EMBERS (Marcus Acacius)

XXII | Guilty as Sin

I had been living and working in Aemillius' house for several weeks now. My duties kept me pretty busy, but never too busy—it seemed—for my mind to drift to thoughts that were not exactly relevant to my job.

I had started to hear whisperings in the halls of the house. The other servants seemed to talk about me when they thought I wasn't listening—wondering who I was and where I had come from. Their watchful eyes followed me around every corner, tickling the hairs on the back of my neck uneasily.

Sometimes, I wondered if it would have been easier to just stay in Numidia. But, every time that thought crossed my mind, I mentally scolded myself. I was grateful to be home. I didn't wan to think of where I would be if I had stayed there...

It was early afternoon when Acacius arrived. I had sensed his presence before I'd actually laid eyes on him—the shift in the air, the murmurs of the servants. When I finally saw him, my heart gave a tumultuous leap in my chest. He was dressed in a crisp white robe, adorned with a white and gold cloak draped over his shoulders. It contrasted to the muted neutrals of the room around him.

I knew the exact moment when he found me in the crowd. His cold, detached gaze flickered over to me, but it did not linger for more than a couple of seconds. It was like I was just another face in the crowd, someone he had merely noticed in his quest to search for a familiar face. But, I was not that face.

It stung a little.

I forced my focus back to the patient I was tending to. My hands moved mechanically, making rehearsed motions without any direction from my brain. I gritted my teeth as Aemillius entered the room, his eyes flicking down to me. He nodded in greeting, before beckoning to Acacius. They both walked past, but neither acknowledged my presence in the slightest.

Aemillius' fellow senators filed into the house, following their host into the dining room. I could hear their voices through the open door—tense and urgent—as they talked over each other. Every now and again, Acacius' quiet voice would interject and the others would fall silent, eager to hear what he had to say. They all respected him intensely.

I tried to ignore it all, drawing my attention back to the task at hand. But, it was impossible to ignore him.

It wasn't until the meeting broke, and the others had begun filtering out of the room, that he finally re-entered my sights.

I didn't know why I'd thought things might be different. He had been distant ever since we met again in the marketplace, but I had hoped—foolishly—that once he saw me again, he would remember who I was to him—remember us.

But when he left, there was no glance, no smile, no trace of familiarity in the way he held himself. He barely looked at me at all.

I was left standing there, alone in the room, with nothing but the faint scent of him that lingered in the atrium.

***

The hours ticked by painstakingly slow, but I couldn't seem to focus, no matter how hard I tried. My hands trembled as I sorted through the stash of herbs in my quiet quarters. Crushed leaves sat in the bottom of a large bowl, as I mixed together a salve for Senator Aemillius' gout—another endless, tedious task. But, I was going through the motions absentmindedly. My mind was on him...

And I hated myself for it.

He was married. To Lucilla of all people. And it wasn't like they were strangers, or that their union wasn't real—it was just that it wasn't founded on love. It was purely political; a mutually beneficial partnership. And that didn't make it any less real—but it definitely rubbed me the wrong way.