Thirteen Lullabies | ✓

II.I

Above is Roman's tattoo

The tattoo on the inside of my right wrist burned red-hot, searing my flesh and nearly bringing me to my knees. I had never felt anything like it before. The symbol looked much like a geometric, rune-like fish. In one of your lifetimes, you mentioned that it may have had a meaning: separation. But in 146 BC, feeling this pain from a tattoo I couldn't even remember receiving left me speechless.

I was relatively young at this point. Although I am unsure about the commencement of my existence, I can't remember a time too long before Corinth.

As I stared down at the unknown tattoo, a woman in her early forties approached me, still beautiful, with reddish brown hair and sparkling green eyes. "Ambrose? Is that really you?" Her mouth opened in disbelief, as if seeing a ghost. I looked behind me, but I was alone besides her.

She must have seen the confusion on my face, for she continued. "Nobody has seen you in twenty years! Where on earth have you been? How do you look exactly the same?" Her eyebrows puckered, but I still had no idea what she could be talking about. As far as I knew, I had never met this woman. I also had never been called Ambrose.

I moved a few steps back, hoping to put some distance between her and I. I seemed to have a reputation with the ladies, but I couldn't think of when I would have had any sort of dalliance with her.

"I know nothing of this Ambrose." She opened her mouth to speak again, but I cut her off. "I am Demetrius. You are?" The fake name slipped off my tongue, remembering that the name Roman would do me no favors here.

Her frown deepened, as if she thought I was lying. "My name is Eos. When you left us, we didn't know what to think." She looked around, then continued softly. "I was worried about you."

"My apologies, but I fear you are mistaken."

"Do you not remember all the nights we had together in Carthage all those years ago?" She tried to move closer, but just as she did, a child of about four came running to her, latching his chubby arms around her.

"Eos, I am but twenty. You must be thinking of someone else." With a quick smile, I hurried past her toward the marketplace. I didn't know what sort of ware she was selling, but I was in no mood to acquire whatever it was.

The whispers of the Roman defeat at Carthage stirred many Corinthians into a panic, worried that they were next. I listened intently as a short, round woman in the agora spoke in rapid sentences, arms waving wildly. She hardly breathed as she spoke, face turning comically red as others came from around the marketplace to listen to her concerns, as well as to voice their own (if they could get a word in).

My lack of attention led me right into you, my dearest nightingale. I had been so focused on the possibility of Roman conflict, the strange woman who had accosted me, and the pain of my searing flesh that I had missed the fountain in the center of the agora.