Finem Respice (Consider the End).
by foxy squid
January 24, AD 41.
"I had a dream last night, Kallias."
"Yes, Master?"
"I dreamt I was in heaven with the gods. They favored me. They heaped golden laurels on my head and tempted me with a thousand flavors of ambrosia. They bathed me in nectar."
"It sounds a pleasant dream, Master."
"No, noÖ. It was not pleasant. Not at all. Just as I was about to have my way with the fairest of the nymphs, the clouds gathered, and Jupiter came storming towards me, spitting lightning. He roared, and I was terrified. I rose to flee from him, but I was too late. He attacked me, raining blows on my head just as lately the other gods had rained laurels upon me. He drew his left foot back a mile to kick me out of heaven with it. I went sailing through the air, screaming-- and then I awoke."
Kallias said nothing, but grew thoughtful. His dark eyes were even lovelier in somber thought than in joy.
"What can it mean?"
"I'm not certain, Master."
The Emperor scowled. "You're not much help. But I suppose it's no good asking slaves to interpret dreams. Maybe Tancinus will know?"
"Tancinus is dead, Master," Kallias replied, careful to keep his voice even.
"Is he? Tancinus dead? DeadÖ so many deadÖ," the Emperor whispered, as though to himself, as though Kallias was not there. "Kallias, why aren't you dead yet?"
"I don't know, Master." Kallias said this in all sincerity. He could not imagine how he could still be among the living. He had been Caligula's personal slave for years, and as yet neither Caligula's enemies nor Caligula himself had taken his life from him.
"I'm glad I still have you. That's one thingÖ no one will take you from me, isn't that so?"
"Yes, Master."
"It's funny that I should dream of Jupiter when I am Jupiter. Do you think it could mean that my divine self is driving out all that remains of my mortal self?"
"That could very well be," answered Kallias diplomatically.
Caligula smiled. "Yes, I like that." He sat up in bed, yawning and stretching as was his habit, catlike, extending his fingers like claws. "What day is it?"
"The twenty-fourth of January."
"Ah, the last day of the Games? What a pity. It seems as though they've only just begun." He climbed out of bed, but froze as soon as he was on his feet. "How strange," he said softly. "How strangeÖ."
"What is it?" asked Kallias, concerned, for the note that had crept into the Emperor's voice was one he knew well and one he did not like. It was a note which often heralded the most vicious and unreasoning of the Emperor's rages.
"I dreamed about Jupiter. Remember when I ordered the Governor of Achaea to dismantle the statue of Jupiter at Olympia and ship it here? My orders were not complied with. They said-- they said that the statue burst into laughter and terrified the workers. Do you think-- do you think that means anything? At the time, I put it off as incompetence and a stupid lie, but my dream last night was so vivid that now I don't knowÖ."
The Emperor was doubting himself, Kallias saw, and, as always happened when he doubted himself, a squall was threatening. Fortunately, it was not yet inevitable. In an attempt to subvert the impending fury, Kallias sat up and stretched himself, displaying to full effect the beauty of his body, a beauty which had only increased in the three years since he had come to serve in the Emperor's household. He was rewarded with the sight of Caligula's gaze sweeping over him in a contemplative manner. The Emperor's features softened, and Kallias knew he had won.
"Omens, omens," laughed Caligula dismissively. "What do omens mean to a god? I am no mere Caesar. I am immortal."
"You are, Master."
With a bound, Caligula was back in bed, his arms around his slave. Kallias was not fooled; this was no affectionate embrace. It was too much like a wrestling hold. He knew, with all the art and craft of an old lover, that he was in danger, as he had been so many times while enfolded these arms. "Eheu fugaces labuntur anni!" ["Alas! The fleeting years glide on."] The Emperor poured these words into his ear like poison. "Time has remade you into a lesser man, Kallias. You were not always a sycophant and a whore. But I am a blade that is no less sharp for the blows it has dealt. It is unwise to patronize me."
"And you would prefer I disagree with you?" asked Kallias, who knew when he could push and when he could not-- and perhaps that was why he yet lived.
Caligula smiled, drawing back a little ways. "Hm. No, not that. I've never taken well to disagreement."
"Then you admit, there is no right path to take with you."
