Read Online RomanQuest by Herbie Brennan - Free Book Online Page A

name, but after Augustus it became the same thing as the title King and the name Imperator became the same thing as the title Emperor. Lasted quite a long time as well. The Russian Tsars were called after the Caesars. So were the German Kaisers. Anyway, the point is I need to get you back to the time of Augustus now so you can do something about Caligula.”
    â€œCaligula was around at the time of Augustus?”
    â€œNo, he wasn’t. At least not for all of it. Caligula wasn’t born until Augustus had been Emperor for nearly forty years. After Augustus you had Tiberius. He became Emperor two years after Caligula was born. And if you don’t stop him, Caligula gets to be Emperor in 37 a.d., just twenty-three years later.”
    â€œSo how do you want me to stop him?” you ask, your head reeling from this history lesson.
    â€œListen carefully,” says the Sibyl. “This is the really important part and it’s complicated. Caligula’s father was a grand-nephew of Augustus called Germanicus, who got himself adopted as Tiberius’s step son in 4 a.d. At about the same time, Germanicus married Augustus’ granddaughter, Agrippina. Between them Germanicus and Agrippina had nine children, including Caligula who was born on August 31, 12 a.d. In theory, if we get you back to Rome a year or two before then, you might be able to stop Caligula happening, but I think it would be easiest if we get you back to 4 a.d. so you can stop the wedding of Germanicus and Agrippina in the first place.”
    You look at her in horror. “How am I supposed to be that?” you demand. “How am I supposed to stop a high class Roman wedding?”
    â€œYou’ll think of a way,” the Sibyl tells you confidently. “I’ll have you dropped off in the villa where the wedding takes place.” Before you can stop her, she whips out her Star Trek communicator and says, “Sibyl to Jupiter. Two to beam back to 4 a.d.”
    Instantly there is a ringing in your ears and the temple around you begins to shimmer. You watch in something close to panic as the sibyl turns into a sparkling pillar that fades, then disappears completely.
    From somewhere far away a deep voice whispers through your skull, “Stupid, am I? I’ll show you stupid!”
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    Then your whole body transforms itself into a shimmering pillar as it is broken down into its constituent molecules and beamed away through space and time.
    To be reformed, without weapons or armour, at 8 .
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    Wow! The Romans certainly liked to eat in style! This dining room is absolutely enormous!
    You notice at once that instead of a single banquet table there are several smaller tables, each a lot lower than the tables you’re used to. Couches are arranged around them, reminding you that the Romans liked to eat lying down rather than sitting up, a practice that must have played havoc with their digestion.
    In a sudden burst of curiosity, you look up Eating Habits in your Brief Guide to Roman History and discover that next to watching slaughter in the Games and conquering large parts of Europe, the Romans loved to eat more than anything else in the world.
    In fact they loved to eat so much that many of them had an annex off their dining rooms called a vomitorium where they could go to puke after a good old pig-out, thus making room for more food. Gross!
    It occurs to you that the wedding reception might be held in this very room and for a moment you’re half tempted to hide here and wait. But then you remember that the feast would normally follow the actual wedding ceremony, which is what you have to stop.
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    There are two doors leading from this room. One in the eastern wall marked LVIII and the other to the south into what looks like a little annex room marked LIV .
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    â€œWrong!” exclaims