Fighting Fit

by Annie Dalton

  I watched dreamily as half-naked girls and women wandered to and fro between the steam rooms and the plunge pool. The humid air was full of soothing scents, jasmine, rose and sandalwood oils, perfumed creams and Roman shampoo. The sounds were soothing too. The whoosh of steam, the swoosh and bubble of water, the murmur of voices.

  I felt safe in this scented female world. Safe enough to risk a teeny little snooze…

  My eyes flew open in terror! I’d felt someone brush past. A pale blue robe was disappearing around the corner. Aurelia’s jewellery! I panicked. But to my huge relief, my mistress’s possessions seemed undisturbed.

  It was mid-afternoon by the time we went back out on to the street. After the languid atmosphere of the baths, the heat and noise outside seemed tremendous. A new temple was going up across the road and the air was thick with dust. Armies of sweating slaves wearing unbelievably filthy rags, wrestled massive blocks of stone into place, as an overseer bellowed instructions.

  While we looked around for our litter bearers, a guy tried to get us to buy a carpet. “For such pretty ladies, very special price.”

  Another guy was trying to sell us a jar of rejuvenating oil!

  “Cheeky thing!” I fumed. “I’ll rejuvenate him if he tries that again!”

  “Do you know where they get that stuff?” Aurelia grinned. From the glint in her eye, I knew this was going to be gross. “It comes from the gladiator schools. The masseurs save all the dirty oil they scrape off the gladiators and sell it on!”

  I stared at her, open-mouthed. “Who in the world would buy dirty massage oil?”

  “Deluded old women, mainly,” she said giggling. “They believe gladiator sweat will keep them eternally young!”

  “Euw,” I said faintly. “Bottled gladiator sweat! That is so icky!!”

  We eventually spotted our bearers squatting by the roadside. They’d been waiting patiently for us in the broiling heat for hours. Most upper-class Romans didn’t even register a bearer as a human being. But Aurelia was not like most Romans. “They look half-starved,” she said in a low voice. “Give them a few denarii to buy food, Mella. We’ll wait here.”

  While we were waiting, I spotted a poster advertising the next day’s Games. I was startled to see a girl gladiator amongst the attractions. So girls really do fight in the arena I thought wistfully. This gladiatrix, as girl gladiators were called, was known as Star. Someone had added a drawing of her in a tiny leather skirt and boots, wielding a short curved sword. Her face was hidden behind a spooky metal mask.

  “Have you heard about this girl?” I asked Aurelia.

  I turned in time to see her furtively examining a scrap of papyrus. I just glimpsed a childish drawing of a fish and what might have been a street name, then she hurriedly slipped it inside her stola, looking flustered. “Did you say something, Mella?” she said in an innocent voice.

  Don’t say Aurelia’s got a new love interest already, I thought. She’s only been in Rome a couple of weeks! How did that happen?

  It turned out that my mistress knew all about the gladiator girl. She’d got the local gossip from her masseuse at the baths. Star herself had only arrived in Rome a few weeks ago, but she was already a bit of a celeb.

  “You’d have to be really special to be a girl gladiator,” I sighed enviously. I couldn’t imagine that kind of courage.

  Aurelia shook her head. “Gladiatrix are really just novelty acts. Like dwarves and exotic beasts. No-one takes them seriously as fighters.”

  “They’re taking this one seriously,” I pointed out. “It says here she’s mastered three different fighting styles.”

  Aurelia shook her head. “It doesn’t matter if she masters three thousand. Romans admire gladiators in the ring, but they fear and despise them in real life. This girl will be an outcast all her days. When she dies, her body will be thrown in a pit with the corpses of criminals and suicides.”

  “That’s terrible!” I gasped.

  “I know. We Romans are a terrible people.” Aurelia looked upset. Her hand strayed to her bulla. “Mella, do you believe—” she began.

  At that moment we heard a polite cough. Our bearers had hastily devoured their hard-boiled eggs and lentil porridge and were ready to take us home.

