Household Gods

She’d printed out the manumissions in block capitals, that being the universal style in Carnuntum. The reed pen she’d bought with the papyrus sheets worked about as well as a fountain pen, except she had to re-ink it every line or two. She’d spelled the Latin by ear and by guess, but she’d seen from signs and graffiti that she wasn’t alone in her uncertainty.

Titus Calidius Severus mumbled to himself as he read one copy. “Not bad. Not bad at all. Nice and clear, nothing too pretty, no flowers of rhetoric, but it gets the job done. I’ve seen lots worse.” He seemed to be surprised, too – probably because no one expected a woman to show even basic literacy, let alone a decent writing style.

Gaius Calidius Severus agreed with Nicole’s impatience. “Come on, Father, leave off. This is no time for literary criticism. “

Titus Calidius Severus shot his son a narrow glance, but he didn’t seem inclined to pull rank. “No, it’s not, is it? Umma, where’s the pen and ink?” Nicole brought them to him. He signed his name on each sheet of papyrus, and his son followed suit. Both of them wrote with great labor and effort, tongues stuck out, as if they were a pair of second-graders. Nicole couldn’t have proved they weren’t, either, not by their handwriting. Which of them had the more painful scrawl was hard to judge, but neither would be entering a calligraphy contest any time soon.

Sextus Longinius lulus couldn’t write at all. He made his mark instead, a sprawling Roman numeral six – VI – for Sextus. The Calidii Severi witnessed it. There didn’t appear to be any stigma attached to his illiteracy, no patronizing looks or one-syllable explanations. Some people wrote. Most didn’t. That was the way the world was.

Once the documents were signed, witnessed, and duly executed, Nicole handed one copy of the manumission to Julia. “Here you are,” she said. “I don’t think we can get much more official than this, not without Brigomarus. Head up, now, and eyes front. You’re a free woman.”

Everybody clapped and cheered as if at a play. Julia clutched her sheet of papyrus in stiff fingers. She looked glad – oh yes, very glad indeed. But apprehensive, too, if not outright terrified.

Maybe she had a point, at that. She’d been dubious about the idea from the beginning; had done her best to impress on Nicole that freedom wasn’t a purely abstract thing. It meant changes, profound ones, in her status, in her position, in her mode of living. Suddenly, she wasn’t property anymore. She was her own person, with rights and privileges, but with responsibilities too. Slaves had none of those things, nor anything else but what their masters gave them.

Nicole might have been tempted to drop the whole thing, to let Julia go on as before, bound but safe. But she couldn’t bear the thought of owning another human being. She knew – she’d known for a while now – she was going through the manumission at least as much for herself as for Julia.

“Now we celebrate! “ Gaius Calidius Severus declared. “Wine all around, on me!”

Everyone cheered again. Through the last of the noise, Titus Calidius Severus said with a degree of indulgence, “Look at the kid spending my money. I’ll have to buy the next round, I suppose.”

“No,” Nicole said firmly, squelching them both. “The first round is on me.” She filled six cups from the amphora of Falernian – yes, even for herself. She might drink the cheap stuff for meals and the middle grade the one time she set out to get seriously drunk, but this called for the heavy artillery. To hell with the unleaded, she thought. One cup of premium in the tank won’t hurt.

It was definitely sweeter and stronger than the wine she was used to. Everybody sipped slowly, with suitably appreciative noises, just like a wine tasting at Spago.

Because she’d served the good stuff on the house, Gaius Calidius Severus bought a round of Falernian, too. Left to himself, Nicole suspected, he would have been more likely to order the two-as wine.

Just as Julia fetched the cups for Gaius Calidius Severus’ round, Ofanius Valens squelched in from the rainy outdoors. He hadn’t shown his face in the tavern since Nicole had pried Julia off his lap.

Well, Nicole thought, if he did have to show up, now was a good time for it. Teach him a lesson, and a good one, too.

Sure enough, he looked at the gathering by the bar, with a particularly keen glance at Julia, and asked, “What’s going on?”

“We’re celebrating,” said Julia. “I’m free.” She sounded more cheerful about the idea, now she had a cup of Falernian in her.

Ofanius Valens smiled with apparently unfeigned pleasure. “Now that’s worth celebrating,” he said. Nicole smiled back at him, a little smugly, until he added, “You cost me the same old two sesterces the last time.”