Empire (43 page)

“Alright, then,” said Vitellius, “enough of this. Lucretia is dead. The audience is thrilled. Her lifeless body remains on the bed during the rest of the play, while her grief-stricken husband rouses the people to revolt.
Sextus Tarquinius gets his comeuppance, and the chorus delivers the final lines. You needn’t stay for this part, eunuch. You and your friends are dismissed. Go back to your quarters. And practice your lines!”

Her gown torn and her hair in disarray, Sporus managed to stumble across the stage and step down from the dais. The Praetorian who had been blocking Epictetus stepped aside and allowed him to join her. Lucius and Epaphroditus rose from their couches and made their way across the room.

As they stepped into the hallway, Asiaticus suddenly blocked their way. He seized Sporus’s chin in a viselike grip and flashed a lascivious grin. “Did you enjoy that?” he said. “I know I did.”

Sporus tried to draw back, but Asiaticus held her fast. “Tomorrow night, we do it for real, for everyone to see.”

“Not . . . in front of an audience!” whispered Sporus

“Of course in front of the audience. That’s the whole point. Exciting, isn’t it? Here, feel how excited I am, just thinking about the things I’ll do to you while everyone watches.” Asiaticus pressed one of her hands between his legs and whispered in her ear, “Feels like a dagger, doesn’t it? And when I’m done with you tomorrow night, when you reach under the bed, you’ll find a real dagger waiting for you, not a toy.” He thrust his tongue into Sporus’s ear. She wriggled and squealed. He bit her earlobe, sinking his teeth into the flesh.

Sporus pulled free. She ran weeping down the hallway.

Lucius and his companions stood speechless. Asiaticus threw back his head and laughed.

Vitellius called to him from the banquet chamber, “Asiaticus! Leave the eunuch alone. You’ll have your way with that disgusting creature soon enough. Get back in here. We need to rehearse your exit speech!”

The Praetorians who escorted them back to Epaphroditus’s apartments did not depart but took up stations in the hallway outside.

Sporus resisted all attempts to comfort her. She withdrew to her bedroom and closed the door.

On a terrace overlooking Nero’s meadows and the lake, Epaphroditus
sat and covered his face with his hands. Epictetus muttered and paced, tugging at his beard.

“Can this really be happening?” said Lucius. “Does Vitellius really expect—”

“It’s quite clear what he expects,” said Epaphroditus. “Tomorrow night, before an audience, Sporus will be publicly raped—the consort of two emperors degraded like the lowest prostitute! Then she’ll be given a dagger to commit suicide for the amusement of Vitellius and his friends.”

“Seneca and Nero are responsible for this,” said Epictetus.

“How do you arrive at that conclusion?” Epaphroditus looked up at him wearily.

“Vitellius is merely taking their work one step further. Seneca debased the whole idea of stage plays with those obscene dramas he wrote, playing up the prurient interest and the meaningless horror, making hopelessness and horror the whole point of the play. Nero took the tradition of execution as a public spectacle and raised it to what he and his depraved friends considered art—burning people alive and inducing bulls to rape young girls while the audience in the stands applauded and cheered. Now Vitellius intends to make his vile fantasies take place on a stage while his friends stuff themselves with pike livers and pheasant tongues.”

“Is there no way to prevent this from happening?” Lucius said. “Perhaps Sporus can flee the city.”

Epaphroditus shook his head. “The Praetorians stationed outside the door are there for a reason. If you look below this terrace, you’ll see more guards. Vitellius has no intention of letting his Lucretia run off before tomorrow’s banquet.”

Lucius left them on the terrace and went to Sporus’s room. Through the door, he heard her weeping. He called her name. She did not answer, but after a while the weeping stopped. He called her again and heard only silence. Lucius pushed against the door. It was locked, but the lock was flimsy, intended only to keep slaves from entering when they were unwanted. He pushed against the door with his shoulder. The lock gave way and he stumbled into the room.

Sporus lay on the bed, no longer in disarray but dressed in one of her finest garments, a gown of green silk with gold embroidery inherited from Poppaea. Her hair had been combed and pinned. Makeup hid the bruises
on her face. Her hands lay crossed on her breast. She no longer looked distraught but seemed composed—too composed, Lucius realized. On the floor beside the bed, lying on its side, was an empty silver cup.

Sporus stared at the ceiling with glassy eyes. Her words were slurred. “Lucius, you’ve been such a good friend to me these last few months.”

He knelt beside the bed. “Sporus, what have you done?”

“Don’t pester me with questions, Lucius. There’s no time. But I’m glad you came. Glad it was you, not one of the others. Because I have to tell you something. I need to confess.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I was responsible . . .”

“For what?”

“It was my fault Nero died.”

“No, Sporus. You don’t know what you’re saying.”

“Listen to me, Lucius! It was my fault Nero died—and my fault your father killed himself.”

Lucius drew a sharp breath.

“I was responsible for everything, for all the horrors since Nero died . . . all my fault. . . .”

Lucius picked up the empty cup. “What did you drink, Sporus? Why is it making you say such things?”

“I know what I’m saying, Lucius. It’s been so hard to keep it a secret . . . all these months. . . .”

“I don’t understand.”

