The Last Sacrifice (7 page)

Vitas turned to the Jew behind him.

John was already seated, his gaze on the horizon. Vitas sat beside him. The crew members had returned to their various tasks, but occasionally one would glance in their direction.

“What can you tell me about the cross?” Vitas said.

John slowly moved his eyes toward Vitas. His smile was sad, thoughtful. “I can’t think of a better question for any man to ask.”

This Jew, Vitas knew, was a Christian. Vitas also knew from his wife, Sophia, the significance that the cross played in the faith of the followers of the Christos. This, however, did not appear to be a time for any discussion about faith. The ship, for Vitas, was a floating prison, surrounded by hundreds of square miles of open water. If the crew had malevolent intentions, it was imperative to know.

“That cross there,” Vitas said, again impatient, “against the mast. What did I miss during my fever?”

“The crew is near mutiny,” John answered. “They believe this ship is doomed.”

“There’s no storm.”

“The sky has been cloudy since departure.”

Vitas knew the importance of that. Without stars at night or the sun during the day, navigation was difficult. “Still,” he said, “the breeze at this time of year is steady. Any sailor can use it for rough navigation.”

“You know as well as I do when this ship departed,” John said. “At night. Without the customary sacrifices. Nor did the captain wait for the right omens. This crew is as superstitious as any.”

Vitas needed no explanation. On occasion, captains waited days for the right omens. And they never departed without the appropriate sacrifices.

John looked away, paused in thought, and looked back. “And there is the matter of a dream the pilot had.”

“This dream?”

Dreams were highly significant too—good or bad—enough to speed or delay a ship’s departure.

“Both the first night at sea and the second night, he dreamed the sirens of the whirlpools at Messana drew the ship onto the rocks. He’s reported this dream widely, and nearly all are afraid of drowning when we reach the straits. The men grumble that it will happen because the gods have not been properly appeased.”

“The crew, then, blames us for the troubles they fear,” Vitas said.

“I’ve been told,” John replied, “that several dozen passengers had made a booking on this voyage, but were left behind because the ship left without warning. Without paying passengers, the crew expects to receive reduced wages.”

“The crew blames us.” Vitas grunted this repetition.

“They wonder who you are and why you are so valuable that the captain risks the wrath of the gods to speed you from Rome in the dead of night without the proper omens or sacrifices.”

“They could be asking the same questions about you.”

“They’ve seen me with you.” John smiled and pointed at the damp cloth beside the netting, the cloth he’d used earlier to gently wipe the face of Vitas. “Most think I’m your slave.”

“Then let me ask what they won’t. Why are you on this ship?”

“Perhaps God intended for me to help spare your life.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You understand,” John, son of Zebedee said. “Why else did you ask about the cross?”

“Your name is John, son of Zebedee,” Damian told his prisoner. “You are a Jew. A fisherman in your youth, raised in Galilee. I know this much about you, but not much more, except that you, like all other followers of the Christos, defy Caesar by refusing to worship him or his image.”

In the olive grove, Caius Sennius Ruso had not expected it to come to this—the rough edge of stone biting into his skin, a massive weight poised to crush the bones of his arm, the smell of fresh olive oil below his face a strange contrast to the horror of the impending torture.

“Speak to me,” Damian said. “End your silence.”

Ruso met Damian’s eyes squarely but kept his silence. If he spoke, his accent would betray him, and this man would know he was not the Jew named John, son of Zebedee.

Damian gave a barely perceptible nod, and Jerome pushed the wheel forward slightly.

Ruso could not help the cry of pain that escaped him as the stone dug into his flesh.

Damian nodded again, and Jerome pulled the wheel back slightly.

“If I understand correctly,” Damian continued, intently studying Ruso’s face, “you were one of twelve disciples who spent a few years with this Christos before he was crucified by a Roman procurator. John the Beloved, I believe, is how many refer to you.”

Ruso clamped his jaws. He could not deny to himself how afraid he was. Yes, Ruso had expected to be captured days earlier. Yet Ruso’s careful plan had fallen apart in the moment of capture. Instead of delivering him to Helius, Damian and his monstrous slave, Jerome, had taken Ruso to a shed hidden in the olive grove and begun an interrogation.

Answering any of Damian’s questions that evening had been unthinkable. Doing so would have ruined what little of his careful planning was still intact. So Ruso had chosen silence and been punished for it by over thirty-six hours of hungry, thirsty solitude. And now this, a massive stone about to pulverize his arm.

“I’d prefer this to be a two-sided conversation,” Damian said. “I do have real curiosity about the Christians’ claims. You, of all people, would be in a position to answer, if indeed you were one of the man’s best friends. How can you maintain that this Christos was risen from the dead and still expect me or any other man to believe you are sane?”

Damian gave the slight nod again. Jerome pushed the wheel forward, and again the stone’s weight brought a gasp of pain from Ruso.

Lord Jesus,
he prayed to his Christos,
please give me strength to endure.

“If you are going to speak at all,” Damian said, “I would much rather know about your vision than a claim about resurrection, which I cannot believe no matter how sincerely you might repeat it to me.”

This time, however, Damian did not nod for Jerome to release the stone. It remained in place, squeezing on the muscles of Ruso’s forearm and biceps. An inch more, and he knew that it would snap his elbow. Another few inches, and the bones would be mashed into pulp.

