milliways_bar | (no subject)

Tavi sits down, stretching his legs out in front of him, ankles crossed, relaxed and confident at once.

"The first Roman I met, actually. I thought he was Aleran until I asked--it was rather confusing for me at the time." He smiles at the memory. "I was reading Gaius Julius' book on the Gallic Wars that day. It's part of our ancient history, as good as lost--you can imagine what it was like to meet a man who knew him personally."

A very slow smile spreads across the Queen's face.

"You are speaking to a woman who knew him very personally," she says, slowly. "My heart was broken the day he was murdered. It was my dear Antony that put me back together."

She touches one of the papyri fondly.

"They are both shining examples of men."

Tavi's eyebrows go up, and he sits up a little, interest in his eyes. "Really?" He looks--not quite happy, not quite admiring, but... fascinated, perhaps, is the word. And to an extent like he hadn't realized it before now.

He's done his research, since having access to the Bar, on just what the Romans were like, and who they were. He knows who Cleopatra is--and for him, they've talked before.

"It's an honor, my lady," he says, with all proper courtesy. "Gaius Tavarus of Alera."

She deserves that kind of respect from him.

She smiles softly, as she nods, setting aside her paperwork.

"Yes, they are both dear to my heart, as, I hope I am, and have been to theirs."

She inclines her head a little. Enough for a proper greeting.

"Cleopatra VII Philopator, Queen and Pharaoh of Upper and Lower Egypt, The Living Isis..., well, the titles do run on, don't they?"

She's a playful thing. Dangerously playful.

"I'm sure you are," he says with a faint smile.

And then his smile turns very, very rueful. "They do. Granted, Alerans have, for the most part, avoided the overload of titles--although they've managed to curse me with one."

He scowls a little. That 'Magnus' at the end of his name was so very much not his idea.

That letter, well, she knows the underlying thing is that he needs more troops sent to Athens...but, it's got his undying affection in it.

She makes sure to hold on to that. It helps her hold on to her kingdom.

"I think, out of all mine, I prefer Living Isis the best. Antony has been named Dionysis, so, it is fitting."

Tavi's expression is wry, with tired fondness for his people and their insanity.

As though he weren't the worse of the lot.

"We don't have gods as the Romans did, and technically I have no titles beyond being First Lord."

Then, with a roll of his eyes, he adds in exasperation, "They just decided to add Magnus to my name, and somehow all my persuasion couldn't get it out of the legal records. I still refuse to sign with it, but..."

For all his arrogance and knowledge of his own cleverness, he's surprisingly humble at times.

"Magnus...that is an interesting title," she says. "It has taken me a long while to learn Latin. It is...a difficult language to learn, but I'm mastering it. It surprises them, I think."

She shrugs.

"They are very....flowery, with titles."

With a roll of his eyes, "My friends and family keep using it when they know it will irritate me most."

The original Legion on Carna was one of Varus' lost three--and it's been about two millennia since then. In some ways, Tavi is a modern boy. Just a Roman one.

He smiles a little, wryly. "I think somehow our history beat some of the flowery tendencies out of us--though not entirely. We have Houses of the Valiant and Faithful, for those who have performed above and beyond the call of duty in service to the Realm. My step-father's been called Valerian since he was a young man. But for the most part..." He shrugs and smiles. "Life was too brutal on Carna to waste time on it for a while."

"I believe the Romans insist on making time for these things," she says, laughing. "There's nothing like the rituals and self-important tendencies they have..."

Though, she's got plenty of her own. She just doesn't see them as empty, of course.

"They mock us for having animal headed gods...while they, for the most part, have empty heads."

She looks around briefly for Antony...who may not like to hear her speak that way.

Tavi's eyebrows go up a little, looking faintly amused.

"My own people consider my wife's to be animal-worshiping barbarians--but then Kitai tells me, repeatedly, that Alerans are all utterly mad."

And then, more wryly, and with a kind of chagrin,

"I sometimes think she's right."

"And what people are your wife's? Egyptian, perhaps?"

She finds this an interesting thought.

Tavi laughs.

