Claudius did not let anyone know, not even his closest associates, not even the director of the hemp plantation where he often helped to prepare compost, not even Zita, the mistress embroiderer who was working hard to train a new batch of uninterested apprentices. Claudius did not even tell his servants.

For months on end, he had worked hard every day and night, trying to get people to work on the old hemp fields. He had worked himself to the bone to increase production. He had brought foreign blacksmiths to the village, but none of them could replicate the old craftsmanship of Gadalian art. The purported apprentices were too amateurish even to produce anything of quality. The name of Adachia, once synonymous with luxurious artifacts, had sunk to the nadir of imperial inventories. And yet, he kept trying hard, at least, to keep it afloat.

He did not let anyone know that he was leaving. He took a few round trips to Tharcia, carrying his own luggage, with no servants by his side, just the driver of his carriage. That part was routine, but when he knew Florianus had ridden to the East with his best cavalrymen, he knew it was his chance to go back home. He reached the old Provincial Capital of Tharcia, thousands of miles to the South. A happy town with bricks of concrete and stone, with old Hellenian pillars and an industry that could boast of being strong, though modest. He did not meet with the city’s prefect, but quietly slid payment to his driver to leave him close to the Western City gate. There, he paid for a carpentum with a long wooden body, an arched roof top, and iron wheels, guided by an old Thracian with olive skin, a pointed hat, and a thick white mustache.

He packed his light luggage and a few gifts for his children, paid the driver with a bag of silver coins, and set off on the main road.

As the carriage advanced through the miles-long road, and its wheels made a grinding sound so terrible it could wake the dead, but Claudius was so used to it he could even sleep. Its price, however, was to wake up with a stiff neck.

“You’re not from here, are you?” the old man asked. Claudius leaned out of the body of the carriage, with a smile. The man’s clothes were simple, a plain white tunic. His hat, Claudius recognized as the ones freed slaves wore.

“Well, I’m from the capital.”

“Oh, yes, sir, I apologize if I offended you.”

“No, you did not offend me.”

The man did not utter a word. He picked up the lines and pulled them lightly, altering his hand grip to make his horses turn.

“Are you saying it because of my skin?” Claudius asked.

“I . . .” The man did not know how to ask. Claudius smiled but avoided laughing.

“Yes, my grandparents are from Habesha, a great kingdom south of the middle sea.”

“Oh, I see, a great kingdom.”

“Yes, very far away. Never conquered.”

The man turned his head back.

“So how did you end up as a patrician?” Claudius was not only a patrician, but also a senator at the top of the Itruschian elite. However, he did not believe that this made him better than others, only that it gave him more responsibility with his people.

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“Well, we did not live in the independent kingdoms of the south, but in the north. It was part of Itruschia. My father escaped from the south and grew in influence. He ended up directing the commerce between the independent Kingdom of Aksum and Libya. He became so rich that they had to give him citizenship. He sent us to be educated in Itruschia, and the rest is history.”

“Good, good.”

“He was also a slave at one point,” he said.

The old man took a deep breath.

“I honestly don’t care much about gold. I just want to live an honest and peaceful life. But to each his own.” The man glanced back at him.

“Yeah.”

“So that made you a patrician?”

“Part of it was his genius, part of it was marrying right. And more than just right, he had five wives.”

“One after the other? I’m on my third.”

“Simultaneously.”

“Oh, that happens.”

“My name is Claudius Duodecimus. What about you, good sir?”

“Me? Grabus, no more, no less.”

Grabus remained silent for a moment, guiding the horses to the side with a light flick of his whip.

“So you’re the twelfth child?” he asked.

“I am. Twelfth of sixteen. I was born to Kletus Salis Mercator and Cornelia Aebutia.”

“Oh, so you’re from the Aebutia family. Important family. So that’s how you really became a patrician,” the man said with a hint of irony.

“And that could be. Really, I was just a lucky fellow in a way.”

“I have lived here all my life, worked and saved just to be free. That’s all I wanted, to be free.”

“I wish all men were free,” Claudius said, looking out the window.

“You’re a patrician and saying that? That’s new.”

“I’ve seen things.”

“Who hasn’t seen things? You may have seen, but you haven’t lived.”

Those words felt a bit like the sting of a bee.

“I can’t deny that.” He really had grown in wealth, never knowing misery, and yet he felt a deep compassion for others. He wasn’t sure if it was his father’s understanding of life or his instructors and their stoic philosophy. At least, he thought, he could bring freedom to the people of his land.

“And what were you doing here, Claudius Duodecimus?”

“I used to work with the Thracian governor, Larius Quintus.”

“I heard he died.”

“Yes, honestly, don’t say this to anyone, but he made a big mess. A big mess. That village sank to the lowest point in Hades, and there’s no way to get it back. A shame, really, I was working with them for a long time. They destroyed the people, the economy, etc.”

“I never understood why the governor wanted to settle in that province.””He did it because he had a project that failed.” Cladius, like a million times before, felt his heart sink with what had happened. Part of him thought of the financial losses, which made him shudder in guilt, but the horror that was committed against innocent people had surely sunk Larius in Phlegethon, the fiery river that flowed living flames in the depths of Tartarus.

“So are you running away?” Grabus asked.

“No,” Cladius responded instinctively, raising his head.

“If I were you, I’d start a life somewhere else.”

“No, it’s not that. I came here because of my responsibility to them. I couldn’t let this happen like this, and, listen, I cannot tell anyone what went on. It’s horrible. It’s horrible. I wish I could turn back time and repair what had been done, return things to how they were, but that damned Larius wanted to kill the people he wanted to kill, and everybody believed him. Can you believe that? Everybody in the damned Senatorial Hall believed his lying mouth.”

“Things happen,” the man said.

Cladius leaned back on the carriage walls. The man was not as curious as he seemed to be. Cladius loved talking, but his own rant had left him with a bitter taste. There were other issues that weighed on his heart like an iron yoke. His wife Lukrezia and his children. He expected her to throw the biggest tantrum in both their lives, but he yearned to hold his children in his arms. Five months was not too long a time, but he wondered how tall his children had become and what new words little Lenna had learned.

The travel was uneventful. Cladius slept at resting homes along the road, alone, and talked to traveling merchants. There, he heard of strange news and nightmarish visions spoken by oracles in distant cities. They said that the Sacred Itruschian Empire was at its last moments. Cladius couldn’t believe his ears. Who would say that? Those foolish fears had prevailed fifteen years prior, during the height of the Barbarian Invasions, but at that point, the Empire was stronger than ever. Nothing could destroy the biggest empire in the world. Nothing could make it collapse.

Or could it?