All fake, none of it's real, Elsanna not incest, have fun.
In ancient times, I lived. When gods and goddesses still spoke to mortals and bedded them, still bore demigods like me to unsuspecting women in the traditional combination of a blessing and a curse. Hades had lain with my mother before marrying Persephone and I could give Ice to the world, at will. To the disappointment of my family, my chosen husband died during the wedding night when he brought me pain. To my own disappointment, the child I was supposed to bear did not ever grow. I had taken comfort, back then- before I truly lived- that I could at least look after the children of our people.
Before my adopted sons and their children thereafter referred to it as Italy, it had been a smaller peninsula, called Sabinah. I had been young, then, and naiive. My tribe of Tubal was renowned for beauty; in art, in music, and in our own countenance. Unfortunately for my people, the Chittim took notice. Romans, they called themselves. Lead by the ambitious, deceitful Romulus.
As with all invading tribes, there had been disputes when the Romans had settled in the middle of the mountain's valley. Few in number but superior in combat, they had seen the sheep and the shepherds... yet they claimed the land only to drive out the property. They had ridden on the backs of horses, appearing as centaurs and behaving just the same. Stubbornly, the new tribe did not heed to the warning of the indigenous Tubal, the founders of Sabinah. Despite the area of the open valley being the capital site, it was a hazardous plane and only for use during the dry months. The Sabine were logical, living on the edges of the mountains' cliffs for fear of the ocean's flood in rain season. It was the dry season when the Roman's came but would not be that way by the next equinox. The young tribe of Romans had yet to learn and now the Sabine were loath to assist the pig-headed invaders. The Tubal people believed their Elders denied the requests for marriage due to the suitors being barbarians, alone. All men, the people had assumed, in want of wives. Besides, the Sabine expected them all to drown by the start of the Season of Rain.
The rain season came, so the tides did rise. The rain season went, so the waves did recede. But the Chittam, obstinately, remained.
They had torn down the market tarp, constructing buildings made of something different and stronger than stone. Unlike us, as well, they dug deep into the very earth, something none of our people had performed for shelter; why would anyone dig deeper in an already wet land? Regardless, the towering structures only spread. They spread with the Chittim conquest, claiming land from hill to hill until they found my own tribe.
The elders came to me and demanded that I go to the Romulus, the thief of land and culture, synonymous in title to "barbarian". They told me to kill him. As a daughter of Hades, it was my right. At first, I had reservations. After all, this was a leader who had taken our land with brute force, but without blood shed. They had seen my resistance and it angered them. "It wouldn't be long," they had said, "before the Chittim come and make slaves of all of us. Destroy our heritage and steal our freedom, making us pay for it in service. You will kill him," they insisted. "for your family and all of our people." I did willingly go when the Elders proclaimed the abduction of their women by the winning invaders.
Under the guise of an offered wife, I was escorted the next day with my own white and gray mare. "We have yet to see him," one councilman informed me, "all the proud barbarian does is send messengers." What terrified me about that statement was a rumor. Whispers that the Chittim were actually a democracy, similar to Greeks already overthrown, and the reason a wife had yet been chosen was because no woman could take that quantity of suitors.
My attending party stopped far short of turf path's edge. Skirting where the Road began were two soldiers dressed in gleaming metal armor. Stones which eased the jostling of carriages and wagons were what made the Road invaluable to its craftor's nation, but to the tribes like mine, outside of the Chittim kingdom, they were a raised scar on Gaea where the Chittim army scourged and reigned. My horse continued on and my reins were caught by the soldier on my left as I was lead down the path and into the fallen city of my ancestors.
