De Immortalitate – Immortality

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Chapter 14 – Truth

"Cave vereare ne tua mihi veritas acerba sit."

"I beg you not to be afraid of your truth giving me pain."

(Cicero, Letters to Atticus, 3, 17)

Antonius' POV

The night went on, but trapped in my thoughts, I didn't sleep. Over and over, I counted the days I supposed we had before Felix's arrival. I went through the names of all the friends I could try to contact to ask them to hide Bella. There should be a way, I kept repeating to myself. I can offer them gold; I can repay them well. Someone will help me to protect her. There was nothing I wouldn't do to keep Bella safe. No avenue would be neglected. No stone left unturned.

I recalled the night Bella had told me that she prayed for her parents. Why did she do so? Could I also pray for the people I had lost? There wasn't any god I would have liked to pray to, but I would have liked to talk to Alica. Little sister, I would have prayed, forgive me.

A lock of Bella's hair fell on her cheek. I brushed it back behind her ear. With her hair loosened, she seemed even younger, even more frail.

Realization dawned on me: frail. She was breakable. That was the key.

Felix had said that Alica was too breakable. When he had given me Bella, he had said that I ought to enjoy her as long as I could, because for him she was breakable. What did he mean, as long as I could? What had he planned for Bella? Was there any way to protect her from the monster that used to be my father?

As if she had sensed my fears, Bella stirred in her slumber.

"I'm here," I murmured to her. She curled up and went back to her dreams.

When her eyes finally cracked open, she was disoriented. She looked at me without speaking. Then she leaned toward me, and I gathered her in my arms.

With light caresses, I roamed her face, whispering, "Good morning." Could I ease her pain and make her feel cherished and precious? I felt her relax in my arms at my touch. Her eyes were still puffy, but she wasn't crying anymore. I wanted to kiss away any trace of tears. I would kiss her lips until she could smile again, but never without her consent.

"Bella, I'd like you to listen to me," I told her, following her fine profile with a finger. "I'm asking as a free man who talks to a free woman. Whenever you are not comfortable with anything, and I mean anything that I will say, just tell me and I'll stop myself."

She looked at me, appearing confused. Her lips parted as if she were going to speak, but she didn't. Instead, she averted her eyes.

I tilted up her chin. "You know my given name, don't you?" I smiled at her.

She nodded.

"Say it. Out loud," I instructed.

She raised an eyebrow; it seemed as if she were asking herself if she had heard me correctly.

"Please," I added.

"Antonius," she whispered.

Even if her voice was still hoarse, I could feel the sweetness with which she complied. Did I hear affection? I had heard her saying my name when I had found her in the garden at nighttime, but finally it wasn't said out of fear. Or so I hoped.

"I want to be nothing different than Antonius for you, from now on," I assured her. "Don't see me as your master, Bella. I'm only Antonius to you. The man you care for so much that you prayed for him. Although I haven't done anything to earn it, I'm the man whom you want to be happy. I'll be always grateful to you for this." I skimmed my fingers across her cheek, where her tears had streamed until a few hours ago. "You saved my life, Bella. Even before the accident in the atrium. You made me feel alive again. Before you arrived here, every morning I needed to remind myself to be strong, to get up, to do what I was requested to do, even to breathe in and out. With you, I didn't need to do it anymore."

I saw her eyes glistening. "Don't weep, my dear," I murmured. "You're beautiful, my Bella. You're so beautiful that I can't find the right words to describe it, and I've borrowed a poet's verses to speak to you."

Her brows furrowed as she stared at me.

"There's no danger to you/ that any fairer woman shall see/ the bright day rise from the Ocean waves," I said slowly. Bella came from a sea city; she could remember how the waves looked. Having seen many fair women, I could assure her that none were fairer than she.

"So in the colorful little garden/ of a rich man/ blooms a hyacinth flower." Was I a rich man? Maybe other men thought so. But I had never felt so rich and blessed as when she had shown me her affection.

In Rome, I had been deemed an highly eligible bachelor. I was the only son of a rich and powerful family; I was considered handsome and I was educated. Many fathers had suggested that I could be a good match for their daughters. But I knew that even the women whom I had approached without our families' influence didn't really see me. All they could see was my public role.

Bella had seen me at my worst. I hadn't done anything to charm her, but nonetheless she had offered to me everything she still had. She was the light when I thought that my life was fatally compromised; she was the flower that made beautiful everything around her. Was I so brave to tell her the rest of the verses I had chosen?

In my life, I had felt more prepared to face a foreign army and guide a legion of soldiers, coupled with the necessity of earning their trust, than to show my feelings to the girl I had in my arms.

"If I was allowed/ to kiss your honey-sweet eyes,/ I might kiss you three hundred/ thousand times, and never be sated,/ not even if my kisses were more/than the crop's ripe ears of wheat," I told her, verse by verse, without any pause. I was sure that if I had stopped, I wouldn't be able to continue. We were close, so close that I could feel her warmth on my skin. Again, I gathered my courage. "Bella..." My voice was trembling. Was I so afraid of her rejection? I leaned closer to her. "May I kiss you?"

She gaped at me. I was going to apologize and ask her to forgive me, but she stopped my words and my heart with her smile. A shy, shy smile, followed by the sweetest words she could have said to me. "You may."

Eager to savor every moment, I wasn't going to release her from my embrace soon. I kissed her lightly on her cheek, enjoying her blush. With my lips, I caressed the delicious softness of her skin. Then my mouth searched for hers.

