told him the Thermae Glabrianae, once the pride of one of Rome’s greatest families, had stood. They were on the far edge of the Subura now, on a slight rise where an infrequent, unlikely breeze ghosted its way among the houses to take the jagged edge off the intense heat. Here the apartment blocks were larger and an occasional sumptuous villa clung to the edge of the hill. Valerius turned to study them and his eye settled on one villa in particular.
‘That’s it,’ he said. ‘That’s the one.’
‘Watch out!’ Marcus made the gladiator’s secret sign that warned of danger to the rear. Valerius forced himself not to look round. ‘The place is crawling with Praetorians and that bastard Rodan is nosing around looking for trouble.’
‘Has he seen us?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Then we go back the way we came. Be natural. Don’t make a fuss.’
A few minutes later they sat together in the shadow of one of the aqueduct’s arches on the opposite side of the hill. ‘How were they waiting for us?’ Serpentius demanded.
‘They weren’t waiting for us. They’re looking for Petrus. Rodan knows what we know and he’ll have every rathole in and out of this district sealed tighter than the stopper in a wineskin. We can’t get in and the Christians can’t get out. He’ll scoop them up like fish in a net and then they’ll go the same way as Sulla and Lucina.’
‘Does it matter if Rodan gets to Petrus and a few of these Christians burn?’ Marcus asked. ‘The Emperor can’t blame you just because the Blacks got there first.’
Valerius said bitterly, ‘It matters to me.’ He told them about his father and Olivia.
‘Well, you were right,’ Marcus said. ‘We might get in but we’d never get back out with an old man and a sick woman. They have the house watched from every corner. Anyone who tries to leave will be picked up the minute they stick their nose out of the door.’
Valerius looked up the hill past where the channel disappeared into the rock. ‘What if I could get in? Would it be possible to create enough of a diversion to allow me to get my father and Olivia away?’
‘We could try,’ the scarred gladiator said. ‘But I don’t see how you can get in unnoticed. The place is guarded as tight as a mouse’s arse-hole.’
‘There must be another way.’ Valerius began to climb the hill.
Minutes later they lay flat on the ground looking over the edge of the hill above the villa which had caught Valerius’s attention. The Viminal was occupied mainly by a patchwork of apartments and small allotments, but here, where the hill was steepest and the soil thin and worthless, it had been left clear. The slope fell away sharply, almost a cliff, and the roof of the building was probably fifty feet below them.
‘Well, that’s that,’ Marcus said. ‘If you try to get down there, you’ll be lucky if you only break your legs.’
Valerius had studied the face with equal care and he realized that Marcus was right. This was no conveniently fractured Dacian rock; it was weathered almost as smooth as glass. What was more, it was visible from the streets below where Rodan and his men waited. There had to be another route.
They searched the edge of the hill for an alternative and Valerius was beginning to despair when he noticed something unnatural in the dried yellow grass. It took a few moments before he recognized it. He was standing over yet another of the inspection shafts.
He walked back to the far side of the hill and did his best to work out the course of the aqueduct. When he was satisfied, he stood for a moment with his head bowed. He tried to visualize the interior of the channel below his feet. Could it be done? When he looked up, Marcus saw the same look in his friend’s eyes as he had seen in gladiators making their final appearance in the arena: a confused mix of fear, resolve, certainty and confusion. Valerius handed Marcus the polished bronze disc and reached down to place the key in the capstone. ‘Signal the water tower to cut the supply.’
The two gladiators looked at him in disbelief.
‘You can’t-’
‘Just do it.’ Valerius barely recognized his own voice. He knew that if he hesitated for even a second he would turn and walk away. With Rodan’s Praetorians surrounding the villa there was only one way into the baptism chamber — through the subterranean passage ten feet below him. He was more frightened than he’d ever been in his life. More frightened even than in the final suffocating hours of the Temple of Claudius. There, he had persuaded himself he was already dead. Here, he had to live. For Olivia and for Lucius.
Reluctantly, Marcus used the bronze mirror to send the single flash that warned the men in the water castle to stop the flow.
‘Help me with this.’ Serpentius hesitated and Valerius’s fear made him snarl. ‘Help me or by the gods I’ll send you down there instead.’
The Spanish gladiator scurried to Valerius’s side and together they heaved the stone aside. Serpentius took an involuntary step back as the shaft opened up at his feet.
Valerius stared into the dank black opening. The inspection holes they’d checked at ground level had been perhaps three feet deep, with the water clearly visible at the bottom. This disappeared into the darkness like a wormhole leading to the River Styx. It was two feet in diameter with rough steps cut into the rock to allow a man to descend safely.
‘A lamp and a rope, at least,’ Serpentius pleaded. ‘I will fetch them quickly.’
‘We don’t have time. If the Christians finish their ceremony they’ll walk out into a trap and my father and Olivia will be taken.’
Valerius stripped to his loincloth and handed his clothes to Marcus, but took the belt with his dagger and hung it from his neck. He sat on the lip and closed his eyes. His father had talked of faith in his God. Now Valerius called upon his own faith. Faith in himself. Faith in his courage. He was a Hero of Rome, he wasn’t frightened by a little dark passage. Messor had given him the idea. Messor, the skinny legionary his comrades had nicknamed Pipefish, who had shown more bravery than all the rest put together when he had slithered into the soot-blackened hell of the hypocaust below the Temple of Claudius. The attempt had been doomed, of course, and poor Pipefish had died nailed to the temple door as the flames of Boudicca’s fire ate at his flesh. But he had got through the hypocaust and that was what gave Valerius hope.
Hope, but how much? Pipefish had been whip thin and greased with olive oil. Valerius was probably twice his breadth and his shoulders were heavily muscled from his daily training with sword and shield. How wide was the tunnel? How deep? He heard the water sound change below him from a violent rush to a musical gurgle. Soon. How wide? How deep? He wouldn’t know until he got down there. At least if it was too narrow he would be able to turn back, with his honour and his conscience intact. His father and Olivia might die, but he would have done his best. He tried not to hear the voice in his head willing the shaft to be impassable.
The gurgling faded to a whisper. It was time. He turned and his foot searched for the first step.
‘Wait!’ It was Marcus. What now? ‘The diversion. How will we know when you are ready to come out of the villa?’
Valerius cursed himself. Of course he should have thought of that. One more mistake that could kill him. He cast his mind back to the front of the villa. It was a large building, surrounded by a walled garden, with a heavy door set back from the street. He remembered three windows at first floor level, all of them visible from the alleyway where he would have to make his escape.
‘Give me my cloak and tunic.’ Marcus handed over the clothes and Valerius bundled the heavy cloak into a ball with the tunic at its centre. ‘I’ll wave the cloak at the window above the doorway. Count to one hundred and then start the diversion. I don’t care what you do, just get them away from the alley, but don’t set the city on fire.’
Though the sun was high above them, he had never felt so cold; chilled to the very centre of his being. With a last glance towards his companions he climbed into the shaft.
XXXIV
The chamber stank of damp and the steps under his bare feet felt as slippery as if they were coated with ice. He had to grip tight with his single hand until his toes found and secured each foothold, whilst holding the bundled cloak in the crook of his right arm. At least he had the comfort of the circle of light above him and the anxious faces of Marcus and Serpentius that almost filled it. He reached the bottom of the channel, identified by thick, oily weed
