Fic: A Dish Best Served Cold
Title: A Dish Best Served Cold
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 672
Warning: for implied noncon
Summary: Placidus does not like to be humiliated….
Disclaimer: The characters aren’t mine, I’m simply having fun with them.
Author’s notes: Written for Round 2 of the Eagle Fanmedia Challenge, inspired by the picture of the hands. Set towards the end of the movie when Marcus and Esca return the eagle. Sorry it’s so short.
“He is not a slave,” Aquila had said, “and he knows more about freedom and honour than you ever will.”
Those words had pierced Placidus like a thousand bee stings and his skin burned and prickled as he watched Aquila and his barbarian Briton walk away side by side, striding out boldly with their heads held as high as emperors. He had never expected them to return from their foolhardy mission, in fact he had almost forgotten about them until they had walked in and disturbed today’s discussions, bringing with them the lost eagle standard. Placidus tried to ignore the murmurs of astonishment and praise resounding around him as every man present whispered of nothing but the scale of Aquila’s achievement. The very man who had insulted him was being hailed a hero when he should have been rebuked for his arrogance, eagle or no eagle.
Placidus’ face stung anew as Aquila’s words echoed once more in his head. He had never been so humiliated. How dare the man talk to him in such a way! The barbarian was an animal, all the natives here were; savages sprung from the diseased womb of this wretched land. That painted whore had no right to look at a Roman of Placidus’ standing with such undisguised disdain.
Different, secret thoughts then stole unasked into Placidus’ head as he stared after the two of them, unable to look away; thoughts that only deepened his shame and made him start to sweat uncomfortably beneath his toga. They had almost disappeared from sight now, Aquila and his man, one tall and ungainly, the other slender, smaller; wiry strength contained within a compact and eye-catching form. Placidus remembered looking at the barbarian once before, at the dinner with Claudius Marcellus and old Aquila. Oh, how he had wanted him then, desire stirring within him and making his cock harden at the dinner table. The slave (as he was then; as he should be still) had stood silent and scowling in the shadows and Placidus had imagined using him, humiliating him, asserting his dominance over another man’s slave. If Aquila, that lumbering son of tainted stock, had not lost his temper over a perfectly innocent remark, Placidus had been considering asking for use of the slave as a pleasant after-dinner amusement while the old men lost themselves in reminiscences of the past. He had seen the swirls of ink on the barbarian’s arm and had known what it meant. The slave had once fancied himself a warrior and the thought of showing him how far he had fallen, fucking him like a common whore, had made Placidus’ desire all the more acute.
He felt no desire now though as he stared down at his hands, palms up in front of him, trembling with the anger that had begun to overcome his shame. Once, he had imagined those hands spread wide on the barbarian’s painted skin, holding him still, controlling him but now he clenched them into tight fists. Anger, shame, jealousy; he felt them all keenly, mixed in with the nausea that coiled uncomfortably through his gut. He was Servius Placidus, tribune, Roman, and he was not without connections or influence. One day he would make Aquila sorry for speaking such harsh words to him. One day he would see that smug smile wiped from the barbarian’s face, replaced by the downcast eyes of humiliation and pain.
One day, Placidus promised himself as he unfurled his fists and gazed down at the livid red crescents his fingernails had dug into the soft skin of his palms, he would have his revenge.