Blood and Sand

by C. V. Wyk

  They were trapped.

  Lucius glared at his uncle even as he rested a hand on his sword. When he saw Xanthus, he spoke in a low voice. “Do you think these are the thieves from the clearing?”

  Xanthus shook his head. “No. I doubt these would have run.”

  Timeus scowled. He looked more irritated than frightened. “They’re rabble in need of a bath. Nothing more.” The man was too proud for his own good.

  Xanthus tried not to look back down the road, at the cart where Attia rode with the child. If he’d learned anything these past few days, it was that the Thracian could take care of herself. At any rate, he knew he’d have other things to worry about soon enough.

  The Ardeans’ leader emerged from a break in the city’s wall. He was a blob of a man with black hair that hung in strings around his face. His rounded belly bulged against his tunic as he shuffled toward the caravan.

  “At least they don’t seem to be short on food,” Lucius quipped.

  Xanthus actually smiled.

  The man walked right up to Timeus, who was still atop his horse. “Well. Who in Pluto’s name are you?”

  “I am Josias Neleus Timeus. And who”—he looked over the man’s body with barely concealed disgust—“are you?”

  “Fido. I am master of this city, and you are uninvited. But since you’ve already walked down my road, you’ll have to pay the toll.”

  Xanthus glanced back at his brothers, who’d come to stand a few feet behind him. The gladiators weren’t restrained this time. But they didn’t have weapons, and they could all count.

  “Five to one,” Lebuin murmured. “At least.”

  Albinus’s hands twitched at his waist.

  “The Princeps has not instituted a toll to use his road,” Timeus said.

  The Ardeans laughed.

  “Neither your Princeps nor any Roman has standing here,” Fido said. “And we are a simple people. You pay the toll, or you die.”

  Everyone in the caravan knew they had little to offer. The whole point of coming to Ardea was to seek shelter and try to resupply. Whatever debts they incurred would have to be paid at a later date. At least, that was Timeus’s plan, and he said as much.

  “I can give you whatever price you wish. After we reach Pompeii,” he said.

  Fido shook his head. “I don’t want gold,” he said. His eyes turned to Xanthus. “I want him.”

  Timeus didn’t even blink. “A single slave?” he said, infusing his voice with skepticism.

  Fido shook his head and clicked his tongue. “I am not stupid, and we are not so removed from the Republic that I can’t recognize the Champion of Rome when I see him. His reputation precedes you all, and he’ll be worth more than any price you can pay once I put him up for auction. Give him to me, and in exchange I’ll offer shelter and whatever else you need.”

  Timeus narrowed his eyes. “No.”

  “You’re hardly in a position to deny me,” Fido said. “But if you insist, then you can leave. Without your property. Without your horses. Without your women or your guards or your slaves. Just you—walking off into the sunset on your way to … Pompeii, was it? Do you think an old man like you can survive a week on the road alone? Choose carefully, Josias Neleus Timeus. If you want to keep your household intact, the champion is the price.”

  Timeus looked ready to tear Fido apart with his bare hands.

  But then Lucius spoke up. “I have a better idea,” he said. “Let Xanthus fight.”

  Fido cocked his head, considering.

  The vein in Timeus’s forehead was bulging again. “Lucius…” he said in a dangerously low voice.

  “Xanthus is the Champion of Rome,” Lucius said. His voice hardened and his expression became unreadable. “Let him fight, and if he lives, you give us what we want. If he dies…” Lucius shrugged. “You keep whatever we have left. Simple. But I think we can all agree that Xanthus is the best fighter in Rome. He’ll beat any man you have and then some.”

  “Really?” Fido said with a slow grin. “Any man?”

  “Any,” Lucius said again.

  “And then some?”

  “That’s right.”

  Fido looked at Timeus.

  The old man glared back. “That’s our offer.”

  Fido’s grin widened, and he spread his arms to the Ardeans gathered around. “Do I have any volunteers?”

  Every single Ardean man let out a loud shout. The sound reverberated against the darkened sky.

