by Lydia Pax
Leda and Conall leaned into one another, the shock wave of the news not quite settling down upon them.
She was free. She was free and she was a princess and he was a slave and a gladiator.
It was like this bad news had simply been waiting on them to announce their love for one another, to make the hit all the worse.
“Go and grab your affects,” said Publius. “The guards will wait, but I’d like to have you gone before training starts. I don’t want my men starting fights with foreigners.” He eyed the Armenian soldiers with some suspicion.
Conall swelled with emotions he did not even know what to call. Joy, yes, for his love. But also sorrow—deep sorrow that burrowed into the core of him.
Leda, his love, the woman he wanted nothing more than to live for entirely—freed. Gone from his life.
Chapter 43
Leda stood at the gates with Conall. Their hands were clasped around one another, and they kept grabbing, as if they could somehow grab just the right way to keep themselves there. There had been no time to make ready. No time to prepare.
She had run upstairs to gather her things, hardly having the time to think. Her bag with her things—there were few of them, a few spare stolas, some scrolls of writing along with her own writing materials—sat in the wagon prepared for her. Her papers for freedom—and the token designating her as a freed citizen—was on her person. She had inspected them thoroughly. They were either genuine or such a magnificent forgery that she had trouble believing anyone would ever discredit them.
The soldier with his heavy Armenian accent was clearly from her home country. Still, there was something suspicious that she simply could not place the fingers of her thoughts around.
“Somehow we’ll fix this,” she said to Conall, nodding. “We can fix this. I shall write some letters and it will all be taken care of. Gladiators can be sold. They can be freed. We shall be together again.”
Conall shook his head.
“No. It’s all right, Princess. I’m not worthy of you, remember?”
He was smiling as he said it, trying to joke. But just recalling those words hurt her.
“Don’t say that.”
“You’ve said it enough.”
He shook her just slightly, trying to earn a smile. But she would have none of it. This was no time to pretend that the past was different.
“No. I was wrong. I wasn’t…I wasn’t worthy of you. I should have acted better. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for a lot. I wish…” she could feel tears brimming now. She tried to straighten. She was a princess. “I wish this was different.”
He nodded, silent. It was the sort of silence that said to her he did not trust the sound of his voice.
“I wish anything else at all was happening right now,” he said finally. “Earthquake. Flood. A fire.”
They embraced once more, unable to stop themselves. His lips were sweet and rough. Gladiators began to trail out from the cell blocks, doctores ordering them around the yard.
“I love you,” she whispered in his ear. “Do you hear me? I love you. This is not the end of us.”
“I love you too,” he said. “Gods, I really do.”
She wished with him that something would happen—anything—to stop this. Ten fires. A thousand earthquakes all at once.
But there was no such thing. They kissed a final time and she got up on the wagon they had provided for her. Very soon the horses started.
Conall remained in sight, just looking as she rode away.
The gates creaked loud, closing behind her and shutting the sight of her love away. And that was the end of that chapter of her life.
Chapter 44
Training began and Conall’s heart was on fire.
They began as they always began, in front of the posts in the sands. The intent of the post was to practice form. Conall used it to practice his fury. He attacked his post until his arms dragged, trying to fight out the pain.
Every chop was laid against Publius. Every thrust against the soldiers who had taken Leda. Every slash against the blasted Romans who had brought him to this garden of torture to begin with.
His form was terrible—sloppy and scary. Murus, watching him, knew the score, and knew better than to try and stop him. These matters usually took care of themselves. At the rate Conall was chopping, he’d be burned out soon enough.
Twice now, when he thought he had finally reached some zenith of happiness, some inescapable foundation of joy, it had been taken away from him. Twice. Once after gaining the primus—only to be driven from it in the very next munus. And again, now, with Leda.
There was nothing sacred. And with nothing sacred, there could be nothing profane.
Nothing.
This was the word that drove him, strike after strike as he drove himself into exhaustion against the posts. Nothing—nothing. The sun beat down hard, squeezing sweat from the training gladiators, and Conall resolved to beat the sun if he could.
There was nothing in his life going the way he wanted. Nothing happening that would do anything for him. It seemed like all the world was some insane device meant to bear down misfortune on him and him alone.
Were anything good ever to come out of it, Conall would have to break the machine.
At midday they broke for water and a light meal of hard bread. Conall felt the strength in his limbs return quickly, and with that strength came frustration. He did not want to feel anything. But all the training he had undergone in the past had raised his endurance to the peak of human conditioning, and it would take more than just a hard morning’s training to expend him.
Back out on the sands, Conall felt the heat of the sun as a challenge. It was all a challenge, and if he did not rise to the occasion, no one would do it for him.
There was something he had thought of a long time ago that he had put aside. A thought that was dangerous and low. He did not want to dishonor the ludus, nor hurt the men in it. But that honor had brought him to this point, and so it was worthless.
