The year is 180 AD. Centurion Lucius stood on Hadrian’s Wall, staring north into the brutal cold of Caledonia (Scotland). He was old, tired, and the Roman Empire was retracting, slowly bleeding men and resources.
His job was simple: watch for Picts, the painted warriors from the North. But there had been no Picts in weeks. Only silence and an unnatural, heavy snow that refused to melt.
He heard a sound in the white void: a soft tapping. It wasn't war horns or war cries. It was a stone hitting the wall, a signal.
Lucius raised his standard Roman short sword and looked over the edge.
A Pict warrior stood below, gray-haired and weary, just like him. The man wasn't holding a spear. He was holding a small, carved wooden horse, a child's toy.
The Pict looked up at Lucius and pointed to the snow, then to his own empty hands. He was hungry, cold, and offering a peace offering. A trade.
Lucius thought of the Emperor's strict orders: no trade, no peace with the 'barbarians'. He looked at the small toy horse. He pulled a wrapped piece of hard Roman cheese and a piece of dried meat from his pouch and lowered it on a rope.
The Pict took the food, placed the wooden horse on the ground, and nodded a silent thank you before vanishing back into the snow.
Lucius picked up the toy horse. He returned to his post, the stone cold in his hand. The war was still official, the Empire still vast and demanding. But for one silent moment, on a lonely stretch of wall, two old soldiers had declared a private peace.
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