Conn Iggulden - The Death Of Kings

“He has taken oath, Senator. There-”

“You are understrength, are you not?” Cato interrupted. “I can have a thousand men here tomorrow morning. Healthy slaves from my own estate to be the backbone of Primigenia.”

Renius growled suddenly, “There are no slaves in the legions, Senator. Primigenia are freemen.”

Cato waved a hand as if it was of no consequence. “Free them after they have taken your precious oath, then. I have no doubt a man like you will find a way, Renius. You are so… resourceful.” As he spoke, a fraction of his spite gleamed through and Julius knew to give way to him would be to invite destruction.

“My answer is no, Senator. The oath cannot be bought back.”

Cato looked at them without speaking for a moment.

“You leave me no choice then. If my son must serve two years with you, I want him alive at the end of it. I will send the men”-he paused-“ freed slaves, Renius. I will send them to you to protect my son.”

“When you have freed them, they may not do what you want,” Renius replied, matching the senator glare for glare.

“They will come,” Cato snapped. “Few men are as troublesome to me as you have been.”

“They will not be your son's guards if they come to Primigenia,” Julius said. “Believe me when I say I will not allow it.”

“Will you give me nothing ?” Cato said, his voice rising in anger. All movement in the courtyard changed as hands began to creep toward swords.

“If the gods allow, I will give you your son two years from now. That is all,” Julius replied firmly.

“See that you do, Caesar. If he does not survive…” He spoke through clenched teeth, all pretence at calm gone, “Be sure he does.”

Turning on his heel, he signaled to his men to open the gate. The soldiers of Primigenia reached it first and Cato climbed into his carriage without a backward glance.

Brutus turned to Julius as the closing gate hid the view of Cato's men.

“What are you thinking ? How many of his ‘freed slaves' will be spies, do you think? How many will be assassins? Have you thought of that? Gods, you have to find a way to stop him.”

“Don't you want a thousand more for Primigenia?” Julius said.

“At that cost? No, I think I'd rather give Germinius back to his father, or have taken the gold. If it was a smaller number, we could have them watched, but a thousand! A full half of Primigenia we can't trust. It's insane.”

“He's right, you know,” Renius added. “A hundred would be more than I'd like to take in, never mind this many.”

Julius looked at both of them. They had not been there when he had scoured the coasts for Roman sons, nor when he'd found his veterans in Greece.

“We will make them ours,” he said, ignoring his own doubts.

Having slept until the sun rose to its greatest height above the wintry city, Cato suffered with a headache that even hot wine could not shift. It throbbed slightly as he listened to Antonidus, hardly able to bear his posturing.

“Ten thousand sesterces is high, even for a death, Antonidus,” he said. He enjoyed watching the prickle of sweat that broke out on the general's brow, knowing as well as the man himself that if the money wasn't paid, a sure death would come from the assassins' spite. Keeping him waiting was a petty response, Cato knew, but still he let the time drag out, tapping his fingers idly on the arm of his couch. Pompey's public enmity was to have been expected, of course, even if the assassin hadn't left a clay token in the little girl's grip, as he had been told to do. Cato could not have guessed the senator would throw away his favors simply to make the point, though he could applaud the subtlety of the move. He had hoped Pompey would act in grief and folly, allowing Cato to have him arrested and removed from the games of power in the Senate. Instead Pompey had shown a restraint that marked him as a more dangerous enemy than he had realized. Cato sighed and scratched the corner of his mouth. If he were judged by his enemies, he was surely a power in Rome.

“I would be tempted to withdraw my support and my funds from your revenge, Antonidus, if it wasn't for the matter of this trial of yours. I have hired Rufius Sulpicius to be your advocate.”

“I can argue against Caesar myself, Senator. It is a simple enough case,” Antonidus responded in surprise.

“No, I want that young cockerel humiliated. From what I have seen, he is young enough and rash enough to be brought down easily. A public embarrassment in front of the magistrates and the plebeians should remove some of the fresh gloss of his tribune rank. We may even demand his death for the wrongs you have suffered.” Cato rubbed his forehead with his eyes closed, his full mouth pursing. “There is a price for my son and he must pay it. Use Sulpicius. There are few better minds in Rome than his. He will appoint the jurists for you and find the precedents in custom. I have no doubt that this Caesar will be well prepared. Have you sent the summons?”

“No, I was waiting for a date to be set. I have applied to the praetor, but there has been no reply as yet.”

“That, Antonidus, is why you need a man like Sulpicius. Meet with him and let him handle the case. He will secure a date for trial in a month or less. That is his business, you know. Your precious house will be back in your hands, for which I expect you to be suitably grateful and indebted to me.”

“I am, Senator. And the money?”

“Yes, yes,” Cato said waspishly, “you will have your funds, both for the court and… the other matter. Now leave me to my rest. The day has been long and tiring.”

Even in the privacy of his own home, he did not speak without care, taking pleasure in the forms of conspiracy that forced him to employ men like Antonidus. He knew that many of the senators saw him as a man only of words, preferring the cut of a reply to their martial posturing. The assassins were a delicious departure from his usual intrigue, and he found the power it gave him quite intoxicating. To be able to point to any man and call down a death on him was a thrill even for a palate as jaded as his own. As the general left, he called for a cool cloth to drape over his face.

The trial began as the sky lightened to the east of Rome, the false dawn that woke the workers and sent the thieves and whores to their own beds. The area in the forum that was set aside for legal proceedings was still torch-lit from the night, and a large crowd had gathered at the boundary, held back only by the solid line of soldiers from the city barracks. Under the direct command of the praetor who would oversee the trial, these were charged with keeping the peace in the event of an unpopular verdict, and the crowd was careful not to come within range of the staffs they carried. Unusually, for a case concerning such an apparently minor matter, the benches on either side of the advocates' square were also full. Many of the people Julius knew from the Senate had come to listen, either at his invitation or the call of Antonidus. His own family had stayed at the estate outside Rome. Cornelia and his daughter had to remain under the protection of Primigenia, and Julius did not want Tubruk anywhere near Antonidus or the senators, for all his assurances that he could not be recognized.

Julius's searching gaze found Brutus in the second row of three, sitting next to a woman who raised her head to look back at him. There was something disturbing in her cool appraisal, and he wondered how she seemed to stand out against the crowd around her, as if she were sitting fractionally closer than anyone else. In a timeless moment, she leaned back slowly, arresting his attention. Her hair was unbound, and before he summoned the will to break the contact, she raised a hand to pull a tendril back from where it had fallen loose over her face.