Twenty-three
THE first day of the new year belonged to Janus, god of doorways, god of beginnings, and as always Cornelia and her cousins exchanged coins stamped with Janus’s double-faced profile. One face looked forward and the other back, and on the first day of this year, it couldn’t have been more appropriate. Cornelia was looking ahead to the future along with the rest of Rome, looking ahead to Emperor Vespasian as he made his triumphal entry into the city . . . but she couldn’t help looking back too, and she felt a twinge as she remembered an emperor who was torn to pieces in the Forum and an emperor who marched north to defeat and suicide and an emperor who died alone and terrified in a stable. Three dead emperors, and the thousands who had died supporting them.
Emperor Vespasian entered the city today, on the first day of the year, and later Cornelia heard how loudly he had been cheered. But she hadn’t been there to cheer for him. She had other words to say, more important words.
“Quando tu Gaius, ego Gaia . . .” Drusus’s hands squeezed hers fiercely as she recited the ritual vows, and even through the red haze of the bridal veil she could see the tears in his eyes. Just a small wedding, only family and friends gathered around the public shrine—Lollia bouncing up and down on her toes, Diana slipping in late as always, Drusus’s parents and sister clustered together proud and a little shy. Marcella wasn’t there—even a prince’s wife apparently knew better than to come where she was so bluntly unwanted. Cornelia was grateful.
Drusus’s hand squeezed hers again as the priest brought a white goat forward for the matrimonial sacrifice, and Cornelia looked up at the marble statue of Juno that gazed down on her. Is she smiling at me? Perhaps.
The goat escaped the priest’s knife and ran bleating down the street. Cornelia couldn’t suppress a giggle as the priest began to swear, and Drusus was so convulsed with laughter he could hardly speak. “Let it go,” Lollia called from the circle of guests. “Some woman in the slums will be the richer for a nice milking goat by evening. That’s a better wedding omen than goat blood on our shoes!”
Cornelia couldn’t have agreed more.
The wedding party broke up amicably, streaming back up the street toward the house of Lollia’s grandfather, who had offered to host the feast. Drusus snugged Cornelia close against his side, pushing her veil back so he could kiss her. “All mine now,” he whispered, and his hand brushed her stomach, which had just barely begun to round.
“All yours,” she whispered back. He looked so imposing in his formal red and gold—a centurion of the Praetorian Guard once again, thanks to Emperor Vespasian. Was I so happy the first time I married? Cornelia didn’t know. Maybe that was a question that didn’t need an answer. Maybe it was enough that if she’d had to marry twice, it had been to two such good men.
“Juno’s mercy,” Cornelia exclaimed as they led the way through the vast double doors into the atrium. The columns had been twined with garlands of myrtle and jasmine, the fountain flowed with Falernian wine, soft music filled the air, the smells of a hundred savory dishes tantalized the nose . . . “Lollia, you shouldn’t have!”
“This wedding might be a bit on the hasty side, my honey, but no one will say it wasn’t done up properly. My grandfather did the works, let me tell you.” Lollia gazed around with satisfaction. “It’s such fun to plan a wedding that isn’t mine.”
“Nothing but the best for you, m’dear.” Lollia’s grandfather pinched Cornelia’s cheek affectionately. “My jewel tells me how much you comforted her when she was married to that vicious bastard Fabius Valens.”
Cornelia looked at the plump face of Lollia’s grandfather, beaming and happy again, and flung her arms around his neck. She remembered her own father, who hadn’t even attended her first wedding and could barely tell her apart from her sister. “You’ve done more for me than my father ever did,” she said, and kissed Lollia’s grandfather on both cheeks.
He beamed at her again, and then took Drusus by the arm and bore him off to the other side of the atrium. “You come with me, my lad! Plenty of guests here want to meet our brave soldier. Let’s see what we can do to make you a commander down in Tarracina, eh?”
The wedding guests were flooding in now, exclaiming over the flowers and the wine, and Cornelia looped an arm about Lollia’s waist. “I suppose there will be another wedding for you soon?”
