“Must be nice!” said Romulus curtly, no longer laughing but still holding the amulet and gazing at it. Potitius suddenly felt self-conscious, as he sometimes did with his two friends. Potitius came from one of the oldest and most respected families in Roma. Romulus and Remus had been foundlings; the swineherd who had raised them was a man of little account and the swineherd’s wife had a bad reputation. Potitius’s father disapproved of the twins, and it was only behind his father’s back that Potitius was able to associate with them. Potitius dearly loved them both, but sometimes, as now, he acutely felt the difference between their status and his own.
“And what does this Fascinus do?” said Romulus.
Remus laughed. “I know what I’d do, if my manhood had wings!” He flapped his arms, then made a lewd gesture.
Potitius was beginning to regret having worn the amulet. It had been a mistake to think that the twins could understand what it meant to him. “Fascinus protects us,” he said.
“Not from flying figs!” said Remus.
“Or from boys who are stronger than you,” added Romulus, regaining his high spirits. He released the amulet, reached for Potitius’s arm, and twisted it behind his back.
“You are not stronger than me!” protested Potitius. “I can take either one of you, as long as you come at me one at a time.”
“But why should we do that, when there are two of us?” Remus seized Potitius’s other arm and gave it a twist. Potitius yowled in pain.
It was always thus with the twins: They acted in concert, as if they shared a single mind. Their harmony was one of the things that Potitius, who had no brothers, admired most about them. What did it matter if no one knew their lineage?
The infant twins had been discovered by the swineherd Faustulus in the aftermath of a great flood. The Tiber often flooded, but that flood had been by far the worst than anyone could remember. The river had risen so high that it submerged the marketplace. The marshly lake that fed the Spinon became a little sea, and the Seven Hills became seven islands. After the water receded, the swineherd Faustulus had found, among the flotsam, two infants in a wooden cradle on the slope of the Palatine. Many people who lived upriver had died in the flood. Since no one ever claimed the twins, it was assumed that their parents must be dead. Faustulus, who lived only a stone’s throw away from the fig tree in a squalid little hut surrounded by pigsties, raised them as his sons.
Faustulus’s wife was named Acca Larentia. An unkind joke told behind the twins’ backs claimed that they had been suckled by a she-wolf. As a small boy, when Potitius first heard this joke—told with a leer and a wink by his cousin Pinarius—he thought it was literally true; only later did he realize that “she-wolf” was another term for a whore, and thus an insult to Acca Larentia. Pinarius had also told him that the names given to the twins by Faustulus were a rude play on words—Romulus and Remus referring to the two ruma of Acca Larentia, whom Faustulus delighted in watching when she suckled both infants at once. Because her favorite place to suckle them was beneath the shade of the fig tree, Faustulus had named it the ruminalis, or suckling-tree.
“A vulgar, dirty man, hardly better than the pigs he raises!” That had been the pronouncement of Potitius’s father about Faustulus. “As for Acca Larentia, the less said, the better. They’re hardly fit to be called parents, the way they let those boys run wild. Romulus and Remus are none the better for it—a pair of wolves, raised in a pigsty!”
But even those who most disapproved of the twins could not deny that they were uncommonly handsome. “Only Romulus is better looking than Remus,” went the local saying, in which the names could as easily be reversed. “And only Remus can compete with Romulus,” went the response, for the twins were by far the fastest and strongest of all the local boys, and delighted in any opportunity to prove it. To Potitius, it seemed that the twins were everything a boy could wish to be—good-looking, athletic, and unfettered by a father’s control. Even when they ganged up to inflict a bit of misery on him, Potitius found it exciting to be in their company.
In unison, the twins released him. Potitius groaned and rubbed his shoulders to relieve the ache.
“So?” said Romulus, looking at his brother. “Should we tell him, or not?”
“You said we should.”
“But I’m having second thoughts. He’s all high and mighty with his fancy amulet from his father. He looks down on nobodies like us.”
“I do not!” protested Potitius. “Tell me what?”
Remus looked at him slyly. “We’re hatching a plot, my brother and I. We’re going to have some fun. People will talk about nothing else for days afterward.”
“Days? Years!” said Romulus.
“And you can join us—if you dare,” said Remus.
