Out of a total of 41 female prisoners that started the morning, only 17 walked back through the gate, and another half-dozen were alive but needed to be carried. The medic and a female saurian helper moved among the wounded, patching them up.
Two of the tough male gladiators entered with a box right behind Pashera and handed each of the female prisoners a flask of mead. “Good job,” one of the men said over and over. “You did well. Good job.”
The exhausted women sat on benches or lay on the floor. Some cried. Pashera looked around for Amaz and didn’t see her at first. But she did see Tenrici.
Tenrici was covered in blood. It soaked her hair, her face, her breasts and chest, and her arms all the way to her shoulders. She looked in shock.
“You did very well,” Pashera said.
“Ha.” Tenrici said weakly.
“You caught the eyes of the senior gladiators I was with. They might pick you to join the ranks.
Tenrici looked at her coldly. “It can only be one of us, right? How about Rylo? Or Kaltiash? It was her blow that killed that pig-snake monster, you know. Or what about Amaz? Amaz would get that ‘honor,’ even if it were to happen.” Tenrici looked away bitterly.
“It will happen,” Pashera said. She hoped her words were a comfort. “I know it’s unfair, but I can’t change that.” She lowered her voice. “And it won’t be Amaz. I came to tell her.”
“What won’t be me?” Amaz said from behind Pashera.
Pashera turned. Amaz was somehow less covered in blood than Tenrici, despite the carnage she’d committed in the arena. Pashera stood up and whispered to her. “They told me you won’t be the one who is picked to join the gladiator ranks. Word came down.”
Amaz looked at her for a few seconds. Then she laughed. She laughed and laughed.
“That’s perfect,” she said.
The other women in the room turned to look at her laughing. Amaz pointed to herself and said, “I won’t be chosen to join the gladiators. Imagine my heartbreak.”
A few of them laughed, though it sounded desperate to Pashera.
A hand grabbed her arm. It was Tenrici. “We’re getting out of here,” she said. “I don’t know if you’ll be with us when it happens. If you are, be ready. You can come, too.”
Pashera shook her head. “Have you seen the warriors posted around this place? And the professional gladiators will stop you, too. They think it’s an honor to die on the sands. They won’t let you go.”
Now it was Tenrici’s turn to laugh. “Just let them try,” she said. “Just let them try and stop us.” She nodded, looking ahead, as if addressing an invisible audience, and gulped down mead.
Pashera turned to Amaz. “It’s madness,” she said. “Don’t throw your lives away in a breakout attempt. I know only one of your sisters will be picked to join the gladiators at the end of the games. But the others are allowed to live an entire year …”
“A year under threat of execution,” Amaz interjected.
“… a year in the arena. There will be other festivals. Others will be chosen, and they will live, too. Even you yourself won’t be executed for a year. Something good can happen. Don’t throw your life away,” Pashera ended. She hated how much her voice sounded like pleading.
Amaz looked at her with eyes that almost bordered on pity. “At what point,” she asked. “Did you become their tame pet? When did you become a lapdog, Pashera, ready to die at master’s bidding?”
Amaz turned to the room.
“I lead free women!” she shouted. “Our spirits are always free! And our bodies will be, too, by the blood of our ancestors. I will lead you to freedom!”
There arose a ragged cheer to this, followed by a louder one. The two male gladiators looked at each other, and one rolled their eyes. They tossed the rest of the mead flasks around– 41 had been provided, even though only 17 women were walking and another half-dozen lay seriously wounded or dying. Then the men walked toward the exit.
“See you on the sands,” one said to Amaz as they passed by. “You fight like a champion. May the gods favor you.”
“I don’t need YOUR gods,” Amaz said fiercely.
“If you die, may it be swift,” the other man added.
“Worry about your own death, man-meat!” Amaz fairly spit at him.
The men chuckled to each other as they left.
“You best leave too,” Amaz said to Pashera. “This is a room for free women. Not broken slaves.”
Pashera bristled at this. But what point was there in arguing? She squared her shoulders and said: “I am always your friend, Amaz. I will look out for you if I can.” She walked toward the door.
