********* WEEDS & WEDLOCK *******
Chapter One
Northern Province of Roman Empire
48 AD
A month was a long time to wait. It felt like a lifetime. But now it was done. Negotiations were complete and my future decided. There remained only one more formality.
I skipped down the hall but stopped to pet the guard dog sprawled in the atrium near the rectangular rainwater pool. Shining through the roof's opening, the sun's rays danced upon the water and shimmered with a thousand sparkles. I felt the same, effervescent with excitement and luminous with expectation. Today I would find out when I meet my betrothed.
At the entrance to father's study, I peeked around the thick drapery that cordoned of the doorway.
Seated at his writing table, its marble top aglow in the morning sun, Father hunched over a parchment.
We greeted each other, and I noted his cleared-eyed gaze with relief. Father was alert and lucid today.
"Faustinus agreed to join us for dinner tonight." Father frowned, his eyes dropping to the documents.
"You look unhappy." I fussed with the gold bracelets at my wrist. "Is something wrong?"
"This!" Father swept a few scrolls to the floor. "Taxes! Rome bleeds us dry. Emperor Claudius may add to Roman coffers with new conquests, but he sucks profits from hardworking citizens like me to finance his projects."
"What sort of projects?" I picked up the scrolls and set them back on the table, my attention fixed on the list of taxable items—land, dwellings, workers, livestock, income, furnishings—and not Father's loud litany of Roman schemes.
Father's fist struck the table. "Aqueducts. A new port. A lake-draining tunnel. Ridiculous! And we pay for it. Bah! Claudius is a drooling, limping fool who imagines himself a great builder. He's as bad as Caligula!"
I set down the scroll I was reading and rolled my eyes.
"Come, daughter." Father beckoned me forward. "Do not let my ravings mar this delightful day."
I rounded the desk and kissed the top of his smooth head. "And you should not let a Roman fool ruin yours."
"An excellent idea." Father pushed aside the offending documents. "However, there's one thing we will enjoy like Claudius and that Roman rabble."
"What's that?"
"Why celebrate Rome's eight hundredth anniversary of course. There's no better time for you to meet your future husband than while we drink wine from our vineyard and feast on fatted capon." He lifted my chin and smiled. "Faustinus will wed the most beautiful woman in Gaul. With a beauty that rivals the goddess Venus and a fair knowledge of healing plants, you'll make a commendable wife. Expect a large gift tonight. Jewelry worthy of your new status, perhaps?"
I clapped my hands together, then remembering more adult behavior was required, dropped them to my side.
"Now, away young bride, your father has unpleasant business to finish." Father waved his hand and returned to his documents.
I hugged him, hurried from the office, and almost collided with a houseboy as I raced past the sunlit atrium.
"Pricilla!" I pushed away the heavy linen drape that partitioned off my bedroom and bounded inside.
My favorite servant sat by the narrow window, her head bent over a stola draped across her lap. She glanced up, full lips and amber eyes smiling with expectancy. "When do you meet him?"
"Tonight." I plopped down on the bed and touched my bare neck. "He might even give me jewels."
"He'll want to give you more than that after the wedding." Pricilla glanced at my belly.
"Babies." I looked down, imagined my stomach rounded like an inflated pila that the boys kicked about in the fields. "Will I be a good mother and wife?"
Pricilla shook her head. "You will not be good at all."
My eyes widened. "Why?"
Pricilla twisted her mouth, a mischievous gleam in her eye. "You'll be nothing less than excellent."
I sighed. "Am I ready for such responsibilities?" I wanted to make my husband happy and Father proud.
"No woman is ever really ready. You worry too much." Pricilla folded the stola, set it aside. Has Dominus told you anything about this man?"
"Only that his first two wives died." I recalled the first time Father mentioned negotiations with Faustinus.
"He's old."
I grimaced. "Don't say that. He might be young." But Pricilla had never been wrong before. About anything.
Ten years ago, Father purchased the fourteen-year-old Pricilla to take care of me after Mother's death. As the years passed, Pricilla's duties changed, from nursemaid to tutor to handmaid to confidante. Although a servant, Pricilla's position in the household was less burdensome than those with lesser skills.
Pricilla was educated. She taught me to read, write, and calculate sums despite Father's belief that women had little use for such learning. I disagreed with him. I loved reading Plato and Socrates. Found delight in answering questions correctly. Found even more delight in solving riddles or equations. My studies were useful! It gave me satisfaction.
"As long as he's not veryold," I said.
Pricilla narrowed her eyes. "How old is very old?"
"Wrinkled and gray."
"Family Parisii is too wealthy to permit anything less than an advantageous financial match." Pricilla squeezed my fingers. "Prepare yourself. Faustinus will be old and wrinkled and you will lay with him and bear his children."
