Anno Mortis Read online

  The guards - one short and dark, the other tall and fair - exchanged a look.

  "Caesar's busy right now," the shorter one said. "Not to be disturbed."

  Petronius felt a rising tide of exasperation and fury swamping his good sense. He pushed the guard's sword aside with a violent jerk. "Listen to me, you idiots—"

  "Now, now," the taller guard said. "There's no need to be insulting." He grasped the front of Petronius's tunic and pulled him high on his toes until they were face to face. The soldier's breath smelled of fish, and there was a half-moon of pimples round each corner of his mouth.

  "Oh, leave him be," the second guard said. "Send him in and let Caesar deal with him - however he chooses."

  The tall guard smirked as he dropped Petronius, who teetered for a moment on his heels before regaining his balance. He ostentatiously smoothed down his tunic. "I can pass then?"

  The short guard scratched a hand through the rough stubble on his chin. "Go ahead - it's your life, citizen."

  The other man held the door open with a mocking bow. Petronius hurried through, his heart pounding. Caligula had listened to them earlier, but there was no guarantee he'd do it now. The unpredictability of his moods was notorious. And Petronius had no evidence of wrongdoing tonight, only instinct. He just had to hope that would be enough.

  "They're meeting somewhere else," Boda said. And as soon as she said it, it was completely obvious. The cultists would have been fools to return to a known location to hold their ceremony. She and Vali were fools for assuming it.

  Vali's face looked very pale in the torchlight and she could see the strain in the lines around his mouth. "Where then?"

  She shrugged. "Back in Rome? The chamber under the baths, maybe? Not here, anyway."

  "We can still find them," he said. And though neither of them really believed it, they started moving again, retracing their steps back. They had to try. What else was there to do?

  But they had no more idea how to leave the cavern than they'd known how to find it. Following their own tracks was impossible. Nearly a hundred cultists had fled from here yesterday, setting off in every direction and leaving footprint on top of footprint throughout the surrounding tunnels.

  "Up," she said, because that had worked before. Vali nodded and reached out to clasp her hand. His was warm and she could feel his pulse beating a comforting rhythm through his palm. Then he pulled and they started to run, heading down the broadest of the tunnels that led from the sacrificial chamber.

  The air down here was stale. Within a few paces she felt as if she'd already sucked all the nourishment out of it. Her lungs burned as they strove for more and her legs wobbled but she forced herself to keep moving. Vali's torch cast an uncertain light ahead of them, flickering and nearly dying as they moved.

  Its flame was little more than a spark when the pit opened in the rock floor in front of them. Neither of them saw it in time. A stride ahead of her, Vali fell in first, and his grip on her hand dragged her in after.

  The bottom was a very long way down and when she hit it, she hit it hard. There was a brief bright flash of red behind her eyes, then darkness.

  Caligula was naked, and so were the three women who were with him. The youngest sat astride him, brown hair flowing down her shoulders as her head was thrown back in - Petronius suspected - feigned ecstasy.

  The second squatted athwart his face and looked like she might genuinely be enjoying herself. It was probably the most fun she'd had in years - her hair was bone-white and her cheeks seamed with wrinkles. They crinkled further as her lips spread wide in a rictus of pleasure.

  The third woman, a portly matron, lay sprawled alongside Caligula's lean body. She wasn't participating, just gasping for breath as if she'd recently been exerting herself.

  There was something curious about the women's faces, and after a moment Petronius realised what it was. They all had the same upturned nose and rounded cheeks, the exact same shade of hazel eyes. They looked like the same woman pictured at different stages of her life. They were clearly a family, mother, daughter, and grandmother.

  The mother opened her eyes and saw him staring. She screamed and sat up, clutching her hands to her breasts. The daughter jerked round at the sound, pivoting on Caligula's cock, and the grandmother fell backwards against the headboard, uncovering his face.

  He looked murderously angry. "Get out!" he said. "Get out, and I'll kill you when I've finished!"

