Roma

She recognized the voice of the Virgo Maxima, and of Foslia. They called her name aloud: “Pinaria! Pinaria! Are you here?”

The Vestals had returned.

“Tell me again, where and when you found this infant?” said Dorso, frowning.

“Yesterday, abandoned in the bushes outside the ruins of my old master’s house,” said Pe

“And who might the mother have been?”

“Not a Gaul, surely. The child is too handsome to be a Gaul, don’t you think?”

Dorso scrutinized the baby. “He is a good-looking fellow. And too tiny to be a Gaul! The child of a returning Roman, then?”

“My intuition tells me so. No doubt the mother experienced great hardship during the occupation, and when she returned to the city to find that all she knew was burned or in ruins, the prospect of caring for the newborn was simply too much for her. Another harsh legacy of the Gauls, that the women of Roma should be so beset by fear and uncertainty that they abandon their children! And such a beautiful child as this little fellow!”

“You appear to be very fond of this infant, Pe

“There is something very special about him. Can you not sense it? I think it was a sign, that I should have found this child on the very day the Gauls departed and the Romans returned—a pledge from the gods that the city is to be reborn, that its best years lie ahead.”

“Words of piety and optimism from you, Pe

“I am a changed man since my months on the Capitoline.”

“And you will be a free man, as well, if I have any say in the matter. You accompanied me when I made the sacrifice on the Quirinal. You fought beside us when the Gauls gained the summit and frightened the geese. You’ve more than earned your freedom, and your master is dead and no longer needs you. I intend to approach his heirs, pay them a reasonable sum, and see that they set you free. What do you say to that, Pe

“The gods are surely smiling upon me, that I should rescue this child, and receive such a pledge from you, in the space of two days! But…”

“What is it, Pe

“If you truly wish to reward a humble slave for his service on the Capitoline, I have a different request to make. Not so much for myself—for what am I except a broken thread in the great tapestry woven by of the Fates?—but for the sake of this helpless, i

Dorso pursed his lips. “Go on.”

“What use is freedom to me? On my own, in such a devastated city, a dull fellow like me would probably starve. I would much prefer that you purchase me outright and keep me as your slave. I promise that I shall strive every day to prove my worthiness to be your trusted servant. I shall be honored to be the slave of the bravest descendent of the bravest of all Roman houses, the Fabii. And if someday, after my years of service, you should see fit to manumit me, I will proudly bear a freedman’s name that honors my former master: Gaius Fabius Dorso Pe

Dorso was not immune to flattery, even from a slave. “I see your point. I will be glad to honor this request. You shall be the most senior of the slaves in my household, and my trusted friend.”

“And also—though I know this is an extraordinary request, still I feel compelled to make it—I ask that you adopt this foundling, and raise him as your own son.” Seeing the look of surprise on Dorso’s face, Pe

Dorso raised an eyebrow. Why was Pe

Dorso felt an impulse to call Pe

Dorso recalled the long walk from the Capitoline to the Quirinal, with Pe

Dorso nodded gravely. “Very well, Pe

“I hoped…I dreamed…I prayed…” Pe

The scattered exiles returned to Roma. Little by little, order was reestablished in the devastated city. The Senate reassembled. The magistrates resumed their offices.

Almost at once, the Veii Question was raised again. Camillus was determined to settle the matter, once and for all.

A few of the most radical of the tribunes of the plebs argued that the city was so ruined, and its sacred places so polluted by the Gauls, that Roma should be abandoned altogether. They proposed that the entire population should move at once to Veii, where many of the exiles had taken shelter during the occupation and had begun to feel at home. Ignoring all other possibilities, Camillus seized on this argument and decided to frame the debate as an all-or-nothing proposition: Would the citizens completely abandon Roma and move to Veii, or would they pull down every building in Veii for materials to rebuild Roma?

With the Senate united behind him, Camillus came before the people assembled in the Forum. He mounted the speaker’s platform to address them.

“Fellow citizens, so painful to me are these controversies stirred up by the tribunes of the plebs, that in all the time I lived in bitter exile my one consolation was that I was far removed from this unending squabbling! To contend with this nonsense, I would never have returned even if you recalled me by a thousand senatorial decrees. But now I have returned, because my city needed me—and now needs me again, to fight an even more desperate battle, for her very existence! Why did we suffer and shed our blood to deliver her from our enemies, if now we mean to desert her? While the Gauls held the city, a small band of brave men held out atop the Capitoline, refusing to abandon Roma. Now the tribunes would do what the Gaul could not—they would force those brave Romans, as well as the rest of us, to leave the city. Is this a victory, to lose the thing dearest to us?