without_hesitation | (no subject)

Entry tags:

spartacus

(no subject)

Though she would not give voice to feeling, Ilithyia finds herself nervous at prospect of having Spartacus in home. Besides Capua, they have limited interactions to public venues, even in intimate moments, and though she has little love for the apartment she has been given, it is still a home of a kind. To open it to enemy leaves her with unsettled feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Yet she cannot be sure he still truly stands as enemy.

She has done nothing to prepare home as she may have with others. There is no food set out, no wine waiting for him. There is only her home as it is most days, clean, well-kept, a state which may surprise Spartacus when she has no slaves at disposal, but Ilithyia is a woman used to certain standards of living and will not live in squalor simply because she must now pick up after herself.

From the living room, Albinius makes a noise of protest and Ilithyia turns in time to see her son lose grip on couch and fall from standing position. She smiles fondly, watching as he struggles once more to stand.

He is growing more with each passing day and she cannoy deny she fears influence Spartacus may have upon him. It is no secret he detests her and she would not have him turn son against her. Yet there is little she can do to prevent such short of turning Albinius against Spartacus before he has time to truly change her son. It is with these thoughts whirling through mind she finds herself waiting for Spartacus, to introduce him finally and formally to his son.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The last time he was in her chambers, it was in Capua, in the ludus, and now he feels none of the dull rage and helplessness that he had felt then. He walks a free man, he'll enter her rooms as one and he'll leave them as one, and nothing now can change that.

What he feels... He isn't sure. Anticipation, but of what kind? Trepidation, some, perhaps. But in truth, perhaps, he has no idea how to feel.

He is going to see his son.

Arriving at the door he knows is hers, he knocks, and looks for stillness inside himself.

The sound of fist upon door causes Albinius to fall once more and there is moment when Ilithyia is sure he is going to cry, certain such sound will be indication of how meeting will progress. Instead he looks at her with bright eyes, then crawls toward her on hands and knees. When he reaches the hem of her gown, she smiles, bending to lift him from floor, then turns to door.

At sight of Spartacus, she steps back to let him inside, though she has little thought as to what she should say. Albinius, in her arms, lets out a cry and stretches one hand toward Spartacus, waving a fist at him. A string of sounds follows, none quite a word, though Ilithyia suspects they are soon to follow.

He might be about to say something to her, but both his speech and his progress are arrested by the child - by sounds that draw so near to speech, by the way the child was... extending a hand toward him.

He swallows. This isn't the first time they've met, but before... It was some time ago.

"He grows... well," he says, sounding more uncertain than he would like. "Healthy and strong, it seems."

"Healthy and strong and well-loved," she agrees, unable to crush swell of pleasure that rises in her when Albinius smiles, but turns face from Spartacus, pressing warm cheek to curve of Ilithyia's shoulder. He is her son, she must remind herself. No man can take such title from her.

Though she knows, at some point, she must give him up, if only for a moment. It is what she has agreed to. As if he knows, Albinius looks back to Spartacus, still smiling, then waves his hand once more, grasping at air.

"What is his age now?" He finds himself fumbling for words, and not because of her. This is new, a singular newness that's now coloring the world, everywhere he looks. A child, his child, with his blood blowing through his veins.

His and hers.

"Nearly nine months have passed since birth," she says, an evening she well remembers. Appearing upon streets of Darrow, heavy with child, faced with lights and sounds she did not understand. There was little comfort found in explanation given by others, their words mostly meaningless, her anger near to overwhelming. "He stands with support now. Soon he will be walking and speaking."

Soon he will call her mother. She cannot deny that she looks forward to such moment, to hearing title in his voice, knowing she is the only mother he will ever have. She is his and he is hers and there is no one who can take that from her.

"Closing upon a year," he murmurs. Time is still so strange, so mutable; once he had accepted that most of the people he would meet here knew of him only from ancient tales and histories, the thing itself had seemed to lose a great deal of its meaning. But here, now, it means a great deal once again.

"And what words would you have him say, when time to break first word is come?"

At question, Albinius lets out shriek, then says, "Maaaaa," while looking directly at Spartacus. Ilithyia knows it is not yet meant for her, that it is not a word and holds no association and yet she cannot help smile that curves lips.

