This Fire Burns - Chapter 10

After my little wager with the Praetors, Jason and I were cleared to leave the infirmary. The rest of the cohort was still at afternoon training with the other centurion. I could’ve rejoined them, but I figured this was the perfect time for the two of us to finish our talk without an audience.

Except, things hadn’t gone according to plan. We walked back to the barracks without exchanging any words, and now we were just sitting on our respective bunks, occasionally glancing at each other.

Man, this awkward silence is killing me. Better to clear the air directly before it gets any worse.

“Well,” I started, breaking the quiet that had stretched for a solid five minutes. “I guess our fight earlier was pointless. How about we actually talk things out?”

Jason straightened his shoulders and retorted, “That’s what I tried to do. But you just wouldn’t listen.”

I waved a hand dismissively. “Hm, my bad then. Let’s actually try listening to each other this time, alright? I’ll even go first. Feel free to ask me anything you want.”

He hesitated for a second. Then asked, “Why? Why are you so resistant to following the rules? The legion has seen insubordinate demigods before, but no one was as defiant as you.”

I didn’t expect him to go straight to the heart of our entire conflict. But it might have been better that way.

“It ties into my idea of what a home should be,” I said slowly, not sure if it would make sense. “If I’m staying somewhere but it doesn’t feel right, I don’t want to be there.”

“So that’s the problem? Camp Jupiter doesn’t feel right to you?”

“It’s weird. Um, think of the Wolf House as an example. When I started out there, I had problems with all the wolves and the other demigods. But Lupa let me do whatever I wanted. I picked a fight with all of them, until eventually no one tested me. After that, Lupa started training me personally. We talked, I played around with her, she told me stories...”

My voice trailed off for a second. “And soon enough, it started feeling like a home. Maybe not a comfortable one, but a home nonetheless.”

Jason nodded slowly. “Freedom and connections then. You value your independence above all else, and you need people so you don’t feel isolated.”

I smirked at him. “Looks like you’ve been keeping an eye on me. Those are probably the two most important things for me to consider a place my home.”

“So what is it here? You get a lot of leniency from the Praetors, and you don’t seem to have problems with making friends around here either. Help me understand what’s missing.”

I thought back to what I’d expected before coming here. Lupa’s stories hadn’t painted a flattering picture. She’d told me about the endless duty while leaving out the parts about the city. The reality that it was more than a soulless camp, that it was a community.

“Being here is like being a compass needle. Right now, I’m at a place that’s so amazing. There’s so much dedicated to giving demigods a good future. So many people see it as their home. All that combines into this incredible force pulling at me. But there’s this other, fainter pull, somewhere in the opposite direction, that makes the needle tremble. It feels like I can’t ever fully settle.”

Jason’s gaze drifted to his forearm. To the SPQR, the eagle, the eight bars of service. 

“Maybe what’s missing is the choice,” he murmured. “You chose to fight the wolves and earned your place with Lupa on your terms. You didn’t choose to come here. I never had a choice either. For me, this camp just is. I’ve never known anything else to compare to.”

It wasn’t exactly the same, but I could see where he was coming from.

“Well,” I said, “that’s enough about me. You can tell me your side now.”

“For as long as I can remember, everyone has treated me differently. You know, people were already looking to me for orders when I was only six.” He looked down at his hands. “For you, independence is everything. For me, the only thing that matters is making sure no one gets left behind; the only way to do that is to become exactly what the legion expects me to be.”

That was admirable, even if I could never do the same.

I continued with my next question. “When we fought, it felt like I personally wronged you. So, when I arrived, what were your expectations of me?”

He looked me straight in the eye. “You were right about what you said earlier. I saw your power, and I hoped you could be a... partner. Someone to share the weight of it all. I was wrong to put that expectation on you; it was the same thing everyone has always done to me. For that, I'm sorry."

As he apologized, his expression showed honest self-reflection.

And I could work with that.

I couldn’t help but grin. “Alright. I don’t need to hear anything more. I’ve decided I’m going to burn away those expectations placed on you.”

Jason looked at me, confused.

“You see, because I’m around now, the legion has a new standard for what a powerful demigod acts like. So from now on, you don’t have to be so perfect. All you have to do is be slightly better than me. And I promise I’ll set the bar so low that you’ll look like a saint in comparison.”

For the first time all day, he let out a smile.

