His name is Lucius Scipio Servius, or Skipio to those who call him friend.

His shorn head shines like ripe wheat, and he stands taller than most, with a robust frame and pleasingly deep tenor. His piercing, verdant eyes come darker than river moss, and his chiseled face boasts a captivating mouth no man can resist.

Vitus Servius is his father.

[REMOVED - TAPAS CHARACTER LIMITS]

Last year, Skipio crossed the Alps with his father to face his first real battle in uniform. Boyhood friends Titus Flavius and Planus Caesar rode with him, all three eager to see action after serving four years at Mediolanum’s sleepy garrison.

To their dismay, the invading Gallic horde were merely the Veragrii, a migrating tribe of swordless men and women with children. They proved a stark disparity from the formidable opponents the trio anticipated, yet heeding the order to attack left them profoundly disillusioned. United by a shared melancholy, they redeem themselves under Publius Crassus’s command.

Crassus, a man of their years and temperament, is a master of delegation, fostering pride within the trio after each plays a part in the Sotiatian siege, and the peace that follows it. Bloody fights claim the lives of many, and Skipio keeps his head while taking those of Rome’s enemies.

Crassus and his men reunite with Caesar in northern Belgica, where Skipio, Titus, and Planus earn a coveted place in the Legio X Equestris.

Elevation to the rank of decurio doesn’t keep the Servian heir from action. Never one to watch from the flanks, Skipio rides in when holes emerge amidst the front lines, swinging his gladius like he swings his cock at the brothel for painted boys.

Vitus has not seen his son in many weeks and finds him kneeling outside an engagement field. Restless, his infantry brothers linger nearby.

“Why are we not determining formation?” Vitus asks Crassus.

“Decurion Servius says something’s not right,” the young leader tells him.

Titus Labenius comes alongside them, his horse anxious like the others.

“Our enemy comes at dawn,” he nags. “We must assign formations before nightfall,”

“I’ve learned to trust Servius the Younger’s instincts,” says Crassus, his voice firm. “We’ll begin troop placement after my decurion clears this field of whatever ails it,”

Vitus winks at his frustrated friend, Labenius. He walks out to his son and studies the meadow that stretches before a coastal hillock. Its tall, stiff grass looks born of sea-soaked bedrock, and almost immediately, Vitus sees what troubles his son.

“Watching the weeds grow, Skipio?” he asks.

“Look at it,” Skipio says, uneasy. “It grows light in linear patches,”

Vitus eyes him. “An abandoned farm?”

“No,” he shakes his head. “There would be uniform lines from years of plowing.”

Like his father, Skipio is a draftsman and sees the world behind its skin.

“It’s as if the moles lived here and then left,” he adds. “But moles never leave,”

“What does that tell you?” Vitus asks.

Skipio blinks before facing him. “The moles are Gauls.”

[REMOVED - TAPAS CHARACTER LIMITS]

Shovels in hand, they uncover the first hollow corridor and find it unfit for a grown man’s body. With a promise of roast duck, Skipio persuades a slave boy to crawl into the tunnel and find its end. When the boy emerges several yards behind their battle camp, Planus and his craftsmen shape clay pipes that are then fed into the passage.

A bonfire fills the pipes with smoke.

White whisps rise from the meadow like gray sea worms dancing out of benthic sand. Titus and his archers assemble quickly, aware that spies watch from the trees. They fake a drill, and with each formation halt, his men covertly fill each smoking air hole with sand.

No battle cry sounds at dawn.

Shrill cries fill the waning dark, waking the legions to find unarmed men in skins and war paint digging up the meadow. Women sob as their suffocated children are pulled from the ground. It is an obscene harvest that stabs Skipio’s heart.

Caesar orders no attack, allowing the enemy to remove their dead.

“You didn’t put those boys on the battlefield,” his father says.

“Minerva warned me.” Skipio’s lips turn down in a contemptible sneer. “When none of us could fit in that tunnel, she sent me a child,”

“What does that tell you?” his father asks.

“We could’ve collapsed it. We could’ve placed men at the exit to protect our supplies.” Skipio blunts his tears with his knuckles. “There was no need to choke the enemy out. Not like this,”

“If their goal were only to set fire to our munitions,” Vitus says. “There would not have been so many air holes,”

Skipio stares at him. “And if the holes weren’t for breathing?”

“You didn’t put those boys on the battlefield.” Vitus grabs his son’s shoulder. “Now, dry your tears before the others see you,”

Skipio refuses to hide his guilt, and one young man among the lancers stares longer than acceptable. Castor Junius is shorter than most, with a maiden’s beauty and the physique of a teenage boy. He no longer endures the handsome Skipio’s rough affection, but his heart weeps, catching his ex-lover’s rare vulnerability.

