Chapter Text
Yellow and rusty red are two of the oldest pigments in the world: ochre, cinnabar, antimony, sulfur, vermillion. All were ground down, mixed with any number of substances, toxic and otherwise, until pastes were formed, until paints could be mixed. In time, humans would come to value other stains: rose madder, tyrian purple, malachite green, but those warm yellows, amber or golden depending on the light, and those auburn reds have never been fully abandoned. They were humanity’s oldest colors, and they have survived every test of time. They seem to speak to something in the human soul of passion and joy and life and home. Or someone’s soul, at least. At the beginning of it all, there was one being whispering in the ears of cave painters, urging humanity to find a way to give him more of the colors that made him feel most at ease.
When Aziraphale first saw the handprints on the walls, his heartbeat quickened in his chest.
“May I?” he asked, voice shaking. The woman nodded, and held out a dried reed, the end of which was filled with red paste.
Aziraphale steadied his trembling hand against the cold, rough cave wall. Putting the clean end of the reed to his lips, he heaved out a breath, spattering the paint over and around his hand. Gingerly, he removed his hand, leaving behind a perfect handprint void in the russet spray.
“You can wash your hand in the basin, there,” she told him.
Aziraphale stared at the back of his hand, transfixed. “No,” he said, not minding the cold damp spreading into his skin, chilling him. “No, it’s alright.” He glanced up and caught her perplexed gaze. “I think I rather want to keep it like this a while longer.”
The woman shrugged. “Suit yourself,” she said, plucking the reed from the numb fingers of his other hand.
He knew now what it was to be bathed in that shade just off crimson, to have a part of him so close. And he wasn’t willing to let it go.
When the humans discovered Naples Yellow,1 Aziraphale decided he could live happily surrounded by it forever.
The golden light of sunrise peeked into the thermopolium2 and was put to shame. Abashed, it skulked around quietly, not venturing too far into the corners, letting shadows try to tame the aurelian walls, resplendent even in the shadows.
From the back room, there already came the clatters and bangs of a busy kitchen. Steam wafted out, presaging the entrance of a person dressed in an unadorned tunic and toga. Everything about him, from his attire to the curls of his hair were as white as if freshly hewn from the purest luna marble, though the most adept of sculptors would hurl his tools in frustration should they try to capture the benevolence in his mien.
He was carrying a wide-mouthed cup in one hand and, as soon as the door swung shut behind him, raised his free hand into the air casually drawing it down until his fingers met. A fire sprang to life in the stove at the end of the counter. As the cacophony continued from the back room, the being leaned against the counter in the quiet of the shop and cradled the cup to his face, breathing in the steam of the calda3 and the quiet moment. Absently, he ran a finger along the border of one of the pictures painted on his vibrantly yellow walls, this one an image of mallard ducks. A small, wistful smile played at the corner of his expression.
The earth shook.
In the streets outside there arose the clamor of broken crockery, barking dogs, shouts of surprise. The plaster along one side of the thermopolium’s long l-shaped counter cracked, but quickly fused itself when a sharp glare was leveled at it.
A girl burst out from the back room in a frenzy, shouting, “Aziraphale!” Her voice died off awkwardly when she saw him standing serenely in the middle of the room. “Ah, you’re okay, then.”
“Well, of course, Aemilia,” Aziraphale responded placidly. “It was only a minor tremor.”
The child, slender and so fragile in her panic, nodded, forcing a huge breath out of her nose, and then burst into tears.
“Oh! Oh, Aemilia!” Aziraphale cooed, rushing behind the counter, hands fluttering around her in concern. “Really, everything is okay. No one will have been hurt from that one.” He assured her. When she still struggled to regulate her breathing, he gathered her to him and let her sob. “It’s okay, dear girl. Just a little shake. Nothing to be worried about.”4
Aziraphale had come out to Pompeii on a whim, trying to escape the bustle of the world’s largest city, but still wanting to be somewhere that served good food. The clear choice was a town in Campania, playground of the wealthy. He’d asked Crowley if he wanted to join him; Campania had excellent wine, after all, due to its lovely, volcanic soil, but Crowley had been sent off to aid the Roman expansion into Britain. A spot of colonizing genocide that his bosses thought would make him happy. 5
When Aziraphale had reached the Bay of Naples, he found himself drawn to the bustle of Pompeii. Part major harbor city and part idyllic vacation spot, it seemed an excellent spot to wait for Crowley spread God’s love.
