eyes wide.
'Livilla is his victim, too,' Antonia pleaded, 'deceived like a child that she was loved by such a monster. I fear for her life if the truth gets out. People won't forgive such foolish naivety in a highborn woman.'
Antonia waited for the price of silence to be named.
'I want justice.' Apicata spoke her first words. 'Money has no use to me, Lady.'
'You want justice?'
'And perhaps you'll want it too, when you learn the extent of Livilla's depravity in the name of her passion.'
Antonia was frightened now. 'What haven't I been told?'
'Your Livilla had Castor poisoned.'
Tiberia cried out in shock, then rushed into the room when she heard her grandmother collapse. Cradling Antonia's head in her hands, Tiberia faced the two visitors as they gave their story of how her mother had conspired to kill her beloved father with poisoned footbath water. Nothing was more damning in hindsight than Castor's final words. ' My wife… ' Tiberia had believed they were words of love. Now she knew better. They were an accusation.
'Justice will be done for my mother's crimes,' the girl said coldly. 'I promise it. And I will personally ensure it.'
The Kalends of November
AD 31
Two weeks later: forty-four speeches are delivered in the Senate about Livilla's punishment. A few are prompted by anxiety, but most by routine servility
A picata stole away at dawn from the house she and Plancina shared with Martina, neglecting to tell either friend what she intended. She had travelled the Gemonian Stairs so often that she knew every inch of them, providing a pair of hands for Plancina while her friend provided the eyes. Apicata felt less confident alone, as she would be this time, but she would not let this deter her.
She found the way to the stairs easily enough, picking her path along the familiar streets that led towards the Forum. She might have been delayed if anyone had recognised her, but no one did. Even if someone had, there was no reason to fear it. So notorious was the story of her ill-treatment at her husband's hands that she was seen by Rome as another of his victims. That she had actively schemed for Germanicus's death before her fall had not emerged.
When Apicata reached the base of the Gemonian Stairs, she felt the rotting remains of the traitors near her feet. None were fresh. Some were months old or more. All of them she and Plancina had already picked over on earlier occasions. But ingredients were not what she was here for. With her days spent in silence in front of the fire, Apicata's friends imagined she was losing herself in dreams. They were wrong. She depended so much more upon her remaining senses and lived wholly in wakefulness, her ears sharply trained on the talk of the people passing in the street. This was how she learned she must return to the steps.
Apicata tilted her nose to the wind. The street talk had been accurate. Amid the rot and decay she smelled something fresh. The Gemonian Stairs had seen one final traitor dragged by the hook. Apicata took to the steps with pace, her hands feeling the stones in front as she made the ascent. The dogs knew her well enough by now not to be threatened and allowed her to pass. She flung bones from her path as she ascended towards the Arx.
'I'm coming for you,' she whispered. 'Prepare yourself.'
Her hand met wetness on the stone. She held her fingers to her nose and sniffed. Fresh blood, still warm. She advanced more slowly, one step, then another. She touched the flesh of a hand and gasped. The hand curled, still alive, gripping her fingers.
She fell forward, cradling Sejanus in her arms. 'It is me. I am here for you, my love.'
His throat had been crushed, but not enough to rob him of breath for his final moments. Sejanus lay where the hook had dragged him; he felt the soft hand in his and heard the words that were said to him.
'Forgive me… Please, forgive me for what I have done to you.'
The dawning sun was in his eyes when he opened them. It was not Apicata he saw haloed by the rays, but someone else: his lifelong love, whose name they had evoked when they hooked him. His lips mouthed the words, 'I forgive you for it. I love you.'
Tears dripped upon his cheeks. Lips pressed themselves to his. He took them humbly.
'They're the only words I have ever wanted from you.'
'But I give them freely,' Sejanus whispered, almost surprised that his beloved should think they had never been said before. 'I have loved no one else but you.'
Apicata reached inside her palla and found the knife. 'Thank you,' she said. 'We can leave this place together now.'
'Together…' The last of his life was slipping away.
She placed the blade beneath her breast and embraced him. The knife pierced her ribs, entering her heart.
'Together. Just as we've always been…' Sejanus said as her blood joined his. 'I love you, Father.'
The echo of a distant voice came to him, carried on the wings of death. ' The doctor's lad will take the stairs, from darkness comes the wronged, no eyes, no hands and vengeance done, but worthless is the prize…'
Watching from the foot of the Gemonian Stairs, where they had followed Apicata, Martina pronounced herself satisfied. 'A fitting end.'
Plancina used a stump to smear a tear away.
'Oh, what's the matter with you?' Martina said, disgusted.
'You be quiet,' snivelled Plancina. 'I'd grown very fond of her. Despite everything she'd done in the past.'
Martina pressed a handkerchief to Plancina's nose while she blew. 'It had to end this way, and you know it. She still loved him.'
'It's still a shame,' Plancina said. She waved the soiled handkerchief away. 'Now it feels as if all our work is done.'
'Good. Retirement at last.'
'Don't make me laugh, you old sow. Retirement equals death.'
'I was very happy at the musica muta, you know.'
'You were a sham. For all I know, you drugged your way in there. Don't think they'll let you pull that trick twice.'
Martina glowered.
'Face it,' said Plancina, as they began to walk away. 'You won't know what to do with yourself when Livia runs out of schemes.'
'She'll never run out.'
'Let's hope. The boredom will kill us both if she did.' Plancina stopped and cast a glance back up the stairs again.
'Look, the blind woman died with him,' Martina said. 'And she was happy to do so. Stop blubbing and let's go.'
'I'm not blubbing.' Plancina had turned and was marching towards the ascent.
'You mad woman! What are you doing?'
'Bring the knife,' Plancina called over her shoulder. 'Dead she may be, but so is he. It's stupid to let a good traitor's genitals go to waste. And Livia might like a souvenir.'
'Let me out! Please, Mother, let me out! Please, Mother!'
Side by side on wooden stools, their backs pressed to the bolted door of Livilla's room, Antonia and her granddaughter willed the cries to penetrate them like knives.
'Mother, please!' Livilla sobbed from the other side. 'Please don't do this!'
The little boy Gemellus stared uncomprehendingly at his sister and grandmother on their stools.
'It must be done,' Tiberia said to him. Speech was beyond Antonia. 'The Senate ordered it.'
Gemellus threw his hands to his ears. 'I can't bear Mama's cries — let me bring her some water,
