Domina (Paul Doherty Historical Mysteries) (25 page)

‘So, there you are, you bitch!’ Evodus bawled. ‘You haven’t even the guts to take your own life!’

The officer peered through the gloom, recognised me and nodded. Evodus was now indulging in a litany of abuse, as the officer stood staring down at the Empress. Messalina lifted a dagger, and pressed the tip against her throat, then against her breast, but couldn’t drive it in. The officer took a step forward. Messalina’s head went down and she sobbed.

‘Quickly!’ her mother murmured. ‘For pity’s sake, do it quickly!’

The officer took another step forward. ‘Excellency,’ he whispered.

Messalina looked up hopefully. The officer was well trained and his sword leapt from the scabbard. In one quick thrust he plunged it into her neck. Messalina’s mouth opened and shut, her hand clawing at the blood pumping from the gaping wound. She whispered something and slumped on her side. Evodus cackled with glee, until the officer pressed the edge of his glistening-red sword against his throat.

‘Shut up, you bastard! Just shut up!’ He nodded at me and Messalina’s mother, re-sheathed his sword and joined the cohort outside.

I was with him when he reported Messalina’s death to the Emperor. Claudius, deep in his cups, nodded and barked for more wine.

Years later, when everything had turned to dust, and Agrippina and I were preparing to flee to Antium, I broached the subject of Messalina’s fall.

‘Never once,’ I said, ‘after your rival’s death did you refer to her. You never gloated. You never rejoiced. It was as if she never existed.’

‘She was an opponent,’ Agrippina replied. ‘She died and that was the end of the matter.’

‘How did you achieve it?’ I asked. ‘How did a woman like Messalina lose her senses and involve herself in such stupidity?’

‘Have you ever watched a pastry cook, Parmenon, prepare one of those marvellous delicacies: strawberries mixed with cream, all hidden in layers of pastry?’ She wetted her lips. ‘That’s what I baked for Messalina and she gave me every assistance.’ Agrippina motioned with her hand as if to indicate layers. ‘She was wanton and spoilt. She offended the freedmen. She threatened. She believed she could do what she wanted. She hated me and was determined to take Silius at any cost. The more Claudius tolerated her wantonness, the greater grew her fury, until she lost all reason.’ She shrugged. ‘After that, it was simply a matter of waiting.’

‘As you did?’ I asked.

‘Oh yes.’

‘And the rest?’ I asked. ‘Your marriage to the Emperor?’

‘The groundwork had all been laid,’ she sighed. ‘Claudius was a goat, but as well as his mistresses he wanted a wife who was the opposite of Messalina. He believed that I was quiet and studious and, of course, I had the blood of Augustus in my veins.’ She laughed mockingly.

‘But you were his niece?’

‘Oh, you remember how we managed to overcome that little problem, Parmenon, firstly, I had old Vitellius, who was only too willing to advance my cause with the Senate and with the Emperor.’

‘Bribed already by you?’

‘Of course, as was the Senate and the Praetorian Guard. Although some people spoke out against the marriage – I remember one soothsayer describing it as a “wicked marriage bed, a torch for mourning” – Claudius and I had our way. I thought he would be too old for bed sport but I’ll give the old goat his due, he kept me as busy as I did him. The rest?’ She paused. ‘Well, perhaps, I did overdo it. I became the Emperor’s wife, and received the title of Augusta. My image was stamped on coins, and when I went through the streets, lictors carrying the fasces preceded my litter. I listened to the debates in the Senate, received the flattery of the standard-bearers.’ She smiled. ‘Marvellous times, eh, Parmenon?’

‘And what of the opposition?’ I asked.

‘Come, come, Parmenon. There was no bloodbath. You must admit I was quite restrained.’

‘Except in the case of Lollia Paulina.’

‘Oh yes.’ She tapped her sandalled foot. ‘I had to watch her. Claudius developed a passion for her; he liked to make love to her when she wore all her jewellery, especially those pearls she kept close to her skin so as to retain their purity. Within a year of our marriage, Claudius was inviting her to banquets, but she was stupid enough to start consulting fortune-tellers on how long my marriage would last. She should have kept her nose out of my business. I had her accused of treason. One night I dressed in my own jewels and pearls and gave Claudius a night of delight. The following morning Lollia Paulina was exiled.’

‘But that wasn’t enough?’ I insisted.

