The Furies of Rome (23 page)

‘We must see the procurator immediately,’ Vespasian informed the steward who met them in the atrium.

‘Alas, master,’ the man said, smiling with oily regret and bowing his head, ‘the procurator is indisposed.’

‘Well, un-indispose him then!’

‘Alas, master, would that I could but his indisposition involves him not being here.’

‘Well, where is he then? Send a messenger to have him brought back here right away.’

The steward paused for a sigh and an apologetic hunching of the shoulders. ‘Alas, master, but by not being here I mean that the procurator is not in Londinium.’

‘Where’s he gone then?’

‘Alas, master, I am not privy to that information; all I know is that he left yesterday morning soon after dawn with an ala of auxiliary cavalry. He didn’t say where he was going, just that he would be back in seven or eight days.’

Vespasian wanted to hit the man but knew that would get him nowhere. ‘Then find out as soon as you can; someone will know in the auxiliary camp. And tell me once you know.’

‘It’s so typical of a man like Decianus to go missing just when he might be of some use,’ Sabinus complained as they reached their villa. Torches blazed to either side of the steps leading up to the front door. Slaves scuttled down to them to take their horses around to the stables as they dismounted.

‘It’s why he wanted to take an ala of cavalry with him that puzzles me,’ Vespasian said as he climbed the steps. ‘Almost five hundred men is quite a bodyguard.’

‘Perhaps he had already heard about some unrest and had gone to suppress it,’ Caenis suggested. ‘What we saw this afternoon must have been a part of it.’

‘No, if there was any danger involved you can be sure that Decianus would have sent a junior officer; he’s not the sort to put himself in harm’s way. No, what he plans to do might cause unrest so he thought it would be better not to take any chances.’

That moment Hormus came into the atrium to greet his master.

‘Did the business with the Cloelius Brothers go well, Hormus?’ Vespasian asked.

‘Indeed, master.’ He handed Caenis two scrolls. ‘These are the bankers’ drafts redeemable with the Cloelius Brothers back in Rome, mistress; the fee was twelve per cent of the total; Tertius Cloelius said that they had added a premium because of the growing tension in the province and the dangers of transporting cash over the sea.’

‘I knew he would; but I suppose it’s fair enough and, after all, it’s Seneca’s money not mine.’

‘Well done, Hormus,’ Vespasian said, ‘you did a good job.’

Hormus coloured, unused to praise. ‘Thank you, master.’

‘Did Tertius tell you when the ship would sail with the cash?’

‘Yes, master; he said in a market interval or so.’

‘Why so long?’

‘Decianus ordered him to wait for his return. He’s gone to fetch some money and he wants it to be sent to Rome immediately.’

Vespasian frowned. ‘Fetch some money? It must be a substantial amount if he wants it to leave the province immediately. Where’s he fetching it from?’

‘Tertius didn’t know exactly; only that he’s taken a large body of cavalry with him and he’s headed northeast about four days’ ride away.’

Vespasian, Caenis and Sabinus all looked at each other in alarm.

‘That’s a lot further than Camulodunum,’ Vespasian said.

Sabinus nodded. ‘Much further; you could get to Venta Icenorum in that time.’

‘Yes, brother, you could. He must have heard about the Iceni collecting money to pay off Seneca. The bastard’s going to steal Boudicca’s gold.’

There was nothing to be done until the following morning and it was as the first glow grew in the eastern sky that Vespasian and his three companions headed in pursuit of the procurator, knowing that he was two days ahead of them. Hormus had been left in Londinium with their slaves as well as Caenis’ two slave girls; Caenis had insisted on coming as she felt that the matter was very much of her concern.

To speed them up, each had a spare mount so that they could rotate horses every hour. In this way they were able to reach Camulodunum before midday. A brief enquiry of Paelignus, who looked terrified to see them and flinched every time Vespasian spoke to him, was enough to ascertain that Decianus and his men had passed through late afternoon two days before, without stopping. They were gaining on them.

