The Gladiator's Mistress (Champions of Rome)

by Jennifer D. Bokal

  It was then that the gravity of the situation hit Phaedra. Having given everything to Acestes upon his death, Marcus had left Phaedra with nothing. The villas, both in Rome and Pompeii, now belonged to Acestes, as did her dishes, her clothes, and even her cosmetics. Over the years Marcus had gifted Phaedra a small fortune in jewelry alone. She should have been shrewd and sold some of the more expensive items in the days following Marcus’s death. With the profit, she and her father could have lived in relative comfort a little longer. Instead, she had spent eight days cocooned in darkened rooms as grief swirled around her like dead leaves caught in the gale. Now it was too late.

  “I assumed you would write to my father and tell him when you planned to arrive. Since we had not heard from you, you were not expected,” she said to Acestes. “Still, you shall find everything as your uncle left it.”

  “I traveled faster than any rider with a missive would have,” Acestes said.

  “Was your journey long and tiring?”

  “Yes to both,” he said while lifting his arm. “Now, be good and help me untie this.”

  Phaedra dutifully pushed his scarlet cloak aside to reveal a series of canvas ties at the side that held the molded leather breastplate in place. She worked knots, stiff with dirt and sweat, loose. The muscles in Acestes’s back and shoulders were unmistakable under his fine woolen tunic. Heat radiated from his skin. Far from repelling Phaedra, the warmth drew her in. At the same time, she hated the betrayal of her own flesh’s carnal reaction.

  Acestes stepped away from his armor without warning, and Phaedra held the weight alone. She staggered to stay upright. Terenita stepped forward with arms outstretched to accept the load. Phaedra shook her head and continued to hold the armor. Her shoulders ached, yet she refused to hand over the burden and have Acestes view her as weak.

  “I usually have men who travel with me,” Acestes said, taking no note that she continued to hold his breastplate. “In order to make it to Rome on time for the funeral, I needed to travel faster than I could with a retinue.”

  “Even so, I am glad you made it in time to accept his ashes,” Phaedra said, shifting to balance the armor on her hip. “Certainly, your uncle looks down from Elysium, proud that you arrived looking splendid in your uniform and humbled by how much trouble you took on his behalf.”

  “I hope that more people than my uncle saw my efforts. What a small and disappointing crowd. I imagine word will spread. I almost missed my chance to arrive in such grand fashion. The rains actually slowed my travel today.”

  Phaedra waited for a moment, unsure if she had heard Acestes correctly. She had, had she not? “You planned your arrival for this moment?”

  Acestes wiped a hand across the back of his neck as he shook his head. “You are still so naive. I camped nearby last night. I actually hoped to arrive in time to meet the parade in the streets. Imagine my surprise when a swollen creek delayed me by an hour.”

  Yes, when they first met, Phaedra had been a naive girl, and Acestes’s bluntness had intimidated her. Now she was a woman with a mind of her own. Far from being frightened of the powerful general, she was outraged. “You degrade Marcus’s memory with your theatrics.”

  “In order to court the plebs for the vote and impress the patricians, one must always remain aware of appearances. I had little love for my uncle, you must recall.” He reached out and traced her jaw with a featherlight finger. Phaedra’s insides tightened and her breath caught in her throat. “Just think. If you had accepted the offer I made to provide you with a child of my loins, I never would have inherited. I thank you for being such a loyal wife.”

  Phaedra shoved the armor at Acestes. He flexed backward and gave off a satisfying oomph. “Swine,” she said.

  “A swine, am I?”

  She shrugged.

  Acestes easily lifted the breastplate onto his saddle. “I pay you the highest compliment, my dear. A loyal woman is rarely found.”

  “I am not your dear, and what know you of loyalty? Nothing. You know nothing.”

  “I disagree,” Acestes said. “Since childhood I have been single-minded. I mean to be consul, and I will be. In this life, I have been nothing if not loyal to that goal.”

