Commodus Read online

  It was refreshing to say the least, sitting there, wishing my rump was more numb than it was, feeling as though we were atop the world looking down. I could almost feel the pent-up emotion draining from the prince. I had led him to this place. He had done the rest. We returned at leisure and dropped the horses off at the stable. Commodus swore all present to silence about our ride, not at all sure his father would approve of such a frivolous journey – not understanding the need for it – and certain that my reputation would suffer from the tale.

  After that day, things slowly picked up again. We had called at Halala for one night and stayed for near half a month. When we left, the prince was almost his old self once more, and his father seemed to have dealt with his grief in his own, private manner. Lucilla urged him to return to Rome, but the emperor’s world was ever one of expediency, and even this tragedy could not deter Aurelius from the need to visit the formerly rebellious provinces of the east. The empress’ ashes, along with a deputation and a single unit for escort, left us on the other side of the Cilician Gates, making for the port of Hadrianopolis to take ship back to Rome. The appropriate honours would be voted for Faustina and she would go to rest in the mausoleum with the others, though her official funerary observances would wait until the emperor returned. Meanwhile, Aurelius had business in the east.

  We forged on quickly now, like an army at war. We passed by Cyrrus, the birthplace and home city of the usurper Cassius, and a lack of interest in visiting the place came as a surprise to no one. We did the same with Antioch, though, the very epicentre of rebellion, which was less anticipated. That city had fallen over itself to do honour to the emperor and his glorious son. The council there had raised monuments and planned games for the emperor’s visit, making hasty additions in honour of the lamented empress. They spilled out of the city at the column’s approach and were rebuffed by Aurelius, telling them that he had neither the time nor the inclination to spend a night in a city of traitors. Indeed, he dictated a series of punishments for the city, restricting their civic liberty and their status in the world. I knew we had come east to impose imperial will once more, and it seemed to me out of character for the great Marcus Aurelius to so blithely punish and miss an opportunity for glittering largesse. The fact that Commodus shared my opinion suggests to me that the emperor was still beset by grief and out of sorts.

  ‘Leniency might be more productive in the long term, Father,’ the prince advised.

  ‘I was lenient with Cassius. I let a man of senatorial rank control Aegyptus despite the law. Look what happened,’ was the flat reply.

  We moved on across Syria and south throughout the winter, which is the best time to be in that steaming, barren world. Throughout the tour, Cleander remained a canker in the party, though only Saoterus and I saw it, so good was he at playing the good courtier. At least with the other freedman there, Cleander had someone to argue with and rarely started with me. Now that I had realised how bitter the old emperor still was, I watched with fascination as, just as I had urged Commodus to lift himself from his melancholia, the prince repeated the process on his father. By the time Saturnalia was done, the emperor seemed to be something of his old self and closer than ever to his heir. Aurelius vowed to visit Antioch on our return and put right what he had done. The emperor’s mellowing led to a more altruistic approach to the rebellious east from then on. Rather than punishment, he embarked upon a campaign of forgiveness, the scale of which would make any Christian priest proud.

  Most of the associates of Cassius were pardoned, including whole cities and councils and army officers who had backed him. His head, now little more than a skull covered in brittle parchment carried in a box in the baggage train, was sent to his family at Cyrrus to be reunited with his body for proper interment. Indeed, on the emperor’s orders, even the records of the provinces that might contain damning evidence against as yet unidentified people and groups were burned to prevent their ever being used in bringing down punishment upon them.

  We kept close to the coast and reached Alexandria in the spring, and I marvelled at this mysterious world of Aegyptus, land of the pharaohs. I had grown up on Mother’s tales of cruel Pharaoh and the captivity of Moses and, oddly, I could see an echo of the clear power of that once-great line even now. Great men such as Trajan and Augustus were carved in their temple walls now, but in the guise of pharaoh, not emperor. No wonder emperors were so watchful of the place as a source of revolt. I was a little disappointed that we had skirted Judea and I never got to visit all those places Mother had told me of in her parables, but I did find that Alexandria had a large community of Jews, and a reasonable number of Christians who seemed to be living openly and in peace. I worshipped with them, to the interest and amusement of Commodus and the mocking derision of Cleander, who seemed perfectly at ease with bird- or lion-headed gods, but could not comprehend my simple faith.

  Alexandria had swiftly thrown in its lot with the usurper and now consequently braced themselves to receive much the same treatment as Antioch, but the emperor had mellowed, and Commodus ever whispered words of peace and calm in his ear. Alexandria and Aegyptus were pardoned, though not without exception.

  The governor of Aegyptus was allowed to shoulder the entire blame for his province’s support of the usurper and accepted the death sentence willingly, proving his Romanitas. Though clearly guilty of treason and unmistakably deserving of death, the nobility of his response impressed Aurelius and his son, and so his death was made correspondingly noble and swift. Kneeling on the warm, flat stones of the forum of Alexandria, he mouthed a swift prayer for his loved ones, and then closed his eyes. The sword of execution was held by Narcissus. Though he was in no way trained with such a blade, his sheer size and strength allowed for an ease of use of the massive weapon and gave a great deal of power to the blow. The edge had been sharpened, which was unusual. An execution blade was often deliberately kept dull to draw out the agony of the process. But between the keen edge and the strength of its wielder, the first blow almost went right through the neck, and the big man withdrew it fast for the second, cutting short the pain for the governor as fast as he could.

