PROLOGUE
"We've been here half the morning, Gaetulicus! Are there still no birds?"
"None," the magistrate answered, glancing down at the bald head of the blindfolded man who squirmed peevishly in his chair. He returned his gaze to the south, scanning a ninety degree sector of the sky, bounded on the east by the Forum Romanum and on the west by wharves and warehouses on the bank of the Tiber. Directly ahead was the Circus Maximus about a half mile distant. The rising sun, barely clear of the Esquiline hill, bathed the arena's immense structure in a milky light which made it seem much closer.
The augur sighed. "Tell me, boy, is this the first time you've taken the auspices?"
"It is, sir, my first," Gaetulicus said. And, he thought, is it my fault there are no birds?
Gaetulicus curbed his irritation at the old man's waspish manner, well aware of its roots. Both men were of noble consular families -- but Gaetulicus was a patrician and the augur, Pastor, was a plebian. Gaetulicus, not yet twenty-four, was a newly elected quaestor, a junior magistrate; Pastor, almost seventy, was a senator of long standing and one of the sixteen members of the College of Augurs. And Pastor had nursed a grudge against the patrician class since his boyhood. When Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus, later to become Augustus Caesar and Rome's first emperor, had increased the roll of patrician families to strengthen the ruling class which had been badly depleted during the long civil wars, Pastor's family had been omitted despite centuries of loyal service to the republic.
Then he saw them. "Sir, there are birds now. Approaching from the southeast - doves, I think - yes, six white doves."
"And about time," the augur grumbled. "Now tell me exactly what they do and as it happens!"
"They're wheeling in a tight circle about a hundred feet away -- almost in front of us and about fifty feet above our level. And …"
"Yes, yes! What else?"
"A larger bird, a falcon, has flown in from the west and it's attacking the doves! They're scattering but the falcon has caught one in its talons! The other doves have disappeared and the falcon is flying toward the forum. I can still see it clearly and it…oh!"
"What, boy? What's happened?"
"Sir, the falcon dropped the dove and it fell…"
"Of course it fell! But where?"
"Caesennius Pastor, the dove fell onto the dome of the shrine of Vesta."
The augur sat silently for a whole minute. The only sound was the muted early morning cacophony rising from the forum a few hundred yards away. Then Pastor removed his blindfold and blinked in the sunlight. Remaining seated, he looked up to the young man standing beside him.
"Junius Lentulus Gaetulicus," he said, no longer bullying, "we are on the auguraculum of Rome close by the temple of Jupiter Best and Greatest." He paused and stared into the magistrate's eyes as though to enhance the gravity of his words. "Do you swear by the paramount god and by the gods of your house that what you have described to me is true?"
The magistrate faced the older man and raised his clenched right fist to his breast. "Plautius Caesennius Pastor, I swear by Jupiter and by the lares of my father's household."
"By virtue of your public office you were designated by the college of priests to solicit the gods for a sign of their will before the sacrifice of a heifer on the altar of Hercules tomorrow, the twelfth of August."
"I was, sir."
"The sign has been given you and it is not propitious. It foretells a profanation of the shrine of Vesta, thereby placing in peril the eternal power of Rome and the welfare of its people."
A pious man, Gaetulicus blanched. "Sacrilege! Against the mother goddess of Rome!"
"Yes," Pastor said. "We will go to the flamen Dialis. He must be advised at once of the threat to the city."
Gaetulicus nodded in understanding. The flamen, highest ranking priest of Rome, must be the first to learn of the threatening menace. "To his house on the Palatine, sir?"
"No, we'll go to the temple and have the custodian despatch an attendant to summon the flamen. What I must tell him should be done in a sacred place."
The magistrate picked up the augur's folding chair and the two men walked in silence toward the temple of Jupiter, Gaetulicus dumbfounded by the awesome result of his first auspices; Pastor pondering whether or not he should reveal his full divination to the high priest of Jupiter. The sign of impending sacrilege was all too plain. But there was something more. He was certain the omen pointed to the violent death of a Vestal Virgin.
Certain? Almost, but not quite, Pastor reflected. And if I were to predict the death of a Vestal and it didn't happen, I'd lose dignity, authority. Also, the Vestals are under the potestas of the emperor in his capacity of pontifex maximus. Tiberius wouldn't take kindly to public alarm over the Vestals if it came to naught. So then, a simple unqualified divination of sacrilege would be prudent. And should one of the Vestals meet a violent death, the event would fall within my augury. Either way, he thought, there is certain to be a profanation. The sign revealed to Gaetulicus was unmistakable.
Unknown to Plautius Caesennius Pastor, the sacred shrine of Vesta had already been profaned. One of the Vestal Virgins had forfeited her right to that title.