Amaz stopped her. She hugged Pashera warmly. “I won’t forget what you’ve done,” she said. “Your spirit is broken. I’ll save YOU if I can.”
Pashera tried to hug her back, but Amaz had already broken the hug and walked away. Pashera went out the door, which slammed and locked behind her with terminal finality.
Back in the assembly area for the professional women gladiators, she ran into Ang’kim again. “The prisoners fought well,” Ang’kim said. “Are they holding up?”
“They are drinking mead and talking about how they’ll win their freedom,” Pashera said gloomily.
“Good,” Ang’kim said. “Your Amaz is doing the right thing. She’s keeping up the spirits of her fighters, so that they live to fight another day.
Pashera looked at the saurian and cocked her head. She hadn’t considered this.
“The prisoners go on the sands again tomorrow – facing an extraordinary monster,” Ang’kim said. “You’ll want to watch.”
“I will watch,” Pashera said. And she thought to herself: And maybe more than watch.
On the sands, it was the noon hour, the Hour of the Weapons Masters.
Pashera clambered to the top of the gate. This is where many of the younger girls watched the events on the sand. Below, in the staging area, some of the older gladiators stood ready to go out on the sands. They looked confident, and talked to each other jokingly.
The Weapons Masters had already started. As Pashera climbed up, a man, dressed in fine green and gold clothes, with a peaked hat set rakishly to one side, put on an archery demonstration. The human was slim, with an elegant blond beard. He bowed to the king’s box, and then began.
His targets were pictures of “attacking” leatherbacks on a wood frame set against a wall. The man stood a third of the way down the arena, and started firing. Four out of five arrows were kills. The crowd applauded.
The man walked back to the halfway mark of the arena. Standing by the pillar where scant hours ago, a giant wasp had cleaned itself fussily after tearing a human being apart, the man took aim at his wooden leatherback targets again. Again, four out of five arrows went home. The fifth was just a little high.
“He’s got the measure of the wind now,” said Angani. She and Enara, who had survived the encounter with the shamblers without a scratch – and seemed more confident now – were entranced by the exhibition.
“My father used a bow,” Angari added. “Not this well, though.”
The archer turned and walked toward the far end of the arena. As he did so, he occasionally turned and fired. The first three arrows slammed into the target. The fourth and fifth went to the side. The sixth hit. The seventh and eight went a bit too high. That gave the spectators in the expensive box seats right above the targets something to think about.
His ninth shot was a solid hit, and the crowd applauded.
A gate opened behind the man, revealing a broad ramp that went to the first level. The archer went up the ramp, firing as he went. One shot hit, the other didn’t.
On the ramp, waiting for him, was an old saurian. The old fellow was shorter and even slimmer than the human. He wore the same green and gold clothes and peaked hat. He also had a bow.
“That old duffer is a hundred if he’s a day,” said Enara, who had very good eyes.
The old saurian drew b
ack on an arrow and fired. The arrow fell short of the target.
“Still, pretty good for such an old fellow,” Angari said. “Quite a distance.”
The old saurian fired again. This one hit the target dead-on. He started walking up the ramp. At the first level, he turned and fired again. This one landed right in a wooden leatherback’s eye.
The crowd cheered.
The old fellow turned and kept walking. “There’s a ramp that leads outside,” Enara said. “You don’t suppose – he’s going down the stairs. Wait. He’s stopped.”
Another arrow sailed over the stadium whistled past the great column, and hit one of the wooden targets. The crowd cheered again.
“Now he’s walking again -- I can’t see him,” Enara said excitedly. “How far do you suppose …” she trailed off.
Another arrow whistled through the air. It also struck one of the wooden targets, though it was not, technically, a hit on a leatherback. Still, the crowd cheered.
“Well, that must be it, right?” Angari, Pashera and Enari looked at each other.
“Wait for it,” said a voice from below. It was Orm’ryn.
Another arrow flew through the air. This one actually came over the high wall of the arena. It flew and flew, and thunked into one of the targets so hard the wood split.
