Nova Roma

Chapter 8 - Feelings on the farm

In the field you can see a child instructing a group of slaves who placed a harness and a plough to a bull, clearly the animal did not like it but when the nose ring was pulled, it gave it pain and they pulled the ring, whenever it tried to resist, thus it ended up losing its will and followed the instructions of the slave.

Flavio, Julia, and Sadiki are seeing how one of the most stubborn farm animals acted docilely and is ploughing the field, Flavio looks Sadiki and says in a triumphant voice

"I understand that normally slaves do the ploughing or we use horses, but the advantage we have using the bulls is that they consume less food than a horse and are stronger than man. It is simply a revolution to the agricultural field, but we can not sit on our laurels.

Sadiki I want you to tell the slaves gather dry leaves, fish remains, bones, food remains, straw and enough barrels, we will compost a fertilizer that will improve our crops and fertilize our soil, unfortunately, It can only be used after one month"

Sadiki ordered the slaves to fetch the waste materials and Julia retired to receive a massage, while Flavio returned to the farm where he could hear the sound of a harp coming from one of the slave quarters.

Flavio had the habit of know all of the names of the people he hypnotizes into servitude, he remembered the name of each of his servants but he usually does not pay attention to any of them until they are of some importance to him so they are otherwise only generic slaves or subjects without importance.

In this case, the music aroused his curiosity and he stealthily entered the small room, he could see a slave with beautiful brown hair and green eyes playing the harp with delicately, despite the song being a rather simple melody, the music gave off an air of calmness.

Flavio was lost in the melody until it stopped and he did not hesitate to give strong applause which frightened the young woman who until a moment ago was playing the harp with relative calmness. "Young master sorry if my music has bothered you," said the slave frightfully.

Flavio shook his head "No, on the contrary, I very much liked your performance. The way you play the harp is beautiful, and you have given me a great idea. I have been wanting to give a gift to my mother, accompany me, Hazel. "

(The song can be found in the comments of the author, I recommend that you listen to it while reading the next part I’m sure you’ll like it;))

In the courtyard Flavio ordered that chairs be placed, also sent Sadiki to call all the slaves who knew how to play an instrument or sing, He also asked Sadiki to bring him 2 large harps and some flutes, while the slaves were getting ready with the great harps in the place.

Julia was drinking a sweet Schnapps while receiving a massage that she loved very much, while

curiously observing what her son was doing (The massage room faces the patio, the Romans did not have a concept of privacy as we currently have it)

Flavio sat down on one of the chairs and asked Hazel to observe the melody he was going to play, Flavio’s hands slid over the harp string, releasing a quiet relaxing sound, which transported you to some fantasy land, in spite of only having a few notes the music fulfilled its function.

She observes with great care the notes that Flavio was playing, Flavio explains how to play the correct notes. She takes a seat near the other Harp and follows Flavio’s hands and instructions and began to imitate the strings he played. It took approximately 10 minutes for her to fully imitate the melody.

After that, he asked who among the slaves could play the flute, once 2 of them raised their hand he started to play a melody very similar to the harp. The music just like the harp was very good, the two flute players took 15 minutes to imitate Flavio.

After making sure that the melody was the same, he ordered an item from one of the forges. An elongated and not very heavy piece of metal, from major to minor sizes, Flavio also indicated that these should be perforated at the top, also requested a piece of wood. and thread.

Flavio wanted to cry because there was no violin in this era, and he promised himself that he had to "invent" it. However, it was not essential as the melody only used the violin as an accompaniment and not as a principal sound. It would remove little feeling feelings of the song but not its soul,

He meets with the group of slave women and cleared his throat with a glass of water and began to sing "Ah, ahh, ahh"

Because Flavio is a child he has a high voice, which can easily imitate the tone of a woman, therefore, the sound produced by his vocal cords gives off an air of mysticism as if a fairy was singing, the sound fascinated everyone, once Flavio finished he began to guide the women, to imitate his singing.

Unlike teaching the other two instruments, it took them 2 hours to imitate the music as Flavio wanted it. This gave enough time for the metal pieces to be created as they wanted them to be delivered, when they arrive he grabs the pieces from the smallest to the largest and hung the strings taking up the thread on the wooden stick stuck in the perforation. Despite being a fairly haphazardly created instrument it could produce a sound similar to the one Flavio was looking for.

He takes a bull ring and only add a piece of yarn for making other instruments and gave to a little slave girl, and he showed what she had to do for playing it. The sound from the instrument was very similar to a triangle but it was not the same.

Unfortunately one of the original instrument of the song was a marimba which he also promised himself to make one when he had time, but fortunately the sounds needed for the song was imitated as much as possible with the bull ring, he ordered that a wooden stick was put a wool filling and tied with a small cloth in the tip.

After that Flavio began to try different parts of the ring until he found where the sound was closer to the original, he marked it with small scratches on the parts of the ring that sounded like what he wanted and showed the girl the movement that she had to do, the slave just took a few minutes to imitate him to near perfection.

Flavio began to train his musicians this time, for that he asked that with one of his feet they played as if they walked that way they will know in what time they played

(BGM:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SO-FTl5fM18)(For those people who can’t read authors thought process)

Hazel opened the melody, together with Flavio on the harps, then Flavio moved his hand indicating the flute players to start playing.

The sound of the harp was fused with the noise of the flutes creating a more magical atmosphere, at that moment the calm was disturbed with a sound ( Coming from the instrument that Flavio made with the pieces of metal) similar to an opening.

It was momentary but it marked the silence of the flutes to allow the voice of the women to make its appearance, the magic of the song now seemed to have a divine touch

Julia followed this up for a short time and then listened to the flutes accompanied by the sound of the ring of the bull.

It was a very sharp sound, but it spiced up the song, this was no longer an ordinary farm, the farm now looked like it was sacred ground, for those present and are listening to the song, they never heard anything like this.

The song began to slow, the ring stopped slowly and the flutes were silent to allow the harp to say goodbye, little by little the harp stopped playing.

Those present woke up from their illusion that the melody provoked in them, the applause was heard and when the musicians calmed down, the calm was interrupted by the applause that rained down the musicians.

When Flavio stopped playing the harp he got up from his chair and bowed "This song is called Great Fairy’s Fountain, it’s a song that is given as a gift to my beloved mother"

Julia listened to what her little son was saying and tears welled up in her eyes. She got married at a very young age and became also became pregnant at a young age.

She always felt uncomfortable about taking care of her young son, but after he was 5 years old something changed in him for better, now she feels proud of being the mother of Flavio and more after listening to this song that her son makes with effort only for her sake.

She does not regret being a mother at her young age, she approached her little son and hugged him tightly.

Flavio asked his mother"Mama, did you like my gift? "

Julia said in tears "I loved it, my son, Can you repeat this song again "

"Of course mama"

That night the sound of the harps continued, Flavio had inadvertently created a small song that in the future, became very common to play to mothers as a sign of love and respect ...

Edit by: Chroniclemale