“Anyways,” I clapped him on the shoulder, “we’ve got our work cut out for us if we want to get the Fifth Cohort ready to win the war games. And our first move is morale! An army marches on its stomach, right? So, do you know any place around here where I can use an oven?”

“There’s a bakery on Via Praetoria, but I don’t think they would let legionnaires use the oven themselves.” He hesitated, then stood up. “But I’ll take you. If I put in a good word, the owner will allow it.”

My grin widened. “Alright then, Centurion Grace! Let’s get going.”

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[Leila]

Leila, daughter of Ceres and Centurion of the Fifth Cohort, watched as the cohort’s newest problem walked into the common room like he owned the place. He balanced a tray in his hands, a smug grin on his face, as if the duel earlier today and the chaos it caused had never happened.

Brownies. Of all things. He thought he could waltz into her cohort’s space with baked goods and fix everything?

The worst part was that the smell hit her before her indignation could finish rising. The rich scent of warm chocolate filled the air. As a daughter of Ceres, she had an instinctual connection to food and the nurturing it provided. What Serif brought carried the feeling of hope and safety.

She watched as the others, less suspicious than she was, descended upon the tray. 

Gwen was the first to crumble. “By the gods, this is a gift from Olympus!”

Dakota didn’t even try to restrain himself. He shoveled another two into his mouth before scrambling over to Serif and shaking his shoulders. “What is this magic? You have to tell me the secret. I swear I’ll make it worth your while!”

He fumbled in his pocket and brought out a pouch of cherry Kool-Aid, holding it out with both hands. “I have other flavors if you don’t like cherry!”

But it was Jason’s reaction that caught her attention. He was sitting right next to Serif, smiling as he took a bite. For a moment, her resolve faltered. Jason, who carried the cohort’s burden on his shoulders with grim determination, looked like a boy again.

“Leila!” Gwen called across the room, waving another brownie at her. “Come on, you’re the last holdout. Don’t make me drag you.”

Damn it all.

She accepted the offering with a skeptical frown, telling herself that it was just to be polite. But the moment she bit down, she understood the cohort’s reaction. 

It was perfect. Down to the last minute detail. The brownie filled her chest with warmth, like standing in front of a fire on a cold day.

She didn’t want to like him. She had prepared a list of grievances in her head: insubordination, creating public spectacles, a lack of commitment during trainings, and the humiliation of her co-centurion. Yet she couldn’t deny the effect he had.

Serif clapped his hands once, drawing everyone’s attention.

He cheerfully made his announcement. “Glad you all like them. ’Cause you’ll need the energy. I might have mouthed off to the Praetors earlier today.”

Of course he did.

Serif continued, completely unbothered by the sudden silence. “I may or may not have declared that the Fifth Cohort is going to win the war games this weekend.”

She felt a surge of fury. How dare he make a promise on behalf of the cohort?

Dakota nearly dropped his brownie. “We haven’t won in, actually, I don’t think we’ve ever won one.”

“You bet on us?” Gwen added, her eyes wide. “Serif, no offense to anyone here, but the other cohorts are way stronger than us, and they have all the best gear.”

Serif just grinned, “Yeah, well, we have me.”

Leila couldn’t hold herself back any longer. “A war game isn’t a duel. It’s about teamwork and discipline. Two things you’ve shown zero interest in.”

She expected him to deflect, maybe toss out another smug quip. Instead, he addressed the room with an infuriatingly steady confidence. “I was thinking it’s about time this cohort stops accepting last place. We’re going to get serious. We’re going to go all out. And we are going to win.”

He then turned, his gaze landing directly on her.

“Leila, you know the standard drills better than anyone. Except maybe Jason, since that’s all he lives for, but I’m going to need you to run the main group.”

Her first instinct was to refuse on principle. She had not become a centurion to be told what to do by a new recruit. But as she looked at Jason, all she received was a nod.

Jason is actually backing him up? After that duel?

She looked back at her cohort. Faces that usually held resignation now flickered with hope.

“I’m in if we get more brownies,” Dakota muttered to a few scattered chuckles.

She let out a sigh, knowing she had no other choice. “Alright then. If we’re doing this, we’re doing it right. The Fifth Cohort will fight as one. And we won’t hold back.”

------------------------------

We were at the Field of Mars. 

Jason and I observed from the sidelines as Leila barked orders like she’d been waiting years for the cohort to give this level of effort. They had finally moved beyond the mindless ‘hold shield, stab spear, repeat’ drill that I’d constantly seen since I arrived.