Aziraphale never found himself at loose ends when he came into a new place. It had been his experience that wherever he went, if there were humans there, he would find those in need: downtrodden, destitute, distressed. Aziraphale had taken lodgings in a room over a thermopolium. Oftentimes he wouldn’t bother, but it was January, and the humans tended to take note of someone on the streets in weather cold enough to make ice film over the animal’s water troughs.
Two weeks later, the earthquake struck.6
It was massive, far worse than the tremors typical of the region. The town’s residents knew enough to leave their houses for the safety of the open sky. Aziraphale joined their stricken congregations in the street. Their fear was one, but the face of fear was varied. Some stood silently wringing their hands; some clung desperately to their loved ones; A few were loudly complaining, as if the movement of the earth’s crust were a personal affront. There were tears and ashen cheeks, screams and sobs and even hysterical laughter.
In the middle of the pandemonium, Aziraphale was an island of calm silence, until he noticed there was a similarly taciturn atoll not far from him. A small child curled up against a wall, soundless sobs wracking their slender frame. Aziraphale approached them soothingly and knelt, intending to warn them against being so close to a wall that may yet collapse, but the moment he addressed them, they launched into his arms, and whatever cork had muted their howls popped free as they bawled against his shoulder.
“Oh, dear child,” Aziraphale murmured, his hands fluttering over head, shoulders, anything he could reach checking for injuries, something, anything that he could fix, “where are you parents?” The child’s wailing redoubled at the question, and the angel’s heart broke with comprehension.
He stood and scooped up the trembling ball of grief in his solid, warm embrace. There would come time later for Aziraphale to learn that there was nothing left of the child’s home that could be scavenged.7 Time would also come for him to learn there were no relatives to claim them as ward. In this moment, however, the soot streaked face needed to be scrubbed, the ash-roughened throat needed to be soothed with fresh, clean water, and the shuddering sobs needed to be stroked into exhausted sleep.
The child, once they collapsed into blessed unconsciousness, slept like the dead in Aziraphale’s arms. He took the opportunity to make sure his own lodgings had known better than to allow themselves to be anything other than undamaged and secure. He lay the child out on his own bed and laid out a plate filled with nourishing food should the child wake hungry. Then he miracled up a basin of warm water and a cloth. As the child slept, Aziraphale carefully began to bathe them, checking for any physical injuries that might have been hidden under the emotional ones. After he’d completed just the arms, he had to miracle the water clean again. This time, as he started on the child’s neck, he noticed the bulla.8
Ah, he thought, a boy, then. Finally learning something about my guest.
After the child’s exposed skin was clean enough to pass muster, Aziraphale took out a little book of poetry, Ovid’s Heroides, one of his favorites, to steady his nerves. He settled into reading, waiting for morning to come.
Twice during the night, Aziraphale had to murmur to the boy, “You will sleep peacefully,” and send the command with a bit of power to quell what images plagued his sleep.
When the next morning the boy woke up, Aziraphale inquired very gently, “Do you know where you are?” the boy nodded wordlessly. Aziraphale grasped his hands together and steeled himself to ask the next question. “Do you remember what happened yesterday?” Tears welled up in the boy’s eyes and spilled over gaunt cheeks. He nodded again. Aziraphale stood, feeling helpless in the face of a child’s heartache. He fluttered over the boy for a moment and then settled next to him. “I’m Aziraphale. I’m going to take care of you until we can figure out whom you belong to, okay?” the boy nodded, still mute. “Can you tell me your name?”
The boy didn’t look at Aziraphale. “Aemilia,” the girl told him, voice flat.9
Aziraphale nodded, understanding. “Thank you, my dear.” He held out the plate he’d laid the night before. “You should eat something. Let me get you some water.”
As he poured a cup of water, Aziraphale offered a small, urgent prayer to the Lord for this girl. Even in the urbane Pompeii, the life of a girl born in a body that gave the impression of being male would be difficult. He vowed that he would shield her from as much of it as he could. For however long she was in his care, he would be her guardian.
Human children, Aziraphale had been told once, need structure and stability to thrive. And so his next few days were filled with frantic efforts to make a respectable cover for himself. He learned that Aemilia’s father had been a cook for a local equite10 who had freed him sometime before Aemilia had come on the scene. The girl had grown up in kitchens, and that suited Aziraphale just fine. He still had the fees he’d earned from tutoring Nero in music as a boy. Considering how that had turned out, Aziraphale had always felt rather awkward about spending the money. But it was likely that Aziraphale was going to be in Pompeii for some years now, and he would need to establish the kind of life for himself that humans wouldn’t look twice at.
