Mark Paren
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Everything posted by Mark Paren
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They mustered at first light on the plain below Vetera's walls, and Marcus, riding out with Varus's household to join them, understood for the first time in his life what it meant to see the full weight of Rome gathered in one place. He had grown up around soldiers the way other boys grew up around horses or hounds, familiar with the shape of them without ever quite being struck by what the shape amounted to when multiplied past counting. He was struck by it now. Three legions stood assembl
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Chapter 1 — The Peddler's Boy
Mark Paren commented on Mark Paren's story chapter in Chapter 1 — The Peddler's Boy
The story intensifies in chapter 4. The entire story should be posted by mid October. -
Chapter 1 — The Peddler's Boy
Mark Paren commented on Mark Paren's story chapter in Chapter 1 — The Peddler's Boy
Jack has a heavily internalized voice (think Oscar Wilde). At the start he is an uneducated New England farm boy. He learns his lessons the hard way. -
Chapter 1 — The Peddler's Boy
Mark Paren commented on Mark Paren's story chapter in Chapter 1 — The Peddler's Boy
I hope the 19th century gothic first person POV doesn’t get annoying. I thought I’d try something different. -
Fatum est. Gratias tibi ago pro adnotatione
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Things start getting interesting in the next chapter. Thanks for commenting.
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For a hundred and fifty years, Jack has walked a Connecticut county that has forgotten him, a farm boy who bartered his soul at a crossroads and paid for it twice over. Refused by Heaven, unclaimed by Hell, he has nothing to light his way but a stolen coal, and nothing to fill his nights but windows he can watch and never touch. Then he finds Julian's. Nineteen, chronically ill, and certain no one would notice if he stopped waking, Julian is exactly the kind of loneliness Jack was never allowed to love. As October tightens toward Halloween, the veil between them begins to thin, and an old bargain comes due.
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Chapter 1 — The Peddler's Boy
Mark Paren posted new chapter in Stingy Jack’s Last Trick — A Halloween Tale
Prologue There once was a man called Stingy Jack. He was a cunning man, the old folk say, and a stingy one besides, fonder of his coin than of his neighbors, and fonder still of his own cleverness than of either. One evening the Devil himself came looking for Jack's soul, thinking him an easy catch, and Jack, quick as ever, asked for one drink before the going. The Devil, being vain of his own powers, turned himself into a coin to pay for it, and Jack pocketed him quick beside a silver -
The last full day at Vetera did not feel like an ending. It felt like held breath. Marcus woke to the sound of wheels being checked for the third time that week, iron tires rung with a mallet somewhere near the granaries, a slow patient testing of what would carry weight and what would not. Ingomar had gone before first light, called to the horse lines to see to the guides' own mounts, and the bed had gone cold on his side by the time Marcus rose to it. He dressed slowly. There was nothing
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In retrospect, it seems inevitable. Rome felt itself invincible in the first century. Thanks for commenting.
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We’ll soon see if I can pull off the action scenes. Thanks for commenting.
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Glad you enjoyed it. Only seven chapters to go.
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They will be tested soon. Thanks for commenting.
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As you can probably tell, i have a fondness for Titus too. He’s a simple soul, but kind hearted. Arminius will make an appearance soon.
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The camp had begun to change shape around them, and Marcus had learned to read it the way he once read weather over the villa's garden wall. Carts stood in longer rows outside the granaries now, their wheels freshly greased. Farriers worked past the hour they usually stopped, the ring of hammer on hoof carrying long into the evenings. Somewhere near the horse lines a centurion was drilling a column of new recruits in the particular, unhurried patience of a man who expects to need them soon and w
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I’m not sure where versatile fit in Rome or the Germanic tribes, but I like to think what went on behind closed doors or in sacred groves was nobodies business.
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I appreciate the comment. I’m glad you’re enjoying the story.
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Big step for the boys. Neither the Romans nor the Germanic tribes would be fully supportive of it from either a political or moral point of view.
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Good insight.
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I appreciate it.
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Vetera had not changed in the two days they'd been gone, the same mud, the same drums marking the watches, and yet Marcus felt the difference the moment they passed the gate, some new quality to the way men's eyes moved over him and away again, a fraction too quick to be nothing. It was small things, at first. A pair of recruits at the water barrel who fell silent as he approached and did not quite resume before he'd passed. A groom who looked between him and Ingomar a moment too long while
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Marcus, Ingomar, Vitalis and Lucius will be tested soon.
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Thanks. The Romans did some amazing things.
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Gnaeus acts the way he does because that’s the way he thinks he needs to be. I knew several kids like him in middle school. Thankfully, I was one of the bigger fitter kids and they didn’t dare direct it at me or my friends.
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Thanks, appreciate it.
