Sharpie

Aulus smiled; Horatia had used the same word as he had in agreement with what the other had said. He could only hope that they each thought similarly when it came to more important things that married people had to deal with. "Am I? I was appreciating the smell of your hair, of all things, which is probably a silly thing to be thinking about, but I like it. Is it rosewater?" And there was the torch, burning in the bracket by the door of their new home. Linus had remembered (although Aulus would be astonished if he had forgotten, his body slave had an astonishing recall and was worth his weight in gold, although to be fair it wasn't every day that his master got married.) "Here we are," he said. "I hope you don't mind observing one other tradition, at least, even if we have managed to escape the usual procession?" He bent a little and picked her up, one arm behind her knees, one around her waist, and stepped over the threshold with her, very careful to do so with his right foot first. "I think you're supposed to light the Vestal flame, too," he said. "I haven't actually been to many weddings, I hope we're not missing out too many of the really important traditions and rituals?" @Sara

"Yes," Teutus said, a little amused at her ignorance, although really he shouldn't be - he had striven to keep Antonia protected from knowing too much about how the world worked, after all, and surely Ovinia's father and family had done the same for her? "At least, they sleep there. Most of the rest of the time, they're out and about, at work, or wherever, and there are so many popinae and the like that nobody has to cook their own food if they prefer not to." Buying hot food from a takeaway stall was much safer than trying to cook it in a room in an insula - and not every insulae resident had a cooking area anyway; the risk of fire was too great. "I will have to check my calendar to see when I am free to host such an event," he said, unable to even imagine that her friends would want to come to the Esquiline. lthough, if they did, he could imagine the trail of havoc they would leave in their wake - and they'd probably manage to trash his apartment, too. People from the rich families never could count the cost of their fun, after all, and they certainly couldn't understand that what might be cheap to them with their wealth could never be cheap to those who had to earn every as they spent. @Sara

"Didn't we depose the kings because we didn't like them?" Gaius ground his teeth together. That was a completely different thing, altogether, and Lucius knew it. He was just trying to rile Gaius up, and it was working, dammit. He supposed it was good practise for when he eventually had a teenaged son to deal with. The end of the year... Lucius really would be pushing it if he didn't start his cursus before then but in the interests of fairness, and because he truly didn't want to alienate him any further, Gaius nodded and acquiesced. "All right, the end of the year." Failing that, he would see whether any of his clients would be willing to adopt Lucius, if he truly didn't want to do what was expected of him as a patrician. As even an equite, he might find something more to his liking, though Gaius couldn't see him even as a merchant - even that seemed too far removed for Lucius' tastes. Of course, there was always the possibility that Lucius would find a sense of responsibility somewhere and astonish them all. He could only pray to Jupiter that he would. A trip to the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus suddenly seemed in order... @Chevi

Anywhere secure... no, not really, unless she wanted to trust it to a banker - but that was out of reach of even Imperial slaves, mostly, who couldn't often get out of the Domus Augustorum. "Mistress Claudia could look after it for you, or everyone's got their own hiding spot, there'll be one around here somewhere." This was not Volusa's sleeping space, she didn't know where the former occupant had kept their peculium. "Is everything to your liking?" she asked, although realistically there was no much that she could change if it wasn't. "And - if you have any questions, I'll do my best to answer them." It was always best to have an idea about things before you got dropped in the deep end, after all, and Volusa herself hadn't really had much chance to find things out first. @locutus-sum

"Oh, you're equally as ancient to these young men, Lucius Cassius," Aulus said with a grin. "Even if you refuse to admit it." He glanced down into the arena. She was good-looking enough, but not to his taste. "I leave screwing the gladiatrices to others - I'm sure she will be perfectly accommodating to the late Legate of Nona Hispana. Or the victor of the recent Dacian campaigns." Although he didn't think Titus had screwed anything, male or female, in a very long time. With the possible exception of his wife. He didn't strike Aulus as the type who'd even make use of his body slave in that respect, either, though the bearded Tranquillus was not the type who did anything at all for Aulus. He glanced around at all those in the box with him. "I daresay it would be quite crowded if we all attempted to squeeze in to meet them, and I know you're all dying to accompany me." He'd have them brought up here instead; it would be much simpler and easier. @Sara @Atrice @Liv @Chevi

