They arrived in Athens at dawn, the sun peering over the Acropolis to greet them. The ship docked at the Port of Piraeus and from there they rode in a litter to the Greek forum.

Leonides extended his hand and helped lift Antinous inside. He averted his eyes and they both tried not to smile.

Merchants and artisans spoke in his mother tongue and the air was thick with the smell of sea water drifting in from the Aegean. Even the most careful steps of their litter bearers kicked up clouds of dust. Mules too carried bundles of wood on their backs, tails twitching like the end of a whip, while women carried water in clay jugs on their heads to and from a nearby well.

Antinous was first struck by how familiar everything looked. Not to his homeland of Bithynia but to Rome. Hadrian has done to Athens what he did to all the things he loved: He made it his.

There was a Roman agora, a Roman bath and even a Roman aqueduct. But the most imposing structure was a vast library commissioned by the Emperor with a hundred columns of Phrygian marble, pavilions with gilded roof work and alabaster, decorated with statues and paintings. His taste and influence was everywhere, his name etched into every block of marble.

The Athenians, or so Hadrian said, had erected a Roman triumphal arch in his honor. On the northwest side facing the Acropolis, it read: this is Athens, the ancient city of Theseus. And on the southeast side facing Hadrian's new structures it read: this is the city of Hadrian, and not of Theseus. Antinous felt a twinge of resentment at seeing the ancient city partitioned in the name of Roman glory.

Though everyone around him looked the same, and spoke his native language, he felt as foreign here as he did in Rome. This place didn't belong to him or his people anymore. Like a starling that steals a songbird's nest, the Romans had taken it.

The Emperor's retinue walked up the rocky eastern hillside of the Acropolis. Hadrian held his hand tightly and they ascended together. "Are you not excited?" Antinous could scarcely hide his disappointment.

Just when he thought the city was lost. He saw it. Up close. The Parthenon. Apollo's light shone between the columns, which even in ruins were tall and mighty as Athena's sword. The temple appeared to be part of the sky and not the earth. No Roman could touch this place. It belonged to the gods.

Faith restored, tears sprung to his eyes. He had seen so many copies but all paled next to the original. Hadrian was touched by the emotion in his young companion. For him, this ancient temple had inspired his life's work. For Antinous it was his ancestors calling him home.

Their first official visit would be to the Athenian court for the Heracleia festival but first they were taken to the Emperor's palace. Sabina was not far behind in her litter. Only Commodus was nowhere to be found.

They were greeted by Apollodorus, the architect who designed Hadrian's library and latest commission, The Temple of Olympian Zeus. His hair was thinning and his eyes were dark as squid ink. He had a slight hunchback from drafting his sketches every night by candlelight.

Antinous had never met him before, though the man seemed to know all about him.

"Ah, so this is the new favourite." He kissed Antinous' hand.

The Emperor was a prolific writer of not only poetry but letters too. He no doubt described his relationship with Antinous in intimate detail to his friend.

While Hadrian situated himself in his study, Apollodorus gave Antinous and Orodes a tour of the palace, never quite wiping the smirk on his face.

Unlike Hadrian's villa, which was almost a city and made up of various structures, the palace was one large maze-like compound, with different levels, hundreds of rooms, hidden chambers and twisting passageways. It was dizzying. He dragged his fingertips along the frescos—a bull leaping, partridges flying, a griffin at rest—until they reached a verdant and secluded pleasure garden.

"There are heated baths by the north hall. Here is a pool where you can swim to stay cool. You can go for a dip now if you like," he said, eager to get a peek at what he could only dream about after reading Hadrian's letters. The architect blinked at him, with what Antinous and Orodes would come to describe as his "squid eyes".

With a polite nod, Antinous responded, "I will wait until I am settled."

🌿

They were in Athens for five days and long settled before Commodus arrived with his retinue.

The first sign of trouble was that he entered though the eastern gate on horseback; the second sign, he was sweating and disheveled with dirt on the hem on his toga. Remus was with him, but the slaves that usually fanned him and carried the hem of his toga, so it didn't drag, were nowhere to be found.

There was trouble aboard his ship, they learned. The physician was right. Disease broke out below deck and the emaciated slaves were not strong enough to fight the fever and eventually succumbed to the sickness. Their corpses were wrapped in gauze and thrown overboard one-by-one.

