Winter Wonders

[Sara]

She couldn't recall him ever asking that question and she swallowed - feeling her throat tighten and heart quicken in her chest. They had spent the first few years, after he'd returned home, rebuilding their relationship and his with his children - one of whom he'd never even met prior to his long absence, so much so that she didn't feel bad about the silphium, or the deception. And as they grew again together, and the children aged, she'd never felt pressured by him to have another. 

She didn't lie to her husband, she'd always told herself, she just kept certain things - which weren't his concern - from his eyes. But now he was directly asking, and she had to think of something to say. 

"My thoughts are..." She swallowed and brushed a hand against his shoulder in an attempt to distract, "Complex on the subject." Let it lie there. Please don't press it. She managed to affect a smile and turned her eyes back up to him - feigning curiosity but feeling dread; "Do you? Wish for another?" She had - she supposed - another ten, perhaps fifteen years of fertility left and as far as Aulus knew she was still capable of having children. She'd never asked him that question either, she thought.

 

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[Sharpie]

"Do I want another?" Aulus had to think about it; she had never asked him that before and he'd never considered it seriously. "I wouldn't complain if we had another, but I hope you know me well enough to know that I wouldn't force it. If Juno wishes to bestow another child on us, he - or she - would be just as treasured as the two fine young people we already have."

He wouldn't expose a female child just for being a girl, like some people would, and nor would he force himself on Horatia if he wanted a child and she did not - theirs was a marriage made as equal as possible, considering all the inequalities under the law that women had to deal with. He had never done anything to make Horatia regret marrying him, except for those years spent away from her when the children were very young.

"You do know I would never force it, don't you?"

 

@Sara

[Sara]

And there it was. What she'd hoped for, when she'd accepted his proposal all those years ago, what she'd seen in him since; decency.

She was not naive enough to believe he would never want more children, which man wouldn't when it cost them nothing but might bring them glory through marriage or their progenies careers? But that he reiterated something she already knew, that he wouldn't press the issue, warmed her and pushed off the cold chill that had given her goosebumps. 

"Of course I know that," She answered, acting bemused, "As if I would let you." Horatia - for all her quietness and composure - had a core of iron that she was not afraid to wield when necessary. But despite his platitudes, her secret of the silphium and the trauma of Calpurnia's birth - one of only three she kept from her husband (the other two being what happened en route to Baiae and her miscarriage in Raetia) - sat uneasily with her. Attempting to move past the conversation she shrugged; "We will see what Juno decides, I'm certainly not going to kick you out of my bed to prevent another child," Given I have other means of stopping it, "Although I'm sorry I've not been quite...in the mood here." She offered a smile, trying to smooth over the cracks of why exactly she'd been refusing any advances since they'd arrived and she had realised she'd forgotten the silphium. 

 

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[Sharpie]

Aulus knew, from the many years he'd spent serving in the Legions in some of the wildest parts of the Empire, that if a man was determined to have his way, a woman probably wouldn't be able to stop him unless she could lay her hands very quickly on a knife or dagger, and actually use it rather than merely wave it around in a feeble pretence of threat.

He was not ever going to say as much to Horatia, his beloved wife - if she was ever in that sort of situation, her assailant had better be able to run very fast for a very long time, because Aulus would catch him and would personally drive the nails through his wrists and ankles when it came time to crucify him.

He let out a breath, letting out the sudden tension that he had at the very thought. "I know," he said when he was sure that he could speak normally again. He managed a smile. "Is there anything that could put you in the mood? Given that we are here to enjoy ourselves and who knows what lies ahead in the next few months once we return to Rome."

 

@Sara

[Sara]

He seemed to be holding something back but she was astute enough and had been married long enough not to pry. He shared what he would with her, and kept things back that were not for her ears or thoughts. It suited her fine, and knew he would have a reason as he always did. 

