Chapter Text
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Aprilis 75 CE
Dawn has broken over the capital, glinting off the Tiber and spilling its gentle light over the rooftops and broad streets of the city. A tendril of light peeks through the window casement, warming Decanus' cheek, and he blinks himself awake. After a moment’s confusion at his strange surroundings, he bolts upright, tearing back the bedcovers and jumping out of bed.
“Sam! Cas! Wake up!” he calls, throwing open the casement shutters. “Come look!”
There’s a collective groan as the offending brightness tears both of them from their sleep, but soon Samuel too is scrambling like a rabbit to the window, and Castiel joins them with a bleary-eyed yawn.
They crossed into the city at the Porta Capena the night before, after dark, proceeding directly to the family domus in the Aventine. The only things visible from their window were the lights of torches in the distance, and the shadowy outline of what Decanus assumed must be the city’s great monuments.
But now, in the light of day, the view is like nothing he’s ever imagined. Temples and public buildings dot the hillsides and city below, their marble and limestone shining purest white, and even from a distance, Decanus can make out the rooftops and statues of gold, as if Rome truly is a city of the gods!
They all stare, wide-eyed for a moment, taking it in. Even Castiel, whose last visit to Rome was something he’d prefer not to think about, is in awe. It’s not his first time in the family domus, but he’d not had such a view as this before from his brief stay in the servant’s quarters years ago.
“Come on! Let’s go down and find mother!” Decanus urges.
“You’re not even dressed,” Castiel pulls at the fabric of Decanus’ night tunic. “Let’s find you something you haven’t drooled on.”
Samuel erupts in a fit of laughter.
“Ha-ha,” Decanus shoves Sam playfully. “At least I don’t still wet myself in the night.”
“I don’t wet myself! And anyway, you fart in your sleep!!” Sam yells.
Decanus throws him a wink and rips a loud one, making a show of breathing in deep.
“Ahhhhh,” Decanus smiles, as if scenting the most divine perfume. He waves his hands toward Samuel as if pushing the offending stench in his direction.
“God’s, Dee!” Castiel covers his mouth and nose and makes a gagging sound, as Sam runs behind him, taking shelter. “What did you eat last night?”
“You’re both just jealous that I can vanquish any foe without raising a hand,” his chin lifts as he answers with a proud smile.
“You’ll make quite a name for yourself on the battlefield. ‘Decanus of the Rancid Wind,’ they’ll call you. I’m sure your mother and father will be very proud,” Castiel laughs. “I’m going to get water. Don’t forget to make up your beds,” he reminds them, having already made up his.
It was once Castiel’s job to see to such things, as well as to help the boys wash and dress, but as they’ve grown, Bobby has drilled the virtue of self-reliance into both Decanus and Samuel, and the boys now take care of most of those tasks on their own.
Their cubiculum here in the city is furnished with three lecti to accommodate the boy’s swiftly growing limbs, similar to their room back home at the villa, where Decanus and Samuel have long since stopped sharing a bed, and Castiel’s pallet has been replaced with a lectus of his own.
The brothers go about folding their night clothes and straightening their beds, and are just finishing as Castiel comes back with clean cloths and a large pitcher of warm water for the marble basin in the corner of their room.
All three take turns scrubbing their faces and other parts, then pull on their day tunics and sandals and head downstairs.
They greet Mary, who, after a brief inspection, deems them suitably presentable and embraces all three of them in turn, starting with Samuel, adding a kiss to their foreheads before passing them off to Bobby for their first foray into the city.
“You boys stay close and pay attention. There’s some streets in this city you’re to stay away from unless your father or I are with you,” he says, handing Castiel a linen sack and hauling another one over his shoulder. It’s not terribly heavy, but Castiel wonders what’s inside.
“When’s he getting here, Bobby?” Decanus asks? “And what’s in the bags?”
“Sometime tomorrow would be my guess. You’ll have him for at least a week before the Parilia feast. And shoes.”
“Shoes?” he pulls a face.
“You heard me.”
They walk to the tabernae sutoriae on the northern slope of the Aventine, where Bobby leads them to a shop where the family has done business for years. He is greeted as if minor royalty by the shopkeeper with whom Bobby places an order for 16 pairs of sturdy shoes, 8 pairs of sandals, and turns over a sack of various pieces of footwear to be repaired or salvaged for the servants at the villa. Then the boys are brought to a side room where a woman measures their feet by tracing them directly onto leather. Once Decanus and Samuel have had their feet measured, she stands to go.
