The Horse Changer (15 page)

‘And you can arrange this?’

‘I can if you promise to meet my conditions.’

I stared at her naked body, and yet I knew it was something else. Something I would hate. ‘What conditions do you require?’

‘When you deliver the letter to Allienus, you will need to show him the head of Gaius Trebonius.’

‘The head?’

‘Without it – or with some counterfeit – Allienus will not only refuse your request, he will have you executed.’

My tumescence was gone, and suddenly I was more afraid of this girl than of being discovered by her husband. ‘You want Dolabella to assassinate the governor of Asia?’

‘I did not say that. I want you to assassinate the governor of Asia. You may present Dolabella with your legions once you have them, if that is what you desire, but they will be yours to command. I have already spoken to my husband. He agrees with me. They should answer only to you. They will serve whatever cause you deem best.’

‘I hope you understand that, as the governor of Asia, Trebonius surrounds himself with an army.’

‘You should have no trouble getting him to let down his guard. Trebonius and Dolabella are old friends.’

‘What makes you think Dolabella will agree to let me assassinate a man he calls his friend?’

‘For the sake of four legions I don’t think Dolabella will quibble over a lost friend or two.’

‘And you say I must be the one who kills Trebonius. No one else?’

‘On your word of honour, Quintus Dellius. You and no one else. And before you strike the killing blow, I want you to tell him I am the one who sent you. He must know that.’

As she said this, Livia stepped forward and put her arms over my shoulders. There was no resisting her spell. I kissed Livia’s mouth and felt her body press tightly against me. I inhaled the sweet scent of her flesh. The moment she felt her effect on me, she lifted herself up and wrapped her legs about my hips. Only my tunic and loincloth separated us, and these she soon pulled out of our way. For a long moment we touched without penetration, a playful mime of lovemaking. Finally, she snaked her hand between us. There was a moment of hesitation, the feel of hair and then of her wetness. And finally the impalement of lovers.

I shivered helplessly as I sank into her. Her mouth covered mine, her tongue teasing, tasting, probing. I could not bear separating from her even to walk to her bed, so I staggered with her still clinging to me, faces, torsos and groins touching. Her grip on me as insistent as hunger.

Dolabella’s door was still closed when I returned at midday, though the rest of the house was up and about. He had taken one of Nero’s slaves for his night’s entertainment. I can’t recall the gender, but with him it made very little difference. I gave him time to awaken and then asked to have a word in private. Dolabella had no patience for interviews with his junior officers and signalled me into his room as if suffering a terrible inconvenience. Of course he was miserably hung over and still stinking from sex and drink. I told him I could not speak inside the house. He was curious at this but agreed we should take a ride together, in a little while.

I waited for him at the stable nearly an hour before he joined me. When we were alone and could not be heard, I told him Nero would provide him with the Spartan cavalry he coveted in exchange for the promise of a praetorship. ‘Happy to do it,’ he answered, and I knew him well enough to know he was lying. He had no more praetorships to give away.

‘You will want to give Nero what he asks for,’ I told him.

‘I’ll do anything I please, Dellius, and mind that you take care before you give me instructions again.’

‘In addition to the Spartans, Nero offers me command of the four legions stationed in Egypt.’

Dolabella brought his horse to a halt. ‘Offers you?’

‘That is the condition of the gift, that I command them. But as I serve you, I will naturally remain under your authority.’

‘Nero asks you to command four legions? And he actually has them to give away, just like that?’

‘His wife makes the offer actually. With one condition.’

Now he laughed. ‘Livia is offering it! Yes, well, she does have her way with the old boy. Pray, tell me, Dellius, what is her condition? A good tupping?’

‘She insists I take the severed head of Gaius Trebonius to Egypt. Once I present it to the Roman commander in Alexandria the legions will be mine to command.’

