The Son of Rome

“Is it always like this?” I asked the girl in the sun ray silks. I waved vaguely, encompassing the entirety of the lounge pavilion. Her lips curled down, the only facial feature not obscured by her golden veil.

“To greater or lesser degrees,” Selene said, sighing softly. “It usually isn’t this egregious outside of holidays and celebrations. The death of the kyrios has left everyone on edge.”

I watched a pair of bare-chested men hold a third upside down while a trio of women in sheer, see-through silks threw grapes into his mouth.

“Seems like it.”

“They distract themselves as best they can,” Selene said. “The cult is not well and they know it. There is safety in numbers, and safety in the sun. Out here in the open, surrounded by their peers, they can relax without fear of scavengers.”

Crows. My eyes narrowed, ire rising. I despised their ilk. Gaius had suffered from no end of rats in his time as general of the west, nipping at his heels and striking from the dark. It was why he never slept.

“Still,” I grunted. “They could be doing better things with their time.”

“They’re young,” Selene said, leaning back on the head rest of her lounge. “And they’re afraid. Uncertain. It’s disappointing to see, but can you blame them for seeking relief in simple distractions?” Yes. I could. Most of the truly debauched cultivators on this plateau were older than me.

I glanced at Selene, though, smirking in faint amusement. “Wise words for a fifteen year old.”

“Looks can be deceiving, cultivator.” There was an airy, mystical quality to her smile.

“They can be,” I acknowledged. “Are yours?”

“They are. I may only look like I’m fifteen years of age, but the truth is far different.” She waved a hand over her person, head tilting to reveal the slope of her sun-kissed neck. “I’m actually sixteen.”

I snorted a laugh. Selene smiled indulgently.

“My mistake,” I conceded. “What brings the wise woman to a place like this?”

Selene’s head tilted further. The golden veil that covered her face slipped just a bit with the motion, exposing the gentle slope of her jaw. Her eyes remained shrouded, but I could imagine them gazing out over the mountain, and the sanctuary city below.

“There is strength in numbers,” she repeated, sadly.

No matter where you went, scum would always be scum. “These Crows,” I said slowly. “Their maneuvering. Is it really that dire?” I was fighting myself as I spoke. I’d already involved myself beyond any sensible mark two nights ago. If Scythas was to be believed, a Tyrant wanted to see me because of it. I couldn’t afford to dig deeper. Yet even so.

“They’re not the worst of it,” she said, shaking her head. “They operate at night for the most part. It’s the paranoia they invoke by simply existing. The suspicion. The elders have always had means of competing with one another behind closed doors - Olympia wouldn’t survive any direct contention. But it was never this flagrant.”

“The kyrios kept them in line,” I guessed.

“He did. It was known that lasting harm, let alone death, was not allowed in his halls. There was maneuvering, there were power plays, but mystikos could walk the steps of Kaukoso Mons without fear at night.”

“But now the kyrios is dead,” I said, looking back over the pavilion with a more discerning eye. Whether I saw it now because I expected to see it, or whether it had always been there, I could see the tension now. Tightly leashed stress in every raving man, woman, and child. It drove them to excess. It robbed them of their senses.

“And no one knows who they can trust.” Selene nodded. “Acting out in protest of the shadow game only makes you a target. Withdrawing from it entirely is an insult to your city’s elder. The Raging Heaven was entirely unprepared for the death of the kyrios, and now it suffers because of it.”

“How long will this take to resolve itself?” I asked, the magnitude of things settling in. Cultivators were an elevated existence, capable of things that barbarian and ordinary man could hardly dream of doing. The higher up the divine mountain they went, the more stark this divide became. And two nights ago, I had seen Heroes hunted through the streets like dogs. Something told me it was only going to get worse.

“I don’t know,” Selene admitted. “With regards to politics, I only have my father’s word to go off of. Outsiders aren’t told much of these things.”

“Outsider? You’re not an initiate?”

“The Raging Heaven accepts only the best,” Selene said, tilting her head to face me. “Cultivators that have proven themselves to be exceptional beyond all conventional measures. Whether they be civic, sophic, or heroic, it is not enough to be simply powerful or well-connected. You must be significant - your story worth hearing.”

