The legionaries barely had time to pull the tent flap aside before I burst through it.
Cool spring air struck to my face, but it did little to ease the pressure crushing my chest. I kept walking, desperate to put distance between myself and Mildred's words, until my vision blurred.
The ground seemed to tilt beneath me.
My knees hit the grass.
Bracing my hands against my thighs, I struggled to draw a steady breath as the world spun around me.
I only looked up when a shadow fell across the ground, where I was focusing at.
Marcus searched my face with those dark eyes of his, concern etched plainly across his features. His jaw was tight, like he hated seeing me like this but felt powerless to stop it.
Well, how else was I supposed to react?
Only moments ago, I was clinging on to foolish hope that there was a way home. Now I was being told that I might never leave. Mildred was right about one thing, though, everything played too well into Marcus's hands.
This was his ideal outcome. Me, here with him, living in his world instead of mine.
He was being summoned back to Rome, after all. Perhaps the Emperor had a greater command waiting for him. Another campaign, another victory, another step toward the future he had always been destined for.
Meanwhile, I might never see my parents again. Never hear my mother fuss over whether I was eating enough. Never watch my father pretend not to worry whenever I worked a late shift. Never spend evenings gossiping over wine with my best friend. Never complain about impossible patients, hospital politics or long hours to Julie while stealing a coffee break between rounds.
Every piece of my life felt as though it was being stripped away, one by one.
And I never even got to say a proper goodbye.
"Elena."
Marcus's voice cut through the haze as his hands closed around my face, pulling me close.
"Look at me, Elena."
Mildred was right. To everyone here, I was no longer Elena.
I was simply Marcus's whore.
"Like fuck you are."
My eyes snapped to his.
I hadn't even realized the words had slipped out of my mouth.
Marcus stared at me for a moment, almost offended by the accusation.
"Like fuck you are my whore," he repeated, his voice hard enough to make me flinch. "Do not ever call yourself that again."
"She is not the only priestess in this world. There are others. There are temples, seers, scholars, mystics. Rome alone has more than I can count. We are not out of options."
I swallowed.
"You're actually going to Rome?" I asked, unable to keep the tremor from my voice.
Marcus's expression softened immediately. His thumb brushing beneath my eye, wiping away a tear I hadn't even realized had fallen. "Elena..."
"You are."
"Yes," he answered without hesitation."You cannot expect me to ignore my Emperor's summons. To refuse would be treason."
His jaw tightened. "And treason ends in death."
I looked away, just as the reality of it settling heavily in my chest.
Of course he had to go. This wasn't some corporate job he could simply resign from. This wasn't a meeting he could postpone. No, this was Rome.
The very empire that ruled half the known world.
And Marcus belonged to it as surely as I belonged to the future.
"I know," I whispered.
His hand slid into my hair. "But hear me."
I reluctantly looked back at him.
"If there is a way home, I vow to you that I will find it."
"Do you even want it?" I asked.
He pulled back slightly, confusion flickering across his features.
"All this time," I said slowly, "you spoke only of leaving. Of returning home. I never stopped to ask whether there was a part of you that wished to stay."
His brows furrowed.
"Mildred was right about one thing. The way she spoke...it was almost as if this outcome favored you so completely that I found myself wondering whether you truly wished to return back to my world."
He looked at me like he was wondering if he heard me right.
"Marcus—"
"I have already resigned myself to following wherever fate takes you," he interrupted softly. "If that means losing you to a strange century, then so be it."
His hand brushed my cheek. "But do not tempt me with thoughts of staying unless you genuinely mean them."
For a moment, neither of us spoke.
Then a scream tore through the air and I froze.
It was Mildred's, the sound had come from the prisoner's tent behind us. Then another followed, sharper this time. More desperate.
Marcus's expression didn't change.
My stomach dropped, as it went on and on.
I was a nurse, I knew what screams of agony sounded like, but this was worse.
"What was that?" I breathed, my eyes drifting to how expressionless he looked. "Marcus."
He remained silent, as the realization struck me.
"What have you done?"
His jaw tightened. "What I should have done long ago."
The answer sent a chill through me.
"In your world," he said quietly, "she would hurt you and there was nothing I could do."
Another scream rang out behind us, but his gaze never leaving mine.
"I could not touch her. Could not punish her. Could not protect you."
The words landed heavily between us.
"Your laws would have forbidden it, demanding patience while the people you love suffered."
"Marcus..."
"But this is not your world."
He rose to his feet and offered me his hand. "This is mine."
The screams continued.
"And here," he said, his voice hardening, "I have the power to protect you the way you should have been protected from the beginning."
My pulse hammered. "This is wrong."
"Come, Elena," he said, ignoring me. "Let me protect you properly this time, as a loving husband would his wife."
Reluctantly, I placed my hands in his. He helped me to my feet and began leading me away from the prisoner's tent. The further we walked, the quieter the screams became.
His soldiers stepped aside as we passed, and no one even questioned him. Everyone behaved as if this was normal, even as Mildred's screamed echoing behind us. Each one more desperate, weaker than the last.
I found myself gripping Marcus's hand, not because I was afraid of him. But because it finally dawned on me, the world I came from. There were no courts here, no appeals. Here, power decided justice.
And Marcus possessed more power in this land, than most men ever would.
Behind us, another scream tore through the noon air, only for it to end abruptly halfway through.
Silence followed.
A terrible, suffocating silence.
I have dealt and seen death before, in my line of work. I had watched patients take their final breaths, held their trembling hands. Comforted grieving families.
But never like this.
Never with their screams echoing through the air while everyone carried on as if it were nothing.
"This is how it is done, Elena," Marcus said quietly, his arm settling around my waist as he guided me forward. "It is best that you do not dwell on it."
I swallowed hard and forced myself to keep walking.