“Yes, to some cousin of Vespasian’s,” Lollia said unconcernedly. She wore a sunny yellow dress with an embroidered sash, simpler than the elaborate silks she used to wear, and scarlet poppies in her hair instead of rubies. And Cornelia rather thought the hair itself had been dyed a gentler shade of red. “I think his name is Gnaeus Flavius. Or was it Publius Flavius? Well, I’ll find out soon enough . . .”
“Domina.” A familiar golden Gaul bowed at Lollia’s side. “The steward, he wants to know if the musicians should begin.”
“Gods, yes, Thrax. And get the wine flowing, please.” Lollia turned back to Cornelia, beaming. “I have to say please, since Thrax is a freedman now. Freed last week! So if I’m not very polite to him, he might leave me.”
“Somehow I doubt that.” Cornelia smiled. The slave—freedman—stood quietly as Lollia tucked her hand into his arm, but his fingers caressed hers in silence. “Is that a new ring, Lollia?”
“Yes.” Lollia admired the plain iron band on the fourth finger of her left hand. “Isn’t it nice? Thrax gave it to me when I freed him.”
“What happens when your next husband puts a ring on that finger?” Cornelia said, amused.
“Oh, it can go on top. This one isn’t coming off.”
Diana sauntered up in a gold silk gown, draped high in front and baring her back nearly to the base of the spine. Her arm was looped companionably through that of a graying stoop-shouldered man in a toga, and it took Cornelia a moment to recognize Marcus Norbanus. “Marcus,” she exclaimed as he bowed over her hand. Prison had not been kind to him—Cornelia resolved at once to find him a nice wife. Now that she was married herself again, she wanted the whole world just as happy. “We’ll see you married next,” she told him.
“Oh, I think not. I seem to have bad luck with wives. That Nessus fellow everyone’s talking about ever since Domitian appointed him Imperial astrologer—he told me it would be a very bad idea to marry again. I don’t normally put much trust in astrologers, but . . .” Marcus’s gaze drifted to Tullia, pecking away at Gaius’s shoulder with a sharp-lacquered nail. “I think I won’t push my luck.”
“Nonsense, Marcus,” Cornelia chided. Maybe Diana will do for him . . . they strolled off companionably, Diana chattering about something and Marcus looking down at her with cautious amusement. As if she were some interesting natural phenomenon, like a freak storm or a two-headed calf.
Lollia clapped her hands for the drummers to begin playing as the guests took their places, and the wedding banquet took no time at all to get into full swing. Definitely the best wedding of the year, as many of them as there had been! Even the slaves looked happy, laughing and talking among themselves as they brought in the wine, the silver bowls heaped with fruit, the roast suckling piglet with fried sage leaves and garlic. Drusus and Cornelia took the couch of honor; he began fussing with her wine, watering it anxiously to the exact degree she liked now that she was pregnant. Cornelia laughed and pelted him with a grape. Lollia had little Flavia on her lap and was tickling her with a peacock feather, Thrax hovering discreet and smiling behind them. Lollia’s grandfather perched a laurel wreath rakishly over his wig and was already talking with a shrewd-eyed man in Imperial dress, likely making another fortune. Drusus’s parents had the couch beside their son, and Cornelia promptly dragged them off it and introduced them around the room until they began to lose their awkward stiffness. “Your cousins all have such pretty dresses,” Drusus’s young sister said shyly, and Cornelia made up her mind to get the girl a new wardrobe at once.
Diana stood leaning against a pillar, tossing grapes into the air one by one and catching them unerrin
gly between her teeth, and Cornelia made sure to spoil her aim with a hug from behind. “You were late to my wedding!” she said accusingly. “How were the races?”
“The Reds won. Seven of eight.” Diana hugged her back, but gingerly, avoiding her stomach.
“I’m not made of glass just because I’m pregnant, Diana.”
“I know what to do for pregnant mares, but not pregnant cousins,” Diana complained. “I can hardly feed you a hot oat mash or wrap your hooves in warm wool.”