Before that moment I had never seen Dolabella speechless. He was pre-eminently the man with a clever riposte. Not on this occasion. Perhaps he imagined I was joking and did not want to appear the fool; perhaps he was adjusting his understanding of the world. Whatever his thoughts, they were his own; then, quite suddenly, he burst out laughing. ‘That delicious little tart! I wonder what Trebonius did to her?’

‘I didn’t ask.’

‘Nor should you have done. No, we’ll ask Trebonius, while he still has tongue to answer. I’m sure he’ll be glad to confess.’

‘You agree to the conditions?’

‘For four legions, Dellius, I would give the girl every head in the senate, save my own.’

Returning from our ride, we found Nero waiting for us. I feared the man as I had not previously done, but he did not bother looking in my direction. He handed Dolabella a letter. ‘Have Dellius take this letter under seal to Egypt along with his package. I’ll send your Spartan auxiliaries directly to the Hellespont to await your arrival. And I should like to be elected the urban praetor, if you don’t mind, next in power to the consuls. There won’t be a problem with that, will there?’

Gaius Trebonius, Governor of Asia, assassin of Caesar, old friend to Cornelius Dolabella: I see him still in the torch-lit hall of his palace at Smyrna.

There was such laughter that evening it was difficult to remember we had come to murder these men. Such was my strange mood I could almost believe they had somehow divined our intentions. The hilarity seemed unreal. Perhaps, I thought, they dissembled just as we did.

I reminded myself that Trebonius had not bothered with security, but it was no good. I was sure they suspected us. There were only two men guarding the entrance to the Triclinium. They were there to keep out unwanted intrusions. Trebonius brought all his senior officers to the feast. Like our own officers, they were young gentry and nobility, every one of them in his fighting prime. None of us was armed for the banquet, of course, but knives naturally lay on the tables.

In the weeks leading up to that night, Dolabella had crossed the Hellespont and marched south through Troy. From there he continued as far as Attalia, which is guarded from open water by the enormous island of Lesbos. There he made camp. This was fifty miles north of Smyrna. He then sent one of his two legions along with his Spartan cavalry to lay siege to Sardis. Sardis lies on the Hermus River, fifty miles east of Smyrna. Having Smyrna now threatened from the north and east, Dolabella gathered his officers together and boarded two warships that he might sail into Smyrna’s city harbour.

Those legionaries escorting Dolabella surrendered their weapons as they left the ships. Dolabella and his officers came forward dressed in togas, which is to say completely unarmed. Presenting a passport that declared him Proconsul of Syria by authority of the Roman senate, Dolabella requested an audience with the Governor of Asia. Nor did he make any demands for hostages. In other words he put himself at the governor’s mercy. We walked under an armed escort into the city. There were no chains on us, but we were prisoners all the same.

Once Dolabella stood before Trebonius he announced that he had come to Smyrna to surrender his army to his old friend. He offered his own life in return for the safety of the two legions under his command. He said his officers had served him faithfully, that he alone deserved to be punished for betraying ‘the principles of the Republic’. By this, of course, he meant that Caesar was a tyrant and had deserved to die.

I recalled the face of Trebonius. I had seen him at one of Dolabella’s parties, though we had never been introduced. He was a young man, in many respects very much like Dolabella, especially with his fondness for good wine, cruel wit, and pretty boys. Trebonius played the grim-faced magistrate as he listened to Dolabella’s plea for the lives of his officers and men. He watched imperviously as Dolabella fell to his knees in supplication on our behalf. Finally, with a theatrical flair worthy of Dolabella himself, Trebonius rose from his curule and walked toward his old friend. Only as he pulled Dolabella to his feet and threw his arms around him did Trebonius finally smile. He called Dolabella brother. Dolabella’s eyes filled with tears, his cheeks suddenly streaked, as if his friend’s magnanimity was entirely unexpected. At this, Trebonius scolded him for imagining he might not be welcome. Were they not old friends? Not good friends still?