The city was once a valley with a marketplace, a great tarp of many craftsmen and high poles had kept its vendors well-shaded. When the caravan I had joined passed tall gates which opened and shut past a high fortress wall, I could see it was turned into a citadel of warriors. The walls blocked out the clanging of metals from sword to sword, hammer to shield, the screams of horses being broken in corrals. The sun was blindingly bright without the soft shade of forest trees. The soldier on my right saw my nerves become raw and, in a kind voice, tried to sooth me by introducing his kinsmen by their groups. His gestures and softening features were all I could go by, as my Latin was not a fraction as fluent as his own. It still helped to calm me as we kept to the road leading up to stairs. Narrow stairs which the horses could still climb up to the raised building made of what I now know as concrete. I hadn't seen it, before. I hadn't seen a building like it, either; open air between all columns instead of planked walls and a vaulted ceiling which seemed to be one solid, suspended stone perched atop of these thin, unstable-looking vertical poles. And we went DIRECTLY UNDERNEATH of the PRECARIOUSLY PERCHED STONE THAT COULD CRUSH ALL OF US. So as I was trying not to think about how easily my body would compress beneath the ceiling, it slammed into a vision of impossibility at the other end of the tall, stone death-trap.
A girl no older than her twenty-fourth season was standing on a raised platform. She was in front of a larger-than-normal wooden chair which was surrounded by an outstanding wall as though enshrining her now-vacant thrown with flowers, trees growing from pots, and ferns. This skinny, fair-complexioned girl bearing gleaming armor confused me. The color reserved for a fire's embers was interlaced with gold in her long, plaited hair. That was a color of hair I had never seen on anyone. I considered myself well-versed in text, and this was my first ever concept of a female holding any rank. I didn't know who she was, at first, but I knew she had importance which was unheard of for a woman of my culture.
To add further injury to my inner head-trauma, the soldiers dismounted and took a step back to kneel before the child. "Hersilia Elsa, Romulus," and departed as quickly as their horses could descend those perilous stairs.
She asked, "Are you the smartest or are you the most comely of your people?" and it had not been spoken in Latin, but in Sabine. Broken and heavily accented against the soft consonants, but with confidence and without hesitation.
Unlike my stilted reply, in Latin, "I am neither. Who are you?"
That's when she grinned. "I am the Romulus," she said sticking her chest out. In hindsight, it was not as intimidating of an act as it would grow to become. "And if you are not the most fair in your kingdom, Hirsilia Elsa..." she stepped down from the dais and walked towards me to stop five feet short. She warmly smiled, "then I fear the wrath of Athena's direct descendants."
And I was flattered, but taken off guard by that blunt compliment. I was no more or less beautiful than the rest of my people. I had blonde hair and blue eyes. I was neither tall nor short; plain, by my country's standards. The only thing I had been exceptional at was my power.
Close as she was, I could tell she must have been one and a half hands shorter than myself.
Romulus; not a name, but a title. A deceitful one, for this was a young woman. A woman even younger than myself, barely out of her childhood. She looked at me through the eyes of a warrior beyond her years. Ancient teal eyes, the mark of Poseidon, no wonder the men followed her. But all of that power was in the hands of a twelve-year-old? A girl?
"Please," she urged, gesturing with her hands as though giving me a gift, "use your Sabine. As you can tell, I need the practice." This girl used her hands... a great deal, when she spoke. Large gestures I hadn't observed before. She pointed down, "I'm here, and the language is Sabine," she spread her arms wide, I lost my nerve, at that, and stepped back once before she finished the sentence, "and nobody here speaks Latin."
She quickly brought her hands to her hips and then pointed her index finger at me, tilting her head and looking up at my face to say, "Not yet, anyway." She straightened her body and put down her pointing hand to match its sister, resting it on her other hip. "So, Sabine, if you please, why are you my chosen wife?"
I blinked a couple of times. Unafraid, I walked to the seat she had lifted herself from, on top of the raised platform. After all, I didn't really believe her, back then. As I said, I was quite naiive. Shaking my head while I sat myself down, I told her plainly, "I am supposed to wed Romulus. Is he your father? Your older brother?"
Good natured as she always had been, she still wasn't going to tolerate being talked down to, as was made apparent by what happened next. Her face turned from curious to deadpan; she followed my footsteps and locked her eyes with mine. "I am Anna Quirinus Romulus. The first of many Romula to come," she leaned close to me and I leaned back in the chair. "My power was forseen and I was informed by the Sybil of Delphi." Her hands enclosed around my wrists, which had been resting on the arms of the chair, "I am a daughter of the god of War, and you will respect me and my position." I heard a soft crunch and looked at where the pads of her fingers had embedded themselves deep into the wood. My eyes snapped back to hers when she started to lift the chair, with me still IN it, and placed it off of the platform. My wrists not even bruised, I couldn't stop looking at the dented, splintered marks made in the chair arms. By the tips of a tiny, thin, girl's fingers.