“One more,” Bobby says, beckoning Castiel over. The woman raises her eyebrows - it's unusual treatment for a servant - but she smiles and bids Castiel to step forward onto a strip of leather and be measured for his own custom shoes.
Once they are measured, Bobby gives the order for campagi, and sandals for all three, as well as more formal shoes for Decanus, who is closer to manhood. Mary has made a list with explicit instructions as to materials and colors for the boys, which Bobby hands over after having his own feet measured for new campagi and boots.
He leaves directions for the finished order to be delivered to the family's domus and hands over a partial payment in silver.
After the orders are placed, they walk to Saddlers Row, where Bobby orders a variety of new tack for the horses, and finishes their errands with one or two more purchases.
They purchase a flask of posca from a street vendor on their way back toward the domus and take turns sipping from it, and Bobby promises to take them on a quick route to see some of the sights of their temporary home.
“Can we go see the amphitheater? Please?” Decanus begs, and by the pleading looks on all of their faces, the other boys seem to agree.
They take a route through the streets toward the part of the city the emperor designated for the construction. As they approach, Castiel hears shouts and orders barked, accompanied by the sounds of striking hammers and the cracks and pings of chisels fracturing stone - but nothing prepares him for the sight that greets them as they round the corner.
The amphitheater rises before them, hosts of men scurrying around like ants building and shaping and climbing its heights.
Great wooden cranes and pulleys haul blocks of travertine, limestone, and marble as an organized chaos of men – engineers and masons, freemen and slaves - labor skyward, as if daring to close the distance between the heavens and the earth.
The amphitheater must be nearly a hundred and twenty feet high, with three tiers already constructed, and a fourth rising. The air is thick and like smoke around them, and smells like fresh rain on earth, which Bobby says is the travertine dust. It mixes with the sweat and musk of the men and animals as they work and clings to their skin and hair. The taste of minerals is in Castiel’s mouth — like blood and chalk — the scent and the taste of Rome.
It makes him think of a story his mother once told him of a tower the Kasdei Bavel, the Babylonians, dared build before the Hebrew God chastised them for their hubris.
But the Roman gods seem to encourage such daring.
A few feet away, a young man is hunched over a large sprawl of parchment pinned down by scraps of quarry stone. Behind his ear is a rounded piece of ochre, his left hand twirling a brass compass as he studies what looks to be a plan of the construction.
“You, boy!” Bobby calls to him. “How tall is it?”
The boy, who must only be fifteen or so, answers without looking up.
“Hundred and eighteen pedes,” he finally says, glancing up without lifting the compass. “Fourth tier will take us to a hundred sixty-two.”
“All those empty spaces. Seems likely to fall in on itself,” Bobby mutters.
But Castiel, his eyes sharply taking in every detail of the structure, shakes his head. “No. The empty spaces — the arches- are the point. They push the weight out and down, not in. The more they build, the stronger it becomes.”
Then the boy behind the plans looks up. Dust clings to the sweat at his temples, dusting his blond hair. His eyes land on Castiel, green, keen as a hawk, assessing.
“Very good,” the boy says. “Not many spectators know how a vault works. I’m impressed.”
He smiles, all white teeth, and bronze skin, and Castiel’s heart somersaults in his chest. The boy stands, he’s an inch or so taller than Castiel, who feels suddenly naked under his appreciative gaze.
“Apollodorus,” the young man says, extending his arm.
Castiel glances uncertainly at Bobby, who nods.
“Castiel,” he answers, stepping forward and grasping Apollodorus’ forearm in the traditional Roman greeting.
Apollodorus' grip is firm — strong, but not excessively so in the way of men who doubt themselves.
“You are here studying engineering?”
“Umm…no. I am here with...with my mistress and her sons…my family.”
Apollodurus’ brows rise. He glances back at Bobby and seems to notice Decanus and Samuel for the first time.
“Your servant has a unique understanding of construction.”
Castiel steps back, eyes flicking nervously to Decanus and Sam before landing lower, to the drawing on the parchment. Any excuse to avert his eyes from their scrutiny as the blood runs to his cheeks.
“Sounds like a foreign language to me,” Bobby comments.
“Oh, Engineering is a language, that’s for certain. A language of mathematics and physics, but also of beauty and inspiration. My father used to say it’s ‘I glóssa ton theón.’”
“The language of the gods?” Samuel chirps.
Apollodorus’s curious eyes settle on the boy.
“You speak the eastern tongue?”
"Hikanàs glṓssas ísmen,""We know several languages." Decanus replies, as if answering a challenge.