Caligula considered, his gray eyes alight. "True. There is no right path-- but somehow you always manage to take it, whether it exists or no." He closed in with his arms again, but this time Kallias knew the embrace was one of genuine desire. "It is early yet. There's a little time left before we must depart, I think."
****
From the ages of three to fifteen, Kallias had spent his life in the service of a master who had had no taste for sport or drama, who had hidden himself away in an unassuming retreat several miles from the capital. He had "inherited", so to speak, this first master's austerity and dislike of spectacle. If he could have, he would have preferred to miss the Palatine Games, but his place was at Caligula's side, and Caligula had a taste for pomp and drama that was unmatched. As he was thus obligated to attend, he made the best of it.
Still, there was something strange about these games. The air hung heavy, as before a storm, although the sky was clear. There was an air of dread to the proceedings, particularly on this, this last day of the games. He watched the presentations from his seat with a growing feeling of anxiety. Something was wrong.
Caligula arrived early at the theatre, as his hunger for the Games bid him. He had recovered from the dark mood his dream had put him in. He was smiling and laughing. The crowd was like a great bird, cawing and shitting on itself, but its crazed cacophony served only to raise Caligula's spirits further. He raised his head; his eyes were shining with life. Kallias had seldom seen him so happy, if "happy" was a word that could ever be applied to his emperor, the man he had come to love and loathe with such suppressed intensity.
The Emperor opened the ceremonies, standing before the screaming crowd with his arms outstretched, and for a moment, he was not the most hated man in all Rome, but that same young, beloved Emperor who had ridden into the city nearly four years ago, bearing with him news of Tiberius's death and his own accession. They had adored him then, and there was something now like adulation in their shrieks, only darker, more unsettling.
Caligula stood behind an altar, upon which lay a trussed and struggling flamingo. Someone pressed a ceremonial dagger into his hand, and Caligula raised it towards the heavens. "In memory of Augustus!" he cried, and the knife came down, parting the pink feathers of the gangling bird. Blood spurted.
Kallias gasped. The Emperor was covered in blood, as were several people who had been standing near him. It was unusual in such a sacrifice that the blood should fountain everywhere, but Caligula did not seem to mind. "Augustus!" he screamed, and the crowd answered with a scream of its own. Kallias shifted uneasily in his seat.
Usually the theatrics were his favorite part of the interminable affair, but not today. If anything, the performances soured his mood further. The dramatic subjects presented before them on the stage were ominous. First was the Cinyras, which ended with the hero and his daughter killed, a bloody piece with as much violence as dance. The theme of incest made him uneasy; was it a subtle jab at the Emperor? When he glanced at Caligula, however, he saw his master was greatly enjoying the show, throwing bread crumbs towards the stage in approbation.
The Laureolas, later, was no better. The lead actor, in his role, stumbled and vomited fake blood. After that performance, two of the understudies to the lead had a competition with each other, stumbling and vomiting blood themselves to see who could do a better job of it. These antics of the understudies had the crowd roaring with laughter, but Kallias could only see the red of the blood. The stage is covered in blood, he thought. There's too much blood today. He looked down at himself. He was dressed in robes the color of blood, the color the Emperor thought suited him best. He tugged lightly at the jeweled collar around his neck, knowing without looking at it that it was a collar of blood red rubies, that same collar Caligula had given him the first time they had gone to watch a spectacle together.
Kallias was no great believer in omens, but this was different. It was not merely a string of coincidental incidents. It was much more. It was a vibration humming through the air. It was a change in the wind, a shift in the atmosphere, more real than the fake blood coughed up by the clowning actors. Again he looked over at his master, but Caligula was eating and drinking unperturbed, chortling at a ribald jest someone had just made. The consul Pomponius Secundus was crouched fawning at the Emperor's feet, licking the man's toes like a dog. Kallias felt the outsider, much as he always did, a slave and a foreigner, apart even in this crowd.
"Excuse me, my Emperor, but are you ready for your luncheon?" That high, piercing voice carried even in the tumult. Kallias recognized it at once and glanced over. Cassius Chaerea. The slave bristled.
"My luncheon? Do I look like I'm ready for my luncheon?" Caligula narrowed his eyes, neatly sizing up the man before him. "I'm enjoying myself here."
