Chapter Text
Arms outstretched, Hannibal sighs as the water pours warm, rather than bracing cold as it is on mornings when he finishes early, and it’s fresh from the river. He watches the ash and pumice streak dark down his legs, scrubbed pink beneath it, and tilts his head for the muck to be rinsed from his hair.
The gymnasium is still, so early in the day when most of the city is still at work. Hannibal’s feet against the mosaic tiles echo in the small chambers through which he passes, towards a tub from which the scent of juniper is bright and intoxicating. With a deep breath, Hannibal slips into the bath, and settles with a groan as water - steaming hot from where it was brought up from the fires - is poured slowly over him. There are no other patrons here so soon, and Hannibal watches his attendant slave depart, pitcher empty, to fetch more water.
Muscles uncoil each in turn, and he follows them in his mind, visualizing every stroke or movement that has left him so stiffly sore. The heavy wooden shield hefted against his shoulder now yields to twitches of relief across his belly. His shoulders ache with the motion of spear-thrusts, legs stretched long against the pull from his hips to strike with his sword. In practice only, today, before the place fills with civilians and athletes, but enough that the sight of the slave returning with a full pitcher earns an approving hum.
They could learn something from the Spartans, he muses, these Greeks who fill their ranks with farmers and artists. But he can't imagine that the Spartans would allow a bath after training, and so he settles content, as the water fills up around him.
The slave kneels, careful fingers to work through Hannibal’s hair, just hard enough against the scalp to draw a groan, and Hannibal leans back to enjoy the sensation.
He hears the voices before he hears the footsteps, youthful and loud, and the tension he had been working so comfortably from his body returns to his shoulders. He should have anticipated that while men worked, boys did not. Study would only take them so much of the day, and while they were not apprenticed, they were free to do as they pleased within the city.
More, Hannibal knows, than he was allowed when he had been their age.
The slave attending Hannibal soothes his hair back from his face as more water is poured against it, no longer as tangled as when he had arrived, though still longer than what the scholars wore, still barbarian in the way it was daily braided.
Beyond, Hannibal distinguishes two voices, and allows his eyes to open as he waits to see who had come to interrupt his peace.
"He should trust me to make my own choice!"
"My boy, he had. You simply took too long."
Younger and older, a boy with his personal keeper. Or a tutor perhaps, though Hannibal doubts that a tutor would allow a student to speak to him thus. When they finally come into view, only the boy is undressed, carrying himself as a king might, with straight shoulders and wide strides, hair wild and curling, the weight of it pulling the curls to rest just above his shoulders.
"I will not go,” the boy declares, turning mid-stride to walk backwards, just as graceful, to face the man keeping him company. "And he will not send me. You know how Father gets before the Council meets. He grows irrational. His words will be all but forgotten by the evening."
Resisting the urge to sigh, Hannibal watches passively as they converse, draws his knees up to fill as much of the tub with his body as he can. Meant for smaller men than he, but the slave at his side accommodates by pouring the remainder of the pitcher over Hannibal’s knees to keep them warm, the water filling around him.
He feels the curiosity of the slave’s attention on him, skimming down his body, up to his hair again where the boy settles his fingers and begins to curl it up for him. A note, hummed low, dissuades him from proceeding and it is left to fall heavy again. He will not wear in the manner of the Athenians, as he will not allow his beard to grow long and be curled as is their fashion. It is shorn as short as he can manage, now that the days of needing to curry their favor have passed, and in turn he feels the attention of the boy’s tutor drift over him and away again - that manner of looking without looking that the aristocracy practices.
Hannibal listens, and considers waking earlier still the next day in hopes of avoiding the chatter that echoes now through the well-hewn chambers.
The boy continues to talk even as they pass through to another chamber, voice authoritative and loud only in delivery, the content is childish and immature. A spoiled boy demanding rights to his choices when he himself is not capable of making them.
When they return, the young man’s lithe body already wet with cold water, Hannibal refrains from another sound of displeasure as they take the bath next to his own, the chatter still unending. The slave attending Hannibal stands to gather more water for him, and another bustles over to serve the little lordling, who pays them little mind.