She was still looking at me. Down at me, then. "My older brother, by moments of birth, was named Remus. He tried to overthrow me. Then he tried to kill me as I slept. So I killed him, instead. You will not be marrying him. But now I don't even know if you will marry me. I will not be insulted by my wife, beauty or no beauty." Petulant as her age, she crossed her arms and turned her back on me. She stared at the tarp hanging behind where her thrown once perched, as though studying the fabric.
I shook my head, still not convinced. "I'm supposed to prove that I should marry you? You're a little girl, Anna. No matter your strength, that won't change what you are; I'm a woman," I'd scoffed, "you cannot marry me. We cannot bear children. There is no point in a marriage between us."
"Not with that attitude," she threw behind her auburn-draped shoulder.
My eyes shot wide and one eyebrow crested. Was this child so insane as well as stubborn?
On her heel, she pivoted in a dramatic fashion. "Understand me: Your people are now mine, therefore you are now mine. These men," she gestured to the soldiers who stood posted at the entrance, "have been mine, and there will be more men and their wives and their children- all of them all belong to me. I already have their children. What I do want is love. What I love is beauty, and I have not seen anything as beautiful as you. But if there is anyone prettier around here, state their name and you are free." As if an afterthought, Anna added. "They can be married, it does not matter."
I had, by the way, begun to list my fellow women which were fairer than me and which features were their highlights. Despite what was suggested by the Romulus, I was excluding the wedded members. When I had finished with around fourteen names, the Romulus nodded her head and started asking questions.
"So this Heronai, her hair is fair and dark, but is it as soft as yours?" and I said I didn't know, I hadn't ever touched it. She nodded and kept inquiring, "The Basothea, do her eyes reflect soft pools as yours do?" and I told her Basothea's eyes were brown. "Malreh, the one of the plains, does she have a voice as strong and as defiant as you have?" And I told the Romulus, Anna, that Malreh was much too meek and shy. It continued, like that, until the Romulus cast her hands up in surrender, "Then none are as fitting for me as you. Congratulations, I will have to accept our marriage."
"Will you not hear of the men, Romulus?" I had smiled when I asked, completely disbelieving this entire day was not either a game or very long dream.
Thumbing her chin, Anna worried her bottom lip with her index finger. It was a long pause of inner reflection for her, looking back. "Very well, describe them, too."
So I had, as with the women; and as with the women, the Romulus questioned further when I was done. At first she had prowled with hunched shoulders, as if ready to defend herself. Then she paced with her back erect. Then she started skipping when she had a rebuttal to a suitor I had nominated. Finally, she had opted sitting sideways on a seat beside me, below the pedestal. "Does Dnaner have as strong a mind as he has a jaw?" and when I started then finished listing the scholars of my people, she asked "Has Nidref the shoulders as broad as his mind?" and when the sun had gone from the center of the sky to the very edge, my having spoken more in the one sitting than I had total in my life and never feeling quite as proud or as exhilarated from any conversation and the young girl smiling so broad that she had outwitted me, I humored her. Because she had, really, even if I had deluded myself that she hadn't, at the time.
"I think I understand, now. So you'll have me because I am not the prettiest nor smartest, nor strongest, nor brave, yet you'll have me because I'm the best of all these traits, combined, that you're ever going to get?"
"Yes," she answered. By then, she had given up on being intimidating, having too much fun and relaxing. "I believe you do not have a word for it, but I call it 'aequipondium'; just enough of everything."
And then the sun went out of the horizon completely. Servants came in and lit the sconces on the walls. At first, I was outright distressed, but that had been because I hadn't thought of it, before. If there were not thatch around, of course the building would and did not catch fire.
Other servants brought wine and cheese with bread and roasted lamb.
