OK, fair enough. So here is a free sample of the marvelous adventure through the ancient world that awaits you when you purchase my newest book. This is the full prologue to THEOPHILUS. Read on at your peril - this blog post may fill you with an uncontrollable urge to buy the book when you're done!!
PROLOGUE
Rome:
October, 64 AD
The
last of the smoldering embers had been put out weeks before, but the city of
Rome still reeked of smoke and death.
The Great Fire had swept across the city like a scourge from the gods,
destroying three of the fourteen districts of Rome and severely damaging seven
others. Tens of thousands were dead, and many others still missing, their
charred remains buried beneath the fallen houses and shops that sprawled across
the seven hills of the Tiber. The Great Forum
had been spared from some of the damage by the frantic demolition of the many
wooden buildings that surrounded it, but still two temples had lost their roofs
and some of the shops along the far edge of the plaza had burned to the ground.
The
Senate of Rome had gathered in the Curia
Julia, the meeting hall built for them a century before by order of Gaius
Julius Caesar, the Divus Julius that
many Romans still worshipped as a god.
Barely begun before Caesar’s life was cut short by treachery, the Curia
had been finished by his great-nephew and adopted son, Caesar Augustus, the
first true Emperor of Rome. The hall was
crowded when the Senate was at its full capacity, but the purges and executions
carried out by Augustus’ three successors had nearly reduced the Senate to its
original size of three hundred members.
The
mood of the city was ugly, and the Senate’s mood reflected that. No one knew for sure how the fire had
started, but rumors had swept the city for weeks – and the most persistent
rumors involved none other than Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, the Princeps and Imperator of Rome. Some said
that he had set the fires himself, riding out incognito with a gang of young
hellions that he enjoyed carousing with.
Others said that he had ordered his minions to set the fires, and then
stood on the balcony of his villa and played the lyre, singing about the sack
of Ilium while Rome burst into flames all round him. The official story was that the Emperor had
been away from the city, inspecting an aqueduct project in Antium when the
fires broke out. According to his Praetorians,
the Emperor had rushed back to the city, organizing companies of firefighters
and relief efforts for those rendered homeless by the blaze. It was a measure of how much the people had
come to despise Nero that very few people believed the official version of
events. There were stories that the
young emperor had been jeered and even pelted with stones by an angry crowd in
the forum when he last showed his face, a month before.
So now this emergency
meeting of the Senate had been called, and the Conscript Fathers of Rome waited
impatiently for the Imperator to make
his appearance. Laecenius Bassus, the senior Consul, shifted impatiently in his
curule chair, glancing at his consular colleague, Licinius Crassus. During the days of the Republic, the Consuls
had been the highest elected officials of Rome, chief executives who commanded
armies and conducted foreign policy during their year in office. But since Augustus’ great reforms of Rome’s
government, the Consuls had become senior magistrates who served at the
Emperor’s pleasure. Nero had initially
restored some of the Senate’s powers when he inherited the purple at the age of
sixteen, but in recent years he had become more and more arbitrary and
tyrannical, and neither Consul dared call the Senate to order without him.
The tramping steps of the
Praetorian guards echoed across the Forum, audible through the open doors of
the Curia. The murmuring of the crowds
in the Forum swelled excitedly, and the members of the Senate turned their gaze
to the bronze doors. The marching boots
came to a halt, and then the slapping of sandals mounting the marble steps
announced the Emperor’s approach even before he reached the doorway. The Senate stood in respect as he entered the
chamber.
Nero, the ruler of a
quarter of the world’s population, and the last surviving heir of Caesar Augustus,
passed through the corridor that bisected the interior of the Curia Julia and
took his place behind the two consuls on a raised dais. His marble throne was
behind and above the curule chairs of Rome’s chief magistrates, but he remained
standing for the moment, surveying the chamber nervously. He was not a popular man with the Senate or
the People of Rome, and he knew it.
Nero was twenty-six years
old, and he had ruled over Rome since the death of his great uncle and adoptive
father, Claudius Caesar, ten years before (some said Nero had engineered that
death, poisoning Claudius with deadly mushrooms). Once muscular and athletic,
his over-indulgence in wine and fine foods had added a sheath of fat to his
waist, but he was still taller than the average Roman, and
broad-shouldered. His face had grown
plump, and his nose was slightly reddened from too much drinking. His toga, once gleaming white and trimmed
with the Imperial purple, was stained with soot, ash, and wine spills. His eyes constantly shifted back and forth,
as if fearing an assassin’s dagger at any moment. His mouth was always in motion, going from a
grim, straight line that bespoke determination and cruelty, to a quivering,
soft orifice that reeked of fear and a desperate desire for popularity. His nose was not the proud, stern beak that
Romans treasured, but rather was somewhat short and bulbous. Nor was he clean shaven, as the previous
Emperors had been, but grew a short, scruffy beard that swept from his shaggy
locks and met under his chin. Only the
area immediately surrounding his mouth was devoid of hair. The Emperor of Rome was a petulant, angry,
fearful, neurotic child, and the Senate and People of Rome paid dearly for his
insecurities.
“Conscript Fathers,” he
said, his booming tenor echoing from the marble walls, “The auguries have been
taken and the omens deemed favorable.
The pontiffs have given offerings to Vesta and Fortuna, to Jupiter
Optimus Maximus, and to the divine Emperors past, Julius, Augustus, and
Claudius, imploring their blessing on the rebuilding of our great city, and
their healing to the wounded hearts and bodies of our citizens.”
