Titus Statilius Taurus, aged twenty-seven, was the least man among them, and therefore knew the least about Octavian’s ideas and plans. Another military man, he looked what he was, being tall, solidly built, and rather beaten around the face—a swollen left ear, scarred left brow and cheek, broken nose. Yet he was, withal, a handsome man with wheat-colored hair, grey eyes, and an easy smile that belied his reputation as a martinet when he commanded legions. He had a horror of homosexuality and would not have anyone so inclined under his authority, no matter how well born. As a soldier he was inferior to Agrippa and Salvidienus, but not by much; what he lacked was their genius for improvisation. Of his loyalty there was no doubt, chiefly because Octavian dazzled him; the undeniable talents and brilliance of Agrippa, Salvidienus, and Maecenas were as nothing compared to the extraordinary mind of Caesar’s heir.
“Greetings,” said Octavian, going to the vacant chair.
Agrippa smiled. “Where have you been? Making eyes at Lady Roma? Forum or Mons Aventinus?”
“Forum.” Octavian poured water and drank it thirstily, then sighed. “I was planning what to do when I have the money to set Lady Roma to rights.”
“Planning is all it can be,” said Maecenas wryly.
“True. Still, Gaius, nothing is wasted. What plans I make now don’t have to be made later. Have we heard what our consul Pollio is up to? Ventidius?”
“Skulking in eastern Italian Gaul,” Maecenas said. “Rumor has it that shortly they’ll be marching down the Adriatic coast to help Antonius land his legions, which are clustered around Apollonia. Between Pollio’s seven, Ventidius’s seven, and the ten Antonius has with him, we’re in for a terrible drubbing.”
“I will not go to war against Antonius!” Octavian cried.
“You won’t need to,” said Agrippa with a grin. “Their men won’t fight ours, on that I’d stake my life.”
“I agree,” said Salvidienus. “The men have had a gutful of wars they don’t understand. What’s the difference to them between Caesar’s nephew and Caesar’s cousin? Once they belonged to Caesar himself, that’s all they remember. Thanks to Caesar’s habit of shifting his soldiers around to plump out this legion or thin down that legion, they identify with Caesar, not a unit.”
“They mutinied,” Maecenas said, voice hard.
“Only the Ninth can be said to have mutinied directly against Caesar, thanks to a dozen corrupt centurions in the pay of Pompeius Magnus’s cronies. For the rest, blame Antonius. He put them up to it, no one else! He kept their centurions drunk and bought their spokesmen. He worked on them!” Agrippa said contemptuously. “Antonius is a mischief maker, not a political genius. He lacks any subtlety. Why else is he even thinking of landing his men in Italia? It makes no sense! Have you declared war on him? Has Lepidus? He’s doing it because he’s afraid of you.”
“Antonius is no bigger a mischief maker than Sextus Pompeius Magnus Pius, to give him his full name,” said Maecenas, and laughed. “I hear that Sextus sent tata-in-law Libo to Athens to ask Antonius to join him in crushing you.”
“How do you know that?” Octavian demanded, sitting upright.
“Like Ulysses, I have spies everywhere.”
“So do I, but it’s news to me. What did Antonius answer?”
“A sort of a no. No official alliance, but he won’t impede Sextus’s activities provided they’re directed at you.”
“How considerate of him.” The extraordinarily beautiful face puckered, the eyes looked strained. “As well, then, that I took it upon myself to give Lepidus six legions and send him off to govern Africa. Has Antonius heard of that yet? My agents say no.”
“So do mine,” Maecenas said. “Antonius won’t be pleased, Caesar, so much is sure. Once Fango was killed, Antonius thought he had Africa in the sinus of his toga. I mean, who counts Lepidus? But now that the new governor is dead too, Lepidus will walk in. With Africa’s four legions and the six he took there with him, Lepidus has become a strong player in the game.”
“I am aware of that!” Octavian snapped, nettled. “However, Lepidus loathes Antonius far more than he loathes me. He’ll send Italia grain this autumn.”
“With Sardinia gone, we’re going to need it,” said Taurus.
Octavian looked at Agrippa. “Since we have no ships, we have to start building some. Agrippa, I want you to doff your insignia of office and go on a journey all the way around the peninsula from Tergeste to Liguria. You’ll be commissioninng good stout war galleys. To beat Sextus, we need fleets.”
