Men — were utterly invincible.
That particular myrmillo had died, of course.
Stern’s one-armed man had recovered within a couple of days.
They were paused midway down a long passage, lit by the guttering flames of several oil torches. To their left a heavy velvet drape shifted subtly. Caligula pulled the drape aside to reveal a short passage and, at the far end, a pair of thick oak doors, a locking bar across them. Two more of his Stone Men stood to attention either side of them.
‘I think I shall go and take a look at the oracle.’
Stern nodded.
Caligula’s bare feet tapped lightly along the smooth floor. Ahead of him the two guards watched his approach with impassive grey eyes. They slid the locking bolt to one side and pushed the heavy doors slowly open. Beyond, a dark room, completely dark. Caligula reached for a tallow candle and lit it from one of the torches.
He didn’t need to instruct either of the guards not to follow him inside. They knew the dark space beyond was for Caligula alone. They were forbidden to enter, Stern and his men. They also knew to close the heavy doors behind Caligula as he stepped inside and not to open them again until he rapped his knuckles on them to be let out once more.
Thick hinges creaked under the weight of old oak and Caligula found himself standing alone in the darkness. The candlelight formed a small pool of brightness on the tiled mosaic of the floor.
‘Are you awake?’ His voice echoed across the large chamber.
He took a step into the darkness. It was there, just ahead of him. The candle would pick it out soon.
‘I cannot sleep again.’ Caligula’s voice reverberated in the empty chamber. ‘What about you? Hmmm?’
His candle picked out the front of the wooden box in the middle of the chamber. A box, like the doors, made of thick oak and reinforced with metal brackets. He could smell it from here. An awful smell. Not dissimilar to the reek of those overcrowded streets in the Subura.
‘Are you awake in there?’
He heard a shuffling sound inside the box. A restless stirring like that of a caged tiger.
CHAPTER 44
AD 54, Rome
It took several days, in fact, for Crassus and Cato to coordinate a meeting of their fellow conspirators. Crassus carefully arranged for two other ex-senators to discreetly join them; Cicero and Paulus, two more elders like Crassus, were alive because they too were wily politicians, and at the right moment had stepped away from the aborted attempt on Caligula’s life.
Cato brought with him a centurion he trusted from his cohort — the Palace Guard. Fronto. A muscular man in his early thirties with a scar running down the left-hand side of his face, and all his teeth missing on that side. One other conspirator, Atellus, was a tribune like Cato, but from another legion, the Tenth. Like Cato in his late thirties, muscular but lean, a career officer with a face that gave nothing away.
And, of course, Cato’s trusted old friend, retired Chief Centurion Macro. Just seven men prepared to discuss the assassination of a leader that was rapidly driving Rome — the only beacon of civilization in a dark world of savagery — towards a cliff edge.
‘Do you know how dangerous it is for us to even be in the same room together?’ said Cicero. He was referring to himself, Paulus and Crassus. Caligula’s spies kept an eye out for any huddled meetings of the few politicians left alive. ‘And you have us standing here… with these complete strangers! They could be — ’
‘They’re not spies, Cicero. I’m quite certain of that,’ replied Crassus. ‘They stand out far too much for that.’ He shrugged. ‘That’s why they’ve been my guests here, out of sight. Beyond the reach of spying eyes and wagging tongues.’
Rumours had a habit of travelling quickly through the narrow streets and tenement blocks of the poorer districts of Rome, rumours that could quickly reach the ears of an emperor. Macro had worked quickly to crush the stories being told by his tenants of the ‘invincible superhuman who had wiped out an entire collegium ’ in mere seconds. They’d all seen Bob take that mortal wound and walk away from it as if it was just a scratch. He’d spread the word among his tenants that the large man had unfortunately died of his wounds during the night. Sadly he was not an invincible champion of the poor and frightened, just a good fighter who, for a few moments, had provided onlookers a rare glimpse of hope and cheer.
Cicero looked at them all and finally nodded in agreement. ‘They do indeed look very strange.’
‘What did he say?’ asked Sal quietly. Maddy waved that away. ‘We’re not from Rome.’ She was getting used to the technique of muttering to herself what she wanted to say and then repeating aloud the Latin whispered to her. ‘We’re from another place, very far away.’
‘Britain, I believe you told us.’
Maddy shrugged. ‘America actually.’
The conspirators looked at each other. Sal recognized the word amid the Latin. ‘Are you telling them about — ’
‘ America? I’ve not heard of that place,’ said Cato. ‘Is that a region of Britain?’
Liam shot her a cheeky grin.
‘Not exactly.’ She smiled. No one’s going to hear of it for another fourteen hundred years!
Atellus was studying Bob intently. ‘Cato, you say this man is… is like Caligula’s Stone Men?’
Cato nodded. ‘Not one of them… but he is the same kind.’
‘The Stone Men are of particular interest to us,’ said Maddy.
‘Some of the men from the Palace Cohort think they’re evil spirits,’ muttered Fronto. ‘Don’t like being around them.’
Cato glanced at Maddy. ‘What is your interest in them?’
She looked at Liam. How much to say? How much to tell them?
‘We believe they come from the same place as us. We believe they are the remnants of a larger group of people who arrived here.’
‘You’re talking about the Visitors?’ said Paulus.
Maddy nodded. ‘We’ve heard so many different stories about what happened, about that day.’
‘I was also there,’ said Paulus. ‘I was a witness to it.’
‘Can you tell us what you saw?’
‘It was a long time ago. I saw things I couldn’t understand.’ Paulus shrugged. His old rheumy eyes closed. ‘Since that day I have wondered what we saw. Sometimes I almost believe it was a shared moment of madness.’ He laughed. ‘Bad wine even.’
‘Tell me,’ pressed Maddy. ‘What did you see?’
‘There were perhaps a hundred of them. To my eye, as I remember them, they looked like ordinary people, men and women. The Stone Men appeared to be their soldiers. Their protectors.’
‘Support units,’ Liam uttered in English. Maddy nodded.
‘One of them spoke to the crowd in the arena. He spoke in a voice inhumanly loud.’
‘Do you remember what he said?’
Paulus shook his head. ‘I recall small portions, but then I wonder how much of what I remember is a fiction my old mind has conjured up.’
‘Please… try and tell us what you remember.’
Paulus’s eyes twinkled with moisture as he reached back to try and relive the memory. ‘He spoke of bringing news… that our Roman gods were a cruel trick, a lie. I remember that. He said that there was only one God. This… for sure is part of what he said, because I remember thinking that peculiar notion reminded me of… of that odd, that very strange cult that was coming out of Judaea.’
‘Christians?’
Paulus frowned. Eventually nodded. ‘Yes… yes, I believe they called themselves something like that.’ He resumed his story. ‘The Visitor said that they were here to guide us all… to… to steer us to a better way of life.’ The
