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He wakes, teeth bared and snarling, and his jaw just misses snapping shut on a hand that hovers above his mouth. A fool, to let bare flesh so close to his mouth. More fool him to miss it.
“So there is still life in you,” a voice rumbles from somewhere above him. “I thought that Rome had drained it out, taken your blood and replaced with that sickly sweet sap of softness.”
He laughs, something harsh that brings with it copper and iron, strength that he tries to spit above him. “Come closer and I'll show you what runs in your own veins.”
“Oh, I know what's in it.” A flash of light before his eyes wander, teeth perhaps, or a knife, something that can take a man down quickly if he gets close, though only one man has been skin to skin with this foe, felt the heat against his neck and still managed to have breath another day. “I spilled enough of it, didn't I?”
Coriolanus—no, Martius—needs not ask who mocks him as he rages against the restraints that bind him to this bed. It is a strange sign of respect from Aufidius that he feels the need to do so, for that must mean he thinks Martius has something that hasn't been chained down, tamed and gentled until all blades, bone and steel alike, are dulled and useless.
Martius lets his grin widen, wonders what Aufidius can read in its lines. He arches back, lets his neck be exposed. If Aufidius thinks to put him on display as a trophy, show Rome what became of their hero, then his vision is as clouded as Martius, without a fever or the pains of near death to excuse him.
Rome has already seen him fall to his knees and it is ink that stains him now, a mark just as the one Cain bore, for has he not sold out his brother just the same? There is none who would welcome him now.
“And yet you couldn't finish the job,” he says. “Would you not say that was weakness as well?”
Aufidius's lips are hot against his mouth, too hard and quick for Martius to be able to catch. It's not a kiss that any man might give to his bride on their wedding night, but it is one that Aufidius would give to him here, madness burning in his eyes.
“Perhaps,” Aufidius says. “We shall see.”
The door shuts and Martius is alone, hard and furious.
He grows accustomed to the room, to its cracked ceiling and boarded up window. There are distant gunshots but nothing close, and save for Aufidius's voice, muffled at times outside, he hears no other sign of life. It would make sense for him to keep his men away, to ensure that Martius has no chance of swaying them to his side as he did before.
It is unnecessary as well. He is no god to them now, no statue to be wreathed and lauded in his moment of victory, but something to be torn down, like so much else. They cannot burn Rome to the ground and so they will reduce him to ashes, as they would the paper he signed his name to. Perhaps then that is why Aufidius takes care of him, nurses his wounds and feeds him thin broth and stale bread. He will fatten him for the slaughter, a final act for this circus.
Aufidius only laughs when Martius spits this out. “A fine thought,” he says, spooning stringy beef into Martius's mouth. It would go down better with the beer Aufidius has gotten drunk off of, but he will not allows Martius to have even a taste. “I believe the Colosseum is not completely bombed out. Shall I invite Rome to watch as well as a gesture of peace?”
Martius chews the meat. It is not nearly bloody enough for his taste. “We could make a show of it,” he says. “Set you against me with blade in hand and let it all be done for good.”
“Mmm.” Aufidius stretches, half mangy dog with hackles bared, half lion with ragged mane and gleaming eye. “I would dance with you until judgment day if I could, bones crackling beneath our feet and our boots caked in mud while they clap and cheer us on. But you are weary of such things and so am I.”
“Of war?” Martius's mouth twists. He licks his lips, watches Aufidius's covetous eyes follow his tongue. “Maybe I have died and this is some strange dream where Tullus Aufidius retires to the country to spend his life tilling the fields.”
The bowl shatters as Aufidius throws it against the wall and then he is atop Martius, hard thighs digging into Martius's own. His hands clasp Martius's, his beard scrapes Martius's skin as he licks a stripe up his chest. Martius should not allow this, should grow cold and turn his head, allow him not even a scrap of his attention, but if this is not real and they are indeed in their own hell, then there is no reason to hold back, nothing to be gained. His name, his honor, his soul – all are lost to the flames.