  “I see,” said Phaedra. Acestes’s ambitions were like a knife blade—exacting, pointed, and all the more dangerous because of it. With his lofty goals, she also saw that he was not one with whom she wanted to quarrel. She needed to endure his company only a little while longer, and then she could be rid of him forever.

  Acestes pulled the short red tunic worn by all Roman legionnaires over his head and used it to wipe down his arms. Phaedra tried not to stare at his well-muscled chest or his long, strong legs. It took even more willpower to ignore the fact that he wore no loincloth. She looked away, but not quickly enough.

  “I have thought of you, you know,” he said.

  She refused to look back at him. “You never crossed my mind. Not once.”

  “Liar,” he said. “By the way, I am dressed now. You can speak to me instead of to the horse’s ass.”

  “Oh, I had not noticed a difference.”

  Acestes laughed. “Why so skittish? It is not like you never looked upon a naked man before. Unless you have not, and if that is the case, I should have taken my time in dressing.”

  Phaedra knew what he implied, but in fact, during her four years of marriage, Marcus had lain with her sixteen times. Once a season he plowed Phaedra as if she were a field, both hoping that he had planted something fruitful.

  “I have,” she said.

  “Just not often, I would wager.”

  “That is where you would be wrong.”

  “That is the second lie you told me today. Do you know how I can tell?” He did not wait for an answer. “You grip the side of your gown.” He held his tunic between thumb and forefinger.

  Phaedra eased her right hand from the fabric she held. “My, you have become astute,” she said. “But tell me: Why do you insist on forcing your company upon me? You must realize that I do not want to become reacquainted with you.”

  “You are doing it again.”

  Phaedra turned to Terenita. “Come, let us take our leave.” Both women began moving from ground that still smoldered and air that still smelled of death.

  “Wait,” he called after her. “You cannot walk away from me forever.”

  She ignored the delicious desire to yell something horrible at Acestes.

  “You cannot leave me to find my way back to the villa,” he said. “What will become of your possessions once the house belongs to me?”

  Ah, but she could leave Acestes to enter Rome alone. Her pots of cream be damned.

  “Pity if I claimed something you value, like your maid.”

  Phaedra stopped. Damn him. Terenita had been given to Marcus as a gift for Phaedra. By rights of the law, she did belong to Acestes. For her sake, for Terenita’s sake, she would endure a few more hours of Acestes’s company. She held her hands in front, folding them together lest her twitching fingers betray her thoughts. “Of course,” she said. “We can leave as soon as you are ready.”

  He held the horse by the reins and came to stand next to her. “Might we start over? I have often thought about seeing you again. Each time the encounter is different, but this, well, this was never what I envisioned.”

  “You should not think of me,” she said.

  “But I did. I do still. You unnerve me, Phaedra. With you I speak foolishly. Act rashly.”

  “And make improper propositions,” she added.

  “Marcus owed me this inheritance. At the time I worried he would not honor his family. Just think about this. If you agreed to my offer, you would not be a barren widow, but the mother of a child everyone assumed to be your husband’s and a very rich woman.”

  “I have been used by my father. He saw me wed to your uncle for enough coin to maintain his position in the Senate. Your uncle took the bargain to ensure my father’s support. My father then brought the ot
her moderate senators over to Marcus’s side. Apologies, General Acestes, but when it is my choice, I refuse to be a means to someone else’s end.”

  “Well, we all did the right thing. You refused to bear my child and pass it off as my uncle’s. My uncle honored his family and named me heir.”

  “Yes, we all behaved very admirably.” She hated Acestes, and at the same time found him inexplicably compelling. The gods save her—she must resist finding him handsome, too.

  They walked toward the city and began to climb the Palatine Hill. Soon they stood at the doors to Marcus’s villa. Phaedra knocked and a small flap in the wood opened. A pair of eyes peered out.

  “See to the beast,” she said, “and to the general’s belongings.”

  The heavy wooden door opened. Two slaves in short brown tunics came out. One wrested the bags from the saddle, and the other led the horse away.

