Rooster removed a bronze and silver medallion from around his neck. “Here. This is yours.” He placed the symbol of the champion of the House of Gallego in Jonathan’s hand. “For now,” he added, his grin returning.
Jonathan looped the medallion over his head. The sword-bearing griffin rested against his chest. Tao and Quintus would be proud of him too. He was champion.
Torren rubbed his hands together, anticipation clear on his face. “You’re ready.”
Chapter 31 – A Different Game
Torren caressed the beautiful woman beside him. “Wed me.”
She stirred on the silk-covered feather pillow he’d bought for her five summers ago. Her skilled fingers stroked his chin. “I can’t, Amore. You know that.”
It never escaped him that as many times as they’d been together, Caelina never used his name. He was amore, like the others who could afford the thousand sesterces for the pleasure of her company. She kissed him lightly on the mouth and slipped from the bed like a shadow retreating from the sun.
Torren sat up on his elbows, wishing he possessed enough coin to keep her with him, only him, every day. “Dine with me before you go.”
She pulled her silk tunic over her head, making even that look graceful. “I thought you dined with your gladiators in the evenings.”
He suppressed a sigh. “No, I dine with each of the men in turn every Monday. You’ve said before how generous that is of me. Remember?”
She sat on the end of the bed to lace on her sandals. “I need to return home.”
“This could be your home.”
“I love Rome too much.” She turned and presented him a sultry twist of her lips. “You know I only leave the city to see you.”
Torren rose and found his tunic. Her visits to the ludis were not a privilege he’d earned. She didn’t want it known her patrons included a lanista, though she could never afford to admit it. He buckled his belt, an idea forming to take her pride down a few rungs and test his theory about his champion.
“Did you know most lanistas reward their men with women after victories? I’ve always found it easier to give them a share of their winnings and let them do as they please with it.”
“Do the perditi hominess even know what to do with coin?”
His teeth clenched through a sharp intake of breath. He spun to face her, surprised at how deeply her words had wounded him. “It’s one thing for the matrons in the temples to refer to me and my men that way. But to hear it from you?”
“I didn’t—”
“You call them lowest of the low. The rich men I share you with mock us, call us animals, barbarians, inferi. The same men who recount my men’s battles in the baths, collect their armor for their villas, and hire their swords to defend their very lives. So tell me, who are the greater men? Who are the true Romans?”
He crossed to the window, unable to stand the sight of her.
“Do not be angry with me, Amore.”
She sounded sincere, but when he turned to face her, her sky-blue eyes told the truth. This was business. No more. No less.
It would be for him too. “I’ll let you make it up to me.”
Seduction oozed in her smile. “What do you have in mind?”
“My champion performed exceptionally in all three spring games. Spend tonight with him.”
Her smile vanished. “You said you didn’t do that.”
“I’m making an exception for Jonathan. He saves all his earnings. Never visits the brothels with the others. He won’t bet even a copper on knucklebones.”
“Then he wouldn’t spend a thousand sesterces on me, even if he has it.”
“I’m feeling generous.”
A long silence followed as she worked her jaw back and forth and stared at the wall. Torren might not have the rank or reputation of her other clients, but his coin spent the same. Too much of which he spent on her and she knew it.
Finally her gaze, and that smile that lightened coin pouches, returned. “Five thousand sesterces and the standard arrangement. You tell no one.”
Torren flinched at the price. But knowing who he could trust in the coming months would mean life or death. “Done. Provided you remain with him till dawn and earn the coin. No ordering him to the floor or insulting him as you did me a moment ago.”
“He’ll be well satisfied.”
Her smug grin as she left cut him like a knife, providing images he forced from his mind. It was too late to call her back. Sending her to Jonathan was an inspired way to test how much Jonathan could be trusted to tell him the truth. He’d remind himself of that when he wanted to curse himself a fool for adding another lover to her collection.
He’d entered into a war, and war always meant sacrifices.
A gladiator was a slave. Even more beneath her reputation than a lanista. But, five thousand sesterces was a lot of coin. And all the talk in the baths, the forum, even the bedchambers of her other patrons about this gladiator had Caelina curious. Her two guards, Lucius and Octavius, didn’t like this either. Because they’d be up all night or because she’d lowered herself to pleasuring slaves now she couldn’t tell.
It didn’t matter. They’d follow her into the deserts of Egypt if she asked them too.
For tonight they would wait at the end of the hall. At the last closed door, Torren’s servant Rufus raised his hand to knock. She grabbed his wrist, careful not to spill the oil in the small clay lamp she carried. “Don’t announce me. Make certain my guards are comfortable and we’re undisturbed till morning.”
“Yes, my lady.”
My lady. Only servants called her that still. She unlatched the door, and it made no sound as it opened. Well maintained—like everything in Torren Gallego’s villa. She crept in, the faint glow from the lamp revealing Torren’s gladiator already asleep in his bed. Thank Juno for that blessing. She had no intention of waking him. Not until just before dawn if she could help it. Tiptoeing across the tiled floor, she felt ten years old again, trying to sneak from her bedchamber before he would come. She placed the lamp on the table and settled on the only stool in the room.