I chewed on my lip. "Did you ever lay with an old man?"
Although it was not men Pricilla favored.
Pricilla was beautiful, with amber eyes and ivory skin taut over athletic limbs. More than once she hinted at the other servants' jealousy over our friendship. I thought it more likely they were envious that Pricilla was permitted to leave the estate, earned a few coins from her herbal remedies, and engaged in indiscriminate behavior with like-minded women. I adored Pricilla and her affairs did not prevent me from loving her as much as my own family. In truth, her boldness made her more endearing.
"I did. Long ago. I was forced to be with several displeasing men. More than several. I dare say I had my fill of men." Pricilla's eyes hardened with memory.
"I'm sorry." I pressed my lips together. Pricilla did not like being reminded of her former master, a man with a vile temper who treated his servants with contempt.
"It's the past." Pricilla shrugged. "Will you take me to your new home?"
"Of course. We will both need you."
"We?"
"Yes, because if Faustinus is as old as you suspect, you'll have to give him a tonic to increase his virility, and I'll need one to make me a willing wife." I hid my worry with a giggle.
Pricilla saw through my fears and set a soft hand on my shoulder. "Those tonics are easily made."
"Will you teach me how to make them." I only knew how to make a few herbal potions. Drinks to sooth a sore throat, ease monthly cramps, and calm worries. I wouldn't mind one now. A soothing draught ought to ease the knot in my stomach. "Tell me about the wedding night."
"What do you want to know?"
"Everything. How can I be a good wife if I know nothing about the art of love?"
"You confuse love with lust. Love is a feeling of the heart. Lust an action of the body."
I crossed my arms and tried to scowl but blushed instead. "Tell me! I want to do it ...right."
"Marital relations between a man and woman can be wonderful." Pricilla offered an indulgent smile. "You'll be Faustinus's third wife, I'm certain he'll be a skilled lover."
"What does it feel like? What must I do?"
"It's not something you can study. Anyway, I dare not tell you erotic secrets. Faustinus will question your virginity. Do you want him to send you back to your father in shame because you know things you should not?"
"I would never disappoint Father like that."
"Don't look so distressed. I'll tell you what to expect a few days before the wedding."
I stood, paced the room, fiddled with my bracelets, spun them around my wrist. "A year is a long time to wonder about sexual intercourse."
"You can watch your uncle's horses mate." Pricilla's eyes glinted with mischief.
"That's not the same." I flipped my hair. "Well, if I'm to be the mare, then I suppose it's time my groom style this into the mane of a goddess."
I tugged on her hand, pulled her down the hallway towards the baths and didn't let go until I ducked under the drapery.
Enfolded in the steamy cocoon, I took a deep breath and inhaled the sweet musky scent of the linden tree just outside the window.
Father had built the baths several years ago. Insisted cleanliness was a necessity not a luxury. Proud of his marble testament to hygiene, he made the baths available to our friends and family.
I stood in the circle of sunshine that poured through the skylight and pulled off my tunic.
Pricilla untied the soft leather strap around my breast. "Don't wear this tonight." She held the restrictive binding between two fingers.
"Why not?"
Pricilla gave me a pointed look, wiggled her own unbound bosom.
"Oh." I snatched the binding, threw it over her head, and looked down at my nakedness. These blossoming curves did not feel like they belonged to me.
Pricilla lifted each breast, cupped them in her hands. "Always use these weighty assets to your advantage."
The thought of Faustinus touching my breasts made my cheeks blaze with embarrassment. I descended the steps into the bath where my breasts floated weightless in the cool water. "An advantage like getting my own way?"
"Sex is a great persuader. Intelligence and beauty too." Pricilla knelt down and placed a folded towel at the edge. "You have all three, so I'm certain Faustinus will be clay in your hands."
"But I'm the one who needs to be molded into a worthy wife and mother." I rested my head against the towel, looked up at the circle of blue, and imagined married life.
I was young when Mother died, too young to recall anything about their marriage. For as long as I could remember it had always just been Father, Camilla, Varinius, and me.
"Who will help Father when I leave?" I asked. "His muddled moments are becoming more frequent. What will happen when he's no longer able to manage the estate? Varinius isn't capable."
My brother, the eldest, avoided social events, rarely made eye contact, became agitated by loud noises, and laughed indiscriminately. We often found him lying in the vineyard, daydreaming the afternoon away.
Pricilla told me she had met his kind once before. Varinius, she had explained, possessed select talents that surpassed those of other men. Father had since given up finding Varinius a wife, but since my brother never noticed women, I doubted this troubled him in the least.
"Calm yourself." Pricilla stroked my forehead. "Varinius is not simple-minded. Far from it. He's good with numbers and counts grape yields with more speed and accuracy than anyone we know."
"It takes more than calculations to manage the vineyards. Perhaps Uncle Amando can find a trustworthy overseer."