  Fido clapped his hands. “He fights until dawn. If he survives, so do you.”

  * * *

  The cart lurched and rocked on the uneven road. Rory still had her arms wrapped around Attia’s waist, and Attia could feel her tiny body trembling. At least an hour passed before the cart stopped, and then it took yet another hour before someone opened the outer door. Attia leaned out to take in their new surroundings.

  Timeus’s guards paced warily around the cart. Tall, bright torches lined the road on both sides. Empty insulas rose up around them, the windows dark and the doors thrown carelessly open. A row of silk awnings had been erected from the back of the cart to a pitted wooden door on ground level.

  It seemed that Rory’s cart had been driven down a street that curved through the city of Ardea, right up to the door of a small, windowless room that had been allotted to the Mistress Aurora Bassus and her nursemaid.

  Biting back her questions, Attia carried Rory inside. A fur rug covered the hard-packed earth floor, and old tapestries hung crookedly on the walls. Against the far wall, a bed of blankets, pillows, furs, and other soft things had already been prepared. Water steamed from a copper tub in the middle of the room, filling the space with the scent of lavender.

  “Do I have to take a bath?” Rory asked, her head resting on Attia’s shoulder. “I’m not the least bit dirty.”

  “Then it shouldn’t take very long, should it?” Attia said.

  She tried to make a game of it—frothing up the soap and water so that a thin layer of bubbles coated Rory’s pale skin. The poor thing must have lived quite a boring life; she was so easily amused. She laughed and giggled and made little splashes in the water until Attia declared she was quite finished.

  “You’re going to look like a prune if you stay in the water much longer.”

  “Mother loves prunes,” Rory said.

  Attia hid a smile before pulling a sleeping tunic over the girl’s head and tucking her into the blankets and pillows. Within moments, the girl was asleep, and Attia knew from experience that nothing but the falling sky could wake her now.

  Sabina entered the room a few minutes later. Her face was damp with sweat. She walked to the copper tub and splashed water onto her forehead.

  “There are people everywhere,” she said. “The Ardeans were hiding—waiting for nightfall.”

  “Clever of them.”

  “Timeus has arranged for us to stay a while, but the soldiers have to wait at the gates. They aren’t allowed into the city.”

  “So Ardea has seceded after all.”

  “It certainly looks like it,” Sabina said. She looked toward the bed, and seeing Rory already asleep, she smiled sadly. “You’re good with her. You’ll make a fine mother.”

  Attia shrugged, suddenly uncomfortable. She felt more affection for the child than she thought she could ever feel for any Roman. But Attia wasn’t the tender kind, and she only had a few memories of her own mother. How could she ever be one? Especially now?

  “You kept her safe, too,” Sabina said, almost to herself. “Who knows what might have happened otherwise?”

  “Timeus’s men would have intervened.”

  “If you thought so, then why did you bother?”

  Attia didn’t respond, and neither of them said anything for a while.

  Somehow, despite the fire, the room had gotten colder. Attia could even see her breath. The burning coals shot little sparks of red up the shaft in the wall that served as a vent. An unexpected funnel of cold air swirled th
rough the room.

  Attia turned, and her eyes settled on the door before she even realized why. It was only a dark, ugly thing separating them from the guards who paced in the street. Heavy and pitted, it blocked out all of the light from the lanterns outside, except for one bright, narrow crevice along one vertical edge. Attia stood and began walking toward it.

  “There’s something I should tell you,” Sabina said, though her voice sounded far away. Attia’s gaze was focused solely on the door. “The dominus, he’s agreed to … Attia, what are you doing?”

  Attia stood before the door, reached out, and pushed gently.

  The unlocked door swung open.

  * * *

  Xanthus stood alone in the middle of a pathetic excuse for an arena. Fewer than thirty yards across at its widest point and bordered all around by rotting wooden boards, it held over five hundred spectators. The ground was nothing but dirt and excrement, and squeaking critters raced along the edges.

