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"Oh, Cassius, kid me not with your dramatics," I shout with too much force, his breath rushing against my nose in short bursts.
Suddenly, with surprising grace about him, he drops to his knees.
His gaze hits me through the glass of his dark eyes. I must have focused upon his line of sight for too long because he flinches toward the floor, falling upon the ankles below him.
My hands burn at my sides, sharp tingles squeezing up my arm. I reach out, timid as a doe, not quite touching; only then does he relax against me, nuzzling against the jutting bone of my hip.
Craven as I'd been up until this point I finally touch the flesh of his scalp. I would feel a sense of guilt for messing up the curls he tames so tirelessly, but the thickness of each strand against my hand gives me a sort of grounding in this moment that I cannot go without.
It's at this point my hand rapidly burns, almost as if his head was the earth's core itself; I realize, with all amazement, the tingle previously felt must have been him in some way, tied to my very nerves.
I am punched out of my daze by a series of mutterings against my leg. This I begin to realize, in a sort of resonance with him, is a murmuring of his apologies, an incessant susurrus, a beg of forgiveness.
I sink down to him, the very roots of my soul pulling me toward him.
"Stop that, stop that! Do not beg a fool, my dear Cassius."
His eyes slide up at me then, typical smolder now a conflagration working its way through both of us.
"Brutus, oh my dear Brutus," I try to quell the fever but it flows freely from him, "thou art truly noble, thou art good and I consist of ignominy,"
"hush with this nonsense you are a moral man Cassius"
"if I wasn't"
"I would worship thee still"
He shudders against me.
"I would worship thee absolute"
These words are not my own. These words kneaded out of me. His fire has loosened the rocks of my many mountains and an avalanche has struck us and we move rapt against each other.
---
We end up curled against each other in my cot, though I do not remember how. There are waterfalls dried on his cheeks, they no doubt linger on mine as well.
I pull at him, hands smoothing against his spine and we whisper to each other in the tenebrae of that night.
It is closer to dawn when he slacks against me at last. I ruefully gaze down upon him.
Despite myself I question why marble was carved into Caesar. He was a great man, of this I cannot rid myself, but marble, the making of Gods, that is only worthy of one beauty, the one heavy in my arms.
I curse myself for this blasphemy against the man whose crimson seeps beneath my nails. I curse myself for the want to take Cassius away from all this.
I fear that if I think on this too much I might carry it through, lift him off linen and take him towards Athens.
I cannot make of myself a fool. I cannot undo myself.
---
Once first light lifts my eyes I reverently rise, careful not to wake the slumbering crane.
It must have taken me centuries to fully leave his side, the finality of it burning up from my ankles.
I bite my signet ring from my finger, prying it off. It nestles into his hand, my skin rubbing against his a moment longer than I could bear.
At last I raise his palm to my lips.
"mi anime," I mouth against flesh.
I leave him there covered in morning fog, making sure to wrap him in linens, cover him from cold.
My crane.
---
"My lord, Cassius has been found."
Confusion wraps its way around me. "Found? Messala, I am not feeble-minded, he occupies the left flank."
"No general," speech fails him then, as if his open mouth finds nothing. I look at him, brows pointing inward. "What is it?"
Finally, with what appears to be a horrible deal of effort, he speaks.
"Cassius has fallen."
"Messala! Have you taken bribes? Why come to me with this dissemblance?"
"There is no perfidy, Brutus. He has gone to the shades."
It is as if I have stumbled into the bleak, winter's claws digging their way down my veins as if they are vines to climb.
"Take me to him."
"Brutus… a thousand paces of bloodshed."
A bellow rips out of me.
"Take me to him!"
---
He was right. Miles of crimson hollow follow our footsteps.
My head all nonsense, shouting in tongues, words becoming apparent as I gaze upon the gored dove.
I cry out his name, once, perhaps many.
As I get closer my wit fizzles.
My beauty is dead.
He is lifeless and his body sanguine. All of a sudden I am kneeling, cold against him.
"The last of all men," I roar. "Rome has fallen!"
I claw his frigid hands away from his pale eyes, clutching them against my cheek. A whisper falls upon his fingers.
"May you rest above Caesar."
I lay him to rest, flipping his staring eyes down, laying his arm against his chest. Cold sweat fills my mouth as my lips graze his forehead. I hold there briefly, soaking in my final taste of him.
"Oh my dear crane. In aeternum."
As I force myself back and take my final behold of him, I realize the cold pressed against my cheek was not gold formed from Junia's devotion but instead the gold placed upon him just this dawn.
In my final breath of him I feel nothing but selfishness.
My crane truly mine, the marrow of my very being imprinted onto him evermore.