by M. A. Mott
He hung there for what seemed an eternity. His struggles had only managed to change his view enough to see up and out of the hole. There, he saw the face of a man peering back down.
“Did we get it?” shouted a voice from outside the hole.
Maximus saw the man smile. “I think this is it. Fortune smiles on us today, brother!”
Maximus saw another man, this one a little younger, peer over the side of the hole.
“That’s it,” the man said. “That’s got to be. Spotted, large cat.” He laughed and slapped the previous man on the shoulder. “By the gods, we’re going to be rich when Lucullus sees this! I think we captured Tanit, the Goddess!”
Now, Maximus recognized him. The man was his own master huntsman.
DOLPHUS THE HUNTSMAN stood aghast, feeling the anger well up within him. The Roman centurion stared back, jaw set.
“What do you mean, this won’t do?” Dolphus demanded. He started at the large, spotted cat in the cage in the pack of the wagon. The cat stared back at him hungrily. He looked back at the centurion confronting him. “That’s the big spotted cat, just like you said.”
“That,” the centurion said, jabbing his thumb behind him in the direction of the caged creature, “is a big, spotted cat, all right, but that ain’t no goddess.”
“Well—why not?”
The centurion turned impatiently to the cage, then back to face Dolphus. “Because of one important thing. That is, two important things. Notice the balls on that boy?”
The animal looked away, as if in disgust. It seemed to almost understand their conversation. Dolphus stared at the creature, up and down where it lay in the cage. Sure enough, he saw them; large, round and black. The cat had huge balls. Its gaze returned to him, as if sensing his growing embarrassment.
“Well...well.... it’s a big spotted cat.”
“Yeah, but even goddesses don’t have balls. That’s a boy cat. The goddess is most definitely a girl cat. You’ve gone and bolloxed this up.”
Two legionnaires standing near them snickered. Dolphus shot a dark glance at them, but they appeared unconcerned.
“Look, what else could it be? My men and I caught this thing with our best trap! It fought like a fury!”
The centurion nodded. “I bet it did. Look, you aren’t getting the big reward. You’ll get a typical finder’s fee to sell this thing for the games in Nova Cartego. That’s...let’s see...twenty denarii.”
“Twenty denarii? But that’s...”
“I know, I know. You wanted the full 200, but that was for a Goddess, which happens to be a girl cat.” The centurion pulled out a small bag of coins and handed it to the sputtering huntsman. “Bring the Goddess for the full coin, got it?” He turned and strode off, leaving Dolphus staring ruefully at the bag of coins. He looked up at the cat, which glared at him sullen through the wooden bars of the cage. If only Maximus were here! He’d have made sure Dolphus was paid properly. He pocketed the money and turned.
“All right!” He shouted to his helpers. “Let’s get this wagon on the road to Nova Cartego. This damn cat is bound for the arena!”
In his cage, Maximus roared. He watched Dolphus jump at the sound and look at him fearfully. Maximus got up and stalked back and forth in the small cage, his fury stifled by captivity. The Arena! Maximus roared again. It had come to this. He had fallen. His command was gone, his family name was trodden in the dust. He would be forgotten. He was cursed. All from his own huntsman! He roared again, and threw himself at the wooden strakes that held him. He wanted to tear the man to pieces. He wanted to rip his claws through the man’s face, to sink his teeth into his neck and hear the bones crunch. He was Commander Maximus Severus Pantera! The Beast of Rome! He roared again in fury.
Chapter 20
TANIT HEARD HIM. SHE looked up from the sleeping acolyte. Renata had passed through the danger, and now was safe, sleeping and well. Tanit was relieved...but now she realized it—the roar came from inside her. She felt him. She opened her heart and reached out for him.
My love, my love. What has become of you?