"He will not find me a suitor if I do not wish for one,” the boy concludes, and Hannibal finds himself unable to continue his silence.
“If your father is a councillor, it matters little what you wish for,” Hannibal intones, suppressing his annoyance at the childish disruption that today has substituted for the normal discourses at the baths, and training his tone to a practiced neutrality. His accent is still thick however, fitted poorly against the words.
The boy turns, words finally silenced, enough that the otherwise empty baths seem to echo with it. Both slaves return, one to Hannibal another to the boy, and it seems enough to draw his voice back from him.
"And if I am to become one as well? " he asks. "Would that not make his promises empty and his demands of me null?"
The boy motions for his slave to pour water on him, and sinks into a comfortable sprawl in his own bath.
“Becoming a councillor is not the same as already being one,” Hannibal responds.
"He cannot fault me my stubbornness if I aim to become just like he."
Both brows lift in response to the youthful declaration, and the man sits up a little taller in the bath, his head visible above the edge, but no more than. “If he is your father, he can fault you however it suits him,” replies Hannibal, the scarcest glimmer of amusement allowed to gather in the corners of his eyes. “And with a mouth like that you’ll be lucky if it’s not first with a fist.”
The boy turns then, hands lax against the edges of the tub but eyes harder, narrowed, the blue beneath the lashes darker.
"You speak out of line,” he says, voice not dangerous but certainly displeased. His tutor clears his throat and the boy lifts his fingers to silence him, eyes still on Hannibal. Then he curls his hand, bends it at the wrist and reclines once more.
"Would you?" He asks, feigning casual, words obviously directed at Hannibal, "Fault me? And with a fist, too?"
Hannibal gives himself a moment to consider the questions, dark eyes lifted toward the sloped ceiling above, rising to a point on which he focuses, hand sweeping absently through the cooling water around himself.
“I know not the details of what you complain, in fairness, merely than that you do it loudly, and incessantly,” he allows, expression thoughtful. “Were I you, I would bite my tongue and consider myself lucky for what I have, compared to those who have not.” His hand lifts from the water, a passing gesture towards the slave at his side.
“And,” Hannibal adds, hardly able to resist his delight in it, “were you my boy, I would have you bared over my knee as a child, to feel the flat of my hand.”
The boy's eyes widen, but before he can find the breath to recognize his own insult, Hannibal lifts a hand towards him.
“Let us try to prevent that,” he interjects, amused. “What has you upsetting the calm air of the baths with such discord?”
"Do not." The tutor's voice is not loud, but heavy with warning, and just as before the boy disregards him, though this time the man continues. "It is unbecoming to complain so, and to a man you do not know."
Blue eyes settle on him, lips still parted with unspoken interrupted words, before the boy dismisses him.
"I can return alone," he decides, tilting his head back with a quiet groan as more water is poured over it. "Tell my father I will see him then."
The audacity is astounding, and yet the older man leaves without another word, passing his eyes over Hannibal once more when he does. The boy sighs, apparently weary from hearing sense spoken to him, and sits up to regard Hannibal once more.
"My Father wishes to see me apprenticed. I disagree with his decision."
Hannibal’s brows raise a little, stretching himself a little as hot water is poured slowly down his back where he leans, reclined.
“Is that all?” he asks, without rancor, but with nearly a laugh. “It is a common practice, is it not? And what else have you to do with your day but learn new skills?” Now, there is a laugh, a single note of it on a sigh as Hannibal runs a hand across his face.
The tone settles out into a pleased hum and he asks, patiently, “In what does he wish you to be apprenticed? You excel at indignant declarations and laying about in baths already.”
Those eyes narrow again but the boy does not let his tone seep to anger. Instead, he drapes his arms over the side of the tub, rests his chin against them, tilts his head.
“He wishes me to learn of war,” he says. “Of strategies and horsemanship, sword and spear.”
Suddenly, his expression is entirely wicked, a youthful sort of power that Hannibal can feel, even if he cannot explain why he responds to it so readily.
