Of late, however, Marjanita’s loyalties seemed to be more procedural than full-spirited. Ever since they had arrived in Greece, Calpurnia had noticed that something weighed heavily on Marjanita’s mind. She was more irritable than usual, and Calpurnia suspected she worried, or brooded, over someone in her distant homeland. Calpurnia had never known Marjanita to be affectionate in any way, but she had on two occasions seen her gazing off to the east from the balcony of the villa. Those had been the only two times Calpurnia had ever seen Marjanita’s face not set in something bordering on perturbation. It had afforded her a brief glimpse of the woman beneath the assassin, and had left her wondering if Marjanita was beginning to tire of the oath she made to a man who was now dead.
“Tricostas sends you greeting, my lady.” Marjanita said through quivering, blue lips, after she had donned her dress and had wrapped her wet hair in a blanket. “He is pleased that you are well.”
Tricostas was captain of the Faun, a trireme moored half a mile away. He was one of Calpurnia’s most trusted friends. They had been friends since childhood, and he was still loyal to her. She had often relied on Tricostas to give her dependable updates on her father’s health and state of mind, and he had always kept their communications confidential. She had faith in the word of Tricostas, not Naevius, or any of the other captains of the heavy ships. They were all political appointees with their own agendas.
“Yes, yes,” Calpurnia said impatiently. “But tell me, Marjanita, does he know anything about my father’s death?”
“Nothing more than he has already shared with you in the messages sent by carrier bird, my lady. He knows nothing of the circumstances surrounding the admiral’s death, but he did confirm that a small vessel bearing the flag of the Senate went alongside the Argonaut earlier on the same day the admiral was murdered.”
“Does he know who was aboard that craft, or which Senators met with my father?”
“No, my lady. The Faun was on the opposite edge of the fleet at the time. He only knows that the Senate vessel had already departed by the time your father was found and pronounced dead.”
Calpurnia slapped her hands together in frustration. “Postumus had something to do with it. I know it, Marjanita. The way he acted at dinner tonight, complacent and amiable, heaping compliments on the Argonaut’s officers, entertaining them with humorous stories, as if he were running for Praetor again. I would bet my life he was the one who visited my father that day.”
“It is very likely, my lady.”
“I know he is guilty, Marjanita. If not of personally murdering my father, then of arranging it. I forced myself to wear a pleasant face tonight. His stories were sordid and crass, but I listened to them all while he had every man at the table roaring with laughter. He wanted it to bother me. I could see it in his eyes. He wanted me to leave, Marjanita, and I wanted to. He expects me to run home crying like a little girl. He wants me out of his way. But I will remain here, and I will defy him.”
“Do you believe him to be the one you seek, my lady?”
Calpurnia looked at her for a long moment. “Yes. In my heart, I do.”
“Then this murder of your father gives you yet another reason to destroy him. The gods demand nothing less. The pig is well protected by those two bodyguards of his, and his aide, but I know I can get to him. Give me the word, my lady, and I will bury my dagger in his heart before the sun sets again.”
“No, Marjanita. Not yet. We must have proof. We must know for certain. Anything less and I will carry the doubt with me to my grave.”
XIV
Later that night, Calpurnia bedded down in her father's cot. Marjanita had wished to remain in the chamber with her, fearing more sinister intentions by the senator and his cohorts, but Calpurnia wished to be alone and ordered the overprotective handmaid to sleep in the antechamber just beyond the screen.
It was a peaceful moment after a long day that had begun with her father’s funeral and had ended with the raucous dinner. The wind whipped the flap drawn across the window. The toll of the distant ships' bells signaled the changing of the night watch. Feet padded dully on the deck outside. Sailors, crowded around fires, conversed in muffled voices. All of these things, with the gentle roll of the harbor swell, sent her into a deep sleep. She dreamed of the days when she was but a girl, and her father was rising in the cursus honorum. She played with her brothers, Drusus and Quintus, on the grounds of the family's country villa just outside of Rome. There was much laughing. Smiles crossed the faces of her parents as they watched from the veranda, smiles she had not seen in many years. Then, they were playing a game of hide-and-go-seek. Drusus and Quintus were hiding from her. She searched the grounds, inspecting every nook of the house, behind every cypress tree, behind every column, but she could not find them. As she continued to search, she began to realize that she was completely alone. Her parents were gone from the veranda, and no one was around – no slaves, no attendants, no one! She went into the house, but it, too, was deserted. Then, suddenly, the house began to crumble before her eyes, as if rocked by an earthquake. It shook and dissolved around her, and she felt as though she would be crushed at any moment. But then, a giant arm suddenly scooped her up, and carried her outside to safety. Soon, the house was nothing more than heaps of brick and shattered columns. As the dust settled, she saw a solitary figure standing amidst the ruins in a shaft of sunlight. It was not her father, or her brothers, but she somehow knew this was the man who had saved her. He was a warrior unlike any she had ever seen at that point in her young life, a horseman of the east, squat and compact, built with powerful, long arms in which he held a strung bow with exquisite, recurved tips. His windblown, shoulder-length hair brushed past his eyes as he looked down upon her. The eyes were not hateful, nor compassionate, but were somehow all-knowing, and she felt as though the mysterious warrior understood every emotion she was feeling at that moment, like no one in her life ever had.
It was a dream she had had many times before, and from which she always awoke most disturbed. She woke now, breathing heavily as she collected her bearings. It took her a few moments to remember where she was. The dark room was suddenly much colder, and she realized that the leather flap that had been secured across the window now flailed freely in the wind allowing a faint shaft of moonlight to filter through. She froze and listened intently. She could hear the quiet voices of two sailors chatting casually outside. She heard another man relieving himself into the harbor, but nothing was out of the ordinary. Not moving from the bed, she began to scan the room, methodically identifying every object. The table, the chests, the brace of armor, the cage – all were in their proper places, but something was not right. She was overwhelmed by the sudden feeling that there was another presence in the room, and that it had been this unseen presence, not the violent end of her dream, that had awoken her.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw something move – a shadow that quickly merged with other shadows. Her ears detected a noise that she had earlier dismissed as the wind, a labored breathing, as though the air was being drawn through a collapsed lung. It was faint, but it was there, and her body went icy still with fright.
Could it be her handmaid? No, Marjanita knew better than to disturb her unannounced. Perhaps it was an assassin, sent by Postumus. Or, perhaps the evil spirit that had tormented her father's soul still lingered in this room.
She waited for what seemed an eternity, and had almost convinced herself that her imagination was getting the best of her, when the shadow suddenly moved again. A putrid aroma filled her nostrils as she came to the realization that this was not some apparition. The outline of a hair-covered beast took shape before her bed. A single, wild eye illuminated by the moonlight looked directly into hers. She started to scream, but the creature flashed into motion, bounding the few paces that separated them before she could get out any more than a muffled cry. In an instant, her mouth was compressed by a giant, leathery hand, the foul-smelling fingers and calloused palm preventing her from making any further sounds. Then the creature’s terrifying features were suddenly before her face. The loose withered skin of an empty eye socket, the black and yellow teeth protruding at an odd angle from the small mouth, the flat nose speckled with wiry black hairs, hovered above her for several long moments like something summoned from her deepest nightmares, and though she recognized the face and knew full well this was no demon nor a dream, her heart still pounded with terror. The one wild eye stared into hers. There was an intelligence in that eye, an understanding and awareness that seemed out of place when taken with the other frightening features. The look stirred a memory from years past, a memory that made her want to stop resisting, but her instincts told her she was in danger, that the same hands that restrained her now had killed before, and that no matter how searching and pleading the solitary eye might appear, she must resist it with all of her might.