Glass. Glass was expensive even within the Roman empire - the very best glass came from Syria and Egypt in the east, and Teutus could well believe it was prized in Germania. He couldn't help glancing at his father over the rim of his winecup. He looked irritated. Good. That was his own fault for orchestrating this little get-together of his two adult sons without warning them of the other's existence - and that he thought Wulfric knew about him where he hadn't the faintest notion of Wulfric's existence at all before today... Tertius played things so close to his chest that he couldn't see how much it hurt those around him, who should be equally aware of things. Or did he still see Teutus as merely a slave, rather than a son? Would he allow Peregrinus to know more, once he was old enough to take on a man's role? Did Teutus' relationship matter so little to Tertius that he would only ever share as much with him as he would tell his slave secretary? He forcibly relaxed his suddenly clenched jaw and nodded at the suggestion. "Yes, of course - we shall have to discuss this properly, I think. Trading glass and amber would be very profitable for all concerned, and of course my brother must be part of it." @Sara @Atrice

"You can blame your dominus for that, he's the one who gave the dog to mine in the first place," Attis said. "Pretty sure it's going to be the size of a horse when it's finished growing. Aren't you, Licky?" He pulled a clean rag from the gardener's stash and offered it to Tranquillus. "You can wash the worst of the slobber off in the fountain." He shrugged. "He's friendly, though, the dog. Just needs to learn that he's not supposed to lick people half to death." He had a sudden vision of Tranquillus' master receiving the exact same greeting and couldn't help grinning at the mental picture. That would be something to behold! @Chevi

"Quite," he replied. "Choosing it is one thing, but when the procession only happens because of custom and tradition - well, not all traditions are beneficial to the subjects of them, are they?" She was - seemed to be - a private sort of person, which suited Aulus. Even with his ambition and desire to rise in rank and prominence within the political system open to him as a patrician and senator's son, he had no wish to live his entire life in the public gaze. From as close as this, he could smell her perfume and whatever she had washed her hair with - rosewater? Something light and delicate and floral, something that clung closely to her, a secret scent. He had never been as close to a woman as this unless she expected payment - and even then, it had only been a handful of times. Aulus did not care to sow wild oats as many men of his age and class did. @Sara

"Let's go home - or the house that I hope will be home for the nest year or so, anyway," he said. It was not warm today and he was dressed more warmly than she was. He drew her closer to him, to share some of his body heat. At least they had moonlight tonight, and wouldn't give their presence away by needing to take a torch from one of the brackets by the door of her father's house. "I take it you're hoping they don't try following us," he said quietly as they walked down the quiet street. They would surely be missed at some point, but hopefully not for a while. @Sara

Blue eyes met blue eyes - wasn't it strange that in a nation of olive-skinned people with dark hair and dark eyes, both Aulus and his wife had blond hair and blue eyes? (Well, mousy-brown hair and gloriously red, but both of them had hair far lighter than was commonly seen in the streets of Rome!) "Of course I trust you, my dove," he said. He had never had any reason to doubt that, and never would - she had been the exemplary Roman wife since the day they had married. She might have blamed herself for things, like talking to that thrice-damned Praetorian tribune who had then set out to cause as much trouble as possible for them, but that was entirely his fault, and Aulus was not some tyrant who would keep his own wife and children in their own home as the Athenian men did in centuries past (if the stories were to be believed!) "You have only ever tried to do what you think is best," he said - he had noticed, even if she did not think he had. It mattered to him that she knew he had seen it, too. @Sara

"Men generally can be extraordinarily stupid, sometimes," Aulus murmured. "They feel that it somehow reflects badly on them if something happens to their wife - they expect a far higher standard of their wives and daughters than they do of their brothers or sons. They cannot trust their womenfolk, I think." Double standards, of course. Aulus could understand why Horatia had kept it to herself for all these years - he had been away for a good number of those years, they had had to relearn how to live with one another, to trust one another. And he did trust her; she had never shown that he could not trust her, had never allowed the slightest impropriety to besmirch her (perhaps because of this? It hardly mattered why!). She had been as irreproachable as any Vestal Virgin, as far as Aulus was aware. "I hope you know you can trust me," he said, probably repeating the reassurance, but needing her to know that his opinion of her had not changed and nor would anything else change between them. @Sara

"Licky! Licky, no! Oh, mehercle!" Attis' attempted to call the dog off were half-buried in laughter and it was a moment before he could get himself under control. "Ragum, come! Sit!" The dog finally paid attention and let Tranquillus sit up. "Stay!" Attis added, for good measure, before offering a hand to help the other slave up. "I'm sorry. He's young and doesn't know how big he is! I hope you aren't hurt?" @Chevi