Shaking her head, she offered him a sympathetic, if a bit amused look; "Would you be devastated if I told you it might be because we're in Baiae?" She offered a fake wince and reached out to squeeze the hand that rested on her leg, "It has a lot of memories for me, not all of them happy and with your parents here, and our children..." She chuckled, "It doesn't particularly leave one feeling their most...seductive. At least not me." But then again - once wouldn't hurt would it? She swallowed and tried to bat away the thought. She was the very opposite of reckless in most aspects of her life, and she couldn't be so foolish now, could she? 

 

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[Sharpie]

"You don't like Baiae?" It had never occurred to him that she might not like it here, but if it had such bad memories for her from all those years ago... "We don't have to come here again if you don't like it - I can buy a villa for us somewhere else. Formiae, maybe?" Campania, though perhaps not near Vesuvius - there were many other places in Italy that would be good for a country villa. Just because they had always come here did not mean that they always had to come here.

"Why didn't you say?" he asked, full of concern for her. Though, hadn't the years since helped to make it a place with happy memories for her?

 

@Sara

[Sara]

"No! I do, I do..." She started. She was tying herself in knots with her attempt to not offend him with her rejection, and now look what she'd done! 

"I," She sighed and shook her head, "You don't have to buy me a villa Aulus, I just...I don't know," She frowned. This was most unlike her - she felt flustered, which she rarely was anymore, and ill at ease, "It was hard when you weren't here. Six years is a lifetime to some unlucky souls and this place well...it reminds me of that sometimes. Lots of happy memories to of course," She squeezed his hand again. Well, this was all true at least - if not a bit of a lie about why she didn't wish to bed with her husband, "And this will always be the place, of course, where I had to pretend to be a slave to get your father to admit me." She chuckled, trying to lighten the mood and distract him from a more serious conversation.

 

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[Sharpie]

There was something wrong, it was obvious. What that something was, though, Aulus had not the first idea.

"I'm sorry," he said, knowing one thing only: It had something to do with him, which meant that he must have made a mess of this conversation somewhere. "Ah - let's start this conversation over again?"

He made to get up, to go to the door and come back in, but was stopped as Horatia continued speaking.

"Is there something I can do, to help - to make it better for you?" He had been away for too long, perhaps - it was a shadow over their marriage, that separation, no matter how much they had worked to repair it. They had come back stronger than ever, but there were still shadows.

"I won't talk about children any more, if it was that," he added.

 

@Sara

[Sara]

"Aulus." She gave him a firm, very 'Horatia' look that she usually reserved for her children when they were being quarrelsome or a slave when they were being impudent. "I love you," She reached for his face and rested her hand on his cheek, "And I'm not upset or annoyed I promise." She gave him a light smile, the feeling of guilt - over the lies and the fact that she'd evidently made him feel bad eating at her but she finally managed to pull herself together and none of that showed on her face. 

Leaning forward, which was awkward from her position - legs draped over him - she left a soft, lingering kiss on his lips. "I promise, it's nothing, and it's not important." She said close to his face, imploringly. She did love him, with more strength than she ever had, and she wasn't going to let him think he'd ruined anything. 

 

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[Sharpie]

"You're too good to me," he murmured, and bent to kiss her, recognising the truce, and the fact that she thought he was being a complete idiot - but was good enough not to tell him so in so many words.

"You would tell me if it was important, though, wouldn't you?" he added, reaching for her hand and lacing his fingers through hers. "You know you can talk to me - I'm not so hot-headed I'm going to grab my sword and go charging off to wreak havoc. Not without a proper military strategy and backup, anyway."

 

@Sara

[Sara]

"I know I can." She offered and dipped her head to kiss the back of his hand as it was laced through hers.

This might have been the closest she'd ever come to admitting the truth to him - about everything; her flight from Rome, Calpurnia, the deception over another child, the miscarriage...but something stayed her. How could she admit she'd kept it all from him for so many years, when she'd said so many times that she was an open book to him? No, she couldn't...could she? He was her husband, she should be able to tell him anything and she knew he was decent enough not to react badly enough that she needed to be afraid. What was stopping her? Pride?

