The shouts of the crowd rose and fell with each blow, with each strike of trident and sword. When they were silent, the heavy grunts of the fighters pushed through the weighted air, reaching Cato and reminding him that it was not a dance, but a fight to the death.
His arms grew fatigued by the tight grip on the stone wall. How could Ariella still push on with her trident and nets?
But it could not last. He saw that now. Saw her weakening, slowing. She had only speed as an asset, and without it she would fall. He watched her face for signs of defeat, but he was too far to read her expression.
Floronius delivered a kick to her ribs and Ariella bent over the blow. Cato started forward, as though he could put a stop to this madness. Heat sparked along his fingertips and he felt himself flush with panic and indecision. Torn between a desire to save her and a desire to honor her wishes, he shuffled his feet in the stone box.
Octavia smacked his arm. “Sit down, Quintus. You are making me nervous.”
Beside her, Isabella chimed in, “Isn’t he the same little fighter who had you so agitated at the last games, Quintus?”
The crowd sent up a gasp and then a shout.
Cato watched in terror as Ariella backed away, her upper left arm blooming with the spread of purple-red blood.
She used her other forearm to wipe sweat from her head and gave only a glance to the injury.
Cato had known before the fight began that should Ariella go down before Floronius, he would certainly declare mercy for her. But the blood began to run down her arm to the hand that held the trident, and Floronius circled her like a lion preparing for the kill. It was likely this brute would make an end of her before Cato had the chance to intervene.
Gods have mercy, she was going down.
He felt it in his own body even before the crowd sensed her wavering on her feet. A moment later and she was facedown in the sand, Floronius standing over her . . .
Somehow, impossibly, Cato found himself leaping the stone wall and running down through the tiered seating toward the arena wall.
The drop from the edge of the seating to the sand was no more than his own height, and it jolted but did not slow him. He ran past the arched entrance to the arena where Paris and another fighter waited.
Paris watched him come, eyes wide.
Cato spotted the scimitar in the fighter’s hand and pointed as he ran. “Give me that!”
The gladiator looked down, held out the weapon, frowning.
Cato snatched the curved blade, turned, and ran to the two fighters in the center.
Floronius had put his foot onto Ari’s back and his sword at the base of her neck. His back was to Cato.
The crowd had gone deadly silent at Cato’s leap into the arena, and Floronius searched the stands to see why he was not cheered.
Cato yelled. It came deep from his chest and exploded as he ran, sword raised, across the sand at Floronius.
The fighter spun, his own weapon held out at his waist.
Cato did not slow.
The crowd screamed their delight.
Their swords met in a deafening clash of metal. They pushed apart and Cato gained his balance for another charge. A quick sideways glance revealed Ariella scrambling to her feet and pulling back.
Good.
He ran at Floronius once more, and their swords met again, the sound lost in the frenzied screams of the spectators.
Somehow he held his own. Calling on everything he’d learned by years of watching the gladiators, he thrust and jumped back before Floronius could strike. Some part of his mind evaluated the situation, aware that this was something he had dreamed of since he was a boy.
Aware that it was ludicrous and he was soon to die.
Just as he had known that Ariella could not have victory here, it did not surprise him when it was his own back in the sand, with Floronius’s angry and confused face above him.
“What is this?” Floronius’s voice was the growl of an abused animal. “Did you wish me to let you win?”
Cato inhaled, fighting the tightness in his chest.
Floronius seemed to sense his chance to perform. He lifted his voice into the air. “What shall it be, sponsor? Death or mercy?”
The crowd laughed at the irony, then waited for Cato’s response.
Before he could speak, a flash of leather and rope, flesh and blood, flew across the sand. Ariella’s nets whipped around Floronius’s feet, and with a practiced yank, she toppled the bulky fighter. A moment later the prongs of her trident were balanced across Floronius’s chest.
Again the townspeople went wild. It had been a fight to talk about for years.
And Cato saw his moment.
He scrambled to his feet, crossed to Ariella, and lifted her good arm into the air, signaling her as the victor. To Floronius he whispered harshly, “Get up. Get out of here.”
The fighter performed his duty, retrieving his shield and sword and running from the sand.
Cato shouted into the heavy air, and the crowd seemed to perch on their seats to hear every word. “I promised you something you had never seen before!”
Beside him, he sensed Ariella’s tension, even her anger.
The moment hung, suspended, and he let them wait, then turned a circle, arms out, and made good his promise. “When have you ever seen a politician in the arena?”
Thousands of cheers lifted from the seats.
“There are some who say that I cannot win. That I do not have the strength, the power, to take on my rival.” He was warming to his speech now, and he had them. “That may be true. But like Scorpion Fish here, I will fight with everything I have. I stepped into this ring today to show you who I am.” He paused again for effect. “I am a fighter!”
The crowd screamed.
“I am a fighter who despises the odds and the risk! And I will fight for what is right, for the good of the people of Pompeii!”
