And in her new work, she was happy her own objectives were being fulfilled. She had never found a situation over which she had had so much control — never such an opportunity to achieve safety and security for Brica and herself. Indeed, in a sense the Order, dominated by her own relatives, was itself like an extension of her family.
She had little interest in Julia, though.
After that first meeting with her mother, and after she and Brica had moved into the estate, it seemed that some tension within her had been relieved. This introverted old woman had little to do with Regina’s own vibrant memories of childhood. Sometimes, though, she caught Julia watching her, as if her arrival had stirred up guilt or remorse that she had thought was long buried. If so, Regina would shed no tears.
And anyhow, Julia was not the center of the family. She was — she and the matres, who were with her now as they had always been.
In the morning — the day of the ceremonies — the news was not good.
The last barbarian assault on Rome had come a mere three years before, in the shape of the Huns under their squat and brutal leader Attila, “the Scourge of God.” Pope Leo had met Attila in his headquarters, and had persuaded him to spare the city. But now even the pope, it seemed, could not find a way to persuade the Vandals to turn back.
Despite the ominous news, Regina was determined that her day of celebration would go ahead.
It had begun, in fact, the evening before, when Brica had come to Regina’s room. It was a tradition for a bride to surrender the relics of her childhood, her toys and childish clothes, to the gods of the lararium. But nothing of Brica’s childhood had come with them to Rome. So they cut a lock of her hair, tied it up, and burned it before the matres. Mother and daughter spent the evening quietly, and retired early, with barely a word passing between them, as they had spent so many evenings before.
In the morning Regina and her mother helped Brica prepare for the wedding ceremony. Brica’s hair was dressed in an old Roman way, with six strands separated by a bent iron spear tip. She wore a simple tuniclike dress without a hem, tied around the waist by a woolen girdle. Over her dress she wore a cloak colored a gentle saffron, and on her head she donned an orange veil. Briefly she recaptured the brightness and beauty of the girl of the British forests, and Regina’s tough old heart ached at what she had had to do to her daughter.
The morning was still young when the groom and his family arrived.
Castor had been born a slave, the son of slaves. It had only been recently that he himself had been freed, and with his earnings had been able to purchase the manumission of his mother and father. But both parents still wore around their necks the tags of beaten tin that had once marked out their servitude, evidently an act of perverse pride. They kept themselves to themselves, saying little to Regina, or the other elders of the community.
The ceremony itself was conducted immediately. Helena, Regina’s aunt, acted as the matron of honor. She took the couple’s right hands in her own frail fingers. There was a sacrifice — the killing of a small piglet, carried out in the peristylium — and then came the signing and sealing of contracts, which cemented the transfer of the dowry. All this was witnessed by as many of the community’s students as could cram into the atrium. Some as young as five, they were a giggling, breathless mass of curiosity and eagerness, and Regina thought they loaned the ceremony happiness and light, like bright flowers.
Little Aemilia’s birth ceremony was simple and traditional. It was the eighth day after her birth, so the baby was formally given her names: Aemilia as her family name, and the second taken from the name of her mother. The formal registration of the baby at the Temple of Saturn was to take place the next day.
The father, a stolid man involved in money lending, held the little bundle in his arms and raised her in the air. It was a vital moment for the child, Regina had learned. In Rome, despite its centuries of prosperity, fathers retained the right to reject their children, and the exposure of babies, especially in times of turmoil like the present, was not uncommon.
The coming-of-age ceremony for Venus was more complicated. There was no real Roman tradition to celebrate a girl’s passage from childhood — unlike a boy, who, during the festival of Liber and Libera in March, would dedicate his childish clothes to the household gods, don his toga of manhood for the first time, and then march with his family to the Tabularium for registration. Regina had decided, however, that some such tradition should be instigated for the girls of the Order. So now Venus dressed in a simple stola to mark her adulthood, like that worn by the women who had taught her, though without the purple stripe of the seniors. She was asked to dedicate a scrap of cloth bearing a trace of her first bleeding, carefully wrapped up in white.
Through all this Regina observed Sulla hovering in the background, his doleful eyes on the girl, and Amator lurked behind him, flushed and already drunk, a cup of wine in his hand.
After the ceremonies, the festivities began. The atrium, peristylium, and big reception rooms had been set up for food, music, and dancing. When the party started Sulla made straight for Venus. He lavished on her food, wine, and attention, and danced with her as much as he could. Regina relished the deepening anguish on Amator’s whitened face.
As the day drew to a close, with the banqueting done and the youngest children already falling asleep, the wedding procession formed up. Tradition had it that the bride should be accompanied by three small boys, one to hold her left hand, one her right, and the third to carry a torch lit from the hearth of her mother’s home. Regina had decided that this tradition should be modified a little, and she had three of her younger students take the place of the boys. The procession, of bride, groom, attendants, and wedding guests, would now walk through the streets to the groom’s home. There Brica would throw away the torch, and whoever caught it would be assured a long life. She would smear the doorposts with oil and fat, and wreath them with wool. Then she would let her husband carry her across the threshold. Once inside she would touch fire and water symbolically, and then she would be led to the bedchamber …
But none of this came to pass.
They had not yet left the compound when the first cries came up from the city. “The Vandals! The Vandals are here!”
Regina heard the first screams, saw the first glimmering redness of fires.
Brica clutched her groom’s arm. The wedding procession broke up and the guests milled, carrying their torches, confused. Some of them were too drunk to be truly frightened, and some too drunk to care either way.
Julia came to Regina, wringing her hands. “The Vandals attack by night. Everybody knows that. They blacken their faces and their shields, and—”
Regina took her hands and pressed them between her own. Julia’s fingers were thin, the bones as fragile as a baby bird’s. “Mother,” she said. “Don’t be afraid. I have prepared. Follow my lead. If you support me, nobody need be harmed. Do you understand?”
Through her obvious fear Julia forced a small grin. “You always were the strong one, Regina.”
“I’ll show you the way. There won’t be room for everybody. Family first, of course. Hurry, Mother!”
As Julia bustled away through the confused crowd in search of Helena and the other elders, Regina pulled Brica away from her groom and her attendants. Castor drifted after them, uncertain. They ran first to the small shrine, where Regina swept up the three matres, and then to the peristylium.