Diocles entered the sands after him, talking with his fellows and boasting about some whore he’d nabbed after the last series of games. Conall stood right in his path.
“Greek,” he said. “Why don’t you spar with me?”
“Spar?” Diocles scoffed. “With you? Why don’t I tie some swords to a rabbit and save myself the time?”
“I am ready for you.” Conall held up the swords in his arms. “You can tie my hands as much as you like. Or are you afraid of this rabbit?”
It was a taunt he knew that Diocles could not ignore. The Greek’s face twitched.
As much as he must have despised Conall for all the talk and derision he had laid at Conall’s feet over the last many months, Diocles would have been a fool to think Conall easy prey.
This was how bullies worked. They took something obviously untrue and said it loud enough, long enough, until it became the pattern in people’s minds.
Diocles took up his sword and shield and he and Conall began to circle one another in the sands. The doctores stood apart, knowing they could not stop them.
“Spar friendly, boys,” said Murus, warning in his voice. He clearly saw the threat here to both men.
The other gladiators had gathered around them to watch. They all knew the game afoot—who won here would rule the yard from then on.
The build was more momentous than the fight itself, as sometimes these affairs go. Diocles rushed at Conall straight off the bat, his guard down.
It was a maneuver Conall had seen before. A fighter, hoping to gain the early advantage, feinted with a bull rush and at the last instant leapt to one side with a heavy slash. It worked well against the uninitiated, and was a good way to put an otherwise veteran fighter on the defensive.
But, it was a maneuver Conall had seen before. And so he stepped to one side, anticipating Diocles’s leap, and kicked him in the gut. The strike spun Diocles around in the air like a top. He landed hard on the stones bordering the sands with a heavy cr
unch. Popping through the air was the distinct sound of bone breaking.
Diocles screamed in agony on the ground, clutching at his arm. His followers rushed to him, helping him off the sand and up to the medicae. Murus crossed his arms and glared at Conall for a moment. Then he turned to the rest of the gladiators.
“Are you waiting for an invitation? A hurt gladiator is an invitation for the rest of you to train harder, how about that? Now, pair up!”
Chapter 45
“You are a man gone mad!”
Publius banged his desk. Conall supposed he meant for it to be intimidating. After dinner, when Publius had caught word of the sparring “match” with Diocles, the lanista called Conall to his office. They were alone, excepting the guards outside in the hall and a slave on hand ready with a small amphora of wine.
“What is wrong with you? Why must you toss these spears into the wheels of every plan I lay?”
“I don’t know, Dominus. Why do you keep tossing me out of your plans?”
“Because you are a slave. And a slave does as he is told.”
Conall’s smile was grim. “Apparently not.”
“You…” Publius shook his finger. “You little bastard. I should have you killed.” He nodded now. “Yes. That would be the best thing. You dead. On a spike. Your head reminding all the others to never act as you did.”
Conall leaned forward. “That seems like a very good idea for you, Dominus. But I have to say, I don’t see it working out with Governor Trio.”
Publius frowned, but Conall could tell he saw the sense there. In all truth, without Leda, he was not sure he cared one way or another. He had little hope she would return.
For so long as she was in the ludus, she had been his. But now she had the world at her disposal, a princess again. And princesses did not marry down to the bottom of the social ladder to slaves, and especially not to gladiators. It would be like an eagle marrying a dragonfly.
“You’ll recall the governor expressed an interest in using me in the primus. If your first choice were out of commission, and you killed his favorite, that would put you in a hard spot indeed.”
Publius collapsed down to his chair, arms limp. He stared up in disbelief. He snapped his fingers for wine. The slave, unused to this command, took a moment before obeying. Publius downed the cup quickly and snapped his fingers for another.
“You’ve trapped me,” he said. “How did you trap me?”
“Because I want this. And I know I deserve it.”
“Deserve.” Publius picked up a small figurine of a gladiator off his desk. For a moment he looked as if he might strike it. “Since when has ‘deserved’ had anything to do with anything?”
Publius closed his eyes.
“My father told me that every fight was a story, whether it wanted to be or not. The crowd supplied it. They put the context around the men in the arena. Some fights, unskillful fights, could be more entertaining than any other for this reason.” He sat forward. “Sell me on this. Tell me the story.”
“The crowd loves any man who comes from behind to win. I would start from behind. They would cheer me by default. Maybe not at first. But the longer I survived, the more I would be cheered. And you? Any man that would have a house to fight the Titan is honored enough. To have a fighter who would survive as long as I would? Doubly honored.”
Publius stroked his chin. “Aye. Perhaps.”