"We fed them to the sharks," Remus said all too calmly.

Commodus was not so calm. His cheeks were hollow as wilted peonies. He too had almost succumbed: to the horror of having to do things for himself.

Apollodorus, whom he had met on Hadrian's last tour, hobbled into the courtyard to greet him.

"Welcome, Commodus. The old favourite has arrived!"

This proved to be too much for the noble to take. Commodus could be called a murderer and tyrant, a sexual deviant, but to call him old was unforgivable. Slander.

He refused to let Apollodorus kiss his hand and retired to the west wing of the palace in a quiet rage.

"Poor squid eyes," Orodes whispered.

The sun set on another fiery day in Athens. The palace was on edge with Commodus' arrival. He refused to dine with them. Hadrian said he simply needed wine and sleep. He would be fine in the morning. Knowing how petty Commodus was, Antinous wasn't so sure.

That evening, Commodus flew past the guards in scarcely a tunic and opened the doors of the banquet hall while Orodes was filling his cup. He could only imagine the fright his pale skin caused Leonides and the other guards.

"I can't live like this," he spat at Hadrian, who sat stunned on the dais. "My skin has been ravaged by sea air and my hair limp in this infernal Athenian heat, while half my household sits in the bottom of a shark's belly."

Hadrian told him to go to the slave market in the agora and buy more.

"You can buy twice as many, an army to tend to your delicate constitution."

"Greek slaves? I may as well buy a herd of cats! They'd be just as useful! I need one who speaks Latin." He looked at Orodes and his intentions became clear.

Antinous leapt in from of him. "You cannot have him. He belongs to me."

"Not legally," he turned to Hadrian. "Give me the Parthian. I'll make do."

Orodes was trembling, no doubt thinking of the dead slaves who endured unspeakable horrors at the hands of Commodus.

"You only want him because I care for him."

Heir to the empire or not, Antinous would scratch his eyes out and send them back to Rome in a box if he so much as came near Orodes.

Hadrian rose from his chair and stood between them with a hand on each of their chests.

"Antinous, you're being hysterical. Lucius has suffered a terrible loss."

"Loss? He's the one who killed them!"

"I can't talk to you when you're like this," he scolded. "Be reasonable."

"No. He's doing this to spite me."

"This is a practical matter between Romans," Commodus called over Hadrian's shoulder. "It's not my fault you're a foreign catamite who owns neither slaves nor property."

"It's not my fault Apollodorus called you old!"

Sabina, at the far end of table, set down her fork and said primly, "Well, don't look at me. I'm not going to let him starve my slaves."

In the end, Hadrian offered four of his own slaves to keep the peace. Orodes was far too precious to Antinous, and Antinous, being the favourite, got whatever he wanted. This battle was never about dead slaves. What old favour Commodus was trying to win back was lost forever along with his youth.

His blue eyes were now rimmed with red. He didn't say a word as he left the banquet hall with Remus and Hadrian's slaves. They, like their new master, on the brink of tears.

🌿

In his grand library the next day, Hadrian was pensive but not himself. The argument with Commodus troubled him and though he tried to distract himself, the moment kept coming back to him again and again.

The library housed not only scrolls but also the official state archives. Lectures were often delivered there, and the finest orators invited to give speeches. It was also used as a place of study by students of philosophy. A group of boys in matching blue tunics were quietly reading the unfurled papyrus, hairless legs dangling from the bench, their small pink lips mouthing the words as they read.

"Do you think I'm cruel?"

Since Hadrian had sided with him over Commodus, Antinous was feeling generous. "No, I think you are a just man," then added, "when you want to be."

He waved a hand over the columns behind him. "Lucius picked these out, you know. He was younger than you when I designed this library. Apollonius showed us the samples of marble and he chose Phrygian without hesitation, because it was rare and from Phrygia, a conquered province. He has an eye for beauty and a gift for politics."

Lost in his memories of young Lucius Commodus, tyrant-in-training, it was unclear if he felt guilty for ending things. Even if they were a match, Commodus was destined to be the future of the empire and not a long-term companion. Was being named heir not consolation enough for losing his lover? When Antinous thought of Leonides taking his hand at the port he knew that the answer was no.