Anger. Rage. Captivity. Fear. Something so deep, so final. He was to be sacrificed. Butchered. Blood. Blades. Dirt. Spears. Nets. He was to be put to death for amusement. She tried to reach out to him, tried to sooth him. Tried to see with his eyes. She saw wooden bars, a long road stretching out behind. Then she knew. He was captured and being taken to the arena. He could not hear her. His mind was in turmoil. The beast in him now commanded his thoughts; blood and anger. He could not control his change. He could not come back. Not without her.
“Goddess?” The tribesman touched her arm. She pulled herself from the vision and looked at him as if waking from a dream.
“What is it?”
“We have word on your priestess; they approach up the canyon.”
She stared at him as the information sunk in. They lived! Oolaht lived! So, the messages had been right. They’d heard snippets and tales, whispered along the tribal foot-trails. The woman and her retinue, and two soldiers who had deserted the Legion. All were coming. All were on their way. And now they arrived! She put the water on to boil. This would require tea and much planning.
She stood in her robes, fresh, hand-washed by the Lusitani women, awaiting her priestess. When the group rounded the turn into the cavern, The Lusitani men escorting them in the lead stood aside, and Oohlat drifted into view. Her eyes grew wide. She strode forward with dignity, clutching a staff, but then her dark eyes welled with tears and she dropped the staff, covered her face with her hands, and wept at the sight of her Goddess.
Tanit stepped forward and embraced her, then clutched her to her own body, hard. Oolaht buried her face in Tanit’s shoulder and the Goddess held her until her sobbing subsided. Around them gathered the flock of acolytes, their white linen cloaks worn and stained with the journey. They stooped to their knees and bowed their heads, many also weeping like their priestess.
Eventually, Oohlat leaned away from her, and Tanit used the sleeve of her gown to wipe the woman’s eyes. Oohlat smiled slightly, then fresh tears fell down her cheeks.
“Oh, my Goddess,” she lamented. “We have lost one of ours from the temple.”
Tanit smiled. “Have you?” She motioned to Thal, who left the group. In moments, he returned, leading Renata, who walked shakily, but cried out upon seeing her friends.
The women all looked up, and immediately lost their composure, many crying out loud upon her sight.
“All of you, go to your sister!” Tanit told them, smiling.
The young women left the two and ran to her. Oohlat embraced her goddess once more.
“How did Renata arrive before us?”
“You were burdened, no? And she appears to have run all night.”
Oolaht pulled away and went to the overwhelmed Renata.
After the reunion had died down, the priestess and her Goddess, with Thal of the Lusitani, sat around the fire circle, finishing the last of the simple soup made after their arrival. The joy of her priestess’ return had darkened with the news that Maximus had been captured.
“My goddess,” Oolaht said, “This is evil news. But I must ask you—please do not try to save him. You must stay free. Our way, the way we have worshipped for centuries, will be gone if they catch you.”
“No,” Tanit said simply. “I must go to him. He is my mate for life. I made him. I put this curse to him, this blessing if you will. Without him, my love, there is no future for me. Those who love me must love him too.”
Oohlat struggled. She was strong-willed, Tanit knew, but she knew her friend of long years, the keeper of her secrets, would not speak rashly to her. “If you insist, my Goddess, then I must help. If not, I must perish with you.”
Tanit put her hand on her friend’s. “I do not seek my destruction,” she said. “I seek my salvation. We know this would not have happened had we our whole temple full of followers, acolytes, patrons, and all those who loved us in Carthage. But we are not wi
thout help.” She turned to Thal. “My friend, what do the Lusitani know of the path to Nova Cartego?”
In a short time, Tanit, Thal, Oohlat, the two Roman deserters, Tychus and Quintus, and the others assembled around the fire. Their desperate plan was unfolding as they stared at one another, and into the flames.
“Your man on the inside—he works for the Romans in the arena, but he hates them?”
“Aye,” said Thal. “I know it makes no sense, but he works with the men and the animals. He was a great warrior among our people, but they took his family and held them until he gave his oath. Now, he tends to the animals and men who are about to die in the arena, for the Romans’ sport.”
