But why would Caelius kill Maecenas? Was it the silver mine Lucullus mentioned, or some other dirty business? Why the mithraeum? Too many questions, and none of them came close to helping me forget what I kept seeing. I walked southeast in a hurry. The Iseum was near the big bridge across the river, where Bilicho had woken up to a headache.
She was a gentle goddess in an ungentle world. I’d seen one of the big processions in Rome, the priests with the shaved heads and the spotless white robes, the sistra, the buckets full of the sacred Nile water, the palms, the lanterns, the gold breast full of milk. Isis was a suffering goddess. She understood what pain was like, and knew all about death, and didn’t care for it much. She made Egypt the grain center of Rome, because her tears flooded the banks of the Nile every year. And she’d saved her husband, Osiris, and brought him back from the underworld. I guess she promised to do that for her followers, too. She was like Demeter at Eleusis, but not as exclusive. She helped those who needed help, so she helped everybody.
We wanted our gods to be kind-unless we wanted them to be cruel to someone else. We were Romans, after alclass="underline" god was always on our side. But Isis took in the lame, the blind, the sick and the dying. She offered them hope, if not healing. I liked her. And since I didn’t really believe in much-I’d seen too many gods toppled in my life-liking was as close to worshipping as I ever came. I paid my taxes, and made the public gestures. But I still felt more at home in a grove of trees than a stone temple.
In a few days I’d be in that suffocating dirt hole where Mithras would reveal himself. Another of the savior gods. Promising life after death was fashionable among deities. I didn’t mind going through the motions if it helped me solve this murder. These murders.
Stricta could hide in the Iseum. They’d give her sanctuary. Not even Caelius could walk into the temple and do what he pleased. Hell, not even Agricola would do that, at least without his guards. Those Egyptian priests were a burly bunch, and Caelius was a coward without his bully stick.
I made my legs walk faster. I didn’t want to think about Caelius. I liked problems I could solve. The law didn’t recognize Caelius as a murderer. I couldn’t help that. Couldn’t help Galla now. I could only chase shadows, hunt whispers, pump procurators for rumors, as impotent as the Emperor without his Empire. Goddamn it. Goddamn Caelius. Goddamn Maecenas. Goddamn me.
The temple loomed up in front, a modest affair. I was glad to see it. Concentrate. I swallowed, stopped breathing so hard, stopped shaking so much. Must be a festival today-I could hear women ululating from within, a kind of ecstatic but painful moan. A cloud of incense curled out into the brisk air, swelled and grew thin, then dispersed to the sky. I walked up the rough stone steps, pretending to admire the carving on the columns. The outer door was open, the middle door was shut. The members, the initiated ones, were behind the middle door, or maybe the door after that, in front of the holy of holies, chanting the pain of life.
The temple was more Roman than Egyptian, and the man in white who came to greet me looked like he was from Hispania, but he spoke Greek. I stood in a wide, hospitable chamber, rugs on the floor, a small niche with a marble statue of Isis wearing the moon’s crescent, a clean wooden roof above me, with two doors leading out, one directly in front, the middle door, and one to my right. It was probably like a labyrinth inside. You had to be initiated to know how to get in or get out.
Unlike Roman temples, it wasn’t all facing front, it wasn’t a big long room with steps and inner chambers and columns everywhere, and it didn’t have a gloriously large front altar. But it was still built east to west, and the columns it did have were Roman style, Roman marble, though the temple itself was painted brick and wood. A hybrid, like most things in Britannia.
The smoke was unfolding from a small altar in this room, a public one for non-initiates to leave offerings or pay their respects. The incense was high-quality frankincense.
I said in Greek: “Greetings, friend, and son of Isis. I come in peace.”
The bald man nodded, and raised an eyebrow. Most of his believers wouldn’t speak Greek. To maintain purity, he’d open with that language, and then quickly switch to Latin. But Stricta would speak Greek, and I was, too. His sunken eyes, fathomless, roamed my face. He was a big man for his height and well-muscled. He could’ve been an infantryman or a eunuch. I didn’t plan to ask him which.
“You wish to make an offering to the goddess?” he asked courteously.
I pulled out my pouch again, and took out my second-to-the-last denarius. “Alas, my troubles have overflowed this day like the waters of the Nile-I did not have time to purchase an offering, and hope that The Mother of Us All will be content with a base gift.”
The wails built into a crescendo, and the door on the right opened. A procession of women with cloaks covering their heads emerged from an inner room, now moaning softly. The one in front carried a small, crude wooden statue of Isis with cow’s horns suckling Horus. She opened the back door, and the others-about twenty in all-followed.
The priest interposed himself between me and the view, and deftly plucked the denarius from my palm. “Your gift is a generous one,” he said in an undertone. “The goddess shines love upon all of her children, but this day is her son’s birthday, and she looks with especial favor upon those who pay him tribute.”
Horus’ birthday. Stricta must have been planning her escape for sometime, since she had the drugs ready. Or maybe she was going to take them herself, and Caelius’ crime changed her mind. Horus’ birthday. That explained the moaning, at least.
I bowed my head, and took hold of the priest’s white sleeve. It wasn’t as immaculate as the one I saw in Rome, but neither was I.
“Childbirth is painful for women. Many die.”
He looked at me warily, and pried my fingers from his cuff. “Yes, but Isis will bring them eternal life.”
“The Goddess With Many Names will protect all who are in pain, I know. But there are some within who may need a doctor.”
This time he took hold of my wrist. His grip was not gentle. “Who are you? You speak Greek, but are not Greek and not of this temple.”
“I am a healer. The doctor whom even Isis may need.”
His grip tightened, and his breath felt hot on my face. “You answer questions with riddles. What do you want?”
I flung my arm suddenly, and took him off-guard. He reached inside his robe, and held something there, ready. I smiled.
“No, brother, you don’t understand. I am a friend. I am a iatros. My name is Arcturus. I have a message for one within, who today has given birth to both grief and freedom. When she is ready, when she is able, I need her help. She can save lives. She can punish the evil. Send word when she can talk.”
His eyes bored into mine, intense, emotionless. Not a flicker. But he dropped his hand back to his side, and opened his palm to look at the denarius. Then, without a word, and without a backward glance, he turned around and walked through the rear door, the hem of his white robe grey and dirty, dragging in the dust.
The third woman in the procession had been in a green cloak.
* * * * *
Keep busy. Keep walking. Stricta was safe, for now. Caelius would look for her himself-he wouldn’t want the involvement of a fugitivarius, even if he could find one, unemployed and waiting for him, in Londinium. The priests would give her sanctuary, hide her well. But she couldn’t stay there indefinitely. Another problem; maybe one I could solve.