that it was a barbarian called Brennos who was marked for assassination. Rome, to his mind, should fight such people, not try to engage renegade Celts to murder them.
There had been scrolls relating to this Brennos in the chests below, old reports from Aulus Cornelius, the man who had fought him first, as well as from Aulus’s youngest son Titus, made many years later. They described a man of tall stature and golden hair, a Druid shaman from the misty lands of the north, simple of dress but with a commanding personality. There was only one thing that really marked him out, a device he wore at his neck, gold, shaped like an eagle in flight. For a moment Marcellus’s mind went to that image which had so terrified his father, had been, to him, some kind of harbinger of doom. The notion of a connection was too fanciful; the owner of that gewgaw was in Spain, his father had been near Neapolis. A powerful shaman they said about Brennos; no one had power over that distance.
He told the slave to send the scrolls on to the Forum and, alone again, he considered going to the family altar to say prayers for the soul of his father, which reminded him he must order a death mask to place with those of all his other ancestors. But he felt lonely; he wanted comfort, so before going to pray, Marcellus went to visit the chamber of the best gift he had ever had from his father, the slave girl Sosia, who looked so like Valeria Trebonia they could be twins.
And unlike Valeria, Sosia was his property, to do with whatever he wished.
CHAPTER ONE
The return to Rome of Cholon Pyliades served as a sharp reminder to Claudia Cornelia of the limitations placed on her by her situation as the widow of a patrician noble. A freed Greek, the former body slave to her late husband, Aulus Cornelius Macedonicus, he could travel as freely as he wished; she could not. Claudia had missed his company while he had been in Neapolis and Sicily, so she did her best to welcome him warmly, suppressing any feelings of resentment. Not that such a thing precluded the odd barbed comment, especially when she heard of his intention to attend the funeral rites of Lucius Falerius Nerva.
‘I never thought that you, of all people, would attend such an event.’
The Greek smiled, knowing there was no real malice in the words. ‘I think your late husband must have understood Lucius Falerius better than you or I. After all, he held him in high esteem, despite the fact that they disagreed on so many things. Perhaps the bonds of childhood friendship were stronger than we knew.’
Claudia replied with mock gravity, her dislike of Lucius being well known. ‘You’re right, Cholon, Aulus would have attended the old goat’s funeral, in spite of the way the swine treated him. He forgave too easily.’
‘Then I am absolved?’
Claudia had not quite finished baiting him. ‘There was a time you would have gone just to ensure the old vulture was dead.’
‘True, but I met him in Neapolis only to discover he was an interesting man, and the irony is that when I got to know him, I found his ideas were more Greek than Roman.’
Cholon did not say that Lucius had used him as an intermediary; it had been he who had taken the Roman terms to the leaders of the slave revolt and persuaded them to accept them. Right now, he was amused by the shocked reaction of his host.
‘Lucius Falerius saw himself as the complete Roman. He would not be pleased to hear you say that!’
‘Not the words, perhaps, but I think the sentiment would please him. He was far from as stiff-necked as he appeared and I did discover that he was remarkably free from the cant you normally suffer from Roman senators. I think Lucius understood his world and knew what he wanted to preserve. Perhaps he was illiberal with the means he needed to employ to gain his ends, but he was clever. Certainly what he did in Sicily was positively Alexandrian in its subtlety. Not Roman at all!’
‘What would a Roman have done?’ asked Claudia.
‘Put the entire island to the sword or lined the roads with crucifixions, then strutted like a peacock, full of virtue because of his actions.’
‘I doubt my late husband would have done that.’
The Greek suddenly looked grave, partly because she had referred to the nature of his late master, but more for the wistful look on Claudia’s face. To Cholon, there had never been anyone like Aulus Cornelius, the conqueror of Macedonia, the man who had humbled the heirs of Alexander the Great, yet never lost that quality of modesty which defined him. It had not been for his military prowess that his Greek slave had loved him, but for his very nature. Sitting here with Claudia, he was reminded of how she had hurt him, and how he had withstood that for year after year with a stoicism that made him even more of a paragon. He knew the reason and had to compose himself then; too much deliberation on the life and death of his late master was inclined to induce copious tears.
‘No, Lady, he would have freed them all, and then dared the Senate to override him.’
They sat silently for a while, each with their own recollections of a man who had stood alone, not aloof, but one who refused to support any faction, yet was there when the call came if Rome needed him. It was Cholon who finally spoke. ‘I am about to commit a shocking breach of manners.’
‘You?’
He ignored the irony, given he was always accusing Romans of being barbarians.
‘It is not often polite to allude to a friend’s private situation, to the lack of pleasure, the emptiness in their lives.’
Claudia wanted to say that he alone had the power to change that, he who had helped her husband, but she had promised never to ask again the only question that mattered to her, the one that haunted her dreams — where had Cholon and Aulus exposed her newborn son that night of the Feast of Lupercalia — so she bit her tongue.
‘I wonder that you do not take another husband.’ Her eyes shot up in surprise as he continued. ‘There, I’ve said it. I have wondered for some time and now it is finally out in the open.’
‘I’m shocked.’
‘Please forgive me, Lady.’
Claudia laughed again. ‘What is there to forgive? I am happy to know that you care so much for my welfare.’
‘Truly?’
She smiled at the Greek, in a way that made her utterly believable. ‘Truly.’
‘It’s just that you spend too much time alone and, if I may say so, too much time in Rome. There are some wonderful places on the coast around Neapolis…’
His voice trailed off; he had said something to wipe the smile off her face, yet whatever it was had not made her sad or angry. No, whatever it was had rendered her thoughtful.
He could not comprehend the sheer size of Rome, nor the quantity of people, rich and poor, who thronged its busy thoroughfares. Here he was, in the capital of the empire, ready to admit that the place scared him more than the idea of facing a herd of elephants armed with a catapult, not that he had ever seen one, let alone a herd.
They were rude, these city folk, treating Aquila’s polite enquiries with either a shrug or ill-disguised contempt, eager to be about their business and with no time to give directions to someone who, by his accent, was a country bumpkin and, by his appearance, no true Roman anyway. So Aquila saw more of the city than he should, saw that Rome was full of temples, some to gods he had never heard of, while the sheer wealth of the place was as astounding as its size. Numerous carts fought for the right of way with those walking, everyone pushed aside for the occasional litter, as the rough servants of some wealthy individual demanded passage.
The marketplace was bursting with produce of every kind while behind the stalls, and in the streets that led off the square, little shops abounded. They sold goods of silver and gold, leather and wood, made statues of men whose brows all seemed noble. Aquila, with his height, his distinctive red-gold hair, now down to his shoulders, plus his battered sweat-stained armour, stood out from the jostling crowd. Many a suspicious glance was thrown in his direction, looks which tended to linger on that valuable charm he wore round his neck, with eye contact being broken as soon as he turned to face these curious people. They were wary of a man who had a spear, used by the look of it, wore a sword at his side, and carried a bow, with a quiver full of arrows slung across his back.
He found the bakery eventually, only because, once he realised that he was being ignored, his enquiries