She had been silent for a long moment. If not now, when? On her death bed? 

"There are some things that I...have not told you." She felt her heart hammer against her chest and her breathing tighten and shorten as she bit her lower lip. "It is nothing that endangers our family," She squeezed his palm from where she kept his grip, "And it is nothing that will impact  your career." She needed him to know that she hadn't done it to be spiteful, or at risk to the familia. 

 

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Edited July 18, 2021 by Sara

[Sharpie]

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

[Sara]

[TW - Sexual Assault]

His arm around her was comforting but felt like a weight at the same time. She almost backed out and said 'nothing, it's fine' but steadied herself. He deserved honesty and her inner monologue was right; if not now then when? 

"Much of it happened when you were away." She flicked her eyes up to gauge his reaction. Horatia Justina was on afraid of confrontation, which served her well now as she met his own tense look with an even one of her own. 

How to phrase it though? 

"I...never told you the full reason why your parents didn't admit me here, when I fled with Titus and the slave, after you'd left with Felix. We'd made it a day out of Rome, I had taken Decius - I don't know if you remember him, he was a house slave in the domus in Rome. We were in the forest on the side of the road and I went to change Titus and when I came back he was...well," She winced and took her eyes from Aulus' face finally - dragging them to look around them at the garden, "They cut his throat. Bandits, deserters, I don't know." She shrugged and drew her eyes back to Aulus'.

"They had been asking him who he was with and he refused to say so they killed him. I ran, with Titus and I don't know what made him start to cry but he did and they obviously heard that so..." She shrugged, she was keeping her voice even - as if she was recounting something as mundane as a shopping list to a slave. It had been so many years, she tried to remind herself that she was over it - even if that wasn't true.

"One found me, he cast Titus off and he," Only now did her voice take on any sort of hue of emotion, "Tried to...take me." She kept her gaze steady, even if her voice wasn't any longer, "And he," She pulled a face of disgust but needed to say it all, needed to get it out now she had started talking and leaving details out would only provoke questions from him - better out with it all, "Undressed me and...touched me, but he didn't...." She shrugged, he knew what she meant, "I stopped him before he did, there was a rock and I don't know if I killed him, I suspect I did," She said it with such nonchalance it was a touch startling, "and so I picked up Titus and fled and..." She managed a tight little smile, "That's why I turned up at your parents house looking like a mine slave - we didn't have food or water or anything for those days we were walking after what happened. I..." She managed a hoarse laugh, "I thought if I told you - if I told...anybody, there'd be questions...Calpurnia's paternity..." She looked at him imploringly, willing him to understand. 

 

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[Sharpie]

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

[Sara]

She let out an unsteady breath and watched his reaction carefully. She'd always been an excellent judge of faces, and made quick studies of characters and this was a side - despite over a decade and a half of marriage - that she had not seen from her husband before. She had expected maybe anger, although considered it was unlikely to be directed at her, and she had expected him to offer words of comfort - which he did not, although that didn't surprise her that much either, truth be told; the gentle squeeze of her hand told her that he was supportive. 

Yet she'd never seen the quietly furious look, the determination in his eyes before. She wondered, briefly, if this was the Aulus that the barbarians in Britannia and Germania and such saw before they met their end and it sent a shiver through her blood. How could she keep going with explaining the deceptions now? Seeing how he'd reacted to the one that, in reality, was her fault the least? The one she had the best justification for keeping from him? 

"It was the Civil War," She reminded him with a stroke to the face, "Things are different now, aren't they? We travelled on the same road last week down here, and we were fine." Past the very place where it happened, "Although I heard the Princess, Claudia Caesaris was felled last year I think it was, when she was out riding." She shook her head and shifted her position, relieved that she'd managed to find a way out from admitting anything further, given this new side of him. "What the Praetorians or the Vigiles be responsible for that, if the legions can't cross the Rubicon?" 

