Fated: Torn Apart by History, Bound for Eternity (5 page)

Using the corner of his robe, Brutus cleaned the blood from the area. How could this tiny injury create such a flow? How did the horse injure itself in the first place? The wound was on the
inner
surface of the leg. How could a stray nail from a shop have cut it there? Investigating further, Brutus found the answer, as the air rushed from his lungs.

“
Get the Vestal to the Temple!” Brutus shouted to the attendant. The boy was still wringing his hands over the second stallion. The child could not understand the danger that his charge was in.

Turning to the crowd again, Brutus pointed randomly to pedestrians. “You, you, you! Take the yoke. Pull her to the temple.”

The plebeians snapped to attention, but did not move. It was unheard-of for mere common folk to attend the Virgins. Even this frightened young boy must have been the son of a senator, or else he would not be part of the Vestal’s entourage.

“
Now!” Brutus shouted.

The young attendant had recovered his color and stomped over to Brutus. “How dare you! No one but—”

The boy’s words died as Brutus showed him the tip of the poison dart that had penetrated the stallion’s thick hide.

The bloom rushed from the child’s face, but he managed to stammer to the crowd, “Yes, quickly. Pick up the yoke.”

With the permission of the attendant, people streamed forward and took up the wooden harness. Within seconds, the carriage was heading up Capitoline Hill to the Temple. The crowd followed the carriage as if it were a beacon on a dark night. Suddenly Brutus was left on the empty street with a dying horse.

He was startled when a voice boomed to the right of his ear. The burly plebeian stood over Brutus, staring at the poison dart tip, shaking his head.

“
Nothing good will come of this. Nothing at all.”

* * *

Syra shielded her eyes as the oxcart jerked to a stop. The sun blazed overhead as if the globe were angered at the world. She strained to witness for herself this great city of Rome that everyone worshipped, but all that lay before her was a long line of carts, much like their own.

Far off in the distance, a speck flickered on the horizon. It looked nothing but dusty and soiled. This could not be Rome. But why, then, had they stopped? Where else would the miles upon miles of carts be headed?

Where else would
she
be headed? Syra could not remember a time, not even running down a hillside of heather in her native land, when she did not know that she would find her feet upon Roman soil. Her soles seemed to crave it. Of course, she had always assumed that her entrance would be most grand, upon a dark stallion, her sword raised high above her head. Not stripped down to a coarse toga, chained to a rickety oxcart.

Frowning at the notion, Syra did not hear Rax’s approach until the butt of his whip knocked the back of her head so hard that her chin snapped forward and struck the rough wood of the cart. Lips cracked from weeks on the road split open.

“
Keep to the cart, wench!” the slave driver bellowed.

Syra’s arm cocked back, ready to snatch that ridiculously small whip from the slaver and plant it in an extremely uncomfortable orifice, but Navia put a restraining hand on her arm.

“
It would not be worth it.”

Still, Syra strained at the metal that chained her to the creaky cart. “I will be the judge of that.”

Navia’s hand moved to the barely healed wound on Syra’s forearm. “It was not worth it that time. It will not be worth it now. Not so close to auction.”

“
Why? So that Rax might fetch a higher price?”

“
No. So that someone besides the whorehouses will bid upon you.”

Letting out a hiss, Syra looked at the woman who had just saved her from another whipping. If either of them had to worry about the whorehouses, it was Navia. Dirt streaked her worn face. Her tiny feet were a mass of blisters. There was no way the girl would be sold as a house slave. No, the only thing this girl looked good for was lying on her back to give a centurion a few rides until she gave out completely.

Worse, Syra had noticed the weeks of Navia’s sour stomach and was certain that the Spanish girl was with child. Despite her usual disdain for others, Navia had grown upon her, so she had held her tongue, not wanting to give away the girl’s condition. If Syra had, Rax might have sold her off to the first whorehouse they stumbled upon. She might not be able to free them, but at the least, Syra could delay this young girl facing such a life.

Anger rose in the back of her throat.

Damn them. Damn them all. Roman and Spanish.

If Syra were still free in Spain, then bards would have written a different story. But she was a slave like any other. Her fate in someone else’s hands.

* * * * *

CHAPTER 3

The ground baked through Brutus’ leather sandals. Even for Rome, it was unseasonably hot for February. Brutus looked up at the sun. The sphere was red-hot and seemed to be flying across the sky this morn. He had stayed with the Virgin’s stallion until its last breath had given out. By then, the high priests had arrived and demanded a retelling of the entire sordid tale. With his pristine white robes splattered with blood, Brutus had borrowed the plebeian’s rough-spun toga and struck out again for the Forum.

Brutus had thought cutting across the market would avoid the knotted mass of citizens in the open-air court near the Rostra, but he had been wrong. If anything, the crowds had swelled with the temperature. Commerce bustled in the heart of Rome.

Canvas awnings flapped in the breeze as merchants hocked their wares, but you could barely hear them over the hammering of workers repairing the back wall of the Forum. While Caesar had brought on this devastation, the general seemed most desperate to build the city back to its former glory.

Earlier this morning, Brutus had seen Rome through the eyes of a true patriot. Now, having to shuffle his way through the dusty market, he saw what Rome had really become—congested and tired. Brutus surveyed the distant horizon for some respite, but found only dusty trails left by desperate farmers. During the civil war, the aqueduct just north of the city had ruptured, and the surrounding area had been without its water supply for weeks now. Engineers and slaves worked day and night to shore up the breaches, but the water could not be allowed down the channel until the entire length was repaired. Which meant that for the next few weeks, things would be dusty, noisy, and congested.