“I’ve had a Jewish rabbi translate and interpret your letter for me,” Damian said. “The Lamb against the Beast, your Christos against the Roman emperor and the Roman Empire. Am I correct?”

Ruso was so thirsty that it felt like he verged on madness. Moments earlier, watching Damian suck juice from the orange had forced him to use all his willpower not to beg for a single drop for himself. Dizziness disoriented Ruso further; he could not think beyond a single act of resolve.

Remain
silent!

Ruso was intensely focused on Damian. Dreading the next slight nod that would release the giant slave to push the stone forward that next inch.

Remain silent!
Speaking would immediately reveal to Damian that Ruso did not have the Galilean accent that Damian expected to hear.

“Your letter predicts the death of Nero and suggests the possibility of civil war,” Damian said. “That, truly, is what I want to discuss with you.”

Remain silent!
At first, in the shed, Ruso’s silence had been simply to ensure that the man Damian did seek would have time to escape by ship.

“Do you have any evidence of a conspiracy that allows you to promise Nero’s death to the followers of the Christos?” Damian’s voice had lost its conversational tone, and he leaned in, stopping inches away from Ruso’s face.

Remain silent!
If Damian discovered he’d captured the wrong man, he’d realize he needed to kill Ruso or face a trial and probably execution. It would be much easier for Damian to bury his mistake than allow Ruso to go free and tell the world about it.

“This is all I need from you,” Damian said. “Tell me and you have your freedom. Speak or the second arm will be crushed after the first. Then your legs. And finally, your skull.”

Seconds passed like hours to Ruso. He fought the urge to vomit, such was his fear. Yet even now, was John the Beloved safe from this slave hunter?

Then came the slight nod that Ruso dreaded. Jerome eased the wheel forward again, and Ruso felt the joint of his elbow begin to separate. He did not have the courage to remain silent. Eyes closed in shame, he screamed in primal fear and pain.

The pain suddenly ended.

Ruso opened his eyes. Had shock mercifully ended it?

He saw instead that Jerome had pulled the wheel away from him, while Damian shook his head in disgust.

Had the slave hunter somehow understood Ruso’s shame?

“I’m a weak man,” Damian said to Jerome. “I cannot do this. Not even to avenge my brother.”

Damian leaned against the lower half of the olive press, still speaking to Jerome. “Put this man back in chains. Give him food and water, but make sure he remains under guard.”

“Shall we wager on who will kill us?” Tigellinus asked, grinning. “Nero or Vitas?”

Helius was in no mood to make light of their situation, much as the proposed wager accurately summed up their situation. It had taken great resolve to go ahead with the previously arranged appointment with Chayim and Leah and Hezron. He’d barely been able to focus on the conversation as he worried about Tigellinus and whose head he would bring back to the palace.

Well-justified worries.

If Vitas was still alive, Helius and Tigellinus faced a double threat. The first would come from Nero, who would lose all confidence in both of them if he discovered that they had allowed Vitas to escape Nero’s wrath and punishment.

The second, just as dangerous, would come from the revenge that Vitas might seek. Aside from the fact that Vitas most certainly knew Helius and Tigellinus had encouraged Nero to provoke the physical attack that had resulted in Vitas’s arrest, Vitas would discover that they had also engineered his wife’s suicide and the confiscation of his estate.

Helius had no doubt that if Vitas so chose, the man had the ability and patience to find the time and place to hunt and murder each of them, no matter what precautions Helius and Tigellinus arranged. Vitas was a former soldier and war hero renowned for coolness under pressure. Who knew when he would strike with his legendary fighting abilities?

Worse, what if Vitas decided instead to marshal a circle of military allies in an attempt to overthrow Nero? The possibility was all too real. All it would take was the support of enough generals united in opposition to Nero. Their emperor, after all, had no son as successor. And, as Julius Caesar had proven decades earlier, the real power was in the loyalty of soldiers.

“We kill Vitas first,” Helius said. “It is that simple. Then we have no need to worry about our own deaths.”

“Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus,”
Tigellinus said, lapsing into the formal grammar of a common adage.
The mountain groaned loudly in great labor, then bore a tiny mouse.

“What are you implying?” Helius snapped.

“That your solution is no better than a mouse. Yes, Vitas’s death is necessary, but it’s hardly enough.”

Although Helius was tempted to protest the insult, he was curious enough to remain silent.

“Listen,” Tigellinus said. “His escape was plotted by men with power, agreed? Men who had a way to find or force someone to die instead of Vitas. Men who were able to smuggle him out of the cell. Men who were intelligent enough—”

“Your point is made.”

“Even if Vitas was killed tomorrow, we still face those unseen enemies. And their malevolent motives.”

“Piso . . .” Helius said softly. Piso, the man behind a massive conspiracy that had nearly succeeded in the assassination of Nero. Piso and dozens of conspirators had been executed, but the discontent behind their effort had spread.

“With each passing month,” Tigellinus said, “Nero orders more suicides, confiscates more estates, creates more enemies. The empire is nearly bankrupt, yet he is determined to tour Greece, and you know better than I do how ruinously expensive that will be. If he is killed or dethroned before we have a say in picking a successor, we, too, are dead.”

“By the gods,” Helius swore, “do you have any idea how difficult it will be to find those who set Vitas free while keeping the hunt for them secret from Nero?”