CHAPTER XXXIX

XXXIX

 

 

Could it be that I was about to destroy that sublime, apparently solid power which had

matched the Solar God from the West to the Fertile Goddess of the Nile? The fact of

cherishing such a power was dazzling me even more than the budding hope to have

you back, which later on would seem quite a tangible thing. A few days later, on the

Ides of March, Anna Perenna’s festivity made us evoke what was really celebrated

more vividly than ever: the rebirth of nature, the renewal of the earth with new life force,

incipiently fertile. A strange hopeful unease had taken hold of my belly for the first time

after so long. …I suddenly remembered what Blodwynn had once told me about that

festivity which was celebrated on the first day of the previous month and which had the

same meaning. It was devoted to the virginal face of the ´Great Goddess. “It is Birgitt’s

feast, the day of the Wise Maiden”. Could there be any Goddess of ours who had a

similar role? Maybe Minerva…or Diana.

 

–Your husband, my little one….He has crushed Pompeian resistance in Hispania..

 

Many cities in the province where he used to be a quaestor as a young man, Hispania

Ulterioris, have suffered heavy fines, including his friend Balbus’ hometown. It is said

that Gnaeus Pompeius‘ head was exhibited in the Forum of Hispalis… Caesar’s return

is only a matter of matter of few months.

Was it proper of my father to show such a perturbed emotion… more adequate to my

mood than to a father-in-law who considered his daughter’s husband mainly a solid

social support? Yes, no doubt it was I who should display such an emotion, mainly

when that seemed to confirm the hope which had started growing inside myself a

month before. All that intuition seemed to develop, becoming diaphanous like a

tarnished mirror that had suddenly recovered its cleanliness after being purified with

those emanations coming from resins and scared plants. That knowledge which was

inexorably growing inside me like some kind of new life would make me see the dark

 

side of the next triumphus which would be held across Rome, something quite different

from my father’s intentions. Lucius Calpurnius knew all that that was being chatted
 

about in the senate and in the Forum, those things he would never disclose to me but

that I would finally learn through Kornel. None of my friends wanted to anguish me. But

I eventually got to know that the opposition against you was much broader and more

ruthless than I had previously imagined. Despite your victory over the supporters of

 

“our good old mother Republic”, there was still an immense group of Romans, both

patricians and plebeians, who were not determined to see what they held as the true

root of their identity and tradition being crushed by a demagogue-supported aristocrat,

almost five hundred years after the creation of a concept of Roman greatness which

was based on resistance against tyranny. A sort of subterranean force was growing,

willing to sharpen its most wicked wit in order to reach their goal. It was Marcia who,

accompanied by Cornelia, told me about the reason why Father looked so uneasy.

–I’ve known it through my father and, obviously, his wife, your husband’s niece… It

seems that, just on the verge of the final battle he suffered … some kind of breakdown,

like that which paralysed him at Tapsos. You see, he has forced his health dangerously

for a lifetime and now, at such an old age, his physical state has started to decline.

What’s worse, just when he is expected to need more energy than ever before.

Therefore, any fainting could turn out to be really disastrous. His enemies aren’t Cato

or Bibulus anymore, straight human beings who would openly express their disliking.

There are many deadly vermin instead, Calpurnia, even among those who inspire him

more trust….

They even told me a lot more. Your legions, discouraged by having been denied any

access to war booties and the fact of being considerably less numerous than

Pompeius’ supporters, remained totally reluctant to fight while your voice was

desperately growing weaker and weaker after quite a long barren rallying, even walking

through the ranks of legionaries, exhorting each of them. Something nobody could

have ever imagined of you. My friends also let me know that you dared taking off your

helmet and sword and, in some sort of mad suicidal attempt, thrust yourself that armed

crowd you had in front, only protected by a shield which was not even yours. This was

a truly convincing sign to drag your troops into battle. This was the point when some

kind of legend rose up, according to which you did not even suffer a single scar in spite