In the aftermath of the earthquake, there was a whole slew of buildings going up for sale. It seemed like every third person you talked to was looking to get out before something even worse happened. Even Aziraphale considered leaving, but the last message he’d been able to get to Crowley had said he’d be here, and subsequent messages had been unable to be delivered. And anyway, when he mentioned to Aemilia the thought of emigrating, she went into such a fit of agitation that Aziraphale couldn’t bear to tear her away from the place where her parents were entombed.11 Besides, what dangers did tectonics hold for an angel and his ward?
So, Aziraphale purchased the small thermopolium under his own lodgings, since it had sustained only superficial damage, and set about having it remodeled. As he was talking through the options with the painter, Aziraphale made one thing clear: he did not care for the newfangled Spanish red or the trend to dark colors. His thermopolium would be the prettiest color he knew, one he could happily drown in.
As he was pressed to decorate the counter with frescoes to attract customers, Aziraphale’s thoughts strayed down a well worn path to the one being he truly wanted to attract. He gazed out towards the harbor, wondering when a ship would come in bearing a certain garnet haired fiend. Last he had heard, Crowley was still up in Britannia, though that had been quite some time ago.
“...a god would be good,” the painter’s voice filtered back into his awareness.
Aziraphale blinked, his attention coming back from where it had sauntered off in the footsteps of his only friend.
“A god?” he asked blankly.
“Or a nymph,” the painter replied, shrugging indifferently. “Something protective.”
“Something protective,” Aziraphale parroted softly, his eyes drifting back towards the port. He and the painter eventually settled on a Nereid, one of Neptune’s attendants, a protector for travelers.12
Aziraphale found himself approached by the very woman who used to work in the thermopolium under its previous owner the next week. He knew her in passing as Cassia, a kindly woman of middle age. She stood with the broad shouldered posture of a woman who had thrown out her share of belligerent customers.
“I’d like to stay on,” she told him frankly. “If you’re going to keep it running.”
Aziraphale cocked his head, considering her unsparing gaze. “The job will have to change a bit,” he said, cautiously. “I have a ward I’d like to be trained to manage a business of this sort.”
The woman looked surprised but not displeased. “How old?” she asked.
Aziraphale colored, his hands fluttering uncomfortably at his side. He hadn’t thought to ask. “Not…yet ten,” he hedged.
A tight, wistful smile passed over the woman’s features. “My son would be 11 this year,” she told him in a voice just as tender as it was wretched. Aziraphale felt his reservations and his heart melting.
“Well,” he responded with a warm smile, “I would value your assistance.”
After that, all it took were a few miraculously generous contracts with local merchants, and Aziraphale was ready to open his first business.
The days passed as slow and tranquil as the ships that dotted the horizon on their interminable journeys to the distant parts of the empire. Aemilia would spend her mornings in school and her afternoons with Cassia in the thermopolium.
In the evenings, Aziraphale made sure to actually teach the girl something of worth: a solid diet of his favorite books.13
Slowly, Aemilia settled into the routine. Over the months, her nightmares became less frequent, and her quiet, self-conscious smile became a common sight. Her piping voice became the music of his lodgings, crafting melodies of curiosity and joy at all hours of the day.
None of this had been what Aziraphale had had in mind when he settled on Campania as a place to rest his sandals for a time, but as it happened, the only thing that could make this better would be for Crowley’s ship to come in.
Crowley strode into the city from the port, confident that the ship’s foreman had forgotten about payment. He looked around the overcrowded harbor, and set off into the surrounding streets at random. Aziraphale was somewhere in the city, but he wouldn’t be in the forum or particularly near it, if Crowley was any judge.
Taller than most Romans, Crowley was able to slither through the thronging people without much difficulty; they naturally moved out of his way.14 He made his way out into the smaller streets, less crowded and pompous than their broader counterparts. Like any Roman city, the street fronts of most buildings were thronged with shops of various types, business spilling out into the road so that people of every walk of life were conversing and haggling and arguing.
Crowley was walking so quickly that he almost passed the street Aziraphale was on and had to double back, his head craning back around the corner, lured by the sense of peace that wafted from the far end of the lane.