“Damn, they’re really going at it. I guess all they needed was a dose of PEDs. Or, wait, PEBs? Performance-Enhancing Brownies.”

“I’d credit a certain someone for inspiring them,” Jason said, the corner of his mouth quirking up. “But I thought this meant you’d finally be joining us for drills.”

I shook my head. “I’ll train, just in a different way. For demigods as strong as us, training with them is a lose-lose situation. We’ll only hold each other back.” I saw the frown starting to form on his face and elaborated. “Think about it. We’d force them to move at a pace they can’t handle, and they’d force us to slow down and never reach our full potential. We have to train separately.”

His frown deepened anyway. “A Centurion’s place is with their legionnaires. We lead from the front, not from the sidelines.”

“Relax, that’s what Leila’s job is. Our role isn’t to be part of the shield wall. We’re the living siege machines that’ll lead the charge and break through the enemy line so the cohort can sweep in and clean up.”

Jason looked back toward the cohort. Leila had them in a wedge formation now, with Gwen shouting encouragement and Dakota managing not to trip over his own feet for once.

“Fine,” he conceded with a sigh. “We’ll train our powers. But we are not going as hard as we did in our fight. I’m not interested in another trip to the infirmary.”

A cheeky grin spread across my face. “Well, duh. I don’t want to have to carry you there again. My back is still sore.”

I clapped my hands together. “Anyways, let’s get started. Forget about drills and all that formal crap, show me what you can do. The fun stuff only.”

Jason held out a hand, and a perfectly controlled gust of wind shot out, knocking over a target from fifty feet away. With his other hand, he dropped a bolt of lightning from the sky onto a different target.

It was impressive. He had both power and precision. 

And also lacked any joy.

I stuck my thumb down. “Boo! You stink! Boring!”

He shot me a look.

“But seriously,” I added, dropping the act. “It seems like all this is a chore for you. Like you’re going through the motions because you have to, not because you want to.”

“Training is about discipli—”

“Y’know, the first time I used my fire was when a pair of monsters cornered me in an alley. I was just eight and didn’t know what a demigod was, didn’t know about the gods or any of this Roman stuff. All I knew was that I was in trouble.” 

I held up my hand, letting tiny wisps of flames burn on my fingertips. “And then I found out about this. I kept my powers a secret, thinking I was the only one in the world. Like the protagonist of a story. So what did I do? I played. I spent all my free time messing around with my fire, trying to copy moves I saw from all kinds of fire-based characters. That’s why I’m so good with my powers. Fire’s a part of who I am.”

Jason looked thoughtful. “I never had that moment of discovery. I knew all about my heritage before I could grasp the significance of it. My powers were just another responsibility for me.”

“Alright, that's your assignment then,” I declared. “Stop thinking about what your powers are and start thinking about what you want them to do. Be creative. Try something that sounds stupid. Like, what if you shaped the lightning into a blade around your hand? Imagine stabbing a monster right through the heart and shouting ‘Lightning Blade!’”

Without saying anything, he flipped Ivlivs into his hand and let it transform into its lance form. He planted his feet, electricity crawling up the shaft, and then released. A beam of lightning arced across the field, vaporizing another target into a smoking crater.

He turned back to me. “How’s that?”

“Yeah, that works too! Oh wait, I got another idea. What if you ran a bunch of electricity through Ivlivs while it’s still a coin? Could you use that charge to fling it forward so fast it’s basically a bullet of lightning? You could even call it Railgun!” 

A one hundred percent original idea from me, like all the ways I use my power.

Jason considered it for a second before shaking his head. “No. It feels disrespectful to Ivlivs.”

I shrugged. As long as he was thinking for himself, my job was done. “You do you, I’m just the guy who makes up cool moves. It’s your loss if you want to put people to sleep.”

He crossed his arms. “Alright then, critic. You’ve had your fun with me. Now it’s your turn. Show me something you haven’t tried before.”

“Oh, is that a challenge I hear? Just watch me.”

Something new. There was an idea I’d been toying with for a while, but never got the opportunity to put it into practice.

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes.

Flames began to erupt from my skin in controlled streams. I directed them, willing them to swirl around me until I was completely encased in a roaring inferno.

Please tell me my eyes are glowing right now. That would really sell the look.