“But you live here anyway,” I mused. Scythas had mentioned accommodations for guests, I supposed. My eyes wandered, as the rest of what she’d said simmered in my mind. It sounded wrong. “I can’t say I’m interested in hearing any of the stories on display here.”

“That’s because you didn’t know them before they joined.” There was something powerfully troubled in her voice, some sorrow in the way her fingers caressed the golden filigree of sunrays woven into her tunic. “The cults of greater mysteries exist for many purposes, and their prestige is undeniable, but ultimately, they are artificial institutions. And how can an aspiring Hero refine ivory from their soul without the proper conflict to drive them?”

The sentiment was a familiar one. I’d heard its like often enough during my time at the Rosy Dawn. “You don’t want to join this cult, even if you could,” I observed. Selene smiled wistfully.

“I love my father and my mother,” she murmured. “But there are days that I can’t help wondering what life is like when you live it yourself, and not vicariously. Now that the kyrios is dead, I fear I’ll be suffering more and more days like that.”

I frowned, dropping my olives back onto their platter. I’d lost my appetite.

“You don’t have many friends here, do you?”

“How cruel.” Selene placed a hand to her chest. “What gave me away?”

“You wouldn’t be talking to me. Also, every single person on this plateau has been avoiding this corner since you sat down.” I flicked an olive across the pavilion. It struck the ear of a Philosopher that had been eyeing me earlier, sizing me up for a fight. The man flinched, but he did not turn. “They’re too afraid to even look.”

Selene was silent.

“You may not be a member of the cult,” I said. “But your father is. And he’s prominent enough to extend his influence to you.” Piece by piece, I was assembling a mental image of this place and its people. Different in every way from the Rosy Dawn on the surface. But the foundations? Those were all the same.

“You have eyes, cultivator,” Selene said softly. “So tell me, where is Olympus Mons?”

I looked back, meeting the shadowed silhouette of her eyes through the gossamer veil.

“Not here.”

A sharp cry split the skies before she could respond, and mystikos of the Raging Heaven turned and craned their heads to see a shadow bolt shoot out of the sky. It spiralled and careened through the air in a blur, avoiding thrown cups and pneuma projectiles hurled up at it with contemptuous ease.

I held out an arm and the messenger eagle of Rome swept down onto it with surprising force, talons wrapping around my arm with deceptive care. Sharp enough to draw blood, but steady enough not to. It snapped its beak, sharp eyes riveted on my discarded olives. I gathered them back up and offered my open palm to the bird of prey. It snapped them up in its beak one by one, each snap powerful enough to sever a man’s finger, but it didn’t once nick me.

“What is that?” Selene asked, astonished.

“A messenger from Rome,” I answered, running the back of my free hand along the ridge of its wing. The eagle ruffled its feathers, pleased with the attention. I smirked.

“You’re from Rome?” I raised an eyebrow at the sudden hitch in her voice.

“I am.”

“I’ve never met anyone from Rome before,” she confided, with barely constrained excitement. She leaned forward on her lounge, planting both hands on the edge of its upholstery. “Clear across the sea! You must have seen so many amazing places before coming here.”

I thought of Gaius’ campaigns. The mountain ranges of the Gauls, treacherous heights and war-torn valleys, and the Black Forest that sprawled across entire nations. The frozen north, with their swirling Celt sigils carved into the stones and planted in their fields, squat villages clustered around the seas. Even the vile marshes and miserably damp plains of Brittania.

“You have no idea,” I told her. She lit up even further. It was odd, seeing the sudden shift in her demeanor. A bit endearing, but odd.

I was distracted by a gagging sound, and turned in time to see the eagle vomit into my open hand. My nose wrinkled. But mercifully, instead of mashed olives and the breakfast I’d fed it earlier in the day, a scroll of rolled papyrus fell into my palm. I stared at the missive for a moment, then back up at the bird.

“These are supposed to go around your leg.”

The eagle trilled sharply, snapping its beak.

“Did it just… scoff at you?” Selene asked wonderingly.

I glared at the bird. “It did.”

Miraculously, the message wasn’t covered in bile despite where it had come from. I unrolled it, curious, and rolled my eyes when I saw the distinctive handwriting scrawled across a scrap of one of Scythas’ star charts.

Greetings brother,

I pray this message finds you promptly and in good health, though I’m not expecting much from a mongrel Roman bird. Assuming it has, though, meet me after dusk where the stars align and the heavens descend to earth.