He slept naked on top of his blankets, and the skin of his back sent a shiver down her own. Welts covered it, some long and dark, most thin and white, like those on his arm. Above a thin chain on the back of his neck a strange symbol had been inked into his skin. His dark hair glistened in the lamplight. Damp from a bath? It couldn’t be sweat, for none covered his skin and he smelled rather clean—another surprise.
His face was stunning, even marred by a small scar near his eye. Except for his back, he looked nothing like a slave. If she focused on that exquisite face when he woke, she could put from her mind she was being intimate with a slave again. At least this time she was a woman—and it would be her choice.
To pass the time, she counted his scars. After losing count where they crossed each other for the fifth time, she gave up. He shifted in sleep, adjusting the arm beneath his head and bending the leg closest to her. His hip bone popped, the way an old man’s does, but he slept through it. Another hour or two and she would be fighting sleep. That would prove a problem, especially if he woke first.
But the fates weren’t going to be so generous. Torren’s gladiator shifted again and this time he opened his eyes. He shot up and yanked the blanket over his lap. “Who are you?”
“Calm yourself. If I were an assassin, you’d already be dead.”
“Then who are you?”
His voice was deep, and as strong as his chest appeared. Scars covered it also, but they looked different. Made by weapons, not whips.
“A friend of Torren.”
His expression remained stern as his gaze moved over the rest of her. This part she knew well. His breathing deepened and he swallowed, his gaze caught on her fullest curves.
She was in her element now. “He sent me in congratulations of your performance in the spring games.”
“Did he?” His mouth pulled into a frown and rocked her confidence. “Pl
ease tell him I’m grateful for the gesture, but it’s not one I can accept.”
Caelina stiffened, nearly tipping backward on the wooden stool. “You’re refusing me?”
“I mean no offense by it, but yes.”
She’d never been refused. Not once, and this, this, slave stared at her as if he were serious. “Do you prefer men?”
“No.”
What other reason could there be? “Then why?”
“I have reasons.”
Injury? Religion? “What are they?”
“My own.”
It didn’t matter what his secret reasons were. She wouldn’t be denied five thousand sesterces because of them. “I’m not leaving until dawn.”
“Yes, you are.” He pulled the blanket more securely around his waist and stood. In only two steps he turned for the door.
She leaped from the stool and reached the door first, barring it with her body. He continued to advance, the blanket trailing behind him. Out of time, all she could offer was the truth. “I can’t leave before dawn or he won’t pay me.”
The gladiator stopped and inclined his head. “How much?”
“Five thousand sesterces.”
His mouth parted as he stood there frozen.
That’s more like it. “That’s right, gladiator. I’m not some tired kitchen slave. I’m the highest-priced pleasure in all of Rome.”
He suddenly grinned. Maybe she was making progress.
“Actually, I am. Torren earns five times that much for me when I appear in the arena.”
His insolence was as overwhelming as his perfectly-muscled body. Didn’t he know who she was?
He closed the distance between them and stopped in front of her. “Please make way.”
“What do you intend?”
“To tell Torren I’d rather have the coin.”
Rather have—
She slapped him.
His head snapped sideways and her palm burned from the impact. The fury in his eyes told her to scream. But he grabbed her by the throat before she could. His grip squeezed her neck as his gaze filled with wrath. She grasped at the wrist choking her, trying to call for help, beg him to stop, but no voice came. No way to call for help. It was happening again. She met his glare to try to plead with her eyes but there was no mercy to be had in his.
And then he blinked. The killer vanished and the prison of his hand released her.
Air never felt so good, but the cough that followed hurt, and still wouldn’t let her scream for her guards.
He’d backed away from her, his eyes wide and his mouth parted, as if surprised he’d nearly killed her. “Forgive me.”
Absolutely not. She rubbed at her neck, and the coughing stopped. She heaved several deep breaths and put her hand on the latch of the door behind her. Torren would have him executed for this. She’d make sure he did. But the man hugging his blanket to his waist was not the one who’d choked her. He wouldn’t raise his head, and she could feel the remorse rolling off him in waves. The ridiculous urge to comfort him overcame her.
His head finally came up, though the regret was still in his eyes. “Forgive me. You reminded me of someone I once knew.”
“Then I pity her.”
“She doesn’t deserve it. Nor did you deserve that.” He raked his fingers through his black hair. “I’d rather you never slap me again, but I’ll try to remember to turn the other cheek if you do.”
He was mad. Mad like Nero. Maybe even Caligula. But Lucius and Octavius were still near. If she left now, she forfeited the coin and this would have been for nothing. Then there would be explaining to Torren, including the part where he refused her. She hadn’t made the reputation that kept her in silk and pearls by admitting defeat. Surely a gladiator would understand that.
“I won’t come near you, but I am staying till morning. I doubt Torren will ask, but if he does, tell him you enjoyed yourself.”
He just stood there. Like a statue. A blanket-wrapped mute with sorrow in his gaze.
She sighed and crossed her arms. “Please.”
The word tasted foreign on her tongue. She was used to hearing it, not saying it.
“Is the coin that important to you?”
“Yes.” Her reputation more so, but he didn’t need to know that. “Considering you almost crushed my throat, it’s the least you can allow me.”
