While waiting for Clemens in the darkness of the secret passage Gaius became really calm. After a while he heard the echo of closer coming footsteps, then the light of a closer coming torch came in his sight.
The newcomer asked in a hurry whether he was too late, and Gaius insured him that he had arrived here way too soon. Politely Gaius asked for the reason of this secret meeting. Instead of an answer Clemens pulled out a papyrus. Silently Gaius studied the paper, recognised the script and the poem. Expectantly he looked at Clemens.
"I know that these are not just some harmless verses, sir", the Praetorian said quietly but certain. "You have sent hidden messages in lines like that before. Don't worry. I haven't told anyone about it, because the others would laugh it off and call me a dreamer for months. You are trying to get more information about your mother and your brother"
Gaius studied the young Praetorian who he had underestimated until now. Asking how Clemens had find out all these things, Gaius noticed that the Praetorian turned red in the slim light of the torch and mumbled: "I have definitely visited a rhetoric school and I have met a teacher there who taught us to see more than others"
Gaius nodded and frowned. Was Clemens about to blackmail him with this information or why did he ask for this meeting? Clemens put his hand in his chest plate again and pulled out other papyri that he gave Gaius silently. Still suspicious Gaius took a quick look on the first few pages and looked up in surprise.
"These copies were made from Sophie in my order. The originals are still in Macro's chest"
Gaius listened to Clemens' report about the stealing with one ear. The princeps had ordered that Gaius should never get access to these documents. As soon as the young Praetorian finished his report, Gaius began to read the letters and reports. It couldn't be true. How did this tiny, innocent girl manage to get access to these sensitive and confidential information? If his mother and brother died in their exile, wouldn't he know that in any way? But here in his hands he held the letters sent by his grandmother and sisters that the princeps decided to keep from him so that he could keep Gaius unsuspecting. Had everyone beside him knew in this from the gods abounded country? This old pig had tried to control him this way. Like Gaius wasn't already at Tiberius' mercy.
"She knew", he whispered more to himself and a part of him wanted to break down and burst into tears like a little chill, but he couldn't show any sign of weakness in Clemens' presence. Because of that his face kept unemotional. When his gaze met Clemens' eyes, he could read the same question that he was fearing the most: What should they do with Aurelia?
"I won't let my great-uncle get her in his grip by any chance", Gaius said emotionless, after he was sure that none could listen to them. "I will help her to behave like a true Roman and after that I will find a way to get her out of here. I already have a story and a family in mind that can give her a name and a home so that she can flee from this golden cage in a calm and happy life"
A life far away from him, he thought bitterly. For Clemens to hear he added: "But first I will find out the truth about her"
With these words Gaius gave Clemens the documents back, nodded and disappeared in the darkness.

Then he felt on his bed absolutely exhausted he registered that Aurelia was not laying in it. He wanted to sit up and start looking for her, but as soon as his head touched his pillow he was drifting into sleep.
Sometime later he was woken up by soft fingertips on his check. Blinking he opened his eyes, and the beautiful girl removed her hand in shock. He grabbed her hand fast and sat up.
"How did you know?", he asked sleepy and pulled her closer to him. But she started to tell him again that he would never be able to believe the truth and he moaned in frustration. Before she could react, he grabbed her waist, throw her on his bed and pressed her with his body weight in the mattress. Her by surprise widened eyes became darker, her breath faster, her inviting lips parted and without noticing she moved her body closer to his. Internally cheering that this beautiful and mysterious girl reacted to him just as intensive as he to her – even if they were able to hide their desire from each other until now. For a short time, he asked himself whether he will get more information from her, if he sleeps with her. In the next moment he pushed the flooding images out of his head and was nauseated by himself. Tiberius may have taught him to calculate sex a means to an end, but he wanted to never follow his great-uncle's advice. None deserved to be treated like that – especially not a goddess like Aurelia.
For the last time he inhaled her intoxicated scent deeply, then he forced himself to roll from her and to get a little bit space between them. Fighting the urge to pull her close to him he closed his eyes. How long they laid next to each other breathless – he couldn't tell. But when he opened his eyes and looked at her, he flinched. Silent tears were running down her checks and dropped in her hair and at his pillow without a sound. At first, he hesitated, then he pulled her softly to him and hummed an old lullaby in her ear that his mother used to sing for him when he woke up crying from his nightmares as a child.
