Part III

An invitation had come the previous evening to dine at the house of Marcus Lepidus. It was a warm night for mid-March, but the sky had clouded over early and there was already the odd shower of light rain to dampen the party wear of the dictator of Rome as he and his party made their way through the more upmarket streets of the city. By Caesar's side, as always, his oldest, most trusted and currently extremely disgruntled personal agent bore the paperwork that needed to be completed that evening, despite the convivial setting.

"So you will go about Rome vulnerable to attack by any of those who mean you harm. An excellent idea, Caesar. Perhaps Antony will be kind enough to have me as a kitchen slave when you are dead?"

A torch in the bracket above the secretary's head revealed his cocked eyebrow. Caesar grimaced.

"Firstly, Posca, as you well know, you will be freed the moment my will is read." That particular clause had been written in for the past decade. Caesar didn't want any other man being master of Posca, even after he was dead. The slave knew too much and as a freedman, couldn't be tortured for information that might reflect badly on his memory or the fortune of his heir. "Secondly, as I say, I will have my tame senator at my side for my protection. Vorenus is a fine example of the kind of Roman who deserves to be raised to the nobility."

Posca barely suppressed a snort. "Who, so my reports tell me, initially opposed your advance into Rome and probably still considers you an unconstitutional tyrant. What's to stop him killing you himself?"

"I'm sure those reports also tell you that Lucius Vorenus is a dutiful and pious man, my dear Posca. He wouldn't dare to bring down the wrath of the gods upon his head by turning on his patron. You'll recall also that the entire Senate has sworn to guarantee my personal safety."

"Be that as it may, Caesar, Strabo and I are now spending at least half our time filtering reports that your noble senators are plotting your death before you leave for Parthia." In four days time. Not long to wait, then.

"Names?"

"Gaius Cassius, Publius Casca, Lucius Cimber – and Marcus Brutus." Well, that last at least was no surprise. The graffiti plastered all over the city had proclaimed that someone at least was trying to pull Brutus' strings – and Caesar had a good idea about who that person was.

"It's Brutus' mother hates me, not the boy himself, Posca. The pamphlet was not from his pen, as any of his correspondents familiar with his style could tell. He's never blooded his sword in battle, let alone killed a man in cold blood. He is upset about Macedonia, true, but that will pass."

Ah, Servilia. If the ruler of the world had one regret, it was that she had had to be cast aside to avoid the taint of scandal damaging his campaign against Pompeius. That landslide of auburn ringlets, the husky purr, her still slight and elegant figure – despite her years and his own - enchanted him even after nearly ten years with only ink and parchment between them. He had not truly come home from Gaul until he'd found himself in front of her at his niece's dinner party. Now she hated him, a necessity if she were not to cling on to any hope that he might return to her. Had he miscalculated? Did she hate him enough to manipulate her naïve son into joining a plot against him…?

Posca interrupted his thoughts. "Be more cautious, Caesar," he urged, "If they intend to strike, they will strike soon. The omens have been bad for months and all point to your destruction."

"Then we are fighting fate, which is impossible for a mortal man – which I still am, Posca, despite the ridiculous honours they heap upon me. I am Caesar – I will not be kept caged and bound like that pitiful brute we made of the king of fearsome Gaul. I would rather they struck me down swiftly than live the rest of my life cowering behind an armed guard."

"So be it, then. Let us hope that Lucius Vorenus is as formidable a bodyguard in your service as he was in Titus Pullo's."

Posca silenced, Caesar's thoughts turned to Vercingetorix – he had not lied to the bedraggled prisoner when he had said that the man's condition had indeed made him think about the fickleness of fate.

Vercingetorix's elevation to king of all the Gauls and his subsequent rebellion had very nearly reversed the progress the Roman proconsul had made in what were now three of the largest and potentially (once properly settled) most productive provinces in the empire. Caesar had had to re-pacify almost the whole area after the siege at Alesia. To see the formerly proud, regal Vercingetorix again after the years he had spent in captivity, on the eve of being dragged to his death, helpless and humiliated, had been a grim reminder of the games Fortune could play with the ambitious. Caesar had fought a civil war to avoid such degradation at the hands of Cato and Metellus Scipio. Both dead now, by their own hands, when he would have spared them.

They had refused to let him – the tyrant – spare them. They would not owe him their lives. Caesar inwardly sighed. He had no wish to be a tyrant. Conceivably, Rome ran more efficiently now that all his serious enemies had been eliminated, but he missed the challenge of a rival with Cato's tenacity or Pompeius' authority. Cicero simpered and placated, Brutus remained a pathetic stalk that wavered in the wind. Antonius was likely a far greater danger than either of those two honoured conscript fathers. What was the point in glory and reputation if one had no worthy opponent against which to measure oneself? Perhaps the Parthians would do better.

The lictor rapped on Lepidus' door with his bundle of rods and demanded entrance for the consul and dictator, Gaius Julius Caesar.

- - -

Bloodied and torn, feeling the life slip from him as his wounds – over twenty of them – seeped blood onto the marble floor, Caesar stared into the soft brown eyes of his killer.

There was silence now, after a minute or so of pure furious chaos raining down steel into his body, his face. The cut to his face – that ungrateful bastard Cassius – had cast a sheet of flowing red down his neck, joining the outpourings of the medley of other jabs and slices around his chest and shoulders. Caesar had ceased to even feel the pain as his body shut down and he folded up against – irony of ironies! – the base of Pompey's statue. His son-in-law looked out at the conspirators serenely.

Brutus came forward, knelt. Caesar had underestimated the boy. He thought he was serving his ancestors well and had come to strike the final blow. Do it then, my son, and please your mother and those brave fools who stand there waiting for you to prove yourself. The breath from my body will fan the flames that burn Rome to the ground.

Caesar's consciousness was fading even as Brutus finally drove his blade downwards into his unfeeling groin. He was helpless – neither Antonius nor Vorenus had been there in the end to beat off the assassins. Helpless, but not humiliated, like the Gaul had been. His legs already mostly covered with the ragged toga, Caesar forced his blood-starved hand to grasp the upper part of what remained of it and draw it towards his face. The world came to a sudden halt as Rome's most remarkable man surrendered to death. Caesar's arm fell.