Quintus Drusus’s son was born on the Kalends of March, exactly nine months to the day his mother had married his father. The infant was a large, healthy child. Antonia’s joy at the birth of her child was short-lived, however, for the next morning, the two little boys born of her marriage to Sexus Scipio were discovered drowned in the atrium fish pond. The two slave women assigned to watch over the children were found together in most compromising circumstances; naked, entwined in a lascivious embrace, and drunk. There was no defense for their crime. Both were strangled and buried before the fateful day was over. Antonia was hysterical with grief.
“I shall call him Posthumous in honor of his brothers,” Antonia declared dramatically, large tears running down her cheeks as she gazed upon her day-old son. “How tragic that he shall never know them.”
“He shall be called Quintus Drusus, the younger,” her husband told her, slipping two heavy gold bracelets on her arm as he gave her a quick kiss. “You must not distress yourself further, my dear. Your milk will not come in if you do. I will not have my son suckling on the teats of some slave woman. They are not as healthy as a child’s own mater. My own mother, Livia, always believed that. She nursed my brother, my sister, and myself most faithfully until we were past four.” He reached out, and slipping a hand beneath one of her breasts, said with soft menace, “Do not cheat my son, Antonia, of what is his right. The sons of Sextus Scipio were innocents, and as such are now with the gods. You can do nothing for them, my dear. Let it go, and tend to the living child the gods have so graciously given us.” Leaning over, he kissed her lips again.
The nursemaid took the infant from Antonia. She lay the child at her master’s feet. Quintus Drusus took up the swaddled bundle in his arms, thereby acknowledging the boy as his own true offspring. This formal symbolic recognition meant the newborn was admitted to his Roman family with all its rights and privileges. Nine days after his birth, Quintus Drusus, the younger, would be officially named amid much familial celebration.
“You will remember what I have said, my dear, won’t you?” Quintus Drusus asked his wife as he handed his son to the waiting nursemaid and arose from her bedside. “Our child must be your first consideration.”
Antonia nodded, her blue eyes wide with surprise. This was a side of her husband she had never seen, and she was suddenly afraid. Quintus had always been so indulgent of her. Now, it would seem, he was putting their son ahead of her.
He smiled down at her. “I am pleased with you, Antonia. It has been a terrible time for you, but you have been brave. You are a fit mother for my children.”
He left her bedchamber and made his way to his library. The house was quiet now, without his stepsons running about. In a way, it was sad, but in a few years’ time the villa would ring again with the laughter and shouts of children. His children. A single lamp burned upon the table as he entered his private sanctuary, shutting the door firmly behind him. Only the gravest emergency would cause anyone to disturb him once that door was closed. He had quickly trained the servants after his marriage to Antonia that this room was his sanctum sanctorum. No one came in but at his invitation.
“You did very well,” he told the two men who now stepped from the shadows within the room.
“It was easy, master,” the taller of the two answered him. “Those two nursemaids was easy pickin’s. A little drugged wine, a little fucking, a little more wine, a little more—”
“Yes, yes!” Quintus Drusus said impatiently. “The picture you paint is quite clear. Tell me of the boys. They gave you no trouble? They did not cry out? I want no witnesses coming forward later on.”
“We throttled them in their beds as they slept, master. Then we placed their bodies in the atrium pond. No one saw us, I guarantee you. It was the middle of the night, and all slept. We made that pretty tableau for everyone to find before we done the children. Quite a wicked pair, those girls looked,” the tall man continued. He sniggered lewdly.
“You promised us our freedom,” the other man said to Quintus Drusus. “When will you give us our freedom? We have done as you bid us.”
“I told you that there were two tasks you must perform for me,” Quintus Drusus answered him. “This was but the first.”
“What is the second? We want our freedom!” the tall man declared.
“You are impatient, Cato,” Quintus Drusus said, noting his look of distaste. It amused Quintus Drusus to give his slaves dignified, elegant-sounding identities. “In nine days’ time,” he continued, “my son will be formally named, and a ceremony of purification will be performed. It is a family event to be celebrated within the home. My father-in-law will come from Corinium; my cousin Gaius and his family from their nearby villa. It is my cousin and his family that I want you to study well.
“There is a Celtic festival in May. I remember it from last year. Gaius Drusus allows his slaves their freedom that night from sunset until the following dawn. I intend to pursue the same custom. On that night you will eliminate my cousin and his family. As an extra incentive, you may steal my cousin’s gold from a certain hiding place I shall reveal to you when the time comes. In the ensuing uproar it will take several days for me to discover that those two new slaves from Gaul that I recently purchased are gone. Do you understand me?” He stared coldly at the pair, wondering if there was a way he could eliminate them as well and save himself the possibility of ever being discovered. No. He would have to rely on these two. If he was any judge of men, they would flee as fast as they could back across the sea to Gaul.
“Beltane,” Cato said.
“Beltane?” Quintus Drusus looked puzzled.
“The Celtic festival you mentioned. It is celebrated the first day of May, master. There is no other spring festival of note.”
“How appropriate,” Quintus Drusus said with a brief smile. “I married my wife on the Kalends of June. Our son was born on the Kalends of March. Now on the Kalends of May I shall achieve the beginnings of my destiny. I do believe that the number one is a lucky one for me.” He looked at the two Gauls. “I will dim the lamp a moment. Go out by the garden exit, and behave yourselves. Both of you! You must have easy access to the house when my cousin and his family are here. If you have been causing difficulties, the majordomo will send you to the fields. You are of no use to me in the fields.”
In the morning, Quintus Drusus sent messengers to his father-in-law in Corinium, bidding him come, and to his cousin Gaius, inviting him and his family to the new Drusus’s name day and purification. It was not until they arrived for the celebration that Gaius Drusus Corinium and his family learned of the deaths of Antonia’s two older sons.
“Ohh, my dear,” Kyna said, kissing the young woman on both cheeks, “I am so terribly sorry. Why did you not send for me? My mother and I would have come. Cailin too. It is not good for a woman to be by herself in a time of such great sorrow.”
“There was no need,” Antonia said softly. “My little ones are safe with the gods. Quintus has assured me of it. There is nothing I can do for them. I must think of the baby. Quintus will not have a slave woman nursing him. I cannot distress myself lest my milk cease. That would displease Quintus very much, and he is so good to me.”