Chapter 1



The cool, almost cold air hits him in the chest.  A little steam rises
off his white tunic, and lifts from his horse. His tunic is white, his
horse is white too.  He breathes deeply taking in the voluptuous shape
of the Pyrenees stretching before him. Cracius stands up in his
stirrups, his thighs still sore from the night’s exertions, completely
spent but still intoxicated by last night’s fierce ride. He is
supreme, taller than the oak at the top of the hill where he stops
every time he returns from a night of love making. The hill has become
his domain; it overlooks the succession of hills here where the
Garonne river  suddenly abandons its wide valley to plunge brutally
into the mountain’s side, like a sword thrust sideways, as if seeking
a second source. All the small peaks that surround the town look as if
they sprang up after the mountains and the rivers, in a feverish
afterthought, as though the gods had forgotten something when they
created this corner of the earth and then decided to add it later on.
This place has a peculiar charm for Cracius because it reminds him of
the seven hills of Rome. In the distance, the Pyrenees radiate their
beauty. They’re almost too lovely, too regal, and indomitable; he
feels closer to the hills here at the foot of the mountain.
As he pauses with his horse, the city of Lugdunum Convenarum behind
him is still dark. The rays of the rising sun haven’t reached it.
Still, in places the city is slowly waking up: Cracius can make out
the first stirrings. He knows them well : merchants and craftsmen
whose early preparations keep him awake when he comes in to rest after
a night of revelry. He doesn’t need to look around: he knows the
stalls around the Forum, the workshops below, further to the North and
the houses in the poorer part of town where traditional Gallic
dwellings mix with modern stone houses with curved tiles in the Roman
style. Up higher, just below the fortress, standing above the rest of
the city is the Roman quarter where the villas and the gardens and
orchards are almost as grand as those on the Latium. Turning his back
to the city he admires the high snowy mountain tops standing against
the sky at the far end of the valley, sharp as swords. They thrust
into the sky, softened only by the round hills at their feet.  He
feels he could tame the wind and silence the birds if he wanted to. He
is all powerful and today’s magnificent dawn is his only rival for
glory. The Romans, after all, are masters of the world, of all that is
known from far away Asia to the Celtic shores, from the Nile to the
Danube, and he, Cracius, is the strongest, the handsomest and the
youngest of all Romans. He thinks of Epostorivida, the young Gallic
lass: the scent of her skin lingers on his lips, his fingers; he
breathes it in again. Stretching his tired loins he opens his powerful
chest as if to defy nature. He twists his mouth up violently to lick
the spicy odor of the hairy one’s open sex on his lips. He remembers
her blond mane and, standing up in his stirrups, he roars and his wild
shout echoes in the valley and against the surrounding hills, waking a
sleeping bird of prey.
Cracius closes his eyes to retain the last remnants of the night’s
receding pleasures, before heading home. Just a little while ago, as
the day was dawning, he silently left his beautiful victim; now, he
will sleep like a tiger returning to its lair after the night’s meal.
As for the others, the creatures of daylight, let them talk, let them
say what they want about his escapades. He can hear them all talking
behind his back, jealous fathers, envious matrons, the upright and the
righteous, who disapprove of him but keep coming to his house to curry
favor every day.
       Since debauchery hasn’t yet become fashionable in the faraway
provinces of the Empire, Cracius, whose behavior wouldn’t raise an
eyebrow in the Latium, here passes for the most scandalous of all the
young Roman noblemen of Lugdunum Convenarum. Yet his parties are the
most well-attended in the city.