Quintus
The sanctuary sleeps, but I move through pre-dawn darkness as I have every morning since awakening in this strange new world. My feet know every stone, every worn path between the buildings. The horses stir softly as I pass their stalls, recognizing my step even in the dark.
Three hours before sunrise, I fall into the rhythm that has kept me alive longer than most men. Order at dawn keeps chaos away. Chaos killed men in theluduswho didn’t see trouble coming, and it claimed fighters in the arena who weren’t ready for whatever might come.
The drills come first. My body flows through the combat forms that once meant life or death. The wooden practice sword feels light compared to a steel gladius, but the discipline remains—the focus that kept me standing when stronger men fell around me.
The lyre comes next. My mother’s lullabies echo in my fingers as I pluck out the tunes she taught me long before the chains, before the sand and blood. Varro and Laura found this instrument for me in an antique store; they knew music was the one thing Rome never managed to steal from me. Even now, in this century of lights and machines, the strings remind me I am still human beneath all the armor.
By the time pale light spills over the fields, I’m walking the grounds. Not because the electronic security isn’t enough—itis—but because I trust my own eyes and hands more than wires. A door latch tested. A fence post noted. There’s always something to fix. Always more waiting.
People bring me their troubles, and I mend what I can. Flavius shattered another phone last week, swearing at its fragility. Thrax asked about a new punching bag. Cassius mentioned a loose board in the hayloft. They know I will see to it. When I cannot fix, I listen. I carry weight so they don’t have to. That’s who I’ve always been.
And yet, lately one face lingers at the edges of these rounds. Brown hair catching light in the barn. A steady look that didn’t flinch when I steadied her elbow. Nicole. Her name moves through my mind like a low note on the lyre—unexpected, but fitting.
The dining hall hums with morning noise. Sulla keeps to his corner, his back to the room. Flavius is already in the center of it all, red hair bright as fire, retelling yesterday’s near-miss with dramatic hands. Laughter follows him as easily as bees chase honey.
I take my place at a quieter table, content to eat and observe.
Laura’s message buzzes on my phone.Saw Draco last night. Someone posted a video—he was performing magic onstage at an underground club in Brooklyn. Coins flying through his hands like magic, crowd roaring every time he winked. They’re calling him ‘The Gladiator,’ and he doesn’t correct them.
I picture it—the almost-youngest of us (Flavius truly the youngest by months), already fluent in current-day fast words and strange tricks, commanding a crowd with nothing but charm and quick fingers.
Draco thrives by leaping into this world headfirst. I admire it. I also wonder if, when the lights go dark and the noise fades, he sleeps on borrowed couches, hiding the loneliness none of us can outrun. The boy has fire; I hope it doesn’t burn him when the crowd goes home.
Old memories stir, as they always do when the morning is calm and my guard drops.
Gaul, before I went to theludus. The smell of thin barley soup, watered to nothing, fills our single room. Mother’s hands shake as she ladles the broth into wooden bowls, trying to make it seem like enough.
“Mama, I’m still hungry,” whispers Arius, my younger brother. He doesn’t understand why there are only three children left in this cold room. Once, seven children filled this space with noise—Segovax teaching me to whittle, Brennus and Ambiorix wrestling by the fire, little Livia singing the old songs with Mother. The fever took four in two terrible winters, leaving only me at eleven, Arius at five, and baby Castor barely walking. I became the eldest by default, not birth order. Quintus—fifth child—but carrying the weight of the firstborn.
“I know you’re hungry, little rabbit. Tomorrow will be better.” But Mother’s voice holds no conviction. The harvest failed. Rome still wants its tax. We have nothing left to sell except…
Her eyes find mine across the dim room, then slide to where Father sits hunched by the cold hearth, face buried in his hands. The proud farmer who once sang as he worked is a silent shape now. Ancient knowledge passes between my mother and me—the choice no parent should have to make.
“Quintus.” Her voice is thin as a thread. “Come sit with me.”
I’m eleven—old enough to know what’s coming, too young to stop it. She pulls me onto her lap despite my size, her thin arms wrapping around me like she can hold back fate.
“We have no choice, my little shepherd. The coin will feed your brothers through the winter.”
“But Mama, I don’t want to leave you.”
Father’s shoulders shake in the corner. Mother’s voice stays steady even as tears track down her hollow cheeks. “Be strong. Remember our songs. They can take your body but never your soul.” Her fingers trace patterns on my palm. The lullaby humsin her throat—the one passed down through women who knew that music keeps a person whole when the world tries to break him.
The sound of coins changing hands the next morning. Rough rope around my wrists. My last sight of Mother standing in the doorway, one hand pressed to her mouth to hold back her cry.
I learned sacrifice before I learned to fight. Learned that love sometimes means letting go.
The memory thins as chatter rises around me, but the lesson remains. Survival demands sacrifice. Strength means carrying burdens for others. Love is putting their needs above your comfort.
It kept me alive across thirty years of slavery and blood. But lately, watching the people who found each other here, I wonder if there’s another way.
Thrax and Skye lean shoulder to shoulder over a circuit board, her laugh low and sure. Near the stables, Cassius brushes straw from Diana’s sleeve, and she swats his hand, smiling. Across the field, Victor and Maya spar between classes, their movements sharp and playful. Even Lucius, once the Ghost, glows now at Rosemary’s side. And at the center of it all, Varro and Laura—our compass—steady the whole place with the ease of a family long built.
I glance up and find her. Nicole sits at a table across the room, head bent as she laughs at something one of the other women says. For a brief heartbeat, her gaze lifts and collides with mine—a quick, startled meeting of eyes, like the brush of a hand in the dark. Color warms her cheeks, and the corners of her mouth curve before she looks away.
I’m still watching when Flavius drops onto the bench beside me, grinning wide. “If you won’t move from where you’re planted, I’ll go sit with her for you.”
