Praetorian Series [4] All Roads Lead to Rome (22 page)

I heard Galba clear his throat.  “So where is…
she
?”  He asked, clearly referring to Helena.

“She’s sleeping,” I heard Jeanne reply.

“Still?”  Galba asked.  “Lazy of her, but perhaps the luckiest thing to have happened to me in days.”

“Why’s that?”  John asked with a challenging edge to his voice.  He rarely got upset about things, but was always defensive when it concerned his friends,
especially
Jacob and Helena.  “Worried what she’ll do to you when you tell us that you’re taking us back to Britain?  Or that we’re going to stay here for months and pacify Gaul?”

“Quite the opposite, in fact,” he said, and I lowered my hands in confusion over what he’d said, just in time to see similar expressions on my friends’ faces.  “But you are not incorrect in your assumption that I was worried about her reaction over what I am about to say…”

“Now is not the time to upset any of us, general…” Jeanne warned from his seat beside John.

Galba glanced at him and lowered his head.  “That is hardly my intention.  I merely…”

“Then what did you come here to say?”  Georgia interrupted this time.

Surprisingly, Galba didn’t seem upset over all the interruptions.  “It is quite simple,” he said.  “I came here to give you leave to continue on to Rome, under certain conditions, however.”

Silence befell our table and I knew my friends were as equally surprised as I was, but then I had to break the silence.  “What made you change your mind?”

Galba leaned heavily on his arms, but turned his head to look at me, and I was surprised to see sympathy in his sunken eyes.  He didn’t say anything at first as he looked at me, but then his mouth tightened and he answered.  “You did, young Hunter.  I know less about you than I do any of these other fools, yet, for some odd reason, I pity you the most.”

“Me?”  I asked.  “Why?”

“I saw you yesterday upon the battlefield,” he said, his voice calm, “and I was struck with an incomprehensible feeling of sympathy.  You see, I do not like you.  I don’t like any of you.  Yet, logic be damned, I am faced with a moral dilemma.  It wasn’t much of one when I dealt with Hunter’s woman – who I like the least, currently – but it was you who reminded me that
Jacob
Hunter is merely human, a man with faults and deficiencies like the rest of us, and one who has, again against all logic, family and friends and people who actually care about him.”

Galba placed his hands on the table, and looked at them, clearly at odds over his decision.  It was a trait I’d often observed in the man.  He often seemed as though he pondered decisions until the last possible moment.  It wasn’t that he was indecisive or uncertain of himself, but that he was often faced with questions of great depth, ones with no easy answers, so I appreciated his determination to thoroughly examine each and every question posed to him.

I respected that.

“I do not wish to see any of you suffer any longer, not even Hunter,” he finally admitted.  “Not anymore.  I believe I understand what has happened to him, and I certainly know Agrippina and her motivations.  He is not innocent in all this, but he too is a victim, and you all have suffered for it.  You and
her
, especially,” Galba said, nodding his head first at me and then away from us.  “Jacob Hunter especially, I think.  So, I give you leave to go after him.  Go to Rome.  Find him.  Apprehend Agrippina.  Do whatever in the name of Tartarus it is you do.  But do it quietly.  Do it clandestinely.  Do it so that when I return to Rome, there is still a Rome for me to return to.  I do not believe an army can achieve such a thing quietly, but you people can.  You’ve done it before.  So, go.  I will join you when I can.”

“Just like that?”  John asked, clearly not convinced.

“No,” Galba answered, turning his head to face him.  “There are stipulations that you all must agree to right now.”

John leaned back and crossed his arms.  “Hit me.”

Galba cocked his head to the side.  “May I?”

“I meant
tell
me.  Christ, I hate it when you guys can’t understand a simple expression…”

Galba raised a finger, ignoring him.  “Stipulation number one: when you find Hunter, he is not to make another decision ever again concerning your future here in Rome.  He is never again to lead you or give you orders.  I will never deal with him again.  Never.”

