‘Actually, they were not,’ Lysandra said. All eyes turned to her.
‘Really, Dacia is not worth the effort in manpower to placate.’
She shook as she cleared her throat, annoyed that her words were slurred slightly. She knew the wine was taking effect but she found that she did not care and poured herself some more. ‘There is nothing there of value, is there? Except slaves,’ she said as an afterthought, gesturing to Sorina. ‘It would take a long and costly campaign to subjugate such a wide territory, which is why there have only been minor Roman operations there.’
‘When I am finished in this place, I will gather the warriors of the plains, and bring them to war against the Romans!’ Sorina said vehemently.
‘And you will be crushed.’ Lysandra shrugged. ‘No barbarian army can stand against disciplined troops.’
Sorina got to her feet, swaying slightly. ‘Who are you calling a barbarian, you arrogant whore?’
‘Anyone who cannot speak Hellenic is a barbarian.’ Lysandra stated the obvious, letting Sorina’s insult pass. ‘It is the sound of your language… like sheep… baa, baa!’ She laughed at this. It was an ancient truism, but never failed to bring her to mirth.
‘Peace, Sorina.’ Eirianwen put a calming hand on the older warrior’s arm as the Amazon’s face darkened in anger. ‘The drink is in us all. Let’s have no more of this talk.’
Lysandra was about to speak again but decided against it; she did not want to distress Eirianwen. Sorina sat, but would not let the matter drop. ‘How can you be so sure of a Roman victory?’ she asked.
Lysandra ran her hand through her hair. She looked around and saw a long wooden ladle on the ground by a pot of barley stew. She stumbled up, retrieved it, and returned to the table.
‘Here.’ She tossed the implement to Sorina. ‘Can you break that?’
‘Of course,’ the Dacian responded, snapping the wood with ease.
‘Now take the two halves and break them at the same time.’
This time, the task was much harder but the Amazon persevered.
With a loud crack, the staves broke. Sorina triumphantly met the Spartan’s gaze. ‘You are very strong,’ Lysandra observed. ‘Now break the four.’
Sorina cast the wood to the ground in disgust. ‘That would be impossible. What are you trying to prove?’
‘Simple. That is how civilised people fight. In close units, you see. For the Hellene or the Roman, personal valour is honoured but discipline and training count for much more on the battlefield. A barbarian fights for glory, charging to battle, swinging a big sword round his head… her head, in this case. And achieves what? On foot, she needs space around her to wield her sword, lest she kill the compatriots by her side. Instantly, she is outnumbered three to one, for civilised troops lock shields and fight as a unit. On horseback, she charges into a hedge of spears and swords. And dies.’
‘You talk a good fight, Spartan,’ Sorina said. ‘For one who has never set foot on the battlefield.’
‘Have it your own way, Amazon.’ Lysandra found that for once she did not wish to pursue an argument. Better to end the conversation. ‘You are just like every other barbarian. Too proud and too stupid to learn from your betters.’
Sorina sprang across the table, crashing into Lysandra. The two women fell to the ground, rolling over several times. Sorina emerged on top and slammed her fist into Lysandra’s face, sending a sharp message of pain through her wine-fogged head. A few onlookers saw the brawl erupt and called to their fellows. Soon a crowd had gathered around the two struggling women and began chanting rhythmically, ‘Fight, fight, fight!’
Lysandra thrust her hips upwards, causing her furious assailant to overbalance and topple forwards. She rolled away and sprang to her feet but the liquor had made her clumsy and she stumbled. Sorina was charging towards her, spitting hate, and it was only by long-learnt reflex that Lysandra was able to lash out with her foot, catching the onrushing Amazon in the pit of the stomach.
Sorina doubled over in pain and Lysandra moved in quickly, seeking to grasp her foe’s head and smash her face to pulp with her knee. But Sorina’s reaction was swift: she lunged forwards, butting her shoulder into Lysandra’s midriff. Jerking upright, Sorina carried Lysandra with her, flipping her skywards.