  It had taken less than an hour for the news to spread throughout the city: The Champion of Rome was among them and ready to fight. Borrowed swords in hand, Xanthus waited in the center of the arena as Timeus introduced him.

  The old man’s long face had calmed, but there was an edge to his voice as he forced the familiar words out of his mouth. “Rome’s champion needs no introduction,” the dominus shouted. “Call his name! Release his fury!”

  The crowd screamed.

  Finished, Timeus met Xanthus’s eyes, and for a split second, an emotion that Xanthus had never seen crossed the old man’s face. If Xanthus didn’t know better, he would have thought it was regret. Then it was gone, and the first of his opponents entered the arena.

  The Ardean seemed to think he was some kind of dancer. His feet moved in ridiculous, circular movements, and he bobbed his head to music Xanthus couldn’t hear. He made a big show of edging around Xanthus but staying just out of reach. His comrades cheered him on.

  Even if Xanthus wanted to look that stupid, he couldn’t afford the luxury. According to the terms of Timeus’s agreement with Fido, Xanthus had to fight until dawn. To do that, he needed to conserve his energy as much as possible. So when the man finally charged at him with a shout and a lazy swing of his sword, Xanthus simply ducked. He smacked the broadside of his weapon against the man’s thigh before moving calmly to the other end of the arena.

  The Ardeans weren’t expecting that. They began laughing and pointing in delight while Xanthus’s opponent reddened with embarrassment.

  From the balcony above, Timeus muttered, “I hate when he does this.”

  Ennius smiled. “But the crowds always love it.”

  The man was too easy to play with. Xanthus managed to draw the fight out for ten minutes. Then twenty. If circumstances had been different, he might have seriously considered simply falling to his knees and letting his opponent’s sword drive home. But his mind swirled with images of Attia—the olive gold of her skin in the moonlight, the way she unconsciously scrunched her nose when she was annoyed, the curve of her mouth when she granted him one of her rare smiles.

  “Damn it all, Xanthus. Finish him!” Timeus shouted.

  Xanthus blinked, flexing his callused hands around the grips of his swords. A second later, he ducked his opponent’s blade, came up on one knee, and struck the other man in the back. The man fell with a hollow thud.

  The Ardeans clearly didn’t consider themselves Romans, but to Xanthus, their cheers sounded exactly the same.

  * * *

  Cold air streamed in, raising goosebumps all along Attia’s arms. The hanging lanterns glowed against the sky. The guards outside were asleep, having succumbed to fatigue and hunger.

  This was her chance. With the soldiers shut outside the city gates, the guards asleep, and nearly everyone else preoccupied with the match, she could run. Better yet, she could find Timeus’s chambers. Once she had him alone, she’d kill him. Then nothing would stand in the way of her hunt for Crassus.

  Attia hurried to one of the chests in the room and started rummaging through it for proper shoes and clothing. She knew she wouldn’t get anywhere in the dress and flimsy sandals she currently wore.

  “Attia, stop,” Sabina said, grasping her arm. “You’re not thinking this through.”

  Attia shook her arm free. “As you’ve been so keen to remind me, I am a slave in a Roman household. Escaping is nearly all I’ve thought about. Do you really expect me to just sit here now with an open door staring me in the face?” She pulled out a pair of dark trousers, a matching tunic, and soft boots that likely belonged to Lucius. They were too big, but wrapping her feet in fabric helped with the fit and the cold. Attia burrowed through one of Rory’s chests, looking for the last thing she needed.

  “Timeus will find you. You know that. You’re risking your life for nothing! You want to escape? Escape where?”

  Attia reached to the bottom of the chest and pulled out the map she’d stolen from Timeus’s study.

  “You can’t go, Attia,” she said firmly. “It’s not just Timeus’s guards you’ll have to worry about. If the Ardeans find out someone’s escaped the city, everything will have been in vain.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “It was the price Timeus paid for us to stay here—the toll the Ardeans demanded for accommodating us and for letting us all leave together.”

  Attia frowned. “What toll?”

  “Xanthus has to fight.”

