“Your family. . .” I said.
“I don’t know. They may be dead now. Oh, I wish I could know. I was only a child when I was taken. I would do anything to be free, so I could try to find them, even if I only find their bones.”
It was a terrible thing for a slave to say, but I could not find it in my heart to blame her. Instead I reached out to touch her hand in sympathy. But before I could do so, she moved swiftly away, and I was left hurrying after her, trying not to lose her in the crowd.
From that day on, Avitoria’s interest in me disappeared like a shadow under the rising sun. She barely gave me a glance, instead spending all the time she could whispering with Ganymede in corners. I was hurt and humiliated and angry, but how could I object? They were slaves. I was free. They were not even my slaves, so I could not free them. I cried myself to lonely sleep every night, knowing how stupid I was being, unable to stop feeling things Roman women in stories – Lucretia or Lavinia – would have scorned to feel. I read the Aeneid over and over again, especially the part about Dido, who promised to be faithful to her dead husband, but fell in love with Aeneas by the will of Venus. She killed herself when Aeneas sailed on to his destiny to found Rome. Dido and Cleopatra, Punic and Egyptian, were unable to conquer their passions, and were destroyed by them. Miserably, I felt that, like them, I was an Eastern woman, not Roman enough, lacking in virtue, dignity and piety. I did not understand my own feelings. I only knew that Avitoria was unhappy, and so was I.
Then one day Julia Domna said something that made me realise what all the whispering was about.
“When will that Theodora sell you to me?” she said to Avitoria casually, as Avitoria carefully curled and lifted up her hair into the rolls she loved so much.
A hairpin fell from Avitoria’s hand. One of the other girls pounced on it and handed it back to her.
“I do not know, my Empress,” she said quietly, setting the pin in its place.
“Tell her I will pay well. You have skilful hands, and you work quietly, without gossiping. I like that. I expect to hear from her soon.”
Now I understood what the trouble was. Theodora had made no secret of the fact that she meant to free her slaves in her will. But if Avitoria was sold to the Empress, she would never be free – she would be taken back to Rome and she would never know what had happened to her family.
“You won’t be sold,” I told her as soon as we were alone. “Theodora would never sell you. You are like her family.”
Avitoria turned to me. She was still holding the Empress’s face cream, a gold pot with a red glass snake on the lid. Her fingers were white as she clutched it.
“A request from the Empress,” she said, her voice shaking, “is not a request.”
I had no answer for her. We both knew it was true.
“Let me talk to the Empress,” I said. “Perhaps I can appeal to her.”
Avitoria looked at me gratefully. I wanted so much to be able to please her. But when I found myself alone with the Empress, my courage fled. I did not know how to open the subject. What could I say? It would look strange and suspicious to care about the fate of a slave. In the end, I tried in the evening, when she seemed calm and relaxed, and Geta was at home for once.
“My Empress, are there no hairdressers in Rome?” I said, trying to make my voice sound casual.
She looked at me in surprise. It was very rare that I spoke to her without being spoken to first.
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know why you want to take that Caledonian back with you.” It was a dangerous game I was playing, and I was horribly aware that I did not know how to play it. “Can she be trusted, after all?” I said weakly. Had I said too much? I did not want to push the Empress the other way, into mistrusting Avitoria and perhaps having her killed. “She is a Caledonian.”
Julia Domna frowned at me.
“Now what is your real meaning,” she said to herself, a smile in her voice. “Oh, I see. You are jealous of her, aren’t you? You fear I like her more than I like you?”
I was forced to nod.
“Don’t concern yourself. She is just a slave, and you will no doubt be married when we return to Rome, with plenty of other things to fill your mind and time. I will find someone. . . appropriate for you.”
I could not think of anything else to say. At least, I told myself, I had tried.
Later in the week, I spoke to Theodora about it too, but she just shook her head bleakly.
“I cannot refuse the Empress,” she told me. “If I let her have Avitoria, at least I am safe and the other girls are safe too.”
17.
Snow
It was February, a colder day than I had ever known, and the air was sharp as a sword blade. I could not settle. I paced up and down in my room, watching the messengers go back and forth in the courtyard below.
“Camilla!” The Empress’s maid called me, sounding annoyed. “Get ready, the Empress wants you to go with her to the basilica.”
I dressed in a hurry. Every day, Geta was supposed to hear cases and complaints from local landowners. He was the face of the Emperor. But he hated every moment of it. As he sat in the chair in the basilica it was clear he was dropping off to