She crashed painfully to the ground, cracking the back of her head as she landed. Head spinning, she staggered to her feet, barely in time to meet Sorina’s attack; the Amazon’s fist connected with the side of her face and Lysandra responded in kind, her own blow snapping back her opponent’s head. She surged in, but suddenly, she was being dragged back, as was Sorina, cursing and kicking.
Eirianwen had hold of the furiously struggling Gladiatrix Prima.
‘That’s enough,’ she shouted. ‘Sorina, enough!’
Teuta grasped Lysandra around the middle, lifting her from the ground and heaving her away. ‘Gods, Spartan! Leave it!’ Lysandra ceased to struggle and the Illyrian let go, dumping her uncere-moniously onto her bottom.
The crowd around the fracas had dispersed as quickly as it had gathered. Lysandra touched her cheek ruefully, feeling a large bruise beginning to swell up. She puffed out her cheeks, trying to clear her head, which spun both for the wine and the forceful blows landed by the Amazon.
She looked up to see Sorina standing over her.
They regarded each other in silence for some moments, then the older woman extended her hand and pulled Lysandra to her feet. ‘You fight well,’ she acknowledged.
‘As do you.’
‘But not well enough.’ Sorina turned away before Lysandra could respond. Feeling somewhat foolish, she made to leave, but Eirianwen stepped up to her.
‘Don’t worry. That will be an end to it for tonight,’ she said.
‘Come. Let’s have another drink.’
VIII
Sorina awoke, her head thick and pounding. Her mouth was gummy, her eyes full of sand. Sitting up, she groaned as her stomach lurched. Teuta lay next to her, snoring softly, her arm resting across her eyes. Sorina smiled and swung her legs out of the bed. Their lovemaking had been unrestrained and passionate, a perfect end to an entertaining evening. She had even enjoyed the fight with the arrogant Spartan.
She made her way to a full-length bronze mirror, a gift from one of her supporters. Leaning close, she saw that Lysandra had blackened her eye. Three years ago and she would have put her down before she had had the chance. She stepped back and regarded herself. Her body was still lean and tight, her breasts still firm. But that belied the passage of years. Thirty six was no age to most in the Empire, with their doctors and medicines.
But on the plains of Dacia, her home, she would be classed as an older woman now.
Six years, she mused. Had it really been six years since her capture and imprisonment? Six years of death in the arena, six years of slavery. She looked around her room. She had more than most freeborn Romans could ever hope to possess: a house, wealth, the adoration of the mob. She dimly recalled accusing Eirianwen of getting used to Roman luxuries the previous evening.
For a moment she wondered if the accusation was in fact her own conscience speaking. Was she too becoming what she hated?
She shook her head and dismissed the thought.
Without her liberty it was all fool’s gold. She had long since given up believing Balbus’s lies that she would one day buy her freedom. There would never be enough money for him. She knew there were only two chances for her: to be freed during the games by a benevolent editor, impressed enough by her prowess to deem her worthy of the wooden sword; or escape. She had come up with many plans, but none seemed feasible. And if she were caught escaping, the penalty for runaway slaves was a slow, agonising death by crucifixion.
She slipped a tunic over her head and made her way to the baths. The training area was a hive of activity as the domestic slaves cleared the debris from the previous night’s celebration, looking none too happy that they had had no part in the revels.
But,
she thought to herself, a banquet was small reward for those risking life and limb on the sands, something the scrubs did not have to bear.
She was unsurprised to see the baths virtually empty. The entire famillia would no doubt be sleeping off the effects of the evening.
Only Eirianwen, a famous early riser, was there enjoying her routine swim. Sorina disrobed and slipped into the pool, not wishing to disturb her friend until she had finished her laps.
She watched with pleasure as the Silurian’s perfect body sliced through the water. Eirianwen was a living embodiment of the universal mystery, a balance of opposites. So beautiful and yet so deadly. She had been at the ludus merely two years and had already slaughtered her way to become Gladiatrix Secunda. Sorina prayed that they would never be matched against one another.
But she knew Balbus. If the price was right they would be compelled to meet on the sands and only one would walk away.
She saw Eirianwen swimming towards her and the smile she gave her served to break her melancholy.
