Talos III

Here is my first Wednesday update.  Look at mah rhetorics.




"This is why I work here, rather than anywhere else.  Sometimes I even sit down there, in the garden, while I try to work, but too often I get distracted.  It's better as a temporary diversion."  He stopped talking for a moment, and both of them starred down towards the garden in silence together.  "I had everything here brought from home.  The trees, the shrubs, the grass, the birds all.  I miss it, you know.  I'd never have come all the way out here had I not needed to, had the needs of our people not demanded it."  He looked over and up towards Talos, his eyes seeming somewhat more weary now.  "You do understand that, don't you?"

"Of course," the younger man replied, but he wasn't entirely sure his voice dripped with sincerity.

The elder man sighed, his body visibly shrinking into the railing as he returned his gaze down towards the garden.  "I'd never wanted to be Princeps; I never asked for this.  I'd already been alive for some sixty years when I was adopted by Tellius Bilus Castius.  He had no natural heirs, and he needed someone to carry on his duty after his death.  That's what I did.  I did my duty.  That's what we've always been taught, is it not?  Loyalty to the gods, to the state, to your family.  Duty to the gods, to the state, to your family.  How else could we have come so far, be the people favoured by the gods to rule the world of men, if it were not for our loyalty, our devotion, our piety?"

He sighed once more, but this time building himself up, strengthening himself more than at any other point in this visit.  Even his voice grew in vigor.  "So too now must you fulfill your duty to the state.  I know that you've held political office before, and I know that you've served as an officer before, but... duty is something different.  It's not always what you choose to do, but rather what you are chosen to do."

He pushed himself off of the railing and hobbled on his cane back towards the table, back to the morass of scrolls, pushing one further open, to expose it in its entirety.  "All of my natural philosophers say that this winter will bring with it an unusual cold."  He slammed his finger down onto the map, continuing, "The river Aeoxus will freeze, and we will face invasion as we've not seen in generations.  Our people have grown weak and complacent with no wars to fight.  I need you to save us from invasion."

Talos II

Starting after this post, I'm going to make updates every Wednesday and Saturday.  However, starting with this one, I'm going to make them approximately half the length of what they are normally, as that way I won't be posting absolutely every single thing that I write, and perhaps it will make it a bit more digestible.  Opinions on either of these matters?

And there he sat, the most powerful man in the world, able to shape the entire world as he saw fit, influencing the lives of millions with a single epistle, even a word from his lips.  The legends and how they were depicted, in statues, friezes, mosaics, or even on pottery, would show men such as this to be as physically powerful as they truly were, a physique to rival the gods, should they feel bold enough.  Yet here he sat, the most powerful man in the world, old enough to be Talos’s grandfather and frail enough that he could be overtaken by a child.  He sat there, his hunched and withered form bent over a table, almost enveloped by the mountain of scrolls piled about him, many half-open and strewn about.  His hair was white and wiry, well trimmed except for his beard, which grew long and the appearance of a learned philosopher.

As Talos circled about and drew closer, he was able to get a better view, a sight which he had no beheld in some fifteen years, and how it had aged.  His face was still long and his skin still tanned, but it had aged so much in this time.  The skin now clung desperately to his bones, lines crossing it as a draped cloth, his eyebrows bushy and wiry blazes of white.  However, as Talos drew yet closer to the massive table which served as his desk, the Princeps looked up and their eyes met.  His body was growing old and weary, but his eyes were still bright and shown with the same fierce determination as when they had last met, and Talos assumed that he always had.  They were a light blue, stabbing out from his darkened skin.

Talos went down onto his left knee, then both, and finally dropped his head down, eyes gazing at the floor.  He began to mutter out, “Gnaeus Loftus Vexillus Majoris.”  He took a pause, a shallow breath in before continuing, “First citizen of the Senate, father of the State, revered among men, lord of…”

“Pah!” interjected the seated man, causing the man on his knees to sharply raise his head and look up at him.  “You came here because I demanded it, not because you have some problem to drop into my lap, begging for my aid.”  He was gesturing with stylus still in hand, having been writing on a tablet of wax.  “In fact, I summoned you here because I need you to help this old man with something he is unable to do himself.  Come, get off your knees like some peasant and join me at the window.”  He put down his stylus and pushed against the table with both arms in an effort to stand himself, his cushioned chair’s wooden feet scraping ever so briefly against the marble flooring, only next to grab an old gnarled piece of wood he used as a walking stick.  Gnaeus was only able to hobble over still, walking short distance to the balcony, resting both hands on it once there.

Talos followed behind him and came up to his left side, himself resting both hands on the railing, drinking in the gardens below.  A long rectangular pool stretched out before them, lined by a hedge of an Alder shrub on either side, and the walls on the flanks of the garden had numerous tall, narrow Cypresses standing vigil.  The far side had a colonnade covered in a flowering vine, but it was too far off to be able to tell of what.  Songbirds wove together songs of love to one another rand pheasants meandered lazily about, picking at the ground for grubs.