Stone walls flank the northbound road, a crushed gravel path that stretches toward the mountainous horizon.

Trees dip over the passage, shedding seasonal yellow leaves onto the ox cart’s bonnet. She strides behind its iron-rim wheels, her Master and barbarian son sitting back-to-back upon her.

Master scouts the bordering pastures for trouble while her son studies his new surroundings.

Afternoon finds them on the first mountain, where the road rises with each new turn until they reach a high valley. The city, now a tiny collection of colorful spots flush against the vast haze of the sea, cannot compete with a cool water bucket.

Past the first valley, her group veers onto a wider road. She trots alongside their four-wheeled beast, driven by the same gruff coot who packed it with fabric reams, oil jars, a hefty salt crock, and bags of beans and feathers. Somewhere within that bounty is Master’s new overnight tent, a grand one fit for a Tribune.

A tug on her reigns guides her to a walkable overpass, where a bucket drops near her mane. Master pulls some coins from his purse, drops them inside, and retrieves a green-knotted rope he secures to her harness.

“Is this his road?” her son asks in Greek.

“No, the Postumia belongs to Rome,” Master answers.

Her son blinks. “It has a name?”

“You Gaul’s name hills and passes all the time,” says Master, urging her ahead with a gentle kick. “You’re not ignorant, A-Dawn, and acting so makes you uglier than you are,”

The cart rolls ahead of them.

“Some we name,” says her son, “but none require coin for existing,”

Master grins. “Roads require tolls to maintain them,”

“Everything costs something with you Romans,” her son muses. “Even the street toilets,”

Master tuts. “You expect the men cleaning those toilets to work gratis?”

“Gratis?” Her barbarian son retains his ruse.

“Gratis means free.” Master stretches his tense back. “Lean your back onto mine and keep it there,”

Her son mocks. “By your command, Lord Skippy-oh,”

“You’re begging for the belt,” Master warns.

“What would your sister and mama say?” her son smirks. “If I appeared before them, black and blue?”

Master speaks no more, his mind conjuring a solution.

**

Torchlight brings a dull glow to the Postumia’s black pavers, and their convoy often halts for a drift to the left, giving those going downhill the right of way. Southbound traffic thins upon reaching another ascending portion, each mile ending with a semi-circle turn.

Aedan’s eyes grow heavy as the shit trail behind Looir becomes scant.

“She’s tiring,” he whispers in Greek.

His Roman bride releases a forceful bark that moves everyone to the wall. He asks Reed Eyes about Libarna, and the man tells him it’s just a mile ahead. Reed Eyes will accompany their goods to Dertona, but before the carts depart, Mud Face and Milky order their tents taken out.

Looir joins the other beasts in hopping a portion of the wall broken down by the men. As they repair their deconstruction, Aedan realizes the barriers stand tall enough to impede beast-drawn carts yet are scalable to anyone on foot.

If there’s coin earned anywhere in this land, Rome’s white robes find ways to take their share of it. On that, he thinks about how the tribal leaders back home did the same, with druids taking their portion of it through sacred rituals.

Twenty horsemen take off in the dark, boisterous boys on an adventure.

Milky’s familiar crow brings torches together to illuminate the edge of a forest. The paternal Mud Face warns them to mind their flames in seasons without rain. Aedan’s eyes fight to see the trees, and a short trek brings rushing waters that excite the horses.

Unable to stay awake, he slips off Looir like a corpse after his Roman bride dismounts. He misses the rumbling brook, snoring away as the men step over him while shedding their tunics.

Later, he wakes naked within four canvas walls.

Alert eyes adjust and find his bride’s armor on wooden shoulders, with a sword, sandals, and red-comb helmet beneath them. Light dances atop a modest trunk, revealing a small wooden owl with two large eyes beside a half-shell of burning oil.

Aedan takes comfort in her presence.

He ruminates on why the wolves call her Minerva when the tent flap opens and jars the oily flame. He rolls away, the rabbit fur under his ass soft and the sheet around his body, crisp.

Bare feet shamble closer with the pleasant smell of his Roman bride.

“Aaaayyy-dawn,” whispers a wine-sodden drawl.

No matter how much loathing he musters, just hearing the brutal fuckface, hardens his nipples. Still tender from their morning bath, his anticipation holds sway for several moments, but when nothing comes of it, Aedan rolls onto his back.

A hand clamps over his mouth, bringing the Roman’s weight down.

“Not a sound, my ugly little owl.” Mossy orbs sparkle with madness as three fingers push past his lips. “Not a sound. My men need their sleep,”

Aedan’s teeth long to attack, but he holds back, savoring the brackish fingertips that tickle his gag spot. Rigid flesh dabs his arousal, leaving a slick trail as it moves to his navel. He resists until the handsome bitch captures both his wrists with a free hand.

“What did I say?” he demands softly, pressing on his tongue and poking further into his gullet. “Not a sound,”

Fierce green eyes capture Aedan as dexterous thighs wedge beneath his ass and raise his legs. Without guiding hands, the Roman’s cockhead brushes his hole.

“You let me in,” he whispers. “Or I’ll break down your door,”

Aedan’s ring gives easily from the day’s earlier invasion.

Pain is pleasure, but every moan finds him gagging from fingers eager to enforce silence. It is a strange and delightful restriction. Ruthless eyes hold him as each deep stroke forces his cock to weep.

The Roman’s hips quicken as his fingers burrow, forcing him to retch. Unbearable fullness compels Aedan to let slip the faintest cry, but his Roman bride’s slick muscular tits heave, and his head swings another warning.