Tanit felt even now the rage that Maximus burned with, the horror he knew he faced.
“Many of the animals are maimed before they are put into the arena, if they are to face a favored gladiator. However, for ones they want to slaughter—those who have angered the rulers in some way—they get fresh animals that are not wounded. The animals are held in cages under the floor of the arena, then set free into the pit. There, they stalk and slay the ones set before them. The refugees, sometimes whole families, are frightened and fight badly. The animals, filled with anger, starved for days, attack and eat them. Same with poets who have angered the rulers, courtesans who have displeased them, musicians who play badly, and any chiefs of my people, or any other of the tribes, who fight back against them.”
“So, your man. How does he help us?” Tanit asked. She had to take a breath to keep from snapping at the man. She would turn into her beastly self if she heard more details of the arena.
“That is a good question,” Thal said. “He tends to the animals, feeding, watering. The ones slated to live a while, those from far away and transported at great expense, are kept in some fashion for a while. Lions are fed meat, elephants given bread and beer, bulls given hay and cows with which to rut, that sort of thing. But sooner or later, mostly when they grow tired of the battles in the arena, the animals are marked for slaughter. Your man will be young, fiery. They may try to maim him, but then keep him alive for a bit before slaughtering him.”
“Just a minute here,” Tychus interjected. “Why are we sitting her, waiting for him to be drawn away to another town far away, and set in an impenetrable fortress like the arena?” He huffed. “Why not just go now, catch them on the road, and slit the throats of the drivers?”
Thal nodded. “That’s a good plan, I say. They’ve got two days head start. We must go now, that way.” Thal pointed in the general direction of Nova Cartego.
“That’s the long way,” Quintus interjected. “Why, that goes through the passes. It goes East for days, and only then turns South.”
“It does.” Thal agreed. “And it goes into the lands of the Hiberii, who are now allies of the Romans. My people still have friends there, but something like this...well, I suspect we can’t catch them in time.”
“We must try,” Tanit said softly. “We must try to catch them. Thal, can your people escort a few of us, swiftly, to cut the path of the cart?”
Thal hesitated. He was honest. Good, she thought. She needed answers, not promises.
Eventually, he spoke. “We may,” he said. “We must leave swiftly, and travel lightly. I can send ahead on the many roadways. We can have ones who are trusted receive us, and make our time. We might still catch them in the passes.”
“Then such must be our plan,” she said. She turned to Oohlat. “That chest, it is on the way back, no?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“Do we still have desert blossom essence?”
Oohlat’s eyes went wide. “We do. Perhaps a good amount.”
“Good,” Tanit said. “We must help him come back, and keep him from becoming feral.” She turned back to Thal. “Please ready your people in the way you described. Can you accompany us?”
The man nodded easily. He seemed to have no reservations.
“Then we are off. If we cannot catch them on the road, then your friend at the arena must be the one to give us another chance.”
Oohlat interjected. “My Goddess—may I beseech you not to take this quest. We may find others to do it, those who would respond to offers of gold and of favors from a Goddess.”
Tanit put a hand on her friend’s shoulder. “My beautiful Oohlat, my faithful. I do understand why you might fear this. But there is no future for me without my mate. He is in my own heart. I am his. I will not live without him. Come what may, I will fight for him with everything in me. I will not wait by the fire for him. I want to look in his eyes. I will take the trail fate has set me to.”
She got up, left the firelight, and walked into the darkness of the cavern.
The next morning, they collected some simple things—a satchel, some cooking and eating utensils, and cloaks, and followed their Lusitani retinue into the mist of the morning; Tanit, Oohlat, Thal, Tychus and Quintus, and the men gathered by Thal to accompany them. They carried only food for a few days. Oohlat had a small parcel wrapped in silk. It contained the needle and tincture.
“The horses are at the bottom of the ravine. My tribe will have a fresh set partway to where we’ll catch them on the trail—we hope,” Thal said.
