Septonia Halabrian

Septonia Halabrian was the wife and consort of Aurelion Aurelos. She was also the mother of Aurelion's only legitimate child, Trebia Aurelos. Betrothed to Aurelion from the tender age of three, she was groomed to be the perfect wife by her overbearing mother, who controlled every aspect of her life.

Aurelion and Septonia were married in Pellix after they had both turned sixteen. For the next four years, they lived together as husband and wife on Aurelion's father's estate. However, Septonia's life would be forever changed after the shocking massacre of Aurelion's paternal relatives - an event which made Aurelion heir to the imperial throne. Septonia was crowned alongside her husband as his imperatrix the following month, by which time she was pregnant with Aurelion's child.

Despite their difficulties, Septonia proved to be a devoted partner to Aurelion, renowned for her charity and dedication to her husband's vision. She was dearly loved by the citizens of the empire.

## Marriage

Despite the fairytale façade, Septonia's marriage to Aurelion was not a happy one. They largely lived separate lives, Septonia having her own suite of rooms in the palace that were separate from her husband's. The only thing they had in common was their daughter, whom they both adored and raised together.

When Aurelion returned home from the war, Septonia proved to be her husband's most loyal servant, caring for him in the wake of his life-changing injuries. They grew much closer during this time. In her diary, Septonia wrote: *"I have always loved him, as a wife ought to love her husband. And while he not may reciprocate that love, it does not diminish my strength of feeling for him. I will always stand by his side."*

 A sticking point in their relationship was Markus Abrudas. Septonia tolerated her husband's homosexuality so long as he did not act upon it, convinced that she could somehow fix him. But when she discovered he was actively engaging in sexual acts with Markus, she became inconsolable. She made it her mission to drive Markus away in any way that she could, believing him to have corrupted Aurelion's morality. Entries from her diary at this time recount her misery:

*"For all these long years, I have been a dutiful wife to him and a loving mother to his child. I have nursed him when he fell ill, I have held him as he wept. I have loved him unconditionally. Yet, it is still not enough. I am not enough. And so he falls prey to his unnatural affliction. To have found him in the arms of another woman would have been one thing. But to have found him in the bed of another man...the very thought of it drives me to despair."*

Unable to weaken the bond between Aurelion and Markus, Septonia became severely depressed. After Trebia died in childbirth, she began suffering from suicidal thoughts, unable to cope with the loss of the only person she felt had ever truly loved her. She blamed both Markus and Aurelion for her daughter's death. When she attempted to gain legal custody of her grandson she was stonewalled by Aurelion, who had chosen Markus' side in the family feud.

Septonia purportedly tried to convince Aurelion to make a second child with her but he refused, out of loyalty to Markus. Desperate, Septonia got Aurelion drunk on wine and placed him in her bed after he passed out, then lied that he had lain with her while drunk. She also lied that she was pregnant as a result of their union. When Aurelion discovered the truth, he was livid. Septonia confessed to lying but claimed that she had been driven to such desperation by Aurelion's distance from her. Aurelion, understanding his role in his wife's unhappiness, chose to forgive her. He suggested that they divorce but Septonia refused, telling her husband that her life would have been nothing more than a lie if he abandoned her.

### Death and burial

Septonia in 310 BCE, aged 45. Her premature death shocked the empire, which fell into a period of mourning for its lost imperatrix. The cause of her death was unknown at the time but, according to Aurelion's memoirs, she died of complications related to the heart. Modern scholars believe her cause of death was stress cardiomyopathy, brought on by the sudden death of her daughter, Trebia. Septonia was embalmed by spirit priests on the same day as her death and then lay in state for seven days inside Temple Palaven, where she was guarded by seven members of the imperial praetorian guard, one from each of the seven colonies. Hundreds of thousands of people journeyed from across the empire to pay their respects, with people queuing for days outside Temple Palaven to get in.

On the eighth day after her death, Septonia was taken from Temple Palaven in a great funeral procession to the Cipritine Necropolis. Her bier was carried by the seven members of the praetorian guard and was draped with white silk, upon which her sigil was embroidered. She wore a blue silk dress and gold jewellery. Her death mask was made with rose quartz, inlaid with amethyst for her colony markings and tiger's eye stones for her eyes. Upon her head she wore her imperial crown which Aurelion had designed for her upon her ascension as consort; she was the last member of the Imperial Family to be buried wearing a crown. Behind her walked Aurelion, accompanied by the rest of the Imperial Family, all dressed in white.

## Symbolism

### Sigil

   From birth, Septonia was entitled to use the sigil of House Halabrian; a silver squalus swimming upon a field of blue, head down, and tail bent. The squalus is a large predatory fish native to Macedyn, similar in appearance to Earth's sharks but much larger and covered in metallic scales. Septonia often wore jewellery made from these scales as a nod to her Macedynian heritage, even after becoming imperatrix.

Upon her marriage to Aurelion, her birth house's sigil was incorporated into a new design alongside the golden sunburst of House Aurelos. This new design became the personal arms of Aurelion and Septonia as the ruling imperator and imperatrix of the empire. Septonia designed this sigil herself, with Aurelion approving its legal status upon its completion. She chose a white and blue shield halved horizontally; a swimming shark of silver, head down, and tail bent on the blue field, representing House Halabrian, with a gold sunburst in splendour on the white field representing House Aurelos. Septonia either wore or made visual references to this sigil with her clothing and jewellery choices for the rest of her life. Even in death, she wore it stitched into the silk of her burial shroud.