I sampled her lower lip, savoring the first taste of her like if it were a ripe, juicy strawberry. I had seen her mouth curled in a smile, I had seen her laughing. More than that, I recalled the kind words that had left from those lips and had reached my soul. I gently parted her lips with my tongue, trying to convey both my desire and my respect. Bella had already made me feel welcome in her heart; it was her body's turn to show me her affection. Still shy, she closed her mouth around my tongue and almost bit it. I put a hand behind her nape, tilting up her head. Her lips parted again; I let a rain of light kisses fall on them.

"Antonius," Bella murmured again, while our lips were still touching. "I'm so confused."

Abruptly, I stopped. But she didn't squirm in my arms. I searched her eyes, desperate for a sign of her intentions.

"I thought of you every night," she confessed.

"As I thought of you," I admitted. My hands slid down her shoulders and my nose skimmed across her collarbone. I pressed the side of my face tenderly against her chest, listening to her heart. "I won't ever have enough of your kisses," I vowed. Whatever Fate was going to decide for us, the moment we were living was still ours.

Bella's eyes glistened again, but they were happy. I was sure that, finally, so were mine.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Bella's POV

I'm yours. I'm yours now, Antonius, I thought.

I could say his name aloud, as I had desired for so long. I was his in the only way I had ever wanted to be: not as a slave, not because I was forced to be in his house, but because I was giving myself willingly to him. Finally, I had seen him smiling again. I had received even more than what I had asked for in my prayers for Antonius: he was happy and he was so because of me.

But a bitter thought marred my joy. I understood he had sent me away only to protect me, but I felt guilty. I had doubted him, believing that he was going to get rid of me. He had suffered no less than I had during our separation. I caressed his hair as he leaned his head on my chest. "I owe you an apology, Antonius," I told him.

He tilted up his head. "How could it be possible, my Bella?" A smile passed over his lips. "You can't have anything to apologize for."

"I doubted you. While I was at the farm, I thought that you..." I couldn't finish.

Antonius put a finger on my lips. Gone was his carefree gaze. "I had to, Bella. I would have never sent you away from me if it hadn't seemed the only way to keep you safe."

"But the danger isn't over, is it?"

"I can't lie to you, Bella," he murmured. "I don't want to lie to you."

"Then don't," I said quietly. A wrinkle appeared between his eyebrows. I would have liked to smooth it. I couldn't bear seeing him under the burden of such a great, secret sorrow. "Please, don't keep it from me," I pleaded.

"I sent you to the farm because of a message I got." He cringed. "It was a letter from Felix. He is going to come here soon."

I stiffened. In light of the memories of what Felix had already done, I felt even more trapped by the fear of what he might do next time. "What are you afraid of?" I asked Antonius.

"When he visits, he doesn't leave alone. He takes one of the servants, and..." Antonius didn't continue.

He had just confirmed my darkest suspicions. I averted my eyes from him. "He takes their life, doesn't he?" I mumbled.

Antonius' eyes widened. We both remained in silence. I had expected that he was going to prove me wrong–but he didn't. He swallowed hard before speaking. "I promised you the truth, Bella. The truth is that I can only confirm what you said."

His words made everything crumble around me. It had taken me a while to understand. I had always believed that they were only rumors, until I acknowledged that they were possible.

"How did you know?" he inquired.

"The strix cries by night." I began to tell him the verses of that myth. I still remembered them. "Without food or drink, with head below and tips of feet above. It brings war and death to men and feeds on human flesh and blood."

"Go ahead." His voice was hollow.

"When I was still at home, I heard an ancient legend. It was about a creature that is awake all night long, doesn't need to eat or drink, and takes human blood. I had considered it a myth, but when..." I sighed. My eyes welled up with tears. "When my parents were killed, too many things were odd. The men who took them didn't seem like you, like me. They didn't seem human. Then, when I was brought here..." I couldn't say anything else; tears streamed down my face.

"Bella." Antonius' voice sounded terrified. "I have to know. What have they done to you?"

"I don't know if I'm right, but he...sniffed me," I admitted.

"Felix?" he whispered, sounding strangled.

I nodded.

Antonius briskly stood up and started to pace the room. "Felix is coming in a few days," he growled. "He wants me to leave with him."

I felt as my throat had been caught in an invisible grip, and air had been sucked out of me. "How long?"

"I don't know, Bella. But you can't be here when he comes. He knows that I care for you. It's too dangerous."

I shook my head in disbelief. I couldn't avoid what was coming. Was Antonius going to send me away again? Where?

Before I could voice my fears, he spoke again. "Felix thinks that I need to be detached," he seethed. "In order to teach me this lesson, he takes the people who are most important to me. I am ready to trade my life for any of them and I tried to, but it didn't work."

"But you are not like him."

"Not yet."

A shiver ran down my back. "What does that mean?"

No time, no time, there is no more time. The dire words resonated in my mind. We will never be to each other like we are meant to be. Our love is going to be taken from us, we will both perish, one way or another…

"I don't know, Bella!" he shouted, sounding exasperated. He paused before continuing. "Believe me. Felix was a person, like me, ten years ago. I don't know what happened to him, but when he came back home after years of absence, he had changed. I'm afraid that he can make me like him and I suspect that he is actually planning to do it," he confessed.

"You couldn't!" I cried. "You couldn't ever become like him!"

But Antonius remained silent.

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Chapter Notes

For Bella, Antonius chose some verses by Catullus and by Propertius (with some poetic licenses, you know). In particular, the verses are from the Carmina 48 and 62 by Catullus, and from Propertius' Elegy II, 15.

Strix was the Ancient Roman and Greek word for owl. It was considered a bird of ill omen, product of a metamorphosis. You can find more about it on Wikipedia (Strix).

Author's Notes

Romanward gratias agit to Camilla10, LJSummers, Duskwatcher2153, Marlena516, and Jmolly. Don't miss their stories! Thanks to Project Team Beta.

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