Gambling on the fact that Decianus would be in no special hurry to reach his destination as the Cloelius Brothers’ ship would not sail until he had returned and so therefore there was no point in blowing his escort’s horses, they kept their speed at an easy canter knowing that they would steadily eat away at the procurator’s lead. And so they retraced their path to the lands of the Iceni, sleeping that night a good distance from Camulodunum wrapped in damp blankets, with only Magnus being able to claim relative warmth snuggled between an exhausted Castor and Pollux. Rising with the sun the following morning they pressed on and, with every hour they travelled, the trail of the ala appeared fresher. As they came to Venta Icenorum at the tenth hour of the day, they arrived to find that the procurator had been in the settlement for only one hour.

But that hour had been enough; the settlement was sealed off.

‘I don’t care what your orders are, decurion,’ Sabinus shouted at the officer commanding the turma of cavalry prohibiting entrance at the southern gate. ‘My name is Titus Flavius Sabinus of proconsular rank, up until recently the prefect of Rome itself, and if you do not let us through then I shall personally see to it that you get a tour of the city ending up in the Circus Maximus.’ He thrust his face, red with frustration, forward so that their noses almost touched. ‘Do I make myself clear, little man?’

Sabinus had evidently explained himself adequately for the decurion swallowed, thought for a moment, and then snapped a salute; a couple of barked orders had his men on the gate open it and Vespasian and his companions trotted through into a town in the grip of a raucous chaos.

Although it was the biggest Iceni settlement, Venta Icenorum consisted of around five hundred habitations, therefore there were also roughly that number of fighting-age men and they were not necessarily all warriors; far from it, for most of the population farmed the surrounding land. Decianus had therefore chosen his escort well: the four hundred and eighty troopers of the ala had the town completely under control with groups of them riding through the lanes between the round huts shouting and threatening any of the population at large in order to keep them indoors.

The shouting continued as they made their way to the marketplace at the heart of the settlement where they had previously met Boudicca outside her late husband’s hall. As they neared their destination, individual voices could finally be heard and they were raised in anger.

‘You have no right!’ The voice was harsh and deep and if Vespasian had not met Boudicca he would have thought it to be a man’s.

‘I have every right as Rome’s representative,’ Decianus replied as Vespasian and Sabinus pushed through the circle of troopers gathered outside Prasutagus’ hall; Caenis and Magnus followed them, having tied Castor and Pollux to a post for fear of them attacking the wrong person in such a congested area. The commotion of their arrival caused Decianus to turn his head towards them as he sat in his curule chair, a symbol of his power; in his hand he held a scroll. Boudicca stood before him, her wrists manacled and her arms secured by two troopers as if she were a common criminal. The bodies of a dozen of her warriors lay bloody on the ground around her.

‘What are you doing here?’ Decianus demanded as he recognised Vespasian and Sabinus.

‘I’m here to ask you the exact same question,’ Vespasian replied, striding forward to place himself between the procurator and the Queen.

‘I don’t have to explain myself to you.’

‘He’s here to steal the money that we have collected to pay off Seneca!’ Boudicca screamed, her voice a study in rage.

‘Shut that bitch up!’

The trooper who tried to gag her with his hand was rewarded with deep teeth marks between his thumb and forefinger.

‘That is not your money, Decianus,’ Vespasian said.

‘I’m the procurator of Britannia and therefore in charge of gathering taxes and the general financial wellbeing of the province. Just after the invasion Claudius lent all the highest ranking nobles substantial sums of money so that they would have senatorial status; lent, mind you, not gave. I am here to recall the loan and to show Claudius’ successor just how good a servant I am to him.’

‘By stealing Seneca’s money?’

‘No; Claudius lent to them first so his debt has priority over Seneca’s. The Iceni have no right to dispute that now that they’re officially a part of the province.’

Boudicca struggled against her restrainers but they held firm. ‘My husband’s will named me and my daughters as co-heirs with Nero.’

Decianus looked at the scroll he was holding and then ripped it in half. ‘The will is worthless because under Roman law you cannot inherit.’

‘Which law?’

‘The
lex voconia
forbids testators in the first census class to name women as their heirs.’

‘That law is a hundred years old,’ Caenis said.

‘But it is still valid.’

‘Perhaps, but, as you said, only for people in the first census class.’