  “Alert Jovita that I have arrived with the new dominus,” Phaedra said to another slave. They entered the atrium where Marcus’s body had lain for eight days, the faint scents of death remaining. Pungent herbs mixed with flowers dried and then crushed, and the underlying smell of decay.

  Acestes touched her elbow and brought her back to the moment.

  “He will see the housekeeper in”—she paused, not sure where to introduce a new master to his staff—“the small dining room. Bring wine and food.”

  “Yes, my lady,” the slave said before leaving to do her bidding.

  She gave Terenita a few orders about packing their belongings. Tonight Phaedra must return to her father’s home, and she meant to take as many things as possible.

  Acestes ran his hand over a table near the door. “I see the villa is as untidy as ever.”

  “Marcus never did care much for trivial comforts. Almost sanitary seemed good enough for him.” She shook her head, not quite believing he was gone. She led Acestes through the garden, the shortest way to the family dining room from the front door. “I kept the Pompeii villa in order, but I never came back to Rome the entire time we were married. Marcus came to the city for matters of the Senate. A short stay here, a month there. I doubt he ever noticed the dust.”

  “Do you miss him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you love him?”

  “In my way.”

  “For your loss, I grieve,” he said, “sincerely.” Acestes kept his gaze on the white gravel of the garden path.

  “I thank you for your heartfelt sorrow.”

  Phaedra had never told Marcus of Acestes’s advances to her. She did not want to upset her husband and cause a rift between the two men, or so she told herself. In those early days she had not known how Marcus might react, and Phaedra had feared her husband would side with his nephew and accuse her of wrongdoing. Sighing, Phaedra realized that if she had told the truth about Acestes, her father might well have inherited Marcus’s fortune. There was nothing to be done about it now, but the knowledge brought back some of her former animosity toward Acestes.

  “What will you do now?” he asked.

  “Return to my father’s home.”

  “Not for long. I imagine that Senator Scaeva is planning another high-profit marriage for you right now.”

  Phaedra shook her head. “I choose my next husband.”

  “Have you chosen him already?”

  She said nothing as they entered the smallest dining room. A tray of fruit and cheeses already awaited them on a table. Phaedra reclined on a sofa and picked up a fig. She ate without speaking.

  “It is my belief,” said Acestes, his voice ending the uncomfortable silence, “that the law gives your father the right to choose for you in order to keep you from making an unwise decision.”

  “With your uncle,” she said, “I visited a people in Africa ruled by a queen. Your antiquated Roman notion of a woman’s place bores me,” she said. She refused to live within a box ever again.

  “And yet, here we are in Rome, with Roman laws. Not in some barbaric hinterland where women have not the decency to cover their breasts as they walk among the people,” Acestes said.

  Phaedra looked away. There would be no fighting with this man, especially since he spoke the truth. Her father was once again her lord. She was his to do with what he saw fit. The only way to shed her father’s yoke was to marry. Yet, in taking a husband, she traded one master for another.

  Before Phaedra could respond, Jovita entered the dining room. With hands clasped in front of her, she kept her gaze on the floor.

  “General,” said Phaedra, “you recall your uncle’s housekeeper, Jovita.”

  “Of course! You have been with Marcus longer than I have been alive. How do you fare?”

  “Well, dominus,” she said.

  “No aches in your knees, or pains in your back?”

  “No, dominus. I am still fit.”

  “The household staff, are they relics from my childhood, too?”

  “No, dominus. Most are young, all hardworking.”

  “Good. I want this villa cleaned from top to bottom.” He turned to Phaedra. “I have lived too long in army camps and squalid cities. I will not reside in a fine villa that resembles either.” Then to the housekeeper, “You may go.”

  Phaedra waited until the old woman left before speaking. “Marcus is rather fond of Jovita. I doubt he would like you speaking to her as you just did.”

  “Was,” said Acestes. “Marcus was many things. He is not anything, not anymore.”

  She stood. “I dislike both your attitude and tone. I must make sure Terenita has collected all my belongings so I may take my leave.”

  “I wish you would not walk away from me every time I open my mouth.”

  “I wish you would either think before you speak or, better yet, keep your mouth closed.”

