Thomas Greanias
Wrath of Rome
Soli Deo gloria
I
Deep inside the cave a young woman cried out to him, “This way, Athanasius! Hurry!”
He tried to find her but stumbled in the darkness. The further he followed her down the endless tunnel, the further out of reach she seemed. I have to save her! At last he caught up to her in a dim shaft of light, grasping for her long, black hair. When she turned to look at him with her dark and haunting eyes, tears of blood trickled down her tragic face.
He stared back at her, suddenly aware they were not alone in the vast subterranean cavern. All around him were thousands of others like the young woman with bleeding eyes, their hands reaching out to him for help. He opened his mouth to scream, but the mountain above began to quake and the rock ceiling crashed down upon him.
Athanasius of Athens awoke from his nightmare, gasping for breath, aware of the smell of the salty sea and sound of scrolls shuffling. He blinked into the bright daylight inside his cabin aboard the Pegasus. He was lying on a cot, dressed in the uniform of a Roman tribune. Like a heavy stone fell the realization that the events of last night in the city of Rome were no nightmare and that his life as he knew it was over.
He looked over to see the back of the steward, Galen, hunched over the open Chiron box, going through its contents while he nibbled on fish and bread.
Athanasius quietly swallowed, careful not to make a sound, waiting for the proper moment to stir to life and kill the swine.
Was it only yesterday I woke up in my comfortable bed inside my comfortable villa in Rome as Athanasius of Athens, celebrated playwright and hedonist? Was it only yesterday I woke up to the woman of every Roman’s dream, Helena, and the premiere of my greatest production yet, Opus Gloria?
It was, he realized grimly. But then he had been arrested and sent to certain death in the arena. The absurd charge? That he was Chiron, the mastermind behind Dominium Dei, the mysterious and militant Christian conspiracy that had been blamed for the assassination of Emperor Domitian’s chief astrologer and other Roman officials. Now Caesar, Rome’s self-proclaimed Lord and God, had initiated a Reign of Terror, slaying any and all suspected enemies.
And by some cruel twist of fate, Athanasius had become one of them.
It was only by some miracle in the person of a Roman tribune and Christian named Marcus that Athanasius had escaped, alone with the secret that Dominium Dei was in fact an imperial organization created to infiltrate and destroy the fledgling underground Church.
The last thing he remembered was making it to the Pegasus before it set sail in the middle of the night from the port of Ostia. I was poisoned, he recalled. Galen the steward poisoned me. How did I survive? Then he remembered the elixir that Marcus had given him in the prison back in Rome. It must have been an antidote of some sort, something to coat his stomach in anticipation of exactly this kind of betrayal.
Galen sat up suddenly and glanced over his shoulder, sensing something. Athanasius froze, afraid he had made some movement that drew the Dei man’s attention. Through the slit of his eyelid, however, he saw that Galen was looking at the cabin door.
“Tribune?” asked a voice outside. It was the captain. He then seemed to address somebody else. “Isn’t this unusual?”
“No,” said a voice that Athanasius recognized as that of the centurion in charge of transporting the 80 troops on board to Ephesus. “I’ve found that imperial interrogators like to keep to themselves, have food brought in. Don’t like to mingle with the rank-and-file, even the officers like me. They are political officers more than military, and as likely to interrogate us as the enemy. They don’t want to make friends. I get nervous when they do want to join us in the galley. It usually means one of my men is under suspicion.”
“Well, Galen says he is taking his food. I’ll have him inform the tribune that we’ll enter the Gulf of Corinth by nightfall and make our way through the canal in the morning.”
The voices faded with footsteps, and then Athanasius heard the planks creak as Galen approached and stood over him. Athanasius could smell the wine on his breath. The man had poisoned him and was now eating his food, going through his papers.
Enough.
Galen said, “So you wouldn’t eat your fish with the rest of us, would you, dear, departed general of the Dei. Now you are food for fish when I chop you up with your own knife, stick you in your box and dump you overboard. If only I had kept you alive long enough to tell me the key to the coded texts. Now they remain a mystery, and all I have is your gold.”
Athanasius opened his eyes, shot up his hand and grabbed Galen by the throat. “Your prayer is answered, swine.”
Galen’s wide eyes seemed to pop out of his terrified face as he choked in Athanasius’s vise-like grip. Athanasius stood up and quietly pushed Galen against the wall, pinning him at the neck.
“Who are you people?” Athanasius demanded.
Galen struggled, gasping for breath, saying nothing.
Athanasius said, “Who do you take orders from?”
“You,” Galen said.
“Then why did you try to kill me?”
“That’s how we advance.”
“That doesn’t sound very Roman to me.”
“We are not Roman.”
Not Roman? Athanasius thought. The Dei was imperial. That was the big secret. “If you are not of Rome, and not of the Church, then of what?”
“Ourselves.”
“For what purpose?”
“Our own.”
Athanasius looked into the weasel’s eyes, saw the fear and felt he was telling the truth. “Why me?”
“I don’t know.”
“My family in Greece.”
“They will be slaughtered, if not already. As will you!”
Athanasius felt a prick at his shoulder and saw a thin stick in Galen’s hand. It had hit his leather strap and not his skin. Athanasius grabbed it with his free hand and waved it in front of Galen’s face.
“That’s twice you’ve missed, Galen,” he said and stuck it into Galen’s neck.
“No!” Galen moaned before blood began to trickle out of his nose and the corners of his mouth. His eyes rolled back, and Athanasius let go. The body crumpled to the floor with a thud.
Athanasius looked at Galen’s twisted face, worried that the crew on the deck below heard the fall. He knelt over the body of the dead steward. With his right hand, he ripped the tunic away, exposing white skin and a twisted cross of black. The mark of Rome’s mystical legion.
Dominium Dei.
Almost immediately there was a knock at the door, followed by a voice. “Tribune, are you alright?”
It was the centurion who had been with the captain.
Athanasius dragged Galen under his hammock. He looked in the brass mirror and ran his fingers through his unruly black hair. His face was pale, the blood drained, his eyes hollow and haunted. He was a mess.
He opened the door a crack to afford the centurion a peek at his desk but nothing more.
“Tribune, are you alright?”
“Never better, centurion. I just rolled out of the wrong side of the bed today. You know how it is.”
“Yes, Tribune.”
“But I’m still hungry. See if you can find my steward Galen for me. Oh, and tell the captain I’ll be joining you and the officers for dinner tonight in the officer’s galley.”
The centurion gulped and nodded. “Yes, Tribune.”
Athanasius removed the key ring from Galen’s stiff finger and slipped it on. It looked different than before. Now that its key had broken off, what remained was a form of the Chiron insignia—the Chi-Ro symbol. Only it was flanked by the Greek letters Alpha on the left and Omega on the right. It also had a tiny jewel inside the loop of the Ro. Possibly an amethyst, he thought, taking a closer look. He couldn’t be sure, and right now it didn’t matter.