‘Come to the point, Brutus. We’re all tired. What actually happened in the end?’
‘Marcellus tried to bring a verdict of treason against the state. After all, though the evidence was entirely circumstantial, it was pretty compelling nonetheless. You’ve got to try and see it from an objective point of view. You were found over the bodies of both Romans and Gauls with a sword in your hand – within the pomerium, in a building that theoretically contains no blades. The presence of the Gauls and their blades wasn’t likely to do much to change the verdict. Fortunately, Galba managed to turn that blow well enough. Even the serpents in the senate baulk when asked to bring a capital verdict against a patrician with a history of valiant military service.’
Fronto let out a relieved sigh. ‘Good. I’m sick of putting the good of Rome above self and family and with no consideration in return. I’ve spent seven years helping conquer Gaul for the republic, but it’s starting to strike me that I’ve done the world irreparable harm there. It’s becoming unpleasantly clear to me that the Gauls have an innate sense of justice and loyalty that is sadly lacking in Rome. Just look at the men in this room alone. Biorix, Galronus and Cavarinos. Each one a Gaul of some tribe who has put their life and freedom on the line time and again to help a republic that couldn’t care less about them.’
‘There are still good men in the republic, Fronto,’ said Brutus defensively. ‘Look at Galba, for instance. Without him you’d be facing a death sentence.’
Fronto huffed. ‘A few years ago I pulled away from Caesar. I saw trouble in him. I saw him treading a dangerous path of power and becoming a new Sulla, commanding Rome alone and with an iron fist, disposing of his enemies and directing policy – a king in all but name. Seeing how much worse Pompey was drove me back, but I still think that’s the general’s end goal. The odd thing is: the more time I spend in this pit of serpents, the more I think that a new dictator might be just what this sickly, diseased republic needs.’
He had expected some rebuttal from Brutus, but his friend’s expression was bleak.
‘I didn’t get off free, did I?’
‘No. I am the bearer of awful tidings, in fact.’ He passed over a sealed document with a troubled expression. Fronto looked down, wiping a faint sheen of sweat from his forehead, cracked the seal, unfurled the document and read down it, his face darkening as he did so.
‘What is it, Marcus?’ Lucilia murmured nervously.
Fronto took a deep breath, his face stony. ‘It is the judgement of the senate that the evidence of my motive is far too circumstantial to support any accusation of treason, or even of murder, despite the bodies at the scene. However, since there is clear record that I was bearing a military blade whose source could not be adequately determined as coming from anywhere other than my own person, I have been tried and convicted of breaking the sacred laws of the pomerium.’
‘And?’
‘And for a period of ten years, I am banished. I am to remove myself from Rome and all Italian soil for the duration of that sentence. Additionally, all my property is forfeit and has been claimed by the state.’
Lucilia’s hand flew to her mouth in shock. ‘This cannot be, Marcus?’
Fronto shook his head slightly as he looked around the assembled faces. Many dark or disapproving, some shocked or even horrified. Only his mother seemed to be oddly unaffected. ‘It is,’ he replied. ‘Our holdings in Rome will go. The Campanian vineyards and the house at Paestum. This villa, too, since I am official paterfamilias of the family. All of it.’
His mother nodded. ‘In these vicious days of politics, such a sentence is commonplace. Many of your contemporaries have suffered exile in their time, and usually for standing up for what is good against tyrants. It speaks well of you, my son, that you are so righteous that the snakes of the senate need to banish you to feel safe.’
Fronto gave his mother a sad smile. His strength – his moral character had all come from her blood.
‘Your senate exiles you, but only for a time?’ Cavarinos frowned.
Balbus nodded. ‘Ten years is long enough, but the property confiscation is usually worse. It’s basically a sentence of destitution or even death for most. Luckily, I have plenty of funds, so you’ll not find yourself lacking, Marcus. Where will you go?’
‘To Massilia, of course.’
‘But our property…?’ his sister murmured, still in shock.
‘Massilia is not inside the republic and, as the city’s boule have been so fond of reminding me this year, the land on which our villas are built is contested ground. If Rome tries to confiscate a villa on land that Massilia considers theirs there will be a great deal of trouble. I think the senate and even Marcellus will leave us that land rather than risk opening a war against free Massilia.’
‘Besides,’ Balbus added, ‘the deeds to the place are actually still in my name. I keep meaning to lodge the records with your name instead, but I’ve not got to Rome yet to do it. Officially you own nothing at Massilia, and the senate’s decree will not stretch to my property.’
Brutus nodded. ‘And thanks to Galba’s expert defence, it’s only a lesser banishment, not Aquae et Ignis Interdictio. At least you get to keep your citizenship and leave with your head held high, so in ten years’ time you can take up where you left off, and so long as you can maintain funds, your boys’ future won’t suffer.’
Fronto nodded. ‘All is not lost. This stinking pit of corruption and failure might take against us, but we have somewhere to run and a name to hold on to. There are still men in the republic who will see me in the same light as always.’
Lucilia frowned suspiciously. ‘You’re going back to Caesar, aren’t you?’
‘No,’ Fronto shook his head. ‘Just Massilia. Somewhere safe.’
But he couldn’t meet the gaze that burned into him from beneath her furrowed brows.
The world was closing in now, and the republic was polarising. With Marcellus in Pompey’s purse and the consuls of Rome actively defying Caesar, two sides were emerging from the chaos of the past few years as he’d been fearing for so long, and Fronto couldn’t help but feel that the lines were already being drawn.
When it came down to the bones of the matter, Fronto knew where his lines were.
And Massilia would be close…