John glanced between Jeanne and Georgia before settling back on Galba.  “Well, we’re certainly not putting Archer in char…”

“No,” Galba agreed.  “I do not trust that one either.  In fact, none of you will be in charge. 
They
will be.”  Galba finished by rising to his feet and standing between Gaius and Marcus, who had been standing behind me the entire time with their arms folded.  “I have just appointed these two, provisionally, as prefects of the Praetorian Guard. They were among the first to abandon Agrippina and once held high rank within the guard.  They understand the reality behind everything we have done and everything we will do, and I have found their loyalty to be above reproach.  I was hesitant to authorize this initially, but I have now ordered them to return to Rome with their fellow Praetorians and take control of the entire contingent.  Should those in Rome stand against them, they will destroy all those loyal to Agrippina.”

John nodded from his seat.  “Congrats guys.  You earned it.”  He turned back to Galba.  “I thought this was going to be hard.”

“Why the need to make it difficult?” Galba asked flatly.  “I am not that friend of yours lost in his own web of lies, deceits, and paranoia.  I simply wish to bring order to the empire.  Now, do we have a deal?”

No one answered at first, but slowly, as though hoping the person next to them would answer first, my trio of friends nodded their heads in silent agreement.

“You speak for the others?”

I shot a glance at Archer, eating alone, staring aimlessly at the table in front of him.

“Sure,” John answered.

“And you, young Hunter?”  Galba asked from behind me.

I twisted at the waist and looked over my shoulder to see him peering down at me, his eyes unjudging.  I stared at him for a few moments, not really needing the time to think about my answer, but simply wanting to stare at the man for a while.  I didn’t know why – he certainly wasn’t appealing to look at – but maybe because I now saw him as a man willing to change his mind even when there was so much at risk, and that gave me hope.

I tilted my head down.  “Agreed.”

“And you will speak to
her
on my behalf?”  Galba asked, his voice humorously concerned.

“Of course.”  I smiled.  “But I don’t think she’ll need much convincing.”

VI

Déjà Vu

May, 44 A.D.

Rome, Italy

Jacob Hunter

The streets of Ancient Rome had once been dangerous throughways that could leave a careless citizen dead in an alleyway or penniless as they made their way home for the evening, but such dark days were well in the past.  Things had changed in recent decades, beginning in earnest with Augustus’ reign, and had improved considerably more under Agrippina’s rule.  Massive renovation projects had left Rome in a constant state of construction during her first few years in power, resulting in opulent new temples, updated roads, widened aqueducts, sprawling public parks, and a fresh gleam that took Augustus’ city of marble and turned it into a city of diamond – metaphorically speaking, of course.

She may have left the rest of the empire in ruin, but she’d done wonders for a city that had already been quite beautiful.  And she’d done it flawlessly, without the grandiose and narcissistic building projects that had turned the population of Rome against other emperors, including her own son in another timeline.  She’d had a plan for the city, and had kept the populace in mind.  It was just her way of keeping them on her side, distracting them from the ills that faced the rest of the world, and I applauded her for it.

Bread and circus.

No one could ever claim she wasn’t a Roman.

But I didn’t care much about monuments or artificial landmarks as Agrippina and I walked through the
Forum Romanum
.  I
was
worried about Rome’s more notable
natural
landmarks: its hills.  Everyone knew there were seven principal hills in total, and if I thought really hard I was sure I could name them all, but the only one I was currently concerned with was the Palatine Hill.  Quite possibly, and very probably, the location of Rome’s first major settlement – as seen during Merlin’s hallucination – it was also the only place the red orb could possibly be… which meant that it was probably lying in a ditch on the side of a recently repaved road, hidden in an ancient bush that hadn’t once been pruned since the age of Romulus and Remus.

I laughed, but it wasn’t one filled with good tidings and joy.

“What is so humorous, Jacob?”  Agrippina asked, her hands wrapped around my arm as we walked.

“This,” I answered, extending my free arm out in front of us.  “All of this.”

“You are here for a reas…”

“Yeah, sure,” I said, eyeing each pedestrian we passed along our route, not for once thinking we were completely safe.  Even with the contingent of loyal Praetorians who trailed behind us, ones that had been left in the city while Agrippina had gallivanted all over the empire, we were always at risk.  “I’m here because of a hallucination.  That’s it.”

“A hallucination that held you captive for over a month, if you remember.”

“Of course I remember!”  I snapped, yanking my arm from her grip.  “That doesn’t excuse the fact that it could have all been just that.  A hallucination.  Or even if it was real, all it could have been was a red herring meant to steer me in the wrong direction, all the while…”

“A red…?”

