The Alpha Emperor’s Resurrection

14: Talia

The incident in the temple shook me in a way I couldn't admit to Aurelia.

She didn't understand why I was so disturbed by the Priestess - the last time I had seen that woman was before Aurelia was even born.

The significance of seeing that woman in that place was harrowing for me, though.

The Priestess had, in her own way, helped me to sacrifice the immortal werewolf who transformed me from a human. Caius had been responsible for my transformation, but Juventas had been the one to physically rob me of my humanity, and I had needed vengeance to be able to move on.

I had sacrificed a cruel, heartless woman - I was supposed to remember what she was, and I had vowed never to become as cold and jaded as Juventas.

When the Priestess appeared, I was reminded of Juventas for the first time in centuries, and I was afraid that she had come to tell me my time was up.

Instead, she had asked me what I would sacrifice to bring Caius back, and I hadn't been able to answer her.

Aurelia was the only thing I cared about, but Nemesis wasn't asking me to sacrifice my only child and I didn't think I had anything of worth left to give...it began to feel like a cruel joke.

The Priestess could have given me another life with Caius if she wanted, but I had nothing of value - perhaps making me think about that was the point.

I left Aurelia in the city. She knew my head was a mess, but it was about more than that; I was afraid that I would lose her, or that she would offer herself to bring her father back. I knew that she would only be safe if I left her until I understood what was happening, but I couldn't explain it to her.

When I tried to find her again, I found that she was staying outside of the city in a Villa near our former home.

She wasn't alone - she was staying with three other people, and one of them...one of them was her father.

I should have gone to them as soon as I found out, but I couldn't face Caius when I didn't know what had been sacrificed for him to be back.

I wasn't ready to talk to him again.

It felt unreal every time I thought of it, and I was afraid that things would be different between us now.

I knew that our relationship had been far from perfect, but I was afraid that all of the things we had loved about each other would be forgotten if I went to speak to him.

Would he even remember that he had loved me? Or would he only remember the things that we had fought about? Would he remember me at all?

He looked far younger than he had the last time I saw him; the body he left behind was that of a man in his twilight years, and it had been engulfed by the flames of the funeral pyre I had set ablaze on my own - a solemn figure wreathed in fire, illuminated by a red-orange glow that seemed to pierce through the night. The acrid smell of burning wood and embers had haunted me for decades, and the bitter tang of smoke still made me choke for more than one reason.

Aurelia should have been the one to light that fire, but she couldn't stand the thought that he would be gone forever when the fire's work was done.

The man I had seen her with… he was in his early to mid-thirties, at a guess. An educated guess, because he looked around the same age as he had been when I first met him.

He was tall, and muscular, with dark brown hair and the same warm skin tone she had inherited from him - he was as commanding as he always had been, too, even though the world he had ruled over with me at his side was long gone.

There was no doubt in my mind that it was Caius, despite the fact he was younger than he had been when I last saw him.

Even without hearing his voice, I knew him so intimately that the way he moved and the way Aurelia interacted with him was all the evidence I needed.

But the way he interacted with the others… I didn't think my return would be entirely welcome as far as they were concerned. I wasn't sure exactly what was going on between them, but they seemed to be close, and they were teaching Caius the things he needed to adapt to his new life in a far kinder way than I had been taught the things I needed to be able to live in Rome when I was captured.

In the end, I decided that I needed time. I was conflicted about how different it was for him to be shown a terrifying new world when he had ultimately been responsible for the misery that I had to endure when I learned Latin and worked tirelessly to earn my place amongst the ranks of the highest regarded Courtesans in his city. I didn't resent him for it, but the similarities between his situation and my own were undeniable and that time in my life was one I had never truly been able to move past.

Needing more time was perhaps the most ironic conclusion I could have drawn about my complicated feelings when I had waited so long to see him again, but I was willing to wait - I needed to... and Caius needed time to settle into the world.

It would have been selfish of me to intrude on Aurelia's time with her father, anyway. So, I stayed away from them, watching from a distance and waiting for the right time to speak to Caius again, when I wasn't even sure it would ever come.