Solar Wind. Book one - страница 3

Now Hadrian himself decided on whether to appoint Marcus Annius Verus as his heir or not. Behind him was the final word, as for the formidable and all-seeing Jupiter. In fact, he, Hadrian, was a god still living among the living. But one day his time would come and then his soul from the flames of the funeral fire would soar to the sky with the freedom of an eagle.16

“Oh, he's a monster, I assure you! A real monster!”

Empress Sabine angrily squeezed bloodless thin lips, frowned her eyebrows, and tried to give her face a neutral, detached expression, but she did not always succeed. And now she couldn't cope with herself. Evil tears rolled into her eyes, and dry, heart-weeping sobs came up to her throat.

She reclined on the bed—under her back the slaves slipped a few pillows for convenience—talking to her longtime friend, Marcus's mother, Domitia Lucilla. The bed was small, with elegantly curved wooden legs, decorated with bronze. Domitia was lying opposite exactly the same. The space between them was occupied by a small table on which there was a tray of fruit and a jug of wine.

In the spacious room the hand of the Empress was felt—on a large stone floor stretched a bright woven carpet, brought from distant China through Parthia, and along the walls in the niches were busts of Greek and Roman writers; Sabina was fond literature. Here were Virgil, Homer, Catullus, Horace, but there was no Ovid, as he was never forgiven by Emperor Octavian Augustus.

It was a hot, dry summer on the street, so slaves stood near her bed and the bed of Domitia, fanning the women with large fans fashioned from long ostrich feathers. They were almost alone in the Palatine Palace, except for the slaves, but who would think of them. Hadrian spent all his time in Tibur, in his newly built huge villa and did not look into the palace.

In the far corner of the hall at the table was Marcus. He read Cato's17 book in a position assigned to him by the grammar teacher of Apollonius, who had recently begun to teach the young man.

The Empress was talking about Hadrian. He had long been the subject of her conversations, and to the curiosity or indignation of visitors, she always spoke about him badly, painting her stories in gloomy tones, attributing her barrenness to Caesar’s dirty passions and vices. Visitors invited to Sabine's palace, her clients and freedmen, for the most part, were afraid of these conversations, because the well-wisher could convey to Hadrian that someone—patrician or rider—listens favorably to all the anger that the disgraced empress thrust on Caesar.

Domitia Lucilla also listened with concern to Sabina's lengthy dialogues, but she was hesitant to interrupt it. After all, Sabina was their patron at the court, it was she who helped Marcus attain a proper place in the heart of the Roman ruler. She supported with her advice, connections, influence, the Annius family all these years, and Domitia Lucilla considered herself indebted to her.

Sabine wore a pink tunic, a rich pearl necklace around her neck. Her hands had bracelets wrapped around them like silver snakes. Fascinated by the conversation, she casually touched the pearls around her neck with her fingertips, sorting bead after bead. Domitia Lucilla was dressed more modestly—in a faded blue tunic with a long handkerchief draped over the top and almost no jewelry.