"Yes," Aulus said. "You'll like it - I hope!" It had a garden, a well-kept shady area where his new wife could sit and read to her heart's content, and a comfortable bed upstairs and all the other things he'd tried to think of, that Horatia would probably tut and shake her head over (at least, Aulus' mother probably would, and she was the only real example he had of Roman matronly approval. Or disapproval, as the case may be. "Let's - they don't need us for the rest of the party." And it had grown rather dull by now, anyway, and the musicians were growing drunk - the double-pipe player kept screeching the top note because he hadn't the breath to sustain it. He shot her a conspiratorial grin and set his cup down before taking her hand. @Sara

"Good," Aulus said, and tightened his hold on her, just fractionally. "I wish - I wish you had been able to tell me this, earlier. You should not have had to deal with it all on your own. Though I can understand why, I think. We men are apt to jump to the most wrong conclusions, or do something extremely silly." It was probably how most wars began - someone shouted something and it was misheard as a gross insult. Or someone ran off with someone else's wife and began a ten-year war when his kinfolk wouldn't send the girl back to her lawful husband. Aulus' views on the great epics would no doubt give people fits! @Sara

"I am utterly serious! It's called the Colossus of Rhodes for good reason - I understand that the little finger of its right hand is bigger around than the tallest pine tree you can see on the hillside there." He indicated the window across the room. "I thank all the gods that I was sent here - I don't believe your father would have taken you to Britannia to meet anyone, but here we are. And surely our fathers must have been in the Senate together." How, therefore, they had not met before Aulus and Publius had begun their terms together as Tribunes was a mystery that only the gods knew the answer to. "I shall take you to Rhodes to see the Colossus, then, once I have any sort of leave to do so," he told her, raising his cup of wine. "I do believe it's our chance to slip away - unless you have anyone here to enact the maiden being torn from her mother's arms with." If she even wanted to bother with that bit of playacting. If not, they could surely slip quietly out and be away upstairs before anyone noticed their absence. @Sara

"You - get used to it, my dove," Aulus told her, his anger almost entirely dissipated for now - though now quite; his was the icy anger that led to resolve and action and would not entirely dissipate without them. "That's why you find battle-hardened soldiers are as they are, and why military encampments and forts are no place for women. It hardens a man." It led to action, too, to the ability to push through and defeat the enemy, and that took resolve. Going through battle meant that you learned to trust the men beside you, because you relied on them - you all went through the same experiences. It was how units were forged together, men from disparate backgrounds learning to live and fight together, and deal with the aftermath together. Horatia had had nobody to help her deal with the aftermath, of course. Which just went to show how strong women really were, and that, ultimately, was why men kept them away from battle. They would become somehow less women and more like men - and the men needed their women to be women, or what was the point of it all? "You had a memorial set up to him? Will you take me out there - or if you would prefer not to come, will you direct me to it?" @Sara

"There are very few places indeed that can be considered safe when the city is in a turmoil like that," Aulus said, and pulled her closer to him, her damp hair making the shoulder of his tunic damp in turn. "I'm sorry about your mother." It would require some sort of new force, and a well-disciplined one - a legion would not do, of course, not against brigands living in the wild. But there must be some sort of force that could deal with them. "I am glad you killed that one, though I'm sorry you have had to carry that." No woman should be forced into that sort of situation. But that she had done what she had just proved the existence of that core of steel that he had always suspected lay beneath her quiet, calm exterior. Was that why she did not want to be intimate with him here in this villa? It didn't make sense, they had lain together here before - but he was not going to push that. @Sara

"I may be a flatterer, but I won't be a sycophant," was Aulus' good-humoured rejoinder. "Don't you like being flattered? It's all true, though." He sipped his wine, considering her question. "I would like to see Troy, but that is beyond Asia, even - maybe another time, once my posting is over. Delphi would be interesting - or Ephesus. The temple there to Diana is one of the great wonders of the world, and Rhodes has the Colossus, or at least, its remains. It isn't still standing, but I've heard that you can walk around it - I understand they host dinner parties in the head." Greece had so much to offer, it was no wonder that people came to visit and stayed for far longer than they had anticipated. @Sara

"The Vigiles are raised from freedmen and can barely keep order in Rome itself, and the Praetorians' main duty is to be bodyguard to the Augustus," Aulus said. "There is no force in the countryside to keep brigands and the like in check - they terrorise the country populace and use times such as the civil war for their own ends. They don't care what loyalties a man has if they can profit by robbing him - and they will attack anyone." He should never have left her to make the journey on her own, but what other choice was there, when armed men were prowling the streets, out for the blood of anyone associated with the Junii-Silani and Flavii-Alexandri? No choice at all, but that it had put Horatia in danger... Would she have been in less danger had she accompanied him? He and his companions would not have made to Ancona so fast if they had had her with them - and Titus, who was only a baby. "I am sorry. It was my decision that led you to be there, with only a slave," he said. @Sara

