“It’s impossible,” Lucia whispered.
“No.” Rosa took her arm. “Just a little hard to imagine, that’s all. And now, here is the man I want you to meet …”
Lucia turned. The man was right behind them. She hadn’t heard him approach.
He was perhaps thirty. He was taller than Lucia, and bulkier; his body looked a little soft, flabby, and his skin was pale. He wore casual clothes, a pale blue shirt and jeans. His hair was dark and neatly combed, but he had something of the features of the sisters, of Lucia and Rosa themselves.
He smiled at her. And as he glanced over Lucia’s figure his gray eyes were alive with something of the intensity of the contadino boys.
Rosa touched Lucia’s lips with one fingertip. “Don’t say anything. You mustn’t speak to each other. Lucia, this is Giuliano Andreoli. He’s a contadino, strictly speaking. But he’s actually your distant cousin — you can tell from the coloring — you can look him up in the scrinium if you like. He lives in Venice. He’s a bricklayer … I think that’s enough. Come now.”
She took Lucia’s arm and led her away. Lucia looked back, but Giuliano was already out of sight, around the bend of the corridor.
“I don’t understand,” whispered Lucia.
“Reproductive biology, Lucia. To produce babies you don’t need just mothers, but fathers, too. Oh, of course, nowadays the new biotechnologies could make anything possible, but the ancient ways are the best, I think … Ninety-five percent of the babies born here are girls. Most of the boys leave after their schooling, and those who stay are mostly either homosexual or neuter.” Neuter: it seemed a strange, cold, clinical term. Rosa went on, “So where are the fathers to come from? From outside, of course — though we like to keep it in the family if we can.”
Lucia stopped. “Rosa, please — who is Giuliano? ”
Rosa smiled, but there was a wistful sadness in her expression. “Why, he’s your lover.”
Chapter 28
It would be a multiple ceremony, Regina decided, an overlapping celebration of life, motherhood, and complicated relationships.
First there was the birth of Aemilia, daughter of Leda, Regina’s half sister, and niece to Regina herself. Then the girl Venus had reached her menarche. Venus was the daughter of Messalina, granddaughter of Regina’s aunt Helena. And at the center of it all would be the marriage of Regina’s own daughter Brica to the young, clear-eyed freedman Castor.
It would all be held, she had decided, on the spring feast of Beltane when, according to the tradition of the Celtae, the warmth of the returning sun and the fertility of the earth were celebrated. Regina and Brica had been here in Rome for two years already, and it would be a nice reminder of her days with Artorius.
Of course her elaborate plans immediately threw everybody into a state of confusion. For days the Order’s big communal house on the Appian Way was filled with the smells of cooking, with the din of clumsily practiced musical instruments, and with the hammering of nails as decorations were put up everywhere.
Which was all, of course, according to Regina’s design. For they all needed a distraction from the looming presence of the Vandals, the dreadful horde of black-painted barbarians who were even now, so it was said, camping on the plains north of Rome.
On the day before the ceremony, Amator came to visit her, at the Order’s house.
He walked into her small office and prowled around its shelves and cupboards, fingering the heaps of scrolls and wax tablets. His face was caked with cosmetics, with white powder on his cheeks and black lining to emphasise his eyes. Despite these expensive efforts he looked his age, or older, and, she knew now, he was plagued by ulcers and gout, the sicknesses of an indulgent old man. Today he seemed oddly nervous.
“I see you have found yourself some gainful employment,” he said. “How long have you been here — two years? You have been busy. Busy, busy, busy.”
She spread her hands over her scrolls and tablets, her seals with the Order’s kissing-fish symbol. “I deal in information. That is how things work, Amator. Businesses, cities, empires. You should know that.”
“I had no idea you had developed such talents.”
“There is much you don’t know about me.”
“Perhaps I should have hired you, rather than Brica.”
She shook her head. “I don’t think so, Amator. My ambitions have nothing to do with you.”
He faced her. “You’re cool now that you don’t need my money anymore, aren’t you? And are these records of your Order’s work?”
“Yes. But there is some history of the Order here — reaching back to the days of Vesta, in fact. I like to maintain such things. And—” She hesitated.
“Yes?”
“There is something of myself as well.” She had begun to write out a kind of biography, the story of her own complicated life and the great events that had shaped it. “I want my granddaughters to know where I came from — how they got here. You have a starring role, Amator.”
He laughed. “You should make it into a play. Your petty self-justification and trivial complaints would be a great favorite in the Theater of Nero.” He turned around, arms spread, almost elegantly, like a dancer. “But none of this scraping and scribbling will do you a grain of good when the barbarians come. All they will want is your money. That and the bodies of your beautiful nieces.”
“I have prepared for that contingency.”
“You are a foolish and complacent old woman. The Vandals will slit your throat.”
“We’ll see.”
He gazed at her, curious, clearly trying to be dismissive, not quite succeeding.
From her first days here she had, in fact, been preparing for the eventuality of breakdown. She had, after all, lived through it all before. Her life had been devoted to finding a safe haven for herself and her family. Rome itself, with its mighty walls and monuments of marble and eight hundred years of arrogant domination, would surely be more shelter than poor Verulamium had been. But still she had prepared what she thought of as a bolt-hole.
For all his bragging, she saw that Amator was not nearly so well prepared. Good, she thought; the more vulnerable he was the better, for she was not done with him yet. Toward that end, in fact, she had made sure to invite him to the wedding of her daughter and the other celebrations. The more he was close to her, the more opportunity she would have to deal with him.
“The ceremonies are not until tomorrow. Why are you here, Amator? Are you so sorry to lose a worker from your bread shop?”
“Brica is a flat, dull girl. She has looks, but none of your spark, little chicken.” But his fencing was unconvincing. “I am more concerned about Sulla.”
“Ah. Honesty at last. Your pretty boy.”
Amator said tensely, “I was not aware until this morning that he is to attend your ceremonies. I had not intended to bring him.”
“We gave him his own invitation.”
“Yes,” he said. “And I know why. Venus. ”
The boy, whose true inclinations evidently did not match Amator’s own, had become besotted with Venus, granddaughter of Helena, and he had been invited to the girl’s coming-of-age ceremony.
“I have no problem with that. The boy has a good heart.”
Amator jabbed a finger at Regina. “I know you engineered this, you witch. You made sure they met, and encouraged their relationship thereafter. And I know why.”