In the military encampment, we were trained to think of ourselves as one body. We were encouraged to identify ourselves with our regiment, and if we could not do that, identify "regiment" with those who might support us, and who we might support. We were taught to imagine that we, as boys with purpose, were part of the great organ of the military, and that along with government, trade, and Rome itself, we made the great body of empire. We were told that we lived at the mercy of our empire, but that the empire was at the mercy of its organs, and of its smallest parts, its smallest men. And so this made us feel great in our smallness, and it helped me sleep at night when even though I was tired I could not close my eyes.
Death and starvation, disease, disfigurement, psychological scarring, exhaustion, the twisting of young men into monstrous forms, these things were all of a purpose and all of a single cause. It was easy to keep moving when all the boys around me agreed that what we were doing was important, and the more it tested us, the more the others seemed to say the same things. We ate and slept as one body. If one of us died of malnutrition or infection, we prayed for him and continued to say his name. Secretly, we named each other, and even when we had proper names, we whispered the secret ones in the dark. The same flesh, hundreds, thousands, endless.
And then there came a day when we, as body, sensed something different in the air. There was the taste of intrigue. The call had come for us to rise, and to wash, as usual, but where usually there was breakfast, there was none. In the cold, misty sunlight, so bright after sleep that one may only squint, we were told to line up, hands behind our backs. We were told not to look up, no matter what we might hear. We were told not to speak, not even to whisper, not even about our fears, concerns, about what was happening. We thought "decimation" for sins not our own. We thought "theft" for which we would all be punished, and some of us lose a hand. We never thought "masters" or "market". We did not know we were slaves. We had been told that we were soldiers. It was all a lie.
And my brothers had been lying to me, my own body, and myself, for surely some among us must have known. Surely, this was not the first time a line up had happened, and surely, there must be some among us who had at least heard rumors, who could have told us all and spared us the feeling of betrayal that would never completely go away, and that made a bitterness in me that caused me to feel resentment and mistrust. I waited in the line. It was many hours. I wept, and could not cover my face.
We had not been given anything to eat or drink, and so it was as if I were sleeping on my feet. My body could not catch up with me, and I felt very little. Shouted down to us were that there was a delay, and another delay. Every time I closed my eyes, my eyelids were red with the bright sunlight. Occasionally, behind our line, our direct superior would come down, trailing a reed rod down the backs of our knees to keep us awake as he passed. And after a long time, there came a man in a white tunic, with clean-looking leather thongs, and a measured voice. He held a long stylus and wax tablet, but didn't write anything. I wasn't allowed to look up, so only was able to see him from the waist down. "This," he said, gesturing. "This, and this. The others, none." One of them was me.
They stripped me and blew powder into my hair that smelled of lavender. They put me in cotton and gave me new sandals to wear. I was so upset about the lie that I could not even be angry, or be sad. A chestnut mare clad in indigo blanket was brought, and the man who had chosen me rode behind me, his forearms resting on my stick-out hips, his hands clasped over my belly. With wild sandy hair and a serious expression, he did not tell me that his name was Vasvius. I didn't care. After my earlier tears, I was ready to be numb and nothing for the day. We rode ten miles toward the sea, to Herculaneum, twelve boys, all in a line. The other boys could hardly have been called all of a kind, except that we were of similar heights and did not speak at all. Ten of them I never saw again. One of them was Cassius, but I noticed him, golden boy, lean.
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The Story of the Vampire, L (Completed | Featured )
VampireHe looked over at me in the dimness, fingers loose in my grip. "You are hurting me," he said, without interest. He had caked powder on his already pale skin, all of one shade except for points made by a hot pencil. Though it was no longer the mode a...
