'There have been kings in Egypt younger than me.'
'And they were murdered for it.'
That quietened him for a moment. Then his eyes were shining again. 'Who's going to be murdered next in Rome? My big brothers, do you think? Nero next? Or Drusus?'
'It's a terrible thing to hear you hope for their deaths so casually,' I said.
He was incredulous, pointing an accusing finger at my sleeping domina. 'You helped her kill more people than I can count on my hands — and all just to put my grandfather Tiberius on the throne.'
'Be quiet,' I hissed. 'Your grandfather was prophesied, too.'
'He's not much of a king.'
'Little Boots!'
He was unrepentant. 'I bet you talked about your murders all the time — especially with that hunchback witch who used to mix up all the poisons.'
'Quieten down. You only know these dreadful things because I told you when I was ill and raving, domine.'
'I nursed you back to health.'
'Yes, yes, and I'm very grateful.'
'That was when you told me I was a god — and that you were one too.'
Not for the first time, I regretted how much I had told Little Boots in my illness. 'My divine state is no business of yours.'
' My divine state is. The old soothsayer said I was divine too. I was there when he said it, remember?'
I threw my domina 's ointment down and stalked across the room to grip him hard by the shoulders, shaking him. 'Now, listen. Perhaps you will be divine but you are not divine yet — you are only a boy, and not a very nice boy either, and certainly not a boy who is worthy of a throne.'
He stared in shock at me.
'You will wear the crown that was meant for your murdered father — it was prophesied — but your father was loved by all of Rome. It breaks my heart that he was not the chosen one — he deserved to rule — and it certainly broke my domina 's heart. Your father would have been a good and honest king, but it was not to be and that's all there is to it. So…' I stared hard at him. 'Will you be loved, Little Boots?'
He went to answer but I shook him again. 'Not if you carry on like this, you won't. You must look in your heart, domine, and think hard on how the people will love you. Nothing is guaranteed. If you gain the throne tomorrow, you'd still be 'the prophesied' but you wouldn't last a minute. Not one minute.'
I released him and he was silent for a long time. 'I'm sorry,' he said at last. 'You are right, Iphicles.'
It was a concession from him — not something I received very often. Affection overcame me and I hugged him. 'You'll be a glorious king one day, Little Boots,' I whispered. 'Just let your loving Iphicles help you become it.'
He kissed my cheek.
'Now. Your older brothers,' I said, breaking the hug. 'The first thing for you to learn is that even though they're marked for death, we must never disrespect them or make jokes about it. If we do, they'll learn of it, and then we'll be the first ones they visit when they come back as shades.'
'Do the ghosts of all the others haunt you, Iphicles?'
'No,' I answered truthfully. 'I loved and respected all those I led towards death, but I did what I did because prophecy demanded it — and because my domina demanded it. I did nothing for pleasure or excitement or revenge. All those who died would have learned the reasons for my actions when they went to the Underworld — and it would have helped them rest, knowing why they had to die. Plus I always spit the beans.' My decades-long habit of spitting mouthfuls of black beans during Lemuria — the festival of the dead — always proved very effective against ghosts. 'I advise you to try spitting them too, Little Boots.'
He nodded again.
'Your older brothers' deaths will not be easy to achieve,' I went on. 'Your poor mother has got them so surrounded by loyal slaves and protectors that poison could never be administered.'
'I'll help get it through,' Little Boots suggested.
I slapped his hand. 'You will not.'
'You can get it through, then,' he said. 'You're a very cunning slave.'
I slapped his other hand. 'And end up being fed to the bears? Some good I'll be to you then.'
Little Boots turned petulant. 'I want my brothers murdered now, Iphicles — they're standing in my way!'
'What have I just been saying to you? Respect and patience.'
He tried not to look sulky, even though he was, and I retrieved my domina 's wooden phallus from its chest, wrapped in its silk shroud. 'Keep going on like this and Sejanus will think of poisoning you next,' I told him.
'He wouldn't — '
'He will in time, if he wants the throne — and what else would he want? You're an obstacle in his path, just like your poor brothers are.'
Little Boots was on the verge of tears. 'But I don't want to die..'
'Don't worry,' I said. 'Your poor mother keeps you protected too — Sejanus will never be able to poison you either.'
'But you have to give me extra protection, Iphicles.'
'Then you should stop sneaking out of bed at night.'
Chastened, he shut up. I was right, of course. He would become Sejanus's target. It was inevitable.
'So who will it be then?' he whispered to me after a few minutes. 'Who will Sejanus murder next?'
I smeared the special ointment on my domina 's phallus and was ready to put it to its purpose. 'You know the answer to that,' I said. 'If you don't, then you're even sillier than you'd have me believe.'
He stuck out his bottom lip, but I could tell that he knew the answer.
'So our job is to see if we can help Sejanus in his next murder without being discovered ourselves. And then we'll help him with the one after that, and then the one after that. And then, when everyone with the blood of the Claudii in their veins has been killed off except you, we will kill Sejanus himself and you'll be king. Simple.' There was nothing simple about it, of course. Six decades of such carnage had taught me that. But at least we had prophecy on our side.
Little Boots smiled, feeling happy. 'I'll go back to my bed and see if my dreams can give me clues.' With that he vanished into the gloom.
Alone again with my domina, I began my nightly ritual of easing the smeared phallus inside her to maintain her endless sleep. I congratulated myself at how my approaching divinity had brought me such cleverness. My domina would never wake up — I could promise it — and when we were eventually reunited upon Olympus I knew she would forgive me for everything I had done — and everything I would do. It was from her Claudian womb that four great kings had been prophesied to spring. The glories of their reigns were and would be entirely for my domina. Her son Tiberius, the first of the four, had been placed on the throne by Livia herself. But she had been naive to think the other three would owe their ascendency to her efforts alone. After all, no one had received greater schooling as her apprentice than I.
If it hadn't been the day of young Hector's death, perhaps I would have had my wits better about me. I was distracted, my mind on Little Boots and the prophecies and Rome. I wasn't paying attention to my domina 's slender hands. Livia was lost with Somnus in her dreams, her body no longer hers to control, and yet, impossibly, as I gently wielded the implement that kept her in this state, her useless fingers, so long lifeless by her sides, slowly began to curl into tight, hard fists.
She no longer slept as soundly as I intended.
Sejanus squatted on the floor among the ruins of the wedding banquet, his head cradled in the hands that had broken the neck of his young son-in-law. It was no surprise to him to hear Castor's voice — barely a whisper — seep inside his ear, as it always did when fate brought him low. He had been expecting it — almost hoping for it; how could Castor resist the urge?
'My father calls you 'the partner in my labours',' Castor's voice whispered, and Sejanus imagined his enemy's lips speaking from just behind his ear. It was almost as if he could have turned and kissed them if he wished — or bitten them off.
'My father's partner,' Castor's voice repeated. 'How consoling that must be. Clutch it as you clutch the pretty