 

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Edited July 18, 2021 by Sara

[Sharpie]

"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

[Sara]

"And you will suggest a new force, when - if - you are appointed Consul, to keep watch over the countryside?" It was a novel idea, and depended on how it was funded, may be seen as either a blessing or a curse by those he dwelt on farms and such. 

Shaking her head, she gave his hand a tighter squeeze. Seeing him in this mood, or this side of his personality was disquieting, even if the fury and focus wasn't directed at her. "It is not your fault, I would have done it even if you hadn't insisted," She swallowed, "It was no safer for us in Rome - I mean, look what happened to my mother." Killed in a night of unrest the year prior. "I just...was ashamed I supposed." She offered by way of an explanation, "Even if I he didn't..." She didn't wish to verbalise that part, "I thought rumours might still spread if people found out and...I didn't wish for you to hear them so far away." 

Pushing her hair from her face with her free hand she sighed, "It was a long time ago now, it is forgotten. I am only sorry I kept it from you." 

 

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[Sharpie]

"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

[Sara]

"I don't know how you stomach it," She said against his shoulder as he pulled her closer, shaking her head, "Not taking a life, that I'm less troubled by," He had deserved to die - if not for the indignity he and violation he had visited on her, then for casting her son into the dirt. Had Titus been younger he might have been seriously wounded, "But seeing somebody else in pain or dying I..." 

She shook her head and sighed. "I know he was a slave, and that is what they should do, but Decius died in agony to try and protect me...I had an altar set up for him, on the side of the road. But I sometimes still picture it." She frowned to herself and let out an uneven sigh. "It had given me newfound respect for what you must have endured during your years of service, my love." 

 

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[Sharpie]

"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

[Sara]

She supposed he was right and nodded. It made sense, and matched with her experience. Her papa was a different man to her after his various terms as a leagate, Publius too. Aulus himself - when he returned from that six year absence - was not the dewy-eyed man that flustered over his words with her. He'd come back hardened in a way, or perhaps not hardened per se, more stoic and less emotional. It stood to reason that war and what he had seen was the cause of that, but she supposed to her shame, she had never stopped to ask. 

"I will take you," She nodded against his chest and shoulder. "I visit it every year, and send a slave for its upkeep in between. It's a half day ride from Rome so, perhaps when we stop on the way back to the city we can have a day and I can take you before we join the others back at the domus." It would be painful and shameful in a way, to take him to a place of profound pain for her, but she owed the sweet Decius the thanks of his master, if nothing else. She was very sure in the afterlife he was sick of hearing only her voice.

 

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[Sharpie]

"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

[Sara]

She sank into his touch as he tightened it, smiling a little against the sleeve of his tunica. She felt like a weight had lifted, a small one, but the scales were still unbalanced and there was still so much she had left unsaid. But she felt like the moment had passed and didn't wish to build upon the mood he seemed to be easing out of, by dredging up more woes. One - the biggest one, perhaps - had been more than enough for now, hopefully.

"I'm fine," She lied and shook her head, "But...I am grateful for the understanding and that you are not most men, and do not jump to the wrong conclusions." She chuckled, but grew a touch more serious; "I know plenty of men who would not be so understanding, or necessarily believe their wife when she said that she managed to put off the worst of it." 

 

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[Sharpie]

"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

[Sara]

Horatia said nothing but watched him carefully, with the same reserved, neutral look she often wore in public. He seemed aggrieved still, but not by her - that much was clear. 

"I know that," She said, bemused that he should feel the need to say it. She'd trusted him in every respect - but her four secretes - since their marriage. She trusted him when he moved their family across the Empire, when he ran for office, with the difficulties they'd faced with that Praetorian...everything. But she felt concern creep into her voice; "And you do trust me, don't you?" 

She squeezed his hand and then her hand found his face, lightly brushing over the arch of his cheek.

 

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