“This,” I announced, my voice distorted by the flames, “is an offensive and defensive aura. Since I’m a hand-to-hand fighter, anyone who wants to fight me gets burned the moment they get close. Plus, my own hits get that much more dangerous.”

And I definitely look cool.

I let the fire die down, feeling quite pleased with myself.

Jason’s mouth twitched like he was fighting a smile. “That’s impressive. But Serif?”

“Yeah?”

“You burned your clothes off.”

Slowly, I glanced down. Sure enough, not a scrap of fabric remained.

Ah. I thought I fixed that problem. Better do something about that.

------------------------------

[Vulcan]

Mechanized arms arced down from the ceiling, fitting celestial bronze onto frames of adamantine. This forge was his sanctuary, a place where logic triumphed over the fickleness of love.

Vulcan sat hunched at one of his more modest workbenches, which still had more processing power than a thousand mortal factories.

“Come on, you piece of scrap,” he muttered as he tinkered with a stubborn automaton leg. “You’d think I could create something that didn’t break itself after a century.”

Suddenly, a voice from a prayer arrived directly in his mind.

Hello, my esteemed godly parent. Wait, my bad. Maybe you don’t prefer that because I haven’t been claimed. Ahem. Greetings, Lord Vulcan.

Vulcan’s hand jerked, nearly snapping the delicate wire. He set his tools down with a heavy clank.

He quickly ran through the list of his children. There was Flint and Cole, both of whom have already been acknowledged by him. And then there were another two, Kendal and Blaise, who were too young to join the legion.

The voice he heard belonged to none of them.

Anyways, I wanted to ask if you could make something for me. Or maybe I’ll go on a quest for you, and you could reward me with it? Basically, the problem is I keep burning my clothes, and I end up naked. I was hoping you could make me a pair of fireproof pants. You don’t have to claim me or anything, I don’t really care about that part. This is all I’ll ever ask from you.

A prayer for pants. Of all the trivial requests he received from mortals, this was by far the most absurd. He dismissed the prayer as the ramblings of some unhinged demigod who had gotten his godly parentage wrong and was about to return to his work.

But before he could pick up a tool, a warm presence brushed the edge of the room. One that was much gentler than the searing heat of his forge.

“Vulcan? Are you there, nephew?”

Vulcan’s gruff expression softened. “Auntie. It is good to see you. Do you need something?”

Vesta was the only one he was willing to consider family. While the others saw him as a means to an end, she had always seen the person behind it. She was the only one who ever brought him a kind word without asking for anything in return.

She stepped closer. “I was hoping to commission a set of fireproof clothes.”

“Huh? You want me to make you some clothes?”

“Yes. I was hoping for the highest quality possible. I know such a request is beneath your usual standards, but I would consider it a personal favor.”

He froze. A strange boy praying for pants because he kept burning them. His aunt, who happened to be the goddess of the hearth, arriving moments later to commission the same thing.

“Auntie, does this have something to do with that prayer I just received?”

Vesta’s serene smile widened as she placed a hand on his shoulder. The comforting warmth he’d felt from her presence suddenly intensified, gaining a threatening edge.

“Actually, never mind,” he said quickly. “I don’t want to know. In fact, I’ve… I’ve recently been having problems with my memory. Must be the fumes.”

“That’s terrible, nephew!” Despite the sweet tone, her hand pressed harder into his shoulder. “But you’re right. With all the stress of your work, it’s for the best that you don’t trouble yourself with thinking too deeply.”

“Auntie, your hand is still on my shoulder.”

She ignored him, her gaze becoming distant as she began to list specifications. “We’ll want a full wardrobe, of course. He prefers fitted clothing, but not tight. He’ll tug at the seams if it restricts his movement. Oh, and make sure it doesn’t itch. He has this adorable nervous tic where he’ll scratch absentmindedly during serious conversations. Though I haven’t seen it from him in a while, so maybe make it a little itchy? No, what am I thinking, it’ll be better if it’s natural.”

“Do you have a camera following this kid?”

She ignored him again.

“And let’s not stop at simple fireproofing. While you’re at it, make sure the material has the durability of celestial bronze armor. Oh, and the pockets of the hoodie? Can you make them larger on the inside than they appear on the outside? Just enough to carry a snack and large amounts of Denarii.”

“I’ll get started right away.” 

Maybe once I'm done, Auntie will return to normal?