"I never expected to return home a married man," Aulus said, also taking a goblet from the tray as the slave passed him. "But I will be the envy of all my fellow tribunes, and all my friends at home." And he had married a wife of rare intelligence (though not so intelligent as to turn down a very spur-of-the-moment proposal! He was still astounded she'd accepted him), which led him to hope that they could actually have some proper conversations about things, rather than spending their evenings in pointless small talk. "Where would you like to visit, supposing I can manage to get some leave to be able to take you anywhere?" @Sara

Aulus was silent, listening, though he tightened his grip on Horatia's hand when she stumbled over her words. "Brigands have plagued Italia for long enough," he said, quietly, icy fury coursing through him. "The reason they do so is because from time immemorial, there have been no soldiers allowed further than the Rubicon - you remember Gaius Julius Caesar and alea iacta est?" He was stroking her hand with his thumb, reassuring her that his anger was in no way directed at her. "But that has allowed these... scum... to operate with impunity, and something needs to be done about it. If it takes crucifying every last one, they need to be stopped." @Sara

Tribune Aulus Calpurnius Praetextatus was perfectly capable of taking charge of military manoeuvres, or minor campaigns, or ordering the flogging of a recalcitrant legionary, and any of a dozen other things, without batting an eye. But put him in a room with Horatia Justina - his bride, for Juno's sake! - and all sense flew out of the window. He reeled his thoughts back in. He had no idea, really, how to talk to a woman, but if she was a fellow soldier, it would be a different matter. So why not pretend, at least for now? So long as he didn't stray into military subjects - and he had found her reading an account of the campaigns in Dacia, so even that might not be completely over her head... "I have nine years' service, which means I have just one more year to go," he said. "That makes me one of the senior Tribunes. Quintus - my Legate - likes to give all of his tribunes the opportunity to learn their trade, and as I'm one of the senior ones, I probably have more likelihood of being able to get leave than otherwise. It might only be a week or two - but the house is fairly close to the camp, too, so I should be able to spend my nights with you unless there's a pressing need for me to remain in the camp." It would work out somehow - he thought he must be a rare bird indeed, to have found a wife while still serving as a Tribune, but Quintus had been somewhat sympathetic, and he'd received the necessary dispensation. He owed Quintus a very big favour, though, and knew that it would be called in at some point. @Sara

The atmosphere had changed, grown more charged and tense, which brought Aulus' soldierly instincts to the fore - not that his wife seemed to need them. He wrapped his free arm around her. "Go on," he prompted, and bit his tongue so as not to say anything further, anything foolish - she had had ample examples of how foolish he could sound, at least in his younger days, and he could only hope that he had grown and matured past all that. If he had not, he was bound to go down in history as one of the most foolish Consuls Rome had ever had, and he did not want that to be his legacy. @Sara

Teutus, the freedman and eldest son (though not officially because of major legal reasons which are migraine inducing for all concerned!) of Tertius Quinctilius Varus, who presides over what must be the most dysfunctional domus in Rome. Teutus has recently moved out to rooms in an insula which only induce headaches due to noise levels, rather than complex webs spun by the paterfamilias, and is in the early stages of setting up an import business to be a nice little earner for him so that he doesn't need to rely on his father's generosity any longer than absolutely necessary. To this end, and as a consequence of going up in the world, he is on the look-out for a slave to help him, by hopefully fulfilling the double role of secretary/accountant and body slave. He would prefer a younger, more active, sort of slave, simply due to the job requirements and having to climb stairs to Teutus' rooms. Playby, age, parentage, background and history are all up to you!

"A domus would be better, but an insula isn't bad, if you're in a half-decent part of the city - and nowhere near a bath-house," Teutus admitted. "I'm only on the first floor, and it's a suite of rooms, smaller than a domus but bigger than some of the rooms higher up." He only needed a single room, not having a wife or a slave (and he really should think about getting a slave, at least) and therefore didn't need more than one room, but taking the suite had been a sop to his father. He didn't think he would have been allowed to move out if he'd only been moving into a single squalid room somewhere on the top floor of an insula - and he had grown used to a certain standard of living, even as a slave, living in one of the bigger houses on the Esquiline. He maintained the polite fiction Ovinia had offered. "You should come and visit some time, it would be my pleasure." And if her slave reported that to her father and nothing else about this whole bizarre conversation, he was sure the Senator would have an apoplectic fit and throw him out on his ear. @Sara