coquaigne | ROMANI ITE DOMUM.

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log:3rd

ROMANI ITE DOMUM.

Esca doesn't realize he's walked through any door, at first, because the door to the peristyle at the Aquila Vila don't have doors, precisely. It takes Esca a moment to realize what's happened, and in that moment he walks into and onto a bed, of the softest quality he's ever encountered. The shift in perception shocks him further, and he turns, scaring and confused. An open door behind him leads back to the garden. But here... There are things to explore. Gently, he closes the door, and walks out.

The floor is soft under his feet, softer than fresh grass, and the air is pleasantly chilled like the best days at home. There are shining metal boxes open, but nothing happens when he walks inside, and eventually he finds stares that take him to identical rooms. None of the doors are locked, though it does take Esca some time to understand that one must twist the handle to open them.

He repeats this descent until he finds himself in a large room full of color and sound; multiple booths call out to him like sirens, and he is at once curious and skeptical. He wishes he had brought a sword. As is, in a shirt and braccae, he feels slightly exposed.

He climbs atop one of the nearest flashing booths, this one bright yellow and shouting about 'slots'. Crouching, he cups his hands around his mouth and calls out to allies. "Am I alone? Show yourself, friend! I mean no harm, and have naught which you could steal."

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"Seal?" It's a good thing George isn't here, she thinks--he'd be utterly disgusted at the thought. Even she, meat-eater that she is, has difficulty imagining eating seal. "They eat all kinds of things. I usually just make pilaf--it's really easy, just rice and whatever else you have in the house cooked in with it."

Esca looks back, puzzled at her seeming shock. Even those that worship the seal still eat him. He shrugs, giving up at wondering; very like, some things about this woman he'll never understand. "I have never heard of pilaf. Surely you have heard of seal?"

"Of course I've heard of seals." She's not an idiot, Esca. "But we don't eat them."

She pauses at the landing, looking around at the next floor up. There's a really nice swimming pool, but no restaurants. Onwards and upwards. "Anyway, pilaf is...well, I guess if you don't have rice, it's kind of hard to explain, but it's really good. One of my dads taught me to make it."

"Why not?" Esca says, already dreading the answer. "They are very good eating."

Esca is not quite sure what rice is, and so he can only nod sagaciously with empty confidence. "Your family," he says, thinking. "Do the tribes still live? Which are you from?" He assumes, by 'dads', she means she was adopted into another chieftain's protection. Rare for a woman, but perhaps they have different rules, now.

"Well--because they're seals! You can't eat them. Besides, they're endangered." Which probably doesn't mean anything to him. "It means there aren't a lot left, so you can't hunt them or anything."

Martha would be happy to introduce him to all the deliciousness of cuisine from outside the British Isles, but it'll be another two flights of stairs before they can even think about that. "Well, uh. I'm not from a tribe exactly. Dad's family live in Nottingham, though. And Tharkay was born in India. It's on the other side of the world from England, really far away. Are you from a tribe?"

This is just new, more confusing information. "You have over-hunted them?" He tsks lightly under his breath.

She lives in Londinium but is from no tribe; Esca's face falls, just slightly, in the knowledge that the tribes are gone, at least in that part of the world. Many who live in the south no longer belong to a tribe, but all know which ones their ancestors are from. It is a loss. "Brigantes," he says, a bit hushed under his breath. "I've not heard of Nottingham or India. I fear I know nothing of which you speak-- is India Roman? Where is Nottingham?"

"Well, I didn't. Anyway, my brother'd go mental if he thought I ate a seal." George grew out of the self-important vegan stage before puberty, thankfully, but Martha's pretty sure he could find some condescension in his heart for the idea of eating an endangered animal.

"Brigantes," she repeats. Martha isn't entirely sure the extent to which tribes were a part of England; she wonders vaguely if perhaps there are people who still keep to them. Neo-pagans, maybe, she supposes. "Nottingham's in the midlands. North of London, but not really north. And India never really belonged to the Romans, I don't think. I don't know if they knew about India in your time. Maybe for spices, they did."

Esca still finds this a bit ridiculous, and it shows on his face. "Seal is very good for eating. Strengthens the spirit." He feels like an old housemother saying this, but it's true.

"Ah!" Esca says, suddenly inspired. They have a reference point-- Londinium, London-- and can understand things from there. "I have been north of Londinium, very north. Likely I have been where Nottingham now stands. Eboracon is very north of your London." He pauses a moment, thinking. Common ground is good, best to foster it. "Before the Romans, the Cantiaci and the Catuvellauni lived in Londinium." Esca never thought he would be an arbiter of old knowledge, but it seems important to relate to this confused girl who has probably never eaten a seal.

"But--but seals are cute." They're fuzzy and white and roll around in snow. Chickens, by comparison, are horrible, mean little creatures with scaly feet. Eating them is entirely justifiable. "I know that's a stupid reason not to eat them, but I just couldn't do it."

"Very north," Martha repeats, thinking. England's not exactly huge; surely she can figure out where Eboracon is. "I wonder if Brittania includes Scotland--Edinburgh's the only name I can think of that's close to Eboracon."

"Cute?" Esca chuckles to himself. "Have you ever seen a bull seal?"