Cornelia giggled. “Before I get to be the size of a house, we’ll have to go to the races—you and me and Drusus. There should be time before we leave for Tarracina.” Drusus had been posted to the training camp there—and Gaius had rather unexpectedly given them the villa as a wedding gift, despite Tullia’s protests. The same villa where they’d snatched a happy fortnight and dreamed of children running through vineyards. “You know, Drusus and I are thinking we might acquire a few horses ourselves?” Cornelia went on happily. “And a vineyard; Drusus is determined to make the best wine in the region—” She could see Diana stifling a yawn but couldn’t stop herself, telling all about the room she’d already had readied for the coming baby, which would of course be named Drusilla if it was a girl and Drusus if a boy . . .
“Oh, gods.” Lollia came up in her sunny dress, scowling. “Guess who just arrived to ruin the fun.”
“She wouldn’t dare,” Diana said ominously.
“She’s married to a prince of Rome now, my honey. She can dare anything she likes.”
They looked across the room as a fanfare of applause started up. Cornelia hadn’t even laid eyes on Marcella since she had walked away naked into the steam of the bathhouse—just heard her name, as the news of her unexpected marriage flashed through the city on the wings of gossip. It took Cornelia a moment now to recognize her sister, standing in the entrance hall with her jeweled hand tucked into Domitian’s arm as Lollia’s grandfather came forward to greet them. A ripple of bows crossed the room—and the buzz of whispered voices rose like soft thunder as Domitian led his new bride into the room.
“I still say it isn’t fair,” Cornelia couldn’t help bursting out. “Vespasian doesn’t have a wife, and neither does Titus, so Marcella’s Imperial hostess now. After everything she’s done, she gets to be first lady of Rome.”
“And maybe Empress one day,” Diana said. “If Domitian ever takes the purple.”
“Well, he won’t,” Lollia snorted. “What did we all learn from this year? No one in line to the throne ever gets there. Marcella will only be Empress if she bumps Vespasian and Titus out of the way.”
“This is Marcella we’re talking about,” Diana pointed out. “Look at her win-loss record so far.”
They all looked at each other. They looked at Marcella, whose jeweled hand was being kissed by half the room.
“She’s in purple,” Lollia said a little sadly. “We all used to dress in the same color for parties.”
The four dashing cousins of the Cornelii, always dressed in harmony. Lollia and Diana had worn various shades of yellow and gold today, to match Cornelia’s saffron bridal cloak, but not Marcella. Cornelia remembered that day at the races little more than a year ago, when they had all put on red with such high hopes of the future. She’d made herself as severe as possible, hoping to look like an empress; Lollia had looked her garish and outrageous self; Marcella had been restrained and unjeweled. But now it was Lollia who looked soft and womanly, Cornelia could feel her own hair coming down in tendrils—and Marcella across the room was stiffly wrapped in heavy silks, her hair prisoned in rigid curls, so many jewels shackled about her neck that she could hardly move. She looked across the room at Cornelia, and Cornelia looked back, but then Domitian’s hand descended possessively on Marcella’s arm. Cornelia saw how her sister dropped her eyes to the floor as she trailed in his wake.
“What are we going to do about her?” Lollia asked, somber.
“I will never speak to her again,” Cornelia said under her breath, but she couldn’t help looking across the triclinium where Domitian and Marcella, after a rapid reshuffling of guests, had been given the couch of honor. Cornelia had accompanied her sister to a hundred banquets; Marcella always lounged on one elbow with an untouched wine cup in her hand, watching the other guests and smiling faintly. But now she lay at Domitian’s side, lashes covering her eyes as she drank deep from her goblet. Utterly still. Utterly silent.
“I’m not sure,” Diana said at length, “that we have to do anything.”
“What do you mean?” Cornelia blinked.
“I have just had the most interesting chat with Marcella!” Tullia bustled up, her embroidered flounces fluttering. “So good to see her at last! One might have thought she’d have invited us to the palace by now, but I daresay she’s been busy with her new duties. Really, she and Domitian could have managed their wedding with a trifle less sensation, but these impetuous young men!” Tullia addressed herself mostly to Lollia, since she could still not approve of Cornelia’s marriage, and could never bring herself to speak directly to Diana. “Just think, an emperor’s son for our Marcella!”
“You hate Marcella,” Diana observed.