of the numberless arrows raining over your body. All your men were convinced that it

had been your mother Aphrodite who had protected you, though the augurs had

predicted this was not a suitable day for a battle, as much as she had cared for our

legions so that they won on that day….No doubt she had fully shown her gratefulness

for that magnificent tribute that you had offered her on Campus Martius,no matter that

her effigy should have shared prominence with the golden statue of the incarnated

goddess. Perhaps she might be showing her own approval of this new phase in your

life, your aim at spreading your would-be royalty into Egypt. No, I could not admit they

were no more than feverish collective obsessions, very similar to those prodigies that

many believed to have seen in the sky and which could have portended something that

would certainly disturb our daily life. Quite an important thing had been that palsied

uneasiness I found in Cleopatra’s eyes, as if discovering some kind of living being

inside me that could be invading that impulse of hers, which she had initially driven to

get wherever she chose, beyond her own human limits and what many Romans still

call moral principles. No, I well knew this thought could be rather a wish than a real

thing which might really count for Rome’s future. But such a tangible thing could not be 

just an abandoned wife’s yearning….Nevertheless, I still had the hope that, seeing you

faint in the decline of your life and harassed by subtle invisible enemies, the Goddess

might no longer feel attracted to the Divine Lover from beyond the Nile. I suddenly

realized how mean of me all this was, basing my last hopes on you own decay. After

all, this was what she really expected. I remembered Kornel’s words. Yes, I must save

him from that serpent at all costs.

–What does the Senate intend by anticipating so many honours while he has not still

 

arrived back? Yesterday, taking advantage of Palilia celebration, a chariot race was

hastily organized in his honour inside Circus Maximus. What’s more, fifty thanksgiving

days have been decreed…for having defeated Roman citizens. No wonder that nobody

paid any attention to the procession of both his own effigy and Victoria’s through the

streets. Quite a brilliant bizarre idea! Can’t they think this will only increase your

husband’s unpopularity among Roman citizens?

Evidently, Cornelia saw it as crystal clear as I. Not all the blame should be put on that

woman on the other side of the Tiber. There might be quite a more a complex ring of

connections than it would have been initially thought of, involving people who did not

even know they were interconnected….. Why may these thoughts have come to me?

This time I did not have Kornel around to encourage them….

–Let’s hope your husband will have a bit of common sense and keep his feet on the

ground, seeing what awaits him.  

Who would dare advising Goddess’ descendant? Aphrodite’s child, the man who was

forced to return in a litter for the first time in his life, dragging a body that had been

shattered by exhaustion, stomach frailty and that disease I had been recently told

about and that had struck you right before your final battle in Hispania. This had really

alarmed me, though not having been informed about what had truly happened. I clearly

saw that Death had left an invisible knife cut on your face, a fact which you would try to

 

ignore whenever any aruspex would foretell a bad omen, something you had always

sneered at, despite your studied defence of your divine lineage. I well know that your

sceptical view of supernatural things is not such as many think and I am sure you have

already begun to feel its imminence even before going to Hispania. Portia told me that

as soon as you were back in Rome you met up with Marcus Iunius Brutus, her brandnew

spouse, so that he could inform you about his management of Cisalpine Gaul. I

also learnt about how disgusting it had been for you that …Servilia’s son had married

the daughter of that man who was fatefully bound to hang over you beyond death.

Death, no doubt, imperceptibly invading you…I really feared your homecoming, unable

to face a husband who had definitely turned into a spectre, no matter how solid and

panting your physical contact could be… I even discovered myself relieved by the idea

that someone who lived on the other side of the river could be the recipient of most of

your virile energy. Nevertheless, could she still be enabled to keep your life force

hanging on her? Perhaps I was daydreaming on my own potential might, which I

momentarily found as powerful as to remove that sort of stormy sea-like force and learn

about all that little body contained by means which could be even beyond tangible

reality.

During one of her almost daily visits, Cornelia gave me a tubular crimson leather

container which had her own seal.