‘I didn’t expect to see you here,’ Eirianwen said in the language of the Celts. Though their two lands were separated by many thousands of leagues, their tongues were surprisingly similar.
Eirianwen had learned enough of Sorina’s native Getic and they conversed in a jumble of both.
‘I thought a dip might clear my head,’ said Sorina.
‘You did overdo it.’
‘It was that sort of evening. Good fight too,’ she commented.
‘I should have taken her earlier.’
‘You don’t like her, do you?’
‘There is nothing to like.’ Sorina threw up her hands, trying to put into words what she felt in her heart. ‘These Greeks and Romans revel in their achievements but what have their kind brought to the world? The cancer of stone, and the fire of war. Was not the greatest of all Greeks, Alexander, a conqueror, a slayer of nations?
The Romans have their Caesar and have made him a god. Lysandra is a child of this culture and she represents everything I despise.’
Eirianwen sighed. ‘She is just a woman, like you and me, Sorina. She has no wish to be here either.’
Sorina’s laugh was sour. ‘Have you seen her train? She loves it. It is as if she has been doing it for years. Even the beatings she takes. It is like a contest to her. And yet I sense she is still not giving it her all.’
‘Perhaps it is the Greek mindset,’ Eirianwen offered after some thought. ‘Perhaps she too is trying to make the best of her lot.’
‘You sound like a Greek. Mindset!’ she mimicked. ‘Next you will be talking philosophy.’ She used Latin for the word, as there was no Celtic equivalent.
‘Maybe I am becoming a little too civilised for my own good, Sorina!’
‘I am sorry for what I said last night,’ Sorina said earnestly. ‘I was drunk.’
‘As were we all; beer makes bad talk sometimes.’
They rested in companionable silence for a while, enjoying the shared feeling of sisterhood with each other. Neither had set foot in the other’s land, yet the blood of the Tribes stretched over oceans. Truly, it was an empire greater than that forged by the Romans, for it was made whole by kinship, not carved by the sword. Sorina knew the Tribes would endure when the Romans and their stone cities turned to dust. The Earth Mother would not permit their atrocities forever. Indeed, just over ten years since, she had spat her defiance at them, and turned their great city of Pompeii to molten rock. It was a warning the Romans failed to heed, and it would bring them low.
‘Why did you bring Lysandra to our table?’ Sorina asked after some time.
Eirianwen did not respond immediately. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘There is something that draws me to her. I cannot say what it is.’
‘Perhaps you should take her to your bed and get whatever it is out of your system.’ Sorina laughed. ‘Can you imagine it?’ the Dacian hooted. ‘She’s as dry as a bone, that one!’ She wiped her tears of mirth away, noticing that Eirianwen had not joined in the laughter. ‘What’s the matter with you?’
‘You probably have the rights of it, Sorina. She’d be affronted at the mention of bedding someone. But I don’t feel comfortable mocking her.’
Sorina snickered. ‘Sweet on her, are you?’
‘Of course not,’ Eirianwen said quickly. She seemed to lose herself in thought for long moments, and when she spoke again, her voice was low. ‘But there is something about her, Sorina. I know it.’
Sorina sobered. Eirianwen’s father had been a Druid, a religious leader of the Britons, and in his blood ran the power of that mystical brotherhood. Some of his magic flowed through his daughter, of that she was certain.
‘I feel that our paths are intertwined,’ Eirianwen said. ‘Yours, hers and mine. The Morrigan has had a hand in this.’ Sorina made a sign to ward off evil at the mention of the dark goddess of Fate.
Eirianwen blinked and came back to herself. ‘Fate is her own mistress, Sorina. She will do what she will, and we must follow.
Come,’ she clambered out of the water. ‘Let us find some food.’
Sorina nodded, her thoughts still on Eirianwen’s mention of Morrigan Dark Fate. A Druid’s daughter would not say such things unless the Sight had come through her. That Eirianwen was able to say it was testament only to her youth. Fate was nothing to the young, she thought ruefully. Whilst the body still possessed youth and strength, even the gods themselves could be challenged. Only in the later years did one realise that the greener days would soon turn to autumn.
