Empire - Saylor Steven (книги без сокращений TXT) 📗

Titus trembled so violently that he thought he might fly to pieces. He wept uncontrollably. He had no choice but to remain on his knees. He could not stand.

Nero shook his head and clucked his tongue. “Poor Pinarius! Did you not realize your predicament was all a practical joke?”

Titus stared up at him, baffled.

“A practical joke, Pinarius! That ridiculous family heirloom you insist on wearing gave me the idea. Where is it, by the way? Don’t tell me you’ve lost it.”

Titus pointed mutely to Kaeso, trapped in the basket atop the nearby pole.

Nero nodded. “I see. You gave it to your twin. How appropriate! Petronius always said it was in very poor taste for you to wear something that looked like a crucifix, since everyone knows you have a Christian brother. How amusing, I thought, if Pinarius should find himself among the Christians.”

“You… you planned for this to happen?”

“Well, not all of it. I had no idea you’d run out to greet me like this. But how perfect! Truly, this is one of those rare, fortuitous moments that sometimes happen in the theatre, when everything comes together as if by magic.”

“But I could have been killed. I could have been burned alive!”

“Oh, no, you were never in danger. I instructed the guards to lay in wait and apprehend you outside the latrina – you had to go there sooner or later – but not to harm you. Well, no more than they had to, to convince you to go with them. You’ve had quite a scare, haven’t you? But inducing terror is one of the functions of the theatre; Aristotle himself says so. Terror, and pity – which you will feel soon enough. Was it not delicious, to feel the hot breath of Pluto on you, and then, when all hope was lost, to escape unscathed? I fear your arsonist brother shall have a different fate.”

Cupping Titus’s chin, Nero directed his gaze to Kaeso. With his other arm, Nero mimed the act of hurling a thunderbolt. The pole on which Kaeso was trapped burst into flames.

Titus was unable to look away. He watched – horrified, spellbound, stupefied.

Never before had he felt the presence of the gods as powerfully as he did in that moment. What he felt was beyond words, almost too intense to bear. This was the place, unlike any other, where the characters in a tragedy arrived; this was the moment of utmost revelation, so terrible that a mere mortal could barely endure it. What Titus felt was wonderful and horrible, bursting with meaning and yet utterly absurd. It was Nero who had brought him to this moment – Nero, who loomed above him, smiling, serene, godlike. To have devised this moment, Nero was without question the greatest of all the poets or playwrights who had ever lived among humankind. Titus felt again, now magnified beyond measure, the awe he had experienced when he heard Nero sing of burning Troy. Truly, Nero was divine. Who but a god could have brought Titus to this supreme moment?

Nero gazed down at him and nodded knowingly. “And when this is done, Pinarius – when the smoke clears and the embers die down – we shall retrieve that amulet of yours from your brother’s ashes, and you must wear it every day. Yes, every hour of every day, so that you may never forget this moment.”

AD 68

“You are a man now, my son. You are the heir of the Pinarii. Sometimes the passing of the fascinum has taken place at the death of its wearer, sometimes while the wearer is still alive. It is my decision to pass it to you now. From this moment, the fascinum of our ancestors belongs to you.”

Titus Pinarius was repeating a ceremony that had been enacted by countless generations of the Pinarii since a time before history. He lifted the necklace with the fascinum over his head and placed it around the neck of his son. Titus was fifty. Lucius was twenty-one.

But the mood in the household was not jubilant. Chrysanthe averted her eyes. Their three daughters wept. Hilarion lowered his face, and the other slaves followed his example. Even the wax masks of the ancestors, brought into the garden to witness the ceremony, seemed melancholy.

The garden itself was full of colour and fragrance, surrounding them with roses and flowering vines. Like every other part of their splendid new home on the Palatine, the garden was remarkably spacious and exquisitely maintained, a place of beauty and elegance, especially on a warm day in the month of Junius.

As one of the emperor’s most loyal subjects, always ready to take the auspices, to give him trusted advice, and to encourage his endeavours, Titus had prospered greatly in the last few years. Thanks to Nero’s generosity, he had acquired a considerable fortune and owned properties all over Italy. The old house on the Aventine had begun to seem cramped and antiquated. It was a proud day when the Pinarii moved into a newly built mansion only a few steps away from the Palatine wing of Nero’s Golden House.

Titus made ready to leave the house. He wore his trabea – the same one he had worn long ago when he first joined the college at the invitation of his cousin Claudius – but the lituus he selected was his second-best. The ancient ivory lituus he had inherited from his father he decided to leave behind.

“Are you sure I can’t come with you, father?” said Lucius. There were tears in his eyes.

“No, son. I want you to stay here. Your mother and sisters will need you.”

Lucius nodded. “I understand. Goodbye, father.”

“Goodbye, son.” They embraced, then Titus embraced and said farewell to each of his three daughters. The youngest was ten, the eldest sixteen. How like their mother they all looked!

Chrysanthe and Hilarion followed him to the vestibule. Hilarion opened the door for him. Chrysanthe took his hand.

Her voice was choked with emotion. “Is there no chance-?”

Titus shook his head. “Who can say? Who knows where the gods will lead me this day?”

He kissed her, then drew back and took a deep breath. Quickly, not daring to hesitate, he strode out of the house and into the street.

The last member of his household he saw was Hilarion, who looked after him from the doorway. Titus paused and turned back.

“You’ve served me well, Hilarion.”

“Thank you, Master.”

“How old are you, Hilarion?”

“I’ve never been entirely certain, Master.”

Titus shook his head and smiled. “However old you are, you still look like a boy to me. Still, I suppose, if you were a freedman, this would be the time for you to think of starting your own family. You know that I’ve left instructions to Lucius that you should be manumitted, in the event…”

Hilarion nodded. “Yes, Master, I know. Thank you, Master.”

“Of course, I would expect you to continue to serve Lucius. He’ll need a slave – a freedman – he can trust. Someone loyal, like you, with intelligence and good judgement.”

“I’ll always be loyal to the Pinarii, Master.”

“Good.” Titus cleared his throat. “Well, then…”

“Shall I close the door now, Master?”

“Yes, Hilarion. Close the door and bar it.”

The door closed. Titus heard the heavy bar drop into place. He turned and walked quickly up the street.

He passed no one. The street was deserted. Perhaps that was a good sign.

He reached the nearest entrance to the Golden House, the one he was accustomed to using almost every day, but found it blocked by a massive bronze door. Titus had never seen the door closed before; invariably, at any hour, he had found the entrance open and guarded by Praetorians. Today there were no guards in sight.

He raised the heavy bronze knocker on the door and let it drop. The sound reverberated up and down the street. There was no response.

He used the knocker several times, self-conscious about the noise he was making. No one answered.

He would have to try another entrance. Probably the closest was the original entrance to the old imperial house, the one built by Augustus, which was now essentially the back entrance, the farthest from the grand vestibule of the Golden House at the south end of the Forum. Titus had not used that entrance in a long time.