“You and I shall never grow tired of battle,” Aufidius breathes above Martius's heart, his mouth against his skin as if he wishes to take it in whole. “That is all we know. That is all we have left.”
He grinds against Martius, prick to prick, as Martius curses his name and line and mouths threats into his skin that cause Aufidius to harden even more. Injury has made him weak, illness has made him tired, and Martius comes quick, his skin sticky and hot from more than the fever he cannot seem to chase away. Aufidius soon follows, a step behind as he always has been, but he still pins Martius to the bed, his body collapsed, spent and exhausted.
Martius does not sleep, keeps his eyes fixed to the rusty stain above his head until Aufidius wakes some time later, stumbling drunkenly as he does up his pants, throws a tattered blanket over Martius as he leaves.
Only when the door shuts does Martius look down and run a finger along the blade he slipped beneath his naked arm as a man slept.
It is nothing for Martius to undo his restraints, a matter of seconds, but it is almost an hour before he does so. Every soldier has a routine, even if he does not wish his enemy to know so, and they have learned each other's steps in this dance well enough to take either role.
The straps come away easily and Martius takes a moment to center his body once more, let limbs lose lassitude, mind and vision clear and sharpen, until the weapon he is is calibrated once more. There are parts missing or rusty, a pull in the side, a pain in the gut that says that he will never be what he once was again. δὶς ἐς τὸν αὐτὸν ποταμὸν οὐκ ἂν ἐμβαίης, but still Martius will rise to his feet and dress himself in his enemy's garb.
He listens for sound, for speech, for something that will tell him that Aufidius returns and there is indeed something to be heard.
Thus, he is not surprised when the door flies open and a man stands there, gun raised, body trembling.
Does he know him? Martius does not think that he does, for no man that served under him would ever be such, unable to pull the trigger while he has the upper hand. There can be no hesitation in war, no uncertainty; as a poet said long ago, it is impossible to kill and question at the same time. And this man does, he wishes answers and blood and he is too young to know that one of those is impossible for Martius to give him.
“You,” the man says. “You did this to him.”
He does not say who he means nor what Martius did, but he has not learned how to hide his face, to wear the blank mask forged out of death and time and things long gone. He has never had to scrape and bow and while false smiles and soft hands drip poison from tongue to teeth and expect it to be swallowed whole. He can be read by anyone with eyes to see and it reminds him of a child he no longer can hold claim to.
“I did nothing,” Martius says. It is not a lie. It is not true. “Only what I was asked to do.”
“He wanted you to die.” There are tears in his eyes, a boy that sees one god fall at the hand of another, and has nothing left to devote himself to. “Why didn't you?”
“Because I commanded him to live,” Aufidius says, sunlight and shadow behind him, and the gun drops a second before the man does, both hitting the floor like a stone. His chest still rises, with only Martius to see how swiftly Aufidius took him down, a predator making easy work of prey that never knew what it was.
“I do not listen to your orders,” Martius says calmly, the knife still in his grasp. “You are not my master.”
Aufidius tilts his head, a fond beast that will not be leashed and yet will come to one's hand to sink its teeth ever so gently down. “We have none,” he says. “No gods, no masters, no men. Just us.”
This is why the world is silent, Martius thinks. This is why no birds sing, no voices chatter, no shots are heard around them. Aufidius has dragged him from the underworld and never looked behind, taken him and ran.
He looks at his arm. There are marks in it, faint as if something else has been dripped into him. If he looked at Aufidius's, would he find ones to match, or does he even need to look, when his veins burn with life that has been forced back in?
“So what now?” he asks. “Do we set our blades against each other until both of us are dragged down once more?”
Aufidius takes a step forward, then another, not the wild rush that sent them embracing out a window, but a more measured invasion that does not falter even at the risk of utter defeat. “We could,” he says, and his own knife taps against his side. “Or we could discover just how much of this world we might lay claim to before that.”
The wind blows through the room, carrying the scent of smoke. Behind Aufidius, Martius can see a truck, laden down with crates and packs. It's the sort that could carry two men a great distance, perhaps to the very end.
“We shall see,” Martius says and his mouth is ready for Aufidius's answer.