"Kai ou mónon doûlós estin hēmîn ho Kas,""And Cas isn’t only a servant to us," his chin lifts proudly. "Didaskalós estin hēmîn."He is a teacher to us." He knows just about everything about everything. I’ll bet he could even teach your engineers a thing or two if he wanted."
“Decanus,” Castiel chides quietly, flattered but also a bit mortified by his friend's confident assertions about him.
“What? It’s true,” Decanus shoots back.
Apollodorus's brows lift, not unkindly, but with a kind of restrained amusement. “Didáskalos,” he corrects gently.
“What?” Decanus squints, and Castiel's stomach twists for Decanus' sake.
“Di-dá-skalos,” Apollodorus repeats, lingering just enough on the long á to make his point. "The alpha in this case is a long vowel.” He shrugs, “A small detail. But otherwise your syntax is quite good.”
Decanus’s jaw clenches. Red blooms on his cheeks.
“All right,” Bobby scowls, “Enough philosophy. Latin, if you don’t mind, for the soldiers among us.”
“Then perhaps I can get your opinion on something,” Apollodorus asks. “Cas, is it?”
Castiel’s eyes whip to Apollodorus again at the shortened use of his name. Despite his earlier cockyness, the man seems sincere.
Castiel glances tentatively at Bobby again.
“Well, go on, boy,” he waves, affectionately.
Apollodorus steps back to the plans, pointing. “With a project this big, unforeseen problems are always cropping up. The master engineer has thrown me this one. He likes to keep us apprentices on our toes.”
Castiel joins Apollodorus, their heads bent together over the stone, Decanus and Samuel gather in on either side, while Bobby watches from over Samuel’s shoulder.
Apollodorus gestures to the plans as he speaks. “If you had to move fifteen thousand people down from the third tier without crushing the ones on the second, and if this,” he jabs the plan, “was in the way, where would you cut the stairs?”
“Fifteen thousand?” Decanus scoffs. “On each tier? They say the Circus Maximus holds more than two hundred thousand!”
Apollodorus looks up, regarding Decanus.
“Fifteen thousand in this one section alone. The amphitheater itself, when it’s complete, will hold as many as fifty-five thousand. Not as much as the Circus, no. But this isn’t some drawn-out track for chariot racing. It’s for theater!” He looks at each of them in turn. “Political, historical…whether reenactments of great battles, acrobatics, or public executions, it’s all theater. The roar of the crowd will rise up from the walls of this amphitheater and be heard through the whole city.”
“People will gather to see men executed?” Decanus asks.
“Of course. Some by the sword, some by lions or other beasts. It’s spectacle.”
“And they will cheer for that?” Castiel asks, his brows knit. His stomach begins to churn. “To see men die?”
“Welcome to Rome,” Apollodorus says with a shrug, lips arching in a weary half-smile.
Castiel takes a step back, uncertain.
“Oh, come now.” Apollodorus urges. “If I don’t come up with a solution it’ll be my head on the block. There’s a bottleneck here,” he points. “A column here, and a vault here.”
Castiel steps forward again, lured in by the problem in need of a solution. His fingers move across the parchment to the places Apollodorus spoke of, as if taking in the complex drawings and scribbles of measurements by touch.
“You have about fifteen pedes here?” Castiel asks, turning over possibilities in his mind, and ruling them out as others emerge from his thoughts.
“Yes, no more than fifteen to work with.”
“May I?” Castiel asks, pointing to the stick of ochre tucked behind the young man’s ear.
Apollodorus hesitates, as if wary of letting a stranger mar the plans, but then nods. He pulls the stick of ochre from behind his ear. Apollodorus eyes Castiel, a half smile on his lips as he passes it over. His fingers linger on Castiel’s a breath too long – Castiel’s eyes flick from the ochre to Apollodorus, who is gazing intently at him – and that stuttering feeling in Castiel’s chest is back.
He pulls his gaze away from Apollodorus and focuses on the plans in front of him. After a moment, Castiel draws a series of arcs and lines, adding some measurements. The others look on with furrowed brows, but Apollodorus’ brows rise, his half smile morphing into one of pure astonishment, understanding Castiel’s intent.
They speak the same language.
“Why didn’t I think of that?” he chuckles.
“Told you,” Decanus says. “Cas knows just about everything about everything.”
“We could use a mind like yours,” Apollodorus says without thinking. He turns quickly to Bobby. “I’m sure the Chief engineer would buy him from you for a good price.”
Castiel’s heart thunders, panic rising in him.
“Castiel isn’t for sale!” Decanus insists before Bobby can speak, throwing an arm around Castiel’s waist. “He’s family.”