‘Which Tiberius Claudius Prasutagus was; the Emperor Claudius placed him there the last time he held the censorship soon after he had lent him the money to give him that status.’ Decianus smiled in triumph. ‘As procurator I’m well aware of the status of the citizens in the province and Prasutagus along with Cogidubnus and Venutius are all in the first class. The will is invalid, therefore he died intestate and so his estate goes to the Emperor unless the heirs would wish to challenge it in the courts, which, of course, they cannot because of their sex. But even if they could they wouldn’t succeed as Boudicca and the three daughters are named as co-heirs of half the estate or twelve and a half per cent each. As you well know, in law a husband
or
wife can only make a bequest to the other of no more than
ten
per cent of the estate’s value. Again we have a cause to make the will null and void. Do you want me to carry on?’

‘But this is Iceni land and not under the jurisdiction of Rome!’ Boudicca screamed. ‘We have our own customs and women have always been able to inherit.’

Decianus pointed down at the discarded will. ‘Yet as a citizen, which no one can deny he was, your husband made his will under Roman law; he even got two men of proconsular rank to witness it.’ He indicated to Vespasian and Sabinus. ‘What am I to do?’ He leant forward, teeth bared in a parody of a smile. ‘I must enforce the law, of course; which means the will is worthless and everything goes to the Emperor and therefore this Iceni land is now part of the Roman province.’

This was too much for Boudicca; with all the strength of her huge frame she tore herself away from her guards and flew at Decianus, knocking him backwards off his chair and crunching her manacled wrist down into his face at the moment that the back of his head slammed into the ground. Cartilage was crushed and blood sprayed her hands; Decianus’ nose was flattened to one side. His scream of pain was cut short as the Queen thumped her right knee, not once but twice, into his genitals causing him to choke with white, searing agony. Boudicca had time for one double-fisted punch that split both the procurator’s lips before she was hauled off by half a dozen troopers.

‘I thoroughly enjoyed that,’ Magnus muttered next to Vespasian.

‘I think we all did,’ Vespasian said as Decianus was helped back to his feet clutching at his testicles and hyperventilating.

‘Strip her and whip her,’ Decianus wheezed.

‘You can’t do that,’ Vespasian shouted as Boudicca was pulled away, kicking and hissing. Decianus, still hunched over as pain raged through his innards, looked up at Vespasian with half-closed eyes; blood poured from his crushed nose. ‘Can’t I?’

‘No, her husband was a citizen.’

‘Just watch me.’ He raised a shaking, crooked finger towards Vespasian. ‘Tie them up.’

Vespasian, Sabinus and Magnus all went for their swords but many hands grabbed them; hands that were unwilling to disobey a procurator, especially when the status of the arrested was unknown. And as Vespasian felt twine encircling and binding his wrists behind him, a sharp knife was ripped up the back of Boudicca’s tunic and it was torn from her to expose great, pendulous breasts and wads of hair poking from under her arms. As her trousers were wrenched away she raised her eyes to the sky and screeched a curse to her gods in her own language; long it was and, as the first lash drew blood from her shoulders, it strengthened in intensity. Her body writhed in time to the whip but there was not one sound of pain; just the curse, intoned again and again, each repetition more venomous than the last as libations of her own blood poured into the earth of her homeland to seal her covenant with the deities of her people.

As the lash came down for the thirtieth time there was a scream, not of agony but of fear and it was not Boudicca: it was far more high-pitched and it was multiple. Into the ring of troopers three girls were dragged, all in their early teens and all naked.

Boudicca looked down at her daughters as they were thrown wailing to the ground. ‘Stop that noise!’ she shouted. ‘Fight them, hate them, curse them but don’t cry for them.’ Another lash of the whip returned her to repetitive invocations as the three girls, now spitting curses in emulation of their mother, were pinned down, willing hands holding wrists and ankles. Even as the first troopers forced their way into each of them they did not cry out, nor did they submit peacefully during their ordeal and many an auxiliary had bite marks on his face by the time he had finished.

And so Vespasian watched as the mother was scourged and the daughters were raped again and again and again and he knew that what Decianus had done was irreversible and, with the legions busy in the north and the west, it was an act of such imbecilic foolhardiness as to take one’s breath away.