“He does that every year,” Orm’ryn said. “Been doing it every year since I first attended the games.”
The human bowed, and then after a while, the old saurian puffed his way back to the top of the ramp and joined him. The crowd went wild.
Trumpets sounded. The next exhibitor was their own Urnkali. Wearing her three metal skulls (and little else), she strode confidently onto the sands. A burly custodian brought out a huge quiver of javelins for her.
Urnkali started with a series of spinning square targets on a wooden frame. She nailed them all in quick succession. Then someone in the king’s box threw spinning, plate-like targets out into the air. Urnkali got each of those, too. One of her javelins, after smashing a target, went and landed uncomfortably close to one of the expensive boxes on the first tier. The crowd “whoo’d”, and Urnkali waved and laughed. One of the saurians in the box – perhaps the box owner – made a big pantomime of wiping sweat off his brow, and he tossed the javelin back. Urnkali snatched it from the air with one hand, spun the javelin around as she pirouetted and bowed. The crowd applauded and cheered.
Next came a rugged saurian, dressed only in blowsy scarlet pants and sandals, the better to show off his impressively muscled chest. He juggled swords, knives and weapons of all types. He had a woman, an assistant obviously, strapped into a harness on a spinning wooden wheel. The saurian threw a veritable flurry of knives at her from 30 paces away, and didn’t scratch her once.
“He’s pretty good,” Pashera told the others.
The assistant left the sands to applause. The saurian collected his knives and went and stood by the great column. A door opened and a dozen men and saurians – obviously prisoners from their scruffy and wretched appearance – stepped forward, blinking in the noonday sun. They each held a short sword.
Kro’tos stood up. His face appeared, projected and magnified to giant-size around the column. “If any of these prisoners can kill the great Ra’Desh,” Kro’tos boomed through a sono-enhancer, “I shall grant full pardon.” The projection of his face vanished.
The men and saurians looked at each other dumbly; obviously they hadn’t been briefed. Then one of the men grew a knife in his ear. He went down with a great cry. The others looked at each other. Ra’desh threw another knife and took a saurian in the throat.
Two things happened next. Two of the prisoners, both humans, bolted away from Ra’desh. But the others readied their weapons and charged him.
Again, there was a flurry of knives. But this time, Ra’desh did not miss. The last of his attackers died five paces away from him.
Ra’desh then gripped two knives in each hand and went hunting for the cowards.
Pashera slipped down from the top of the wall.
“You’ll miss the ending,” Angari said excitedly.
“Good,” Pashera shot back. She’d had enough death for one day.
“A swordmaster is next!” Angari called down to her. “You’ll want to see this, Pashera.”
“No I don’t.” Pashera called back, walking away from the gate.
“He’s making a prisoner hold out his hands like he’s cupping something – oh, he doesn’t want to, the swordmaster poked him. He’s doing it now. Wait!”
The crowd roared in the background. Angari kept babbling.
“Oh! Oh! Pashera, you should have seen it. He cut off the prisoner’s head, and it landed in his hands before the whole body fell over.”
Cursing under her breath, Pashera walked back inside the school to see if she could find some mead.
There was no mead. Especially for someone like Pashera who had to fight that evening. But they gave her food, and she sat quietly until all the weapons masters were finished.
Ang’ess stopped by to brief her on the battle royale. Everyone fought with swords or axes. The weapons were blunted – nobody was supposed to get killed. Each “edge” was, however, lined with short needles specially designed for making savage-looking, but less-than-lethal cuts as the needles ripped along flesh.
All contestants would start within a burning circle. That would last until an illuminated weight traveled the length of the column in the center of the arena.[8] Then an inner circle would be lit, and the illuminated weight would descend at double the pace. And then the circles would get smaller, and the pace would pick up.
“If you end up outside the circle, you’re out,” Ang’ess said. “If you have a spurting wound, you’re out. No back-stabs. No hits to the head. No pouncing – if you want to fight someone, hit his weapon first to get his attention. No running away – we don’t tolerate cowardice. But anyone who limps will probably get shoved out of the circle.”
