Author's Note: Servum non habet personam. A slave is not a person.
Disclaimer: A slave owns nothing; I own no more.
A tricky garment, the toga, but Esca thought he was getting the hang of it. Of how to hang it, that is. He'd begged Stephanos to tutor him in the art, and the Hellene agreed to stand still, while his young colleague draped one of Aquila's old togas again and again around the stocky Greek slave. He did not economize his expressions of disapproval, however. "Drape it gently! Artistically! You're wrapping a citizen, you know, a civilized man—a conqueror, not a dead fish!"
Esca couldn't resist. "Aren't I?" he teased, regretting it almost instantly when he saw the old man's expression sag into the beginnings of a very hurt anger. He grasped the old man's fingers in contrition and begged softly, "I didn't mean it, Stephanos. Forgive me."
The old man sighed, much put upon. "Remove the toga, little ungrateful one; fold it properly, then shake it out and try it again. We can't have you turning young Marcus into a mummy."
Esca looked down submissively so as to hide his smile, and began once again to unwind the long length of wool.
Ffff-pputtt. The arrow buried itself in the heart of the target.
Esca pulled another from the quiver, set, drew— Ffff-pputtt. Less than a finger's breadth away.
Slender fingers reached back for the next arrow, set, draw— Ffff-putt! Three in a row.
The Brigante's thin lips spread into a smile of pleasure.
Let Marcus tell him now he wasn't very good.
All the practicing had paid off. Esca made sure the point hung down properly just below his master's left knee, then brought the long cloth around behind the Roman to curve gracefully both above and below his right knee. Marcus accepted the remainder of the long expanse of wool, and Esca help him smooth it over his left shoulder.
To the eye of a native Briton, however, something was missing. "Can't you wear a broach?" Esca asked, though he knew the answer already.
Marcus frowned. "It's not proper to pin it, I've told you that."
Esca could not fathom why Romans considered it 'proper' for their left arms to be so encumbered, but yes, Marcus had told him, so he just nodded.
Marcus and Aquila had been invited to take prandium with some friends of the old Roman, which was his nephew's reason for putting on so much style.
If he hadn't known better, he would have suspected it to be a plot hatched by Stephanos to retaliate against Esca's own efforts to "Britonise" the young master. And who said he knew better?
"We won't be back until cena; we're going on to the bathhouse after." At the word, Marcus saw worry begin to kindle in the blue gray eyes of his slave, and to extinguish it he explained kindly, "You won't need to go this time, Esca."
The only hint of a smile in the slave's face was the deepening of a dimple in one cheek, and the pursing of the mobile lips. "Thank you for that."
"I hope you won't be lonely while I'm away," Marcus teased.
A speculative look graced the Brigante's face. "I think there's something I can do this afternoon," he said.
"That was quick," Stephanos remarked as Esca reëntered the culina a bare hour after his departure. "I thought you said you'd be gone all afternoon."
"I will be," the younger slave confirmed, busily liberating a double handful of tiny purple berries from his foraging bag and letting them run through his fingers into a wooden bowl. "I just came in to drop these off."
The old Greek's eyes widened. "Where did you find those?"
Esca smirked. "No berry picker worth his salt tells that." He scooped up a few of the little bread cups left over from breakfast. "I'll be back before cena."
"You'd better be back here before your master. What are you doing with that bread?"
The Briton looked worried. "You don't mind, do you? I've a few errands to run yet."
"And you hunger?" the old man suggested.
The unintended double entrendre made his colleague smile. "Yes, I do."
Hunger sated, Linnea leaned back against the plastered wall, and considered the man sleeping within the circle of her "friendly thighs." He was slender as a greyhound, but strong, for all his slightness of build. She thought about how he would look with a full mustache and his hair grown out long. Romans. They'd no notion what made a man look like a man. Still, she liked the way he looked. She stroked the short bronze hair gently. He didn't stir.
"Sleep while you can, a rún, a stóirín," she thought. The traditional endearments suited him. A secret little treasure. Esca. He was well named. No bad omen at all.
She ran a hand lightly up his arm, over the blue and black pattern of the marks of the god. Those she knew; her people did the same. Her gentle fingers traced the course of a thin, white scar across his shoulder, cleanly healed, years old. There was another such scar a mere knuckle's width away, another still beyond that. Not disfiguring, merely there, barely visible. Mute testimony to some long ago beating, as the huge white slash across his thigh bore testimony to some long ago battle. Physical proofs of his ability to endure. None of the scars would have barred him from kingship. The white lines, and the broad slash ending in a jagged white star at the side of his knee, all were as smooth to the touch as the rest of his skin, hard muscle visible underneath. And he had no fresh bruises, no unhealed scabs. The Aquilas were treating him well.
She sighed.
He was magnificent.
He stirred at last, and the blue gray eyes were open, gazing calmly into hers, relaxed and at peace with the world.
"How do you feel?" she asked.
"Good." He snuggled comfortably against her breast. "Did we finish the berries?"
He'd brought them as an offering: sweet, dark berries nestled in thick cream, tucked into little cups of bread. He'd traded some of the berries to the dairy woman in exchange for the cream, he'd told her. It pleased her that he'd not come empty-handed, slave and rockman though he might be.
In answer, Linnea picked up the last of the little confections, and held it while he took a bite, then took a bite herself. A second bite for each of them, and it was gone. As was the afternoon. A pity. He would have to go soon.
"Aquila's invited us to cena next week," she remarked.
"I know."
"Cottia, too. I think your master likes her."
"I think he does."
"Will you be there?"
He exhaled, and she couldn't tell if it was a laugh or a sigh or both. "I will definitely be there."
"Good," she said.