Was she real or was she some new twist on the nightmare?
Her subtle scent of lavender and roses enveloped him and he knew he was in the land of the living. He drank in her being as a man dying of thirst gulps in water. His body hardened as his eyes fastened on her breasts pushing gently underneath her gown with each breath she took. She shifted slightly and broke the spell.
'Julia, what are you doing here?' he said, annoyed at finding comfort in her presence, annoyed at his body's reaction to her. He pulled the soft wool blanket firmly around his midriff. 'You should be asleep in your own bed.'
'I heard you calling out,' Julia answered, rubbing her throat as she stood uncertainly by his bed.
Against the cream-coloured flesh of her neck, three broad red stripes stood out. He watched as they started to fade, horrified by what he might have done to her. 'You should have stayed away.'
'You called for help,' she whispered.
'It was a nightmare,' Valens explained and dragged his eyes from the hollow of her throat to the frieze of garden flowers on the wall behind her.
'I guessed as much.'
He glanced again at her throat where the red marks had disappeared. His stomach turned over and knew the words were inadequate.
'I thought you were someone else. It would have passed if you had not come. It always does.'
'You sounded terrified as you shouted out, begging for help.' Her fingers held the blanket tight about her shoulders. Her body was half-turned towards the door.
Valens froze. How much had he revealed? He examined her in the soft lamp light. She looked wary, ready to flee with sleep-laden eyes and reddened lips.
In his mind, he listed all the reasons to keep away from her. All the reasons that had seemed so important when he first thought of them. They seemed much less important here with Julia standing beside his bed.
'Your name? I called your name?' He closed his eyes and knew he had, remembered doing so. The nightmare had taken a new and frightening twist. Besides his men, he had to save Julia, to keep her from Aquilia's clutches. If he failed in his task, she would be lost for ever, dying like the rest.
'No, others.' Her voice was soft and hesitant. 'You called for a centurion to help you. Then you told your men to get away. Finally you pleaded for help from anyone. At that plea, I ran.'
She gave a slight laugh. Valens opened his eyes and stared directly into her face. A small crease of a frown showed between her eyebrows. His shoulders relaxed. She hadn't heard him call her name, but she had come anyway, only knowing he was in pain.
'I regret disturbing you.'
'You didn't disturb me.' In the soft lamplight, her cheek glowed pink. His gaze dropped to her mouth and his body hardened further, aching for her touch. 'I was awake.'
'I was in the army,' he said, anything to get the conversation away from her and his need for her. 'Years ago, before I became a gladiator.'
'As an auxiliary?' she asked in a puzzled tone. Her head tilted to one side and again Valens was reminded of his pet blackbird, ready to flee but curious.
He refused to lie to her. He would open the door to his memory the tiniest of cracks, and then shut it firmly. It could do no harm. 'As a legionary.'
He heard her gasp and knew she understood the significance. No citizen would willingly take the gladiatorial oath to be burnt with fire, shackled with chains, whipped with rods and killed with steel. After the oath and burning of the tattoo, a man became an infamis, an outcast. Society turned its back on him. A gladiator could never enjoy the privileges of an ordinary citizen unless he won the wooden sword. And even then, the upper reaches of society would be closed to him. He could never be the best hope for his family's success for generations after that
'You were a citizen of Rome, a soldier, but now you are a slave. How could that happen?'
'It is a long and unedifying story about a young man who thought too highly of himself, and, like Icarus in the myth, flew too close to the sun.' Valens forced his lips to turn up into an ironic curve and lay back on his pillows. 'My main preoccupations were hunting, gambling and enjoying the company of loose women. The secondment to North Africa was a chance to break free from my father's lectures.'
'What did you do?' Julia took a step closer and her gown slipped off one shoulder to reveal the swell of her right breast. 'Why did you have to leave the army?
Valens's breath caught in his throat and he had a difficult time thinking of anything but the creamy expanse she had inadvertently exposed. His lips itched to taste the hollow between her breasts, to see if it did truly taste of summer as it had in his dream. With great effort, Valens tore his gaze from her bosom to look at the ceiling.
'My actions in North Africa led directly to the death of my men. Sixteen men, good and true, who expected more of me than I could give.'
'Please tell me, Valens. I would like to know more about you. How did you become a slave? Men have made mistakes in war before without being disgraced like that.'
He stared up, willing his breathing back to normal. The door in his memory he had kept closed for so long had been flung open.
He opted for a safe option, one that told the truth but not the whole truth. He could not bear to think of the look her eyes must surely give, if she realised the full height from which he had fallen and how he as much as anyone else had been his own master of his downfall.
If he had led his life differently, been more the son his father had desired, would his father have wanted him back?
The ransom Aquilia set was far from excessive. The question haunted him and made him more determined to succeed, to force people to acknowledge him as an honourable man. He wanted to return from the dead.
'When the pirates captured me in North Africa, my father refused to send the ransom. I suspect he thought I was dissolute enough to not waste any more money on me. Later I discovered he had adopted a man to take my place—someone more suited to his notions of propriety than I—almost before the ink on his response had dried. Someone less prone to fencing, gambling and gymnastics. The pirate was enraged and killed my men for sport. It tickled his sense of humour to sell me as a slave.'