“Sounds almost fun,” Pashera said. She wondered how the male gladiator was supposed to fake her death under such conditions.
“Oh, it is – it IS fun,” Ang’ess said. “But people do get seriously hurt. They even die. I could tell you stories. Don’t you,” and she shook a finger in Pashera’s face, “end up as a cautionary tale.”
“Yes, Teacher.”
Next came the challenges of men versus women. Pashera got back on the wall for this. She really wanted to see how the veterans fought when their lives depended on it.
The first match was Saytas, with her sword and shield, against a scar-faced, red-headed giant with two axes. To be sure, Saytas was no shrinking flower. Not only was she bigger and more muscular than Dawatana, her muscles were deeply defined and crisscrossed with battle scars. She and the giant were a great match physically.
Their battle was magnificent. It ranged from one end of the arena to another. Now and then they would pause, circle each other looking for an opening, then clash together like two great stones.
This was the first contest where Pashera saw the basic lessons she’d been given in showmanship and stagecraft carried to a high art form. The redheaded giant often twirled his axes in the air before making his attack. Pashera realized this gave Saytas time to prepare a theatrical flourish of her own.
For her part, Saytas often did incredible jumps, kicks and twirls, and sometimes combinations of all three. She once ran up the giant’s leg, put another foot on his shoulder, somersaulted in the air, and then slashed at him from above before landing on the sand again. She missed. But the crowd ate it up.
They battled back and forth. First the giant seemed to have the upper hand. Then he lost an ax – and got a nasty slash on his arm – and Saytas put him on the defensive.
But just when it looked like he was finished, he kicked Saytas’ legs out from under her. Now he was on top, hammering on her shield with his ax. He chipped away at the shield – she seemed finished for sure – but then she threw the tattered remnant
of her shield in his face, catching him square between the eyes.
The giant fell back with a mighty bellow. Saytas was on top of him, her sword at his throat. She looked up at the king’s box – and the crowd cheered thunderously as Kro’tos signaled “Life.”
“Now that’s how you do it, girls,” Urnkali said approvingly, as she watched Saytas take a bow. “Give the crowd what they want. Everybody lives. Everybody’s happy.”
“Oh, please,” Tooloosa said. “Those two are such hams, they should be served for dinner.”
“It’s showmanship.”
“Frippery!”
The argument ended when Saytas strutted back through She-Devil Gate, and Tooloosa went out to battle.
Tooloosa was lithe and lean, and like Pashera, she used a spear. However, Tooloosa had been fighting long enough to get a real shield, as well as arm guards. She wore one of the battle tops that Tol’zen had provided, and this all worked to make Pashera desperate that Tooloosa might win.
Her opponent was called “Old Orlando,” an older man who used two tridents. He was well-muscled, but running to fat around the middle. His once-black hair was shot with gray, and white dusted his impressive beard.
They circled each other for what seemed like a long time, but then she sprang forward with the speed of a cobra. Her spear lunged right at his face, and would have skewered him if he hadn’t stepped back and snapped his head back. He must have felt the wind of the spear on his nose, Pashera figured, and the crowd all around the arena went “ooh” at the sight.
She skipped forward, stabbing again. But for every step she took forward he took one back. Orlando dodged his head this way and that, just avoiding her spear thrusts. The combatants continued circling the column in the center of the arena, a skilled, graceful dance of death.
Suddenly he swung up a trident, putting the tines around her spear. He twisted the trident – and the spear was trapped. The crowd got to its feet, roaring at the cunning of the move. Now he stabbed at her with the other trident, which she barely blocked with her shield.
Tooloosa refused to let go of the end of her spear, so Orlando used his lock on it to push her back around the arena. Pashera could see that he was pushing her to the wall. Pashera shouted a warning, as did half the arena. But Tooloosa could either walk backward or let go of her spear, and she wasn’t letting go of the spear.
Slave in the City of Dragons (Dinosaurs and Gladiators Book 1) Page 39