“How do we pay for them, Caesar?” Agrippa asked.
“With the last of the planks.”
A cryptic reply that meant nothing to the other three, but was crystal clear to Agrippa, who nodded. “Planks” was the code word Octavian and Agrippa employed when they spoke of Caesar’s war chest.
“Libo returned to Sextus empty-handed, and Sextus took—er—umbrage. Not sufficient umbrage to plague Antonius, but umbrage nonetheless,” Maecenas said. “Libo didn’t like Antonius any better in Athens than he had in other places, therefore Libo is now an enemy dropping poison about Antonius in Sextus’s ear.”
“What particularly piqued Libo?” Octavian asked curiously.
“With Fulvia gone, I think he had rather hoped to secure a third husband for his sister. What cleverer way to cement an alliance than a marriage? Poor Libo! My spies say he baited his hook with great variety. But the subject never came up, and Libo sailed back to Agrigentum a disappointed man.”
“Hmmm.” The golden brows knotted, the thick fair lashes came down over Octavian’s remarkable eyes. Suddenly he slapped both hands upon his knees and looked determined. “Maecenas, pack your things! You’re off to Agrigentum to see Sextus and Libo.”
“With what purpose?” Maecenas asked, misliking the mission.
“Your purpose is to make a truce with Sextus that enables Italia to have grain this autumn, and for a reasonable price. You will do whatever is necessary to achieve that end, is that understood?”
“Even if there’s a marriage involved?”
“Even if.”
“She’s in her thirties, Caesar. There’s a daughter, Cornelia, almost old enough for marriage.”
“I don’t care how old Libo’s sister is! All women are constructed the same, so what does age matter? At least she won’t have the taint of a strumpet like Fulvia on her.”
No one commented upon the fact that, after two years, Fulvia’s daughter had been sent back to her virgo intacta. Octavian had married the girl to appease Antony, but had never slept with her. However, that couldn’t happen with Libo’s sister. Octavian would have to sleep with her, preferably fruitfully. In all things of the flesh he was as big a prude as Cato the Censor, so pray that Scribonia was neither ugly nor licentious. Everyone looked at the floor of tesselated tiles and pretended to be deaf, dumb, blind.
“What if Antonius attempts to land in Brundisium?” Salvidienus asked, to change the subject a little.
“Brundisium is fortified within an inch of its life, he won’t get a single troop transport past the harbor chain,” Agrippa said. “I supervised the fortification of Brundisium myself, you know that, Salvidienus.”
“There are other places he can land.”
“And undoubtedly will, but with all those troops?” Octavian looked tranquil. “However, Maecenas, I want you back from Agrigentum in a tearing hurry.”
“The winds are against,” Maecenas said, sounding desolate. Who needed to spend any part of summer in a cesspit like Sextus Pompey’s Sicilian township of Agrigentum?
“All the better to bring you home quickly. As for getting there—row! Take a gig to Puteoli and hire the fastest ship and the best oarsmen you can find. Pay them double their going rate. Now, Maecenas, now!”
And so the group broke up; only Agrippa stayed.
“What’s your latest count on the number of legions we have to oppose Antonius?”
“Ten, Caesar. Though it wouldn’t matter if all we had wer
e three or four. Neither side will fight. I keep saying it, but every ear is deaf except yours and Salvidienus’s.”
“I heard you because in that fact lies our salvation. I refuse to believe I’m beaten,” Octavian said. He sighed, smiled ruefully. “Oh, Agrippa, I hope this woman of Libo’s is bearable! I haven’t had much luck with wives.”
“They’ve been someone else’s choice, no more than political expedients. One day, Caesar, you’ll choose a woman for yourself, and she won’t be a Servilia Vatia or a Clodia. Or, I suspect, a Scribonia Libone, if the deal with Sextus comes off.” Agrippa cleared his throat, looked uneasy. “Maecenas knew, but has left me to tell you the news from Athens.”
“News? What news?”
“Fulvia opened her veins.”
