S.J.A. Turney - The Great Game

Slipping off the boots, he carefully stood them with his clothes and whipped off his breeches, standing in only his subligaculum, bronzed and muscular.

‘I am even considering adopting the full-length trousers of the Celts, despite the connotations. Good Roman breeches leave too much flesh exposed in these harsh climes.’

He glanced at Rufinus, who was still standing to attention and fully dressed, and rolled his eyes. ‘For the love of Venus, Rufinus, will you relax and disrobe. In the baths all men are equal, after all.’

With a grin and a flourish, he let his underwear drop to the floor. ‘ Almost all men, anyway!’

Rufinus tried not to look at the naked, grinning form of Commodus as he hobbled over to the nearest free alcove and began to remove his armour and clothing. His muscles screamed at him as he stretched to reach his feet, and an overwhelming desire to sink into warm water overcame the desires to eat and sleep, both of which were starting to infect his thoughts.

By the time he had shoved his armour and clothes into the alcove, which was not quite large enough to accommodate such bulky kit, Commodus was wrapped in a towel at the waist and held out another for him. With a nod of thanks, Rufinus took the proffered towel and wrapped it around his waist.

‘I have to admit that I’ve been looking forward to a shave and a haircut for a number of weeks, Caesar.’

Commodus’ mouth turned up into a humorous sneer. ‘Only babies and women have clear faces, Rufinus. Your beard and hair are perfectly suitable. They remind me of me!’

Rufinus swallowed nervously. He hated beards. They were itchy and uncomfortable. They made it hard to eat broth without saving half a pint for a future day. When your hair became wet it was like wearing an extra helmet and took more than an hour to dry. And at times he was beginning to worry that things were living in his hair and beard.

‘I prefer to be shaved and shorn after the fashion of the old days, Caesar.’

‘Well the matter is moot for now, Rufinus. The barber only works the baths until sundown. You will have to remain hirsute and Godlike for at least another night. Come.’

With a powerful stride, Commodus stepped through the door and into the cold room with its large pool in the centre and two small half-moon plunge-pools at the edge. Doors led off to the steam rooms and the hot pools, the exercise yard and the outdoor pool. Shouts and laughter echoed from every aperture.

Two soldiers who were ducked beneath the cold water in the central pool burst through the surface, laughing at one another and looked up to see the new arrivals.

It took only a moment for the two men to fall silent and bow their heads in deference. Rufinus frowned. If he had been them and a blond, bearded man in a towel had entered, he would never have guessed the man was the young emperor of Rome. It seemed that Commodus’ visit to the fortress baths was far from his first.

‘Behold! Commodus intoned in an oratorical fashion, striking a flashy pose. ‘Thus enters Hercules in all his golden glory to brighten the dull evenings of the men of the First legion!’

Still grinning like a lunatic, the emperor swung his hips in an expert move that allowed his towel to drop to the floor without changing his heroic pose. The two legionaries cheered and Commodus took a single step and leapt into the water, flailing his arms and landing heavily with a splash.

Rufinus watched with a mixture of awed pride in the man whom he served, and a niggling worry at what he perceived to be a changeable personality. Commodus was clearly a great man, but would likely be quick to anger.

With a sigh, aware that he was now sliding down a career slope to an uncertain fate but also that there was no point in worrying about things over which he had no control, Rufinus also dropped his towel and walked over to the table where the oil and strigils lay. Commodus may be clean enough to jump straight in but, without a good scrape first, Rufinus would likely leave a grey slick in the water.

The world had turned upside down for him for the second time in a few days.

His hand reached for the strigil.

RUFINUS fastened the bronze-plated belt around his waist. It was far fancier than his old one and had cost enough that he really didn’t want to calculate how many weeks of slogging he would have to endure to pay for it. Add to that the replacement helmet and shield and the five sesterces that he owed Acastus for hammering out and smoothing the major marks on his armour, and it started to look like a small fortune. He’d even paid out a disturbing sum for a new cloak, given the state of his old one.

It was all doubly irritating given that, not long after the ceremony was over, he would be transferred to the Praetorian Guard and much of his equipment, including his fresh replacements, would be inappropriate and sold back to the legion’s quartermaster. He may well have paid a princely sum for a cloak that he would wear only once.

Still, it was not every day a man was awarded a decoration by the hand of the emperor himself, and being arrayed in the finest kit available seemed the least he should do, regardless of cost and inconvenience.

The organisation and upgrading of kit had given him something to do this past five days, though, and for that he was extremely grateful.

Those events that had taken place on his return to Vindobona with the guardsmen almost a week ago seemed now like a dream that had flitted away upon waking with the first tendrils of a new dawn. One evening of near panic-inducing nerves upon being introduced to the most powerful people in the world, a burst of most unseemly familiarity from the man who would soon rule the empire, and then it had evaporated like mist and left a mundane normality that had rendered Rufinus flat and slightly confused.

Only six days ago, Commodus had escorted him to the bathhouse and treated him with deference and respect for a short time before turning his capricious attentions elsewhere. As soon as the young co-emperor had spotted a pair of tribunes he knew well floundering in the water, an instant clique had formed and, once again, Rufinus had found himself alone.

In a way, he’d been grateful. To be singled out by men of such power was a thing both wonderful and terrifying, and the chance to relax a little, lower his guard and enjoy the simple acts of cleansing and recuperating had been well-received.

It had mattered little to him that he had no clean kit with him at the baths. With Commodus’ attentions suitably diverted he had slunk away quietly, borrowing one of the bath-house’s robes and carrying his kit in weary arms to the Praetorian barracks. A few eyebrows had risen at the manner of his arrival but, once Mercator’s name was given and the friendly guardsman came strolling out to meet him, all had settled again.

His escort had arranged for freshly-laundered russet tunic and breeches to be set out for him, along with dry boots and even fresh undergarments. Shown to the room that had been put aside for him, he had not even bothered disrobing before sinking gratefully into the relative softness and comfort of a fortress bunk.

He’d spent two days occupying that room on his own, a bunk-filled space designed for eight, his only company being the guardsmen who had been his escort, and even then only on the rare occasions that their duties had allowed. The oak-beamed room with its four double bunks, armour racks, table and chairs and small hearth for warmth was surprisingly dingy even at the height of the day’s sun, and the room depressed him.

With the Tenth legion still out in the field, Rufinus had no duties and no compatriots in Vindobona and the next morning had brought with it a level of boredom and ennui hitherto unknown to him, kicking his heels in the bright coldness of early Martius. By now, spring would be making herself felt on the shores of the Mare Nostrum, in Hispania and Italia; flowers bursting into bloom and animals gambolling on the hillsides. Here in the barbarian north, blankets of fresh snow still covered much of the landscape and the cold, crisp, white sky with peripheral cloud promised further blizzards.