175 AD, Roman Empire
They came early morning. Nobody expected a raid.
Aelia was a slave woman in her early thirties working for a family of patricians in a small border town of the Pontus province in the Eastern Roman Empire. Like other slaves she started her day before anybody else in her household doing menial tasks. This morning she was retrieving the clothes of her masters' family at the fullones, the cleaners. The shop was near the town square and normally a ten minute walk although she knew the walk back would be longer because of her burden of all the garments. When she went out, she saw slaves from other households starting their day too. Rising so early gave her a chance to enjoy the town in relative peace before the rest of the town awoke and the day's cacophony began. Aelia knew that in just a few hours later the hustle and bustle of carts and the shouts of traders would fill the streets and she would not be able to hear herself think.
The empire and especially this stretch of land were enjoying a long period of peace and prosperity. Some of the inhabitants couldn't even remember when armies would pass by on their way to war. As a consequence, trade flourished.
Walking through the quiet streets she thought about her homeland on the other side of the Black Sea. She was taken as a small girl from her family after her tribe had mounted raids in Roman territory. To punish the raiders the Romans responded with a raid of their own to assert the Empire's power. The soldiers that arrived took the Empire's payment from the raiders in the form of several hundred villagers who were forced into slavery and spread throughout the empire.
After she had been taken she was trained to be a house slave in Byzantium where she was purchased by her current master. Within a few weeks they moved to a border town where her master obtained a lofty administrative position within the local government.
In general, life was dull for Aelia. In the mornings she had her cleaning and other menial tasks while in the afternoon she mostly cared for her master and his family. She was the only slave of Justus and Aeliana Tulius, their son Philos and their two daughters Quintia and Cassia. At first Aelia took on the role as a young babysitter for the children, but now they were all grown up. Quintia and Cassia were 24 and 21 while Philos just turned 19. Aelia had grown especially attached to Philos whom she had seen grow up from a ten year old boy to a handsome young man.
In Byzantium she made friends with other slaves her age and even had time for a romantic relationship. But, the border town was too small to have a large population of domestic slaves in private ownership and certainly few of her age. Most of the slaves were from nearby and were older than herself. In Byzantium even as a slave she could see a gladiator fight or talk to people her age in the few hours of a day she didn't have to work, but there was little other entertainment there.
In the duller moments of her days she often caught herself thinking of home. Details were fading from her memory, after all it had been ten years since she had been taken. But, she still remembered the good times; playing in the meadows with the other children, riding the horses and teasing the sheep. She dreamt of buying herself free one day and traveling back to her home country.
Suddenly, she was startled from her reverie when the peace of the street was shattered by a crashing sound in the distance. It sounded like it was coming from the gates. Aelia could hear the clanging of swords and the sound of a horse in full gallop coming her way. She was nearly knocked to the ground by the soldier riding it as he hurried to the western gate.
A horn was blown and a group of slaves ran past her, their eyes wide with terror.
'Run, run', one said as he continued running .
Aelia hurried down the street without looking back. When she arrived at her master's home, she hid in its basement.
'Were they still sleeping upstairs,' Aelia thought to herself of her master's family. She considered warning them, but thought better of leaving her hideaway.
------ Two hours later ------
Hiding in the basement, Aelia could hear soldiers running and doors being smashed in. It sounded like people were being taken from their homes and rounded up. After about an hour the noises quieted and it seemed like the soldiers had gone.
Aelia slowly came from hiding to find her master's house abandoned.
'Where is everybody,' she thought. She hurried to a window and saw no one in the street. In the distance though, she could hear the foreign soldiers shouting on the square.
Aelia crept from the house and hid behind a wall near the square. She could see a few dozen villagers sitting in a group in the middle of the square, all of them scared and confused. She recognized many of them as her master's neighbors. Mothers held on to their daughters and men maneuvered themselves in front of their families in an attempt to protect them.
The townspeople were surrounded by foreign soldiers wondering what would happen to them and what the soldiers were waiting for. Who were these attackers, many wondered? Would they be sacrificed to some unknown god or would they be used as slaves in an unknown country? Some yelled to the soldiers that they had wealth and riches for them if they would just let them go.
Aelia gasped when she saw the children of her master in the group. Philos was holding his two sisters tight while their wild eyes betrayed their panic. Her master and his wife were nowhere to be seen.
The soldiers just stood there and seemed to wait for something. Their posture and concentration showed a great deal of discipline. The invaders looked human but there was something different about them that made them appear remarkable. Many of them looked almost Herculean. They were a few inches taller than the average human and their strong musculature was visible through their uniforms. Aelia thought she could even see some women among the soldiers themselves displaying power and strength with only their bodies.
'These are not ordinary barbarians,' Aelia thought.
All around the guarded group in the square, chaos continued. The battle, if it could be called that, was decided the moment the first invader's spear was thrown. Nevertheless, pockets of the town's defending soldiers were still battling the interlopers. Buildings burned and occasionally screams could be heard, the strange attackers were now roaming the streets freely, rounding villagers up into groups.
Because of the long peace the border town had enjoyed, only a small garrison of Roman soldiers protected it. The garrison was made up of soldiers who were not deemed effective enough to use at the front lines. Many counted themselves lucky to have landed such an easy assignment and were not prepared for invasion. They were no match for the assailants.
Beyond the square, in between the buildings, Aelia noticed a group of townspeople calmly walking in a line behind several soldiers. They were headed for the western gate. They seemed complacent, there were no screams or whimpers like those coming from the group in the square.
Aelia wanted to follow them but she couldn't leave without exposing herself. She also had to find her master. Maybe he would know what to do.
Suddenly, at the corner of the square, there was a flurry of movement. The soldiers guarding the townspeople looked towards the commotion to see someone approaching. The new arrival wore a helmet adorned with an enormous eagle. Obviously a leader, the approaching soldier appeared larger than the other invaders and was escorted by four more soldiers.
The leader walked with purpose and stopped before the cowering group of villagers. He was an imposing figure, much larger than even the strongest of the town's garrison. Sweat mixed with dust streaked his muscular legs and taught abdomen. But, even with a similar physique, the man had a strange, almost alien look about him. Even for that, Aelia found him extremely handsome. His visage raised an unfamiliar excitement in her abdomen.
After inspecting the villagers, the leader called something out to a man in front of the group. Aelia couldn't make out what he said, she saw the man reassure his wife and stand up.