For a long moment Octavian said nothing, just stared at the Circus Maximus so fixedly that Agrippa fancied he had gone away to some place beyond this world. A mass of contradictions, was Caesar. Even in his mind Agrippa never thought of him as Octavianus; he had been the first person to call Octavian by his adopted name, though now all his adherents did. No one could be colder, or harder, or more ruthless; yet it was plain to see, looking at him now, that he was grieving for Fulvia, a woman he had loathed.
“She was a part of Rome’s history,” Octavian finally said, “and she deserved a better end. Have her ashes come home? Does she have a tomb?”
“To my knowledge, no on both counts.”
Octavian got up. “I shall speak to Atticus. Between us, we will give her a proper burial, as befits her station. Aren’t her children by Antonius quite young?”
“Antyllus is five, Iullus is two.”
“Then I’ll ask my sister to keep an eye on them. Three of her own aren’t enough for Octavia, she’s always got someone else’s children in her care.”
Including, thought Agrippa grimly, your half sister, Marcia. I will never forget that day on the heights of Petra when we were on our way to meet Brutus and Cassius—Caesar sitting with the tears streaming down his face, mourning the death of his mother. But she isn’t dead! She’s the wife of his stepbrother, Lucius Marcius Philippus. Another one of his contradictions, that he can grieve for Fulvia, while pretending that his mother doesn’t exist. Oh, I know why. She had only donned her widow’s weeds for a month when she began an affair with her stepson. That might have been hushed up, had she not become pregnant. He’d had a letter from his sister that day in Petra, begging him to understand their mother’s plight. But he wouldn’t. To him, Atia was a whore, an immoral woman not worthy to be the mother of a god’s son. So he forced Atia and Philippus to retire to Philippus’s villa at Misenum, and forbade them to enter Rome. An edict he has never lifted, though Atia is ill and her baby girl a permanent member of Octavia’s nursery. One day it will all come back to haunt him, though he cannot see that, any more than he has ever laid eyes on his half sister. A beautiful child, fair as any Julian, for all that her father is so dark.
Then came a letter from Further Gaul that put all thought of Antony or his dead wife out of Octavian’s mind, and postponed the date of a marriage Maecenas was busy arranging for him in Agrigentum.
“Esteemed Caesar,” it said, “I write to inform you that my beloved father, Quintus Fufius Calenus, has died in Narbo. He was fifty-nine years old, I know, but his health was good. Then he fell down dead. It was over in a moment. As his chief legate, I now have charge of the eleven legions stationed throughout Further Gaul: four in Agedincum, four in Narbo, and three in Glanum. At this time the Gauls are quiet, my father having put down a revolt among the Aquitani last year, but I quail to think what might yet happen if the Gauls get wind of my command and inexperience. I felt it right to inform you rather than Marcus Antonius, though the Gauls belong to him. He is so far away. Please send me a new governor, one with the necessary military skills to keep the peace here. Preferably quickly, as I would like to bring my father’s ashes back to Rome in person.”
Octavian read and reread the rather bald communication, his heart fluttering in his chest. For once, happy flutterings. At last a twist of fate that favored him! Who could ever have believed that Calenus would die?
He sent for Agrippa, busy winding up his tenure of the urban praetorship so that he could travel for long periods; the urban praetor could not be absent from Rome for more than ten days.
“Forget the odds and ends!” Octavian cried, handing him the letter. “Read this and rejoice!”
“Eleven veteran legions!” Agrippa breathed, understanding the import immediately. “You have to reach Narbo before Pollio and Ventidius beat you to it. They have fewer miles to cover, so pray the news doesn’t find them quickly. Young Calenus isn’t his father’s bootlace, if this is anything to go by.” Agrippa waved the sheet of paper. “Imagine it, Caesar! Further Gaul is about to drop into your lap without a pilum raised in anger.”
“We take Salvidienus with us,” Octavian said.
“Is that wise?”
The grey eyes looked startled. “What makes you question my wisdom in this?”
“Nothing I can put a finger on, except that governing Further Gaul is a great command. Salvidienus might let it go to his head. At least I presume that you mean to give him the command?”
“Would you rather have it? It’s yours if you want it.”
“No, Caesar, I don’t want it. Too far from Italia and you.” He sighed, shrugged in a defeated way. “I can’t think of anyone else. Taurus is too young, the rest you can’t trust to deal smartly with the Bellovaci or the Suebi.”
