De Immortalitate – Immortality

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Chapter 12 – Friends

"Amicus certus in re incerta cernitur."

"A sure friend is seen in an unsure matter."

(Ennius, quoted by Cicero, Laelius – De Amicitia, XVII, 64)

Antonius' POV

"Enough." I harshly dismissed the last servant who had asked to speak with me in the morning.

I couldn't control the anger that had seized me since I had discovered that there was a spy in my own home. Someone was keeping Felix informed about everything that happened in the villa. I could trust Esma and Sextius with my life, but any other servant could have been lured by Felix to keep an eye on Bella and tell him whatever I did with her. If I had been calmer, I would have acknowledged that the servants couldn't understand what was going on between Felix and me. To them, we were both their masters, and his word had more authority than mine. But I wasn't calm at all. I pulled at my hair, struggling to find a way to keep Bella safe. All the different options I had considered led to the same result: Bella had to stay as far from me as possible. "You still have to learn to be detached," Felix had said. My hope was that I could protect protect Bella by convincing him that she meant nothing to me. If Felix wasn't going to see her at the villa, he might lose his interest in her; maybe he might even forget her.

A list of names and faces came back to my mind, each one of them eliciting a deep pain: the people whom Felix had taken on his visits. But he had never taken slaves from the farm, I reasoned. Most servants had their own families there, and a disappearance would have raised too many questions. Could the farm be an option? Could I send Bella there, trusting her to a family, and pretend that I didn't care about her more than about any other slave?

I considered the agaso's family: Iacomus had a wife, Victoria, so Bella would live with another woman. I could already count on Iacomus' desire to be appreciated; since he had begun to work for me, it seemed that the slaves assigned to him could yield twice as much as when the former stable keeper was in charge. He could believe that an additional servant was a sign that I was encouraging his work and his wife's as well.

Following my orders, Iacomus and his wife came immediately to the house.

"Here you are," I blurted as soon as I spotted them in the atrium with Sextius, without even bothering to answer their greetings. The woman was obviously upset with my curt manner, but the man didn't flinch from my angry gaze. It was a good sign, since I couldn't bear any cowardice. Cowards became traitors easily, and I didn't need to find another spy in my house. "In my office," I ordered. "There's something I need to discuss with you."

"The horses are fine, Master," the stable keeper began, "and there are some improvements to the stables that I'd like to show you."

I stopped him. I didn't have time for talking; I only needed to find an opportunity to justify what I was going to do. "Do you need help with the chores at the farm?" I asked the woman.

She didn't answer immediately, but looked at her husband, as if she were trying to find out what I wanted to hear. She might have been thinking that a new slave could be useful, but maybe she was afraid to appear lazy if she admitted that she needed help.

I hadn't any time to waste with her insecurities. "Since it seems that you are working hard for the farm, I'm going to give you a new servant. Bella has proven to be good and hardworking while she has been here at the house. You can teach her more about life on the farm, and I'm sure she will behave herself," I announced. I swallowed hard. Let's hope it's the right thing to do.

"Have you been treated well as long as you have worked for me?" I asked them.

"Yes, Master, very well," they rushed to assure me.

"So I expect you to treat Bella well. If there's anything you have to complain about, tell Sextius and no one else, and he will report it directly to me. Understood?"

They both nodded.

"Sextius, go fetch Bella," I ordered. "She will leave with Iacomus and Victoria. They are going back to the farm immediately." I wanted to encourage everyone to think that Bella was a servant like any other. Until I found the spy, I had to maintain the façade with Esma and Sextius, too. If they didn't know the truth, they couldn't be at risk of being used by somebody to get more information. So I couldn't allow myself even a last glance at Bella.

As they left, the stable keeper and his wife seemed relieved. I hadn't reproached them for anything, and they even got to go back to the farm with help for their work. Their relief might not have been so pronounced if they knew my heart went with them.

What would Bella think? I wondered, alone in my office. I'm sending her away without any explanation. Will I ever be able to tell her that I just want to keep her safe?

I stayed in the office for what seemed hours, until I heard a light knock on the door.

Esma walked into the room. "Have you seen Bella?" she asked, sounding confused. "I can't find her."

"I sent her to the farm with Iacomus and his wife," I told her curtly. "She'll be there for a while. They needed some extra help," I lied.

Esma said nothing. Her eyes widened and she blanched.

Even you don't trust me? I thought. Can't you imagine that I'm doing it to protect her? Do you actually believe that she was just a plaything for me and I got bored with her? I would have liked to know Esma's thoughts; was there anything I could say to spare her a new sorrow?

I was too angry to bear the presence of anyone. When Esma was dismissed, I remained alone, allowing us both the opportunity to cry as long as we wished.

The wound that Bella's leaving had created worsened as the days went by. It was an invisible wound, yet undeniable and deep. I felt like my heart was gone—like I was hollow. Bella had brought me back to life. When she had arrived in my home, I was as a prisoner who had been kept in darkness for too long. She had been stubborn enough to teach me to move, to find the courage to look at the light, to start living again. Without her, the darkness closed around me–and it was even worse than before.

Going back to the library was the worst thing I could do since I had sent Bella away. It took me a week to gather the courage to go in and feel the void she had left. I read some poems. One of them could summarize what I felt for her:

"Let us live, let us love"

I couldn't hope for anything more.

"Suns may set, and suns may rise again:

but when our brief light has set,

night is one long everlasting sleep."

If being immortal meant being like Felix, I was looking forward my death.

