The Nero Prediction (20 page)

“Help me, Epaphroditus,” he said, tears in his eyes. “Help me become myself!”

I wasn’t startled. I was frightened. Augustus had done a good job of passing himself off as the Princeps, the first among equals. He worked hard at maintaining the fiction that he held power on the authority of the Senate. The fiction wore thin under Tiberius who eventually, to ensure his safety, withdrew to the natural fortress of Capri for the last decade of his life. Agrippina’s brother Caligula, Tiberius’s successor, was assassinated. Claudius, who followed Caligula, went nowhere without his spear-wielding Germans. Everyone was searched when they called on him. When he visited someone, before he entered his guards went over the host’s house with a fine toothed comb. The torture and summary execution of aristocrats and freedmen was common during his rule - he was notorious for insisting on being present during these gruesome proceedings. In spite of its trappings of democracy, such as the Senate’s “election” of the emperor to endless consulships, the Roman empire was in fact a military dictatorship, Nero knew that. He also knew that military dictatorships were not ruled by musicians. After the death of Agrippina he often talked to me about Periander, the larger-than-life tyrant of Corinth who was equally famous for having been tricked into incest by his mother Crateia (which means Power), for killing his pregnant wife with a kick and for being the first to plan a canal through the Corinthian Isthmus.

“As a young man Periander sent a messenger to the old tyrant of Miletus, a man notorious for his cruelty and famous for his achievements,” Nero told me. “Periander’s messenger was instructed to ask him ‘What is the secret of power?’ The tyrant took the messenger for a walk in a wheat field where he sliced off the tallest heads of grain. The messenger was mystified by the message but Periander wasn’t.”

Nero squinted at me with his myopic blue eyes, waiting for my reaction. I pretended to be as mystified as the messenger. “Oh what a titanic spirit!” he went on when I said nothing. “Far beyond the reach of good and evil. Only someone who enjoys absolute power can do him justice. Oh Nero you must be even greater than Periander if you want to become more than a tyrant. Compose, rehearse and then surrender yourself to the verdict of your audience!”

I suppose it was faintheartedness on my part, but the way he said this gave me a dreadful sinking feeling.

Compose Nero did, during whatever spare time he had, usually late in the evening. The rest of the day being taken up by a hurried succession of audiences with delegations from all over the world that began at the crack of dawn and ended with a dinner that flowed into the evening. I was constantly at his side with my wax tablets, taking shorthand notes of everything he said, and anything of importance that anyone else said as well. I also listened for meanings behind words, digested gossip, paid informers, did everything I could to predict what the reaction would be to Nero performing in public. The answers were always the same. The common people would welcome it. Most senators were convinced it would be suicide. I reported this to Nero but he didn’t seem to hear me.

“The Neronia, that’s what we’ll call it,” he announced to a thousand guests during a slightly tipsy speech towards the end of a very tipsy beachside dinner. “It’ll be a Greek festival with athletic, equestrian, dramatic and musical contests. Periander raced his chariot at the Olympic Games and won. I’m going to race too and perform for the glory of the empire. Who likes the idea?”

Of course everyone did, the applause roared like the surf and men who had drunk too much already called for more wine. The guests, mostly senators and knights, seemed to think that Nero was cooking up some kind of elaborate practical joke. Only when the date was announced in a proclamation inviting contestants, and listing Nero as one who had already entered, did the truth began to sink in and the grumbling begin. But not even a major revolt of the woad-blue English that summer, led by a harridan named Boudicca who slaughtered 70,000 loyal colonials and decimated the 9
^th
legion, would make him reconsider his plans. It needed a messenger from heaven to do that.

It appeared two hours after midnight on August 9 when Nero was already practicing going on one knee to await the verdict of the judges with the appropriate degree of humility. I was woken by shouting outside my window. I called down from my balcony to a knot of people who were craning their necks at something in the sky. "What is it?"

"A comet, don't you see it? North of Perseus, right on the edge of the Milky Way."

The mysterious visitor to the unchanging community of the stars was still faint, a mere hint of the majestic plume of light it was destined to become. All the same I broke out in a cold sweat. The last time a comet had appeared I'd been forced to poison the emperor.

