Wonders In The Crescent Sea

"I give her the Crescent Sea." I answered Lunacia's father, emperor of Chanati, with stubbornness. My head was low and my arm upon my one knee as I knelt before him. I wished to persuade him and win over a wife. "That is what I give her. Of all the men to fail the endeavors of your great vision, none have bestowed upon you your wishes. I crushed the Selacian revolt and crucified their leaders. I enslaved the Chanokic and you've made a standing army out of them. I even claimed the Province of Chanati. The lands we so stand on now. If you have doubt in yourself about me, I would question such thoughts. I would hold them captive and question these thoughts."

I challenged him. A great man who had stood before me in all his glory. Tall and broad shouldered as the gods are; dressed in purple and gold shaped in rippling muscles and an eagle upon his chest. Even the old world of Roma would wish to have statues in his image.

"If it is the old empire you want restored, it is I that will give it. I will have influence over the Crescent Sea."

And so, by the next full moon, he gathered his ten legions of Chanati and conjured a fleet but before, I kiss Lunacia under the white disk of the black sky. We share a moment in the night in silence until the day comes and I leave as the moon does. With this fleet gathered, Lunacia's father warred with the Talucian fleet on the bright waves under a blazing sun; the greatest fleet of Nova Roma. He led them westward and also flanked from the east, opening a passage for me to slip through to the port city: Clara Portum.

As the battle of the Crescent Sea raged, which Lunacia’s father fought bravely in, I had but a quick passage into Talucia. Lunacia’s father had given me two of his legions and I gathered them then marched onto the shores of Talucia and surrounded the smallest cities. I collected two cohorts and besieged the second largest city in Talucia and sent the remaining men of my legions under the command of my best commander: Lunanerio to surround Nova Roma. I had to destroy Nova Roma’s reinforcements before they could strengthen the men of Nova Roma and the seas therein. To my surprise, the city and her men were on the way to bolster the capital. We intercepted and defeated the army with ease and captured the city. They did not expect us, they were disorganized and even if they had expected us, their own disorganized army would have fallen as fate would have it. 

For months, we restored greater numbers of young men who I convinced to fight for the Imperium and those who did not were banished or killed so as to not raise a revolt. I told them of better times of great emperors of old. I made them believe they could be as such. I made five additional cohorts and led them to many other cities where we would eradicate their old dogmatic laws and foolish senates. 

With these cities, I wished to quell the rivers of food, metals, and precious things that flowed into the grand city of Nova Roma; starve out their armies, make their strongest men thin twigs of bundle wood, make their minds into ravenous animals as they were, and crush their wills. I did. I brought the city to their knees and took their people. The men of Nova Roma were reaped from the Mexicanius Provence as slaves, and their training were the poorest of all. Mareius and his generals provided little bravery nor a stance for them to stand and so they fell, bringing another piece for my allowance. I remembered I had smiled when my close commanders gave me the information of how they were trained; it made me think of the glory I’d show Lunacia when all was mine to give.

I waged war with Mareius and executed him in his own city as well as his senators. I had them thrown from the center palace to their deaths for treasonous actions, betraying the Imperium as Mareius' father did. And through it all, I knew I was preparing my gift. Through the carnage and collapsing walls of Nova Roma, I knew I was sewing a better world for the Imperium with the threads of securing the Crescent Sea strongholds.

I wished for glory. I wished for our broken Imperium to be as it was, make a legacy. I never knew the full Imperium, my father hardly knew it but the stories brought me from the bound chains of a lost child to where I am in this day. Rose me out of the filth of the dirt because of a dream of peace and into the sunlight. Allowed me to take up a sword and have a chance to kill the men who tore the precious Terra Nova to pieces.

In the heat of the sun, I rest. I sit upon the chair of my palace in Clara Portum and look out into the north where Lunacia comes. The sails that drive her ship wave and wonder in the breeze. A fleet of 10,000 men and Lunacia's father are racing towards me. I had removed all resistance on the islands for her, and prepared this land for her to see. Five years to prepare my gift. Five years since I last gave her that kiss. Five years of shredding red for my love: the blood of barbarians for my heart to live. Razed cities to the ground for peace in my time, one state at a time but for me and Lunacia, we will not see the flower form again. The whole collection as it was before me. I do not care. This is my gift, my life and I'm filled with glee.

This day, we will raise red. Now, our standard stands high on the ports. The welcoming and certification of this imperial Province into a senatorial Province as it once were.

The weeks before Lunacia’s arrival, I, my legion, and a few hundred slaves, who I commanded to do so, made the walls white. The walls do not stand high now but soon to be. Exotic animals that had come from afar roared and squawked from leashes or from in cages inside the palaces. We awaited to throw grand festivals and celebrations for a new province, for a gift

I want to bring this all to her sight. 

I walk to the port and my heart flutters just a little. I led my horse down to it from her reigns. Swords have neared my face, spears have impaled my leg, men have cried out my name as their dying breath for me to save them, and I had to block what I felt to stay strong in these moments. Harden my heart even in the death of friends but there’s a time for mourning. There’s a time for war, a time for learning, there’s a time for love, and the time of love is now. And here, I let myself feel. Let my thoughts tie with Lunacia but after years of hardening, the effort is hard. I closed my eyes and wondered where I would show her first.

Lunacia always dreamed of the far away sweets of the bitter coco. I did not know why but she had told me that if coco were mixed in with sugar, there was a thing of bitter sweetness she had called chocolate. She told me she has heard stories from men who've ventured into the southern world for this and I heard it as well. Tasted myself but I had never came to taste bitter-sweets like chocolate. Nothing like it. Our trade with the Mexicanius Province became ours and since so, there was coco here. I had my men gather it and make this thing which waited in the palace of Nova Roma.

The ships come to port and Lunacia is the first to come down while her father organizes his men on the decks of the fleet. She’s adorned in a veil from the bugs so as to not blemish her darkened skin. I take her hand and I personally take her to Nova Roma on horseback. I do not look back. She holds me tight as we ride over the small plains of Talucia where yellowish-green grass flows, flanked by mild mountains clad in shares of mist.

The evening darkens the day as we arrive and we are welcomed into the criss-crossed gate. When the 10,000 men and the emperor arrive, a feast is thrown. All the livestock gathered from the cities that were taken, we burn and eat. We as a new people throw grand celebrations. Let fires lick high into the starry skies. We worship the gods that blessed us with victory over our enemies, give wives for our young and brave men, and gain another province in the Imperium as my honorarium to a magnificent woman. And during all of this, I take Lunacia out and away into our private space where the chocolate is and sit her down on the marble floor with me. A call a slave over to bring the chocolate.

“Five years.” She says to me from under her veil. “Again, a time for ourselves after five years. I craved you.”

The slave gives me a small chest and I place it on my lap. “As I you. And I gathered this land as an allowance for you. I bestow this all to you.” We sit beside the open doorway to a balcony where the island is lit by the silvery light of a full moon without shade. Where mild mountains glow softly and a sea beyond, rages. “Every piece is yours while the death of everyone is on me. The inevitable consequences is in my strength to suppress. But what my true gift to you is this.”

I take the coco out of the chest, split the chocolate in two and give Lunacia-Mare a piece of the chocolate what she's wished for since a child who heard stories. Her eyes light with astonishment for my memory of what she wanted but how could I forget all she loved? My gift in favor of my love; wonders in the Crescent Sea.

-Bellum Lunatum - 685 AD

End