  As we swayed and jolted through the city, tremendous waves of sound washed over us: chanting from the temples on the Via Sacra, and the tramp of hobnailed sandals as the Praetorian guard marched through the narrow streets, grimly maintaining Rome’s precarious law and order.

  Occasional bursts of sexy music pierced the din, as we passed bars featuring saucy barbarian dancing girls. But behind our drawn curtains, Aurelia and I were in our own intimate little world. “So who’s coming to this big banquet again?” I asked with interest. “Your brother, Quintus. Titus whatever his name is, the guy who wants to marry you. And who else?”

  . “A great many important Roman citizens and their wives,” she said wearily.” I won’t know what to say to them.” She looked embarrassed. “Actually I needed to talk to you about that, Mella. I’m afraid you won’t be able to recline with us. Quintus has rather strong opinions about the status of slaves. If it was up to me—”

  “Don’t worry about it,” I told her. “I’m not used to eating lying down. I’d probably choke and humiliate myself.”

  “I may humiliate myself, too,” Aurelia said with a sigh. “My brother has told Dorcas to prepare some extremely strange dishes.”

  My mistress seemed to find her life in Rome as bewildering as I did. I’d at least had a two-day intensive at the Agency whereas she’d spent most of her life as a foreigner amongst hostile British tribes. In normal circumstances, her parents would have helped Aurelia learn the ropes. Unfortunately her mum was dead, and her dad seemed to be having some kind of breakdown.

  We’d see him first thing in the morning, making offerings to the household spirits at the family shrine. Then he’d disappear into his library and stay there reading his scrolls, until a slave took him his evening meal. Just once I saw him in the garden, staring at his dead wife’s quince tree with a haunted expression. He wants to die too, I realised with a pang, then he can be reunited with her on the Plains of Asphodel.

  I think his son was also a major disappointment to him. Quintus Flavius still hadn’t shown up at the house, so Aurelia’s father sent a messenger to Nero’s palace. Quintus eventually replied, sending his respects to his father along with a note to Aurelia, welcoming his sister to the Eternal City, hinting that her admirer was longing to meet her. But it seemed like he couldn’t actually be bothered to drop in to say “hi” in person.

  Then out of the blue he’d suddenly sent instructions for a huge banquet to be prepared in their honour. At first, I thought he just wanted to welcome his father and sister home, in true lavish Roman style - which was nice, if a bit late in the day.

  Then Quintus sent another message to Aurelia, saying she’d better buy herself a new dress, because he was bringing her future husband to meet her.

  The whole thing made me deeply uneasy. All Aurelia knew about this Titus Lucretius guy was that he was one of Nero’s closest advisers. Even her father hadn’t met him, which seemed really disrespectful. I mean, officially her dad was still head of the household.

  I looked up to see my mistress absently sliding her gold bangle back and forth on her wrist.

  Quintus must know how vulnerable Aurelia is, I thought. And he’s deliberately taking advantage. If you ask me Quintus has way too much influence in this house.

  I accidentally blurted my thoughts aloud. “Wouldn’t you rather meet this Lucretius guy before the banquet?” I would hate to meet my future husband, plus an unknown brother, in front of important Roman senators and whoever.

  “Quintus sent word to say they’ll both be at the amphitheatre tomorrow,” she said.

  I gasped. “You’re actually going to the Games?”

  Aurelia looked queasy. “My brother says it’s my duty as a Roman citizen. I was going to ask if
you and Reuben would come and keep me company?”

  Reuben was well in with the other house slaves by this time, and he’d told me horrific stories of the mistreatment of slaves. Reuben and I must be the only slaves in captivity whose mistress actually ASKED them if they’d like to do something! So of course I said yes.

  But I wasn’t just going for Aurelia’s sake. My reasons were mostly personal. On the same poster that featured the gladiatrix, there had been another name in tiny print. Flammia, the Fire-eating Dwarf. If Flammia was performing, chances were the lanista’s other recruits weren’t far away. And that meant I’d found Orlando!

  Chapter Six

  Next morning I felt incredibly jittery. Seeing humans hack each other to death is not a thing I’d ever hoped to have to see. Plus I wasn’t sure how Reuben would hold up under the strain. On his first ever Earth mission, my pure angel buddy saved a dancing bear that was practically being beaten to death. This experience made him incredibly ill.