This was not the city of his youth. As a child, Brutus had strolled across the Plaza under a canopy of palm trees. Despite being a native of the capital, Brutus had always been amazed at the sheer beauty of the temples and statues. Dozens of white marble figures used to reach up to the heavens in supplication. Now, between the civil wars and certain heroes falling out of favor, there were but a half dozen motley statues lining the avenue. Rome was in distress, and it showed.

“
A copper, sire?” a beggar asked, eyes downcast.

In his makeshift toga, Brutus had nothing to give the poor man. Dressed in rags, the beggar sat upon the hot stones, unflinching. One arm missing, and his left leg mangled. Another victim of Rome’s latest civil war.

On another day, Brutus might have rushed past this man, but not this day. Not with the sight of the Vestal’s stallion dead in the street still at the front of his mind. No, he needed to wash that memory away with an act of altruism, and hope that Vesta watched.

“
You there,” Brutus called to the nearest market stall.

The shopkeep leapt at the chance to make a sale. “Yes, sire?” the pudgy man wheezed after sprinting from his stall.

“
What is the largest coin you have?” Brutus asked.

“
I am sorry?” The merchant seemed genuinely confused.

“
Let me see your purse.”

The man snatched his goatskin wallet out of Brutus’ reach. “And who might you be that I should open my purse to you?”

Brutus was in no mood for a lecture on the class structure of the Empire, so he grabbed the wallet from the man’s thick fingers, plucked out a gold coin and tossed it to the invalid. “Use this to go home.”

The injured man looked incredulous at his luck and stared at the glittering coin. “Thank you, sire.”

Before the shopkeep could sputter an insult, Brutus consoled him. “Do not worry, good man. Call upon the Temple of Saturn, and you will be paid in kind, with interest.”

The pudgy man squinted hard. “How do I know they will pay?”

“
Hush, man. Do you not recognize our benefactor?” the injured man interjected, showing the face that graced the gold coin.

Ever since Caesar had returned, the state’s coinage was struck with his own image and those of his Praetors. Brutus felt uncomfortable with such a distinction. There were some honors that you should leave to the gods.

The merchant’s eyes widened when he realized that Marcus Brutus, the man emblazoned on the coin, stood before him. “Forgive me, Senator. I did not—”

“
There is no trespass. Seek the temple, and you will be recompensed.”

Leaving the men behind, Brutus hurried up the hill and entered the public gardens. The date trees, already laden with fruit, shaded the rich soil. Here, Brutus could almost imagine the glory of old, when the Republic was strong and united in purpose.

Climbing the steps to Pompey’s theater, Brutus felt his stomach tighten. The Senate was already well into its debate. It was the highest breach of protocol for a legislator of such rank as Brutus to miss an important session. Bounding the steps two at a time, he nearly ran into one of Caesar’s personal guards.

“
Hold there,” the armor-plated soldier announced.

Normally Brutus would have brushed past him, but clothed in a commoner’s wool, the guard raised a sharp spear.

“
Stand aside.” His tone must have carried enough authority, for the guard’s offensive stance wavered. The soldier recognized the Praetor, for the man’s face flushed even more red than his helmet’s feather plume, and he stepped aside, bowing his head.

“
Forgive me, Senator.”

“
How late am I?” Brutus asked, already knowing the answer.

“
We were told to prepare Caesar’s chariot for departure.”

Brutus cringed. That meant the session was nearly over. His absence would be missed. Pompey’s supporters would most likely see this as a bold act of defiance aimed at Caesar. Antony and the rest of the Caesarians would seek his apology at such a breach. Each faction would try to use his tardiness to its advantage.

Once again, despite his best efforts, Brutus knew that he would be the center of more politicking. On a whim, he changed his route and strode to the back of the Curia and entered through the shadowed rear entrance.

He should not have been surprised by the sight. Brutus was still uncomfortable with Caesar’s remodeling of the Curia. Even after three months, the sight still caught him off guard. Julius sat upon a gilded throne, as if he were Jupiter himself. The engineers had to build a specially reinforced platform to hold the weight of the golden chair. The stage was high enough off the debating floor that Caesar looked much like a benevolent god watching his subjects play out their pitiful mortal games.

And today that assessment was not too far off of the mark. The entire purpose of this vote was not to enable emergency funding for aqueduct repair, or for relief of wounded veterans. No, they gathered for this special session of the Senate to confer yet more honors upon Caesar for his military victories. This one, in particular, stuck in Brutus’ craw.

The Venus Gentrix was considered the highest honor that Rome could bestow upon one of its heroes. The golden necklace was a tangible show of Venus’ affection. Yet all through history, it had been given only posthumously—usually decades, or even centuries, after the hero had died. But here today, this illustrious Republic was placing the gilded necklace upon a very-much-alive Caesar.

The vote must have already been taken, for Antony and Cicero, Brutus’ old mentor, were climbing the stairs to Caesar’s throne. Brutus was certain that not a single dissenting vote had been cast. Not that he blamed any of his fellow senators, though. With the public’s high affection for the general, Caesar was immune to the Senate’s distaste. Anyone who cast a “nay” vote this day would more than likely have been stoned for his effort.

The ceremony ground to an awkward halt as Cicero and Antony stood on either side of Caesar’s throne. The necklace was upon a velvet pillow, and each man had his hand on the goddess’ boon. By right, Cicero, the First Amongst Senators, should have had the honor of bestowing the necklace, but the young Antony looked like he might tear the bejeweled necklace right out of the older man’s hand. Cicero’s face blossomed red, and the veins on his forehead pulsed with a barely contained fury.

An almost-imperceptible nod from Caesar backed Antony off, but it was obvious that the motion was not meant to appease Cicero, but instead to let the older senator know that he survived only by Caesar’s good grace. The flustered orator had no words of glory as he placed Venus’, and therefore Rome’s, favor around Julius’ neck.