~Quintus Flaminius Tullius~

"Please do pardon me, young sir." The voice from the other side of the calidarium was pleasant but commanding. "I am Faustus Cornelius Sulla."

I heard these words across the babble of other voices as I lingered in the hot room in the Baths at Rome - which were filled with people today. So this was the son of the great Sulla, who had once been Dictator. I recalled that Sulla had once fought Mithridates in Bithynia - a territory much on my mind these last few days since I hope to serve as quaestor there, and to see the end of Mithridates, a man who had caused Roman trouble for far too long now.

I strained my eyes to see through the steam. I saw the man who must be Faustus, and also the young man to whom he was directing his charm. I didn't recognise this other person's face, but wondered if he was standing for something in the elections. When I had announced my candidacy before the people of Rome I had been too nervous to think of anything other than myself.

I suddenly felt a rush of excitement as I realised that I was starting my rise up the cursus honorum, and that my dreams of gaining high office could one day come true. The dealings of the great politicians, who had seemed so grand and remote as I grew up, was now within my grasp.

An attendant came up to me and I nodded to him to scrape the dirt and grime of Rome off my back, and relaxed a little for the first time in a week.