Etruscan Blood by AM Kirkby

  ***

  It wasn't till the question of increasing the size of the army came up that Tarquinius started to see Servius' true worth. Tarquinius' wars had stirred up the neighbouring countries; but all-conquering Rome was bankrupt. Every man who was eligible for military service had been called up; there was no more resource. It would only take a concerted push by three or four of the Etruscan cities to push Rome off balance, or destroy her completely.

  Manius, for once, had asked for the meeting; he was usually compliant, doing whatever Tarquinius asked, but this time he was clearly worried. He'd heard – well, Tanaquil had heard, but she'd gently dripped that information into his consciousness till he couldn't quite remember where it came from – that Tarchna and Velzna were talking; not openly, by sending delegations or meeting at the great shrine, but secretly, through traders' messages and private hunting-parties that seemed, quite unexpectedly, to meet up in the great plains or the fringes of the forest near Amiata. (Tanaquil had even made sure that one of Manius' servants got the rumour, from a Sabine butcher on the back lanes, and another from an Etruscan friend who'd been visiting family in Pyrgi for a wedding.)

  There was Manius; Faustus; Tarquinius and Tanaquil, seated next to each other, an image of perfection like figures on a tomb; Servius, of course – he was always at the council, now; a couple of Tarquinius' young men in service. He was practically running a school; almost all Etruscan youths, though one or two Sabines had managed to insert themselves in it – no Latins. Yet. No women. Yet, she thought; she'd have to do something about that.

  "The smaller cities are feeling their way, like beetles in the night," Tarquinius said. "Sooner or later they'll bump against each other; start forming up."

  "They're all wondering who will be the next to fall," Tanaquil said.

  "Does it matter?" Faustus was impatient (when wasn't he impatient? A man whose life was one long series of lusts and rapes, always conquering, taking, like an insistent child grabbing at the tit.) "We have Collatia. We have Apiolae. Ficulea. Nomentum. Medullia."

  "Past victories don't make new ones." That was Servius; he'd not spoken up till now.

  "They're a warning to the Etruscans. And a border defence. They want us, they have to come through the outliers first."

  "Even so," said Tarquinius, and his level, slow speech was a warning of sorts; "Even so, Manius is right. Our resources are too small, as things stand."

  "Oh, I disagree," said Tanaquil, turning to her husband and her voice was as light and seemingly without care as his was deliberate and low. "We have immense resources. Though not perhaps of the kind you meant."

  She let that sink in a minute. She didn't turn her head for a moment, but she could see the others in that dim zone at the periphery of her vision, that blurred, submarine sight that was, in a way, so like augury, that could be depended on not for recognition but for warnings. Faustus was stirring uneasily; if Tarquinius hadn't already warned him, he would have been shouting at her. Manius was still, a frown on his face; only Servius, from what she could read of the smear that stood in for him in her oblique gaze, was relaxed. Was he smiling? She wondered.

  She waited, toying with silence, teasing it out, till she heard Faustus draw breath, felt he was about to speak; and then she said, very quietly, "Spies, not soldiers, will win this war."

  Rome already knew what the Etruscan cities were planning. There would be no surprises. But information was a blade with two edges. Her instruments could conciliate, manage, inform and misinform; sowing the seeds of distrust between the cities, keeping them all off balance. She'd prise open cracks in the polished surface of Etruscan diplomacy; lever cities apart, force them together.

  "You still won't stop them." Faustus cracked the knuckles of one hand.

  "Faustus is right, to some extent," Servius said, quietly. That surprised her; she'd always thought he sided with her on the council. Despite his military background, he rarely argued for action, other than as a last resort; like her, he had a great capacity for patience.

  "To some extent," he said again. "Our knowledge buys us time. Setting the federated cities against each other buys us time. It might win us Etruria without a war, though the chances of that are slim. But our army is too small."

  "So?" Faustus was blunt as usual. "I know the bloody army's too small. What do we do about it, that's the question."

  Servius smiled. "It's not simple."

  "Statement of the blinding bleeding obvious."

  "You won't like my advice."

  "I'll know whether I like it when I hear it. Out with it."

  Servius looked at Tarquinius inquiringly. Tarquinius nodded.

  "We draw our military from the noble class. War costs money. Every man buys his armour, his weapons, his horses."

  "Always been like that," Faustus said.

  "Yes, it always has. But how many nobles do we have in Rome? And nobles – in Rome; well, the very concept... in a city with so many immigrants, so many self-made men. Romulus was a bastard. Half our kings have been foreigners. So why don't we open the army up to anyone?"

  Faustus was fuming; but it was Manius who articulated the objections; first, and most important, the fact that no one other than the nobles could afford to buy their own equipment. Or at least, only the wealthy could afford it; still a small enough class.

  "Right," said Servius. "And this is the bit you really won't like. They don't have to buy their kit. We buy it for them."

  It was a good plan. Put the wealth of Tarquinius' treasury to use; make an army that was genuinely Roman, because every inhabitant, of whatever means or lineage, could join it. Suddenly the size of the city's reserves was quadrupled, at a conservative estimate. But it was guaranteed to upset everyone; Faustus, because it wasn't Roman enough – it let the Etruscans, the Faliscans, the Greek immigrants, every sheepshagger from Apulia or cut-throat from Syracuse, march on equal terms with the Roman ascendancy. (Give him his due, that wasn't just self-interest; he really did believe pure Romans were an improvement on the basic human stock.) It would upset Tarquinius, because he'd have to pay for it; Manius, because he hadn't thought of it first. And Tanaquil, while she might wonder, as a political problem, how it had come to this – in five generations, from an outcast bastard wild child and fratricide, and a settlement of runaways and outlaws, to an entrenched oligarchy - hardly wanted to set up new rivals to the rule of the Etruscan aristocracy she'd begun to establish.

  "Yes," Tarquinius said; "But."

  Servius sucked his lips in at that, waiting, in case there was more. There wasn't. A nasty moment. Tarquinius shuffled the notes in front of him.

  "Don't alienate the nobles," he said at last. "We need them."

  Then, unexpectedly, he smiled. "That's it," he said, and rose from his couch.

  Later, when they were alone, drinking a last cup of warm wine in the small garden where Tanaquil grew her herbs, and bees drifted lazily through the lavender, he looked up at her, and said; "He'll do."