Nero was in a state of feverish excitement. He was certain that Fate's messenger had come to applaud his first performance before the Roman plebs, the performance that was going to save it from its addiction to the savagery of the amphitheater. We were standing on a north-facing balcony when Balbillus arrived. "Well, what do you think Balbillus? It is a brilliant omen, isn't it?"

  Balbillus had to clear his throat twice before he could get started. "Caesar, it is with great reluctance that I tell you this because I know what a disappointment it will be for you. Unfortunately the comet is not a good omen. It warns of dire consequences if you perform at your Neronia."

Nero's brow bunched. A long, awful silence followed during which one seemed to hear the distant tramping of his 28 legions. He let loose a growl so deep that it scraped the gravely sediment of his disapproval. "What?"

Balbillus blanched but his voice did not quaver, I had to hand that to him. I knew that he'd have done anything, well anything within the limits of his professional integrity, to tell Nero that the visitor blessed his performance. "Caesar, the comet threatens misfortune if you do not turn back from the path you are at present taking."

Nero's tone took on the histrionic flavor of the tragic stage, was even more unsettling because of it. "You are suggesting that my singing is unfortunate?"

"No Caesar, certainly not. But the comet's tail points at the constellation Cassiopeia which indicates that you must turn your back on something specific just as Cassiopeia is turned backwards in the stars."

"Cassiopeia? Kindly explain yourself."

"You will recall that Cassiopeia was the queen who boasted that she was more beautiful than Poseidon’s Nereids. Poseidon punished her by sending a sea dragon to ravage her kingdom. In the end she had to sacrifice her daughter Andromeda to the monster."

"Yes but Perseus saved Andromeda!"

"Indeed Caesar, but the comet points at Cassiopeia, not Perseus. You must turn away like her, the time is not ripe for you to perform in public."

Nero slapped his open hand on the table. The rings on his fingers made a frightful sound. "I'm destined to perform, I can feel it in my bones. You've been talking to Seneca and Burrus. You've allowed your personal disapproval of my music to cloud your judgment. Go back to your charts and find the truth. I'm going to get a second opinion. Epaphroditus bring me that diviner of yours, Thallus."

A messenger waited for me outside the audience chamber. Poppaea wanted to see me immediately.

It was barely light when I was shown into her quarters. Her face was still covered by the mask of white cream she slept with at night but she was beautiful all the same. "What did Balbillus say?"

"That the comet forbids Nero to perform at the Neronia. He's furious. He wants a second opinion from Thallus."

"Thallus is already on his way with the sacrificial animal. He will tell Nero that he foresaw the appearance of the comet in a dream and that a voice told him that he must read the auspices for a man dressed in purple."

"So Thallus is going to contradict Balbillus?"

"No he isn't. The comet is too far north of the Zodiac to influence the planets but Ptolemy also sees danger in Cassiopeia. Thallus will help us eliminate the cause of that danger."

"It's cause?"

"The leaders of the Claudians of course, surely you haven't forgotten your promise to help me put them out of the way? Rubellius Plautus and Faustus Cornelius Sulla. They both court Octavia secretly and she’s still empress, you’ll recall, whose dowry was the empire. You must make sure Nero realizes these are the enemies indicated by the comet. There can be no musical war until they are gone. They are the tallest heads of grain."

Obviously Nero had told her the Periander story. I went to Tigellinus. Although I loathed him, he was at least a parasite clever enough to be concerned about the survival of his host. "Plautus and Sulla, Poppaea wants me to help her eliminate them," I told him.

"Do as she says," he said without hesitation.

"Why? Because of Ptolemy? He tells her exactly what she wants to hear. Everybody knows that Plautus and Sulla are harmless as sheep. The Senate will be outraged if we banish them without cause."