“Of course I dare to,” said Potitius. His shoulders ached so badly he could barely lift his arms, but he was determined to show no pain. “What is this scheme you’re hatching?”
“You know what people say about us—what they call us behind our backs?” said Romulus.
Not sure how to respond, Potitius shrugged, and tried not to wince at the pain.
“They call us wolves. Romulus and Remus are a pair of wolves, they say, suckled by a she-wolf.”
“People are stupid,” said Potitius.
“People are frightened by wolves, that’s what they are,” said Remus.
“Especially girls,” added his brother. “Here, look at this.” He reached for something at the base of the fig tree and drew it over his head. It was a wolf’s pelt, fashioned so that the head of the wolf fit over his face and formed a mask, leaving his mouth uncovered. “What do you think?”
With his hands on his hips and the face of the wolf taking the place of his own, Romulus presented a fearsome image. Potitius gazed up at him, speechless. Remus produced another pelt, fitted it over his head, and stood beside his brother.
Romulus smirked, pleased by the look of amazement on Potitius’s face. “Of course, if it’s just Remus and me, everyone will know it’s us. That’s why there has to be a third wolf in the pack—to throw people off the scent.”
“A third wolf?” said Potitius.
Remus tossed something to him. Potitius gave a start but managed to catch it. “Put it on,” Remus said.
It was another wolfskin. With trembling hands, Potitius fitted the head over his face. A rank odor filled his nostrils. Looking through the eye-holes, he felt strangely concealed from the world and curiously transformed.
Romulus smiled. “You look very fierce, Potitius.”
“Do I?”
Remus laughed. “But you sound like a little boy. You must learn to growl—like this.” He demonstrated. Romulus joined him. After a moment’s hesitation, Potitius did his best to emulate them.
“And you must learn to howl.” Remus threw back his head. The sound that came from his throat sent a shiver up Potitius’s spine. Romulus joined him, and the harmony produced by their baying was so uncanny that Potitius was covered with gooseflesh. But when he himself let out a howl, the other two broke into laughter.
“Obviously, this will take some practice,” said Romulus. “You’re not ready yet. You must learn to howl like a wolf, Potitius. You must learn to move like a wolf, and to think like a wolf. You must become a wolf!”
“And when that day arrives, you must be sure to remove that amulet,” added his brother. “Otherwise, someone is bound to recognize it and report us to your father.”
Potitius shrugged. The pain in his shoulders was gone. “I could always wear Fascinus inside my tunic, where no one would see.”
“Your tunic?” Romulus laughed. “Wolves don’t wear tunics!”
“But—what will we be wearing?”
Romulus and Remus looked at each other and laughed, then threw back their heads and howled.
Winter came before the twins felt that Potitius had sufficiently mastered the ways of a wolf. It would not do to carry out their scheme when the weather was cold and wet. They waited until the weather turned warm again. At last the perfect day arrived—a clear, mild day when everyone across the Seven Hills would be out and about.
Very early that morning they went hunting. The twins had been tracking a wolf for several days, watching its movements to discover its lair. Shortly after sunrise They flushed it out and hunted it down. It was Romulus who killed the beast with his spear.
On a makeshift altar—a simple slab of rock—they skinned the wolf and bathed their hands in its blood. They cut the skin into strips and tied these around their wrists, ankles, thighs, and arms. Other strips they carried in their hands. It seemed to Potitius that he could feel the life force of the beast still emanating from the warm, supple hide.
It no longer felt strange to Potitius to run naked across the hills. He had done it many times with Romulus and Remus, though usually at night and away from the settlements. What still felt strange was the mask of wolf hide that covered his face. Peering out the eye-holes, knowing he was hidden, imagining his ferocious appearance—all this gave him a feeling of power and a sense that his relationship to everything around him was changed, as if the mask truly bestowed on him faculties that were other than human.
They ran over the hills and across the valleys, from settlement to settlement, howling and yelping and brandishing their straps. Whenever they encountered a young female, they ran straight toward her, competing to see who could reach her first and give her a smack with his strap. They were the wolves, and the girls might have been sheep; like sheep, most of them were out in groups, going about their morning chores, fetching water or carrying burdens. Some cried out in alarm at the sight of them. Others shrieked with laughter.