Part 22 (1/2)

I still did not know whether Crocus's acclamation had taken Constantine by surprise, or if he himself had planned it. In retrospect, it was inevitable that Constantius's oldest son should claim the imperium. If he had not done so, I suppose Galerius would have made some pre-emptive strike against him, and why should I blame my son for doing what he had been conceived and born to do?

In fact, Constantine had acted with wisdom and decision, establis.h.i.+ng himself in his father's capital, Treveri. So far as anyone knew, to rule his father's territories was the extent of his ambition, and now everyone was courting him.

There were days when it all seemed like some dream. With Constantius I could have enjoyed all this, but I had trouble believing I belonged here, with a son I loved but hardly knew. Still, I had rented out my house in Londinium and brought all the household to Treveri, where Brasilia took charge of my kitchens and Vitellia the management of everything else as if they had been born to live in palaces. I missed my students and Katiya and my other friends in Londinium, but Constantine's enthusiasm was infectious.

Constantius had done his duty, but Constantineenjoyed the exercise of power.

My head was beginning to ache from the clamour by the time we reached the palace, and I was more than ready to sit down on something that did not move. I could see Constantine eyeing the marble facings in the hall as if he were considering copying them for his new basilica. They were magnificent-pink and grey polished slabs laid in patterns on the lower walls and the floor. But though the building itself was impressive, a close examination made it clear that it had been put back into use rather hastily. The long tables so beautifully swathed in brocade were plain wood, and the fittings where tapestries should have curtained the windows were still bare.

The richly-dressed guests who sat at those tables did not seem to notice. Crocus was there, with two of his senior officers, and a rotund little man called Ossius who was the Bishop of Corduba. Though the wedding had been a traditional Roman affair, Constantine had asked the bishop to give it his blessing, which had no doubt pleased the Christians here.

Nonetheless, once the sacrifices had been made, the omens read, and the marriage contract signed, the feast to which we sat down was memorable, even if the little bride had not yet lost her puppy fat and was unbecomingly flushed-with excitement, I hoped, not with wine. Fausta had fine reddish hair, to which her maids had given rather too much curl, and grey eyes. When she grew into her looks, she might be handsome, but for now, her cheeks full of sweetmeats, she brought to mind a bright-eyed squirrel.

During one of the breaks in the entertainment when the guests were milling about, Constantine made his way to my couch.

”My darling,” I gazed up at him, ”you outs.h.i.+ne your bride!” Surely no woman had ever been blessed with such a splendid son. On this day, all my sufferings seemed justified.

Constantine grinned. His cream-coloured tunic of Eastern silk was bordered and banded with gold that set off his burnished hair. ”She is pretty enough when she is not laden with ornaments like a heifer at a festival. But it is true that she is still very young. Will you rule my household, Mother, until Fausta is old enough for the job?”

I pretended to think about it, but he knew I could not refuse, and he seized my hand and kissed it when I smiled.

”And there is another request I would make of you, even dearer to my heart,” he paused, as if searching for words. ”When I was in the East, I formed a... connection... with a woman named Minervina, and two years ago she bore me a son.”

I lifted one eyebrow, understanding why he might feel unwilling to bring up the subject, when from his point of view this Minervina's story sounded so much like my own.

”And what have you done with her, now that you have a legitimate bride?” I asked tartly, and saw the betraying flush stain his skin.

”She died of a fever a year ago,” he replied with some dignity. ”I had no choice but to leave the boy with his uncle when I escaped Galerius, but now I have sent for him. His name is Crispus, mother. Will you take charge of him for me?”

”Pater families,” I teased him gently. ”You are taking all of your relatives under your wing. Did you dislike it so much that I was not able to give you sisters and brothers of your own?”

For a moment he looked confused, then he gave me the sweet smile that I remembered from the days when he was a boy. A grandchild! I was surprised at how that thought excited me.

”Never mind,” I said then, ”bring your little lad to me. If he smiles at me like that I am sure I will love him well.”

”Avia! Avia!See-Boreas will jump for me!”

I turned, smiling, as the golden-haired boy held up the branch. The male greyhound puppy, one of a pair that Constantine had recently sent to me, leapt over it, and the female, Favonia, gambolled around them, barking.

”They are still young, my love-do not make them too excited,” I warned, although in truth it was as much the nature of a puppy to live in a state of excitement as it was for a little boy.

Crispus was curious about everything, and charmed everyone. Constantine never spoke of the boy's mother, but it was clear that she had had the raising of the child long enough to give him a certainty that he was loved. Even Fausta, though she was more of an age to be his sister, played with him like a doll and swore that she would adopt him as her own.

In the three years since Crispus had come to Treveri I had become accustomed to the cry of 'Avia!', 'Grandmother!' It seemed to me sometimes during these first years of Constantine's reign that I had lived three lives, and the third was the happiest of all.

In my first, I had been a maiden of Avalon, struggling to survive Ganeda's hostility and come into my own power. The second had given me the joy of a woman's fulfilment and the pain of a woman's pa.s.sions, but even during the years when we were apart, like a flower forever turning to the sun, my ident.i.ty had been determined by my relations.h.i.+p to Constantius. But now my body had found a new equilibrium, no longer at the mercy of the moon, and I had a new existence as Empress-mother, the most unexpected ident.i.ty of all.

Tiring of his play, Crispus came running up to climb into my lap, and the dogs, panting, flopped down beside us. I popped a candied fig from the painted plate on the bench beside me into the boy's mouth, and cuddled him against my breast.

