Nest of Vipers (38 page)

Thirteen months later: Titius Sabinus,
friend of the widow Agrippina, is arrested
for treasonous remarks made in the
privacy of his own
tablinum
. The ceiling is
found to conceal a paid informant

Claudius had intended to refuse all wine, wanting to keep his head clear for the day's events, but as the hours wore on and the faces of the young people took on looks that spoke of miseries unexpressed, he felt the stirrings of suspicion that these nuptials were not a joyous thing at all. The doubt made him take his first wine. He missed his cousin Castor at these family occasions, given that no one else ever sank so low as to talk to him. Claudius drank his wine in a rush before asking for another. He downed that just as quickly and believed he felt a little better.

Claudius hoped the wine might grant him heightened powers of observation. Sometimes it did. He looked at the young people closely while they completed the
confarreatio
rituals. Nilla, his niece, had no expression at all as the lambskin was laid across her knees. Even with her eyes half-hidden under the saffron veil, Claudius could see that her face was a mask. This was strange for a bride on her wedding day. If it wasn't elation being shown to the guests, then tears were just as acceptable. But the girl let nothing through, and Claudius feared it was because her hopes for happiness were less than nil.

Claudius studied the groom. Ahenobarbus of the Aemilii was handsome enough, despite his curly red hair, and was likely little older than twenty-three. Yet, this gave him a good ten years on his bride. Ahenobarbus seemed absent. It was strange that he hadn't yet spoken a word. His eyes looked out the open temple doors and towards the rooftops beyond, and he rubbed his thumb and forefinger together as if to make a click. Claudius wondered how the wedding night would play out and then chastised himself when he found the thought arousing. It was wrong to think of his niece being roughly deflowered.

Claudius turned his eyes to the other young couple being married at Tiberius's decree. Nilla's brother Drusus was not as adept as his sister in hiding his inner heart. He looked bewildered and almost frightened, as if the news of his nuptials had been broken to him only that morning. With some unease, it occurred to Claudius that perhaps this was so. The double wedding had been a surprise to the guests, who had only been told they would be witness to the union of Nilla and Ahenobarbus. Perhaps the tight-fisted Tiberius had decided at the last minute to get more for his money? Claudius peered at Drusus's bride. She was not a girl he recognised. The priest had named her as Domitia, also of the Aemilii, and with the ignominy of her late mother's conviction for witchcraft still casting a pall over the clan, Claudius suspected that Domitia had spent many years hidden from view. This would account for why nobody knew her.

Claudius accepted a third wine just as the couples began to eat the sacred spelt loaves. He tried to remember what he knew about the disgraced Aemilii and recalled that there were two more children, another daughter and a son. He saw the son among the guests at once, reclining on a couch next to Little Boots. The boys were friends. Claudius looked around for someone who might fit the appearance of the other Aemilii daughter but could find no one. He vaguely recalled that she had been married off several years ago.

'Are you drunk, Grandson?'

Livia's tone cut through the temple air, causing the priest to falter. Claudius spun around to find Livia watching him from her couch. I was in meek attendance at her side.

'I thought so,' said Livia.

Claudius hurried over to her couch as the ceremony resumed, hoping to quieten her. 'It is only my first wine,' he claimed.

'Liar. It's your third.'

Claudius blushed scarlet and Livia laughed at him, placing a cold, dry hand upon his arm. 'I'm only teasing you. It's a wedding – why shouldn't you enjoy yourself?'

The fact that he had drunk three cups of wine in rapid succession made Claudius reply before he had thought about it. 'Nobody else is enjoying it.'

There was a silence. Claudius blushed even darker and began to stammer in his efforts to excuse himself. 'I – I am sorry –'

'Don't be.'

For the first time in his life, Claudius looked into his grandmother's eyes and saw only good humour there. Then he glanced at me and was confused by my stark look of fear.

'Iphicles was making the same observation,' said Livia. 'Well, he would have made it if he were allowed to speak freely, but he is not, I'm afraid. But I could tell it's what he was thinking.'

Claudius knew there was something going on between us from which he was excluded. 'Yes, Grandmother?'