"Just because you are a demigod, it doesn't make all of these people follow you," I had declared. "Was it your human lineage?"
Anna Quirinus was contemplative, again, but smiling. "Yes, in a way," she puffed out her chest, again, to look off in a distance. That was when I had a feeling she had told this story more than a few hundred times. And probably more than twice in my own language. "Myself and my brother were born of our mother, Rhea Silvia, in Alba Longa, and the great god of war, Mars," she looked back at me and pointed, "You call him Ares, like the Greeks," and resumed telling the story, "Our grandfather, a king, had died and so our uncle took the thrown in his stead until we could grow and then Remus, older by moments, would be king in his twentieth season with our nation's council to guide him. Mad with power and driven by greed, we were stolen by our uncle as our mother slept and set adrift to drown in the River Tiber. His plot did not succeed, for our cries were recognized by the Father of the River, Tiberious, Himself. His waves encased around the pair of us, his cousins in heritage of Gaea, and found us purchase at his bank in a cave, where he knew a she-wolf slept in mourning of her own drowned pups. Seeing us, she lept at the second chance for motherhood, and we survived by her teat, grew strong for a year, and were then adopted by the shepherd who slayed her just as she had arrived at the mouth of the cave with one ewe stolen from his flock. We grew and we conquered together until we fought. We fought for we are demigods of war, and there is no better competition than sibling rivalry, let alone twin decedents of the god of War."
"Unfortunately for Remus, I did the strategy and he did the killing, so without me to guide him, he couldn't really get a lot accomplished. When he saw my own kingdom growing, he became jealous and tried to stab me as I slept. I had taken to sleeping in the day and staying awake in the night, because that was when I knew he would try to come for my life. I didn't want to kill him, but I had rather him die than me. So I am the soul defendant of my mother and the rightful heir to the thrown of her fathers, but will build a kingdom of my own so that I may take back what is mine by right when I prove I deserve it."
I just stared at that little girl who had spouted violence for a solid minute.
She slowed the rate of her speech and explained, "Through proving my might is more powerful than my brother's or my uncles, Elsa," as she placed her hand over mine; as though I didn't understand and I was the child, somehow.
"Have you even had your first bleed?"
She scoffed. "No, not yet. The life of a leader can't wait for the age of maternity. According to Sybil, if I didn't start a few years ago, I wouldn't survive past my own twentieth season."
My eyes had narrowed, "And your twentieth season was...?"
"Five seasons ago."
Devoid of the belief that my people, my entire race, had their city overtaken by a ten-year-old girl, I asked as calmly as I could: "Did you or did you not take over Sabinah as a tenth-birthday present to yourself."
"Very good! You're a bright one! Oh, I'm so pleased, you wouldn't believe the dull ones they've been bringing me."
My insult was cut short, "What do you mean? Who is they?"
"Your elders, of course." she said, matter-of-fact. "Don't worry, none of the others these past few years could have held a candle to you."
"Wait, weren't your soldiers abducting our women?" I asked.
At this, Anna frowned. "Of course not. Your elders kept sending them to me, one after another. Not one girl has made it past the stone steps. I look down from the top of this place, you know? I see whoever crosses the gate. They're pretty, sure, but not what I wanted. Plus, I don't know, all these warriors sweating does something to a woman's sense of smell. She would look in one direction and a soldier would see her eyes and she'd see his eyes and it is so romantic, every time," she collapsed, feigning exhaustion. Only a heartbeat passed before she shot back up and happily concluded, "I'm not going to get in the way of love, especially if I want it, myself. Their parents get a dowry, anyway, and they become citizens of Rome rather than concubines. Winners, all around."
As I deciphered how my elders had lied to their people and the Chittim were not stealing our women, we were being sent to them. Likely, all of them were makeshift female assassins with something for the wedding night. A hair pin tucked up a sleeve or a vial of poison in the skirt their only armor. All along, the target thought to be a man desperate for bedding a woman was actually a love-drunk child too young to bleed in her fertility. I was slow, because the wine was heady and the mood was sweet as nectar and the night was calm and cool. So of course I started to roll with laughter. I had never been more comfortable with another human being than I was with the child warlord. I never would be, again. I just kept saying in Latin, because I couldn't even try it in my own language, as ridiculous a concept as it could ever possibly exist, "Twenty two, twenty two seasons," I breathlessly said as I shook with my giggles. I felt twenty seasons, myself, as though being tickled by my siblings all over again.