“He wishes me apprenticed to a general. Foreign. Most likely fat and bored in his old age, caring little for the teaching of strategy, and more for the fondling of his young student.” A laugh, brisk and displeased, and the young man looks away. “A common practice, but I cannot imagine hating anyone as I would hate my lover.”
“As you will hate him,” Hannibal corrects mildly. He has heard the nature of such things, seen the older men and their younger boys, several in his own company of high enough birth to merit an apprentice of their own. They are taught, certainly, trained in arts of combat and war, and in exchange a particular sort of company provided in return.
There is no appeal in it for him, the time they must afford to their beloveds that takes from their own training. It holds less appeal when he remembers his meeting, earlier in the week, in which he was strongly encouraged to take on an apprentice himself, as a reflection of his loyalty to Greece, so constantly in question. He had agreed and made no plans to follow up on it, politely assenting to whatever he must in order that his position remains unchanged.
Hannibal considers again the Spartans, who have outlawed the practice in favor of honing their skills instead, and creating the future warriors who would learn them.
It’s no wonder they’ve been creeping up the backside of the peninsula proper while the Greeks themselves have been so woefully distracted.
“And since you are so self-sufficient, then, that combat is beneath you, what would you spend your time doing?” asks Hannibal, glancing towards the boy again.
The boy hums, pushing back from the edge of the tub as though to stand.
“Combat should be beneath every man,” he declares, gesturing for his slave to fetch more water. “Violence is the language of those who do not comprehend philosophy, cannot use that wisdom to solve problems.”
The slave returns, and the boy shifts, on all fours like an animal to receive the water on his back. Hannibal can see the gentle slope of it just above the edge of the tub. The boy seems entirely aware of his charms, of his appearance and desirability to such men as he claims to abhor.
He will, perhaps ironically, make a fine apprentice to the man he will be given.
“More,” the boy sighs, turning to raise an eyebrow at the slave who immediately moves to get more water for him.
The silence draws long between them, disrupted only by the soft sound of water cascading down the boy’s skin into the bath, and when Hannibal finally removes his lingering gaze from the insolent little thing stretching and proclaiming without a care in the world, he snorts.
“You are very wise,” Hannibal responds, following the slope of the tub with a hand, and despite himself, imagining it mirrors the curve of the boy’s back, pale and bare. It isn’t an unpleasant thought, but the smug look from the one beside him dissolves any particular warmth in its consideration. “Have you considered informing the hoplites of your views?”
The question is an insult, scarcely restrained from a stronger inflection than Hannibal allows it, maintaining a mildness of tone, carefully constructed.
“I’m certain they would be most interested to hear them,” adds the man. “You should address them, who defend your country, and inform them that it is beneath them.”
He leans across the edge of the bath, long arms - well-muscled - trailing nearly to the floor as he watches young man, dark-eyed and somber.
“No,” he amends. “No, you should share your views with the Persians. Perhaps Darius himself would hear you - why, you might be the one to stop the wars, by suggesting the art of philosophy as a solution to their interest in conquering Greece.”
The boy sits back on his heels, regards Hannibal with an expression of youthful, put-upon boredom.
“You speak of matters beyond and above you, metic,” he sighs, arching up into a stretch that draws his pale chest up, the muscles beneath the skin there stark and weak, still. Then he smiles, a slow, deliberate almost feline expression, and moves to stand, no care for the scrutiny, the obvious study Hannibal gives his prone form. Or perhaps relishing in it.
He keeps his movements slow as he steps from his tub, presses his hands against the edge of Hannibal’s and leans, bending his back again, tilting his hips, keeping his brilliant eyes on the man he is so blatantly disrespecting.
“Perhaps I will tell that to the fat general,” he muses. “Bring him words of wisdom as his eyes remain distracted against me. Perhaps I will stop wars. And then you will know to thank me, personally, when I do.”
A grin, bright, confident, and the boy pushes to stand, turning on the spot before making his way back to where his clothes had been folded, feet echoing wet footsteps against the mosaic and the empty chambers.
Hannibal’s eyes narrow, a faint movement of muscle just beneath them, following the long skinny legs as they carry the boy away from him.
