AUTHOR'S NOTE :

One of my favourite scenes in the Spartacus series was the reunion between Agron and Nasir. I wish we had seen more of their storyline than just their tearful parting and their heart-warming reunion. I would have loved to see how Nasir coped with his grief, when he believed Agron was dead and how Agron dealt with realising that leaving Nasir might not have been the best decision he ever made. I'd also have loved to see what happened between them immediately after Agron returned. This story is how I imagined those scenes could have played out.

Also - a note regarding the dialogue - I first tried to write their words in modern language but somehow it didn't sound or feel right, so I reverted back to the strange "Sparty-speak" (lol) that they used in the show for their dialogue, and modern language for the narrative bits. I hope it will make sense. :)

Thank you for reading it, I hope you enjoy it.

CHAPTER ONE – NASIR.

Afterwards, Nasir would say he had known the exact moment Agron had been struck down by that Roman sword. The sun had been midway between its zenith and the horizon. He'd been sitting outside his tent, enjoying a rare moment of peace while he sharpened his spear. Out of nowhere a searing bolt of pain had seen him doubled over in agony. He'd slid to the ground, gasping for breath. They had found him there, his face ashen white, his eyes wild with dread, and one name falling from his lips over and over, "Agron… Agron…" Later, he would say it had felt as if, "Heart was wrenched from chest."

Until that moment he had clung to hope. For weeks, tales of Crixus' victories had arrived on the lips of slaves fleeing from the south to join the rebels. Nasir questioned many of those streaming into the camp, but few had seen the slave army up close, most had fled as soon as their villages were attacked. But one boy claimed to have taken food and drink into Crixus' camp and described the one they called the Undefeated Gaul in accurate detail. But he also spoke of a tall German with green eyes who had been in conversation with the rebel Gaul. Nasir pressed the boy for more information, but he had only seen them for a moment and remembered nothing about the German except that the man carried a sword and had large raised scar, high on his chest, near his shoulder.

"He yet lives," Nasir had breathed a sigh of relief and given the boy extra food before seeing him to a tent.

Then one day another group of escaped slaves arrived, bringing with them the news that Crixus and his army had reached the gates of Rome itself. They told of the rebels camped outside the city walls and the Roman Legions that were massing to meet them. Among them was a girl, little more than a teenager. She made her way to where the new recruits were being trained. She stood in the crowd looking small and shy, a mere slip of a girl, her eyes glued to Nasir.

Gannicus watched her for a while, wondering what she was up to. She seemed more interested in the Syrian himself than the lesson he was giving, but she followed the manoeuvres of his sword closely, her eyes taking in the complicated movements of his feet as he danced around his opponent.

"I fear sword would be too heavy for little arm to wield," Gannicus had chuckled as he stepped up beside her.

"I have no wish for swords. My interest is in instructor," she replied, nodding her head towards the Syrian. "I would speak with him."

"As would many, but his heart is spoken for," Gannicus laughed. He had lost count of the number of women who arrived at the camp and found their eyes drawn to the beautiful long-haired warrior, only to be disappointed when they found out his interests lay elsewhere.

"I do not seek his favour, I carry message from Agron," she told him.

Gannicus raised a surprised eyebrow, but nodded when she stared unflinchingly back at him. As soon as Nasir took a break and one of the others took over testing the new recruits, Gannicus took her by the arm and led her to where Nasir was drinking a cup of water.

"This one seeks you," he said with a grin, giving her a gentle push forward.

"You are Nasir?" she asked.

The Syrian nodded, surprised that she knew his name.

"I carry words from Agron," she told him. "When Rome falls to Crixus you are to enter city. He will await you there and would share embrace of happy reunion on steps of venerable Senate."

Nasir's heart soared. Agron was still alive, this girl had seen him and spoken to him, she carried his very words. He felt like he was walking on clouds, he couldn't keep the smile from his face. Rome would fall, they would all be free. Spartacus could lead his followers over the mountains if he wanted to, but Nasir was turning towards Rome and the arms of the man he loved. He asked the girl when she had seen Agron and she told him it had been just over a week ago. His heart beat even faster, it might already be done, Crixus may already have taken Rome. All he needed to do now was wait until the news of glorious victory arrived on the lips of the next group of fleeing slaves.

But none came.

