29
‘What I don’t understand,’ Brinno whispered, ‘is why they didn’t just kill him? In my country, if a man rises up against his king his head ends up on a spike and that’s it.’
‘This isn’t the same,’ Castus told him. ‘Maximian was an emperor. One of the supreme emperors. Constantine couldn’t just execute him, could he? It would look bad.’
‘Don’t see why not…’ Brinno muttered to himself, unconvinced.
Castus too had very mixed feelings. Even after all the treachery, all the killing, even after his own life had been in peril, he could not fully condemn Maximian for what he had done. Still less could he hate the man. For most of his military life Castus had saluted the former emperor’s image, given sacrifice for his welfare, sworn oaths of loyalty to his name. Along with his old colleague Diocletian, Maximian was like a god on earth. Even now, when he was just a beaten old man shambling along like a prisoner in the emperor’s retinue, he possessed the last gleam of that undying glory.
It was near midnight, and the two Protectores were standing together at the balustrade of a balcony that circled the small enclosed garden of the old residency on the riverbank in Arelate. Behind them was the door to the emperor’s apartments. The night was cold and clear, with an edge of the approaching winter in the air, and the garden below them a maze of grey and black under the moon.
Constantine had moved his court to Arelate only days after the end of the siege. He had left Massilia in a blaze of victorious glory, the citizens lining the streets from the agora to the Rome Gate and spreading flower blossoms before the emperor’s carriage. Riding with the imperial retinue, Castus had noticed the Christian bishop, Oresius, raising his hands to the emperor in some sort of salute or benediction. Beside him, sombre as always, stood the deacon Nazarius, and almost hidden between them was Luciana. Gazing down from horseback, Castus had saluted the girl as he rode by; for a moment he saw her waving back at him, then the crowd shifted and she was lost from view once more.
Nearly a month had passed since then. Everything had returned to peace, officially at least. But much remained uncertain, much unspoken.
‘They didn’t even reward us for what we did,’ Brinno said, breathing the words. ‘I mean to say! We captured the city, didn’t we? They should have given us a purse of coins, or another golden torque each… Or at least made us into tribunes!’
‘You know the story,’ Castus said, frowning, barely moving his lips. ‘It was the loyal citizens of Massilia who opened the gates, out of love for their true emperor.’
But so much else about Maximian’s uprising had been officially forgotten now. It had been a brief moment of madness, soon suppressed. One of the Spanish legions, VI Hispana Maximiana, had been disbanded and the men absorbed by VII Gemina, the sister unit. Maximian’s Praetorian Cohort had been similarly broken up. Aside from that, and a brief spate of private executions, the whole matter had been consigned to the past. Needless to say, Castus had heard nothing of Fausta’s offer of marriage to Sabina.
Fausta had been keeping herself and her household secluded. She was not entirely in disgrace, but neither was she wholly trusted at court. Before she was even reunited with her husband, she had learned of the recent sickness of Constantine’s lover Minervina. A mysterious fever had taken her, and for days she had been close to death. Only the fervent and ceaseless prayers of a group of Christian priests had preserved her life. When Castus had last seen Fausta, her face had been shadowed by guilt.
Castus wondered if he would get a chance to speak with Sabina again. Perhaps she would avoid him, now that the danger had passed and she no longer needed his help. Perhaps, he thought, that was the best thing.
Brinno nudged his arm, breaking the thread of his thoughts. A figure was approaching along the darkened balcony, a man dressed in a white sleeping-tunic with a cloth girdle. Castus straightened, gripping the hilt of his sword. He opened his mouth to call the challenge, but his words died.
‘Fellow soldiers,’ Maximian said. He was barefoot, his hair and beard wild and grey in the moonlight. His slow dragging pace gave him the appearance of a sleepwalker, and his voice was slurred. ‘Fellow soldiers, you must let me pass. I must speak to the emperor, my son-in-law. I have had a dream, a very important dream, and I must tell him about it…’
Castus stepped quickly to one side, blocking the door to Constantine’s apartments. Brinno stood solidly at his shoulder. ‘We’re sorry, dominus,’ he said.
‘Let him pass.’ The voice carried along the balcony, and both Protectores turned to see Hierocles, their primicerius, pacing quickly up behind them.
‘Dominus,’ Hierocles said to the old man, bowing his head briefly. ‘Forgive these soldiers. You may go where you please.’
Castus looked at Brinno, who shrugged.
Hierocles stepped between them. ‘Move aside for the former Augustus,’ he said. ‘That’s a order.’
Squaring his shoulders, Castus took two steps to his right. Brinno moved aside likewise, and Maximian, ghostly in his long white tunic, passed between them and into the imperial apartments.
‘Dominus,’ Castus said between his teeth. ‘What’s going on?’
‘We should at least have searched him!’ Brinno hissed.
‘Quiet,’ the primicerius said curtly. ‘Be quiet and wait.’
For a long while they heard nothing. Hierocles cleared his throat with a wet cough.
Then, from deeper inside the building, a single cry.
‘Follow me,’ Hierocles ordered, striding through the door. ‘Draw your swords!’
They marched along the dark corridor and across the mosaic floor of an antechamber. The slaves and eunuchs who usually waited there, attending the emperor, were gone. Then Hierocles swept aside a curtain covering the far doorway and they were stepping into Constantine’s own bedchamber. A lamp burning on the side table lit the scene: the body huddled on the sleeping couch between the parted purple drapes; the damask sheet punctured in several places, blood spreading across the fabric. Beside the bed, Maximian stood with a knife in his hand, his head thrown back.
‘I’ve killed him,’ the old man said, and turned to the men in the doorway. ‘I’ve killed him!’ he shouted, his eyes gaining focus in the wavering lamplight. ‘I’ve killed Constantine! I am the only emperor now. Kneel before me.’
Castus stared at the bloody corpse on the bed. His throat was locked, his neck muscles stiffening, and the badly healed wound in his side flared with pain. He tightened his grip on his sword, fearing it would fall from his hand. He heard Hierocles exhale slowly. Then a door opened at the far side of the chamber.
First Probinus, the Praetorian Prefect, stepped into the room. After him came two more Protectores, also armed. Then came Constantine, hard-faced and staring, wrapped in a dark robe.
It was Brinno who stepped forward. He grasped the end of the bedsheet and dragged it back. The corpse lay on its side, naked and bleeding from several wounds. Reaching out with a grimace, Brinno shoved the body, rolling it onto its back. Castus knew the features at once. It was the eunuch, Serapion.
‘You are all witnesses!’ Probinus cried, raising his hand to point at Maximian. ‘This man has attempted to murder the emperor!’
The knife fell from Maximian’s hand. He staggered back, slumping against the wall, and let himself slide slowly down onto his haunches. His head dropped forward into his cupped palms.
‘The emperor’s wife warned us of her father’s insanity,’ Hierocles told Castus quietly. ‘But, of course, we could do nothing until he acted. Her eunuch volunteered to take the emperor’s place. A good death, for one of his kind.’
Castus found he could still not speak. He felt rooted, the strength drained from his limbs. Serapion had surely not volunteered to die. Had he been told that Maximian would be apprehended before he struck the killing blow? Had Fausta herself known? Castus had never trusted the eunuch, or liked him, but as he stared at the corpse on the bed he felt a strange sympathy for him. I am just as human as you, Serapion had told him once. We are both slaves…