Drums and firelight. Frankincense and wine. Students marched down the pebbled path of the hillside to make an offering at the temple to the god of war.

With his back to the wall, Antinous tiptoed in the opposite direction to their sleeping quarters. He dragged a hand along the stucco walls, fingertips skipping over its bumps and ridges. It felt like centuries ago that he had done the same with his wooden sword in Claudiopolis. How different his life was now. Back home friendship was as simple as a game of dice and now it wasn't a game at all but a hard fought battle.

Remus said his sleeping quarters were six doors down from Antinous' rooms. Silently he counted the doorframes, looking over his shoulder to make sure no one had followed him.

He reached the varnished door and stood there a moment before softly knocking. There was no answer. He was about to knock again when Remus opened the door. He had taken a bath. He wore a fresh tunic, his feathery mane resting damp on his narrow shoulders. He still wore the copper bracelet. It was unclear to Antinous if he had put it back on after his bath or if he was so attached to the gift, he bathed with it.

He stepped inside the room. Remus was pleased to see him. He smiled wide enough that Antinous could view his incisors. They kissed on the cheek. The young Roman smelled sweetly of lavender oil.

His rooms were much more lavish than those belonging to Antinous. A tapestry of the Vestal Virgins hung on the wall. The desk and chair were carved with rosettes and he had a large trunk filled with clothes, marble trinkets and scrolls.

Antinous did not spot the jug of wine Remus had stolen but he did spy two silver goblets on the desk. Remus motioned for him to join him on the bed. Even his blanket was luxurious, made of Egyptian wool and stitched with yellow thread. Antinous stroked it and Remus placed a hand on top of his.

"Nobody saw you come up here, did they?"

He shook his head.

"You told Decimus that you would climb down the rocks to the temple?"

He nodded.

"Good." Remus lifted his hand and tucked a curl behind Antinous' small shell-shaped ear.

The rocky bluffs, known as Nerio's Spear, was a favourite passageway of the students. The headmaster forbid them from climbing the rocks but Decimus, younger than most teachers, still retained a boyish sense of adventure. He let them climb rocks, trees and if they fell, he would mend their wounds in secret. Remus thought it prudent to make up this story and tell Decimus, in case someone wondered where they were.

They could hear the chanting outside. Smell the thick fog of incense wafting through the window.

Antinous walked around the room, the fabric of his tunic shifting between his long bronze legs. He peered out the window, his face in profile downcast as he picked up a figurine of Rome's she-wolf on the windowsill.

"You know, you're the most beautiful boy in this school. Maybe all of Rome."

"I thought you hated me."

"I do." He leaned back on one elbow.

Antinous laughed at his candour.

Chanting intensified to a wail. Worshippers mourned the death of soldiers lost to the rebellion in Britannia. Three thousand men were dispatched and less than a thousand returned. Hadrian later commissioned a wall that would separate the Romans from the barbarians.

Students led a braying goat adorned with roses to the temple to be sacrificed.

"The gods are never satisfied. All the offerings in the world won't stop them from punishing us."

Remus narrowed his eyes. "When we do things that displease them we must be punished, don't you think?"

"But what if..." Antinous glanced at his own reflection in the mirrored goblet across the room "...the thing that displeases them is out of one's control? Then what?"

"You think too much. Lie down." Remus tousled his hair and threw an arm overtop him.

Antinous toed off his sandals and stretched out on the soft bed stuffed with reeds. Not since his passage to Rome did he have a bedfellow. He was happy for the company. He glanced again at the twin goblets.

"When will we have the wine?" he wondered aloud.

Remus laced his fingers behind his head. His nostrils flared. "Soon."

Antinous didn't know why but he was anxious. If they were caught, surely Remus would blame him. He was no fool. No one would believe a Greek over a Roman of noble birth. He stayed vigilant. Ears pricked. One eye on the crack of light beneath the door.

"I met him here at Caelian Hill," Remus said abruptly as though they had been talking about Hadrian all along, as though there was no other subject worthy of words.

His ivory cheek rested on the pillow as he spoke. "He was sitting right where you are now. I was sitting on the floor with my abacus. He placed me on his lap and recited a poem by Ovid. I was only ten but I knew I was to become his beloved."

His was a wooden sword instead of an abacus, a fig instead of a poem, a field instead of a bed, but it was the same man with the same intentions.

"This was before his travels east," Remus continued. "He said when he returned he would come for me. He sent me letters and gifts from Mauretania and Parthia. He sent me this bracelet from Cyrene. Then he travelled to Bithynia and the letters stopped."

