Everything was concluded, but Menophilus was very aware that of those fully committed to the Gordiani only Valerian would remain in Rome. He finished the bacon and cabbage, took some more, and asked a servant to bring him some eggs. He was feeling a bit less bad, actually hungry. If you could get some food inside you, and keep it there, it helped. As did focusing your mind on something other than your physical suffering. The two barbarians were talking in some language Menophilus did not know. Despite the wine fumes in his head, he continued to reconstruct the events of the previous day.
The afternoon and evening had been the idea of Timesitheus. They had taken the northern hostages to the Equirria. The festivals two-horse chariot races in the Stadium of Domitian on the Campus Martius always made a fine show. Cniva the Goth was from the Tervingi, Abanchus the Sarmatian an Iazyges. They had seemed to appreciate watching from the imperial box. Usually men of their tribes should consider themselves fortunate to be granted a place in the Senatorial seating. There had been drinks throughout the spectacle. Both had wagered large sums of money, and laughed without restraint, slapped their thighs, at every crash, as a barbarian would.
After sunset, when they escorted them back to their nearby lodgings in the Villa Publica, they had found Timesitheus had provided a splendid feast; huge amounts of roast meat and wine, attractive serving girls, things guaranteed to please any barbarian nobleman.
At first Menophilus and Timesitheus had talked together in Greek, confident the barbarians could not understand. Timesitheus had argued at some length that he should be sent to the East. Their conversation came back to Menophilus with a strange clarity.
Who better than the Praefectus Annonae to ensure the supply of Egyptian grain? Timesitheus had said. I know the East from Alexanders campaign, and since then have governed provinces there. The envoy Latronianus was the earliest patron of my career; we would work in harness like a well-schooled chariot team.
Menophilus had been forced to interrupt. You had better know what is really expected of you in the North.
I love secrets, Timesitheus had said.
The Julian Alps around Mount Ocra are dominated by a landowner called Marcus Julius Corvinus. Rumour has it he is more highland chief than respectable equestrian. It is said the bandits who infest the Passes either are his men or pay him a part of their loot.
Timesitheus had appeared interested.
You are to go to his principal residence, a mountain fastness called Arcia. If he can be persuaded to raid the baggage trains of Maximinus army, assure him that such a service would not be forgotten by the Gordiani.
The Greek had still not looked totally reconciled.
Nor will your scheme for the barbarian hostages, Menophilus had added.
That had won over the Graeculus.
The next part of the evening the business with the barbarian envoys was more fragmentary in Menophilus memory.
While detained in Rome, both Cniva and Abanchus had learnt enough Latin to make conversation. Late that night, well warmed by the wine, they had agreed readily to win their freedom by swearing to get their tribes to act in the interests of the Gordiani.
That had won over the Graeculus.
The next part of the evening the business with the barbarian envoys was more fragmentary in Menophilus memory.
While detained in Rome, both Cniva and Abanchus had learnt enough Latin to make conversation. Late that night, well warmed by the wine, they had agreed readily to win their freedom by swearing to get their tribes to act in the interests of the Gordiani.
Menophilus worried about the morality of the arrangement. Posterity might judge it harshly. Fighting for the throne, Vespasian had rejected offers of foreign aid. Any good Emperor would. But Vespasian had the armies of the Danube and the East at his back. The Gordiani had no such array. The Iazyges of Abanchus would draw troops from Maximinus field army. The Tervingi of Cniva would prevent reinforcements reaching him from Honoratus on the lower Danube. Yet unleashing Sarmatian horsemen into the Pannonias, and Gothic warriors into Moesia Inferior would cause untold suffering to innocent Roman provincials. And a taste of plunder only incited barbarians to want more. Once you have released such animals, it was hard to call them off. In politics the things you hope for are the ones you must fear.
Menophilus had finished eating. He wondered if the hostages would ever do the same. He toyed with a piece of bread and honey.
Gordian had given him strict instructions. He had left them far behind. No one in Rome was to die, except Vitalianus. Menophilus had gone on to kill Sabinus as well, smashed his skull like a pottery vessel. Neither Gordian nor his father would have countenanced the massacre of Roman citizens by barbarians. But they were in Africa, and he was here, fighting for the empire on their behalf. Someone had to make the hard decisions. When Vespasian had taken the throne, he had cast aside the generals that had won him the civil war. Probably the Gordiani would turn from him in revulsion. He already missed their companionship. But friends were like figs, they did not keep. Better sacrifice his good reputation, take the odium, and ensure their safety. His Stoicism enjoined that a good man will take part in politics, unless something intervened. It was an irony that he had been put in this dreadful position by a man he loved whose Epicureanism urged the opposite.