  Petronius took a step back. He wanted to take more. He wanted to get out of there as fast as he could, and most of all he didn't want the image of the four of them seared on his mind for whatever remained of his life.

  His hand trembled as he covered his eyes, but he didn't retreat. "I'm sorry, Caesar. I didn't mean to interrupt, but this couldn't wait."

  Petronius heard the bed creaking and risked a peak between his fingers. Caligula had sat up, drawing the sheet around him. "Wait," he said. "You're one of them - a friend of those barbarians who told me about the Cult." He frowned. "Is something wrong?"

  "Yes!" Petronius's voice was breathy with relief. "Yes, something's very wrong. They're gathering, Caesar. Tonight - in the Temple of Isis."

  Caligula's petulant mouth turned down. "But you told me they wouldn't meet for another month. You lied to me!"

  Petronius bowed his head. "I'm sorry. We didn't mean to - we didn't know. But tonight I was walking through the streets and I saw them, and I thought..." He swallowed as he looked into Caligula's pale, unreadable eyes. "I thought there was only one man in Rome with the power and wisdom to deal with this."

  Rage twisted Caligula's mouth and Petronius stumbled against the wall as he backed away from it. He could feel his heart beating in his throat. Then, like a storm cloud in a high wind, the expression passed swiftly across the Emperor's face to be replaced with one of mild irritation. He flung the covers away from him and, buck-naked, strode across the room and through the door.

  He paused on the other side and glanced back over his shoulder at Petronius. "Well, come on then. We haven't got time to waste!"

  Boda knew that she'd only been unconscious for a few seconds. She could still feel the reverberation of the impact through her bones. She struggled to sit up, squashing something soft beneath her. It let out a groan and she realised that it was Vali. He must have cushioned her fall.

  "Are you all right?" she asked.

  "I'd be better if you took your knee out of my crotch," he told her.

  Clearly not hurt too badly, then. She rolled away, onto her back. There was still light and she realised that the torch had fallen to the ground beside them, weakly aflame. It illuminated the sheer rock walls of the pit, stretching three times the height of a man above them. The small square of darkness at the top looked very distant.

  Vali grunted as he sat up beside her and propped the torch against the wall. She saw that there was a smear of dirt on his left cheek, and his hair was sticking up at wild angles, glinting red in the torchlight. He caught her expression and asked: "What?"

  She shrugged, smiling. "You're not always perfectly in control, then."

  He laughed. "Very seldom, in fact."

  She climbed to her feet, wincing as muscle and bone protested. She didn't think anything was broken, but she'd barely recovered from her long imprisonment in the cage, and now she felt as slow and inflexible as a woman of seventy. She sighed and let her fingers trail over the wall, searching for finger-holds.

  Nothing. "Do we have rope?" she asked Vali, but she knew the answer before he shook his head.

  He was sitting cross-legged, staring down at the ground rather than at her. She saw him prod it tentatively with a finger.

  "I don't think we're going to be able to dig our way out," she told him.

  "They're bones," he said. "Look."

  He was right. When she knelt beside him she saw that the five white lumps she'd mistaken for pebbles were the fingers of a skeletal hand. And there beside them, half buried in the dirt, was the dome of a s
kull. There were still scraps of skin attached to it and strands of brittle black hair.

  He picked up the torch and swept it over the floor and she could see suddenly why it was so uneven. The bodies must have been piled on top of each other, who knew how deep? There was only a thin layer of grit and dust on top of them, barely hiding the withered arms and sunken chests. There was nowhere to stand that wasn't on the dead.

  She could hear her own breath, harsh and rasping. She'd never been afraid of death. She'd seen enough of it, over the years. But when she looked down at the piled bodies beneath her she remembered the corpses the cult had raised and her stomach heaved. The torchlight flickering over the bones seemed to make them dance. She was afraid to take her eyes off them in case they actually did.

  She looked up again at the walls of the pit. Even if she climbed on Vali's shoulders, she'd barely reach halfway to freedom. And she'd never been much of a climber. She preferred to feel the earth beneath her feet. Unable to help herself, her gaze dropped back down to the carpet of bones. In a few months, their own might be among them.

