The Year of the Flame (The Calidus Series Book 2) by M.J. Trow & Maryanne Coleman

Author:M.J. Trow & Maryanne Coleman [Trow, M.J. & Coleman, Maryanne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Lume Books
Published: 2019-11-21T05:00:00+00:00

XII

Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, emperor of the greatest empire the world had ever known, god and priest and all kinds of things he had never bothered to find out about, sat on the floor of Poppaea’s chamber, surrounded by blood, vomit and righteous indignation. Alongside him, the body of his latest wife, once the most beautiful woman in the empire, now a bloodied mess, lay, cooling. He knew that sooner or later a terrified slave or two would sidle in and clean up the mess. He had already thought of the proclamation and he practiced it there, all to himself, declaiming to the shocked air of the room.

‘The emperor Nero,’ he declaimed in his best voice, ‘is saddened to announce the sudden death of his beloved wife, the Augusta Poppaea Sabina. As many may know, she was with child, the fruit of the powerful loins of her husband, Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus,’ he let his full name roll out fruitily, ‘and this fact made her faint suddenly and strike her head upon the marble floor of her chamber.’

He glanced across at Poppaea. He was glad she had stopped twitching. He had never actually kicked anyone to death before and he hadn’t been ready for the twitching. With a bit of makeup, it could look as if she had bumped her head, he was almost sure.

‘The fall was fatal,’ he continued, ‘and there will be a day of mourning blah blah blah.’ Seneca could do the rest. But for now, the room was beginning to depress him and, tired of waiting for the slaves, he got up and called through the door.

The two slaves who came in were Poppaea’s personal women and as soon as they saw her body, they started to cry and howl.

Nero slapped one and shook the other. ‘No need for all that,’ he said. ‘Your mistress fell and bumped her head. Common enough in women with child, or so I’m told. Tidy up in here, won’t you?’ He looked down at himself, at his blood and vomit spattered toga. ‘I need to go and bathe and change. Umm…’ he looked around him again. ‘Perhaps when you have finished in here, made her look respectable, one of you might go and tell Seneca. Tell him I will be…’ he stopped, looking at the women huddled over the body of their mistress. ‘He’ll probably know where I will be. But tell him to knock first.’ And he went out, head held high, leaving them to their grisly work.

*

The baths were kept steaming all day and all night in the royal palace, but even so, the bathhouse keeper was surprised to see the emperor so late. He had stripped off the bloodied tunic, but there were still splashes up his legs and flecks of vomit decorated his unlovely face. The bathhouse keeper slipped into the water and helped his emperor in, splashing him delicately and scraping off the worst with his strigil. He was careful with his splashing; his predecessor had once splashed water into the Divine One’s eye and had never been seen again.

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