Aedan pulls back his lips and presses his teeth gently to the skin. The virile bitch’s supple mouth purses before he gives the slightest of nods.

Biting a man never felt so good.

That cock retreats and then brutally returns, forcing throaty cries from them both. The torn hand withdraws, freeing Aedan’s most pleasurable cries. Overcome with lust, his foot strikes the man’s jaw, sending blood and spit across the earthen floor.

The hand securing his wrists flees only to return as a fist.

Pain explodes in his eye, sending the world into a tailspin. That brutal cock jabs again into his gaping flesh, sweet bombardments moving in time with his Roman bride’s lewd grunts. It is a magnificent song for his cruel hand as it wrenches out a punch-drunk Aedan’s climax.

Suddenly, warmth floods his guts, and his sweaty Roman bride collapses.

Sunrise finds Lord Scipio sour, his hand bound in white.

A young medic cuts the contusion on the sinewy Ancalite’s eye to lessen its swell. When the Tribune finds him, he displays that signature uneven sneer, earning him a fist to the stomach.

Back on the road, the homeward-bound legionnaires share bread and berries. All swig from the same water bladder, except the druid, who drinks only from the horse’s bucket. No one mentions the angry bruise along their Tribune’s left jowl.

They make short work of the black-stone highway, and by noon, a modest village wall appears on the hill.

Lord Scipio dismounts and the druid joins him, cracking his back with a stretch. Together with Lord Titus and Lord Planus, they devise a strategy for passing the village.

The Ancalite, unbound for the first time, hops onto Luna. He encourages her to trot ahead, guiding her past the caravan toward what he hopes is freedom—until the beast halts at a carriage.

Lord Scipio emerges from the carriage in a Tribune’s armor.

Its golden breastplate forms like a second skin, detailing the muscular pads of his torso, while long lappets hang from the plate’s hem, a skirt of tongues as red as the cloak on his right shoulder. He mounts Luna, jostling his captive to assume his usual seat.

Back on the road, it isn’t long before the eastern mountains fade, and the western river beside them narrows to a sliver. An arch bridge scales the meager flow, connecting another paved byway called the Aemilla-Scauri.

A longhouse with stables stands at the fork, and as they pass, soldiers emerge, some young and trim—most aging and fat. All eyes follow with whispers not even the druid’s large ears can deny.

Past the fort comes another junction, this one named Fulvia. She hosts a parade of flatbed carts hauling colorful jars and ornaments in tall wooden racks; glass blowers are rare in Brittania, but it seems Rome possesses many.

A horseman darts through the brush ahead, his steed trotting under the bridge before regaining the road and charging north.

“And there he goes,” declares Lord Planus.

“Should we slow him down?” wonders Lord Titus.

Lord Scipio mulls it. “No, let’s give them time to prepare,”

“You’re always spoiling for a fight,” Lord Titus grins.

“And you’ll get one if that boy makes it before us,” warns Lord Planus.

“I can intercept him,” Actus says, joining their line.

Lord Titus nods. “I think that’s best,”

“It’s certainly best for the locals living around the garrison,” says Lord Planus.

The Ancalite, his back to Lord Scipio’s, turns to investigate.

“Mediolanum is yours, Titus,” Lord Scipio proclaims. “Do what you think is best,”

The duo trade smiles as Actus, on his mare, charges off in pursuit.

“We’ll send Castor out after you,” Lord Titus calls to the eager centurion. “If his parcel reads what I suspect it does, keep him at Clastidium until we arrive,”

“Yes, Legatus,” he yells back, blending in with the crowd.

Their caravan moves forward, the trio rejoining their factions.

The druid’s head drums Lord Scipio between his shoulder blades.

“Why does Reed Eyes address Mud Face and Milky as Legati?”

“That’s what they are,” he replies.

“At the port, they were Prefects,”

“What does that tell you?”

“It tells me we’re not in Rome anymore,”

Luna stops with a tug of her reigns.

“This is Rome,” says Lord Scipio.

“I’m sure it was when you left, but the white robes have asserted power in the Battle King’s absence,” the Ancalite says further. “You lot plan to take it back,”

Horseman pass, some casting weary eyes while others watch boldly, anticipating another interesting interlude between their leader and the owl.

“You think too much, A-dawn,”

“You don’t think enough, Skippy-O,” the Ancalite counters. “Riding into an established garrison fully dressed as Tribune? Puts a target on your back,”

“It’s a good thing you’re sitting there to take the spear when it comes,”

“I’ll not die for you,” he snaps.

“You’ll not die until I kill you,” says Lord Scipio.

“Reed Eyes catching that messenger stops nothing,” he says without emotion. “Your enemies will know you’ve arrived the minute certain men from this group enter ahead of you,”

“Only a chosen few are entering Mediolanum,”

“So you say, but after you appeared fully decorated,” he shares. “The same eight men that have distanced themselves since leaving port, now convene at the rear,”

Lord Scipio listens, his eyes shifting with his face still.

“They approach now,” the Ancalite murmurs without looking, “and given their robes when not in uniform, I reckon they are not from this territory.”

Eight lancers bring up the rear and, in passing, lend Lord Scipio his propers.

“They’ll salute you without a second glance, but make no mistake, they’ve chosen on a side,” says the Ancalite. “And that side is not your Battle King’s.”

Lord Scipio gives Luna a soft kick, filing behind the last of them.