Chapter One: In the Eye of the Beholder
Rome. It was considered the greatest and most powerful place in the world. Travelers from all over flocked to the city. They expected great opportunities and riches to fill their empty purses. The great wonders of Rome had been washed away when Nero crowned himself as Emperor. Rome once was a city flourishing with life was now a den of filth, plague, poverty and death at every corner.
There was no life here and every citizen that attempted to flee was executed by Nero's command. With every weed in the field one must look at the flowers surrounding it. There were pockets of happiness throughout the empire's capital. You just had to look for them.
Life is what you make it out to be. Some resorted to taking any job they were able to do even if they hated every waking moment of their day's work. You must find a reason to go on living even if that meant killing people as a job.
In one of the said pockets of happiness in Rome, children were entertained by puppeteers and stage performers. Afar, sitting in a canopy covered outside a tavern, Gabrielle sat in her black hooded cloak, nursing a cup of water.
She lingered in the open faced tavern, watching the children cheer and laugh as the performers made fools of themselves. Cracking a smile she tried not to laugh as others were around her. If the Roman military were in the vicinity the entertainment would be put to a halt.
No enjoyment was allowed unless approved by the emperor. A horrible life it is to live through other people's suffering.
Gabrielle hid her face at the men passing by and a man in a heavy thick cloak discreetly weaved through the crowd of people. She noticed his sly hand gesture and slipped a small scroll out of his long willowy sleeve.
She glanced around at the oblivious onlookers and scooted to the end of the bench and held out her palm. The man passed and handed the scroll off into her hand and hurried away. Tucking the secret message in her cloak pocket she stood from the bench and threw a couple of coins on the table to pay for her meal and drink.
XXXXXX
Across the busy square, Gabrielle searched the area and slipped in between two buildings, one belonging to winery and the other to a sea of Rome's finest artists. She took the scroll hidden in her palm and read it quickly.
Heavily, she sighed and pulled the hood off her head and walked by an open lit fire outside the winery and dropped the letter in the burning embers. Making sure nobody was watching she stripped herself of the heavy black cloak and rounded the corner.
She entered the workshop beside the winery and tossed her cloak on a bench near the entryway. She lathered her hands with a bar of soap and knelt down in front of a spigot and turned the knob. Water flowed from the spigot and drenched her hands then she splashed some water onto her face several times.
"Gabrielle! Have you come to share some of your satirical ballads today?"
She stood and dried her face and hands with her blouse. Lifting her head she spotted Zenodorus standing on a thirty foot ladder, soiled in clay from head to toe. She rested her hands on her hips and arched an eyebrow.
"What are you doing up there?" she asks the artist.
Zenodorus slid down the ladder and jumped down a foot in front of her. She jumped and took a step back. "I've got a new assignment. I'm designing a new statue for the emperor."
Ah, the emperor. Nero the Mad, she called him. She was positive that he was the only emperor who requested to have as many statues and busts made during his reign. He had far more than the emperors before him scattered across the empire.
"I'm not surprised he wants another statue. He's so full of himself," she muttered. "How large is this statue going to be?"
Zenodorus wagged his finger in her face and wrapped an arm around her. "Picture it, Gabrielle," he set the scene, waving his hand across the workshop. "A hundred foot tall statue with a crown of laurels, chiseled physique, sword in hand, standing on a dais. What do you think?"
She rolled her eyes. "I think that you're going to boost his ego."
She shrugs his arm off and grabbed a set of paintbrushes off the table and walked towards the small space she had to work on her paintings. He followed her and jumped on the table, sliding across with ease on his rear just as she was beginning to grab a new canvas to be stretched.
"Guess who stopped by today." He wiggles his eyebrows mischievously.
Gabrielle yanked a couple of wooden boards from beneath the jumpy artist and waltzed over to the stretcher.
"Who?" she asks, trying to sound interested.
Zenodorus grabbed one of the paintbrushes and swiped it across his clean shaven face. "Augusta Sabina," he sniggers.
She whipped her head around. "What did she want?"
"Oh, you know, a little something from you," he whittled the brush on his arm, distracting himself. "She wants a commission for her private villa."
She strung the canvas sheet on the stretcher and pulled it over the wooden beam, cursing under her breath.
"That cow is just as bad as him," she growled. "If I have to paint one more portrait of her I swear I'll rip my eyes out!" she hammered the canvas to the wooden frame and Zenodorus flinched.
"At least she's not ugly like his last wife," he mused.
"You mean the wife he murdered?" she snorts. "When she gives birth to that spawn I have no doubt Nero will chop her head off. Just you wait, Zenodorus."
The artist clicked his tongue against his inner cheek and shook his head. "You shouldn't talk badly about the emperor's wife, Gabrielle." He crept up behind her and whispered, "The walls have ears."
"Get away from me," she playfully snaps back. "When is she stopping by so I can prepare myself?"
Zenodorus lay down on a table and gazed at her with an arch of his thick eyebrow. "It's gonna cost ya."
"Come on!"
He laughed and rolled off the table and climbed up the tall ladder to continue working on the steel framework of his newest creation.
"She's coming by tomorrow morning."
"Perfect." She pulled off the freshly stretched canvas and placed it on the easel. "I hope she doesn't want to 'chat' while I paint because I hate talking to her."
"But you're so good at it!"
XXXXXX
Two steps. Three steps. Four steps.
A noble Roman woman sauntered around the market, searching for jewelry, followed by two male guards posted on either side of her. She stopped at a small shop and stood underneath the canopy, inspecting the necklaces, casually talking with the friendly jeweler.
Five steps. Six steps.
She waved her hand, no longer interested by the small trinkets that the merchant was selling. She took a detour down an alley as a short cut to get through to the next market ahead closer to the square. She and her bodyguards rounded a corner and walked in the deserted alley of apartment homes.