‘I had to make sure,’ she replied. ‘Yes, after I sent a guard to decapitate her, I wanted to make sure she was dead, so they brought her head back to Rome in a bucket of brine. I kept the head as a memorial before giving it over for burial. Were you shocked, Parmenon? Of course you were,’ she mocked. ‘Once she was gone!’

‘You made some mistakes.’

‘Oh, yes I did. You’re thinking of Seneca, our Spanish Socrates? What does Petronius say about him? “As big a humbug as he is a philosopher”!’

‘Why did you bring him back from exile?’ I asked.

‘I wanted my son to have the best: a true classical education. He did deserve that, didn’t he, Parmenon?’

Oh yes, Nero deserved the best! The person to have benefited most from the fall of Messalina was Nero. Agrippina had seized power, but not to glory in it. She had only one purpose: to ensure the accession of her son. Nero was adopted as Claudius’s heir. He was declared the ‘Prince of Youth’ and shown every honour, both in public and private. He was given his own household, and Seneca became his tutor. Everywhere he went Nero was hailed as if he was Caesar already, a god-designate. His only rival was Messalina’s son but Britannicus was weak and sickly, and Agrippina soon dealt with him. One by one his friends and protectors were removed and replaced with Agrippina’s spies, and he was edged out onto the limits of court life. I only met the boy on a few occasions; he was smiling-eyed but weak-faced, and I always felt sorry for him. Nero, on the other hand, chilled me. He loved the adulation and delighted in the role his mother had created for him.

To strengthen her son’s position even more, Agrippina decided Nero should marry Claudius’s young daughter Octavia, although she was already betrothed to a nobleman, Lucius Silanus. Agrippina began a campaign against him, accusing him, of all things, of incest with his sister. Lucius cut his throat and Nero and Octavia were betrothed; the fact that they were second cousins proved little obstacle.

Just after his fourteenth birthday, Nero received the ‘Toga Virilis’, the mark of manhood, as Agrippina was in a hurry for her son to grow up. She asked me to attend on him, which I did reluctantly as I would have preferred to keep well away from him. Whenever I was in his presence I was always reminded of Caligula, though Nero looked nothing like his hollow-eyed uncle. By that time Nero’s hair had a strong tinge of auburn, almost copper-red, and was dressed in thick masses of curls around his forehead and the nape of his neck. He had blunt, heavy features and protruding eyes. His near-sighted pale-blue eyes and heavy eyelids gave him a dreamy, innocent look, which he used as a mask to portray himself as the noble young prince, the studious scholar, the Caesar in waiting. Now and again this mask would drop, as it did on the day of his toga ceremony.

Before leaving the palace, Nero consecrated the gown of his boyhood to the House of Gods, and placed at their feet the golden chain every boy wears as a charm during their childhood. Afterwards he was escorted solemnly to the temple of Jupiter amidst the waiting, clamouring crowds. Nero loved every minute of it. He stopped at the crossroads where the priestesses of Bacchus, their heads crowned with ivy, gave him small fried cakes dipped in honey, a symbol of his new manhood. From the temple Nero was escorted to the amphitheatre, where free corn had been distributed to the mob and silver to the troops. Nero, wearing triumphal dress, was hailed and adored, and sat beaming at his worshippers, licking his lips as his eyes leered at the women. He touched my wrist and leaned over.

‘Do you know, Parmenon,’ he laughed. ‘Seneca says I must be offered all temptations so that I can be trained to master my passions!’

His remark created ripples of laughter around us. Nero’s eyes held mine, and his smile faded; even then he was plotting how he could escape Agrippina’s influence. I reported this to my mistress but she refused to believe it.

‘He’s only testing the water,’ she replied.

‘Was it wise to hire Seneca?’ I asked. ‘Remember what the old humbug said; “If you preach austerity to a young man, eventually it makes him want to savour the opposite”.’

‘Seneca is doing a good job,’ Agrippina replied absent-mindedly. ‘My son is being schooled well, so when the Emperor dies, may the Gods forbid, Nero will be Caesar.’