Antinous hugged his new friend and reassured him. "Men are fickle, like you said, he may come back and realize it was you he wanted all along."

Remus touched Antinous' brow and drew a finger down to the tip of his nose. "How could anyone turn away this face?"

He leaned in and parted his pink lips. Antinous met his kiss with surprise. How sweet his lips were, like berries. It reminded him of the wine and all of the sweetness still to come.

Wind rustled through the stone pines. The chanting in the courtyard grew faint and the firelight pale as the glow of dying embers.

Remus lit a candle on the windowsill.

"Won't someone see it?" Antinous asked, about to blow it out.

"They're already down the hill."

He then reached for the goblet.

Finally. Antinous longed to feel the wine's fire in his belly and fill him with warmth.

Remus handed him the goblet.

"To fickle men."

He took it.

"To fickle men."

He peered inside.

"Thirsty?" Remus asked, pink lips curled over his white teeth.

It was empty.

Darkness crept over the crack of light beneath the door.

Antinous dropped the cup and it clattered on the stone floor.

The door opened and on the other side was Remus but not Remus, no, it was the similar but crude features of his brother Romulus buttressed by the sneers of two other schoolmates. They moved directly toward him, like enemy soldiers in a war he thought had been won.

"Evening, brother."

Two grabbed his arms while Remus held down his legs.

The goblet was kicked aside and they were shouting instructions to each other in Latin that Antinous could only make out in pieces. Terror was lost in translation. He was too confused to be afraid, until Romulus produced a dagger from the folds of his tunic.

No. Antinous mouthed the words but no sound came out.

The dagger hovered above his arm and then his ear and clavicle as he struggled against their grip. Romulus scanned his flesh for a steady spot to place his blade.

"His face!" Remus hissed. "Cut his face!"

Antinous begged for mercy. "Please don't do this! I will give you whatever you want. Please!"

Remus' nails dug into his flesh. "Your beauty is standing in the way of what I want. But not for long. Your soul recognizes mine," he recited, from Hadrian's letter. How did he read it? "Let's see if the emperor's soul recognizes yours when he cannot recognize your face."

The wide-set eyes of Romulus had a single focus now. He pressed a hand to Antinous' forehead to hold him still.

"But," he stammered, "You will get in trouble. Everyone will know what you've done!"

"No, they won't. You were climbing down Nerio's Spear, remember? You slipped and fell, remember?"

"No I didn't!"

"We all saw you."

"That's a lie!"

"Who will believe you? Decimus, who you lied to? The headmaster whom you both disobeyed? Or perhaps Tulius who loathes you and struck your hand?"

Thunder clapped outside, and from the sky poured rain that lapped hungrily at the windowsill.

The Gods envied his beauty. They demanded a sacrifice.

"Do it now!" Remus shouted.

He had a muscle memory of a hand being placed over his nose and mouth in the cradle. Air coiled in his chest like a wounded snake.

Cursed child, he heard his father mutter.

Chanting resumed outside. Those from the temple were returning over the hill.

"What are you waiting for, Romulus?"

"He keeps moving, brother!"

Antinous felt a slap and was thrown back down on the bed.

The boys' grip on his arms tightened and Romulus with a knee on his chest, weighed down upon him from above.

Instead of the hand of his father, Antinous now felt the hand of Leonides, pressing him into the dry earth.

The tip of the blade grazed his chin.

Fight. Fight back, were Leonides' words in the wrestling arena.

As the blade tipped to pierce his smooth cheek he yanked his foot free and kicked Remus in the mouth. The boy fell back with a yelp, which startled his brother who loosened his grip on the blade.

Antinous bit the hand that held his arm and took the dagger. He jumped up from the bed and shakily waved it out in front of him backing his way slowly to the door.

Romulus and the other two boys surrendered at once and raised their hands in the air but madness overcame Remus who lunged for him.

"I won't let you take him from me!"

Antinous shielded his face with the blade and Remus cut himself trying to grab it.

"Futuo!" he shrieked.

Antinous turned and ran out of the room as fast as he could, through the corridor past the marble colonnades and down the stone steps.

The moment he stepped into the open night air, rain came down like a wall. It soaked his hair and tunic, poured over his eyes and into his mouth. He dropped the dagger.

Half blind, he ran through the courtyard, too afraid to go back to his sleeping quarters where Remus might be waiting to deface him. He blinked water out of his eyes and ran to the outdoor gymnasium where the warm earth that had cradled his battle worn body was now cold and wet.