He frowned and ran his fingers through his hair again.
Caelina wouldn’t give him an opportunity to change his mind. She lay across the doorway, the cold tile chilling her through her silk garment. With her arm she made a pillow as the gladiator had done earlier and curled her knees in.
“You can’t sleep on the floor.”
“I can do whatever I like, and this way you can’t sneak out without waking me.”
“You have my word. I won’t leave. Please take the bed.”
“Not unless you put it in front of the door.”
She’d uttered it in jest, but he turned to the wall and retrieved a brown tunic from a peg. He pulled it on with one hand while the other held his blanket in place. His sense of propriety was amusing. A laugh built in her chest, until he placed the blanket on the bed and began to pull the wooden frame toward her.
Caelina scooted out of the way and he slid the bed long-ways against the door. He didn’t linger, simply walked back to where it had been in the corner of the small chamber and lowered himself to the floor. He faced the wall instead of her, stretched out on his side with his head resting on his arm. He’d left the lamp burning, and she could see him shiver on the cold of the stone floor.
She sat on his bed, guilt covering her along with his blanket as she lay on the thick cushion. An earthy, rich scent lingered on the fabric, like a newly plowed field, as complex as the man who’d made it. She’d seen the wrath in his eyes and felt the fury in the hand at her throat. Neither fit with the way he’d then given up his bed and, more intriguing, why he wasn’t in it with her. She’d seen the way his body responded and recognized it in his eyes when he first looked at her. But he hadn’t acted on it.
Why? She studied him in the lamplight. He’d nearly crushed her throat. It still hurt. Yet she felt safe with him. Safer than she had in a long time.
Chapter 32 – Silver
Jonathan missed a block with his shield, and Styx’s wooden sword thumped him hard against his ribs. He needed to spend more nights on the floor if one made him this stiff.
Styx frowned, the morning light of the courtyard shining off the sweat of his brow. “You’re slow today.”
“Don’t get accustomed to it.”
“And tender about it. What happened to you last night?”
“Nothing I wish to discuss.” Jonathan stepped toward him and continued their sparring.
“By the gods, it’s true then?” Styx swore and his grin widened. “I owe Wolf ten sesterces.”
“Told you,” Wolf yelled from where he sparred with Cam.
A sinking feeling told Jonathan he already knew the reason as he took another solid hit. With his shield this time. “Why?”
“I didn’t believe he’d seen Caelina enter your chamber last night. Torren is mad about her. Half of Rome is.”
A quick thrust to the knees should silence him. But Styx blocked it, still grinning.
“Well? How was it?”
Jonathan forced Styx to engage him sword to sword.
“Nothing— ” Crack. “I wish—” Crack. “To discuss.”
The grin on Styx’s face widened. “You’re cruel—” Crack. “Not to share.” Crack.
A growl of frustration tore from Jonathan’s throat and poured into his attack. Their sparring intensified, until Rufus approached them. “Jonathan, the master summons you.”
Eleven pairs of eyes were on him at once. He dropped his training sword and shield in the basket and followed Rufus to Torren’s library. His empty stomach churned with every step. In the library, Rufus closed the doors behind him.
Torren reclined on a couch
, turning an unbitten apple over and over in his raised hand.
“Do you always tell the truth?”
“What?” Jonathan needed to choose his answers carefully to keep his word to Caelina without dishonoring God or himself.
“It’s a simple question. Do you always tell the truth?”
“I don’t lie.”
“Ah, but that’s not the same thing, is it?”
Jonathan’s anger rose even as he tried to remain calm. “Am I accused of some transgression?”
“Not yet. Come sit.”
Jonathan refused to look away from the penetrating gaze, or show signs of discomfort as he took the seat opposite his master. He’d done nothing wrong. Except for grabbing Caelina by the throat when she slapped him. For that he’d already asked her forgiveness, and God’s.
Silence stretched between them until finally Torren spoke. “Did she please you?”
“She did all that I asked of her.”
Torren’s knuckles whitened on the apple that stilled in his hand. “Did she?”
“Yes.” He’d asked her to take the bed and she had, and she didn’t slap him again. “I appreciate the gesture, but bringing honor to the House of Gallego and the share of my winnings you allow me to keep are reward enough for me. You needn’t send her again.”
Torren set the apple down. From between the cushions of his couch he raised a hefty sack of coin and lobbed it toward him.
“What’s this?”
“A hundred aureii. It’s yours.”
Jonathan couldn’t breathe. Ten thousand sesterces. Not nearly enough for his freedom, but with the three thousand four hundred and sixty three he already had, perhaps enough for Nessa’s.
“It’s yours if you tell me the truth, not deliver clever answers designed to avoid deception.” Torren sat up and leaned forward, interlacing his fingers and placing his elbows on his knees. “Did you join with her or not?”
The leather bag in his hands might as well be thirty pieces of silver. If he gave up Caelina, told the truth, the coin would be his. Torren had always proven himself a man of his word. But so was he, and he’d already given it in haste last night. He swallowed. Forgive me, Nessa. He extended the coins to Torren, his arms trembling under their weight.
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