The barbarians had finished. They sat back, wiping greasy fingers, belching.
Now you show us real drinking.
It was the Ides of March. The day the plebs urbana made merry in the open parkland at the north of the Campus Martius. They erected tents, makeshift shelters of reeds. Every cup of wine a man or woman drank ensured another year of life. No one wanted to die young.
Menophilus could imagine little worse. He was leaving for Aquileia the next day. There was much to be done. But he had promised the hostages. Once you have undertaken something, it had to be seen through.
Chapter 24
The Northern Frontier
Sirmium,
The Ides of March, AD238
I took the victims, over the trench I cut their throats
And the dark blood flowed in and up out of Hades they came,
Flocking toward me now, the ghosts of the dead and gone
Maximinus liked to go down where the dead went. He sat on the ivory throne in the Basilica. The alabaster vase in his hands, his court around him. He listened to the Sophist recite Homer.
Brides and unwed youths and old men who had suffered much
And girls with their tender hearts freshly scarred by sorrow
And great armies of battle dead, stabbed by bronze spears
Men of war still wrapped in bloody armour thousands
Swarming around the trench from every side
Maximinus liked to have Apsines around him, have him recite, or talk quietly with him in the dead of night. When the world was younger so the Sophist told him many portals stood open to the underworld; many caves and passages, at Taenarus in Laconia, Aornum in Thesprotis, the Acherusian peninsula on the Black Sea, many places, many magical names. Now the world was older, more wicked, the gods further away. A cave was just a cave. No man could cross the Styx unless he was dead. No living man could emulate Orpheus and his doomed attempt to bring his wife back from the gloomy halls of Hades.
But I, the sharp sword drawn from beside my hip,
Sat down on alert there and never let the ghosts
Of the shambling, shiftless dead come near that blood
There were so many dead. Since Maximinus was a man, Micca had always been at his side. Together they had haunted the Thracian hills, bringing violent retribution to barbarian raiders and bandits alike. In the army, they had quartered the empire. Under the African sun they had faced the Garamantes. In the perpetual drizzle of Caledonia they had waited for the savages to come screaming down from the heather. Rome, the Danube, the East; all those years had come to an end on a wooded ridge in Germania. Maximinus fighting his way through to the chieftains. A flash of movement in the corner of his eye. The spear between Miccas shoulder blades. No time then to mourn, far too long afterwards.
Maximinus had no memories before Tynchanius. He had been a friend even before Micca. The son of a neighbour, a few years older, Tynchanius had been the brother every boy would want. He had known how to hunt, how to make a bow, fletch arrows. Later, he had known which girls would pull up their skirts if you talked to them sweetly, gave them a gift. They were returning from hunting Maximinus had been no more than sixteen when Tynchanius sensed something was wrong. Although they had passed bodies sprawled in the mud of the village street, Maximinus retained a boys foolish hope. Rather than go to his own home first, loyally Tynchanius had gone with Maximinus. They were all dead. Maximinus father and mother, his brother and his sisters. The females were naked. In Tynchanius hut, it was the same.
Tynchanius had been loyal to the end. From what Maximinus had extracted, the mutineers had cut down the old man as he vainly tried to protect Paulina.
To begin with, in a part of his mind, Maximinus had believed Apsines. Time would heal. Soon he would not think of her all the time. In a sense the Sophist was right. It would be two years in June. But, if his thoughts were elsewhere, it was all the worse when the grief came flooding back. It seized his limbs, numbed his mind. Now he did not like to part from her. He held the vase with her ashes, turning it in his great, scarred hands, as he listened to endless speeches. One long-bearded Greek after another; interminable complaints of embezzlement, extortion and theft, larded with fawning flattery. It was a continued affront that the world carried on with its petty, pointless concerns.
Royal son of Laertes, Odysseus, master of exploits,
Man of pain, what now, what brings you here,
Forsaking the light of day
To see this joyless kingdom of the dead?
Maximinus had made his plan. He had questioned Apsines, but had tried not to reveal what he intended. This summer, one final campaign in Germania, and he could put up his sharp sword. His duty would be done, and he could leave the ranks. No Emperor had retired. Vitellius did not count. He had been a weakling, defeated and deserted, destined for death. But Sulla the Dictator at the height of his powers had renounced them all. Julius Caesar had been wrong. Sulla had known what he was about. Like Solon, the ancient Athenian, the Dictator had done all he could, then stepped aside. No man was Atlas, to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders forever.