“Forgive me,” the young man says. Still, his eyes return to Bobby as if seeking the final word.
“You heard him,” Bobby says. “Boy ain’t for sale,” he says, meeting Castiel’s eyes meaningfully.
“Let’s go, you three.” Bobby jerks his head back toward the street. “There’s a lot more to see before we go back for supper.”
They follow. Samuel runs ahead to catch up with Bobby, while Decanus hangs by Castiel’s side.
As much as he enjoyed the chance to speak with Apollodorus about the construction, Castiel finds himself eager now to get away, back to the safety of the domus.
“Castiel!” Apollodorus calls.
He turns, looking back, and Apollodorus pins him with his gaze.
“Den écho synantísei poté tóso oxý myaló me tóso xanthá mátia óso ta diká sou.”“I have never encountered a mind so keen with eyes so fair as yours.”
A blush heats Castiel’s cheeks.
“Talénto san to dikó sou den prépei na spataliétai paízontas tin ntantá ton paidión.”“Talent like yours shouldn’t be wasted playing nursemaid to children.”
“Who are you calling a child?” Decanus turns back toward Apollodorus. He steps forward, fists clenched, expression murderous.
“Please, Decanus,” Castiel says, blushing furiously as he quietly steps in front of him. The air feels too thick, like it’s choking him, and with all of the dust, maybe it is. “I– I want to leave…” he urges quietly. “Please, let’s just go.”
Decanus' eyes snap to Castiel’s. The anger in them softens into something else. He nods.
“Alright, Cas…..Come on,” Decanus turns, throwing his arm once again around Castiel’s shoulders this time. He glances back once more regarding Apollodorus with a scowl, but to Castiel’s relief, makes no more of it. “Let's go see something else.”
Before they turn the corner, Castiel spares one more glance at the great marvel behind them. As a crane hoists another giant block of stone high in the air, placing it on what will become the fourth tier of the Flavian amphitheater, he wonders what it would be like to dream such things into being.
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Bobby leads them to a market a few streets over, where the scents wafting from the cookstoves of several street vendors make Castiel’s mouth water and stomach growl with hunger.
They stop at a stall that sells flatbread. Bobby orders something for each of them from the vendor, who shouts something in another language to a woman at the counter a few feet away. She takes four rounds of flat bread, spreads them thick with warm goat cheese, and spoons a topping of sardines cooked in olive oil and garlic on each. Bobby pays her and picks his up, folding it in half to take a bite as the boys follow suit.”
“Thank you, Bobby,” Castiel says as he folds his.
“Libenter,” he grunts. “Manducate, omnes.”“You're welcome,” he grunts. “Chow down. All of you.”
Samuel is already a third through his while Decanus moans, garlicky oil dripping down his chin as Castiel angles for his first bite.
“Mmmm,” he groans, echoing Decanus, the herbed bread, warm creamy goat cheese and garlic fish melting in his mouth in a delicious harmony.
“We have to have Donna make this back home!” Decanus remarks, and everyone seems to agree.
It’s late afternoon by the time Bobby leads them back to the domus, but not before quizzing them all on the route they took and pointing out some streets they are by no means allowed to set foot on. As long as they keep to the safe areas, Bobby sees no reason they can’t venture out together on their own in the days to come, as long as Mary, or John when he arrives, don’t have other plans for them.
That evening, Castiel takes his dinner with the servants while the family entertains a neighbor at their table. The April nights still bring with them a chill, and the boys wash themselves with warm water while preparing for bed.
Normally, one of them would conjure up a story for the others before bed, but Samuel is asleep almost as soon as his head hits the pillow, so Decanus and Castiel lie in their beds talking about everything they’d seen that day instead.
“I didn’t like the way that boy looked at you,” Decanus says.
Castiel stiffens, “What boy?” he says, playing ignorant, all the while knowing full well who Decanus means.
“You know who,” he huffs. “The engineer’s apprentice. ‘‘Apollollollunus,’” he says, waving his hands dramatically. “Or whoever… The one who looked at you like he might devour you like a plate of sugared dates.”
He mutters an “Ooff!” as Castiel swats him in the face with his pillow.
“That’s a declaration of war, Cas!” Decanus laughs, throwing back the pillow, grabbing his own and using it as a projectile. Castiel attacks again. Decanus stands on his bed, tripping over his own bedsheets and landing on Samuel’s bed, just missing his younger brother’s head.
“Jupiter’s Anus, Dee!” Sam shouts, repeating one of Bobby’s favorite curses as he shoves his brother off the bed.
