Mark Paren
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Everything posted by Mark Paren
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Thank you. It’s always a pleasure to know that my story resonates with readers in the way I intended.
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I can tell the history hasn’t been lost on you. You’ve picked up exactly the tensions I hoped would surface. I’ve kept faith with the true story for the most part, though I’ve bent it slightly here and there, the way a story sometimes insists you must.
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Loyalties will be tested.
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They did not speak of leaving until it was already happening, the horses saddled and the fire's ash scattered before either of them found words for it. Marcus looked back once, at the grove's dark canopy closing over the path behind them, and felt something in his chest tighten around the leaving the way a hand tightens around something it isn't ready to set down. He did not say so. He suspected he did not need to. Ingomar rode a while in a silence that felt different from his usual unhurri
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What a wonderful quote! I must admit that I was unaware of it, but yes, the poem is very fitting for this point in the story. Thank you, you’ve triggered an exploration of Walter Scott.
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Thanks, this will probably be the shortest chapter of the story.
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The gold had gone out of the light by the time either of them moved, sliding first to amber and then, by degrees too gradual to mark, to the deep blue-gray that meant the grove was closing itself for the night. Marcus felt it more than he saw it, a coolness settling into the air where the warmth had lain against his shoulder a moment before, and understood, with a small reluctance, that stillness could not be asked to last forever, however much he might have wished it. "We should have a fir
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You’re reading it perfectly. One more contemplative chapter and things start happening.
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Slow burn, but the fire is catching.
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The gates of Vetera fell behind them a little after dawn, the fortress's noise thinning by degrees into birdsong and the steady rhythm of hooves on packed earth, until Marcus, glancing back once at the wooden walls receding into the morning haze, found he could no longer distinguish the shouted orders of the training yard from the ordinary business of any distant, indifferent world. "You look like a man leaving somewhere he's not certain he's allowed to leave," Ingomar observed, riding easi
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Petronus is an ass and Marcus is alone and vulnerable.
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Marcus is a typical horny sixteen year old with an impressive older man offering him attention. He's only human. We’ve all been there.
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Word reached the camp, the way word always seemed to travel faster than the men it concerned. Marcus heard it from Vitalis first, in the training yard, delivered with the particular dryness Vitalis reserved for anything he found more interesting than he was willing to admit. "Your Cherusci is coming in today. With the cousin, and half a dozen riders, if the gate watch is to be believed." He did not look up from the strap he was fixing on his own kit, though something in his voice suggested
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He was a national hero in Germany up until the end of World War II. He’s still recognized as an important historical figure. I portray him with nuance (I hope) in this story. i know Augustus wasn’t a fan at the time.
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Arminius was a complicated historical character. Depending upon your opinion on the Battle of Teutonburg Forest he is either a villain or a hero. I love history.
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All except one of the key elements are in placethe story should start moving more quickly from here. Thanks for the insightful comment.
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He needs to grow up quickly. Things are beginning to happen.
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The stag never heard him. That was the mercy in it, if there was one, a clean shot needed no permission from the thing it took. It went down without a sound of its own, only the heavy fall of it into the bracken, and Ingomar crossed the distance unhurried, the way his father had taught him, and put a hand flat against its throat before the last of the warmth left it. Not sorrow. Only the accounting a man owed a thing he'd ended. The column would eat well tonight for it, and that was reason
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The emperor never forgot or forgave him. Thanks for sticking with the story.
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Thank you for noticing Marcus’s growth. There are challenges ahead.
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Thank you for the encouragement.
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The Romans are facing significant uncertainty, though most of them are unaware of it yet.
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Sometimes I feel the same about today.
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The knock came before the sky had properly decided what color it meant to be, three soft raps against the tent pole in the particular rhythm Titus had settled on those first mornings at Vetera, quiet enough not to wake the camp, insistent enough that Marcus had learned to answer it without fully surfacing from sleep. “Master Marcus.” Titus slipped inside with the tunic already folded over one arm, the boots in the other hand, moving with none of the bright, tumbling energy that had carried
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“reflect the harsher environment of frontier life.” I’m going to try. Thanks for commenting.