Come alone. We need to talk.

The bird can come too, I suppose. His name is Sorea. I named him for you, since you couldn’t be bothered to do it yourself.

Worthless Roman. You’re welcome.

Griffon

I crumpled the letter in my fist. I was hardly even a novice when it came to stargazing, but I had a good idea of where to look. Based on the phrasing and the portion of the star chart he’d used as canvas for the message, I could find him.

“Sorea,” I mused, considering the eagle. It cocked its head expectantly. “Do you like that name?” Could it understand me at all?

Sorea squeezed my arm, talons digging into my skin perilously close to drawing blood, and then he took flight in a burst of speed that far outstripped any mundane eagle.

“Was that a yes?” I called after him. He cried out sharply and was gone in the next instant.

I stood from my lounge, rolling my shoulders and looking down the mountain. The sun would set soon, evening shadows cast by the mountain already covering most of the sanctuary city. The Storm That Never Ceased rumbled ominously overhead. Best get started now. I’d have to get my clothes back later.

“Wait.” I looked down, surprised, at the hand gripping my indigo attire. Selene looked up at me, visibly bashful in spite of the fact that I couldn’t see most of her face.

“I have to go see a friend,” I told her. She bit her lip.

“Solus,” she said hesitantly. “You’re not a member of the Raging Heaven either, are you?” I considered her and the question both. My first instinct was to lie. So was my second instinct.

“No. I’m not.”

“Then could we speak again?” she asked. “I’d like to hear about the places you’ve been.”

I sighed, and conceded. “If you can find me.”

Selene smiled brilliantly.

“I will.”

My first concern had been leaving the cult, but it hadn’t been an issue in the end. The guards at the gates, those closest to the city, recognized me at once. But rather than demanding to know my name or how I’d acquired my indigo attire, they only grinned knowingly and told me to take it easier at the clubs this time. The benefits of having friends in high places.

I followed my intuition and the clue that Griffon had given me while the sun fell behind the ever roiling peak of Kaukoso Mons. I walked the streets of Olympia, ignoring the deference and hushed words of praise that her citizens heaped upon me. They thought I was an initiate of the Raging Heaven. Even so, this was more than even Griffon had gotten walking the streets of Alikos. Too much.

I wandered, and the sun fell fully from the sky. Eventually I stopped in a nondescript street in one of Olympia’s eastern residential districts. I looked straight up and saw the constellation Griffon had taken from the star chart, the Nemean Lion, the star of its tail curving in line with the sun’s path of descent. This was it.

Griffon was nowhere to be found, of course. Late as always. I sat down on a citizen’s patio and resigned myself to a long wait.

The muted lights of dusk gave way to true night. Still he didn’t come. Finally, I scowled and stood.

“Star maps and riddles,” I muttered, spitting in disgust. Just tell me where to go, worthless Greek.

“Sir,” a hesitant voice said. Behind me, a young boy peered out at me from the cracked door to his home. “Do you need help?” Well, it didn’t hurt to ask.

“Where do the stars align?” I asked him. “At what point does heaven descend to earth?”

The boy stared at me in bewilderment, and then he was gone. Pulled back by the shoulders, a man taking his place in the entryway. His father inclined his head deeply to me, posture rigid.

“I apologize for my son, honored Philosopher, and beg for your understanding. He’s only five years old this spring. We haven’t yet prepared him for the rigors of philosophy.” He was tense, painfully nervous.

I just wanted directions.

Sorea cried out above our heads, a dark impression on the sky. He shot by like an arrow from a bow, flying low over the marble columns and shingled roofs of the city. It was better than nothing. I spared the frazzled citizen and his son a nod and took off after my eagle as fast as my legs could carry me.

The eagle led me down a familiar path of scarlet brick roads and ruin, back the way Griffon and I had first come when we entered the city. As I ate up the landscape with my strides, I wondered if I was expecting too much from the bird, and if I was about to be led back into the sea. But before we could make it to the coast where Olympia’s small port city resided, Sorea dipped left and spiraled down into the shroud of a familiar monument.

One of the world’s eight wonders, as Griffon had referred to it. A massive open-faced temple with an even more massive statue lounging beneath the shelter it provided. The temple of the father.