Of course, in power everything has its own reaction. For four years Agrippina was given the run of Rome, removing opposition, managing the Senate, bribing the guards, keeping the freedmen in her camp. Opponents such as Lollia Paulina were given short shrift but Agrippina had no blood lust, preferring instead to influence people, to ease the way, to open doors through guile. Through Pallas she could organise the Senate and eventually the Praetorian Guard. Whoever controlled that crack regiment had a strong power base: they would be the ones to hail the new Emperor and take care of any opposition. Agrippina had already distributed largesse and, of course, as the daughter of the great Germanicus, the troops held her in high regard. Agrippina made sure that such adoration remained constant and eventually persuaded Claudius to appoint her nominee, the thickset, capable and loyal Sextus Burrus, as Commander of the Praetorian Guard. He was an administrator rather than a campaigner but a man Agrippina thought she could fully control.

Only one obstacle remained: the freedman Narcissus. Although he had joined Agrippina in bringing down Messalina, he had soon realised he’d merely replaced one Empress with an even more powerful one. Narcissus withdrew from Agrippina’s circle, studying her tactics carefully. He did not oppose Agrippina or Nero openly but instead, reminded Claudius constantly of the ‘sweet days’ he had enjoyed with Messalina, and emphasised the rights and duties of poor Britannicus. Claudius had quickly tired of each of his wives and Agrippina was no exception. Once Narcissus realised he was sowing on fertile ground, his campaign gained pace. Britannicus was invited back to court, fawned on and favoured, and Agrippina knew that she would have to strike quickly.

‘It is part of human nature to hate those whom you have injured’

Tacitus,
Agricola
: 42

‘What am I to do with Claudius?’

In the spring of the fourteenth year of Claudius’s reign, Agrippina was openly showing her discontent. She was thirty-nine years of age but looked much younger, despite the occasional white hair or faint lines on her olive-skinned face. Power and influence can create eternal youth, or at least the illusion of it. During those years of power, Agrippina had very rarely consulted me: Nero was the beginning and end of her life, and Agrippina suspected I did not share the same, unquestioning adoration of her son. She would hear nothing even slightly derogative about the young man that I secretly called ‘The Monster’. Nero was a superlative actor in front of those who mattered, but allowed his mask to slip with me. He would sidle up to me and make the occasional salacious remark about a senator’s wife or tell me in vivid detail what he would like to do to some person who had inadvertently offended him. He was an apt pupil of Seneca; the old, yellowing-skinned hypocrite had a tongue coated in acid and all the compassion of a striking viper.

‘What am I going to do about Claudius?’ Agrippina repeated.

We were seated in one of the gardens outside the palace, a sinister place that had once been used as a paupers’ burial ground. The outlines of the death-pits were still visible. During the time of Augustus its use as a cemetery was abandoned and it had been lawned over. Seventy years of lying fallow had benefited the rich soil, in which almost every bush and flower known to the empire bloomed. The heavy scent of flowers was almost overbearing but few birds flew or nested there. Many claimed it was a place of darkness, and the many palace sorcerors and soothsayers would often go grubbing amongst the abandoned graves for bones and herbs to make their magical potions.

‘Are you listening, Parmenon?’

‘I always listen, oh, August one,’ I retorted.

‘Don’t be sarcastic.’ Agrippina pinched my arm. ‘You are getting old, Parmenon.’ She tousled my hair. ‘There’s a good deal of silver here, but even more in the bank, eh? Do you ever think of leaving me, Parmenon?’

I pointed to a butterfly resting on a flower.

‘I’m like that, Excellency. I would love to fly but I am always drawn back.’

Agrippina leaned down and tightened the thong of her silver-gilt sandal, before dabbing at the sweat on her neck.

‘You’ve heard the rumours?’

‘I’ve heard Lepida is dead.’

‘Yes, the mother of the wild whore.’ Agrippina stared up at the sky. ‘She had to go, Parmenon. Blood will out. I killed her daughter and, in time, Lepida would have struck back at me or Nero.’

‘They say the guards threw her into boiling water before the executioner took her head.’

‘I didn’t ask for that,’ Agrippina replied.

‘Nor did Narcissus, Domina, and he’s the real problem, isn’t he? Whispering his poison into Claudius’s ears, openly courting young Britannicus?’

Agrippina was half listening: her mood had changed as her rage began to boil.

I know she had heard the reports. Claudius himself was now inviting Britannicus to supper parties, begging his forgiveness, toasting him with his goblet, saying he would show the people a proper prince. The Emperor was appearing more and more at the Senate House to plead that both Nero and Britannicus should be treated fairly. More dangerous were rumours that Claudius was threatening to change his will. His relationship with Agrippina had soured, and he was fond of repeating the witticism that it was his destiny to suffer the wickedness of wives, and to punish them.