He continues up the stairs. "It might. I've never heard of Edinburgh or Scotland. Eboracon is below the wall?" Another moment, and he turns to frown. "Though I'm sure that's been knocked down..."

"Yes," she replies, unable to keep an edge of defensiveness from her voice. "I mean, probably. They have seals at the zoo."

"The, uh. The wall?" When Martha goes home, she decides, she's going to read all about ancient Britain. It's mortifying, not knowing any of this. She's sure she learned at least some of it in school. "Which one?"

This changes the subject. "A zoo?"

"The first wall. The Aelium." In front of him, Esca motions to make a line, long and swooping, with his fingers in the air. "Goes straight from one sea to the next, all the way across." Say what you want about Romans, but they can build.

"For animals." Very helpful, Martha. "They bring all kinds of animals there--you know, bears and lions and birds, stuff like that--and you can see them. They keep them in different cages, obviously, so they don't end up eating each other."

This sounds familiar in a very vague kind of way. "And what's above the wall?" she asks. Perhaps that'll jog her memory.

Frowns. "It sounds cruel."

"Oh, everyone still free." He frowns a little less, now, the corner of his mouth twitching. "The Romans call it Caledonia."

"Oh, no, they're really nice." Martha won't hear words against zoos--not her zoos, anyway. Maybe some are cruel, but she loves visiting with Tharkay and looking at all the birds. Zoos are brilliant. "They aren't really cages--they make them look like where the animals would live in the wild. And then you get to see animals from all over the world."

"Caledonia! Oh, that's Scotland!" Martha's so excited at recognizing it that she doesn't realize until after her exclamation just how loud her voice grew. Oops. Saying a silent thank-you to Archie, she goes on, "Then Eboracon can't be Edinburgh, because that'd be past the wall. How close is it to the border?"

"So they don't even know they're trapped?" He sniffs at the thought, unsure.

Esca starts at her outburst, but smiles, laughing, when she discovers it. "So it is called Scotland now. Good." He nods his head in approval. "It is a day's travel on horse from Eboracon-- the heart of it, anyway-- to the wall."

"Well, I mean, they know where the walls are." Martha shrugs. "But they treat all the animals really well."

It's very exciting, figuring these things out. There's just enough information to make it a tantalizing puzzle, but definitely not an easy one. "Hm. I dunno how long it takes to get places by horse, but...let's see. Cumbria? Does that sound familiar?"

"Peaceable imprisonment. I am sure they would thank their captors for it, if they could."

"Ah, yes." He smiles again. "That touches the wall. The Carvetii live there, they are like brothers with the Brigantes. It's very near Eboracon."

"Probably," Martha agrees, without a hint of irony. "A lot of the animals are endangered, so they might not be alive otherwise. And some of them were born at the zoo, so..."

"Oh." She can't help being disappointed--she was hoping that was Eboracon--but Esca recognizing it is a good second. They've come to the restaurant floor and are now idling near the stairs, because Martha's a little too engrossed in this mystery to explain the choices to him. "God, I'm crap at geography. Um. Maybe Durham? Or Yorkshire, I guess?"

"You hunt too often, if that is the case. One should only hunt in season, or you'll thin the herd."

Esca stops, and leans back against the railing, equally lost in thought. "I have never heard of Durham, or Yorkshire."

"It's not just hunting. Their land gets turned into farms, or cities, or--well, you kind of have the wrong twin for animal rights. My brother, George, he can go on about it for hours. Trust me, we wouldn't be hunting tigers if they put me in charge."

All the excitement of matching Cumbria dissipates at this. Martha didn't really expect him to recognize names like those (they don't sound even the slightest bit Roman), but it would have been nice. "Well, there's Northumberland, too. Eboracon's probably called something like those names these days."

"I think you have lost me utterly." He hangs his head, but only slightly. "What of twins?"

"If it is like London, it is called Ebora now, perhaps? But Caledonia is a very different word from Scotland; I've no notion of how that transformation took place." He shrugs. "I know only the names of my home."

"Oh. Sorry. I've got a twin, his name's George." Martha's not sure what else she can clarify for Esca, so she doesn't make much further effort there.

Northumberland doesn't strike a chord of recognition in Esca's face, which is another small disappointment. "I can't think of anywhere called Ebora. But it's not like I'm an expert on the north--I hardly ever go there. Maybe I could look it up when I get home..."

Esca nods. He knows what twins are. "And he cares far more of zoos."

He nods, shrugging. "Things change. My grandfather would not understand how things are where I live." He wants to at least appear to accept it. "If the knowledge has not been lost, I don't see why not. For now, these restaurants..."

"Sometimes I think George loves animals more than people," Martha says, giving Esca a crooked smile. "He doesn't eat meat or cheese or anything like that. He won't even wear leather."

It occurs to Martha then that even if she does look it up, she'll have a hell of a time trying to get the information back to a bloke living in ancient Britain. Well, she'll do it for her own self, then. Until then, restaurants. "Well, these're the options," she says, waving a hand at the seemingly endless row of places. Some look rather old-fashioned, like Martha's mental image of some kind of medieval inn, while others are much closer to the sorts of places she visits in London. "We can try any of them you like."

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