The older boys dissolve into a fit of laughter and soon all three are jumping, diving, and wielding their pillows as weapons, until a fist pounds on their door, then opens to reveal a stern-faced Mary Vicurious.
“The three of you are loud enough to wake the Emperor himself! Now go to sleep and not another peep!” she warns, reaching up and extinguishing the flame of the lucerna.
“Yes, Domina,”
“Yes, Mother,”
“Yes, Momma,” they answer in unison, ducking their heads and climbing back into their beds.
The boys lay quiet for a few minutes, and it’s not long until once again, Samuel’s breathing settles into the deep cadence of sleep.
“Cas?” Decanus calls softly.
“Mmmh?” Castiel hums. His arms are crossed on the pillow beneath his head - his eyes too heavy with approaching sleep to pry open.
Decanus takes a moment longer than he should to respond, and Castiel turns on his side to look at him, but the sliver of moonlight from the window above is only enough to make out a shadowed silhouette as Decanus lies on his back, looking up at the ceiling.
“He’s right, though,” Decanus says finally, though the words are choked like the grating of gravel on stone. “You are too good to play nursemaid to me and Sam.”
There’s an ache in Castiel’s chest, like a cord stretched too tight between the life he should have had, and the belonging he feels now, and when he finally speaks his throat is tight, his voice cracked and raw.
“I don’t see it that way…not all the time,” he says. “He made it seem like—”
Castiel swallows, as if speaking the words out loud will make them true, but he has to ask. He has to know. “He made it sound like my life was a waste…is that what you think?”
“No, Cas!” Decanus says, bolting up onto his elbow. “But with that engineer, you could do so many great things!”
“I don’t want to belong to anyone else!” Castiel blurts, sitting up. His heart is pumping so fast with the fear of loss that his ears rush with the sound of it.
“I didn’t mean —” Decanus sighs.
“What?” he asks.
“I meant if you were free…if you had your choice. You wouldn’t want to stay here…with me and Sam. Would you.”
It’s not a question. Decanus says it like an accepted fact, and Castiel hears the ache in it.
But even through the tangle of Castiel’s conflicting emotions, one thing has remained constant — the fear of Decanus and Sam outgrowing him… of leaving him… of losing whatever this is he’s found with them.
He turns over, reaching his hand across to grasp Decanus’.
“There are a lot of things I wish could be different,” he says with effort. “But …I believe you will do great things one day, Decanus. You and Samuel both… And if I’m any small part of that, then I don’t think teaching you…learning with you, and yes, even serving you sometimes — I don’t think any of that will have been a waste.”
He thinks about their mock battles, their games of strategy and strength, their adventures cooking what they catch together over a fire and sleeping under the stars, — of the way Decanus’ face lights up when he knows Castiel is proud of him – of their shared secrets — the ciphers, the cave — and in this moment Castiel realizes with some surprise, that he feels closer to Sam and Decanus in most ways, than he’d ever been, even with Gabriel.
“You're —” he starts again, his voice raw. “You’re my family… You and Sam both, and I….I love you. And if I were free….” Castiel squeezes Decanus’ hand, then rolls onto his back, arms folded beneath his head. “Well, I think I’d just find a way to stay,” he huffs a laugh, “if only to keep ordering you around.”
“You do that a lot!” Decanus accuses in mock annoyance. “It’s supposed to be the other way around!”
“Is it?” Castiel shrugs, a smirk on his lips. “You said we were brothers. The oldest always gets to boss the younger ones around.”
Decanus lets out a long sigh, “Alright, fine…” but there’s a contentment in his voice.
For a few moments there is only the sound of their breathing and the distant noise of the streets beyond their open window. The silence stretches long enough for Castiel to think maybe Decanus has fallen asleep. Then, something soft and traitorous smacks him in the face.
Castiel quickly snatches the offending pillow from Decanus’ fingers.
“I love you, Decanus!” Decanus whines in a feminine, sing-songy voice. He turns his back to Castiel and curls his arms over his shoulders – fingers clutching and lips smacking – as if someone is pulling him into a passionate kiss.
“Mwah mwah mwah! We’re family! Mwah mwah!”
Decanus collapses onto his pillowless bed, giggling, “Gods, Cas! You’re such a girl sometimes!”
“Maybe so,” Castiel grins smugly, placing Decanus’ pillow triumphantly atop his own. “But right now I’m a girl with two pillows.” He fluffs them both and sinks into them with a loud, self-satisfied sigh.
The last thing he hears is a murmured, “Hey, wait! No fair!” as he settles into sleep.
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