Julia watched Valens's face twist as he said the words. His eyes bore a shadow of pain. She reached out and touched his hand, wishing she could say something that would take away that aching sorrow, and that she could gather him in her arms and hold him, much as a mother does with a young child. Her fingers longed to smooth the lock of black hair from his eyes.
She pressed her hands together, lacing the fingers and holding them back. She knew anything she said would sound trite.
Her blood became hot when she thought of what he must have suffered. To be disowned and without a family must be unimaginable torture. It was like taking away the centre of your being. Your family defined you and your status in society. To make matters worse, in losing his family, he also had lost his freedom, his citizenship and his identity. He had become a slave and had had to endure a kind of living death.
'I had no idea,' she said, pulling the blanket more firmly around her shoulders. 'How could a father behave like that towards what I think must have been his only son?'
He gave a bitter smile and a shutter came down over his eyes. The glimpse she had of his vulnerability was gone so quickly she wondered if she had mistaken it. His face with its clenched jaw was as remote as the statues that flanked Jupiter's temple on the Capitoline hill.
'It was over four years ago,' he said, 'and there was fault on both sides. I have forged a new life in the arena. There is a saying that you die when you take the gladiatorial oath and are reborn. If I had know then what I know now, I would have saved my men. We would never have been there in the first place.'
Julia heard the muffled sob hidden in the last words. She again longed to hold him, but feared his reactions. The last three and a half years with Lucius, when he had lashed out at her every time she sought to offer comfort, assaulted her memory. She contented herself with plucking at the folds
of the blanket, pulling the folds tighter.
'I had best go if you have recovered from your nightmare,' she said after a long pause where the only sound in the room was the gentle snores of Bato. She bent down and slipped her fingers under Bato's collar, preparing to drag him away.
'Quite recovered, thank you.' He turned towards her and his eyes were deeply fringed by his impossibly long lashes. The knotting of her stomach was replaced by a different sort of fluttering. 'I regret waking you with my shouting.'
She shook her head. How could she tell him that the memory of him and the kisses they shared had disturbed her sleep?
'Bato woke me,' she said, opting for a half-truth. 'He wanted to go out. When I passed your room on the way back from the garden, I heard your cries.'
At his name, Bato gave a slight whine, thumped his tail against the mosaic tiles, but refused to move.
'Leave him. He looks like he has settled down for the night.'
Julia looked at Bato who put his nose back under his paws. She made an exasperated noise. She'd already embarrassed herself by going to Valens and now her dog was intent on making himself at home, throwing them together. It reminded her too much of the other time, the time when Valens had first kissed her. She felt a warm tingle and a flush begin to spread throughout her body.
'I don't know why he keeps doing this,' Julia said, transferring her gaze to Bato. 'Bato, you should know your bed is elsewhere. Valens doesn't want us here.'
Julia bent down and started to tug Bato's collar. The dog opened one eye and then shut it. Julia felt her gown and blanket slip further off her shoulder.
'I never said that.'
There was a new note in Valens's voice. Something more, something that called to her inner being. Julia swallowed hard and tried to ignore the flick of warmth building in her.
'We had better go.'
Valens leant forward, the covering falling off his chest and sliding with a soft thump on to the floor.
'Must you?' His voice held a different richer note from the hard one he had used when he recited his story.
Julia looked over her shoulder at the door, wondering whether her father would appear. Then she looked back at Valens with his hooded eyes and her feet seemed to have become marble.
'I need to go back to my bedroom,' she whispered. 'Somebody might see.'
Valens threw back the cotton sheet and stood up, dressed only in his loincloth, the naked flesh of his broad shoulders and chest gleaming in the flickering light. She could see his pulse thudding in the hollow of his throat. Julia gulped and her eyes slid down his chest to his flat belly, then down his long muscular leg.
The ripple of excitement built into a wave of desire inside her. She moved her arm and felt the old linen of her under-tunic brush her breast. The nipple puckered and hardened as she remembered his touch, longed for his touch again.
'You could stay.' There was no question in his voice, merely a statement quietly made.
With her eyes, she measured the short distance to the door. Would her knees hold out until she reached the safety of corridor?
'You've recovered from your nightmare.' She twisted a tendril of hair around her finger, torn between wanting to keep her promise to her father and her body's desire for his touch.
Her breath caught as his eyes deepened and a glow came from deep within them. She found it impossible to look anywhere but at that hot gaze that scorched her soul, and caused the warmth in her belly to grow until she was engulfed in flame.
'Perhaps I am in danger.' His voice held her there, entangling her in its silken coils…
'What sort of danger? You said the Furies had fled.'
He stood next to her, so close she could see a thin white scar above his left eyebrow. He leant forward and touched her cheek with his finger. A shiver ran through her and she felt her back arch towards him before she regained control of it. She had to leave now! This instant! But her feet refused her mind's command to move.
'You chased them away, but that is not the danger I speak about.'