“Calpurnia Caesaris, beautiful and sweet…

 

I arrived back Rome a few days before your husband’s return. Yes, I know he will not

  

make his official entrance until the celebration of his…fifth triumphus? I sincerely think

this is an extremely bold thing that Romans will never forget after witnessing all that

show about Cato’s and Scipio’s deaths. According to what I have been told in Gades,

nobody discards his….divinization!!! As far as I know about him, this would only mean

a new challenge which would certainly dazzle him, despite the risk of all the predictable

consequences it may have in his life …
 

Would it be possible for you to remain wide awake and alert? Yes,. I know it is rather

stupid and unrealistic to ask this of you, as, apart from the Egyptian, you are the person

he is supposed to see most frequently here in Rome and also because someone who

  

claims to descend from Iulus or Aeneas will not consent that any common human being

might tell him which way to go. Notwithstanding all this, you know that if he insists on

following the steps that Fortuna has prescribed for him, we will find ourselves

immersed in a lifetime’s tyranny, not only of a Roman but also of a female Pharaoh as

well, which would mean that Roman world would be ruled from Egypt and the

subsequent danger of having some blockheaded upstart as the Great God’s

representative here in Rome… You know who I am thinking about, don’t you? I have

no intention of becoming the saviour of the Republic’s old values as I did in the past. I

  

have been a simple privatus for decades, too many decades, and my world, parallel to

the Roman one, has remained almost alien to it. Sometimes I think it is just a matter of
  

sentimental reasons, so many years of coining some kind of ….dignitas ,virtus…. And

then all of it ends up under the shamelessness of depraved oriental palace officers and
  

outrageous Romans. No wonder one fine day liberti may become consuls or whatever

word that may be given to those would-be representatives of …royal?...or maybe divine

power? Your blood is not only Calpurnian but Rutilian as well, like your mother-in-law’s,

through your respective motherly families. In spite of your fatherly lineage, you’re totally

different from all this pack of assassins who murdered all that our mother Rome had  wrought. The most serious thing is that many, many think the same thing as us… and

they may even be willing to give a dramatic solution to this, what might turn out to be

an even more foolish way out than not doing anything to change the run of events. I do

not intend to darken your mood recklessly. I just desire, intensely want you to do your

best through your intuition. Maybe your father has already told you about it, that your

husband is growing seriously limited. Before the battle of Munda, not only did his moral

strength fail but also his ability to encourage his legions. I personally think he recklessly

thrust himself against Gnaeus Pompeius’ troops so that he could eventually end up

with his life, instead of seeing that as a desperate attempt to encourage his legionaries.

Yes, Calpurnia. That…oriental influence? is possibly damaging his mood and mind in

such a way that one fine day he could either feel like Quirinius himself or see assassins

everywhere.

By the way, he has demanded an important tribute from all those cities in Hispania that

were disloyal to him, including Gades and the riches contained in its temples…except

Venus Marina-Astarte’s.

May the blood of our noblest ethereal ancestors enlighten the path which you are

bound to follow.

Cornelius”

 

With no helmet or sword…Only sheltered by a shield, alone, thrusting yourself into the

bosom of the…abyss? I felt reluctant to use the real word. Oriental influence…Oh,

Gods, that austere stomach of yours being forced to the ingestion of over-spiced

meals. What else could there be in them which might contribute to perturb your mind?

Yes, my suspicions were becoming more and more solid and well-defined. What else

could be expected of someone who in his early twenties felt enabled to possess the

world and had such a ruthless ambitious nature? Yes, Kornel was right. I had to do

even what was beyond my own possibilities to save you from that which you had

 

chosen to approach, after that military aruspex’ s inability to find the hearts of those

sacrificed victims at Munda….. Kornel….Kornel… If only I could be in direct contact

with him so as to join our efforts…

What about Cornelia? Anyway, she had been your mother-in-law and she had some

kind of influence on you… But, no, Gods… Not even would Aurelia herself have been

able to dissuade you…