“I imagine your fat general will find better uses for your mouth than hearing your hard-won thoughts on military strategy,” he answers after him. With an easy movement he stands and slips from his own bath in turn, grasping his hair to wring it back into the water, his back towards the boy.
With a sigh, a moment of mourning for the peace that was utterly lost to him when this spoiled child arrived, Hannibal stretches his arms wide. His attendant is quick, with skilled hands, and he pours from a smaller pitcher a slick of olive oil onto his fingers, and begins to work them into Hannibal’s skin. His shoulders first, down into his back, across one arm to his hands, and then the other, each in turn.
“What will you tell your father, then, peacemaker?” Hannibal muses over his shoulder.
“That I am wise beyond my years,” echoes the voice from wherever the boy has chosen to situate himself. The cavernous space makes it impossible to understand where he is. “That I need not to learn combat where I can learn the history of it to prevent it.”
Another put upon sigh, and Hannibal can’t help but smile as he lowers his arms, closes his eyes as the slave works the muscles in his thighs, now, careful, skilled fingers, never lingering.
“I have talked him into sense with this before,” the boy adds, tone coy. “He has tried many times to sell me into education.”
Hannibal works his hair back from his face, waving away his attendant and quietly requesting his clothing.
“You are loud beyond your years,” Hannibal corrects with a snort. “Insolent beyond them, as well. Beyond mine, for that matter.”
He separates the long strands, made smooth now, less tangled, and works them into a slow braid, stubborn refusal to bind it up regardless of his status in the city. The tie is brought to him and secured to keep it from his face, and he allows himself to be dressed, linen chiton draping smooth across his skin.
“But who am I to say,” he answers to himself. “Perhaps I have met the boy to stop all wars, with his vague notions of ‘philosophy’ and refusal to actually learn any of it. So well-born and talented that knowledge simply bursts from his skull as if it were Athena.”
“Envy is a poison,” comes the lofty reply, and then footsteps again, more hollow now, from sandals rather than bare feet. “You would not understand the concepts I encompass, the words I take wisdom from. And it would be tedious to get you to, considering we shall never speak again.”
Hannibal’s amusement blooms enough to curve his lips towards a smile, adjusting the himation across his shoulder, rather than his arm.
“The first words with any weight I’ve heard you say yet,” the man responds, more entertained than rancorous at this point, and suddenly profoundly grateful that his own arrangements for such an apprenticeship have been intentionally, indefinitely delayed. “We shall not, and the day on which I hear theories of warfare dictated to me by a child is the day I snap my spear and drive my sword into the soil.”
He extends a hand to take the chlamys, soft wool finely woven with the pattern of laurels, and brings it across his own body, to fasten against his other shoulder. The mark of his service, a rich shade of crimson, stark against the pristine white folds of his other garments.
“I wish you well, peacemaker, with your father and your fat general. And I thank you for assuring me that while I dread the concept of having my own apprentice, I will be grateful so long as they are any degree less raucous than yourself.”
A simple laugh answers him, no words needed now, and the boy passes by with a grin and an expression that on any other would read as shy. But this creature controls it like a well-honed blade. Hannibal can feel the gaze pass over his back, then his front as the boy looks, brings his lip between his teeth before sketching out a bow.
Then, without another word, he turns to go, hips shifting in a graceful motion only boys that age and girls much older possess.
He is a temptation, a terror.
And thankfully someone else’s problem.
---
The evenings are still warm here, and Will finds himself gazing at the stars in the garden after supper, after the house had filled with angry words and raised voices as he had declared, once more, that he would not go into another’s service, that he had no use for military tactics and even less for a mentor.
Now the rooms echo with quiet, with his father’s promise that were he to disobey him this evening, when a guest was to arrive, he would find himself not only apprenticed but disowned.
So Will sits instead, alone and quiet, working the tension from his muscles with long deep breaths and the soft smell of flowers from deeper in the garden.
Could his father not see that he would do badly when apprenticed? That Will, his boy who so understood and spoke as he did, was not a fighter? Was barely a man of the people, preferring the company of slinking cats and the dogs the household owned, his scrolls and tablets?