I couldn't see her with my eyes shut so tight, only hear her. "You're not so young, Sabine" she defended. I would give quite a bit of gold to relive the moment and see her indignant face matching the tone she projected haughtily. "How many seasons are you?"
Controlling my spasming stomach, my hands pressed firm to my abdomen. My eyes had closed and my head had been thrown back. I just rested like that, calming myself down. The question sobered me. She was so young and passionate. So full of life, with so much of a life ahead of her. There was no way I would ever harm her, I knew that so deep even back then. My soul knew that I would never cause her harm. My body, though, my powers... there was no guarantee. When I was calm or happy, it was always easy to control. But this child... if she had such a strong initial affect on me, surely she had the potential of that polar opposite affect.
"Elsa," she demanded my attention, but in a comforting tone of voice. I felt her hands on mine. Her strong hands on my powerful instruments which were supposed to encase this warm child in ice. I looked at her, then. Sitting across from me, looking concerned for the concern of a grown woman.
I narrowed my eyes and took on the most 'adult' voice I could, for her. Because no matter how crazy or young, this girl had lead an army for two years. Meaning, in her own way, she was forced to be an adult. "I am fourty seasons into my life," I told her. "In the fourth season after your birth, I became a wife, and I became a widow the same night. I did not bare any young from the marriage." I took a deep breath and had to focus. I had to remind myself, again, that this was not a normal child like my nieces or nephews. This was a General and a demigod, age be damned and rights reserved. "You know they think you're an adult and a man. Just how long did you plan to keep up the facade?"
"Is 'facade' the same as 'lie'?" she clarified, and I tilted my head to find the translation in Latin. I tried and came close to the word for trick, close enough she could state it properly and I nodded. "Never. No one ascends my palace but my men and the people I want to ascend to my palace. I just wanted a bride worthy of marriage, then I return with my wife to rebuild my city on the Palatine. It is small hill compared to these, but it is safe. Filled with fresh water streams- stocked with fish- and overlooking the ocean- stocked with my ships," she beamed dreamily.
It didn't please me to see such a prideful smile on her, back then. After all, she had systemically destroyed my civilization. I'm a demigod, not without wrath, and no one can forgive that in half a day. My tone had been sharp, "If your country is so beautiful, then why don't you stay there?"
She sighed, "I must grow a kingdom. I must earn my name above all others. My uncle is the king of a country. I must be much greater than him, claiming many countries and being that much a greater king. And I will, Hersilia Elsa." She made sure my eyes and hers met before restating, "I will overthrow and grow. My kingdom of moss, it will be slow and quiet, but it will grow."
I scoffed, "At the rate you're going, I wouldn't call you slow."
Her lips pursed and she looked hard at me. "Slowly and quietly because it must happen without murder if it can. If murder must happen, then it will happen. But killing destroys resources; many more resources than any other leader knows. It not only kills a potential investment of a soldier, but his sons and his daughters, who promote birth and growth and patronage. The loss of one life is the loss of several more. I want to take lives and keep them, not discard or forsake. I collect them for they are mine. Their life IS my life."
"So why do you want to marry me? Why not a husband?" I just kept asking questions, one after another. "Why did you let me pass onto the steps and no one else?"
"I wanted a wife," she said. "I wanted someone compassionate who wouldn't be eager to take my kingdom away. All that I have built is mine. A husband owns and a wife supports." She mumbled, "I need support," and she didn't complete the sentence because it had been heavily inferred- "I don't need an owner."
