53 Results in the "The Lion & The Owl" category
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Chapter
VIII
This captive burns hot when he sleeps, never waking, no matter how indelicate a druid’s touch. Here lies the beauty of the falls, the lion from his vision. Aedan’s thumb pushes at an eyelid, revealing a lily pad floating in the white, and its dark center widening with exposure to the light. His smooth skin stinks of cooking fire, and his soft nipples taste of roasted rabbit. He sits upon the strapping prisoner and delights in how the man’s muscular gut feels his bare crack. Cock in hand, he guides…-
120.4 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
The Road Trip
The Servii road winds through pastureland, two worn lines carved by years of plaustrum wheels hauling goods to the Ceresio. At the lake’s north point, the path turns to crushed granite. Most of the year, this route serves only farm-to-market traffic. But between harvest and first snow, esseda replace plaustra as patricians journey south for winter. Unlike their wealthy parents, the Servii siblings decide to winter at their villa, celebrating the solstice and Saturnalia with their villagers. This new…-
120.4 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
The Price of Pain
One calculates a citizen's measure by grading their empathy, benevolence, and financial worth. One measures a soldier’s value by the skill of his kills, his labor, and years in service. Sadly, no rubric exists for a citizen who is also a soldier. Planus ruminates on such things in the shadow of Skipio’s recent brutality, all the while haunted by memories of rescuing him from the sea. That day, Caesar, his leader and kin, sent Planus on a routine inspection of the merchant ships harvesting chalk from…-
120.4 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
The Parents
Lucius Vitus ServiusAge 50 | He/Him | RomanCiniod the FirstAge 45 | She/Her | Brythonic Celt Vitus is a praefectus of the Legio X Equestri, a career cavalryman and cartographer, and owner of Servio Poma et Pira, a family business of apples and pears, fruit wine, and seasonal walnuts our of Cisalpine Gaul. He is the father of Skipio. Ciniod is a Belgae king’s daughter born along the shores of the Tamesa (modern Thames) in Britannia. She is the widow of the arch-druid Fintan (The Owl), and…-
1.3 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
The Owl in Residence
Nothing signifies the cruelty of fauna more than a Roman rooster. Taller than a newborn child, the motley-plume monster slips through a crack in the larder door, head bobbing with every step. It loiters about the pre-dawn darkness before idling near the hearth where the ashes remain warm. It is day three—this cocker’s last day on the planet. With cautious deliberation, it saunters to the lectern, yet before it can raise its feathery head for a sunrise squawk, long fingers snatch its slender…-
120.4 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
The Morning Task
The lake glistens, its placid surface casting sunlight in a narrow path to the wet porch, the shallow water over its tiles giving way to the kitchen. A comforting warmth envelops the space from sunrise to sunset, emanating from a majestic oven nestled in the back corner. Its plump stack extends through the ceiling, and on its face is a masterful carving of Vesta, her arms laden with a bountiful harvest. Below her, the oven’s mouth beckons, where the hearth’s breath forms an uneven glow, and metal…-
120.4 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
The Morning Diversion
Skipio wakes before the sun, his habit since coming home. The frigid lake arouses his blood, and he floats upon its black stillness, lamenting that the coming winter will force his swim routine indoors. He strokes to the porch, its slick balustrade heavy with moss, and hoists himself into the chilly air. Streaking quickly into his room, he stands before the wall hearth’s roiling flame and dries himself with a fresh towel, courtesy of Welletrix. The blond Gaul reappears with a steaming water bowl…-
120.4 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
The Month of Honey VII
No bigger fool exists than a man blind with love. Mother cut his last nerve with that word, leaving him with no guilt for slicing her throat. Discontent, he leans against the Roman, whose words gently tickle his back. Mud Face, Milky, Reed Eyes, and the others conspire at a shady roadside watering station. The two sides speak over a trough where their horses drink, and a civilian stands among them, his curls blacker than Aedan’s. Large blue eyes watch Servius Tribune with a sensual…-
120.4 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
The Month of Honey VI
The northern road bends east, avoiding another of Saturn’s lost stones. They enter Clastidium, an unremarkable collection of stables, eateries, and toilets catering to a daily procession of riverboats and bridge-crossers. “You’re selling water,” Planus scolds the teenage merchant, “when the Padus flows just eighty paces away,” “It flows, awight,” says the young man, unable to articulate his ‘R’s,’ “With the shit, piss, and spunk of evewy pewson living hew,” Titus hands…-
120.4 K • Ongoing
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Chapter
The Month of Honey V
Farewells are the worst things. Sometimes. His cage’s wooden walls lay in a stack, and the oars, upright in bronze brackets, rest without their rowers. Even the desk and its stool sit alone, with no sign of the well-dressed supervisor. A shadow on the ramp becomes his Roman—the red-comb helmet under his arm shimmering in a lone ray of sun. A thicker tunic peeks out from his modest breastplate, and wool leggings run from its leather skirt to his boots. “Let’s go, A-Dawn.” He tosses a xanthous…-
120.4 K • Ongoing
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