I whirled on her, a finger upraised in a silencing gesture, and it took more will than I thought to possess to keep me from striking her.  I lowered my hand, not wanting to spook her Praetorians.

“This could all be a trap,” I growled, “or he could be purposefully leading me in the opposite direction I should be heading.”

Agrippina shrugged and didn’t seem offended that I’d pushed her away.  “Rome seems a rather specific direction in which to send you in for such a ploy.”

“Yeah, no shit,” I mumbled.  “Why do you think we’re even here?”

“Calm yourself, Jacob,” Agrippina soothed in the way only she could, snaking her hands along my arm with a gentle touch again.  “We’re here to discover an object of great power, not some bauble to be sold to a museum.”

I shook my head, annoyed.  “Then where do you suggest we start?  The last time I saw the red orb it disappeared somewhere in time or space.  Maybe both.  I haven’t a clue where to start.”

“Enough!” Agrippina ordered, pulling away, her voice rock hard and steady.  I found myself flinching away from the sternness of her single word as she stopped in her tracks and the contingent of Praetorians behind us come to a halt as one.  I glanced at them, read their unflinching expressions, and in that moment saw them more as prison guards than escorts.

I turned back to Agrippina and returned her stern gaze.

“You are acting like a child,” she scolded.  “What kind of man are you that you cannot find adventure in a task such as this?  Are you not interested in what lays before us?  Where has your curiosity gone, Jacob Hunter?”

“All curiosity has ever done is get me into…”

“Do not make excuses!”  Agrippina demanded, an edge to her voice.  “I have no use for a whimpering fool.  You still have much to prove, Jacob Hunter.  Do not fail now.”

More than ever, I wanted to lash out and slap her across the face, but the sounds of hands tightening on leather and armor clinking and adjusting ever so slightly caused me to rein in my emotions.  I had no need to look at the gathered Praetorians to know they were looking for any excuse to cut me down, and I had no doubt they could.  The orb provided me with many gifts, but invulnerability wasn’t one of them.  Lowering my shoulders, I relaxed my posture and masked my intent as best I could.

Agrippina, sensing my shift in demeanor, placed a hand on my arm once again and her voice lightened.  “Now, Jacob, let us go over the details once again.  Explain what your vision showed you, and how we can use it to our benefit.”

I took a deep breath and held it as I tried to relax, taking a moment to survey the city around me.  Individuals mingled everywhere in this population-dense city, from men in senatorial garb to beggars in the streets.  There were women who gossiped and men who schemed – or vice versa – and children who played.  I found it difficult to envision the area they occupied, the
Forum Romanum
, as the same relic of ancient architecture that still stood in the future.  Then, it was little more than a patchwork of semi-structural rubble and decaying ruins left untouched to mimic its original appearance, but such a sight hardly did what stood today justice.

The streets were solid and well maintained, structures stood unblemished and radiated authority, and foliage was trimmed and pruned.  We were in the heart of Ancient Rome, an area of the modern day city still referred to by the same name so as to not confuse tourists.  Just behind me, the Capitoline Hill soared high above the area while the Palatine, with all its palatial structures and important denizens, rose out of the earth to my right, and the equally lavish but less important Esquiline and Caelian Hills were off in the distance in front of me.

Upon one of these latter three hills, Agrippina’s own son would one day build a lavish home and carve out an artificial lake within the valley made up by said hills.  It would later be torn down by Vespasian, who would commission the great Flavian Amphitheatre to be built upon the lake, a structure that would withstand the ravages of time and was a huge crowd pleaser back home.

It was known simply as the Colosseum, and would become Rome’s magnificent centerpiece.

But now the site was little more than a sprawling cluster of residential homes destined to be consumed in flame one day… should such an event even choose to repeat itself.

As I finally released the held breath that had nearly burned a hole in my lungs, I found my head moving on its own, back in the direction of the Palatine Hill.  I looked at it, most of it obscured by trees and buildings, and much of its structures also hidden because of my low vantage point.  There was nothing particularly special about it, as most of its structures had been built and then then rebuilt numerous times within the past few hundred years.  Nor did even the Temple of Lupercal interest me, the place where I had materialized when arriving in Rome all those years ago.

It was simply the hill itself that held my attention.

I nodded toward it as I spoke.  “You know as well as I the historical significance of the Palatine Hill.  Romulus and Remus founded the city of Rome upon it, and Romulus later ruled from it while the city extended around it.”