  Reuben insisted I had nothing to worry about. “I’m not saying I’ll actually enjoy it,” he added hastily, “but I’ll handle it, same as you.”

  Because of lack of space, as well as reasons of decorum, he had to travel to the Games in a separate litter. This particular day, traffic was even worse than usual and there seemed to be some big ceremony going on at the Temple of Vesta.

  At one point our bearers had to stop for what felt like aeons to let a procession cross the Via Sacra. We obviously weren’t going anywhere, so I peeped round the curtain to see what was going on.

  All the devotees of Vesta were girls and women. They wore dazzling white stolas and wreaths of white roses in their hair, and carried small offerings for the goddess. As I watched them making their way towards the Temple of Vesta, chanting and swaying to the hypnotic beat of a drum, I felt a tingle go down my spine. Vesta’s temple was a genuinely sacred place, no doubt about it.

  “Which goddess is Vesta again?” I asked my mistress. The Romans had so many gods and goddesses, it was hard to keep track.

  Aurelia explained that Vesta was a particularly important goddess to Romans. “She’s the goddess of the hearth. Her temple is regarded as the hearth of Rome.”

  “Is that where those girls tend the sacred flame?”

  My mistress nodded. “It’s seen as a great honour to serve the goddess in this way. Vestal virgins are chosen when they’re only nine or ten years old. They’re taken to live in the Palace of the Vestals, where they undergo years of training. You sometimes see them being carried through the city. They wear white veils to show they are the brides of Rome. I used to dream about becoming one myself.”

  “Can’t they ever get married for real?”

  She nodded. “They can, in theory, when their period of service is finished. But in practice they rarely do.” Aurelia looked wistful. “I used to think it would be wonderful to be a Vestal then I found out what happens if you let the flame go out.”

  “What happens?” I said, not sure if I wanted to hear.

  “You’re stripped and beaten,” she said sombrely. “The flame is supposed to be the spirit of Rome. If it goes out, Rome itself will fall.” She made an irritated noise. “I could walk to the amphitheatre faster than this! Can’t the bearers take a shortcut!”

  She seemed unusually stressed, but I just assumed that my soft-hearted mistress was dreading sitting through so much violence.

  Our bearers dropped us off outside the amphitheatre. To our surprise, Aurelia gave me and Reuben our tickets, actually little clay counters, and told us to go ahead. “I’ll find you inside,” she said firmly. Before we could follow her, she’d vanished into the crowd.

  Reuben and I stared at each other. “That little minx just gave us the slip!” he said. “Do you think she’s gone off to see this guy?” I’d told him my suspicion that someone had smuggled a note to Aurelia at the baths.

  “You can’t exactly blame her,” I said. “She’s going to be married off to some wrinkly old senator any day now.”

  Reuben looked uneasy. “I still don’t think Aurelia should be meeting someone on the sly. She’ll get into big trouble if she’s found out.”

  “I’m sure it’s just a harmless flirtation,” I said. “Aurelia’s not the type to take silly risks.”

  Reuben shook his head. “You know her better than I do.”

  Not that well, I thought wistfully. I’d genuinely believed we were friends. Well, as friendly as a mistress and her slave can be. Yet Aurelia hadn’t breathed a word about this exciting new crush.

  Reubs and I fought our way into the entrance of the amphitheatre. It was seething with fast-food and souvenir vendors.

  “Sorry, man,” Reuben told one guy. “Your little gladiator lamps are cool but we’re really just passing through.”

  “Why not just come out and tell him you’re an angel?” I teased.

  “You think I should?” he said anxiously.

  “I was joking, Reuben!”

  We showed our tickets and a slave took us down a long corridor to the VIP enclosures. We emerged, blinking, into the sunlight and the noise of the amphitheatre.