He knows it doesn’t matter. He knows that the man he had spoken to today was right, that his father’s word would be law to Will regardless of what he thought or desired.
Will watches one of the slaves pass by, urgency in her step, and grimaces at knowing the meaning of her hurry without having heard a word of it. He remains seated, a last attempt at stubbornness, before his father comes along in the opposite direction and regards the boy at length.
“You could not delay it forever,” he tells his son, not unkindly, now that tempers have settled. “There were many suitors, of all varieties, of which you might have had your choosing. None enough for you, nor would there be did you not force my hand to it. It will not do for a councillor’s son to live like a woman, laying about and sighing all day.”
A moment more passes before Will drags himself to his feet. An arm is pressed around his shoulder, a brief affection, before his father straightens the folds of his clothing and ushers him along.
Laurels, gold, woven into a crimson background, folded elegantly over stark white linen. A braid of hair, folded neatly, hanging long against it.
“Hannibal,” laughs Will’s father, extending his arms as the man turns toward him. “General, I should say, for formality’s sake. Welcome. I cannot tell you what good it does my heart to have you here.”
Will doesn’t look up until he absolutely must, and even then finds no words to describe his displeasure.
The man looks somehow taller in his uniform, wider shoulders and sharper jaw, eyes just as dark and beard as strangely short. And all Will can hear are his parting words, how he wishes him well, how he hopes that his own apprentice is not as raucous. Will feels his eyes narrow, an anger and fear and twisted pleasure deep inside his gut that makes him raise his chin and tilt his head.
“General,” Will responds, tone clipped, word almost hissed, enough to turn his father’s head, to have the man’s eyes darken in his displeasure at the disrespect.
“You will show respect, Will, to the man who will teach and guide you.”
Hannibal’s smile widens briefly, although it does not reach his eyes, and he inclines his head in what suffices as a bow.
“Will,” Hannibal repeats. “A pleasure.” There is nothing in his tone of anything but an essential politeness, glancing towards the boy’s father with a modicum of surprise. “Your father has been my patron in this city for many years. Admittedly, I did not know his intended for me was his son.”
The darkness lightens into another laugh, perhaps a little forced, as Will’s father claps Hannibal on the shoulder. “I paid for Hannibal’s first panoply, the whole of it. You ought to have seen him then, fresh out of the forests. I’d never seen anyone fight like that and,” he adds, with a pointed glance towards Will, “any boy should consider himself lucky to be taught by him.”
"Then perhaps he should take any boy of his choosing," Will responds, tilting a brow at the general - Hannibal - before glancing at his father. "It is the most elaborate trick you have tried to get me to behave, Father, but I have read your scrolls, I know our laws, and this man cannot do more than exist here without incident or consequence."
Will’s father glowers and it takes a lot for Will not to cower. And he is scared. He is terrified that for once his father does not speak in jest, in mere threat.
"Father, I cannot be apprenticed to a metic!" Will says, voice lilting into a higher, more worried note. "You cannot be serious in letting him take me, he is not Greek!"
Though his jaw works, the only hint of the profound annoyance resonating through Hannibal, his tone is steady, utterly impassive as the boy’s shrill exclamations ring through the room.
“A complaint best taken up with Council that has granted my citizenship here,” he responds, tongue parting his lips into a mirthless smile, “sponsored by my patron.”
“But -”
“Your father’s sponsorship,” Hannibal clarifies further, glancing towards the boy’s father who allows him continuance. “On faith in my capabilities to lead, and my proficiency in doing so. I have been granted stay not only as a metic but the rights of citizenship accordingly. I own a home. Exemption from particular taxes. Right to attend the assembly.”
“Has he forgotten anything, Will? That you’ve learned from your studies of law,” his father asks, attempting to lighten the mood, however incrementally, but with no less baleful a look towards his son. He leans towards Hannibal, an audible murmur, “Too clever for his own good.”
Hannibal hums, without yet turning his eyes from Will.
Will looks desperate for a moment longer before swallowing thickly and directing his eyes down, hands clasped behind himself to draw his shoulders straighter.