“Hope is good to start. I will take the rest,” Tanit said.
Together, they started down the mountain. It took most of the day to get through the canyon to the bottom. There, Thal, motioned for them to wait while he scouted ahead. He disappeared into the underbrush. It was dark when she heard a series of quiet calls on the wind. Thal parted the leaves of the bushes and walked through into the clearing where they were gathered.
“Come,” he said. “The horses await.”
They walked through the underbrush into another vale where the dying rays of day’s light shone on the gathering. Ten horses, enough for them all and Thal with his retinue. He handed them dark, grey wool cloaks, leaden with oil.
“Wear these,” he said. “These cloaks will hide our scents and make us shadows.”
Tanit, Oohalat and the others donned the heavy garments, and the group rode into the darkening evening.
Chapter 21
“MY LOVE! MY LOVE....” Her voice still echoed in Maximus’ brain. Her again. The woman with the dark hair and green eyes. She called to him at night, but his mind was a turmoil of anger and anguish. He felt dim, as if he knew something, and yet could not quite remember. The assault of smells and sounds in the jostling wagon. The long days with thirst, to be slaked in the evening by a fearful and resentful attendant pouring water into the bowl of his cage. He had stopped roaring as much, instead sitting in the back of his cage, eyes awaiting...something. What? Where were they taking him? He heard their words and pieced them together at times...the arena. He was to be put in an arena and made to...fight? He would fight men. Criminals, they said, who were to die for sport before the crowds. Eventually, he would be put to the spear as well, as fresher animals were brought in to replace him. That would be a mercy.
He hated the arena. As a boy, his family had regular seats at the Circus Maximus in Rome (his father had teased him that he’d named him for it) and had watched the races with chariots, the speeches, the plays, the pageants, but yes, he had seen the gladiatorial games. The men fought one another, slayed one another, and slayed the animals. Sometimes the games lasted for weeks, when a general returned or a victory was won. Maximus hated watching so many animals die so horribly. When he was young, he hid from his father when the games were to be attended, only to be spanked and made to go. There, he watched magnificent creatures from far corners of the empire put to their gory deaths. He’d last gone only a few years back, when Scipio had defeated Hannibal, and they’d captured his last elephant. The fierce, huge creature had been brought in on a gigantic pallet, bound to it, tugging against its chains and ropes, and with a flourish, had been set free on a group of convicts given spears. They ran, only to be trampled by the ravening beast and gored to death by its tusks. So it went with group a
fter group of the condemned, until the better-trained, fully armed gladiators came forward to finish it off. Hours of feints, charges, and lunges, until the trumpeting beast went down and was dispatched ceremoniously by the very favored chief gladiator. Maximus had watched the spectacle as a young Questor, because he knew it was expected. His entire unit had attended to honor the victory of Scipio over Hannibal.
The cart lurched, jostling him out of his reverie. Shouts came. Maximus heard the distinct sound of arrows thudding against the outside of the wagon.
“My love! We come for you. Make yourself ready now!”
It was her. That voice. The woman he...knew. The woman in the cave. His...love!
The wagon lurched again, then stopped fast. Screams of men. Shouts of anger, desperation. He heard the wagonmaster exhort his men. Kill them! Kill the savages! Give them a taste of your blade!
Maximus jumped to his feet, and paced the cage. He looked out a small window of light through the back of the cage, his picture blocked by the criss-cross of thick wooden bars. He saw shapes, a horse, a man running past, the slight shadows of missiles fired or thrown. He smelled the copper aroma of blood wafting in the battle, and he hungered for it.
Suddenly, a man, wild-haired and wide-eyed, came into his view. He said something unintelligible—It was a language Maximus had known, but for now couldn’t quite remember. After speaking the words, the man tugged on the cage, trying to open the door. He couldn’t work the mechanism to open it. In desperation, he pulled out a crude short sword and hacked at the door, the blows clanging against the chain that held it fast.