The next afternoon that terrible premonition had hit him. He felt like a part of his soul had died and it filled him with dread. So when the mysterious rider, draped in a Roman cloak, appeared over the horizon, Nasir already feared the worst. When he saw that it was Naevia who tumbled from the horse clutching Crixus' head, Nasir felt his courage and hope fall with her.

Standing outside Spartacus' tent, he had listened to the voices inside as Naevia told her story. When his nerves couldn't take it anymore, he'd walked in, the bravest expression he could muster on his face and asked after Agron's fate.

"What of Agron? Does he share fate with Crixus or is he yet of this world?" his heart was pounding so loudly in his chest he wasn't sure he'd be able to hear her answer.

But Naevia had no words to offer. Instead, her face crumpling to tears told him what she could not bring herself to say. With a small nod of his head, his jaw clenched and tears welling in his eyes, Nasir accepted the dreadful news that his heart already knew. As he walked from the tent he felt Gannicus' and Spartacus' eyes follow him, and with their gaze came their unspoken words of sympathy for his loss.

A small stumble as he left the tent, little more than a wobble, was the only outward sign he showed until he reached the sanctuary of his own shelter. Once there he fell to his knees and released a scream that split the heavens with his grief. Nasir was inconsolable.

Later that day, Castus had stood at the opening of Nasir's tent, desperate to offer words of comfort and a secure embrace, but all his advances were rejected. In the end it was Laeta who comforted him. She braved the tempest of his grief and ignored his cries to be left alone. She grabbed his flailing fists and hugged him close to her chest, letting his tears spill and his body shudder with the agony of his loss. She held him tightly, rocking him in her arms like a child and stoking his hair. Her own tears for her departed husband joined his, and together they shared in their heartache. Nasir cried and raged all that day and long into the night, praying, pleading and begging the gods to return Agron from the afterlife.

When at dawn, he finally fell into an exhausted sleep, his dreams were plagued by visions of his lover appearing out of the mist, only to vanish in a ghostly swirl of smoke when Nasir reached for him. Laeta lay down next to him, still holding him tightly and let herself fall into a dreamless sleep too.

The days melted into each other, becoming a blur of pain and tears. Sometimes Nasir wept quietly, and sometimes his agonizing cries were loud. He swung between fury and despair, raging at Agron for leaving with Crixus and shaking his fists at the heavens. At night he collapsed onto their once-shared bed, hugging his knees to his chest and clutching Agron's old cloak to his face. His tears soaked it as he tried to breathe in one last breath of his dead lover's scent.

But despite his desolation he was never alone. Laeta sat with him all night, Sibyl prayed with him, Castus watched over him, wishing he could do more for him and Spartacus, spoke gentle words of his own losses, offering what comfort he could.

When Nasir had cried all the tears his body held and cursed the gods with all the words his mouth could form, he emerged once more from his tent. But he was a changed man, just a shadow of the once smiling, free-spirited person he had once been. The too-short life of love and happiness that he had known in Agron's arms was gone, and all Nasir could do now was to honour Agron's memory by living and fighting, and channelling all his wrath at the legions of Rome who had taken the man he loved from him.

Still in despair, but with determination, Nasir picked up his sword and went to the training ground where he threw himself relentlessly into drilling the new recruits. If they were going to face the Roman armies they would be ready, he would not have Agron's death be in vain. Training and teaching kept him busy and kept his mind focussed. When he wasn't giving a lesson in fighting, he was to be found wandering around the camp lost in his own thoughts, sometimes with his eyes lifted to the heavens and sometimes with his gaze cast down to the muddy ground. Occasionally people would approach him, laying a hand on his shoulder and offering him words of sympathy. He acknowledged their kindness with a weak smile and a nod of his head, telling them that he was grateful of the care they sought to give.

The only person Nasir would not accept comfort from was Castus. Every time the Cilician was near, Nasir would seethe with anger. He smacked the pirate's hands away whenever they reached for him and returned his comforting words with hissed curses. Castus' heart ached to see the beautiful Syrian suffering so much, but he also finally understood just how much Nasir had loved Agron, and still did. And to his surprise he discovered his own feelings of sadness at Agron's loss too.

From the moment Agron and Castus had met they had not seen eye to eye, and when Castus had begun his flirtatious pursuit of Nasir, the beautiful man who had caught his eye in Sinuessa, the tentative truce between the pirate and the rebel gladiator had been shattered forever. He'd never been lucky in love but when it became clear that the loveliest man he had ever seen already held the heart of the man who irked him the most, Castus thought the gods were truly pissing on him from above. But still it hadn't stopped him. No matter how many punches he took from Agron, the slightest glance or hint of a smile from Nasir would enflame his passions anew. And now that the impossibly pretty warrior was suffering so much despair, all Castus wanted to do was hold him and try to take away his pain. But Nasir would have none of it. He shouted, he blamed, he lashed out, and Castus fought back the only way he knew how - by trying harder to gain his heart.