"I am sorry, my Emperor. I merely ask because this is the time when you usually leave the Games to take your luncheon in the palace."
"And have you been keeping track of when I leave the Games?"
"No, my Emperor."
"Good. Because I wouldn't like to think that you were rushing me."
"Of course not, my Emperor."
Caligula's tone grew thoughtful and cruel. "We've had so much fine entertainment this morning, and it has whetted my appetite for more. I wonder if you wouldn't mind singing for us."
Chaerea reddened. "Singing--?"
"That lovely, girlish voice of yours makes me suspect you have a fine voice."
To this Chaerea did not reply. A muscle along his jawline leapt.
"Tell us, Cassius Chaerea, did they chop off your dick when they castrated you, or did they only take your nuts?"
Caligula's companions burst into laughter as Chaerea reddened further. The fawning Secundus pulled himself away from groveling at the Emperor's feet long enough to belt out a particularly horrifying guffaw. Kallias frowned. He had never liked Chaerea, but he liked him even less now that he was being suddenly considerate of the Emperor's habitual mealtimes. It was true that although Caligula ate unceasingly throughout the festivities, he was known to return to the palace at noon to glut himself with his chosen companions in his own dining hall, away from the masses. The Emperor's appetite for food was legendary, as was his appetite in all things. Kallias looked up to see where the sun sat in the sky. It was indeed noon. "Forgive me, my Emperor," Chaerea at last managed through his gritted teeth.
Caligula laughed. "The Emperor eats where he wishes and when he wishes. See that you remember that, sweet maiden." Chaerea's high, effeminate voice, emerging as it did from such an unlikely vessel: the great body of a tribune of the Praetorian Guard, had long been a favorite subject of jokes on the Emperor's part. Tormenting the man never ceased to amuse him.
Chaerea, his body held stiff with the tension of suppressed rage, turned and strode away through the crowd. Vinicianus rose from his seat near the Emperor as though to follow, but Caligula spoke to him sharply: "Where do you think you're going?" Vinicianus, cowed, returned to his seat. Caligula sighed, sorry to be deprived of such a fine target for his barbs as Chaerea. He glanced about himself, looking for something he did not at first see. "Kallias? Where's my slave Kallias?"
"Here, Master," said Kallias, coming to the Emperor's side at once. "What would you like?"
"Should we lunch now, do you think?"
"I think there's no reason you should lunch before you're ready to."
"Yes, yes, you're right, of courseÖ. What wasp flew up Chaerea's nose, I wonder?"
"There's always a wasp up that one's nose," returned Kallias, with a casualness he did not feel.
"Ah, is that the reason? I'd mistaken the buzzing of the wasp for his actual voice!" Caligula laughed again, but not so gaily as he had when Chaerea had been present; the taste of mockery in his mouth was not so sweet when its subject was not there to hear it. His companions, all save Kallias, laughed along with him, which sweetened the taste a little, but not enough. "What's wrong with you today?" the Emperor asked his slave. "I've never seen you looking so gloomy, and you're hardly a ray of sunshine on your gladdest day."
Kallias took a deep breath. "Master, if I might be so bold, I would suggest that you retreat to the palace at once with as many members of your guard as you can assemble in a short time."
All traces of gaiety fled from the Emperor's face. He considered Kallias quite seriously. As always, when somber, his face had a pinched, mean look, in contrast to the open fullness his features wore when his heart was light. For a moment, Kallias believed, with a flash of hope, that the Emperor was going to take his suggestion. But his hope died when the Emperor spoke. "Don't be ridiculous. You're almost as bad as Chaerea. I am the Emperor. I go where I will and when. Neither habit nor fear need drive me."
He rose to his feet and his expression was so grave, Kallias expected a blow. No blow came, however. In a swift, fluid motion, the Emperor grabbed Kallias by the shoulder and pulled him close. He whispered in his ear. "That dream I had, it's meaningless. Think nothing more of it. And never again dare to command me." He released Kallias, and Kallias could tell from the look in the man's eyes that if any other slave had spoken those words, that slave would have been struck dead. This knowledge did not frighten him. It was a knowledge he had lived with for years. He was the one that spoke yet was spared. What frightened him was the hatred in Chaerea's eyes and the tension in the air.
