The Pillars of Rome Read Free

filled the atrium, intent on laying claim to a share of his gratitude that the gods should bless him so, a share in the power the Falerii could command in these troubled times. In the streets of Rome, just a few feet away, few men dared to walk alone; the city was split into warring factions, as the ill-bred supporters of Livonius fought the Senate for control of the most potent state the world had ever known.
    Tiberius Livonius, plebeian tribune, was bent on forcing his reforms through the assembly, the Comita Tribalis ; acts that appealed to the basest sectors of Roman society, an alteration to the voting qualifications that would spread authority through the ranks of the thirty-five tribes, so even the meanest, ill-bred member would stand on a level with the richest and most aristocratic. Patrician nobles, members of the oldest and most illustrious families, like Lucius Falerius and those assembled to witness this birth, opposed such moves with all the considerable energy at their command. For such people power could only be entrusted to men of quality and wealth – anything else was a surrender to the mob.
    They had stood quietly, faces set, just like the death masks of the Falerii ancestors that lined the walls, sweating in their uncomfortable garmentswhile out of sight the midwives worked diligently in the bedchamber, muttering incantations for the intercession of Lucina , the Goddess of Childbirth. Each invited guest had stoically ignored the cries of Lucius’s wife, Ameliana, as she struggled, strapped in to her special delivery chair, to bring forth the child; that was in the nature of things and not a cause for comment. No flicker of emotion crossed a brow as the cries of the child took over from the painful screams of the mother. The master’s body slave Ragas, tall, muscular, his shoulders glistening with oils, crossed the atrium, imperiously elbowing his way through the throng, to whisper in his owner’s ear.
    The guests remained still and expressionless, while Lucius, having acknowledged the message, moved to the end of the room, his fine-boned, intelligent face as expressionless as his deep-set brown eyes. Each craned forward as their host made an offering at the altar dedicated to the dio domicilus , a sacrifice to the family Genius, for it was by this Lares , this household God, that a man such as Lucius Falerius, and his ancestors before him, achieved immortality. They knew by the sacrifice of a black puppy that Ameliana had been delivered of a son. Moments later, like a well staged appearance in a drama, the child, carried by a midwife in a wicker basket, wrapped loosely in a swaddling cloth, was brought into the chapel, stillyelling mightily, the small puckered face bright pink with fury and the coal black hair which capped his head still glistening from the scented water in which it had been bathed.
    Ragas took the basket and approached his master, so the true moment had arrived; a man’s wife could be delivered of a child and that child might be a boy, but he was not yet the son of Lucius, not yet a true descendant of the Falerii, who could trace their line back to the days when Aeneas, fleeing from the ruins of Troy, had founded the city of Rome. In the period between the birth and what followed the child was an orphan. If the next stage of the family ritual was omitted it would remain so and shame would fall on the head of Ameliana Falerius from this day forth. Tension was heightened by a sudden pause, as the slave held up the basket, close enough for Lucius to see the child, but just too far away for his master to touch. The guests could only wonder at the way the pair locked eyes, the slave smiling, his master frowning, before the basket was inched a fraction closer. Lucius did not move a muscle, almost teasing his audience in the way he examined the child, carefully lifting the swaddling cloth to confirm his sex, daring someone to break the spell.
    Raising his head he looked around the room,