"I will content myself with simple beginning," she says in response, then pauses, looking at Albinius. "Would you like to hold him?" She does not know why she asks, does not know if she will be capable of handing son to Spartacus should he desire to hold him.

It shocks him into silence. He had expected to be able to see the child, to perhaps spend a little time with him, and maybe - if he acquitted himself well and gave her no immediate reason to mistrust him, a little more time. But to hold the boy...

"Yes," he says, before he has a chance to gainsay himself. "I would... welcome such chance."

She considers issuing warning, assuring Spartacus that should he harm her son or attempt to leave with him, swift punishment will follow. Instead, she simply steps closer and shifts Albinius in her arms, offering him to Spartacus to take.

He blinks, then waves his fists again. He is not yet reaching for anyone besides Ilithyia and for that she is grateful. She does not think heart could take sight of son reaching for Spartacus.

He has held children before, has held newborn babes - the child born on the ridge, the promise of life that he first held to as possible true victory - but this, of course, is different. Would always be different. Carefully, awkwardly, he takes the child from her and brings him close.

There's a hint of fussing and then he quiets, looking up at Spartacus with wide, serious eyes. Does Spartacus see himself in those eyes? Even a shade?

He doesn't mean to smile. But it pulls at the corners of his mouth all the same, small and hesitant.

There is little of what she feels that Ilithyia understands and she watches Spartacus with curious gaze. He smiles down at her son -- their son, she thinks, and why should it be so hard now after she has used it as weapon for so long? Yet it is difficult all the same and despite difficulty, she finds herself smiling faintly as well.

"He is generally well mannered and happy," she says, not knowing if such words will please him to hear. Not knowing if she truly cares.

"As should be. His life is full of more comfort than many could hope for." It might have been pointed, even bitter, for again he remembers the child born on the ridge, born into war and privation, people dying of cold not far away.

Yet it had been better than being born a slave.

"I am glad," he adds, the words coming absent any real consideration. "I would see no child suffer for lack of needed things."

Ilithyia understands implication and cares little for it, having never felt any need to apologize for the world and life she was born into. She would have the same for her child, regardless consequences to herself, and is working hard to make sure he will be respected and feared. That he will have anything he desires.

"He suffers for nothing," she says. "His needs are well met and he has friend of similar age only across the hall." That Cleo's father is something of Ilithyia's friend in another manner of speaking is not something to be shared with Spartacus.

"Is that so?" And yet he's not even truly asking her. The full of his attention is now focused on the child, who is still regarding him solemnly, reaching up for his chin...

And then Albinius breaks into a smile, the kind that only young children can manage simple and guileless and somehow wise.

"Will you grow to love might and power, I wonder?" he murmurs, half to himself. "Or will you bear greatest love for freedom, whatever the cost?"

"He is but child," Ilithyia says, reaching out to touch Spartacus, fingertips grazing his arm briefly. Every passing moment spent in company of this man confuses her further and her desire to return to Capua, though useless, given what she knows of her life there, does not diminish. If nothing else, she understood her place in such a world. Here it is difficult for her to find footing. "Let him be a child."

It almost shocks him, to hear it from her. Not the words themselves, but the way in which she says them, the softness in them - softness which is, as far as he can tell, no pretense. Genuine.

And the touch.

"Yes," he says, still quiet. "Yes, he is. May he remain so as long as he is able."

Should he desire to take her child, she thinks he might have done so already. He has not physically harmed her since initial meeting -- not beyond what she has asked him for in her way -- and in Capua, she watched him kill her husband with little remorse.

Perhaps he will never be ally, but he is the father of her child. And perhaps he is no longer enemy.

"We can make arrangements for you to see him," she decides. "More often, if you so desire."

"Such arrangements would be met with... appreciation." Again, surprise lances through him. That she would let him see her child is surprise enough. That she would let him hold the child, even more so. That she would allow such a thing more than once...

"I never thought," he says, quiet again. "I never thought, after Sura was torn from life... that moment such as this would ever be but distant dream."

"Nor I," she admits, unsure of why she is letting such words fall from tongue. "Gaius wanted an heir and yet after years there was nothing."

He was unable, not her, as evidence of her own fertility smiles and squeals and grabs at the material covering his father's chest.

As Lucretia had, she would have found a way, but it has always been comfort to know issue did not lie in her womb.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only