"Locusta, if you want to look like a serene goddess tonight, you must stop worrying about your father and the vineyards."
I closed my eyes. "Then distract me."
She did. With village gossip about cuckolded husbands, thieving servants, and merchants with rigged scales.
Cooled and refreshed, I emerged from the bath, and left a trail of wet footprints behind me as I went to the next one. My favorite.
"I had no idea there were so many dishonest merchants and cheating wives." I stepped down into the warm bath.
"No one is amused by stories about good folk," said Pricilla, "at least not for long."
My head on a pillow, my body floating in peaceful suspension, I daydreamed about my nuptials. I envisioned myself in the traditional orange veil and saffron-colored wrap. Saw my hand sign the marriage contract. Watched the goat sacrifice. Imagined the grand party and delicious food. My mind painted a beautiful picture. A perfect picture. Despite my not knowing allof the women's rituals.
I knew a few. Married women relatives would stand by my side and demonstrate the proper method to smear the doorpost with oil and confirm the number of times I touched the hearth. The other rituals would be revealed before the nuptials. At least, that's what Aunt Diana promised.
My eyes snapped open. "I must make a gift to the gods today. I'll ask for a marriage like Aunt Diana's." Though it had not begun as a love match it had become one. Uncle Amando, ten years older, doted upon my aunt. He lavished her with jewels, costly trinkets, and exotic perfumes. How Aunt Diana expressed her gratitude I had no idea, although I began to suspect it was in womanly ways yet unknown to me. I never once heard them utter a cross word or saw a disparaging look between them. They seemed like the best of friends.
Aunt Diana treated me like her own daughter after Mother died. She made sure my sister, brother, and I performed all the rites of passage, observed religious holidays, attended festivals, and hosted parties. She planned the banquet that marked Varinius's entry as a full Roman citizen and accompanied him to the Hall of Records for the official enrollment. Only one task was beyond her abilities: Finding a wife for Varinius. Word of his odd personality made securing a woman with equestrian status a challenge for even someone with my aunt's abundant associations.
Warm and rosy from the second long soak, I emerged ready for the female masseuse to oil, massage, and scrape my skin. With a third immersion in the hot pool, my ablutions were complete.
Back in my room, Pricilla dried my waist-length hair with a thick towel and unsnarled my dark curls with an ivory comb.
"I hope Faustinus is good-hearted," I said.
Pricilla sprinkled a few drops of lavender oil onto her palms and smoothed my hair. "You deserve nothing less."
I pressed my hand to my fluttering stomach while Pricilla plaited my hair and coiled the braids around my head.
"Calm yourself." Pricilla slid a pearl-tipped pin into the braids.
I couldn't, instead I shifted from foot to foot, wiggled as Pricilla draped a sea blue tunic over my shoulders and squirmed even more when she attached three jeweled broaches.
I pinched the shimming sash around my waist. "I don't think it's tight enough."
Pricilla tugged on the fabric, pulled until it no longer swept the floor. "I thought you might want to breathe."
I laughed. She always knew the right thing to say.
Pricilla dabbed ochre-colored balm on my lips and cheeks. "Be still." She drew the thinnest black line around my eyes. "Perfection." She stepped back to admire her handiwork.
"Not quite." I lifted Mother's pearls from the lion-footed chest and passed several lengthy strands to Pricilla.
Pricilla put them on me and then held up a polished metal plate. "No goddess is your equal tonight, Locusta."
I looked at my reflection. It was a distortion. My innocence was eclipsed by coal and ochre. It gave my face a depth and luster of one far more worldly.
I turned away from the mirror. "Would Mother approve?" Perhaps it was silly to worry what my long-dead Mother might think. I thought about her often. Wondered what herbal remedies might have prevented my sister's blood-soaked entrance into the world from costing Mother her life.
Pricilla smoothed my stola. "She would be proud of you."
"What advice do you think she would give me?"
"Mmm...I don't know, but if I were a mother, I would tell my daughter to be herself. It's dishonest to pretend to be anything less or more. Falseness hurts both the deceiver and the deceived. At least in this case."
"Be myself." I squeezed Pricilla's hand. "I can do that."
Pricilla draped a sea-green mantel across my left shoulder, wrapped it around my back, and adjusted it over my right arm. "Faustinus will be besotted."
"I hope so." I crossed the room and looked out the window.
A sinking orange sun bathed the courtyard in golden light. In the center, a marble Bacchus cast a long shadow over the fountain, his chiseled arm stretched forth holding a grape cluster. It was usually a comforting view but not tonight. A thousand thoughts swirled about. I rubbed my hands together with anticipation. A hundred emotions churned in my belly, reason and logic mixing with excitement and nervousness.
It was time.
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Thank you for reading.