Bingo, Crowley thought to himself and made a beeline up the pavement, his skin tingling pleasantly with increasing proximity to the angel’s presence. At the epicenter of the aura of goodness, he found a thermopolium. Crowley raised his eyebrows in surprise. The angel had never taken to an enterprise before. Maybe he’s just taken lodging in the rooms above.
As he stepped over the threshold, the crowd that merrily thronged inside faded from his notice, leaving just the comforting aura that permeated any place Aziraphale spent time in regularly. The room was a warm, vivid yellow, brighter than honey and more substantial than any sunlight, with one wall that was a rich, brownish red. The serving counter that dominated the room was decorated with frescoes of animals, a nymph of some sort riding a hippocampus, and even some sort of homunculus running along a counter much like the one that housed it.15
Unnoticed by his conscious thoughts, Crowley’s lips quirked upwards as he examined the pictures. Each one put him in mind of the angel’s goodness. The ducks were just like the ones in Eden,16 which Crowley had tossed wheat kernels to when bored to watch them squabble while Aziraphale looked over the humans from his vantage point on the wall. The dog looked just like the injured one that had approached them while they tempted and taught17 the youth, David, when he was a servant to Saul. After one battle, Crowley and Aziraphale had picked through the battlefield, wondering what the Philistines had done to deserve being fruitlessly thrown against the indomitable Isrealites over and over again. A whimper had caught their ears and there was a black dog with an underside now stained a rusty red rather than its original white, struggling to drag itself out from under the sticky corpse of a fallen horse. It whined again, fixing desperate eyes on them, front feet scrabbling in vain at the earth muddy with blood. Aziraphale had turned equally distraught eyes on Crowley, who hadn’t even thought before he’d healed the creature’s shattered back leg, giving it the leverage to heave itself out.
“Pagan dog,” Crowley had justified as Aziraphale beamed so happily, swinging his arms in an effort to contain his joy. Crowley averted his eyes from the brightness that threatened to enthrall him with a careless sniff. “Probably bit one of God’s chosen people. Rather evil of me to give it the chance to do it again.”18
As Crowley’s eyes lingered on the picture of the dog, he noticed something rude scratched into the plaster around it. His eye twitched in annoyance, and somewhere someone found himself dropping a heavy tool on his foot.
A child came out from the back room of the thermopolium, barely older than a decade, and took up position behind the counter to ask, “What pleases you?”
“Oh,” Crowley said, caught off guard. “Um, I’m just here to meet someone.”
“If you want to meet someone, go to the baths,” the kid quipped. “If you’re here, you’re ordering.”
Crowley couldn’t help but be charmed by the child’s brazenness.
“You have wine?” he asked indulgently.
“Best in the city,” came the quick answer.
“Right, sure,” Crowley replied disbelievingly before considering that if Aziraphale did own this place, it probably did have the best wine in the city. “Get me a cup then,” he said, handing over two small coins. The child gave him an appraising look and then glanced around at the walls.
“Right away,” the child finally said and disappeared.
Refusing to be unnerved, Crowley allowed himself to claim a seat against the yellow wall. Somewhere in this city was his angel, and this place was as good a place to wait for him as any. A cup of wine appeared in front of him.
“The person you’re here to see will be back soon,” the kid enigmatically told him over their shoulder, already striding off, unconcerned.v
Crowley grumbled mockingly to his drink about preternatural children and took a large mouthful of the wine. It was indeed the best wine he’d had since he’d left Rome and not only because no one north of Italy could grow grapes properly yet.
This is the place. Crowley felt something in him relax as the certainty suffused him.
Having drained the cup in front of him far too quickly, Crowley was then stuck nursing an empty cup that in no way sedated his rapidly beating heart. The passage of time ceased to be something he registered as he settled in to wait. His gaze never flickered from the door, watching it steadily like it was a prestidigitator trying to hoodwink him.19
The light through the door was starting to fade when a burst of brilliant white stepped through. Crowley’s heart crowded his throat for a moment, as it always did the first time he saw Aziraphale after a prolonged absence, and he remained rooted to the chair, regretting having already finished the wine, because he desperately needed a drink to clear his ability to speak.
Aziraphale didn’t notice him as he entered and approached the counter where the child handed him a cup without asking out of what was clearly a long standing habit. The angel’s gentle thanks floated over the noise of the crowd to Crowley’s eager ears. Aziraphale sat in an opposing corner, his eyes glued to a slim bound codex. Crowley wasn’t surprised to find himself already standing, and he readily followed his feet’s plan, sauntering over to Aziraphale’s table, reaching into his pocket for the gift he’d brought with him, an offering for being so long absent.