“You weren’t there, Lucius . . . at the end . . . with Nero . . . and your father. You didn’t see . . . or hear. You’ve only been told what happened by Epaphroditus, but he doesn’t know the truth. Epictetus must know, but he’s never told anyone . . . because he loves me. But you should know.”

Sporus’s voice was very weak. Lucius leaned closer, putting his ear to her lips.

“When Epictetus arrived from the city with news . . . I ran out to meet him . . . while the others stayed inside. Then I took the message to Nero, before Epictetus could do it. I told Nero a lie. I told him the Senate . . . had voted to put him to death.”

“But that’s what happened.”

“No! The message Epictetus brought was that the Senate had failed to vote. They were still deliberating. They balked at the prospect of putting Augustus’s heir to death. There was still hope . . . for Nero. Praetorians had been sent from Roma to bring him back, but only so that the senators could address him face-to-face, to try to come to some . . . resolution. They wanted to negotiate. But that was not the message I gave to Nero. I lied. I made him think there was no hope left.”

“But why, Sporus?”

“Because I wanted him to die!” Sporus convulsed on the bed. Her brow was suddenly covered with beads of sweat. She gasped for breath.

“Only later, after Nero’s body was brought back to Roma . . . did the Senate pass the resolution calling for his death. But that was after the fact. They did it just to please Galba, to make him think they had taken the initiative to make him emperor. Don’t you see, that’s why there are so many rumors . . . that Nero must still be alive. All those senators couldn’t understand why Nero would kill himself, when they were ready to negotiate. They think he must still be alive, that his death was a hoax, that he’ll yet return . . . and have his revenge.”

Sporus gripped his arm. “But Nero
is
dead, Lucius. I saw him die with my own eyes. And I saw your father die. He wouldn’t have killed himself . . . if Nero hadn’t done so first. It was my fault. I didn’t understand . . . that so many people would die . . . because of what I did . . . to Nero.”

“But why, Sporus? Why did you want Nero to die?”

“I hated him . . . at the end. I think I loved him . . . once. I don’t know. I was always so confused . . . by what he did to me . . . by what he wanted from me. Who am I, Lucius? Am I the boy your father noticed one day in the Golden House and took to meet Nero? Am I Poppaea? Or am I . . . Lucretia? Why do they all want me to be someone else?”

Sporus convulsed again and grimaced. Her eyes glittered like broken glass. “I caused Nero to die. That means I caused all the suffering that followed. I created Vitellius, don’t you see? I’ve brought about my own destruction. Would you hold my hand, Lucius? I can’t see any longer. I can’t hear. I’m cold. If you hold my hand, it means you forgive me.”

Lucius took Sporus’s slender hand in his. Her flesh was like ice. She shuddered and went rigid. She opened her mouth wide, trying to draw a
breath. A rattling sound came from her throat. The fascinum slipped from inside Lucius’s toga and dangled before her. She reached for it and gripped it tightly, pulling him closer.

Her grip slackened. The fascinum slipped from her fingers. The light went out of her eyes.

Lucius stared down at her for a long moment, then looked around the room. On a dresser nearby he saw the mirror she must have used when she combed her hair and put on her makeup, a round silver mirror with an ebony handle. The mirror had belonged to Poppaea. Poppaea and Sporus had looked in the same mirror and had seen the same face reflected there.

He held the mirror to Sporus’s nostrils. No trace of mist fogged the polished silver. Sporus was dead.

Epaphroditus sent a messenger to inform Vitellius of the death. Asiaticus came to confirm the news. He left in a fury. The Praetorians keeping watch on Epaphroditus’s apartments withdrew.

The next day, the citywide feast in honor of Nero went on as scheduled. Even without the presentation of Vitellius’s play at his banquet, his guests were impressed. For many days the Shield of Minerva was the talk of the city—until news arrived that Vitellius’s troops to the north had been destroyed and Vespasian’s forces were marching unopposed on Roma.

From the terrace of Epaphroditus’s apartments, Lucius watched and listened to the signs of panic in the Golden House. Various residents installed by the emperor—friends, relatives, supporters, sycophants—were hastily gathering whatever precious objects they could carry and making ready to flee.

Epaphroditus joined Lucius on the terrace. “Vitellius is preparing an abdication speech. He sent a messenger to ask me to help him draft it.”

“And will you?”

“I sent the messenger away without a reply.”

Lucius frowned. “Abdication? No emperor has ever done such a thing. The man who becomes emperor dies as emperor.”

“Nero considered abdication. I suppose that’s why Vitellius wanted my advice, though my efforts to help Nero abdicate were fruitless.”

Lucius nodded but made no reply. He had not told Epaphroditus, or anyone else, what Sporus had confessed to him.

They heard the sounds of a scuffle and looked over the parapet. In the courtyard below, two well-dressed women were fighting over an antique Greek vase. The vessel slipped from their hands and shattered on the paving stones. The enraged women flew at each other.

“Apparently,” said Epaphroditus, “Vitellius will ask for safe conduct out of the city for himself and his wife and child, along with one million sesterces from the treasury.”

“One million sesterces? So little—the cost of his precious Shield of Minerva!”

“The Flavians, Vespasian’s relatives in the city, will attend the speech. If they give their approval, a bloodless transition of power may yet be accomplished.”

Below them, the women tumbled on the ground. One of them grabbed a shard from the broken vase and slashed the other’s cheek.

Lucius looked away, sickened by the sight of blood.