There had been a time, not so long ago, when I was ready to die in battle for my country's glory. I considered it a noble and enviable death. I had always also thought that dying in place of somebody else, someone I loved, could be a good way to leave this world. Instead, I seemed damned to live while other people died in my place. "I haven't decided yet what I am going to do with you," Felix had said on his last visit. Every time I recalled his words, I feared that Felix could prevent me even from finding the peace of death. In our previous conversations, hadn't he suggested that immortality was possible?

"Give me a thousand kisses, a hundred more,

another thousand, and another hundred,

and, when we've counted up the many thousands,

confuse them so as not to know them all,

so that no enemy may cast an evil eye,

by knowing that there were so many kisses."

I wanted Bella's kisses on my lips. Her innocence appealed to me more than the refined love tricks of the most experienced women. I wanted to guide her to discover our bodies, following her pace, savoring every single touch. For me, gaining her trust and affection would have been better than conquering an empire.

But as any king has a traitor, I also had to fight against a spy. I'll discover who the spy is, I vowed, and I'll destroy him.

It was raining again. I went out in the garden, not caring about the rain, until I was shivering.

What if Bella is cold? I'm desperate for any news from her. Shall I send her something that could make her more comfortable?

When I went back to the house, Esma was waiting for me. The sad expression on her face told me that she was still hurt by the choice I had made about Bella. But, Esma being Esma, she wouldn't let that stop her from taking care of me. Without a word, she offered me a dry woolen tunic, neatly folded. I felt bad when I saw it. I had to know.

"Is it...?" I asked.

Esma nodded.

I didn't wear the tunic that Bella had made for me. I gave it back to Esma and ran outside again. It didn't matter if it was just for a moment, or only from afar. I had to see Bella.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Bella's POV

I shivered beneath the dripping eaves of the stable. At my home, I had seen only pole barns–simple structures with three sides and a roof that offered just the minimal amount of cover for the horses. On Antonius' farm the stables had enclosed barns, with wash racks and even a riding arena, that Iacomus was attempting to expand. But the rain had been so heavy that it had filtered through the eaves. I had gotten soaked too, but I couldn't go back to the farm without having finished the chores I still had to do. How many days had gone by since the last rainfall? It had been the day of the hail and the accident of the collapsed roof. A pang of longing hit me when I remembered how I had felt when Antonius had held me.

The wind filtered in the stables where I was working. The stables were clean, but the stink of dung was always there; with the gusts of wind, the smell became overwhelming. I rubbed my eyes, feeling so tired that I feared I would faint. I brought the dung I had collected outside, holding my breath to smell its stench as little as possible. The rain had become light; the sound of it tapping on the roof mingled with the horses' neighs. The black stallion was nervous; I could detect his hooves pawing on the ground heavier than usual.

Once again I remembered, moment by moment, my last days in Antonius' house. I struggled to find something, anything, that could explain why I had been sent away.

I hadn't even been given the opportunity to say goodbye to Esma, let alone to the master. Since the storm, I hadn't seen my master at all. I recalled that, the day I had been sent to the farm, a team of laborers were working to repair the roof. In the villa, other servants were speaking about the team, saying that the workers had come directly from Rome and were talking about the capital, a place I had never visited.

What if something had happened to Antonius? Had Esma kept something from me? No one had mentioned anything about sending me away. When I tried to find out if Iacomus and Victoria knew more than I, the only thing they told me was that I had been given to them to work. I was torturing myself with doubts and questions, but I got no answer.

I still prayed for Esma and Antonius every night. But my prayers were often just a tangle of contrasting words. Day after day, the idea that my master could have simply wanted to get rid of me was becoming stronger. It was like a snake in the grass: increasingly closer, increasingly more dangerous.

In my time at the villa, every moment I had spent with Antonius was a gift, and I was always surprised by the tenderness he had shown me. Had I been a fool, believing that I could be dear to him?

At the fountain, I accidentally spilled some water from the buckets I was filling for the horses. I tried to concentrate more on what I was doing, but I was hungry and exhausted. On the farm I scarcely ate. Iacomus maintained that since my work wasn't hard, I didn't need as much food. He had become even more stern when he had asked me what I used to do at the villa and discovered that my daily chores were, mainly, helping Esma to cook or sew and reading and translating for the master. He told me that I had been put under his authority to do actual work and not to be spoiled or amuse myself as if I were a guest.

But these weren't my main concerns. As long as I had to work, day after day, sunrise to sunset, I would endure without complaint. But I was afraid of what happened after dark.

In the villa, I had spent every night with Esma, not bonding with other servants. On the farm, we slaves shared a common room and I had noticed that many servants lay with each other at night. I couldn't rest, fearing that it might be my same destiny. Sometimes even Iacomus took one of the women, although he had his own wife. It gave me nightmares. The slightest sound at night was enough to snap me awake.

Even when I had lost my family, God had helped me through Esma. But who was going to help me this time? I had never felt so tempted into letting every hope go. Had God forsaken me?

I could see my breath as I lugged the buckets back to the stable. Even if I still had to work outside, I welcomed the cold weather, because it chased away other servants who would normally be on their way from the fountain to the stables. I could cry alone.

One of the horses neighed as I gave it water. I went close to the mare and stroked its muzzle, then I took the pitchfork and add some more hay to its bowl. Antonius had told me that he was fond of his horses and had started to ride when he was very young. In his studies, he had been fascinated by the role horses had in war strategies, especially for foreign armies, and had become an expert on this subject. Maybe he also straddled the horse that I'm now stroking.

A harsh voice snapped me out of my thoughts.

"Aren't you supposed to be working, slouch?"

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Chapter's Notes

Antonius reads Catullus' Poem 5, Vivamus atque amemus.

Author's Notes

Romanward gratias agit to Camilla10, LJSummers, Duskwatcher2153, Marlena516, and Jmolly. Thanks to Project Team Beta.

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