The statement was childish to me, at the time, because that would have been a childish thought. In that reality, women did not wed women and women either married or became whores. Having already performed the former, I was safe beneath the roof of my late husband's family so I certainly wasn't going to become the latter. However, with the result the way it was... the elders did tell me to marry the Romulus and kill him as he bedded me like I'd done my husband. Although a marriage was certainly expected by the child, I was convinced that the twelve year old girl certainly wasn't going to bed me. "I asked why you let me pass onto the steps and no one else, Anna Quirinus. As your betrothed, I have a right to know." It was all I had in me not to laugh at the idea. It really all seemed like the brightest, convoluted, ingenious joke.
Especially when her eyes grew wide and she looked at me with what I swear to Gaea was pure love as she described with her whole heart in one word: "Beautiful." Oh, I still thank all of the gods who protected me from melting back into another fit of giggles. Such a precious little wide-eyed girl and so puppy-struck with adoration for a stranger, a woman, and her potential assassin. I think only a bit of a breath betrayed me, but after a nice silence, she did go into greater detail, slinging her arms about in gestures, again, so excited she forgot that she was trying to speak in Sabine. I remember her Latin and I learned the language later, but at the time only caught the gist through the girl's universal body language. "Your hair is spun gold and your lips a fine bow, your neck is slender as a swan and skin is fine as soft clouds. Your voice, my Father, your voice is to my ears honey is to my lips." I did know the Latin word for 'lips' so I placed my hand over hers. I kissed her forehead reverently.
"I will marry you, then," I consented. "When is the ceremony?"
She grinned like a sly fox, once more. "Tonight!"
And she lead me to her bedroom. This was apparently beneath the death-trap structure. Hidden behind the wall of her shrine was a sliding stone door in the floor. And more stairs. She grabbed one torch from the sconce on the wall and grabbed my hand, again, as we went down, together. It was a tunnel and within it: more doors. Behind those other doors were probably more stairs, because the one Anna chose after choosing several directions also had stairs leading down. And then another, immediately, which had stairs leading up. I'd lost all sense of direction and later learned that she only lead me through all of those unnecessary directions so that I would not attempt to leave her or the city that night... but that just makes the structure's sound build all the more impressive.
We finally stopped gods-knew-where and when, and Anna opened the door to a small room with the largest, thickest, and softest pallet bed I'd ever laid on. As I thought would happen, she tucked herself into my shoulder and promptly went to sleep.
I will forever miss those days, only lasting one strong season.
Honored as I should have been, the privilege of being the first to know of the Romulus's blessing by Gaea was not exactly a clean affair. Physically nor emotionally. This was also the season we left for Palatine, so traveling while Anna was in serious pain only worsened the situation. I learned on our travels that all but the company mistook the visage of Aladius, her right-hand guard in the carriage, for the Romulus; all travelers addressed him to pay their respects and looked his direction as the caravan passed. I observed her fuming at the lack of attention, then, and when I placed my hand on her head, it soothed her even more than the balm I had applied to ease the cramps deep under her stomach.
After three days, the young dictator was back to normal. The irritation of the misinformed merely made her sullen or disappointed. It had never happened again, really. Now that I think back on it, she was probably only difficult back then because she had not been mentally prepared for the inconvenience. There was no telling when she had passed her time of needing, after that. In fact, six seasons after, she had seemed to be only in her time of needing. She had developed in her thirtieth season, and her once-rounded jaw then became tightly cut. I'm not sure when I had taken to kissing it rather than her forehead without realizing it. I supported her, however she desired me to do so; fixing a meal, comforting outrage, bandaging a combat wound. The Romulus had control over twenty kingdoms and five islands with a total of fifty indigenous tribes, at the 36th season of her life and at the start of every day, no matter the late night before or the location or the party, I would wake up in our bed with her- still asleep- pawing at my body like a kitten to knead at fabric. In the tent on the battlefield or home in bed, always the pawing in the early morning hours. Every single day I would wake her, she would moan in frustration, resisting me to get up.
There was nothing I could do to satisfy her until her 37th season.
It was, as all of her odd seasons, the rain season and thunder clapped outside as I poured over the treasury books, ever the diligent empress. I felt her behind me, and only knew it was her because she smelled sweaty from mock combat. She had already conquered over her uncle, who had died and let his own son be king- who had not wanted to rule in the first place and happily gave the strong Romulus his thrown to the tune of eighty stones of gold and well-managed lands in the royal villa overlooking a vineyard on one side and beach from the other. I know her dear cousin was enjoying himself, because the location of the villa had a local brothel and I had JUST stamped off on the acquiesce of payment when Anna's hands tilted my head up.