  In the end, Caligula was only able to muster twenty of the Praetorian Guard. The rest were at the palace or off duty, and there was no time to gather them.

  When they marched across the square to the gates of the temple, people stopped to stare. They were mute, but their faces spoke volumes. Petronius wondered if Caligula knew how much his subjects hated him. Or did he only care about their fear?

  The cultists guarding the entrance to the temple were afraid. Petronius could see that they wanted to bar Caligula's way. They'd no doubt been told to stop all comers, but whoever had given them their orders couldn't have anticipated that Caesar himself would demand entrance.

  "Let me through," he said imperiously, and they glanced at each other and stepped aside.

  The gates were guarded by silver statues of the goddess, horned head looking down at them. Petronius looked up at her face as they passed. Narcissus had said she was considered kind, but he didn't think whoever sculpted these statues had thought so. Her face was beautiful but remote, as if no human troubles could touch her.

  The interior of the temple was dark, despite the torches which lined the walls. Petronius saw that there was a vast round hole in the ceiling, a few stars glittering distantly through it. He guessed it was meant to let in the moonlight, when the moon could be seen.

  More cultists rushed towards them as they marched on. Their sandals slapped against the marble floor and they brought the smell of incense with them, and a faint copper whiff of blood. Petronius felt his gut clench. Were they too late? Had the sacrifice already happened?

  "Caesar," the first cultist said. "You come at an inauspicious time."

  Petronius recognised the vacuous woman he'd spoken to at the last Cult meeting. She was pale and sweating and he could hear her yellow robe rustling as she trembled. She must know the risk she took speaking to Caligula this way.

  He ignored her, continuing to stride forward and forcing her to trot along beside him. "There's a ceremony in progress," she gabbled as she ran. "Initiates only."

  He did stop at that, his glare freezing her tongue. "Are you denying your Emperor entry? Do you really think that's wise?"

  He pushed past her as she stammered an answer, and then they were at the heart of the temple. Another statue of the goddess towered in front of them, far larger than those at the door. Its face was nearly lost in shadow high above, but Petronius didn't think it looked any kinder than the others.

  When they'd first entered, the low hum of Sopdet's chanting had drifted through the temple. That had stopped, but as they drew nearer to the gathered cultists, another sound grew louder. Petronius thought it was the cultists chattering until he saw that they were silent, turned from their circle to watch Caligula's approach. The ring of corpses surrounding them stood so still they might actually have been dead. Only their bandages fluttered in the slight breeze.

  The sound was coming from a stack of crates behind them. As his eyes adjusted to the light, Petronius could make out something moving inside them, brown and restless like a muddy puddle in the rain. Two more paces and he flinched as he realised that the crates were entirely full of beetles.

  Caligula noticed them too. He shuddered and turned to Sopdet. Petronius saw with relief that the knife in her hand was still clean and white. Above her head, a black slave writhed on the grill to which he was chained. The body beneath him on the altar was motionless.

  Sopdet lowered the knife as Caligula approached.

  "So it's true then," Caligula said. Around him, the Praetorian Guard drew their swords, scarlet cloaks swirling back to free their arms.

  Sopdet bowed her head in submission, but when she raised it again, her eyes were unapologetic. Petronius saw that the cultists, pale and frightened, were watching her rather than Caligula - as if the high priestess represented the greater source of danger.

  "Caesar, this isn't what you think," she said.

  Caligula glanced around him. The Temple was bare, no ornamentation or treasure except the vast statue of the goddess and the bare stone of the altar on which a freshly wrapped corpse lay. Beyond the light of their torches, the room faded into darkness. Anything could have been hiding in it, and the soldiers shifted uneasily, moving until both Petronius and their Emperor were ringed by a circle of steel.

  At the outer edges of the light, the twelve corpses suddenly moved, taking shuffling steps forward as if they intended to fight the soldiers for their mistress. Petronius saw the men's eyes narrow - then widen as they realised what the bandage-wrapped figures were. The stench of death hung heavy around them.