"I think I should go alone with Lucius to Heracleia tonight," Hadrian said.

Antinous set aside his scroll, which he wasn't really reading anyway.

"I understand."

"You won't feel slighted?"

He knew what Hadrian was doing. He was trying to fix in Commodus what he had broken long ago. It was admirable but more admirable would be not breaking boys in the first place.

"I won't." Then furtively, curling the corner of the parchment, he said, "though I am alone in a new city..."

"I wouldn't leave you unprotected. Two of the guards will stay behind to watch over you and Sabina."

He smoothed the parchment with his palm. "Very well then."

🌿

Commodus wore ivy in his hair, clipped that morning from the walls of the pleasure garden. He looked at once lovely and poisonous. His new slaves fussed around the hem of his toga to make sure the gold piping floated airily around his ankles. The Emperor arrived with his beard trimmed for the occasion and remarked on how ravishing his former lover looked. Commodus beamed and they entered the litter alone.

It was the first time Antinous truly felt sorry for him. He always thought Commodus was free to grow up and pursue his destiny, but he was more of a prisoner than Antinous, for Hadrian held his heart and mind. He would forever be that little boy splashing among the lily pads in Hadrian's fountain.

The guards who volunteered to stay behind were patrolling the perimeter of the palace. At night they would be stationed outside his door. He did not know which guards had volunteered and they were forbidden from entering his room unless there was a disturbance. For a moment he considered breaking one of the Minoan urns. Had they not been a thousand years old he might have.

He decided to slip into his chiton and stroll to the pleasure garden where he would at least be out in the open and see the guards even if he could not speak to them without arousing suspicion.

When he opened the door, the first person he saw, to his right, was Brutus. He frowned. The guard was leaning against the wall with his eyes shut. Nice to see he took his orders seriously, Antinous mused.

To his left was Leonides pacing the hall with a hand on the hilt of his sword.

Antinous pretended to ignore them as he descended the stairs and wandered through the winding passageways. He made a few wrong turns but the pattern of the frescos guided him and he found the pleasure garden with its primrose blooming in the moonlight.

He disrobed and curled his toes over the mossy edge of the pool.

Brutus elbowed Leonides out of the way, when the soldier put a hand against his breastplate.

"We should split up. You go to the gynoecium and guard the women. I'll stay here with the boy."

"You guard the women!" he hissed. "I want to guard the catamite."

Antinous sank into the pool's cool water and pretended not to listen.

Leonides dragged a wincing Brutus out of the garden and after a wordless scuffle, returned to his post.

They were alone at last but there was no telling how long they had.

Leonides kneeled by the edge of the pool. "You decided to go for a swim."

"You volunteered to stay behind."

"I don't much care for Athenian festivals."

"You don't care for Greeks?"

"I didn't say that."

He dipped his hand in the water.

Antinous kicked off the wall and swam out to the center of the pool where Leonides could not follow in his uniform. He looked at him like a cat trying to catch a fish without getting wet.

They hadn't spoken properly since Rome. Antinous felt he should thank him, not tease him, for agreeing to join the tour. But how does one thank another for setting aside ambition to follow them around the world?

Antinous didn't have the words, so he bobbed and deflected like he did in a wrestling match.

"It's lonely in the guards' barracks." Leonides paced the pool's edge.

Antinous dove underwater and re-emerged, blinking droplets from his eyelashes.

"I hear the guards visit the brothel in the agora to satisfy their urges."

He was hurt. "I don't."

Antinous swam a little closer. "I didn't mean to offend you. You're a young man with needs, I only assumed..."

"Do you often think about my needs?"

He furrowed his brow, not because it was untrue but because Antinous did think about them. Often. Too often.

He swam to the opposite end of the pool and jumped out. Against the climbing ivy on the garden wall, he stood contrapposto and slicked his hair back, preening in the moonlight. It cast a pallid glow on his otherwise bronze complexion.

"You look like one of your statues."

"Don't tell Hadrian that. He already prefers those hunks of marble over me."

"How can he prefer a statue over the real thing?"

"Statues don't talk back."