“That arena is the only place in the world where you are going to reclaim the status of this house as you want it, Publius. I would bring you glory to this house. Honor. Every action you take, you tell me, is for the big picture.” Conall shook with rage. He had so much to say, to pronounce. He felt as though a lightning bolt had struck him down into his seat, forcing him upright and enervated. “But your grasps at the long term have left you with so little short-term as to keep yourself tottering on the brink of death, ever floating over the precipice. To what honor would you have had Diocles fight? To what glory? You know he is not ready. You know that. And you know he would have died if he was put in the arena with the Titan. His death would bring you only shame. Let you call upon a real man. A real gladiator. At least with me you know that my death is uncertain, however probable you may think it. Let you call upon a warrior of the arena and see how the crowd rises up to cheer my name even as I am stricken down—for they will have such a fight from me, Publius—such a fight as none you have ever seen.”
“Dominus.”
Conall stayed silent, eyes questioning.
“You refer to me as Dominus. And all others who bear that station. For someone who is dead set on going to Rome, you ought to at least act like you can operate in society.”
“You’ll send me, then?” After a moment, he added, “Dominus?”
“Yes. Very well.” Publius shook his head. “Anything to have you dead at last.”
Chapter 46
The soldiers stopped on the road and waited underneath a tall tree split open by a series of different lightning strikes. The tree looked as though it had survived for centuries, reforming slowly after each time it was split open, only to be split again.
It reminded her of Conall. All those tears, and all those attempts to make it whole again. She wondered if he would survive this latest one. To have her taken away just after the fight of his life.
She wondered if she could survive such a split. If somehow, when she was old and all her best memories behind her, she would look back on her time with him fondly. Or if she would be filled with terrible, endless regret, hating herself for leaving him behind.
Letters, she decided again. She would write them until he was free and returned to her. Once she had reunited with her family, she could ask for some manner of gift. They were bound to feel guilty—or least shamed—for what they had done.
“Why have we stopped?” she asked the soldier in the front.
For a moment, she did not think he would answer her. His face was mean and low, the nose crooked and bulging.
“We wait,” he said, voice rough.
They dropped from their horses and began to disrobe, taking off their armor and leaving it in a small pile. Then they wrapped it up, tying the spears and shields together with cord. Two of the guards looked strange to her. They had always looked strange—and now even more so than before.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Shut up,” said another soldier. “We’re waiting. Didn’t you hear him?”
Leda raised an eyebrow. His voice was distinctly not Armenian—no trace of an accent at all. Or rather, it had a heavy Latin accent, someone from this area.
She realized suddenly why it surprised her that these men were soldiers from the Armenian emissary in Rome. The armor had fooled her for a while—it was the armor of Armenian soldiers, the sort that she had grown up seeing. But the two larger men, while similar in coloring to an Armenian, had distinctly Latin casts to their faces.
This was not a rescue. This was a kidnapping—or worse.
Assassins sent for you.
There was no time to consider. Act now, while they thought she was still complacent, or she would be a prisoner until her death.
She fled down the wagon and hopped up onto the nearest horse. In seconds she was gone, racing in the opposite direction of the “soldiers.” They yelled after her, and she saw a spear skim by her leg. It slashed the horse across its flank, spurring a loud neigh of pain from the beast. But it only made the blessed animal run faster. Leda looked back and saw the riders after her. She had to come up with something—some way to lose them.
All she had to do was get to the city. They had only traveled away from it for a few hours—and that with keeping pace with a wagon. She could make it back and start screaming until the guard helped her. And they would have to: she was a free woman now.
She turned back toward the road in front of her in barely enough time to see a heavy, robed figure measuring a long pole at her chest. Then the world slowed down—she flew off the horse and fl
ipped backward down to the ground. All air fled from her flesh. Unconsciously, she tried to moan, but there was not even the air for that. Gasps and heaves wracked her body.
Someone turned her over, breathing heavily. It was hard to even work up the effort to open her eyes. All was pain.
Above her was the smiling face of the assassin from the streets, weeks ago.
“Hello Princess. You very nearly made this difficult. Congratulations. But now, it is time for Vahram to collect.”
Chapter 47
Conall stood in his cell, fingering at the stone there. How long had he seen it now, this one stone? How long had they all surrounded him? How much of his life had passed here?
A normal man, a free man, might have had any number of experiences in his life during the years that Conall had slowly expired in this cell. He was twenty-six, or near enough, and had been a slave since he was eighteen in some form or another.
In that time a man might have learned a trade. Found a girl to love and married her. Fathered several children. Perhaps become a client of some wealthy client. Make pilgrimages to famous religious sites. Eat meat more than once a year on the Saturnalia. Fight in the legion and have a cause.
His cause had been killing. His pride had been killing. His purpose, his reason, it all devolved to that. And he’d had something else for a good few weeks and started to believe there was something else in the world for him.
But there was only this. There was only the Titan, like the horizon itself, waiting in Rome to strike him down.
Let him come.
Footsteps stopped outside his cell. He turned—and saw his dear friend Lucius.
With a merry cry, he abandoned his dark thoughts for the moment and embraced his friend.
“It is good to see you, Lucius!”
Lucius hugged him just as tight. “And you, my friend.”
They stepped back slightly, arms still clasped. “I see married life agrees with you. How is your wife?”