wine before passing it over.
‘Your life belongs to Caesar, lad. He told you enough times. If you take the field against him after what happened, there’ll be no mercy from him, not again.’
‘My duty is with Pompey,’ Seneca replied.
Ahenobarbus looked at him and blew air out in a long sigh. ‘Your honour is your own, though. Will you break the oath to Caesar?’
‘An oath to an enemy does not bind me, sir.’
‘Well it binds me, lad, because I say it does. You want to think whose side you would rather be on. If you go to Pompey, Caesar will cut your balls off.’
Seneca stood, flushed with anger. ‘As he did yours?’ he said.
Ahenobarbus slammed his fist onto the table, making the dust rise in a cloud. ‘Would you rather he had killed all of us? That’s what Pompey would have done! He said he was coming to restore order and law and then he proved it, Seneca, by letting us go and trusting our oath. He impressed me, lad, and if you weren’t so busy looking for your next promotion, you’d see why.’
‘I can see he did impress you. Enough to forget the loyalty you owe the Senate and the Dictator.’
‘Don’t lecture me, boy!’ Ahenobarbus snapped. ‘Look up from your precious books and see what’s happening. The wolves are out, do you understand? Ever since Caesar came south. Do you think Pompey’s interested in your loyalty? Your noble Senate would crush you for a jug of wine, if they were thirsty.’
For a moment of strained silence, both men faced each other, breathing heavily.
‘I used to wonder why a man of your years was given no more than a road fort to command,’ Seneca said stiffly. ‘I understand it now. I will lecture any Roman soldier who does not give his life into the hands of his superiors. I would expect no less from those who follow me. I won’t sit this out, Ahenobarbus. I would call that cowardice.’
His contempt was written in every line of his young face and Ahenobarbus suddenly felt too tired to go on.
‘Then I will pour a little wine into your grave when I find it. That’s the best I can offer you.’
Seneca turned his back without saluting and left the room, his footprints visible in the dust behind him. Ahenobarbus snorted in anger and lifted the wineskin, pressing his fingers in deeply.
A stranger entered only a few minutes later, finding him drawing idly in the dust on the table, lost in thought.
‘Sir? I have been sent by my master to hear if you have any news,’ the man said without preamble.
Ahenobarbus looked up at him. ‘Who is left to be sending anyone anywhere? I thought the Senate had all gone with Pompey.’
The man looked uncomfortable and Ahenobarbus realised he had not given his master’s name.
‘Some of the Senate did not see the need to travel, sir. My master was one of those.’
Ahenobarbus grinned. ‘Then you’d better run back and tell him Caesar is coming. He’s two, maybe three hours behind me. He’s bringing back the Republic, lad, and I wouldn’t stand in his way.’
The extraordinarii stood by their mounts, heaving at the great doors of the Quirinal gate in the north of the city. It had been left unbarred and the walls were empty of soldiers to challenge them. Now that the moment had come, there was a hush over the city and the streets by the gate were deserted. The Gaul riders exchanged glances, sensing eyes on them.
The tramp of the four legions was a muted thunder. The extraordinarii could feel the vibration under their feet and dust shimmered in the cracks between the stones. Fifteen thousand men marched towards the city that had declared them traitor. They came in ranks of six abreast and the tail of the column stretched back further than the eye could see.
At the head came Julius on a prancing dark gelding of the best bloodlines in Spain. Mark Antony and Brutus rode a pace to the rear, with shields ready in their hands. Domitius, Ciro and Octavian made up the spearhead and all of them felt the tension of the moment with something like awe. They had known the city as a home and a distant mother and as a dream. To see the gates open and the walls unguarded was a strange and frightening thing. They did not talk or joke as they rode in and the marching men of the column kept the same silence. The city waited for them.
Julius rode under the arch of the gate and smiled as its shadow crossed his face in a dark bar. He had seen cities in Greece and Spain and Gaul, but they could only ever be reflections of this place. The simple order of the houses and the neat lines of paving spoke to something in him and made him sit straighter in the saddle. He used the reins to turn his Spanish mount to the right, where the forum waited for him. Despite the solemnity of the moment, he was hard-pressed to keep his dignity. He wanted to grin, to shout a greeting to his people and his home, lost to him for so many years.
The streets were no longer empty, he saw. Curiosity had opened the doors of homes and businesses to reveal dark interiors. The people of Rome peered out at the Gaul legions, drawn by the glamour of the stories they had heard. There was not a man or woman in Rome who had not listened to the reports from Gaul. To see those soldiers in the flesh was irresistible.
‘Throw the coins, Ciro. Bring them out,’ Julius called over his shoulder and he did grin then at the big man’s tension.
Like Octavian beside him, Ciro carried a deep bag tied to his saddle and he reached into it to grasp a handful of silver coins, each bearing the face of the man they followed. The coins rang on the stones of the city and Julius saw children run from their hiding places to snatch them before they could come to rest. He remembered standing at Marius’ side in a Triumph long ago and seeing the crowd dip in waves to receive the offerings. It was more than the silver that they wanted and only the poorest would spend the coins. Many more would be kept for a blessing, or made into a pendant for a wife or lover. They carried the face of a man who had become famous through his battles in Gaul and yet was still a stranger to all but a very few.
The shrill excitement of the children brought out their parents. More and more of them came to reach for the coins and laugh with relief. The column had not come to destroy or loot the city, not after such a start.
Ciro and Octavian emptied the bags quickly and two more were passed forward to them. The crowd had begun to thicken, as if half of Rome had been waiting for some unseen signal. They did not all smile at the sight of so many armed men on the streets. Many of the faces were angry and dark, but as the column wound its way through the city, they grew fewer, lost amongst the rest.
Julius passed the old house of Marius, glancing through the gates to the courtyard he had seen first as a boy. He looked behind him for Brutus and knew that he shared the same memories. The old place was shuttered and bare, but it would be opened again and given life. Julius enjoyed the metaphor and tried to frame it into something appropriate for the speech he would make, choosing and discarding words as he rode. He preferred to be seen as a spontaneous speaker, but every phrase had been written in the wheatfields, with Adàn.
It was eerie to retrace the steps he had marched with the old Primigenia, before they had been scattered by the enemies of his family. His uncle had walked right up to the steps of the senate house and demanded the Triumph they owed him. Julius shook his head in amused memory as he recalled the bull of a man Marius had been. The laws had meant nothing to him and the city had worshipped his irreverence, electing him consul more times than any man in the city’s history. They were different, wilder days then and the world had been smaller.
A child scrambled onto the street after a rolling coin and Julius pulled on the reins to avoid knocking him down. He saw the boy hold his treasure aloft in a moment