Tigellinus stroked the flanks of a gilded bronze stallion that reared, nostrils flaring, striking with its front hooves, an exquisite new addition to his equestrian collection. He rolled his velvet eyes towards me. "Agrippina wasn't the only one to be appalled by the idea of a singing emperor you know. Unfortunately for them Plautus and Sulla are the figureheads of a very large, very powerful, very conservative faction which continues to believe as she did. If musical war stirs the conservative patricians to thoughts of revolution, either, or even both, could be hailed as emperor. Now I happen to be among those who feel that the temporary relegation of two gentlemen to the idiocy of rural life is preferable to the horrors of civil war. What do you think?"

I sent for Thallus.

Shortly after his reading a messenger left for Gaul confirming the restriction on Sulla's movements. Another went to the home of Rubellius Plautus with a note from Nero which suggested that in the interest of public order, which had been unsettled by the appearance of the comet, it would perhaps be better if he removed himself to the safety of his estates in Asia.

But Nero couldn't banish the comet that Thallus confirmed was a sign the time had not yet come for him to perform in public. So the Neronia that began on October 13 ended without his public performance. When he sang it was in private and the performance lacked its usual luster. The prizes that Tigellinus made sure were nevertheless showered on him only deepened his gloom.

The Swan Sings

April 21, 62 A.D. – July 8, 64 A.D.

A year passed. The following spring Tigellinus replaced Burrus (who finally died of his throat complaint) as Praetorian Prefect, another bad day for me. Shortly afterwards Seneca tendered his resignation. The old guard was gone and the future had arrived when Poppaea fell pregnant on April 21.

Nero and I were going over plans for the expansion of the lavish Greek gymnasium he'd built when she made her entrance, a vision in Monday green, the color of the Moon, and announced the fateful event.

In spite of the way the architects shifted their feet when they caught sight of her, Nero was so wrapped up in his dream of senators and knights wrestling and boxing like Achilles and Odysseus, that he didn't acknowledge her presence until she kissed him on the cheek. He'd actually begun to ask her to leave when he saw that there was something special in her eyes.

Her voice had an excited lilt to it. "I have something to tell you."

"It has to wait, I'm right in the middle of -"

"It can't. I can't keep it to myself a moment longer. You wouldn't want me to."

Realization dawned on Nero's face. "In that case..."

Poppaea glanced at the architects. "It's really quite confidential."

Nero waved them out. Neither emperor nor mistress seemed to notice me, half hidden as I was behind a pile of papers, so I stayed.

"Well?" asked Nero as Poppaea gazed at him, cheeks dimpled, relishing her precious secret.

She touched his face with the tips of her fingers. "You are going to be a father."

It was almost comical, the expression of joy that flooded Nero's face. "A son!"

Poppaea's smile was whimsical. "Perhaps, but certainly an heir, for the man who marries Nero's daughter will be emperor."

"How long have you known?"

"Just a few days. My months are as regular as the Moon's. I'm undoubtedly with child."

Nero's eyes widened as the realization hit him. "But we're not married!"

This was the moment Poppaea had been preparing herself for. "We must get married, very soon."

Nero's sounded like someone experiencing the first full turn of a thumbscrew. "How can we, I'm not even divorced yet!"

"You must announce your divorce immediately."

Another turn of the screw. "I can't, there'll be riots. Octavia has her clients, her faction, the Claudians. The army adored Claudius, there'll be mutinies for certain. Faustus Cornelius Sulla or Rubellius Plautus will be hailed. I'll have a full scale civil war on my hands!"

"You have to eliminate both of them immediately. You should have done so when the comet warned you to do it for your music. Now you must do it for your child."

Nero whispered the appalling words. "Eliminate them?"

Poppaea could have been talking about garden cuttings. "Yes. Immediately."

Nero shook his head, almost as if he was awed by the realization. "First mother now you, turning me into a monster."

Poppaea risked wrinkles as she puckered her brow in an angry frown, something she almost never allowed herself to do. "By all means blame me if that makes you feel better."

Nero looked at me, the appeal in his eyes almost pathetic. "Epaphroditus, what do you think?"

I thought that he had to get rid of Octavia sooner or later and that the lives of two idle patricians was a cheap price for peace. I also thought of musical war. "Caesar, you can't allow anyone to stand in the way of your destiny. You are the first man of a new age. A thousand years after the fall of the Roman Empire, men will still talk of Nero."