"He needs not vain attempts to fondle," Laeta told him one day when he was nursing another bloodied lip gained from Nasir's fist. "He stands in need of a friend. Step back, offer comfort from respectful distance, and see kindness better received than lust."

Castus had followed her advice and slowly Nasir had become calmer. Rejection of food and firewood soon gave way to allowing Castus to build a fire and to cook for him, but Nasir still refused to eat. Castus placed a bowl in his hands but he just stared at it. Sibyl sat with him and entreated him to eat, telling him he needed his strength to continue honouring Agron's memory. She told him that Agron would be displeased to look down from the heavens and see him attempting to starve himself. But even Spartacus' wise words and advice could not get the grieving man to lift the spoon to his lips. When those who cared for him began to despair for his wellbeing, they decided to try force where coaxing and cajoling had failed. Gannicus was sent to battle with him. He sat at Nasir's side, concerned by the dark circles under his eyes and the paleness of his skin. He had become so thin that his clothes hung from his already small frame. Gentle persuasion was not working, so Gannicus slipped his finger under Nasir's chin the way he had seen Agron do so many times, and lifted his head until their eyes met.

"That food, or my sword. Your choice which one enters your mouth," the blond Celt's voice was soft but insistent.

Nasir twisted his head away defiantly but found Gannicus' finger replaced by the sharp tip of his sword. As the cold metal pressed against his throat, Nasir knew the gladiator who once stood as God of the Arena, was crazy enough to make good his threat, so he allowed Castus to put a bowl of food in his hands and he lifted the spoon to his mouth. It tasted of nothing, all the pleasures he'd had in life had died with Agron - food, wine, gentle caresses and loving kisses were all gone. He ate the food, his chest rising and falling in anger, his eyes glaring at Gannicus. All the while, the tip of the champion gladiator's sword hovering an inch from his neck.

"Drink," Gannicus said, nodding at the cup of wine Sibyl held out to him.

Nasir drank it down without a word of protest. Only then did the blond Celt slide his sword back into its sheath.

"Apologies brother, my hands bend to another's will," Gannicus said as he turned to leave.

Nasir wondered what he meant, but as soon as he started to feel unsteady and drowsy he realized that a sleeping draft had been slipped into his drink. A small part of him was furious, but in his heart he knew these people, who he now considered to be his family, were only doing their best to help him. His drugged sleep was mercifully dreamless and when Nasir woke up halfway through the following afternoon, he felt more alive than he had since Agron had left. He promised himself, and the memory of the man he loved, that he would try harder to eat and get rest from then on.

When his heart felt strong enough, Nasir went to see Naevia. She was still broken by her grief. Their words to each other were halting and filled with tears. Nasir held her hands and they cried together. But Naevia was still treading the path of anger through her grief. Nasir had already travelled through that dark valley and emerged from the other side of it feeling numb and hollow.

"You stand blessed to be absent knowledge of Agron's terrible last moments," she hissed at Nasir through clenched teeth. "Would that I could close my eyes and not see Crixus head depart his shoulders."

Her words hurt Nasir. They were said as if he was lucky not to know the details of his lover's death, as if he suffered less than she did for having seen Crixus come to his end.

"Would that I knew of it as you do," Nasir replied softly. "I would give own life to have stood at Agron's side as he fell, for my face to be last he saw, for my eyes to carry love of my heart to him at moment he went to the afterlife," Nasir tried to blink away his tears and struggled to supress the sobs that were rising in his chest. "Agron's broken body lies on field of battle, absent even honourable funeral. Would that I had been at his side to see him depart from this world in my arms not alone and far from my heart."

Naevia pulled away from him and hugged her arms around herself, disappearing back into the desolate depths of her mind, losing herself to her loneliness and misery. She stayed that way for a long time, the only thing that pulled her from her depression were the funeral games that Spartacus announced.