  Caligula noticed them too. His fingers fluttered nervously, then tightened into a fist. When he looked back at Sopdet he seemed both more frightened and more determined.

  "But you are raising the dead, I can see it."

  She held out her hands, palm up, letting the bone knife clatter to the marble floor. "We have opened a gateway to the other world, yes."

  Petronius pushed forward till he was standing level with Caligula. "And you plan to keep it open, don't you? To break down the barrier between life and death?"

  The thousands of beetles hissed, as if in agreement, and Sopdet nodded. Behind her, several members of the Cult gasped. They hadn't known and - judging by Seneca's worried frown - they hadn't been intended to know.

  "I don't think I can allow that," Caligula said. "I know offering you a trial would be the decent thing to do, but let's be honest -" his eyes swept the crowd of cultists cowering away from him "- there are for too many important people here for a trial to be politic. So I'll just put you all to the sword now, and make up an excuse afterwards."

  He gestured at the Praetorian Guard, a negligent flick of his wrist. There was a moment's hesitation - there were Senators among the crowd, and two of the richest men in Rome - but only a moment. The soldiers could see the corpses rotting beneath their bandages. They understood why these people had to be disposed of.

  Some of the cultists screamed. Petronius saw a man with a big, sweaty face and hairy arms cower behind a petite woman who was probably his wife. Another dropped to his knees and then his side, curling his arms round his head as if that might somehow protect him. He smelt the sharp stench of urine as one or more of them lost control of their bladders. And these were the people who had planned to end the world? Petronius almost felt sorry for them. But he saw the slave struggling, suspended above the altar, and he remembered Boda's face when she'd thought she was about to die, and his pity curdled into contempt.

  Only Sopdet seemed unafraid. Her face was as beautiful and serene as the statue's she stood under. "Kill us," she said, "and you'll never see her again this side of Hades."

  Petronius had no idea what she meant, but he could see that Caligula did. His face twisted, though it was impossible to tell if it was with anger or pain. "Stop," he whispered.

  The Praetorian Guard hesitated, looking round. They didn't know if the order
had been for them, or for the priestess.

  Petronius didn't think Caligula knew either. In the taut silence he left, Sopdet took a step forward. She was barefoot, her feet startlingly brown against the white marble beneath them.

  "Think, Caesar," she said. "If the gates are open, all may return. We have only to call them through. There will be no more mourning, or grief. Mother and daughter, husband and wife, brother and sister - need never be parted."

  Caligula licked his lips, a nervous flick of his tongue. Petronius realised with a jolt of terror that the Emperor was actually moved by these arguments.

  Petronius clasped Caligula's arm, hard enough for his nails to bite into flesh, not caring that he could be killed for it. They'd all be dead anyway, if Caesar gave in. "Don't listen to her," he said. "The gate between life and death is barred for a reason."

  Caligula turned to look at him, a wild, almost pleading look in his eyes. "Is it? And why do people die, tell me that?" His voice thickened. "Why did she die when I loved her so much? What's the point of being Caesar if I can't open the gates of death when I want?"

  Petronius shook him a little. Some of the soldiers shuffled their feet, a few pointed their swords at him. But nobody moved. Everything balanced on this one man's decision - this one, selfish, cruel, half-crazy man.

  "The gods forbid it," Petronius said. "They'll punish you."

  Caligula wrenched his arm free. Petronius could see the red half-moons where his nails had bitten in, and Caligula rubbed them absently as he spoke. "I am a god, you fool."

  "Indeed you are," Sopdet said, and Petronius could hear in the feline satisfaction of her voice that she knew she'd won. "And Isis is a goddess, the mother of the sun, and this is what she commands."

  "Then let it be done," Caligula said. "Let the gates of death be opened."

  Sopdet moved as quickly as a striking snake, stooping to pick up the bone knife from the floor, then jumping to balance on the edge of the altar. The knife swept out, a white blur through the air, and its keen edge ripped through the slave's throat.