  His name made Attia pause for an instant as she remembered the feel of his hands, his arms, his lips on hers. Escaping meant leaving him, and her stomach twisted with regret. But she pushed the emotion violently away. “Well, so what? I’ve seen him in the arena—he’s just as good as everyone says. He’ll win easily. No Ardean is going to beat him.”

  “But he’s not fighting just one Ardean.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Sabina released her wrist. “He has to fight every man who volunteers, and he has to last until dawn. No other gladiators are allowed, and no one in the household can leave the city unless he wins. If you go missing, the entire deal will be forfeit.”

  “Well, how many Ardeans have volunteered?”

  “All of them.”

  Attia sat back on her heels. The map fell to the floor at her feet. She shut her eyes and turned away from Sabina, swallowing past the lump in her throat. She imagined Xanthus in an arena somewhere in the city. She imagined him fighting at this very moment, forced again to do the one thing he hated most. Alone.

  “He’s good enough. He’s the best. He can do this. He can…” Attia clenched her hands as her vision collapsed to a single point, bright as a dying star. Sabina’s words echoed in her head, each one sharp, each one cutting into Attia with unforgiving precision. She felt as though she were bleeding from the inside. “I…” The choice should have been obvious. In so many ways, it was. She looked down at her closed fists, and words bubbled up from deep inside her. “I have to help him.”

  Sabina grabbed her arm again. “That’s not what I’m saying, Attia. I’m telling you that you can’t help, and you can’t run. You’ll only make everything worse. If Timeus tells Xanthus he has to fight the whole world, there is nothing we can do about it. No one defies Rome.”

  “Rome?” Attia spit on the floor. “Rome has taken everything from me—my family, my home, my freedom. I won’t let it have Xanthus.”

  “It already has him—it owns him. He is a gladiator. His life and death belong to the Republic, to Timeus. Just as we do.” Attia tried again to pull her arm free, but Sabina’s grip tightened. “Attia, don’t.”

  “What happened to you?” Attia said, hurling the words like stones. “When did you become such a coward? Or were you a coward to begin with?” She pushed Sabina away. “I am not. I am a Thracian.”

  “So was I.”

  The breath caught in Attia’s chest, and she could do nothing but stare at Sabina as though seeing her for the first time.

  “I am a slave in a
Roman household, Attia,” Sabina said, softly but clearly. “But I and my mother, and her mother, and her mother were born of Thrace. And my father and husband were Maedi warriors.”

  “That’s not possible,” she whispered. “That’s not … it can’t … no! No! I don’t believe you. You’re a liar. You never said anything!”

  Sabina’s expression turned sympathetic, but Attia shook her head.

  “If that’s true, why wouldn’t you tell me? You let me feel like I was alone in the world. I wanted to die.”

  “But you didn’t. You couldn’t die because you were born for greater things. A warrior princess does not lose hope so easily.”

  Attia laughed bitterly. “You knew that, too? How? How could you know?”

  “I know because ten years ago, the swordlord of Thrace named his daughter as his heir,” Sabina said. “And I was there to see it.”

  Attia stared at her.

  “You were so small and so brave. When I heard what happened—” Her voice broke, but she took a breath and went on. “I wondered if it was you. It didn’t matter, not really. But as soon as I saw you, I knew.”

  Attia turned away, wanting to weep and completely unable to. Maybe she’d already spent her share of tears, or maybe there was nothing left to grieve for. Her last hope seemed to be fading right in front of her.

  A lifetime ago, she’d wanted nothing but the strength to lead her people. A minute ago, she’d wanted freedom, justice. But now all she could think of was Xanthus fighting alone in the arena.

  “I have to help him. I’m going to help him,” Attia said.

  “The moment you step outside that door—to go to his aid or to attempt an escape—the guards and the Ardeans will see you. They will arrest you. You will be crucified.”

  “They won’t catch me.”

  “Even if you make it to the arena, I already told you, Xanthus has to fight alone.”

  “I’ll find a way.”

  “I won’t help you get yourself killed. Not after everything.”