On the day of the games, Nasir joined the others as they prepared to fight and honour the memory of their fallen. He dressed as he would for battle, and stood quietly off to the side away from the others, his thoughts turned inwardly to his memories of Agron. He stared into the burning coals of the brazier and saw Agron's spirit in the sparks that flew up from it. He saw his smiling face, and heard the gentle sound of his voice. He saw the first time they broke words and the first kiss they shared. His mind was filled with the battles they fought and the peaks of love they achieved afterwards. Always in the days after a great battle, Agron would become insatiable, pulling Nasir to their bed every chance he could. They were never so passionate and lustful as when glowing in the glory of victory. And in the quiet times when they travelled with the army or settled in the city they had taken, their love was slower and gentler. Nasir loved both sides of Agron, the battle-inflamed warrior who took him roughly, pounding his cock into his body and biting at his skin, and the gentle, affectionate lover who whispered soft words as his hands travelled slowly over Nasir's skin, his fingertips eliciting quiet gasps of pleasure and his lips pressing tender kisses to Nasir's sensitive neck. All of this he saw in the glowing shower of sparks from the fire while he waited to walk with the others into their makeshift arena, to show their Roman prisoners that while you can break a slave's body, you can never break his spirit, or his will to live and die a free man.

When it was Nasir's turn to enter the arena, he felt like a giant. All the hurt, pain and anguish he had suffered became his power. He felt strong, invincible even. He wished the one Roman that faced him was a thousand men so he could slay them all and honour the man he loved with their blood.

After a good fight, the Roman lay dead, his throat slit by Nasir's spear.

"For you my heart," Nasir whispered to the heavens as he stood over the Roman soldier's corpse. "His blood spilled by my spear in your honour."

Adrenalin coursed through his body, making his heart pound and his blood rush through his veins. He always felt like this after battle, and so did Agron, it heightened everything from their senses to their passion. Nasir had lost count of the times they had gone straight from the battlefield to their bed. Blood and victory filled Agron with a lust that nothing but Nasir's body could satisfy. The only way he knew how to come down from the intoxicating high of combat was in Nasir's arms. Now Nasir had to face that descent on his own. It was the first time he had fought and killed a Roman since Agron had gone, and the first time that he wouldn't lie intimately joined with him, soaring to the heights of climax together, hearing Agron's voice telling him how proud he was. The thought twisted his heart and brought the sting of tears to his eyes, but underneath the heartache he realized that he had found a sense of peace and acceptance that would stay with him always. He hoped that once Naevia had dispatched Tiberius, the miserable son of that Roman shit Crassus, to his doom, she too would feel the way he did. He longed to help Naevia as she had helped him so many times the past, but he knew that only the passing of time, the spilling Roman blood, and the gods' mercy were of any use to her now.

So when Spartacus stayed her hand just at the moment she was about to take her revenge and see Crixus' death avenged, Nasir was both shocked and angry. When he heard the offer that had been made - for five hundred of their own to be exchanged for the one wretched life of Crassus' son, Nasir silently willed her to send a loud, clear message in the form of her sword cleaving the boy's pathetic head from his equally worthless body.

When she let her sword fall away from Tiberius' neck, Nasir's mouth dropped open in surprise and he felt the bile of disgust rise in his throat. He ran to her afterwards and shoved her roughly. "They have taken all from you!" he yelled. "You would let them have this too? That boy's head is yours, why return him to detestable father's arms?"

Naevia turned to him, her eyes glistening with tears. "And what if we stood in gathered crowd?" she said pointing her sword at the hordes of people sitting on the stepped cliff of the area. "What if our loved ones stood among the five hundred to be returned? Would you still bleat for the boy's blood then?"

"But they do not stand among them," Nasir replied. "Agron and Crixus are gone, taken by Roman swords, and I would have that little shit's head cleaved by yours."

"We have lost everything Nasir, I would not be cause of others suffering what we do. Let Crassus have the filth of his loins back, I will meet boy on battlefield again and finish what I have begun today," Naevia said as she walked slowly away.

Nasir lifted his eyes to the multitudes sitting on the cliff overlooking the arena. Almost every one of them held to heart a man or woman that they loved and would do anything to see again. Naevia had nothing, she had lost the only thing she cared about. All she had left in this world was taking revenge on the snivelling boy who had taken Crixus' life. Yet she had decided not to do it so that others might have the chance to have their loved ones returned to them. In that moment Nasir realised how selfless Naevia had been in giving up her chance of revenge, and just how much her sacrifice would mean to everybody who would get hold their loved ones again. His heart broke that Agron would not be among them.

To be continued….