For the first time in my life I had no need to practise economy, and I had servants in plenty to do the actual work of the imperial household. I was free to spend most of my time with Crispus, who had all his father's brilliance, and, as it seemed to me, even more sweetness, though that may have been the partiality of a grandmother, who can afford to love her grandchildren more openly because their success or failure does not so directly reflect upon her own.

”Tell me a story about when Pater was a little boy!” mumbled Crispus through the fig.

”Well-” I thought a moment, ”when he was your age, he loved figs, just like you. At that time we lived in Naissus, and we had a neighbour who was very proud of the fig tree in his garden. Now we also had a dog called Hylas who loved fruit, and would even climb trees to get at it. So Constantine made a muzzle for Hylas, and very early one morning he dropped him over the wall into the neighbour's garden and encouraged him to climb the fig tree and knock the ripe figs down. Then he nipped into the garden with a basket and gathered them up and took them into the playhouse he had built in our garden to eat.”

”Did he eat them all?” asked Crispus. ”Didn't he give the doggie even one?”

”Oh yes, and smeared fig around Hylas's muzzle as well, and when the neighbour discovered his loss and came over, shaking his fist and demanding that we punish our son, Constantine pointed to the dog and swore by Apollo that Hylas had done the deed, which was, of course, true. When the man didn't believe him, he insisted on going to the fig tree and letting Hylas climb it again, and this time of course he was not muzzled, and managed to grab one of the figs he had missed before.”

”What did the neighbour say?”

”Well, first he wanted us to destroy the dog, but he settled for a promise that the animal would be prevented from ever getting into his garden again. So we swore by Apollo as well, and paid the man the worth of the figs in silver, and he went home.”

”I'm glad the dog was safe,” said Crispus. ”But didn't Pater get in trouble?”

”Oh yes, because, you see, Hylas had been trained not to climb that wall. Constantine thought he had been very clever, until we explained the difference between being truthful and being honest, and made him help our gardener dig the flowerbeds until he had worked off the price we paid.”

I saw the child's eyes grow round as he contemplated the idea that his father had once been less than perfect. In recent years, Constantine had developed a distinct taste for splendour, and I thought it would do Crispus no harm to realize that his father was human too.

If I had a worry, it was the continued political turmoil as Constantine struggled with his compet.i.tors for supremacy. I had no real doubts that he would eventually triumph, for was he not the Child of Prophecy?

Still, I waited eagerly for my son's letters, and finding in his mother his safest confidante, Constantine wrote to me often.

When Crispus jumped down to go and play with the dogs some more, I took out the latest letter, sent from somewhere near Ma.s.silia. After the wedding, Maximian had quarrelled with his son and for a time taken refuge with us. Galerius, having failed to rectify the situation by force, had made another treaty and installed a man called Licinius to replace Severus, whom Maxentius had executed.

And now Maximian, who in my opinion was showing signs of senility, had seized the treasury and dug himself in at Ma.s.silia, after first having written a letter to Fausta proclaiming that soon he would be the sole ruler of the West once more.

Constantine was at that point reviewing troops on the Rhenus, and Fausta, who idolized him, had promptly written to inform him of what was going on. By now, Constantine might be fighting his father-in-law. We had received no word since this letter, written from the temple of Apollo at Grannum, where Constantine had stayed three nights before.

”Grannum was on our way, and so I took the opportunity to sleep overnight in the shrine there.

And the G.o.d gave me a dream. Apollo himself came to me, attended by Victory, and offered me four laurel wreaths. Perhaps you will know how to interpret this portent better than I, but I believe that each one represents a span of years during which I will reign. The Almighty Sun has always favoured our family, and so I claim His protection. If Apollo gives me victory in the coming conflict, I will inscribe”soli invicto comiti”on my next issue of coinage in His name. Pray for me, mother, that I have dreamed true, and will indeed gain the victory ...”

A sound, like the distant murmur of trees in a storm, caught my attention, but there was no wind-the sound was coming from the city. The gardens attached to the palace were extensive. If I could hear noise from the street beyond our gates, where the new basilica rose above the trees, it had to be loud. I felt my gut tensing as I rose to my feet, but I folded Constantine's letter carefully and slid it into the bosom of my gown where it bloused over the waist cord.

Crispus and the dogs were still chasing each other around the garden. If it was good news, I told myself, I could wait to hear it, and I had no need to hurry sorrow if it was bad.

Yet it was not some dust-coated military messenger, but Fausta who came running out of the palace as if the furies were at her heels. The cramping in my belly tightened as I saw her face contorted and her cheeks smeared with tears.

”Mater! Mater! He killed himself, and it is my fault!”

Abruptly my own terror eased. My son believed in his destiny too strongly to take his own life whatever disaster might befall. I took the girl in my arms and held her until her sobbing eased.

”Who, Fausta? What has happened?”

”My father-” she wailed. ”They caught him at Ma.s.silia and now he is dead, and it is all because I told Constantine what he wrote to me!”

”Your duty was to your husband, you know that,” I murmured, patting her, ”and Constantine would have found out soon in any case, and the end would have been the same.” It was a very convenient suicide, I observed silently, wondering if Maximian had been given a.s.sistance in expiating his crime. Gradually, Fausta's sniffles ceased.

”Mourn for your father, Fausta, for in his day he was a great man, and he would have hated to live until he was feeble and old. Wear white for him, but do not let your eyes be red and puffy with weeping when Constantine comes home.”