Caligula returned to his seat and took up his conversation with his friends and hangers-on where he had left off. Kallias too sat down again. The minutes that followed were interminable. The day dragged on as noon became afternoon with excruciating slowness. If Chaerea had genuinely wanted the Emperor to leave for lunch, he could not have picked a worse way to go about it. His comments had had the end result of inspiring the Emperor to delay lunch as long as was possible.
About an hour after Chaerea had departed, Kallias spied him again, lurking in the crowd nearby. His manner was so suspicious that Kallias was about to mention it to the Emperor, when Asprensas, a senator who had been sitting in silence throughout the morning's festivities, spoke at last. "Ah, my Emperor, I meant to tell you, they have some lovely Asian actors who are set to go on later in the afternoon. Exquisite creatures, Asians. Remarkable lovers too, I've heard. You might want to go and have a look at them when there's time."
There were few words that could have made the Emperor move more swiftly than those Asprensas had just spoken. Caligula was obsessed with actors and had a boundless admiration for Asiatic features. He rose, his white, bloodstained robes flaring about him as he moved like the wings of some great wounded bird. "There's time now, I'd say. And then we'll have lunch." His appetite had gotten the better of him at last.
The imperial retinue prepared to depart, and the crowd was held back so that their passage might be easier. Smiling, once again the picture of the good young emperor, Caligula waved to his people. He grandly caressed the hands of those who reached out to him and ignored those whose cheers were more akin to jeers. Despite his misgivings, Kallias went with the retinue. He was a slave; he had no choice. Not all the misgivings in the world could offset his life of service, the obedience ingrained in his very soul. He would go where his master went. No matter how dark the corridor, he would follow Caligula to its end. He felt himself a fly trapped in honey, unable to escape his fate. He moved forward as in a dream.
Suddenly, Caligula stopped. Kallias grew more alert. Had the Emperor sensed something of the oppressive atmosphere which had been unsettling him all morning? "Kallias," he said.
"Yes, Master?" Kallias came forward.
"Walk beside me. I want you near me today."
Kallias considered his master as he fell in step beside him. Although Caligula was in a fine mood today, Kallias was not deceived. The man was a monster. Yet when this monster was unnerved or upset, his first act was to call for Kallias. As though Kallias meant something to him, for whatever selfish reason. In spite of himself, Kallias was moved. He glanced at Caligula's profile. Is there a person hidden in there? he wondered, as he had many times before. And is he suffering?
"Don't look so sad," said Caligula softly, so that only his slave could hear, "Evaristus."
Kallias started. Evaristus was the name he had borne when he had first come to serve the Emperor; the Emperor had not used that name for him since he had given him his new one. "Yes, Master."
The Asian actors were as promised: lovely and exotic, full of sighs and fleeting glances, their sleek, dark hair perfumed with the scent of roses. Caligula was quite taken with them. He was on the verge of inviting them back to the palace for luncheon when Kallias saw Cassius Chaerea for the third time that day. Too late, he noticed the flash of metal in the man's hand, and though he opened his mouth too cry out, he could not stop what happened next. Chaerea leapt for Caligula.
Sensing motion, the Emperor turned just in time to take the blade in his shoulder. Blood fountained, as it had at the sacrifice, but now it was the Emperor's own blood. The knife went in deep, gouging a profound gash between his neck and shoulder, severing the tendons there. The Emperor's gray eyes widened. Not in pain or fear, but simple bewilderment. Such an innocent expression. He regarded Chaerea with those wide eyes, then turned towards Kallias, as though Kallias could make sense of what was happening, as though Kallias could tell him how this fool had dared stab him, he who was a god.
Kallias screamed for help. Surely, now that Chaerea had made his attack, someone would rush forward to assist the Emperor. But when no aid arrived, the slow, cold realization came over him that this passageway was not guarded. None of the Emperor's fierce German bodyguard were here. Kallias did not see who struck the second blow. There were suddenly so many of them. Asprensas and Vinicianus, members of the retinue, produced daggers of their own, and others appeared who he did not know. Some held spears and lances. The Asian actors fled in terror. Those members of the imperial retinue who were not conspirators fled also.