“Legends confirm this equally as well as your vision,” Agrippina agreed.  “Such a consensus is held by many of Rome’s most prominent historians.”

“Yeah, I know,” I said, not necessarily annoyed since I still found Agrippina’s interest and knowledge of Roman history refreshing.  I held out my hands, palms up, in the direction of the hill as I continued.  “Now, again, we both know that Romulus constructed his initial fortifications around slopes of the Palatine.  I saw them under construction in my hallucination.  And that was the last place I saw the red orb, although I can’t remember where exactly along the walls it had been.”

“But his walls no longer exist,” Agrippina responded.  “They were dismantled and repurposed centuries ago, well before even the Servian Wall was constructed.”

I almost smiled.  “I know that as well.  However, Romulus’ original demarcation perimeter still exis…”

“The original
pomerium
,” Agrippina finished, her voice elevated in slight excitement.  “Of course!  How fascinating…”

My eyebrows furrowed curiously.  “Why’s that?”

Agrippina flinched almost imperceptibly, as though my question had disturbed her thoughts.  She looked up at me and crossed her arms against her chest before extracting her right arm so that she could flick her hand over her shoulder.  “Two years ago, I commissioned an extensive project that sought to discover the original
pomerium
zone after it had been extended first by Servius Tullius and then by…”

“Sulla,” I finished for her this time.

She smiled wryly at me.  “Excellent, Jacob.  It took many months, but my archeologists were able to pinpoint the entire perimeter by excavating buried portions of the very wall in question.  They left white stones as markers in respect.”

I whistled through my teeth.

That was
very
fascinating, because Claudius had done something similar during his time as Caesar.  While he’d actually expanded the original
pomerium
zone, he too had chosen to leave white stones as markers.

I glanced back at her Praetorians, fully armed and armored, and tossed my head at them.  “Guess you’d better have your Praetorians change into their togas then, because somewhere along the
pomerium
is where we’re going.”

***

It was very likely that most Roman cities had a
pomerium
, but ancient legend had it that the most famous
pomerium
was the original line Romulus had created just outside his ancient walls with the use of his plough.  I’d once assumed he’d had mules or oxen to pull his landscaping device, but now that I’d witnessed the godlike physical prowess he and his brother had possessed in Merlin’s dream, something told me he’d simply pushed his plough along himself.  Some contested this to have been impossible, as much of the area was reported to have been under water or swamp-like at the time, but I wasn’t about to assume anything anymore.  In fact, the whole damn story was open to interpretation, so the only information I could rely on is what I’d learned for myself.

It was impossible to determine where the actual demarcation line had originally stood, but I was confident Agrippina’s white markers would act as suitable geographical landmarks to help us find the location where Romulus and Remus had winked out of existence, only to return instantaneously sans one brother.

Yeah… sure…

What was I going to do?

How was I going to find an orb that was either lost in time, in another dimension, or both?

Now that we were here, I no longer understood what had driven me to this place to begin with.  All I had that could possibly help me was the blue orb, but I had no idea how. I could only use the dumb thing to travel to
prearranged
points along my own timeline, and I hadn’t even bothered trying to do that anymore.  I no longer saw a point.

Merlin’s only advice had been to find the location of Romulus and Remus’ disappearance.  It was my only clue and I had no idea how I was even going to do that.  Agrippina and I could walk the length of the
pomerium
a million times, and I wouldn’t have an inkling where the incident between the twins had occurred.  There were no artificial landmarks, no geographical clues, and I hadn’t known in Merlin’s vision whether I’d been north of the Palatine or south of it. I hadn’t observed the position of the sun or the stars in the sky, nor even the position of the Tiber River.  Nothing about this place looked the same as it had when Romulus and Remus had begun construction on their great city, and I didn’t think Agrippina could help either.

But I tried not to let any of this negativity show on my face as Agrippina and I found her first white marker upon the ground at the southeastern base of the Palatine, near where the Colosseum would maybe one day be built.  Even my excitement at seeing one of these pristine white stones denoting the boundary of Rome was diminished as I faced the reality of our situation.  While I couldn’t just give up – if Agrippina would even let me – I was certain we were destined to spend months and months circling the Palatine Hill in an endless search for something that was akin to seeing a unicorn or finding a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.