Chapter 87: The Noblewoman

May 18, 221 AD, Civitas Aurelia, Gallia.

Valeria stood at the edge of an excavated canal trench, her hair tied back, her hands gripping the dials of a transit level.

Lucius had engineered the device, but he had hired a Greek architect named Heron to teach the noblewoman the application of field mathematics.

Lucius stood a few paces away, his arms crossed over his tunic, taking an hour away from his blueprints to observe her progress.

He was impressed... Valeria possessed an intellect that devoured theoretical geometry, and she was translating it into earth-moving measurements.

Strutting beside Lucius was Argus. The peacock had established himself as the king of the construction site, letting out a squawk whenever a laborer pushed a wheelbarrow too close to his tail feathers.

Lucius glanced down at the bird, then back to the aristocrat at the transit level. He shook his head in amusement.

When the shadows shortened into midday, Heron called an end to the lesson. The architect packed the instruments into a box and approached the Forge Master.

Lucius tossed a pouch of unminted silver to the man. "Your instruction is yielding results, Heron. I appreciate your patience."

Heron snatched the pouch out of the air, the clinking of silver soothing his pride.

He tied it to his belt and let out a sigh.

"I am a master builder, Dominus, not a tutor for runaway nobility," Heron grumbled, wiping the chalk dust from his hands. "A girl of her breeding should be weaving tapestries in a villa, not calculating the hydraulic pressure of a river diversion. But you are paying me enough silver to buy an island, so I will teach her how to move dirt."

Lucius offered a smile.

He had no patience for the egos of ancient men.

"See that you do. You are dismissed for the day."

As the architect shuffled off toward the city center to drink away his wealth, Lucius walked over to the trench.

Valeria was wiping a smudge of dirt from her cheek, a smile illuminating her face.

"I see you are putting my silver to good use," Lucius remarked, falling into step beside her as they began the walk back toward the praetorium, with Argus waddling in their wake. "Tell me, now that you are applying Vitruvian principles in the mud, does it meet your expectations?"

Valeria looked down at her hands, which were calloused and stained with brass oxidation.

She offered a smile.

"It is fascinating, Lucius. But... it feels different than I imagined."

Lucius raised an eyebrow, navigating them around a horse-drawn cart hauling iron ingots. "I can hypothesize two reasons for that. The first is that you miss the smuggler’s galley, and calculating angles is boring compared to evading blockades."

Valeria let out a laugh. "Are you implying I miss Titus? I assure you, Forge Master, I do not yearn for the high seas."

"Then it must be the second reason," Lucius deduced. "You spent your life reading about these mechanics in a library. You fell in love with the freedom of the mathematics. But now, I have you regimented in a construction site."

Valeria stopped walking. The traffic of the Gallic capital flowed around them, but she stood still, looking at Lucius with an expression of shock.

She let out a breath, dropping the remnants of the armor she wore.

"You are correct," Valeria confessed. "For nineteen years, I was a prisoner in my father’s palace. Governor Gratus kept me locked behind marble walls, guarded, isolated from anyone my age. My only escape was the library. I used to read Archimedes and stare out at the Mediterranean, dreaming of a world where my mind mattered."

"When my father paraded those Senators through the villa as potential husbands, I mocked them," Valeria continued. "I told myself they were too stupid, too old, or too arrogant. I rejected every one of them out of pride, terrified of being sold into a new cage. And when he signed the contract with the Claudian house... I ran. But even here, standing in the middle of a revolution, I realize I am still just a girl playing with tools she barely understands."

Lucius stood amid the smoke and noise of his city, listening to the pain of a mind that had been suffocated by its environment.

For a fraction of a second, the Forge Master was gone.

He was an engineer who had clawed his way to the top of the corporate world, only to realize that the apex was a wasteland.

He remembered the corner offices, the board meetings, and the realization that he did not possess a single friend. He had built his own cage out of patents and stock options.

A wave of empathy washed over him.

Lucius stepped closer. He reached out, his fingers wiping a tear from Valeria’s cheek.

"You are not alone in that feeling, Valeria," Lucius said, his eyes locking onto hers. "I know what it is like to be isolated by the things that make you exceptional. I spent a lifetime surrounded by people, yet I was alone."

Valeria looked up at him, her eyes wide with wonder.

To hear the Forge Master admit to such a vulnerability shattered every notion she held about him.

"You?" Valeria whispered, her breath hitching.

Lucius offered a smile.

He gestured down toward the ground, where Argus was pecking at a piece of bread.

"At the very least," Lucius noted, "you have a loyal, loud companion to guard your flank. I never had an Argus."

Valeria let out a laugh.

They resumed their walk in silence, ascending the steps toward the gates of the praetorium.

As they reached the doors of the guest wing, Valeria turned to face him. Her cheeks were flushed with a surge of courage.

"Lucius," Valeria began, her voice trembling. "Promise me something."

Lucius paused, resting his hand on the latch of the door. "Name it."

"...when the isolation begins to crush you... promise me you will come and speak to me. In exchange, I will never hide behind my pride again."

Before Lucius could formulate a response to the request, Valeria leaned forward.

She pressed her lips against his cheek, lingering for a second.

"I think I am falling for the Forge Master," Valeria whispered against his skin.

Without waiting for a reply, she pushed the door open and fled into her chambers, her heart hammering against her ribs.

Luciuslet out a breath, staring at the closed door, blindsided by the confession.

He was unaware that two stories above, standing on the balcony of the master wing, Isolda was looking down at the courtyard...