“Salvidienus will be fine,” Octavian said confidently, and patted his dearest friend on the arm. “We’ll start for Further Gaul at dawn tomorrow, and we’ll travel the way my father the god did—four-mule gigs at a gallop. That means the Via Aemilia and the Via Domitia. To make sure we have no trouble commandeering fresh mules often enough, we’ll take a squadron of German cavalry.”
“You ought to have a full-time bodyguard, Caesar.”
“Not now, I’m too busy. Besides, I don’t have the money.”
Agrippa gone, Octavian walked across the Palatine to the Clivus Victoriae and the domus of Gaius Claudius Marcellus Minor, who was his brother-in-law. An inadequate and indecisive consul in the year that Julius Caesar had crossed the Rubicon, Marcellus was the brother and first cousin of two men whose hatred of Caesar had been beyond reason. He had skulked in Italy while Caesar fought the war against Pompey the Great, and had been rewarded after Caesar won with the hand of Octavia. For Marcellus the union was a mixture of love and expedience; a marriage tie to Caesar’s family meant protection for himself and the massive Claudius Marcellus fortune, now all his. And he truly did love his bride, a priceless jewel. Octavia had borne him a girl, Marcella Major, a boy whom everyone called Marcellus, and a second girl, Marcella Minor, who was known as Cellina.
The house was preturnaturally quiet. Marcellus was very ill, ill enough that his ordinarily gentle wife had issued iron instructions about servant chatter and clatter.
“How is he?” Octavian asked his sister, kissing her cheek.
“It’s only a matter of days, the physicians say. The growth is extremely malignant, it’s eating up his insides voraciously.”
The large aquamarine eyes brimmed with tears that only fell to soak her pillow after she retired. She genuinely loved this man whom her stepfather had chosen for her with her brother’s full approval; the Claudii Marcelli were not patricians, but of very old and noble plebeian stock, which had made Marcellus Minor a suitable husband for a Julian woman. It had been Caesar who hadn’t liked him, Caesar who had disapproved of the match.
Her beauty grew ever greater, her brother thought, wishing he could share her sorrow. For though he had consented to the marriage, he had never really taken to the man who possessed his beloved Octavia. Besides, he had plans, and the death of Marcellus Minor was likely to further them. Octavia would get over her loss. Four years older than he, she had the Julian look: golden hair, eyes with blue in them, high chee
kbones, a lovely mouth, and an expression of radiant calmness that drew people to her. More important, she had a full measure of the famous gift meted out to most Julian women: she made her men happy.
Cellina was newborn and Octavia was nursing the babe herself, a joy she wouldn’t relinquish to a wet nurse. But it meant that she hardly ever went out, and often had to absent herself from the presence of visitors. Like her brother, Octavia was modest to the point of prudishness, would not bare her breast to give her child milk in front of any man except her husband. Yet one more reason why Octavian loved her. To him, she was Goddess Roma personified, and when he was undisputed master of Rome, he intended to erect statues of her in public places, an honor not accorded to women.
“May I see Marcellus?” Octavian asked.
“He says no visitors, even you.” Her face twisted. “It’s pride, Caesar, the pride of a scrupulous man. His room smells, no matter how hard the servants scrub, or how many sticks of incense I burn. The physicians call it the smell of death and say it’s ineradicable.”
He took her into his arms, kissed her hair. “Dearest sister, is there anything I can do?”
“Nothing, Caesar. You comfort me, but nothing comforts him.”
No use for it; he would have to be brutal. “I must go far away for at least a month,” he said.
She gasped. “Oh! Must you? He can’t last half a month!”
“Yes, I must.”
“Who will arrange the funeral? Find an undertaker? Find the right man to give the eulogy? Our family has become so small! Wars, murders…Maecenas, perhaps?”
“He’s in Agrigentum.”
“Then who is there? Domitius Calvinus? Servilius Vatia?”
He lifted her chin to look directly into her eyes, his mouth stern, his expression one of subtle pain. “I think that it must be Lucius Marcius Philippus,” he said deliberately. “Not my choice, but socially the only one who won’t make Rome talk. Since no one believes that our mother is dead, what can it matter? I’ll write to him and tell him he may return to Rome, take up residence in his father’s house.”