Kallias did not have the option of flight. He watched, frozen, as blade after blade rent Caligula's body, each wound drawing forth a new blossom of bright blood. Caligula fell beneath the weight of the men and the force of their blows. In a few moments, Kallias could no longer see him. He saw the crush of men, each one eager to sink their weapon into his master's flesh. He saw the pool of blood spreading across the floor, blood which the murderers kicked up in their killing frenzy. Kallias felt a few drops splatter warmly across his face. He could not reach up to wipe them away.
"Libertas!" he heard Chaerea's distinctive girlish voice cry out.
"For Augustus!" shrieked someone else, whose name he did not care to know.
And then, unbelievably, from in the midst of the crush came the voice of the Emperor, wry and mocking. "Strike again," Caligula laughed. "I'm not dead!"
This enraged the conspirators further, and Kallias heard the voice of Caligula but once more while he lived, laughing faintly: "AgainÖ."
Kallias, his back up against the wall, motionless, could not say how much time had passed before he saw the Emperor's body once more, but eventually, the crowd of eager killers thinned, revealing the corpse lying supine on the floor in a dark pool. Caligula had been all but torn to pieces. His guts had been ripped from his body and strewn across the floor. His mangled heart rested at his side. Even as Kallias watched, one man sawed off a chunk of that stilled heart with a knife and stuffed it into his mouth. Cassius Chaerea stood at the Emperor's feet, holding a spear which he thrust again and through the dead man's genitals, laughing uproariously.
"Chaerea," someone said to him, "the Germans will be here any moment. We must fly!"
Chaerea did not seem to hear. As though his time was limitless, he turned slowly towards Kallias, who had not moved. "Well. Here's the Emperor's pretty shadow. And how about you, Slave? Are you one of us? Did you hate him too?"
The last of Chaerea's co-conspirators fled as Chaerea waited for Kallias to reply. Kallias knew that if he did not speak, did not say he had hated the Emperor, he would die. Kallias had hated the Emperor. But Kallias said nothing. Finally, Chaerea shook his head, smiling. "That's answer enough."
Chaerea's breath was hot and rank as he pressed Kallias up against the wall of the corridor; he stank of blood and sweat and the joy of killing. "I've dreamed of doing this. I only wish Caligula could see me do it. I hope he's watching us from Hades," he said, and drove his spear into Kallias' stomach.
Kallias shuddered. He had sometimes, on sleepless nights, wondered what death would feel like and how it would come to him. Often, at his master's hands, he had come close to experiencing it and he had asked himself, Is it now? It was now. This was the authentic article. This was true death. He coughed and felt warmth on his lips, streaming down his face, as blood rose from deep within his throat, spilling from his mouth as well as the wound in his stomach.
Chaerea pulled out his spear only to drive it in again and again, as had been done to Caligula, only with slower, more measured strokes. Chaerea's strikes were awkward, as he was using a long range weapon in extremely close quarters, but no less effective for that. Something in the way the man held Kallias close as he drove the spear in was strangely intimate, perversely erotic. Kallias, however, felt no sexual stirring, only pain and a kind of gentle sorrow. He coughed up more blood and his vision began to blur. Chaerea saw the slave's dark eyes glaze over and released him. Kallias drifted to the ground like a feather. He could not have remained on his feet if he had wanted to; there was no strength left in him.
Chaerea stood over him for another few moments before moving away. Kallias was aware of a few things more as he lay dying in the corridor. There were others with him, he realized, dead and dying, further victims of the conspirators whom he had not seen fall. He was unable to recognize any of them, whether because he did not know them or because his dying mind was too addled, he was unsure. He was aware of the fact that he was dying at the age of eighteen, but he did not mind that, as he was surprised to have lived so long. He was aware of his own blood mingling with the Emperor's. So we're alike at last, he thought. Emperor and slave.
He was aware that the Emperor's last words had been an entreaty for his killers to strike again. How very like Caligula. He wondered if anyone who had heard those words would record them. Of course, no one would think to record the last words of a slave or even to wonder what they had been, but Kallias was aware, finally, that his last words had been, Yes, Master. How like himself.