"I apologize, general. I have spoken with ignorance and cruelty."
Will’s father offers his son a gentle look before returning his eyes to Hannibal who merely nods, a silent acceptance of the boy’s apology, while here, in public. He is sure to bring up the boy’s thoughtless words later, accompany it with the sharp strike of the back of his hand.
"He will learn," Will’s father continues, a statement, not a reassurance. "I would trust no other with my son, Hannibal. He is a bright boy in need of guidance and company. He will make a fine apprentice, his mind is sharp, and his mouth he will learn to control."
Will swallows again, angry, humiliated, and acutely aware of the other’s eyes on him.
“There is a great deal to be learned,” Hannibal finally agrees, genial enough. “Much more than only use of spear and hoplon - there is military history, not only of Greece but elsewhere,” he notes, without specificity. “Strategy and method, formations and when they should be broken. Hunting for sport, for survival. Horsemanship - their care and keeping.”
Inordinately pleased, Will’s father looks between the two - Hannibal who watches him, the boy who watches the floor - and speaks towards Will, encouraging. “He has always enjoyed animals, haven’t you, Will?”
“They have more sense than people," Will responds, and is surprised when it earns pleased laughs from both men. He wishes this were over, that he could return to his chambers, his scrolls and his silence.
"By the time you return the pups will have been born and grown, you will have true hunting dogs to use, Will," his father says, a long look towards his son before he straightens his shoulders and turns to his friend. "Shall I provide him a horse to ride or will he share yours?"
Will’s skin feels cold, his blood colder still, and he finally looks up, wide eyes and parted lips.
"Father, you will not send me today?"
“If he has one of his own, I have space in the stable for it,” Hannibal responds. “But there is no need to give one of yours if not, and I would gladly find one of my own that suits him. There is something to be said for growing older with one’s mount, a synchronicity of minds and bodies, as both learn together.”
“Father -”
He nods, pleased by the promise of all Hannibal has to teach the boy. “Very well, then. A fair gift to begin your relationship.”
“Father, please -”
Hannibal braces an arm against himself, a more rigid bow than before, a deference that is dismissed by a friendly wave from Will’s father. “I will keep you informed of his progress, as is custom, I am lead to understand,” suggests Hannibal as he smoothes a hand down his tunic.
“Custom!” exclaims the man. “In all the excitement, I’d nearly forgotten. It’s been so many years. He’ll need to accept, of course, it isn’t slavery,” he chuckles, drawing himself up a little taller as he turns to regard his son. “Will -”
"I will not," Will responds, hands fisted at his sides and expression caught between helpless and anguished. "If I do not, you cannot send me."
It is all fear, now, no pride to straighten Will’s shoulders, no delight in his words and games. He watches his father, the flicker of disappointment that hovers just behind his eyes as he looks at his son. And that, in the end, is what moves Will, the guilt of shaming his father, his name, with his youthful headstrong beliefs and demands.
His father has been good to him, rarely unfair.
And this, Will knows, he cannot escape.
He swallows, nods, turns back to Hannibal and keeps his head down as he takes a step towards the man, much closer now, an invitation to touch, to see.
It is Hannibal’s reluctance, then, that stills the man a moment more. A glance exchanged with the boy’s father, an encouraging nod, and Hannibal steps nearer, once, twice, until they are nearly toe to toe. It is a strange performance for the man, something taught that does not yet truly resonate in him, as he bends at the knees. He must, the boy is so much shorter than himself, and with only the barest touch his fingers find the inside of Will’s thighs. A roughness to them, calloused from work and war, against the soft skin and heat.
Will trembles beneath the touch, unknown to any but himself and Hannibal, and a look of sympathy gentles the general’s eyes. He does not grasp the boy, but merely affects it, palm resting against the juncture of his thigh rather than fully between his legs.
A light touch, a slide of his other hand, the side of his fingers tucked just beneath the boy’s chin, lifts it and brings their eyes to meet.