1. Naples Yellow is not the oldest yellow pigment, but was used in Mesopotamia and Egypt, and extensively in Greece and Rome. While its ancient manufacture varied by workshop leading to a variety of hues, it is typically identified with the hex triplet: #FADA5E and the RGB: (250, 218, 94). Viewable here: https://www.color-hex.com/color/fada5e return
2. thermopolium (plural: thermopolia) was a type of grab and go restaurant in Rome. It would serve prepared dishes and wine from a counter. Most Romans did not have a working kitchen in their home, so they would eat at these establishments daily. return
3. Calda (sometimes calda aqua) was a drink of hot water mixed with spices and herbs, similar in concept to an herbal tea. Wine was definitely drunk alongside it and possibly mixed into it. return
4. And Aziraphale wasn’t worried. The celestial sphere had been quiet ever since their plans to make Nero their next scion had backfired so spectacularly that his name was actually synonymous with the Antichrist, which was a new, fun term the humans had recently adopted. It was spreading like wildfire thanks to that John fellow out on Patmos. return
5. Aziraphale rather thought it more likely that Crowley would end up helping the British tribes rebel. He always had had that anti-authoritarian streak. return
6. The earthquake on 5 Feb 62 or 63 AD demolished large swaths of Pompeii, and was immortalized not only in written records but also in art, such as the marble relief in the home of Lucius Caecilius Iucundus. Given the close construction of Roman cities, it is probable though not recorded that fires would have broken out. return
7. Even the family’s lares,* including small busts of her parents, were so unrecognizable that Aziraphale had to miracle them whole so that he child would have the cold comfort of a memento.
*A lar (plural lares) was a small graven image depicting household gods and prominent ancestors. They were housed in small shrines called lararia and were so central to Roman worship that many Romans tried to take them with them when fleeing the eruption of 79 CE return
8. A chain with a pouch filled with protective amulets (usually a winged phallus) that hung around the neck given by parents to their sons upon birth return
9. Fun fact: there is a piece of graffiti in Pompeii that uses the feminine version of a man’s name. This name is not found anywhere else in the written record. return
10. Equites were members of a specially privileged class (originally those wealthy enough to be required to bring a horse with them when conscripted) and having status intermediate between those of senatorial rank and the common people. return
11. Aziraphale had made sure that Aemilia’s family were afforded a tomb with pride of place outside the Eastern gates of the city. Not many of the dead were buried with gold coins for Chiron, since the ferryman charged but copper. Aziraphale, however, was taking no chances. return
12. The painter mistakenly thought this was to attract business from the sailors that frequented the city, and Aziraphale chose not to disabuse him of the notion. return
13. Initially, Aemilia fought back against this until Aziraphale said he could teach her accounting instead, at which point she begrudgingly acquiesced. It wasn’t until she was 12 and started Sappho that she became acutely aware of how enrapturing books could be. return
14. They also naturally made a sign of warding against the giant* barbarian with strange tinted pieces of glass perched on his nose. Even in Pompeii, playground of the wealthy, they were extravagantly expensive.
*The average Roman male was only 157 cm (5’2”). Crowley, like many of the Northern races, was nearly 30 cm (11 in) taller. return
15. Aziraphale’s thermopolium is based on a real one, excavated in 2019, images of which can be found here (CW: animal and human remains (bones)): http://pompeiisites.org/en/comunicati/the-ancient-snack-bar-of-regio-v-resurfaces-in-its-entirety-with-scenes-of-still-life-food-residues-animal-bones-and-victims-of-the-eruption/ return
16. Well, almost. It was true that they were the same species as the ducks from Eden, but those ducks were pugnaciously alive. These ducks were ready to be served. return
17. Aziraphale would insist that he taught and Crowley tempted, but in actuality it was a mixed bag. return
18. I The dog having bowled Crowley over actively licking his face as he said this rather undermined his claim. return
19. Crowley and Aziraphale had first seen the shell game performed in Ancient Greece. Crowley had been impressed, but Aziraphale had been so enamored of the man’s cleverness and dexterity that Crowley couldn’t help but perform a little miracle to ensure the practice would survive to future generations. Whenever he saw a street performer pulling out a trio of cups, Crowley would direct their feet in that direction, easily justifying it with the claim that he wanted to observe the con, and Aziraphale never failed to be delighted by the act. return