Her soft hair tickled his check. Some strand of her hair sticked on his bristle and he decided that would get shaved today.
Slowly Aurelia calmed down at his chest and as soon as she stopped crying, she lifted her head to meet his gaze.
"I shouldn't be here at all", she sobbed, and Gaius carefully sat up, very focused on the fact that she was still laying on his chest but not sitting on his lap in an inappropriate way. Because if she does, he can't guarantee how long he was able to control himself. He whispered softly that he knew that already. Luckily, he could stop himself from telling her how glad he was that she was still with him at the place. Because the bare and hurtful truth was that she was better off without him.
"No", she whispered, and she touched his lips with her fingertips as light as a feather to suppress his protest. "The truth, Gaius, is that I don't belong in this time. Based on your life span I am not born yet. Not even my parents nor my grandparents neither my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-greatparents are alive"
He looked at her in confusion. What was impossible! She was very alive, of course she had to be born yet. But her eyes, these breath-taking sea-blue eyes, weren't capable of lying.
"From the time of my birth", she said, her voice cracking and suddenly she was surrounded by so much sadness that Gaius held her closer to him. "You have died nearly two thousand years ago"
Suddenly the words came out of her moth like she had kept them inside her for too long. He just sat there, held on to her tight and listened to these fantastic words those created her very own myth. After she became quiet, he took a while to think and process her story, then he met her gaze and assured her: "I believe you"
And he meant it. This instant all the tension left her body, she threw her arms around his neck, pulled him closer and thanked him. Hesitating he put his arms around her slim waist and buried his face in her soft, golden glowing hair. A little bit ashamed but happy she moved away from him far too soon and asked in a mocking tune that he was going to do with her now after he knew the whole truth.
His fantasy offered him a few very interesting possibilities, but he answered with a mischievous grin: "We are going to make a real Roman out of you"

Aurelia learnt pretty fast. Obliviously all she had needed to do was telling someone the truth so that she was able to bloom. Within a few days she moved, ate, and drank like the perfect Roman noble woman. Within a few months she was able to play the lyra and she could even play a few passages of the Metamorphoses on it. Sometimes he caught her singing and dancing in her strange and unfamiliar language through his room and by the gods, she was dancing like he had never seen someone dance before. But he liked the way she moved seductively to the rhythm of the music that none beside her was able to hear. Even if he was drowning to her like a moth to the light, nothing happened between them. As much as he wanted to make her his, he wouldn't be able to bear losing her. And he had to lose her.
Once he summoned up all his courage and asked her about his future. Immediately she became very quiet and looked at him in shock. Then she avoided his gaze and assured him that he was about to become the most famous emperor in Roman history. He just raised an eyebrow, but he didn't push her to tell him more. He knew that she kept some details from him and because of that he didn't dare to ask what an emperor was. Maybe she just had made a strange joke about his ancestor who was the famous conqueror of Gaul. He had heard jokes like this his whole life – a fact that he had never been able to avoid thanks to his name.
Returning to his rooms at dawn he found her sitting on his lectus, the blanket was crooked, and his Catull-codex was laying on the ground. Smiling he covered her with the blanket. Today his dreams were filled with her softly, knowing smile. A smile that promises that everything will be all right.
But her foreign accent didn't want to fad away. After three months of training Gaius decided to stop that useless lessons. He had become use to it and started to like it even. But the more time passed the more he had to realise how much things she still had to learn. With every day she had to stay hidden his chamber, his nervousness grew.
But her foreign accent didn't fade away. After three months of intensive pronunciation and speaking lessons he gave up. He became used to it. The more time had passed, the more Gaius had realised, how many things she still had to learn and master to survive in the Roman society. With every day she was hiding here, the restlessness grew inside him. In secret he began to make plans with Clemens to get her unnoticed and safe away from this by the gods abounded island. If Tiberius puts his fingers on her before she was ready, she will expect something worse than death.