He ran and ran until finally he crashed into something or someone, like the sea crashing against the steady weight of the rocks.

Leonides look down at him, water falling from his crown of gold curls. He was calm, at once soaked but untouched by the rain. His wet tunic clung to the contours of his chest and thighs, a man emerging from the clothes of a boy.

He noticed Antinous' bare feet.

"What have they done to you now?" Leonides asked, drawing him near.

Antinous' heart beat like the wings of a hummingbird against the heavy rise and fall of Leonides' chest.

"Nothing."

"Then why are you standing out here in the rain? You'll catch your death."

"I could ask the same of you."

They stared at each other for a moment, their argument that morning hanging awkwardly between them.

There was something Leonides wanted to say but not in the rain. He took Antinous by the hand and led him beneath the arch of the western gate.

From within the folds of his tunic, he produced a pouch with a leather string. Fingers slickened from the rain, he clumsily untied it.

It was frankincense.

"I didn't see you at the temple. I made an offering to Mars... Ares," he said, switching to Greek, "On your behalf."

Antinous could smell its woody richness, even without burning. He rolled the tiny amber pieces in his palm. He didn't know what to say.

"Do you know where frankincense comes from?" Leonides asked. "The resin is tapped from a Boswellia tree by slashing the bark until it seeps out and hardens. They call those hardened pieces of resin, tears."

Antinous closed his hand around the tears and squeezed his eyes shut.

"I want to wrestle with you again, Leonides. This time I will fight with honour. I promise."

Leonides gave him a gentle smile. "What if you lose?"

He remembered vividly the humiliation of defeat in the wrestling arena. Fight. Fight back.

"Then I will keep practicing until I win."

The wind blew in from the north lashing their backs with rain as they made their way to the school's portico. Antinous was chilled to the bone. His knees knocked together with each shaky step.

"Come." Leonides lifted him up in his arms and carried the child to his sleeping quarters.

When they arrived at his rooms he was still shaking, but not from the cold. Water dripped from his feet onto the stone floor. Leonides set him down and swaddled him in a dry blanket.

He swore he could hear Remus pacing like a wolf six doors down.

"Leonides," he whispered, "have you ever been afraid?"

He dragged a hand through his wet mane. "Never."

Antinous blanched.

He punched his shoulder. "All the time, little one."

"Oh. What do you do?"

He thought about it. "There is nothing one can do but remember that fear is a worse affliction than the thing one is afraid of."

This might be true. Had he not had his tablet broken in half? Had he not been attacked with a dagger? Remus and Romulus had done their worst and he was still standing.

As he bid the boy goodnight, Leonides stopped in the doorway, turned and said, "Please, from now on, call me Leo."

🌿

It had been days since he sent his letter to Hadrian and many more days since he received a reply. The emperor was pleased with news of his schooling and particularly interested in the methods of his teachers. Like his last letter, this new one contained another of his funny sayings.

Antinous was careful to watch for the post and make sure the slaves had not read the scroll first. Not long after his night with Remus did he realize that the brothers were bribing slaves from their allowance to spy on their rivals and enemies.

Like the last letter he read and reread it, Hadrian's prose perched on his lips like a songbird:

A teacher is noble servant of the state. I'm so glad you thought to inform me of their methods, beloved. As they say in Parthia, "it is better to tie your donkey than go searching for him afterward."

What a silly saying, he thought to himself. And whatever did he mean? Antinous, of course, did not have a donkey.

Tablet beneath his arm, he shuffled off to his Latin lesson. He still had a small mark on his palm where the teacher's staff had struck him and it itched every time he entered the room. Oddly, on this day, Tulius was late. He was never late.

Decimus approached the lectern and announced that their Latin lesson was postponed. There had been a terrible accident.

The students were not told much. Only that Tulius had unexpectedly died. He was found in the stable with a rope around his neck.

A/N: Who killed Tulius? (I hope it's obvious but maybe not).

What I really wanted to do with this chapter is show how different Leo and Hadrian's approach to love is. They both want to protect Antinous but they have VERY different ways of going about it.

What's the significance of the frankincense "tears"?

What's the significance of tying up one's donkey?

Also, Hadrian's Wall is still standing today. You can visit it in Northern England!

Sidebar: I had such an amazing time at the Hadrian opera last week! It was so cool seeing characters I'm writing up on stage (even if Wainwright's take is very different from my own).

The best part was the nude male dancers that symbolized Antinous' youth and beauty. Sometimes they were dancing and other times they were posing like sculptures. It was stunning. 

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