Will allows his head to be lifted but does not meet Hannibal’s eyes, keeps his own unfocused in the middle distance, somewhere just over his shoulder. He is brought back by a gentle squeeze against his skin, and for a brief moment meets the general's eyes.
He knows he should be demure, accept the touches of his mentor as one would worship. He knows that to this man he will become an idol to covet, something beautiful to keep and show and touch. And that is what Will fears the most.
He finds no cruelty in the man’s eyes, however, and allows himself to release a long, slow breath before parting his lips for him.
Hannibal’s brows draw at the movement, a subtle exchange of expression visible only to the two, held together for only moments that stretch far longer than the actual time they stand touching. Dark eyes follow the youthful flush across the boy’s cheeks, to the fullness of his mouth, further still to the way his throat works, once, a nervous swallow.
“Beautiful,” he murmurs, and Will knows with the softness of the man’s voice that in it, he is entirely honest, and perhaps more surprised by this than anyone.
The kiss is so chaste as to hardly be felt, barely more than a brush of their mouths together before Hannibal’s hands slide free of the boy, and he steps aside again.
Will’s father claps once, elated, and declares, “Wonderful! He will do well by you, Hannibal, and by me in doing so. Will,” he continues, turning towards his son with a quick hand to push the boy’s unruly hair back out of his face. “Go and gather your things, if you have any necessities to bring. Hannibal will provide most everything for you, though, so pack light. And I am only just across the city from you, should there be any need for anything more than that.”
Without a word, Will goes, finding himself facing his dark chambers entirely lost as to what to take, when this entire space is his life, and holds within it all he cares for.
He can hear soft conversation behind him in the main room, where Hannibal and his father speak of many things Will cares not for. Not right then. He gathers his scrolls, carefully wrapped in a sheet to hold them together, a cloak against the cold. He can think of nothing else to take, without taking it all, and returns to the two men waiting for him.
He is no longer so hunched when he faces them both again, and meets Hannibal’s eyes properly before asking for permission to take his scrolls, which he is granted. When Will turns to his father, he cannot meet his eyes, but their embrace is gentle, affectionate.
"Learn well from him."
Will nods.
Pleasantries are exchanged between the older men, polite on Hannibal’s part, enthusiastic on Will’s father’s. Agreements to keep him informed of his son’s progress, to treat him well. Hannibal declines dinner, with no hard feelings considering the stressors of the night, and the unspoken understanding that they should go while Will is still compliant in doing so.
It is only when Hannibal’s horse is brought to him that he speaks again to the sullen boy at his side.
“In Crete, you’d have simply been kidnapped,” he intones, pressing a hand to his horse’s neck. A smaller one than most that Will has seen, shorter and more stout, a dark brown only a shade lighter than black, white stockings up to its knees. Hannibal accepts grudgingly the blanket offered to him by the stablehand, and settles it in place for Will.
A pause, and a dire amusement edging into the man’s voice as he asks, “Do you prefer the front or the rear, peacemaker?”
Will glares, a brief return to his mischievous performance of the early morning, and he licks his lips.
"Wherever the fat general will not displace me,” he returns, displeased, but finally gesturing to the front with a quick flick of his hand. He is not an able rider, he worries his humiliation will only grow if he falls off the horse as Hannibal takes him away.
As good as kidnapping, despite the customs and Will’s grudging acceptance.
He allows himself to be lifted onto the horse, clutches his scrolls close as Hannibal mounts behind him and presses as close as necessary to keep the horse balanced.
Will tenses, keeps his head down, but finds the man has no interest in drawing his hands between Will’s legs again, and simply takes up the reins to coax the horse forward.
In night-dark Athens, the two draw few looks. Far more attention is paid to Hannibal’s horse, the man himself, an outsider even to the city to which he has been named a son, than to Will or their manner of carriage. But there are scant enough people out now, most awake at this hour reconciled to the taverns, and less and less as the city grows thinner around them, and the sky opens above.
It is a reasonable journey, but Hannibal is a steady rider, careful to right Will when he begins to doze languid and loose upon the sure-footed horse moving smooth beneath them. Dawn is spreading golden fingers across the sky when they arrive, and no more words are spoken between them.