“—so, she’s looking after Titus’s daughter Julia now, such excellent practice for her when she has her own babies, and she’s even asked my advice about planning a menu for an Imperial banquet next week. Oh, and she’s quite given up writing those wretched histories! I always knew she’d settle into a proper wife if she had a husband who took a firm hand with her—”
“Cornelia, I must congratulate you on your wedding,” a quiet voice said behind Tullia. “I’m so happy for you.”
Marcella, marble-carved and bejeweled, looked nothing like herself. Up close, Cornelia could see that her heavy bracelets had been stacked to hide a bruise on her wrist.
“I brought you a wedding gift,” Marcella continued, holding out a scroll bound up with ribbon. “I had Nessus draw up your horoscope—he says the baby will be a girl, and you’ll have two more girls and a pair of sons too . . . of course Nessus just tells people what they want to hear, but it’s a nice fortune for all that.”
Cornelia made no move to take the scroll. Marcella finally handed it off to a hovering slave.
“I thought perhaps you might call on me at the Domus Aurea,” she said, chin rising as Cornelia just stood looking at her. “Domitian doesn’t—that is, it isn’t suitable for me to pay visits outside the palace.”
“I fear I am quite busy,” Cornelia said coldly.
“So am I,” said Lollia.
“Cornelia—” Marcella reached out a hand. “Please won’t you come visit? We’ll put our feet up and have a good gossip. Remember when we used to sneak cakes into our bed when we were little, and talk about who we’d marry when we grew up?”
Cornelia saw Piso lying in his own blood on the steps of the Temple of Vesta. She saw Drusus, a knife in his side, brought to his knees but still trying to protect her. She felt her sister’s jeweled fingers twine through her own.
“Please,” said Marcella. “I want my sister back.”
Cornelia pulled her hand away. “What sister?”
Marcella stared at her.
“I shall call on you,” Tullia beamed, oblivious. “Tell me, is little Julia over her cough? I have a very good cough remedy for children—”
Marcella gave a desperate look over her shoulder as she was borne off, but Cornelia turned away.
“I don’t think we need to do anything about Marcella,” Diana said at last. “She’s being punished enough.”
“Punished?” Cornelia said bitterly. “She’s all but an empress!”
“And she’s powerless.” Diana’s eyes were on Domitian, and Cornelia looked too. Just a stocky boy drinking wine on a couch, being charming to Drusus—everyone knew Domitian liked soldiers, determined as he was to outstrip his brother as a general—but his black eyes were unreadable behind the charm. “He reminds me of those charioteers who cl
aw their way up out of the worst slums,” Diana said. “Even when they reach the top—palms and fame and hundreds of victories piled at their feet—they still have that hungry look. Like nothing in the world will ever fill them up.”
“That’s fanciful,” Lollia scoffed. “He’s just a boy.”
Marcella returned to her new husband’s side, passive and jewel-wrapped, and Domitian’s hand at once claimed her elbow. He broke off midconversation to kiss her—no, to devour her.
“I don’t think her life is going to be worth much now,” Diana said. “Just—menus and slaves and other people’s children. And she’ll be utterly alone.”
“Maybe she was always alone.” Cornelia looked at her sister again. “Even when we thought she was one of us.” Domitian had slipped off his couch, dragging Marcella with him as he went to accost Lollia’s grandfather about something, so Cornelia returned to Drusus’s side and nestled under his arm.
He looked down at her as she pressed her cheek against his shoulder. “What is it?”
“Nothing,” she said. “I love you.”
“Is it your sister?” He knew her so well.
Cornelia hesitated. “It’s not that I’m jealous. I certainly don’t grudge Marcella the husband—I’d rather have you any day than Domitian.”
“Thank you,” Drusus said wryly.
“But I was supposed to be Empress!” Cornelia burst out. “Not my little sister!”
“Um, you’re the empress of my heart,” Drusus offered.
“That’s not the same thing!”
Drusus burst out laughing and pulled her close, kissing her temple. A reluctant smile tugged at Cornelia’s lips, and she let him pour her some more watered wine.
Domitian stayed an hour longer, and rose to leave as abruptly as he’d entered. “But we’ve just arrived,” Marcella protested.
“Correct. And now we’re leaving. Did I mention to you all?” he added to the room at large. “I’ve changed my wife’s name. I don’t like the name Marcella, so from now on she’ll be called Domitia. After me.”