*

Twilight descends when Romans surge onto the field.

Before them looms a suffocating fog that reeks of salted earth. From this white wall comes beat-drawn chariots, each piloted by druids with headpieces ablaze. Fierce battle cries sing from behind their frightening masks as they slice a deadly path through the lancers.

The druids hurl gourds of poisonous mist, taking down the lancer’s commander and forcing novice Castor to seize control. Heart racing with reactionary fear, he yells for his men to hold the line, but this makes them an easier target for masked druids.

Skipio rides in to defend his former lover, and Vitus follows to protect his son.

On the front line, battle-seasoned Vitus calls for Skipio’s horsemen to dismount and form a wall of spears. Skipio joins them, as does Castor, spears in hand and their knees planted in the mud.

“Hold the line, and do not falter,” Skipio cries, and sensing their reluctance to harm a horse, he adds. “Give their steeds a path to escape, or grant them a noble death!”

A collective shout rises as the first chariot appears. On the heels of Mercury, its painted driver fails to change course, and his carriage careens toward the spearmen.

The chariot’s beast tucks to protect itself, and Skipio breaks formation, slipping under the horse and slicing its tethers. The beast flees, but the chariot collides with the spear-wall.

Its masked handler flies over the spearmen, his flaming head spitting embers into the night sky. The druid’s body hits the earth and rolls like a discarded doll. The elder Servius’s booted foot stops it, and with two swings of his sword, he liberates the man’s head from his shoulders.

A mighty howl draws his attention.

Another druid stands outside the smoke, sobbing like a child behind his painted mask. He hurls an axe at Vitus, but Skipio jumps into place before his father, his shield taking the blow. Swift as a desert cat, Skipio advances with another sword ready, but to his surprise, the wailing man is gone.

Vitus surveys the mud and finds the druid’s head missing.

Rome is victorious, and morning reveals the ground a ruddy soup of severed limbs and foul-smelling entrails. Roman horsemen gather on the ridge and find a vast and restless surf. This isn’t their Mare Nostrum, but an untamable sea at the edge of the known world.

Days become weeks, and these weeks become a month.

Skipio Servius, a proven leader, commands a thirty-man unit of teenage Gauls. Some years ago, Caesar made them war orphans. They follow the Servian heir blindly after he personally funds their training to ensure new horses and better rations.

Skipio’s second in command is a fellow Roman named Actus Ursius.

The son of a merchant known for his travels east of Zagros, the Comum-born decurion’s strangely narrow eyes go unmentioned, much like his mother’s Sinaean ancestry, if one wishes to keep their jaw intact.

Skipio must inspect the unit today as the camp surgeon tends to Actus’s decaying tooth. The teens and their horses assemble with remarkable precision, their fat daggers gleaming, their faces and heads clean-shaven, and their round shields cleaner than most.

After a meticulous review, Skipio seeks out his oldest friend, Planus, and finds the legion’s master engineer grumbling about the state of his catapults. They walk the shoreline, with Planus praising older engineers and their ability to make do with spit and whatever is sturdy around.

They happen upon three infantrymen shoving a Gallic woman among them. The matron fights with every ounce of strength, her resolve weakening as her clothes are torn. When it’s clear she’s lost the fight, Skipio intervenes.

“We rape no women here,” he comes between them and pulls the sobbing matron to her feet. “If your decurion thinks otherwise, he can discuss it with me,”

The woman grabs her clothes and flees for the camp.

All but one of the men heeds quietly.

“That’s rich coming from you,” says the upstart.

Skipio strolls over to the loudmouth.

“Heard of me, have you?”

The man is as tall as Skipio, and his family is just as wealthy.

“Everyone knows about you, Servius.”

Skipio grins and then drives a fist into the man’s solar plexus, dropping him to his knees. “It’s good a thing you’re not to my liking,” he booms.

The two flee as Skipio steps over their fallen leader.

Planus chuckles, “Such righteousness from a man who also enjoys forcing his lovers,”

“I make no apologies for my vigorous desires,” Skipio shrugs, rejoining him. “But women and girls shouldn’t be part of such roughness. They cannot match a man’s strength. Therefore, it’s not a fair match,”

“Sex isn’t a combat sport,” Planus says.

Skipio smiles. “We shall agree to disagree,”

“Tell me, friend, how did carnal bliss become such a violent enterprise for you?” Planus asks without judgment. “We grew up together, our shared desire for men bone-deep. Yet, I’ve no desire to beat my lover senseless,”

Skipio asks, “Do you recall our first trip to Rome?”

“I’ll never forget it,” Planus answers. “Our balls were bald, and our heroes infallible,”

“Remember that bestiary, where the trainers were breeding a lioness?”

