“Then by his mercy and tolerance the Emperor is in fact inciting discord,” Artorius added. “If the people are never forced to assimilate, then how can they ever be Roman?”
“My thoughts exactly,” Pilate concurred as they approached a large, ornate pond, complete with a six-foot waterfall.
Artorius watched the fish swimming in circles at the base of the waterfall as Pilate continued.
“Gauls, Germans, Spaniards, Greeks, and even Egyptians all have become part of Roman society. They understand that being Roman is not a matter of race or ethnicity; it is about becoming a part of something greater than ourselves. Those bloody Jews don’t get it, and they never will.” He took a small stone and skipped it across the pond, scattering fish to emphasize his point.
“I swear they are all racists!” Pilate continued. “Rome conquered Judea, yet they dare to look down at us. Anyone not a Jew is scum of the earth to them. The only group of people I know of who are even more racist is the damn Senate here in Rome!”
“Of that there is no doubt,” Artorius agreed. “When Julius Caesar tried to give Gallic nobles membership into the Senate, it almost caused a riot. Hell, the Sacrovir Revolt was caused, in part, because of this!”
“If I am racist,” Pilate explained, “it has nothing to do with the color of a man’s skin or where he was born. To me, there are only two types of people; Romans and non-Romans. If a man is a Roman, I care not whether he is Italian, Greek, Syrian, or a black from Morocco. All citizens are Romans! Yet the Judeans don’t even view themselves as citizens of this great Empire.”
“Have you spoken to the Emperor about your concerns?” Artorius asked.
Pilate nodded and scowled.
“As a matter of fact, I have. Tiberius is rather funny when it comes to the Jews. He told me to use prudence when dealing with their sensibilities. This, coming from a man who ordered Germanicus to exterminate an entire race!”
Artorius winced at the last remark.
“Yes, I was there for that,” Artorius replied with a scowl of his own. The visions were still clear as the day they happened in his mind. He remembered wiping out entire villages and murdering all within, regardless of age or gender.
Pilate’s face suddenly brightened.
“You know, I just realized that this August will be ten years since Idistaviso!” The Tribune seemed happy to talk about anything other than the troublesome Jews he would soon have to try and govern over.
Artorius then recalled that his friend’s experience in Germania had been different than his. Pilate had commanded the Army of the Rhine’s artillery and had not taken part in the close quarters combat. There was no mistaking Pilate’s valor, though his perspective was understandably shielded, since most of his work had been done launching deadly projectiles at the enemy from the scorpion ballistae and onager catapults from several hundred meters away. He had never stabbed someone through the heart and watched them die with their eyes wide in terror; let alone a mother who only wished to protect her child or the child who was too young to understand why he had to die.
“I cannot believe I could have forgotten such an important anniversary!” Pilate said, rather elated.
Artorius knew that Idistaviso was indeed an important victory for Rome, as it culminated the end of the wars against the traitor Arminius and the Germanic alliance. The mass murder of the innocents at Angrivari was little more than a punitive action after the war had been won.
“And oddly enough, both sides claimed victory,” Artorius conjectured. “The Germans had Teutoburger Wald seven years before, and we had Idistaviso. I’ve sometimes wondered which one history will remember.”
“Since we write the history books, I would think Idistaviso,” Pilate scoffed. “The loss of three legions in Teutoburger Wald was indeed tragic, but you cannot tell me we didn’t avenge them.”
“There’s no doubt about that,” Artorius conceded as he threw a rock into the pond before both men continued on. “Still, we have yet to re-cross the Rhine and take back the lands that were lost. We paid back in blood the loss of Roman life, yet the lands east of the Rhine still belong to the barbarians. I wonder if history will forgive that.”
It would be time soon, time to leave the infernal city forever. For all the Senate and people knew, the Emperor was simply going on an extended holiday. Even Tiberius wondered if he was, in fact, leaving Rome forever, but then he steeled himself to his task. Even Livia did not know when he was leaving. Instead, the Empress dowager would wake in the morning to find her son gone and she practically alone in the imperial palace.
The traffic was busy during the night, as was usual. Since Roman law prohibited anything other than pedestrians to move throughout the city during the daytime, any form of wheeled transport had to move during the hours of darkness. This made Rome a city that never truly slept, and also made any real form of secrecy for the Emperor impossible. A cohort of the Praetorian Guard had cleared the streets leading to the harbor at Ostia. Such a large presence of the Emperor’s personal bodyguard made his movements known. Another entire cohort acted as his escort, and they would accompany him to Capri. Sejanus sat across from him in a large, covered litter carried by a dozen slaves.
“Don’t you even want to look upon the city one last time?” the Prefect asked as they rode in silence down the Appian Way. Soon they would reach the crossroads that would lead them to the port city just outside Rome.
“Why bother?” the Emperor replied with a scowl. “I know it’s still there, even though I wish it would just vanish into oblivion some days. To tell the truth, Sejanus, I don’t know why the gods mock me and let me linger on so long. I swear they despise me!”
“The gods preserve you because there is no one else able to rule the world,” Sejanus replied smoothly. “Were something to happen to you, the Empire would fall into chaos.”
“Then the gods did a poor job of planning for the future,” Tiberius retorted. “They should never have taken my son from me! I confess that I have cared about very little since Drusus died. I persevere out of a sense of duty alone.”
Sejanus stayed quiet as the Emperor went on about his late son. Though both had done their best to serve Tiberius, the Praetorian Prefect and Drusus Julius Caesar had been hateful enemies. On more than one occasion the Imperial Prince had physically accosted him. Sejanus reluctantly admitted to himself that he had possibly overplayed his hand when he had asked Tiberius for the hand of Livilla, Drusus’ widow, in marriage. Tiberius never even suspected that Sejanus and Livilla had been lovers for some time. Still, in what was one of the only instances where he went against his Praetorian Prefect, the Emperor had denied Sejanus’ request, stating that to ask such a thing so soon after Livilla was made a widow was in very poor taste.
Sejanus had quickly apologized for overstepping his bounds and had never broached the subject again, much to Livilla’s chagrin. Tiberius was hardly a young man anymore; in fact, he had been fifty-five when he became Caesar twelve years before. How much longer could he possibly linger? But then, the Emperor was in annoyingly good health, no doubt kept robust by his years in the legions during the reign of Augustus. The Prefect then sighed as Tiberius went on about his son, who he had practically ignored when he was alive.