  Two blows, and the governor’s head rolled across the stonework to the raucous cheers of a public who had wholeheartedly supported his treason such a short time ago. Thus did the governor meet his end, swiftly and relatively nobly.

  Another death sentence fell upon Cassius’ eldest son, who was discovered hiding in the city and preaching hate and revolt against the Antonines. He was less accepting of his fate, struggling and fighting, denouncing the emperor through spit and bile. His death took almost an hour, slowly strangled with each turn of the garrotte in the forum, where he could see the bloodstains that were all that remained of the governor. I managed to find an excuse to leave before the end of that one, but I was later told with glee by some courtier that his eyes filled up with blood before the end.

  On a lighter note, a senator involved in the conspiracy and the younger son of Cassius were convicted but the sentence commuted to exile. A few leading lights were punished; most went free. The two legions who had remained loyal in the east were to be given great honours. I spent hours after the executions with my Christian brethren, praying for the souls of the dead, and then I bathed and scrubbed until I was raw, as though I could somehow clean off the impurity of watching that horror. Still, that was one day of nightmare, and some would clearly say necessary nightmare. It marred the beginning, but the rest of our time in Alexandria was more uplifting.

  During our unexpectedly pleasant stay, the emperor ordered a number of grand new building works, and the Parthians, still at peace with us since Verus’ campaign almost a decade ago, sent emissaries with gifts, opening up a whole new era of co-operation with a fresh treaty. All was good.

  Inevitably, the summer wore on and we began to move once more. Again, we skirted around the edge of the place that was my spiritual heartland and travelled north. I was neve
r to see Jerusalem or Bethlehem, to stand upon the place where my saviour died.

  In the event we travelled along the coast, visiting places that would benefit from the imperial presence, and called finally at Antioch, where the most restrictive punishments were lifted and the festivals finally held, with forgiveness the watchword. Perhaps someone had suggested to the city’s ordo that the emperor’s heir had had a hand in their pardon, for the greatest games we witnessed there were held in Commodus’ name. We travelled on through the coastal provinces, into Asia and finally came to the Greek sea at Miletus at the beginning of autumn. That ancient city celebrated the emperor’s arrival and held games and a festival in honour of both he and the heir-apparent. Commodus accepted the honour with the same stoic calm as his father.

  Miletus signalled the end of our stay in the east and the beginning of our return to Rome, which I had not seen now for more than a year. Odd how travel and constant demands on the attention dull the ache of homesickness, yet it takes only a single thought for that feeling to come flooding back. Rome awaited, though by a circuitous route. We also began to travel lighter now. The emperor had gradually quartered his troops as we passed through the east, the army diminishing all the time, and we left what remained of the force there on the Asian coast.

  In addition to my increasing homesickness, I was tiring of the journey for other reasons. Quadratus was irritable as his constant attempts to inveigle himself into the emperor’s personal council failed, and thus when he came to me, less and less often now, he was always in a bad mood. Additionally, Commodus was spending ever more time with his father and involved in affairs of empire, which meant that, although things were still good between us, our meetings had become fewer and fewer as the miles rolled by. I began to acknowledge that perhaps this was a good thing. I loved Commodus, and now that I recognised it, there was no denying it, and no changing it. But for now, at least, I could not be his, and so to save us both pain, I had decided that the time would come when distance became necessary. Maybe events had conspired to make that happen by chance. Whatever the case, things were changing.

  While I dreaded what came next – a crossing of three days to Achaea by sea – it turned out to be nowhere near as bad as I had anticipated and was far better than any other sea journey I have undertaken, for that stretch of water is so dotted with myriad small islands that one is rarely out of sight of land for any length of time, and the sea is so shallow that a traveller might think she could even see the bottom if she looked hard enough.

  Our arrival in Athens was clearly anticipated. The emperor’s plan to spend time in that great land of philosophers had been no secret during our time in Miletus and word had reached Athens in plenty of time for her to prepare. Two grand statues of Marcus Aurelius and Commodus had been erected in the heart of the city and it came as no surprise to see that the prince had been depicted as Hercules in this land of the demigod’s birth. I had to smile at the elaborately curled beard on the statue of the prince who, at fifteen, had cultivated all summer something that looked like a dandelion gone to seed. Still, it was the intention to impress that mattered.

  As we moved through the city’s centre, escorted by the pre-eminent members of the council, more than once I saw a statue of Hercules among the more traditional gods.

  ‘See how they worship him,’ Commodus noted, dropping back from the head of the party where the emperor was in deep conversation. The prince’s horse clopped across ancient flagstones next to my litter, a great honour for a pleb.

  I nodded. ‘This is Hercules’ own land.’