Planus conjures the scene.

“I recall her not wanting the male they shoved into her yard.”

“She wouldn’t let him mount her,” Skipio reminds him. “Out of nowhere, her young son jumped on the older male, picking a fight,”

“That I remember clearly.” Planus walks ahead. “It was the first time I’d seen a male animal attempt to breed another of his sex,”

Skipio grins. “That young lion wanted a violent rutting all along,”

“My friend, you and I saw a very different show,” Planus laughs. “The older lion nearly chewed off the younger’s leg. The poor thing had no means to run when the male mounted him.”

Castor’s airy voice sounds off before they hash matters further. The petite lancer jogs toward their position, his blue tunic flapping in the wind. “Those druid-drawn chariots hail from that island across the channel,”

“Caesar made landfall there last year,” Skipio says. “While we were in Veneti,”

“Yes, it’s called Britannia,” says Planus.

“No one will say its name,” Castor whispers. “Other than defeat,”

Skipio smirks. “Father claims it was a reconnaissance mission,”

“Recon, indeed,” Planus cracks. “The sort where the enemy tribes meet you onshore to inspect your fleet before you can land,”

Skipio laughs as an anxious Castor surveys the area for hearers.

“What says Caesar of this newfound information?” Planus wonders.

“We’re setting sail after the last snow,” Castor reveals, eyes bright.

“He truly hates us, doesn’t he?” Planus grumbles.

Skipio agrees. “Wintering us this close to the coast,”

“More glory before the common man.” Planus mocks under his breath. “There’s no reason for a campaign across the water but to feed Rome slaves and make him a legend,”

Castor beholds their disrespect in silence.

Skipio drapes an arm over Planus’s shoulders.

“Do you doubt your mother’s nephew’s intentions?”

“His intentions were borne when he tasked us to murder unarmed civilians at Octodurus.” Planus sees young Castor’s glare. “Never fear, little brother. I follow orders and only question them among my closest friends,”

“Your bitterness is palpable,” the young man pouts.

Skipio grins. “Our Planus still pines for that Veragros,”

“Quiet, you,” his friend snaps, walking ahead.

Castor wheedles, “Did someone catch your heart?”

Planus answers with silence.

“He fell in love with a reedy Gaul,” Skipio teases. “Whose hair is the color of straw,”

“Does it matter?” Planus comes to a halt. “Now that he’s dead.”

“Then whose serving my mother her midday wine?” Skipio wonders.

“What?” Planus turns. “Welletrix lives?”

“The one called Welle?” Castor comes between them. “I took him to the Servian plantation myself,”

Planus turns to his friend, eyes wide like the moon.

“I saw how you looked at him,” Skipio confesses. “So, I purchased him.”

Boyish laughter infects Planus. “You’ve never been so thoughtful,”

“He’s not yours,” Skipio clarifies, arms folded. “Wellet belongs to my house, and since you’re not the sort to ravish a man, you best behave when visiting.”

“Praise the Fates,” Planus laughs. “I’m going to write him this very day,”

Castor watches the bearded man sprint for their city of tents.

Sun filters through the young lancer’s fine brown hair, vexing Skipio.

A strange need overtakes him, and before he can negotiate why, his hand finds Castor’s throat. He hungrily devours the young man’s soft lips, which press tight against his tongue. Teeth defend with a soldier’s strength, forcing Skipio back before he’s bitten.

“I told you,” Castor retreats, holding his neck. “No more!”

Skipio moves at him again, but Castor shoves him away.

“You said you loved me,” he cries.

“We said many things to each other these past years,” Castor whispers, his back against the rocks. “Your brutal love felt exciting at first, but now it just hurts,”

Skipio reaches for him, but the pretty lancer pulls his dagger.

“Touch me again,” Castor warns. “And I will report you to Crassus,”

Skipio huffs, then says, “Does he know of your lust for men?”

“I told him last month in the showers when he saw your teeth marks on my backside.” Castor’s fearful eyes again seek witnesses. “I revealed my carnal habits because I knew you’d use them against me,”

“I would never force a man into anything. You know that better than anyone, Castor.” Anger fuels Skipio’s desire. “Did he tell my father?”

“Lord Vitus was told of my wounds without being told of my name.” Castor lowers the knife. “He said no self-respecting Roman would allow himself used in such a way,”

“You think my affections lack respect?” asks Skipio.

Castor whispers, “Love shouldn’t make a man bleed,”

Disappointment slows Skipio’s heart.

“If nothing binds our bodies,” he snaps, a tempest growing in his groin. “Then steer clear of me,”

“Don’t be like this, please,” Castor begs.

“Leave me be!” he warns, slapping his hand away.

Castor watches, helpless, as Skipio marches for the trees.