In the centre of the room were three couches set round a low rectangular table piled high with elaborate dishes of the rarest fish and meat, fine wines and exotic eastern fruits. They were privileged indeed, the two Vandal princes. Such exquisite dishes must have come from the imperial kitchens themselves.
There was no sign of Genseric, but Beric sat, or rather sprawled, on one of the couches, a sozzled-looking blonde with high-piled hair leaning against him. The Vandal prince wore a white silk robe belted with a golden sash, his eyes were rimmed with kohl that had begun to blur and run, and he had gold bangles on both wrists. He rolled over on the couch and smiled blearily up at the boy, raising his goblet and burping softly at him.
‘Comrade,’ he said, ‘drinking partner, wenching fellow, I salute you.’
Through the darkened door of the further chamber came more squeals and giggles. Beric turned in the direction of the noise. Then he turned back again and beamed at the boy. He patted the couch next to him. ‘Come along, then. Tonight is your special night.’
Attila went and sat down. His throat felt parched and dry but he wanted to drink nothing. He imagined cool mountain streams that caught the sunlight in droplets as they fell. And the slow-moving rivers of the steppes, the herons in the reeds, waiting with their endless ancestral patience for their prey…
A plump slave-girl appeared with downcast eyes, carrying a big jug of wine. Beric held his goblet out towards her. She stopped and poured the wine, but her hand was shaking so much that she spilt a little over his hand.
Beric stared up at her. ‘You stupid fucking bitch,’ he slurred very softly.
The blonde beside him giggled at this witticism.
Beric continued, ‘And so ugly too. Christ, you’re never going to get so much as a poke with a face like that, let alone a husband.’
The blonde positively squawked with laughter.
Beric turned and added, to Attila, ‘Even with my standards lowered by wine as they are, there’s no way I could give her one, could you?’ He looked back at the trembling slave-girl, as if in wonder. ‘Not for all the wheat in Africa.’
The girl kept her face lowered. She didn’t look ugly to Attila. She had a round, gentle face and scared eyes.
‘Why are you still standing there?’ said Beric, suddenly raising his voice. ‘ Go away! ’
She started with fear, but Attila interrupted and said, ‘I… Could I have a bit of wine, too?’ He reached out and took a goblet from the table and held it out towards her. She came over to him, her hands shaking badly, and poured the wine as carefully as she could. She had poured only a little when Attila nodded and said, ‘That’s enough. Thank you.’
He looked up to smile at her but she was already scuttling away like a frightened animal.
‘You don’t say thank you to slaves, you twat,’ said Beric. ‘Sound like a peasant. Christ.’ He gave another tremendous belch. ‘Been drinking since noon.’ His mouth turned sourly down. ‘Think I’m gonna puke.’ He hawked, leant forward and spat on the floor in front of him, then settled back and grimaced. ‘Ugh,’ he said. ‘I need a bath.’
‘Have a bath with me, baby,’ said the blonde girl beside him.
Beric grinned at her and, slipping one hand inside her tunic, began to gently palpate her breast. She crooned at him.
Attila looked down in shame.
Beric held his bulbous goblet aloft, and cried, ‘ Usque ad mortem bibendum! Let us drink until death!’ looking very pleased with himself that he knew this Latin tag. Then he took a huge mouthful of red wine. Still holding it in his mouth, he lowered his lips to the girl’s now exposed breast, and dribbled it over her smooth white flesh. The blonde gasped as if in ecstasy.
Attila kept his eyes on the floor and took a sip of wine. He had never liked the taste and he didn’t like it any more now. The food did nothing for him, either, hungry though he was. In the centre of the table was a roast swan, stuffed with a roast peacock, stuffed with a roast pheasant, stuffed with a roast partridge, stuffed with three or four tiny roast larks, laid out in the very heart of the dish as if they were in a little nest. The whole elaborate creation appeared to have been hacked into pieces with knives by the brothers, and then left uneaten.
Why had he been commanded to dine here? He didn’t understand. Was he supposed to be seduced or something? He glanced over the big silver knives that still lay in the remains of the dish of roast swan, considering. Then he looked away.
‘You should eat something as well,’ said Beric. ‘You won’t get pissed so quickly then. And you’ve got something to throw up, too, if you need to – which you will soon enough, the way this party’s going to go. The two buggering Burgundian brothers are supposed to be joining us soon, and you know how they knock it back. Nothing worse than retching up a bellyful of nothing but wine. Christ.’ He ran his hand across his heavily sweating forehead. ‘I feel unusual,’ he said.
‘Well, hello, dear boy,’ drawled another voice from across the room. It was the older brother, Genseric.
He was wearing a dark red robe elaborately embroidered with hunting scenes in finest gold thread, and belted so that it hung far too high on his thighs. He wore a big silver cross on a chain around his neck – the Vandals were very proud of the fact that they were Christians, regarding the religion as a badge of true civilisation and Romanitas. Genseric also had some kind of pearls or even a pearl necklace draped round his head, and he had his slim, languid arm round a girl who was giggling and looking across at Attila from under lowered eyelashes.
‘My,’ she said softly, ‘look at your scars. How barbaric!’ She spoke as if scars excited her.
She was perhaps eighteen or nineteen, with wide blue eyes and very long, straight black hair. She wore bright red lipstick like a harlot on the street, and thick dark kohl round her eyes, and a white tunic which was slit right up the side of her thigh, and hung half off her shoulder, just revealing the roundness of her breasts.
Genseric let go of his girl and flopped onto the couch opposite. ‘God’s bollocks,’ he said. ‘I’m finished.’ He leant his head back and gazed at the ceiling, and sighed, and murmured under his breath a couplet from Martial.
‘“ Balnea, vina, Venus corrumpunt corpora nostra, Sed vitam faciunt, balnea, vina, Venus.”
Which is to say,
“Venus and baths and wine, they say, corrupt us, but they make life taste so sweet – wine, baths, and Venus.”’
Then he raised his head and grinned across at Attila. ‘This is Lollia,’ he said. ‘Lollia – Attila. May the evening see you better acquainted.’ And he winked over Attila’s shoulder.
Beric laughed and burped.
Lollia went over to the blonde girl and started to kiss her on the lips. The girl responded drunkenly, and their lips and tongues intertwined. They ran their fingers through each other’s wigs and emitted theatrical little moans. The two Vandals looked on and grinned.
Attila eyed the knives.
Then Lollia detached herself, and he felt her walk round behind him. She stopped, laughing silently, perhaps. Her hands closed round his face and covered his eyes from behind. They were damp with perspiration, but he could smell her perfume, too. He felt her hair on his cheek, tickling him softly, and her lips nibbling his ear, the tip of her tongue flicking back and forth, and he pulled away and looked down, his cheeks burning with shame.
‘Aw, the lickle boy’s shy!’ shouted Genseric.
‘Don’t tell me you’ve never…?’ said Beric.
He longed to get up and go. He longed to run. But something held him back.
Lollia was flopping down on the couch beside him, and resting her head on his shoulder. She sighed and stretched out, and her slit skirt left her legs bare up to the tops of her thighs. So bare and brown. Her toenails were painted the same colour as her lips, and her sandals were no more than delicate strips of soft leather, studded with silver, and laced almost up to her knees – which made her legs appear more naked than ever. The boy tried to look away but he couldn’t.