'I'm not sure I understand.' Her voice echoed in the room, hung there between them. 'Nobody saw me come here and nobody will see me go.'
Common sense told her that she should leave. Her father's words resounded in her ears. No more scandals. She had been foolish even to peek inside the door, let alone stand beside the head of the bed. She felt her cheeks begin to sizzle from his look.
'If you must go, may I have a kiss to see me through the rest of the night?'
Without waiting for an answer, his lips touched hers, his tongue gliding over her lips until it reached the tiny parting.
Julia felt her breasts brush his chest with only the thinness of the linen to separate the flesh.
She raised a hand and tentatively touched the silver-white scars on his chest. He captured her hand and brought it to his lips.
'From the ring?' she whispered, noting the slashes and ridges that criss-crossed his chest.
He nodded. 'Honourably won in combat'
'And that?' Julia pointed to a tattoo of a lion with a sword in its paw on the inside of his right arm.
'My gladiatorial mark. They branded me with it when I took the oath. It too is honourable, although I did not think so for a long time.'
He ran his hands underneath her tunic. His hands stilled and she saw a frown appear in his eyes.
'What are those from, Julia?" he asked.
She stepped out of his embrace and, hugged her arms about her waist. Would she disgust him as she had disgusted Lucius? Her insides knotted into a tiny ball.
'I need to go now,' she whispered, and started towards the door. 'I've stayed too long.'
'Stay,' he said in a low voice. His hand gripped her upper arm. 'Julia, who beat you? Who marked your skin?'
'Please, Valens, let me go. It was a mistake to come here.' She tried to twist away from him. How could she explain? How could she bear to see him turn from her in disgust? How could she have failed in her most important duty as a wife— to quicken with child?
'I know the marks of a whip when I see them. Tell me who beat you.' Valens turned her to face him. Her face was white-lipped. 'I won't do anything to harm you, Julia.'
Silence. Valens listened to the sound of her ragged breathing. The level of anger he felt surprised him. Not since the last of his men died in Aquilia's hold had he felt this strongly. He clenched his fist and longed to slam it into a wall, or, better still, into whoever had done this. He felt the red mist begin to descend. The memory of Julia's reaction at the Julian compound broke over him. She had shrunk from him then as well. He contented himself with clenching and unclenching his fist.
'Who did this to you, Julia? Your father?'
Her eyes widened. 'Not my father. No one knows about this except you…and the man who did this.'
'Then who?' He touched her shoulder and felt her flinch. He withdrew his hand, unable to bear that she was frightened of his touch. 'I'm not angry with you, Julia. I just want to know. What sort of person would strike you this savagely?'
Slowly she turned back towards him. Valens longed to draw her back into his arms and kiss away the hurt, but he had to be sure she would not reject him again or worse shrink from him.
'Lucius,' Julia whispered. 'I failed to pleasure him in bed. I tried, but my body disgusted him. Then I could never become pregnant. I prayed to the Good Goddess. Offered sacrifice after sacrifice, but my womb never once quickened. Each time I failed, his fists became harder.'
'Oh, Hades,' Valens swore. Why did it have to be her husband? No wonder she was shaking like a leaf. He'd behaved in an unforgivable manner. He'd nearly lost control as it was. Another caress and would he have been able to stop?
He wasn't sure who he hated more—her ex-husband or himself.
'Julia, please believe me. I have no wish to make you do anything you don't want or desire.' He reached down, picked up the blanket and put it around her shoulders. 'I think I had best take you back to your bedroom now.'
<
br /> Julia watched as he pulled his tunic on and walked over to the window. Her flesh puckered from the cold. She should never have told him. She must disgust him in the same way she disgusted Lucius. But she hated to think of how he must think of her—a woman so devoid of everything that her husband had resorted to beating her.
'I did my best. I wanted to be a good bride and a good wife, the very embodiment of a Roman matron…' she began, but her throat closed, forcing her to stop. How could she explain how much she longed for children and how her failure to become pregnant had resulted in her husband's anger? He had said that others had his children but not his wife, accused her of practising black magic. Awful accusations when her dearest wish was to hold her own baby in her arms.
'I'm sure you were.' His voice sounded remote and she could see his knuckles gleaming white as they gripped the window ledge.
She took a deep shuddering breath and started again. 'At first, when I stood waiting for him, dressed in my saffron cloak and flame-coloured veil, surrounded by the scent of verbena and sweet marjoram from my wreath, I thought this was how marriage was meant to be. Sabina had assured me that all would be well. She and her mother before her had been married in the same fashion. But before the cries of "kiss the bride" faded into the night, I knew my father had done me a grave disservice.'
'How so?'
'Lucius had absolute control over me. He had everything and I had nothing. He took every opportunity to remind me…' Julia faltered, trying to forget what happened by the marriage bed, or in the months that followed. How she made it impossible for Lucius to fulfill his duty, despite everything she tried, from not moving a muscle as Sabina advised, to… She tightened her hold on her waist.
'But I thought your father retained control over you. Couldn't you have just divorced him?'
'My father would not listen. He thought I was being hysterical. Lucius was always polite to him.'
The Gladiator's Honor Page 10