I took his hand and held it against my cheek. My son certainly had the confidence to make his way in the world. Only later did it occur to me to wish that he had possessed a little more humility.
* * *
CHAPTER TWELVE
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AD 293-296
“The court has become ever more splendid,” Constantine’s large script straggled across the page. In the eight years since he had gone to join the Emperor’s household he had no doubt learned many things, but elegant handwriting was not one of them. I shifted the page so that the wavering lamplight fell full upon it. The house which Constantius had rented for me in Colonia Agrippinensis was elegant, but not quite proof against the winds of a German spring.
“A simple salutation is no longer enough, when one approaches the Emperor. Our deus et dominus, Diocletian, now requires a full prostration, as if he were the Great King of Parthia instead of the Augustus of Rome. But I must admit it is all very impressive, and the foreign ambassadors appear to be appropriately awed.”
Maximian, thank the gods, remained the same bluff, hearty soldier he had always been, even though he was now co-Augustus with Diocletian. But no one could doubt which of the two was the senior partner. Diocletian’s coins bore the image of Jupiter, while those of Maximian were adorned with the muscular form of Hercules.
But even if Maximian had been inclined to indulge in ceremony he would have been too busy to do so. The year he became Augustus, Carausius, the Menapian admiral they had appointed to defend Britannia from Saxon raiders, had been charged with misappropriating the spoils. Rather than stand trial in Rome he had rebelled and proclaimed himself Emperor of Britannia. The man was a brilliant seaman, who had roundly defeated not only the Saxon pirates, but the fleet Maximian sent against him. After that, our forces had been fully engaged with incursions of Franks and Alamanni in the east, and slave rebellions in the west of Gallia, with no time to worry about Britannia.
I missed my garden in Treveri, but Colonia, on the banks of the Rhenus in Germania Inferior, was close enough to the fighting for Constantius to visit me between campaigns. Our house was near the eastern wall, between the Praetorium and the temple of Mercurius Augustus, and had been occupied by the families of many commanders before us.
At least at the moment I did not have to worry about my husband’s safety, for he had been summoned to Mediolanum, which Maximian had made his capital, to confer with him and Diocletian. I wondered sometimes if during those months spent away from me Constantius remained faithful, but in truth, if I had a rival it was not another woman but the Empire. When first we met I had loved him for his dreams. I could hardly complain because he now had an opportunity to make some of them reality. Still, with my husband off fighting and my son away with the Emperor there was little for me to do, and I found myself missing the responsibilities that would have been mine on Avalon.
For the moment, Diocletian and Maximian had accepted Carausius as a brother emperor. I wondered how long that would last. When I heard a rumour that Carausius was married to a British princess who had been trained on Avalon I was astonished. Ganeda had always feared and discouraged contact between Avalon and the outside world. That policy of isolation had been one of the reasons I left. But now I could not help thinking that if I had become High Priestess, it would have been I, not Dierna, who would now be deciding what role Avalon should play in this rapidly changing world. Sometimes I wished I could return to Britannia and find out what was happening there, but such a voyage was unlikely so long as Carausius ruled the British Sea.
On a bright day in the middle of March, when the wind, brisk as a hunting wolf, chased the little clouds across the sky, Constantius returned from Italia. At first, seeing his face as stony as it had been once after a lost battle, I thought the Emperor must have given him some reprimand, though I could not understand why Diocletian should be displeased. Surely it was Maximian, if anyone, who would be blamed for not having disposed of Carausius. If Diocletian was unhappy, I thought angrily as I directed the unpacking, he could come to Gallia and try his own hand at dealing with the situation here.