"No--as far as I can tell they're not even from the Earth the Romans came from. They're stronger than humans naturally, pale, higher body temperature, white hair and canted eyes."

There's a slight head tilt as she looks over at him.

"Interesting. A different race of people..."

She doesn't really know what to think of that.

Tavi nods, spreading his hands a little in a gesture of-- not quite uncertainty, more simply a careless acceptance that this is a fact he likely can't learn.

"It's not entirely clear how different they are from us. Most Alerans still don't consider them 'human' the same way as we are."

He looks a little irritated and saddened by the fact--but there's resolve, underneath that, to change it. And anyone who stands in his way really ought to take to the hills.

She knows that resolve. It's something she's had inside her for many years.

"'Human' is a very relative term. In my lands, it is better to be above the status of 'human'. Perhaps her people are gods."

Which would serve the naysayers right.

At that Tavi laughs richly, head tilted back, eyes dancing in sardonic amusement.

"Kitai would love that," he chuckles. "And would never let it go, either. We don't have gods per se," not counting the pantheism of the Marat, of course, "but it would be infinitely amusing."

His smile is subtly wry, despite a kind of untarnished, almost boyish delight.

"Everywhere has gods," she says frankly. "Just not everyone chooses to acknowledge them. The worse for them."

Gods can be brutal. She is a living example of this.

"But it is good that she would get enjoyment out of it if it were true."

"Oh, she'd be amused even more if people thought it without it being true."

Though she'd just laugh and call Alerans mad--she does that anyway.

He rolls a shoulder in a shrug. "The closest we seem to have are the Great Furies--self-aware personalities in the land, though not quite sentient. They've been known to get... very irritated with Alerans."

She nods, "If your people are much like the Romans I know, they are very much, 'kill first, ask questions later' kind of people. They do not take care of their lands as they should."

Which is part of the reason they're dependent on Egypt for so much.

Tavi grimaces a little. "Yes, we did inherit that to an extent," he says a little bleakly.

His eyes are a little tight, lost in a memory and old, partially healed grief.

"I'm doing what I can to change that, though." He'll ram peace down their throats whether or not they like it.

His words make her blink a little, and frown. In a way he reminds her of several people at once.

The most dangerous of which is Octavian.

"In moderation. Pushing things too far too fast does not go over well."

Coming from someone that knows.

That should stand to reason, all things considered.

Tavi smiles a little, faintly and very sadly.

"If you're trying to change the foundations of a civilization which still stands--stagnation or not--perhaps that is true."

He shakes his head. "But two whole civilizations, possibly even three, were left in near-ruin by the warring of my youth. I'm having to rebuild from first principles--and those principles will have something more resembling justice."

The tavar of the Canean continent is a small, wolverine-like creature which can kill a warrior-wolf many times its own weight, and is brilliant, mad, and suicidally brave.

There are reasons why, upon meeting him, the Canim named him Tavar.

She watches him very, very carefully.

She's really seeing similarities.

"It is not meant for one man to change the world," she responds quietly. "Especially in a fortnight."

Tavi grimaces. "I'm still losing sleep over it, and it's been ten years since I started--twenty if you count the first, accidental alliance," he adds with a wry smile.

So he convinced age-old enemies of his people, involved in the battle which killed his father, to make friends with him personally--and bonded to and married their de-facto princess.

Oops.

"It isn't something that will be finished in my lifetime, or my son's, or his. If the Alliance I've built survives the one and a half to two centuries before our civilizations are threatened again, I will have had some small measure of success in my life."

Perfection is, by definition, impossible for people to really achieve--but that doesn't mean the House of Gaius will ever stop trying. And in Tavi's case, he tends to take a view of things far longer than most can manage.

His eyes turn to the window, almost involuntarily, the lights in them reflecting in his eyes. "But our work--that of my House and those who stand with us--won't ever be finished, if it's done correctly. Not in a hundred lifetimes and more. So I sow what seeds I can, hoping one day they'll bloom in more colors than even I can imagine."

Does he normally tell people this? No, not really. More frequently in the Bar, certainly--there are more people his equal here.

But he can sense that caution, and answers the silent communication he's picking up in words.