  Commodus gave a strange smile. ‘An odd thing. The Greeks are notorious for their sneering at the sport of warriors, yet they so readily worship Hercules, the patron of all gladiators.’

  ‘I suspect their aspect was given first,’ I chuckled, and the prince raised one eyebrow wryly. Whatever pithy comment he intended went unheard, for he was summoned back to the emperor that moment. The column came to a halt and with the sudden decrease in noise the ambient sound of the city flooded in. I leaned out of the litter to see what was happening as the general murmur of the great agora nearby closed about me. The column had stopped for the emperor to speak to a man. He looked almost indistinguishable to my mind from the various other elderly, bearded Athenians, but clearly from the way they were at ease, he and the emperor were well acquainted. The pleasant familiarity between them was made all the more noticeable by the seething enmity I couldn’t help but feel emanating from other members of our party. Marcus Aurelius might consider this man a friend, but the Quintilii brothers, each mounted among the imperial party, wore expressions of spiteful hate. Some bad blood clearly existed between these people. There was laughter from the speakers and a few moments later the party began to move again, Commodus dropping back to my litter once more.

  ‘Herodes Atticus,’ he said by way of explanation.

  I gawked at the man now moving ahead with the emperor as though he were part of the imperial family. I had never met Atticus, of course, but I knew of him. All of Rome knew of the great man who had been a close personal friend of three emperors, had commissioned some of the greatest buildings in the world, who was former consul, philosopher and statesman, who was as Greek as he was Roman. There was something about the way the prince almost twitched that suggested he had more to say than merely to announce the arrival of a celebrity.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Father and I are to be initiated into the Eleusinian Mysteries,’ he said with a flood of pride. ‘Atticus has arranged for it during the greater mysteries this month.’

  He fell expectantly silent. I felt somewhat deflated after the build-up. I had felt that his news would be bigger than his being subjected to yet another weird pagan cult. ‘Wonderful,’ I said uncertainly, and saw a touch of irritation dance in his eyes.

  ‘This is an extraordinary honour, Marcia.’

  ‘I expect so,’ I said, a little unkindly, still sounding more enthusiastic than I felt. ‘Like the statue.’

  ‘Far greater than a simple statue. It is rare for a non-Greek to be initiated. Only the greatest Romans are invited. Men like Hadrian. Men like my uncle, who was initiated on his way to Parthia all those years ago.’

  ‘Congratulations,’ I replied, unable to produce anything worthier, though I could understand perhaps why he was so eager, since it would be another pace in his beloved uncle’s footsteps. The prince gave me a look of irritation and shook his head, digging his heels into his mount and trotting forward once more to join his father. We were escorted to our accommodation and there prepared for a lengthy stay in Athens.

  The city was magnificent, of course, but all I wanted now was to go home. Not only had my homesickness taken a new and strong grip on me, along with a fresh desire to visit my mother in the wake of what we’d all felt for the empress, but also our time here was not to my taste, for the prince was always busy with statecraft and religion while I loafed around inside.

  Over the coming days, during which I received once more the regular attentions of Quadratus, the emperor and his son kept themselves busy with these weird mysteries of theirs, consorting with endless philosophers in reasoned debates that seemed to me entirely pointless when Commodus excitedly relayed their content, dining with many nobles, including Atticus, and generally making the imperial presence felt in the city.

  I spent time reading, as I once had in the border fortress of Pannonia, and managed to acquire a copy of a new work by a local man named Athenagoras, purporting to be a defence of the Christian faith, and was somewhat surprised to find that it had been dedicated to Commodus.

  Finally, as winter began to loom, my urge to return home became paramount. I decided that I would even welcome the fifteen-day voyage around the south of Italia and back to Rome. With no sign of the emperor or his son drawing their fascinating debates to a close, and the city revelling in such imperial attention, starved of anything non-Greek I
sent a letter back to the palace in Rome, using the cursus publicus and achieving the highest priority with the blessings of the prince. I sought news of Rome and of events there. Had the plague finally faded away? Was Mother bored and listless with so few of the court there to cater for with her work? What was planned for the emperor’s return? Surely games at least.

  I waited many days in my apartment, hiding from the brutal sexual attentions of Quadratus and the bitter viper’s tongue of Cleander, who was at more of a loose end with Commodus so occupied. Finally, one winter morning, I received my reply, delivered by imperial courier.

  I snapped the seal bearing the Palatine imagery and slid my mother’s news hungrily from the case. The scribe who had penned the missive had perfect handwriting – Mother had never been taught her letters – and I began to read with the first joy I had felt in more than a month.

  Then my world soured, and my eyes stung as I read down the neat script.

  The palace functionary apologised for the tone of this letter, which was to inform me with regret that my mother had passed away during the spring. A letter had been dispatched to inform me, and the man was heartily apologetic that it had clearly not reached me. With our hurtling around the east, it was no surprise to me that a message meant for a minor companion of the court never found us. The letter did not explain how mother had died, though it used the painful words ‘lingering illness’, which left me in little doubt that the ever-present plague had claimed her.