And her lips, hungrily, tasted mine. I swallowed and found myself lost in warm, fervent bliss. A spark I didn't know had been burning within me became a flame. She opened my mouth and that flame in my chest became a campfire, the size spread to my torso. And then Anna gripped the back of my chair, and I heard the splintering crunch of her grip on it. Through it. The campfire grew the size of a blacksmith's furnace with me and below me. She broke the kiss and turned me around, lifted me by my seat without the chair, and held me close so that my legs wrapped around her hips. Which she pressed harder into me before we both mewled with delight.
"I'm sorry," she apologized in Sabine. We hadn't spoken Sabine in years, as I was determined to learn fluent Latin. "I am so sorry, Flower. Treasure. Beauty. Book." I didn't have the humor to laugh, it was all on fire. My ears were licked by roaring flames. "I know how," she promised, "I know now, please forgive me."
"What for, my Romulus?" I murmured behind the resumed kiss.
She had been with her soldiers, wrestling, of course. Pinning Aladius, for insisting that Kings don't bed with women for mere pillow comfort. He had made advances worthy of treason on his Emperor to insight the rage. He apologized, but did not relent that was what his Emperor wanted from Her wife. She had, maintaining her grip, discussed with Aladius- a man of sixty seasons, three happy wives, and twenty children- of what to say, and when to say it, how to embrace and when to do so lightly, where to place lips and where to press hands.
One might argue that Romulus Anna Quirinus then knew too much, as she drove her empress reigning to flagrant insanity.
With a firm grip on my wife of over seven years, Anna lifted me above and stepped onto and over the scroll-laden desk, falling with a grunt as our teeth clicked together when her feet re-met the floor; but she carried me out of library, through the hallway, and into the royal bed chamber. She flipped up my robes at their skirt and tugged them off of my shoulders to enthusiastically lavish the tips of my breast with her tongue while she wedged a knee that only stoked the fire between my legs higher.
I found myself weeping when I had never cried out in front of her, and she savored the tears rolling down my eyes with her own cheek as she smoothly dipped her fingers into my sex. Oh, that relief spread through me and I could not get enough; even when I arced my hips higher, it felt better, so much better, but not enough. My hands interlaced in her hair and I brought her mouth back to one breast. She brought the hand propped next to my head down to my other breast, leaving the anchoring weight in the hand with its fingers inside me, the one which had the very edge of her palm against a place on my sex I had no idea existed- all pressure, all at once, all still rising like a furious tide to drown me in relieving warm ocean, I so very barely thought as I tasted a single drop of the sweat from a lisp of her hair into my lips where I was licking. Where I wanted to lick her, but I couldn't because she was below my mouth. I erupted. A collapsing earthquake rocked me around my Emperor's fingers, and I clamped down to keep her where she was, to keep the moment as long as I could. To beg for her not to move, and tell her what a precious gift she had given me.
That I needed her always. That I wanted her child. This was her last conquest, her final task to master above all her other skills of strategy.
But with years of trying she couldn't produce an heir.
She knew how it was supposed to work. She prayed to every god to give her the equipment. She thought she could, with devoted prayer and humble heart, prevail with the assistance of at least one of our gods.
On a night when I had thanked her, one of the many when my lips kissed her to her own collapsing body, she dreamed of her Father.
He apologized and said this was exactly why he had assured that she, his daughter, would be his only child to rule. Hera had forbid the reproduction of demigods. However, he promised, there was a way for them to bear children on Mt. Olympus as gods, themselves. Not until they passed their mortality, not until they lived their lives on Gaea to their completion.
When Romulus Anna Quirinus told me the dream, I told her to be realistic. It had been, after all, a fever dream. I reverted back to treating my warlord as the petulant child I once knew. So now I'm sitting up here, on this mountain, a goddess... and getting an earful of "I told you so."