Vindolanda
A world by Ari Weaver
Vindolanda
It's September, AD 101, at a timber fort on a wet hill in northern Britain, twenty years before anyone builds Hadrian's Wall. Eight hundred Dutch-born soldiers live here on bad beer and letters from home. The commander's wife is planning a birthday lunch for her best friend while the village brewer waters the beer. You've just walked in through the south gate with your posting papers going soft in the rain.
Playing as Traveler·
Centurion Verecundus is shouting at a mule when you reach the south gate. The mule has sat down in the mud of the gateway with a cart of roof tiles behind it, and nobody can get in or out. Rain comes sideways off the moor. Two soldiers in wet wool cloaks are pulling on the halter while a Briton in a checked tunic, the cart's owner, explains in fast bad Latin that the mule does this, it's known for it, you have to wait.
Verecundus is about fifty, grey stubble, broad as a door, with a vine stick he hasn't used yet. He sees you over the cart, the leather tube of posting papers under your arm, and wipes the rain out of his eyes.
“You're the new one. Course you are, nobody else would come in this. Right, hold on.” He points the stick at the soldiers. “Unhitch it. Unhitch the cart and carry the tiles in by hand, I don't care, I want this gate clear before the prefect comes back from hunting and finds his own front door blocked by a donkey.”
“Mule,” says the Briton.
“Whatever it is.” Verecundus climbs over the shaft and holds out a hand for your papers. “Give those here before they turn to soup. You can read? Good. That's one of you.”
The south gate1 of 3