  “Earlier I said you unnerved me, Phaedra.” Acestes stood and moved until they were so close they almost touched. “The truth is I unnerve you, too.”

  Her skin prickled. She shuddered as she breathed in his scent of leather and horse.

  “Stay,” he said.

  It would be so easy if she could just relax and lean into him. If she could allow this man—with his face and voice so familiar, yet his scent and touch so foreign—to love her at least for the night.

  He moved closer and pressed his lips to her temple. “Stay,” he said again, the word a kiss on her skin.

  Yes. Her mind, her heart, her flesh, all said, yes. Yet Phaedra remained mute.

  “Stay here,” Acestes said, “tonight and always. You never need leave. Keep this as your home, with me.”

  One word, spoken aloud, would solve all her problems.

  Yes.

  Her father’s overspending and increasing debts would never cloud her life again. She could stay in the villa in Rome or move back to the one in Pompeii.

  “Stay here, with me, in comfort. You never need to feel the pressures that come with decisions, or the responsibilities that come with them.”

  Acestes was offering her a gilded life, free of worry. She pressed her palms into his warm chest. Say it. Say yes. She opened her mouth, ready to speak, but found that the word did not come off her tongue. Marcus’s old pet peacock wandered into the room. His beautiful tail dragged across the floor. The once glossy and colorful feathers had grown tattered and dull with age. He cocked his head, looking at Phaedra. In his small black eyes she saw the light of understanding. After a moment she realized she saw a reflection and not an illumination of the mind. Would that be Phaedra’s fate? To wander the grand villa until her beauty ebbed and faded, never thinking, waiting for something to be given to her?

  Acestes wrapped his arms around her waist and drew her to him. She wanted his hard muscles to excite her, or his warm skin to soothe her. They did neither. Instead, she felt confined, even smothered.

  His mouth came closer and Phaedra pushed away. “No,” she said.

  Acestes stopped, his lips almost touching hers. “No?”

  She pushed him again, this
time harder. He released her waist. “No. I cannot,” she said.

  “You cannot?”

  Phaedra shook her head.

  “This seems sudden to you, I am sure,” he said. “While you have been married to my uncle, I have been thinking of you.”

  Had he really been thinking of her, or was this another tactic to get what he wanted? Her father’s political connections would be important to someone so focused on becoming consul one day.

  “I cannot,” Phaedra said again, a little less sure this time.

  Acestes pressed his lips on the top of her head. “I understand.”

  “Do you?”

  “You still grieve. Given time, the reflexive loyalty you feel for my uncle will pass.”

  Phaedra heard the truth in his words, but she doubted they spoke of her truth. Her reluctance to accept Acestes’s offer did not come from grief. Rather, it came from her need to live life as she saw fit, never fashioning it blindly after another’s wishes. “I will think on what you said. Now I should go. Father will be looking for me.”

  “Tell me you do not leave in anger.”

  “I do not.”

  Acestes lifted her chin and studied her face. She saw more differences between the man who now stood before her and her late husband. True, both men had the same gray eyes, but Acestes’s color darkened toward the pupil and had no flecks of blue.

  “Tonight I will see to any army business that needs tending, and tomorrow I need to start making arrangements for the games honoring my uncle,” he said. “But I would call on you after, if I might.”

  Phaedra hesitated. Acestes now had her home, her servants, her wealth. There was nothing more for them to discuss. Yet he wanted to see her. Phaedra found Acestes attractive. And still, she did not desire him, although she knew that she should. Her mother, she imagined, would have found Acestes a suitable husband. Perhaps Phaedra’s affections would grow if given time. “You may,” she said finally.

  “Thank you.” He let go of her chin. “You can stay here as my honored guest, you know. Remain in your own suite. There is plenty of room in this old villa.”

  The simplicity of the word returned to her. Yes. But in agreeing to Acestes’s offer, she would be saying no to any other future she might have. Then again, what kind of future could she expect? Neither poverty through overspending nor jewel-encrusted captivity appealed to her.