Snow

As I walk away from the kitchen, wishing that my most secret of wishes had not been crushed once again, I cast my mind back to my first week in this god-forsaken place. I was barely fourteen, still but a child, recently orphaned and alone in this world. I had been captured from my homeland and brought across the sea to this land, where I was sold like cattle. Baz's father, curse his soul, bought me, a skinny weakling, for only one denarius.

That first week, where I was still coming to terms with my new life, Baz followed me around like a lost dog. It grew rather irritating, until, one day, he just stopped. I have always wondered why he stopped, just when I was warming up to him. It almost felt as though he was stopping himself, forbidding himself, from being around me.

I reach the outside door, startling me back to the present with momentary blindness caused by the golden afternoon sun spilling over the roofs of the buildings. Glancing around, I do not see any members of the household that have authority over me, so I stride around the courtyard towards the servant's sleeping quarters, which are little more than dark, damp cells. I enter the building and find my room more by muscle memory than anything else- the candles are not allowed to be lit before sundown and the hallway is dark even then. Stretching out my tired muscles on my bed, I tell myself that I will only sleep for a moment before surrendering myself to exhaustion.

I wake briefly in the middle of the night to the sound of sobbing coming through the thin walls, the sound oddly unsettling, before drifting back into the calm of sleep. In the morning, I wake to a face of freezing cold water. Shivering I climb out of bed, glaring at the whiskered face of the butler, who is holding another bucket over my head. "I'm up, I'm up, you don't need to waste another bucket," I mumble.

"What was that, boy?"

"I'm up, don't waste another bucket," I say overly clearly.

"Get a move on then, you're on kitchen duty today. The master is having a feast for the local senator, and Cook's already panicking."

"Okay, I get it, I'm coming." He leaves the room half a sand-glass later I hear the splash of another bucket emptying. I stand up and stumble down the hall to the doorway and look-out at the growing splash of light on the early morning sky. I stand for a moment before crossing the courtyard to the kitchen. Halfway across the courtyard, the earth begins to shake gently, continuing for about a sand-glass before subsiding.

"It's going to be one of those days," I think, not bothered by the occurrence. Tremors are common in Campania and a small one like that would not bother any local. I enter the kitchen and am absorbed in the work for a couple of hours until, at the morning meal, the ground begins to shake again. This time it barely starts before it stops again, but once again no-one is really bothered. We finish our food and get back to work, scrubbing dishes and floors, washing the cushion covers and preparing food.

The day passes quickly, peppered with small tremors, and soon the master's guests are arriving, draped in the swaths of woollen cloth that make a toga. Eventually, I spot the senator by the wide, coloured stripes on his toga and the coloured shoes adorning his feet. The inundation of guests stops and we close the gates, providing extra security for our honoured guests. I am sent back to the kitchen after this task, where Cook sets me to work scrubbing the terracotta caccabi, caked with remnants of porridge and meats.

Tales trickle in of the meal above, servants bring stories down with every emptied plate. After a particularly large quake, the repeated tale is that of the Senator having been shaken out of his recliner and falling, face-first, into the convenience amphora. We all have a bit of a chuckle at this, but Cook orders us back to work before we can get completely distracted. By the time the last guests leave, a lively pair of high-born youths, we are all exhausted and no-one needs to be told to go to bed.

We are all shaken awake several times during the night and every time I hear prayers muttered to Neptune and Somnus. By morning slight cracks have appeared in the walls and ceilings and many of the poorer dwellings in the city have collapsed. There is a long queue by the servant's shrine, with everyone trying to appease the gods. Over our morning meal, we are told that everyone is to begin packing all the valuables in the house.

I begin work in the bedrooms with many of the younger slaves. We prepare any transportable valuables for travel. I walk into the master's room and find Baz weeping on the floor. "Ahem," I mutter, "Are you okay?