He shifted his weight
from foot to foot, eyeing his audience to measure their response to what he
said. Surrounded by slaves, prostitutes,
and sycophants for most of his days, he had lost much of the oratorical skills
that his tutor, the Stoic philosopher Seneca, had taught him - mainly due to
lack of practice. But as he spoke, the
words came easier, and he seemed to gain confidence.
“The destruction of the
City of Romulus was a great crime, the blackest crime our fair city has known
since the foul murder of the Divus Julius,”
he said. “I realize that there has been
much speculation about the cause of the fires since that dreadful day in the
month of the Julii when they began. Some
of those rumors are simply too ridiculous to merit mention in such an august
assembly, but I can assure you that no one has been more eager to find out the
truth of this matter than your own Emperor.
Ever since the last of the fires were extinguished, my agents have been
scouring the city, seeking to find the culprits responsible for such massive
destruction and bring them to justice.”
The Senators began to
look at one another with interest. Many
of them half believed the charges that Nero himself had set the fires, or
ordered them set – he was already measuring one badly burned out area to see if
it was large enough to contain the massive villa he wanted to build for
himself. But, if not the Emperor, then
who did set the fires? They returned
their attention to Nero as he continued.
His expression had grown more stern and commanding, as if he was
remembering who and what he was.
“You notice that I say
culprits, not culprit,” he said. “No one
man, not even your Emperor, could have set so many fires in so many places at
once. This was a vast conspiracy
involving many evil men, and it very nearly succeeded in destroying our entire
city! Who could hate the citizens of
Rome so much? Who could possibly wish to destroy our Eternal City? Carthage tried and failed, the Gauls nearly
succeeded once, four hundred years ago. The great Italian revolt during the
Social Wars dreamed of bringing Rome crashing to the earth. But they failed! They went down into Tartarus
with their dreams of our destruction unfulfilled. Even those Romans who have turned our own
armies upon us – Lucius Sulla, Gaius Marius, and Julius Caesar himself! They
marched on Rome not to destroy it but to capture it and win it over to their
causes. So I ask again, who could hate the citizens of Rome so much?”
He cast his gaze around
the chamber, his eyes narrowing above his pudgy cheeks. He had the Senate’s attention now, and even
some of those who had regarded him with contempt as he entered were now watching
him with renewed interest. He smiled grimly and continued.
“It took all of my
Praetorians, as well as the work of many of my other agents, to ferret out the
truth,” he declared. “The conspirators
were diabolical in their cleverness, walking among us unnoticed. Their fanatical creed had drawn slaves,
freedmen, and Roman citizens into its secret rituals. Wealthy plebs and even a
few Senators and patricians were counted among its members! They did not speak openly of what they had
done, but their attitudes and actions in the wake of the fires raised my
suspicions, and vigorous interrogation brought out the truth. Now I have come
to lay bare their foul plot! For this
crime was not just an assault on the Senate and People of Rome, but an attack
on our very gods themselves! It was our temples that drew the ire of these
animals, and their fanatical desire to blot out the worship of every god whose
image can be shaped with men’s hands!”
The Senators began to
whisper among themselves. Could this be
true? Could the fires have actually been
an attempt by a band of fanatics to destroy Rome’s traditional religion? Nero watched their reaction and nodded to
himself. He had them now, he thought to
himself.
“So who did this thing?”
he asked rhetorically. “Who tried, and
nearly succeeded, in destroying our city?
Who longs to end the worship of our gods? Who resents every sacrifice,
every offering, every temple, and every attempt we make to appease our
spiritual guardians?”
His voice rang through
the chamber, high and clear now, echoing from the marble pillars. Seneca’s old lessons on oratory had been
remembered, and the Emperor was putting on a powerful performance.
“It was the Christians!”
he shouted. “Members of a disgusting
cult of religious perverts who worship a crucified criminal! It is not enough that they engage in shameful
orgies called “love feasts,” or that they eat and drink the bodies and blood of
infants! Those things are despicable
enough, but now they seek to destroy the very gods of Rome! So what shall we do with these animals, these
monsters, these vile criminals?”
“Death!” cried one
Senator. “Proscriptions!” cried
another. The anger of the house had
swung away from Nero and found a new target, and the Emperor smiled as he heard
their angry cries.
“Conscript fathers!” he
raised his voice, and the angry shouts died down. “I call on you for a measure that has not
been taken in a generation. I call on
you to pass an Ultimate Decree of the Senate and People of Rome, declaring all
Christians to be hostis, their lives
forfeit, their property confiscated and granted to whoever turns them in. I call on you to name all Christians as
enemies of the state!”
Loud shouts of agreement
echoed through the chamber. The Senate
had become putty in the Emperor’s hands.
Nero’s mouth turned in a cruel sneer, and he held up his hands one more
time.
“But, it is tradition,
before passing such a decree, that I ask if there is anyone here who might
object to it. So I put the question
before you now – will anyone here speak up for these degenerates? Is there any
member of the Senate of Rome who will oppose the permanent criminalization of
all Christians?”
Silence fell, and the
Senators looked at one another for a moment.
Nero soaked up his triumph, and then opened his mouth to speak again –
when he was interrupted by a voice from near the back of the chamber.
“I will,” said a
middle-aged Senator as he stepped out from the ranks and into the aisle. He was slim, but his shoulders were broad and
he moved with the confidence that came with physical strength and grace. A faded, worn crown of grass was wrapped
around his bald scalp. “I will speak for
them!”
Nero shook his head and
sighed. “Marcus Publius! I might have known,” he said.
Well, that's the free sample. If you want to read the rest . . . click HERE:
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