Free The Nero Prediction by Humphry Knipe Page B

shoulder. The candles flickered as a female slave, black as ebony, stirred the air with a huge peacock-feather fan. There was the sound of approaching footsteps. The door opened. A colonel of the guard entered. I recognized him instantly. He was the man who had helped Messalina stab herself. With him was a slave who carried a box.
    He saluted. "Hail Agrippina!"
     She indicated the little citron-wood table in front of her. "Here."
    "It's much decayed, domina," said the colonel. "The hot weather and contrary winds on the way back from Pandateria -"
    Agrippina brushed away his objections with the back of her hand. The slave placed the box on the table, opened it, lifted out a severed head by its long black hair. The face was blotched and slick with putrefaction. The eyes were pockets of milkish colored gelatin. A waft of air from the peacock fan carried with it the sickly-sweet stench of rotted flesh.
    Lucius gasped so loud that for a moment I was afraid we would be discovered. "Don't look at it, you'll be turned to stone," he whispered in a tiny voice. "It's Medusa."
    But Agrippina stared at it and so did I. "I told you to pack it in salt," she said.
    "We did, domina, but with the delay and the humid weather it came out looking like this."
    Her voice was as firm as a rock. "Closer," she said to the slave. "Open the mouth." The hair began to tear out of the rotted scalp as the slave struggled to obey.
    "The jaw is locked by rigor mortis, " said the colonel.
    Agrippina was beginning to sound impatient. "Lift the upper lip, I want to see her teeth." But the lips had solidified. She whispered, "Hold the chin."  Leaning forward she forced the top lip upwards with her thumbs, baring the teeth. Her sigh of relief was audible, even behind the curtain. "It is her. Colonel, you will find that two of the upper teeth are capped with pearls. They are yours. Burn the rest."
    The head disappeared back into the box, the colonel and the slave out the door.
    Agrippina choked. "A basin, water... quickly…" .
    Lucius plucked at my robe. We stole away to the sound of her vomiting.
     
    Eleven months after Lollia's death, at fifty three minutes after noon on the February 25, the instant when the full Moon, still below the horizon, was precisely opposite the Sun, Claudius adopted Agrippina’s son and Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus became Nero Claudius Drusus Caesar and his mother was granted the right to style herself Augusta. The boy was twelve years old.
    Agrippina was too political to appear triumphant. But there was an aura of somber glory about her as she worked her way through the guests celebrating in the palace garden. At her right walked her red headed son. At her left and half a step behind her, was her nomenclator, her name caller, who whispered names she might have forgotten. I kept half a step behind him, writing down names she wanted to remember. Towards sunset, when the gathering broke up, I was dismissed.
    Euodus lay in wait for me on my way to my room. "Come, I need to show you something."
    I followed him outside to a part of the garden, a low promontory, which faced the eastern facade of Caligula's palace. The Sun had just set and the February air was chill. "What are we doing?"
    Euodus was as taciturn as usual, talking in an undertone although no one was in sight. "Waiting of course."
    "Who for?"
    "For your present mistress and your master-to-be."
    "Agrippina and Lucius, I mean Nero?"
    "Yes."
    I said, "He went with her to her apartments for a private conversation. Afterwards they'll dine with Claudius. They won't be coming out again."
    Euodus glanced at the darkening sky. "Oh yes they will.”
    "How do you know?"
    "Agrippina will show him her planet."
    "I thought today was chosen for the adoption because the planets make important correspondences with Claudius's chart."
    "Yes, there are three. But there are six exact correspondences between today's planets and Agrippina's chart and two more which are within a degree or two of being