  I almost bolted when I saw how many people were inside. There must have been fifty-thousand Romans crammed in there, at least. A blood-red awning had been unfurled over the arena to protect them from the sun. The fabric rippled in the breeze, sending waves of coloured light over the sand. Fast-food vendors went up and down the rows of seats. Officials with banners reeled off the names of which gladiator would be fighting who. Bookies were taking bets. The place was in a state of total uproar.

  Our seats were right at the front where a wooden barrier separated us from the arena. At either end of the massive circus ring were pairs of ominous-looking gates.

  I found myself imagining the scene on the other side. Terrified prisoners of war, trained fighters in armour, bewildered slaves; all praying frantically to their gods to help them survive this savage entertainment.

  Aurelia came hurrying towards us, looking slightly pink. “Sorry, I was going to buy us some stuffed dates, but the queues were impossible.”

  Yeah, we believe you, I thought.

  People had started to crane forward, watching the gates with avid expressions.

  My palms went clammy. Something was going to happen.

  A herald in a white tunic ran into the arena blowing terrific blasts on a horn. The musicians struck up and the amphitheatre filled with military music.

  The gates burst open, and the crowd roared with excitement as the gladiators came marching out. They might be outcasts in the world outside, but here, in the arena, they were kings and they knew it. They looked amazing, in their swirly purple cloaks and gleaming helmets with nodding peacock plumes.

  The gladiators’ armour and weapons varied according to their fighting style. The crowd’s favourite was the retiarius, the Fisherman. When he strode out with his giant fishing net and trident all the girls and women screamed, like fans at a concert. The two girl fighters, their faces hidden by strange bronze masks, also raised a big cheer.

  The gladiators marched into the middle of the arena then they formed a double line, standing back to back, raised their clenched fists and shouted, “We who are about to die, salute you!”

  My hair practically stood on end. “How can anyone be that brave?” I whispered to Reuben.

  “It’s the training,” he explained. “Even in his death throes, a gladiator will try not to make a sound.”

  “Are you absolutely sure you can cope with this?” I asked anxiously.

  “I told you, I’ll be OK,” he said calmly. “Anyway we’re not alone.”

  For a minute, I thought he was quoting his own lyrics, then I realised Reuben meant it literally. Every row of seats had at least one Earth angel in Roman costume. If I hadn’t been so preoccupied, I’d have noticed the tingly cosmic vibes.

  “I can’t believe there’s so many!” I whispered.

  “Yeah, and I have a feeling we’re going to need every
one of them,” he said grimly.

  To my relief, the first part of the programme was quite tame: there was an elephant who wrote numbers in the sand with his trunk, with a bit of prompting from his minder, followed by a team of dwarves, who did incredible acrobatics.

  Suddenly Flammia rode into the ring standing in a tiny chariot pulled by a Shetland pony, and brandishing a burning torch. The crowd adored this pocket-sized fire-eating barbarian. At the end of his act he rode out in a blazing chariot, like a miniature fire god, yelling with triumph.

  Next they had warm-up fights between pairs of trainee gladiators. As each pair ran on, bravely waving their wooden swords, I felt a rush of hope. Surely this one had to be Orlando. But it never was.

  The crowd was getting restless. “It’s time they cut some throats around here!” yelled someone.

  “Keep the action going!” someone else bellowed. ‘We want real swords and real blood, not this kids’ stuff!”

  People started to boo and hiss. It was the first time I really understood why our teachers constantly go on about evolution. In my century, you’d never get fifty-thousand humans howling with excitement, purely because they wanted to see blood spouting from other people’s internal organs.

  A rotten apple whizzed past my ear, followed by a flying egg. Frustrated Romans were pelting the recruits with any missile that came to hand. The trainee gladiators quickly ran off. Shortly afterwards another gate burst open. Twenty or thirty terrified men were forcibly dragged and prodded into the arena by burly amphitheatre officials.

  I remembered that the Roman authorities regularly used the Games to dispose of unwanted troublemakers. These guys were probably all convicted criminals. They could handle themselves in a street brawl, but had absolutely no experience of this kind of fighting. They’d been given weapons but no armour or protective padding. But this was never intended to be a fair fight. The audience wanted to see blood flow and now they were going to get it.