'No one's enjoying themselves at all, are they? You'd think it was a funeral, not a wedding. It's such a shame Agrippina is too unwell to be among us. I'm sure she'd be voicing her thoughts loud and clear. It's like we're all pretending we approve.'

It took Claudius a second or two to digest what she was saying to him. 'Are we pretending, Grandmother?'

'Well, I'm certainly not, but it seems I'm the only one.' She looked pointedly to me as she continued. 'My great-grandson Drusus's marriage to this girl from such a disgraced family is a sublime match. I congratulate my son the Emperor for arranging it. I also commend him for neglecting to attend. He refuses to leave his island now, did you know?'

Claudius was smiling in his bewilderment.

Livia kept her eyes on me. 'My great-granddaughter Nilla's marriage to the girl's brother is also something to thank the gods for. Apparently, he has next to no career prospects. He looks half-witted. Do you think he really is, or is it just the way the light strikes his dreadful hair?'

A parrot's squawk pulled Claudius from his stare. 'My bird. Excuse me, Grandmother,' he said hurriedly, glad of a reason to leave. 'I'm sure the two unions will work out well for all concerned.'

'Oh, I have absolutely no doubt of it,' said Livia, her eyes still trained on me.

Claudius hurried to the rear of the hall, where his parrot, Fury, flashed its red eyes and beat its wings. A woman and her little girl stared at the bird in fascination. 'Please,' he called out to them, 'do not provoke her – she has been known to give nasty bites.'

'Is it true this bird talks?' asked the mother.

'She hasn't spoken in years,' said Claudius, placing himself in front of the bird protectively. 'Sometimes I doubt she ever did. I think I must have imagined it.' He was keen for them to return to wherever it was they had come from.

'Maybe she'll speak if we ask her nicely?' said the little girl.

'I doubt it,' said Claudius. He went to guide the child away, but when she turned her face to him fully he gave a little gasp and dropped his hand. 'What a beautiful child,' he marvelled, unable to stop himself. Then he blushed scarlet again. 'Forgive me,' he said to the mother.

'My daughter is very beautiful,' the mother said, smiling warmly at him. 'People say it all the time. Yet she's only six. What effect will she have on men at sixteen, I wonder?'

Claudius felt a sense of peace descend as he considered this, gazing at the girl. 'She will be extraordinary,' he offered. He looked to the mother again. 'Do we know each other, madam?'

'I don't think so. But we are guests at the wedding. It is my brother and my sister who are being married.'

'It is my nephew and my niece,' said Claudius.

'Before my widowhood I was Lepida of the Mesalii. Now I am Lepida of the Aemilii again.'

She was the missing 'other sister'. Enchanted, Claudius told her who he was.

Lepida and her daughter bowed

'And who are you?' the beaming Claudius asked the angelic six-year-old.

Fury cocked her head to one side and squawked. 'Messalina,' she answered on the child's behalf, uttering her first words in years.

Echoing her daughter's delighted cries of amazement, Lepida remembered the words of her long-dead mother.
'Always look for the path. Veiovis will offer it, but it is up to you to see what he offers and recognise it for what it is . . .'

I believed I had an ally in Claudius. He had never treated me harshly and was always thankful when I performed some passing task for his benefit at Oxheads. I stole up to him just as he ushered Lepida and her daughter to their chairs.

'
Domine
,' I hissed.

Claudius barely saw me.

'
Domine
!'

'What is it, Iphicles?'

'Help me,' I said. Across the room, Livia snoozed in her dining couch.

Claudius looked awkward. 'What's the matter with you?'

'What are the reasons for it?' I hissed. 'These two inauspicious marriages. They don't make sense. Not one guest here believes in these unions. Only my
domina
does.
Why
does she believe? What is behind them? What is the plan?'

Claudius was appalled that my words reached Lepida's shocked ears. 'Iphicles, you speak out of turn.'

I was losing my wits. 'Help me,
domine
,' I pleaded with him. 'Why does she approve of this? Help me see the truth of what she schemes.'

A scream brought our conversation to an end. Across the hall a high-pitched cry stopped the final words of the double wedding ceremony. The brides and grooms turned to see a dozen Praetorians descending, with Tribune Macro at their head. It was Lygdus who had cried out in terror.

'It's lies!'

