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Sinric lead Hannibal out of a doorway and into the warm light of spring afternoon. He cranes to look up, following the line of the wall and the buildings. "We're in the right place. The bath should be just through there."

He points to a alley that leads out the road and the grand entrance to the bath houses. "It is small by some standards. Only large enough for thirty or forty people. Many of the greater baths have closed for the cost to keep them is very high and many wealthy households have smaller bathes of their own."

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From:

cook_the_rude

Hannibal looks around and takes a few deep breaths before answering. "Yes, that is a problem for the traditional sentô public baths in Japan in my time as well," he says. "Interesting to find it here. And smaller means more intimate -- less risk of running into anybody who does know you after all."

From:

thewidewideworld

"Just so." The air has the scent of spice and dust and the human smells of a crowded city.

Sinric lingers across the road from the marble facade of the bath, giving Hannibal time to adjust. He gives Hannibal's arm a gentle squeeze and a small, welcoming smile.

Edited Date: 2015-10-06 08:10 pm (UTC)

From:

cook_the_rude

Hannibal turns his head to smile down into Sinric's eyes. "This is amazing," he breathes.

From:

thewidewideworld

"Let me show you something before we bathe." He nods for Hannibal and leads him several streets away to the city wall.

The original walls of Constantine the Great's city still stands, even if the modern city had grown and expanded well past them. However they are maintained, if nothing else but as a tourist attraction.

Sinric finds one of the public stairs and bounds up them nimbly, all exhaustion forgotten in his joy at sharing the city with his dear friend.

The view back across the city and down to the bay of the Golden Horn is not dissimilar to the drawing in Hannibal's office, only more majestic.

The afternoon light dances off the domed roofs of the Sacred Palace and Hagia Sophia. "My home." He whispers with pride and sadness.

From:

cook_the_rude

Hannibal has followed him up the stairs with steady step, and now comes to stand beside him, putting an arm around Sinric's shoulders.

"It is lovely," he answers, "and proud, and eternal. I have seen this view, mutatis mutandis, in my own lifetime, from a similar point. It never fails to amaze; but I love being here now, in this time, with you."

From:

thewidewideworld

Hannibal's words warm his love starved heart and he leans back into the embrace, resting his head on the tall doctor's chest.

"It is beautiful. The way the dawn lights the water of the Golden Horn at dawn, the way the bells of Hagia Sophia fill the streets with sound." He closes his eyes as if sealing the image away forever. "I shall miss it greatly."

From:

cook_the_rude

Hannibal sighs, looking out over the sea; then, he bends his neck to lean a cheek into Sinric's now-dark curls. "Carve this upon your mind," he whispers, "in this moment, you were happy."

From:

thewidewideworld

Sinric nods, leaning his slight weight against Hannibal's strong arms, feeling the warmth of his breath play against his hair. "In this time, in this place, I knew love." He whispers to himself, holding Hannibal's arm around him.

From:

cook_the_rude

"You do," Hannibal says. "You did. Something to hold on to through your wandering days."

His arms tighten around Sinric, closer, warmer.

From:

thewidewideworld

"Even if my path never passes this way again, this place with never leave me. Home and hearth with die with Constantine but I will carry the memories till my end. And I will have shared it with you."

He is glad of the strength of Hannibal's embrace, a touch he would not have been able to bear even a year ago. Today or feels like being held safe against a strong wind, protected from a dire fall.

From:

cook_the_rude

"These moments is all that we have," Hannibal says. "Beautiful by our very knowledge of their fleetingness. Mono no aware is what the Japanese call it -- who are even now entering into the early Heian period, a long and classical time of peace. Tell me, Sinric, how far East would you like to go?"

From:

thewidewideworld

He slips out for Hannibal's arms to look east, putting the city at his back. "The end of the silk road at least. The palace of the Sino Emperor. From there, who knows. I know little of what lies beyond."

From:

cook_the_rude

"You might be the very first European in Japan," Hannibal muses, smiling into his face. "Because you know where it is."

From:

thewidewideworld

"Perhaps. If I am welcomed there. From what little I have read, it may be a place not open to travellers."

From:

cook_the_rude

"Oh, it is, at this time!" Hannibal says. "It only closes off, oh, eight hundred years in the future."

From:

thewidewideworld

Sinric chokes a small laugh. "Then I need not hurry my journey to get there before the gates close."

From:

cook_the_rude

"Harbours," Hannibal says. "It is an island -- that is why it was so easy to close when they finally did it."

From:

thewidewideworld

But surely even an island city has walls.

Not that Sinric asks that aloud. That he can find out for himself later. For now he simply enjoys the setting sun at his back.

"Then one day perhaps I will see their harbour for myself. As you see my city now - as a traveller and collector of experiences."

From:

cook_the_rude

"And an amazing and unique experience it is," Hannibal says, putting his arms back around Sinric.

From:

thewidewideworld

He leans back into Hannibal for a minute, eyes closed as he centres himself. "But I am robbing you of the core of it with my maudlin thoughts. Let us bathe and take in the beauty within the city as well as the view across it."

From:

cook_the_rude

"I am as interested in listening to your thoughts as I am in experiencing your beauty and your talents," Hannibal says. "But yes, let us."

He bends to kiss Sinric again.

From:

thewidewideworld

Sinric returns the kiss with a soft sigh, permitting himself to enjoy it but glad of the fall of dark curls that protect him from being recognized.

What he is doing is treason here - to have taken a lover without his master's consent, to be absent from the palace without leave. For all Constantine's kindness and love, Sinric is outside the rule of law in this.

Pushing that from his thoughts, he breaks the kiss and leads Hannibal down the stairs.

The entry hall of the bath is large and majestic, retaining all the glory of its pre-Christian art in the sculpted figures that line each wall of the domed room.

From:

cook_the_rude

Hannibal follows him, looking left and right and stopping when they reach the entry hall.

He takes a deep breath.

"It reminds me of a hammam, but there is a subtle difference," he says. "Thank you for bringing me."

From:

thewidewideworld

"You will have to tell me of this hammam when we return to the bar." Sinric smiles. He speaks to Hannibal in the English of Hannibal's time, as he has learnt it at the bar. Without the bar's native translation, his accent has a slight clip of the something between modern Italian and Greek.

A Nubian girl greets them, her skin onyx black and lightly oiled to shine. She bows to them and smiles, a little mechanically.

Sinric requests entrance for two and use of a private area in the palestra. He paid her with two bronze 40 nummus. With a slight of hand visable only to anyone really watching, he slipped her a third coin, meant as a tip and an understanding between slaves.

Her smile turned genuine for a moment and she bowed. "This way, sirs." She guides them into the apodyterium, fetching them each a clean linen towel, showing the clothing niche intended as their locker.

From:

cook_the_rude

"I have seen a place like this in ruins," Hannibal murmurs. "It is lovely to see it alive, as it were."

He's taking off his cloak already, and opening his belt.