I found Griffon inside, lounging on the edge of the raised platform that served as a dias and pool both, catching the thin rivulets of olive oil that dripped off the statue. The father was just as impressive to behold the second time as he’d been the first. Titanic, gleaming in the light of torches and flaming braziers that illuminated the temple at night.

“You’re late.”

“I wouldn’t have been if you’d told me where to go.” Up above, Sorea perched himself on the father’s shoulders, flapping his wings expansively. I nodded my thanks.

“I did. If I’d spelled it out and your bird had been intercepted, I’d be in dire straits right now.”

There was something in his voice. His bearing, too, now that I looked. I realized what it was at once. He was restless again. That languid satisfaction that had been rolling off of him in waves since we’d let fly the sails of the Eos was gone, and in its place, the hunger had returned. Three days. It had lasted longer than I’d expected, honestly.

“What happened?” I asked. He crossed his arms over his bare chest. The golden tunic that he claimed to have taken from an old woman was wrapped around his waist now, serving as an impromptu satchel for some lump that I couldn’t discern.

“I spoke to the Oracle,” he said, adding as an afterthought, “of the Broken Tide.”

I hummed. “That was the big one’s cult, wasn’t it? Kyno, the one with the crocodile skin.”

“The same,” he said, jaw flexing. He wasn’t angry. No, it was more focused than that. There was a dark hunger in him now. “She threatened me with tribulation.”

“You’re overdue for one,” I said, leaning against the raised dias. It was tall enough to rest my forearms on it without having to bend. The olive oil pool shimmered in the torch light, reflecting the inexplicable light of the stars etched on the temple’s ceiling. “What else?”

“She mentioned Alikos. You scarlet sons are all the same,” he quoted. “And before that, I exchanged discourse with a few up-and-coming Philosophers of the Raging Heaven.” I snorted. I could imagine the sort of discourse they’d exchanged. The kind that left bruises and broke bones. “They told me something interesting about my humble home.”

He told me, and my eyebrows rose. “Shut off from the Mediterranean? How can that be? Your cousin has been off adventuring for years.”

“Not just that. Foreign dignitaries visit us in scores every year.” Griffon pushed off from the dias and began to pace. “Most come from valence territories within Magna Graecia, true, but not all of them. It doesn’t make sense.”

“Ask a member of the Rosy Dawn,” I suggested. “This is the nexus of the free cities, isn’t it? We may be the first delegates ‘sent’ for the Games, but surely there are long-term members of the Raging Heaven that came from your side of the Ionian.”

“Have you forgotten we’re on the run?” Griffon asked, frowning deeply in thought. Invisible to the eye but bright as day to a cultivator’s sense, his pankration hands massaged his temples and shoulders, alleviating tension as best they could.

“It’s only been three days since we left,” I reasoned. “They might not have heard.”

Griffon shook his head. “No. They know. We have to look into this ourselves.”

“And how do you intend to do that?”

Fierce anticipation shone in scarlet eyes. “How else? We’re going to scavenge.”

My lip lifted in a sneer. I should have known. “I refuse.”

“Ho? Refuse what?”

“I refuse to skulk around like a Crow, picking at corpses and offal.” The quiet despair with which the girl in the golden veil had spoken, and the omnipresent anxiety I had seen in the mystikos of the Raging Heaven. It wasn’t something I had any interest in contributing to.

“We have no choice,” he said, shrugging. “We can’t stay here under the usual terms. We’ve drawn too much attention.”

“Because of you.”

Griffon sneered. “It wasn’t my actions that put you in a Tyrant’s line of sight. How was that meeting, by the way?” I glared silently. “That’s what I thought. Do you think you can ignore an elder forever without them acting on the insult? Do you think we can continue to do as we wish in broad daylight, unmolested? Of course not. The higher ups are too busy to bother with us themselves, but they have other means.”

“We could get a room in the city,” I said stubbornly. “Or stay outside of it, even. I’m not afraid of sleeping in the dirt.”

“I’m sure you aren’t,” he said scornfully. “But that won’t work either. We’re already targets, and because of that we can’t afford to be passive. While the Crows are out, the only place we can hide is among them.”

Griffon stopped pacing, and all twenty of his pankration hands flexed in anticipation. He smiled ferociously.

“Starting now.”

Thus exposed, two Crows exploded out of the olive oil pool.