Seven steps. Eight steps.
Two sets of eyes peered from behind the buildings. Men dressed in fur cloaks and leathers, slithered up behind the Roman guards and wrapped their hands around the Romans' mouths. With a swift twist of their necks the Romans collapsed into the arms of their attackers.
The Romans were dragged off behind the buildings by their arms. The oblivious Roman noblewoman proceeded to head toward the market and then she mistakenly turned around and gasped at a tall woman with wild raven hair and blue eyes standing behind her.
She opened her mouth to scream and then her attacker's arm wrapped around her neck.
Snap.
The noblewoman fell to the ground with a loud thud and her body was dragged off by her boots into a small alley off the main street.
XXXXXX
Gabrielle waited for Zenodorus to leave the workshop so she could go upstairs into the tower. She was sure that he knew that she lived upstairs but since he never said anything the subject was moot. She looked at paint stained hands and dipped them into a water basin.
Scrubbing profusely she wasn't able to get even a small smidgen of the paint off her hands. She wiped her hands on a cloth and plopped down onto the bed and gaped at the wooden beam ceiling. As she lay there in solace her mind wandered over the message she received this afternoon.
Normally, she mentally prepared herself for such tasks but she wasn't sure how she was going to go about this one. All she could think about was Emperor Nero and his will to get rid of every single enemy in his path. He couldn't even do it himself, she scoffs.
She pressed her fingertips together and blew a strand of blonde hair away from her face. Listening to the pure silence surrounding her, she closed her eyes and inhaled. The streets outside were quieting down, people were retreating to their homes, merchants were closing their shops. She heard the usual yelling from the winery next door.
A husband and wife, always arguing over the same thing: grapes or apricots. She wondered if they actually loved to argue since it was the same bickering at the same damn time every single day. Still, she enjoyed listening to them. It was amusing and comical but most of all, it was normal.
Gabrielle even copied some of the words from the argument since she memorized it. While she was listening to the wife yell at her husband she mouthed the words straight from the wife's mouth as they were being said.
She giggled softly and exhaled heavily, listening to the birds walk across the rooftop. In the midst of her normal routine she heard a loud bang downstairs in the workshop. She jumped off the bed and reached underneath the bed and pulled out a curved dagger.
Quickly, she pads down the stairs and peered from afar.
"Hey!" she yelled.
Two teenage boys had broken into the workshop and had all of her paint brushes laden in their arms. They scurried and ran out of the workshop, dropping a few brushes and small vials of paint. Gabrielle ran down the spiral staircase.
She chased after the boys and heaved heavily as they were already too far away for her to catch them. She slammed her hand against the wall and watched as they disappeared into the dim-lit streets. Reluctantly, she turned around and saw her workstation was completely empty minus a few miniscule brushes and useless white paint.
She huffed and bent down and picked up the scattered brushes, vials and canvas skins off the floor. Angrily she threw the supplies onto the table and stared out the window. A sea of darkness.
Gabrielle turned to go back upstairs and paused at a tall woman dressed in maroon gown and veil draped over her dark hair with the bluest eyes she's ever seen. She raised an eyebrow and cleared her throat.
"The shop is closed until morning," she informed the woman.
The brunette walked inside, not heading the blonde's words at all. She walked around a few small sculptures that resembled what looked to be deities.
Gabrielle crinkled her eyebrows and irritatingly eyed the intrusive woman.
"I said we are closed," she repeats. "Hello?"
The woman swiftly spun around and pointed to a sculpture. "Did you make this?"
"No…" she paused and looked around the empty workshop. "We have a sculptor who also works here. Sorry, I don't mean to be rude but I'm not really allowed to let anyone inside after closing time," she proceeds to coax the woman to leave.
The veiled woman smiled and looked down at Gabrielle's paint stained hands.
"So, you're a painter."
Gabrielle shyly hid her hands behind her back. "Yes. If you want you can come back tomorrow and I could commission something for you."
She nods her head slowly and her eyes wander around the large marble work space.
"I'll come back around the same time tomorrow." She turns and heads towards the exit.
Gabrielle's mouth gaped. "Well actually you can't come –" she began to say as the woman vanished. She folded her arms and felt a headache encroaching.
XXXXXX
Zenodorus got an early start on his new sculpture and head to the workshop just after dawn. He sketched the sculpture before he began sculpting the statue but the longer he stared at the sketch he changed his mind.
He slid down the tall ladder and took a step back to examine the height of the statue. One hundred feet. That was a tall task, he snickered at his inner jokes and puns he continuously made throughout the day. He licked his finger and closed one of his eyes, picturing the finished product.
He heard footsteps and smiled at his friend. "Gabrielle!" he greets her with a chipper tone. "Sleep well?"
She rubbed the back of her head and yawned. "I had a horrible night." She walked over to her station grumpily. "Someone stole my…" she looked at the table where she kept her supplies and cinched her eyebrows. "Paintbrushes…" she mumbles.
The paintbrushes which were stolen by those thieves had magically reappeared on the table. She spun around to the thin artist who gaped at her confusedly.
"Did two boys come in here this morning?" she asked.
Zenodorus eyed the brushes and stared at her wide green eyes. "Um, ah, no Gabrielle. Nobody came by. I've been here since after sunrise."
"Hmmph."
She picked up the brushes and examined them. Her eyes drifted to the window above the work station and stared at the citizens preparing for their day. Merchants set out their creations to be sold, vendors put out their fruits, grain and oils to be sold. She tapped the brush against the table and turned back to Zenodorus.
"I should get my station ready for Augusta Sabina," she mocks.
"That's the spirit, Gabrielle!"
She sent a frown his way and he winked with a bright smile.
"I'm just trying to be optimistic," he shrugs a shoulder.