Antinous stalked over to him naked, more out of curiosity than any attempt at seduction. He wondered what Leonides would do. Would he look away shyly? Would he be so bold as to kiss him?

He did neither.

Leonides picked up the chiton that rested on the stone bench and wrapped it around his shoulders.

"I like talking to you."

How did this soldier always know the exact words to disarm him? Curses. Now Antinous was the one who was looking away shyly.

His heart beat against the soldier's leather armour hard enough to pierce him. Leonides glanced down at Antinous like he would gladly lose this battle. They were close enough that their lips might touch if either so much as swayed in the breeze, when someone approached from behind the pomegranate tree.

Remus.

Antinous had completely forgotten that Commodus had left him behind at the palace. He was clearly bitter and a bit drunk.

"Leonides," he slurred, "I was surprised to hear you joined the Praetorian Guard and I'm even more surprised to find you here instead of at the festival."

Leonides stepped in front of Antinous. "The Emperor did not want to leave his beloved unprotected."

"Is that what you're doing?" He gestured with his silver cup, wine spilling from its rim. "Protecting him?"

"Bandits are known to scale the garden walls." Antinous let this little piece of fiction escape his throat without thinking, though it seemed to work. That or Remus was too drunk to care.

He swatted a fly on his shoulder and dragged his feet toward the passageway from which he came. "Wake me when we're back in Rome."

Antinous exhaled but he didn't let his guard down. Remus still wore the bracelet Hadrian gave him on his slender wrist. Another one of the Emperor's lost boys, it was clear where his loyalties lay.

"I should go to bed too."

"I will escort you to your bedchamber. It may not be safe, what with the bandits about."

Antinous tightened the chiton with a cord around his waist. "Shut up."

They walked through the palace, water dripping from Antinous' hair onto the tile and his bare feet. He remembered the night at Caelian Hill in the rain when Leonides carried him to his room. So much of his past blurred together but every night with Leonides was bright as a star in his mind's eye.

They got lost again and Antinous examined the frescos to see if he recognized where they were. The griffin looked like a leaping bull when lit by the braziers instead of sunlight.

He felt Leonides' breath on his neck.

"Do these rosettes look familiar? There are probably thousands of them. What about this crack in the laurel?"

He moved closer.

This was no longer a harmless flirtation, an exchange of cushions and a kiss on the cheek. He was being courted.

If it were Hadrian, he would have quoted an obscure poem by Catullus and talked in allegory until Antinous was unsure if they were discussing love or philosophy.

Leonides was not so subtle. "I want to lie with you."

Antinous was bewildered by his directness. He did not know what to do with such honesty. It was completely foreign to him.

The soldier leaned against the wall with his knee bent, blonde curls shining like polished brass in the firelight. His tunic was short and exposed his thick and shapely thighs, slick with sweat from the moist Athenian air.

Antinous was used to being the one on display. This yielding of power moved him. Leonides was beautiful and presented himself nicely. He flushed with desire.

"You're so bold as to swim naked in front of me but too shy to lie with me?"

He swallowed. "Right here?"

"No," he laughed. "Antinous, do you realize there are a hundred rooms in this palace that no one sets foot in? I thought I would make us pallet, bring some berries and wine." He tossed his head bashfully. "I thought you could bring your lyre and sing for me."

He'd lain on the finest beds in the empire, swimming in silk and satin, but this simple pallet with Leonides sounded like a paradise he did not dare dream of.

"Which room?"

Leonides clasped the scruff of his neck like a pup and drew the boy to his chest. "Not tonight. I must make the necessary arrangements first." His lips brushed against Antinous' ear and made him inexplicably happy. "Soon. We have all the time in the world."

A/N: As you might have guessed, they don't have all the time in the world... Nevertheless, operation lie-with-Leo is underway.

This chapter is lowkey inspired by my trip to Athens last year, where I spent more time looking at Roman ruins than I did Greek ruins because Hadrian couldn't help himself.

The painting above (featuring Apollo and Hyacinth) is The Death of Hyacinth by Jean Broc (1801). That myth reminds me so much of Antinous. After his death, when he was deified, his worshippers were drawn to him because of the parallels to tragic and beautiful mortal-turned-deities like Ganymede, Hyacinth, and Narcissus. 

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