We all took an oath to serve Trebonius and his allies, Cassius Longinus in Syria and Junius Brutus in Greece. The blood of a pig was spilt, followed by vows taken in the name of Artemis, the supreme and most ancient cult deity on the Ionian coastline.

Afterwards, Trebonius and his staff played host to Dolabella and his officers. Our sailors, marines, and rowers bivouacked on the ships; our legionary escort was quartered elsewhere in the palace, but as they had also taken an oath they were not kept under lock and key.

At midnight, while the officers still celebrated their newly formed alliance, certain of Dolabella’s legionaries slipped away and eliminated the guards at the city gate. After that it was a simple matter of letting our Spartan cavalry into the city. The Spartans had left the siege at Sardis early in the morning that same day and arrived in Smyrna at midnight. Once inside the city, they eliminated every soldier they encountered then surrounded the barracks of Trebonius’s Guard.

At the first cry of alarm inside the city, Trebonius seemed vexed. Before either he or his officers could work through the matter, Dolabella’s men took up carving knives and struck at those closest to them. Smiling one moment, cutting a throat the next. One or two of our party failed his task, and the fight was on. All the same, it was bad odds for Trebonius’s men, and the room soon belonged to us.

Trebonius seized a knife when I came at him. His men were either down or backed into corners and outnumbered. I came at him boldly, eager for the fight. I grabbed the handle of a long-necked amphora and smashed the vase against his wrist as he threatened me. Bone broke. The knife clattered across the marble floor. I stepped up and pummelled Trebonius’s ribs with a flurry of punches. Trebonius had served as an officer in the legions of Caesar and was a veteran of a great many fights, but he had not spent the past year training for his next encounter, as I had done. He was at my mercy after only a few blows, but I kept at it. I meant to soften his resolve. In his pain Trebonius cried out to Dolabella. What was going on? What about the oaths we had sworn?

Dolabella gave a careless shrug. ‘No truer, I’m afraid, than your oath to Caesar.’

Before Trebonius could speak of Caesar’s tyranny, as he seemed about to do, I slammed my fist into his nose. I required him to focus on me; I had no interest in hearing his justifications for murdering Caesar. I wanted him to answer my questions. I wanted to hear what terrible thing he had done to Livia. I ached to know the details so his death might be all the sweeter when it came. After he was broken and bloodied and straining to stay conscious I picked up the knife he had tried to use against me. I began cutting him. These were light quick slashes that soon awakened his attention. Finally I spoke. I told him I wanted the truth. He said he would give it, but when I asked him about Claudia Livia Drusilla he claimed not to know the girl. I cut him for his ignorance; I slammed my fist into his ribs hard enough to break more bones. ‘She is the bride of Claudius Nero. Do you know him?’ This confused him, or perhaps he was simply too stunned to think quickly.

Dolabella had watched my performance up to this point without interfering. He was half in the bag with drink, letting me ‘earn my legions’ at the cost of his friend’s life. Now he told Trebonius it did not pay to be slow about answering. ‘Not with earnest young Dellius here. Tell the lad you deflowered the girl, and we can all have a good laugh about it.’

‘I tell you I don’t even know her!’ Trebonius cried. His eyes were wet with tears. He was in pain, but I think the shock of Dolabella’s betrayal had broken his courage. He seemed sincere in his protest, but every man under torture begins with sincerity.

‘Of course you know her,’ Dolabella answered. ‘When she married that old bore Claudius Nero last summer you had plenty to say about it. Don’t play coy!’

‘I made jokes about it! But I don’t know the girl. I only said I pitied her.’

‘By Dis!’ Dolabella cried. ‘He’s telling the truth.’ I stared at my patron uncertainly. ‘He just told you! He pitied the poor girl having to lie under a tub of guts like Nero! That’s what you said, wasn’t it?’ Trebonius nodded without enthusiasm. ‘So kill him and be done with it,’ Dolabella muttered.