She looked upon Eirianwen’s faultless, youthful body as she made her way to dry herself. Then she too heaved herself out of the water, her mood sombre once more.
IX
Never in her life had Lysandra been so ill. She had awoken in her cell, face down on the floor, her face and hair crusted with her own vomit, with no memory of how she had got there. It had been all she could do to claw herself on to her cot where she had lain for some hours unable to move.
Her stomach churned, her hands shook and it was as if Hephaestus himself were using her head for an anvil.
Her mood was as sour as her stomach. It was, she told herself, just further evidence that she was unworthy to call herself Spartan.
Were Spartans not famed for their sobriety, disdaining strong drink and rich food? Yet there she had been, drunk as a sack with the barbarians.
And then there was the fight.
Although trained from childhood in the pankration, the Hellenic art of unarmed fighting, Lysandra had failed to win against an old woman. She could blame the drink, blame the fact that she had been unprepared for the assault, but the stark truth of the matter was that she had failed. Failed her Sisterhood, failed her Spartan heritage and failed herself.
She was lost.
The goddess had turned her face away from her, of this she was now certain. She was destined to die a slave, an ignominious end witnessed by a slavering mob. Perhaps she was unworthy of even facing death with a sword in her hand. She might fail in meeting Titus’s exacting standards and be sold on from the ludus.
The sun was at its noon zenith by the time Lysandra felt well enough to even contemplate leaving her cell. The first order of the day was to clean herself and then to clean the cell. As she scrubbed the floor she could not help thinking that this was the sort of work she was destined to do from now on.
The bell for the afternoon meal was sounded and the women gathered for a bowl of brown barley. Lysandra sat with the Hellene women, embarrassed to face either Eirianwen or Sorina: Eirianwen, because she had broken the law of hospitality by causing an argument with her friend; Sorina, because the woman was her better in combat. Though no final blow had been struck, the young Spartan knew the truth of it. The thought surprised her as it came to mind. Never before had she admitted another’s superiority to her own. She left her meal unfinished and returned to her cell, and decided to remain there till the usual regime recommenced the following day. She had no wish to speak to
anyone.
Dawn had cast a pink hue to the sky as the women assembled in their usual places, their shuffling feet kicking up a haze of dust. None could contain their curiosity at the transformation that their area of the training ground had undergone. Straw mannequins had been set up at regular intervals, as had wooden crossbeams, from which swung many sandbags. Set at a parallel to this was a long ‘avenue’ with sandbags on both sides. Wooden practice swords were stacked up ominously, a mute testament that the most exacting part of the training was about to begin.
Titus strode up, flanked by Catuvolcos and Nastasen, each of them carrying a bucket and stave. They set these down and Titus gave the women plenty of time to take in the new surroundings before speaking.
‘You all know what is at stake.’ His gravelled voice sounded harsh in the dawn. ‘Your last hope of one day attaining your freedom rests upon how well you learn what we are about to teach you.’ His eyes swept down the lines as they shifted slightly.
Nastasen stepped to the front. ‘Lysandra, come forward!’ he barked.
Lysandra’s lip curled and she glanced at Hildreth who stood next to her. The red-haired German smiled tightly in sympathy.
‘Take off your tunic!’ His teeth showed up impossibly white against his ebony face as it split into a cruel grin. As Lysandra made to comply, the Nubian leant close to her. ‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered. ‘I know you love to display yourself for me but I haven’t got the time to pleasure you now.’ She did not respond, looking resolutely to the front as she tossed her tunic to the ground.
‘You are going to learn how to fight and move with skill.’
Nastasen indicated the pile of swords. ‘In time it will become instinctive to you. But always remember that there are but three rules to gladiatorial combat.’ He stooped and retrieved a stave from one of the buckets, its sponge tip was coated in red paint.
‘First rule.’ Nastasen pointed the stave towards Lysandra. ‘You get an instant kill on the red. Here, here.’ He daubed a liberal amount of the fluid between her breasts and at the hollow of her neck. ‘Always remember, go for the red first. Because if you don’t your opponent will.’ He replaced the red stave and picked another. This time the tip was blue.
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