Macro struck him across the mouth and he fell. Then he turned to the eunuch's
dominus
. 'Nero Julius Caesar Germanicus, by the order of the Emperor Tiberius I place you under arrest.'

Nero stood up from his dining couch and looked the Tribune coolly in the eye. He was noble and unafraid, the very image of his murdered father in his prime. 'What is the charge?'

'Gross depravity,' said Macro without expression.

I went pale and glanced at the wedding couples. Drusus looked ill. Had he received my damning notes on his brother's proclivities after all? Had Livia made copies before I ate them?

Nero held out his arms for the chains.

'
Domina
!' Lygdus screamed from the floor. 'See this,
domina
!
Domina
!'

But Livia slept on as they led Nero away. Claudius pushed me aside, disturbed and confused by the turn the day had taken. Ever more bewildered, I stumbled back to the sleeping Livia. She was murmuring with a tone that almost seemed smug.

'Iphicles,' she whispered from her slumber. 'Iphicles . . .'

Trembling, I leaned my ear to her lips. 'What is it,
domina
?'

'
The third is hooked by a harpy's look – the rarest of all birds
. . .'

I recoiled. The words seemed meaningless, yet they held an inestimable importance.

Livia opened her eyes to look at me. 'A harpy is what the Greeks call a fury, you know.' Then she closed them again, asleep once more.

Across the hall Claudius had eyes only for the beautiful child. At last I experienced the first moment of comprehension I had known for a long, long time.

Claudius was the third king.

Nilla threw the ugly thing hard across the room. 'I will not,' she said. 'It is disgusting.'

Expressionless, the aged maid of the Aemilii, once a devoted servant of the condemned Aemilia, retrieved the wooden Mutinus Tutunus phallus and placed it upright on the bed. 'All women of the Aemilii must give their virginity to the fertility deity,
domina
,' the maid said without apology. 'It is a tradition of many centuries.'

Nilla wouldn't let herself cry or glance at her silent, naked husband. 'I said it's disgusting,' she repeated. 'Take it out of my sight, and yourself with it.'

The maid shot a look to her serving companion and suddenly both women had Nilla by the arms. 'The
domina
must. My late mistress would have insisted on it. This is her house. This is her room.'

'Let go of me.' Nilla struggled against them. 'Let me go!'

The women dragged her to the side of the bed and pulled the undergarments from her.

'It ensures the birth of a boy child,
domina
. Your virginity is the treasure most cherished by the god, and he is generous with his rewards.'

The curved phallus was enormous, dull black and ugly. 'Don't make me do this,' Nilla screamed. 'Please!' The tip nudged against her unbroken cleft, seeking to enter her. 'Oh gods!' The tears sprang from her eyes. 'Oh gods!'

Ahenobarbus whipped the thing away just as the servants began to lower her. Shocked, the old maid turned on him. '
Domine
– you cannot interfere here!'

Wielding it like a spear, he thrust the thing in her face. The second maid shrieked. Ahenobarbus thrust again, forcing the phallus into the old woman's mouth. She choked and spluttered.

Nilla seized the advantage. 'Get out! Get out!' she screamed at the two women.

Disgorging the fertility tool, the old maid staggered to the door, her companion pulling her outside. Nilla kicked the doors shut behind them, her hand at her breast to steady her heart as she tried to find her breath. At last she turned to face her husband.

'Thank you,' she whispered to Ahenobarbus.

The tall mute said nothing, the light from the oil lamp making his strange, pale skin glow like marble. They stared at each other. The wedding ceremony had been the first time Nilla had been permitted to see him since the announcement of their betrothal. She knew nothing about him at all, except that her body was now legally his to employ as he would. This she could not fight as she had the foul phallus.

She waited for him to make any kind of move towards her but Ahenobarbus remained where he was, standing on the other side of the connubial room. Nilla moved quickly to the bed and slipped under the linen, pulling it under her chin and never taking her eyes from him. Still he didn't move, although he kept his eyes upon hers.

'Are you mute through choice, husband,' she whispered, 'or have you never spoken?'

Ahenobarbus said nothing.

'I think it must be that you have never talked,' she said, 'and have never been able to talk due to some affliction. No one would cease speaking of their own accord.'