so close together it was difficult to identify individuals. Then he caught sight of a hank of silver hair and a slim, familiar figure. He half rose, but a sharp prick at his ribs stopped him. He looked down to find Rodan holding a small dagger he’d taken from the folds of his tunic.
‘No heroics today. We have more work to do, you and I.’
Valerius knew Rodan wouldn’t dare kill him without Nero’s sanction and he was ready to leap on to the sand to his father’s rescue. But, when he looked again, he had a clearer view of the silver-haired man. It wasn’t Lucius, but a much older person. Rodan grinned at him and he reluctantly resumed his place beside the Praetorian, his heart numb with dread.
Nero stood to address the captives, his querulous tones ringing around the empty circus.
‘You worship one god to the exclusion of all others. Where is your god today? Let him show me a single sign that he loves you and I will spare every one of you.’ He paused, studying the sky like a bad actor in a Greek tragedy. ‘You see, there is no sign, and there will be none because your god only exists in your own minds, which have been warped by those who lead you. The man you follow claimed to be the son of that false god, but he was a mere deceiver who dazzled simple country dwellers with crude conjuring tricks. He rebelled against Rome and was a traitor to his own people. He promised to save you, yet he could not even save himself. He offered you eternal life and you believed him.’ He waved his hand with a flourish and a door swung open in the opposite side of the arena. His plump, perspiring face hardened and Valerius had never seen anything so pitiless. ‘I grant you your wish.’
A lion roared, a thundering growl that seemed to shake the very stones of the circus and was quickly joined by the throat-tearing cough of a leopard. The beasts, five lions and two of the spotted cats, must have been starved for days because they didn’t hesitate as they burst into the light towards the little group huddled in the centre. A collective cry that tore Valerius’s heart rose from the captives and now the herd instinct that had held them together was broken by sheer terror. They splintered in every direction, a few sinking to the ground and raising their arms in supplication, but most fleeing in mindless panic, pleading for mercy they knew would not be forthcoming.
The old man Valerius had mistaken for his father died on his knees as a lioness tore his screaming head from his shoulders with a single twist of her enormous jaws. Blood sprayed bright across the sand. A muscular giant with a red face and heat-scarred arms faced up to a charging leopard, his features set in a determined scowl, but even a blacksmith’s strength counted for nothing against a big cat’s power. He went down under her weight and her rear