The crowd was on its feet now, fists and voices raised in defiance of the city government that had too long oppressed them. Cato felt the flush of success and turned to Ariella, who still breathed heavily.
“I thank you for coming to my rescue.” His words were only for her.
Her lip curled. “I did not do it for you.”
“Even so.” He bowed. “I am grateful.”
Her eyes were narrow slits. “And I thank you for not revealing me. You have benefited me, even. They will be talking about this fight, about Scorpion Fish. The next time I fight—”
Cato took a step closer to her, close enough to smell the sweat and blood and leather. He leaned in until his lips brushed against her ear.
“Listen to me, Ariella, and listen well.” All the terror and fury of the day hardened into one fierce truth. “I swear by all the gods, you will never fight in the arena again.”
26
Cato was still posturing before the crowd when Ariella made her escape. She ran from the sand, grateful that her injuries were all in her upper body so that she was able to flee the arena without limping, or worse—being carried out.
In the corridor beyond the arena, Floronius waited, fuming. “What was that? Do you suppose I am going to allow you to be declared the victor—”
But Ariella did not want to hear it. Wanted none of it, this life of a gladiator, this life of slavery. She dropped her trident and net, ran past Floronius, past the other fighters waiting to be called to the sand, and up the ramped exit to the city. The arch ahead streamed light into the dingy hall and she flew toward it as though chased by demons.
Her left arm throbbed where it had been sliced open and she dared not look. Her ribs burned and every muscle seemed as though it had been stretched over a fire.
Still, she ran.
And as she ran, the truth pounded up through her sandals and into her heart.
You will never be a true fighter.
Never make a name for herself as an opponent of anything more than dwarf or beast.
You will never be free.
&nb
sp; There was nothing for her but to be killed in the arena. Or to run away, be found, and be executed.
And Portius Cato, what of him and his threat? No doubt he would have her scrubbing the barracks latrine and serving porridge to her former colleagues.
At the thought of slavery in the barracks, her heart and mind turned to Jeremiah, and her feet soon followed. Through the city, drained of people by the games at the end of town, she ran, then walked, then stumbled to reach the house where she had left Jeremiah some nights earlier. She had only this one friend in Pompeii. Where else would she go?
She reached the massive doors set so close to the street, leaned a weary hand against the wood, and panted. Her arm was a bloody mess, and she had no legitimate right to be here, as she had the night Jeremiah had directed her to this door. Why would they even open the door to her?
And yet she knocked. Would Jeremiah still be here? She would beg to see him.
The house slave who greeted her that night again opened the door. She swallowed, searched for the words, but he seemed to recognize her. A glance at her bleeding arm and he pulled the door wider and yelled for someone else.
A younger woman, the adopted daughter, Flora, appeared. Ariella staggered across the threshold. Flora caught her around the waist and led her forward, into the spacious atrium, to a bench beside the impluvium, where water sparkled above the blue and green mosaics of the basin.
And then she was there, Europa, whom Ariella only now realized she had been longing to see. The woman bustled out of nowhere as though Ariella were an expected guest, directing slaves to bring water, to bring rags, to move Ariella to a front room.
Ariella let herself be led, silent and numb, to one of the rooms off the atrium, a lavish receiving room where Europa’s husband would meet with business associates. The walls were frescoed in red and yellow plasters, with ceiling-high inset squares that fooled the eye into thinking they were paneled, with painted vases and sculptures and bowls of fruit on low tables, all done in the realistic style that made the room seem even bigger, grander.
Her fuzzy mind noted amazement that she would be brought here instead of one of the back rooms, unfinished and rough, where the servants and slaves spent their time.
“Bring Jeremiah,” Europa was saying to Flora. “He will want to see his friend.”
She guided Ariella to a couch and laid her across it, her arm extended where it could be treated.
Ariella fixed her eyes on Europa’s purple-edged robe, pulled up at the shoulders over her ample bosom and fixed with gold pins. A hopelessness washed over Ariella, as though she had held the tide at bay as she crossed the city and only now it swamped her, drowned her.
The big Persian brought an orange terra-cotta basin and some pure white rags.
Europa bathed Ariella’s arm with the cool water, pausing each time Ariella gasped. “It will heal.” She squeezed the rag and dipped it again. “But you will have a scar.”
Ariella turned her head to examine the wound and found two cuts, perpendicular, with the horizontal slice shorter than the vertical. She closed her eyes and laid her head back against the cushions.
Fitting. Her injury formed the symbol of Rome’s favorite method of criminal execution: a cross. How many of her countrymen had she seen hanging, tortured, along the roads leading out of Jerusalem years ago? That she should be identified with Israel’s destruction, with criminals, seemed only right.
Jeremiah hobbled through the doorway.
Ariella lifted a hand in a weak greeting.
Europa spoke over her shoulder, still tending Ariella with the soft touch of a mother that broke her heart. “She has taken a beating in the arena. She’s lost some blood, and I believe a rib or two may be broken. But she will heal.”
Ariella noted Europa’s knowledge of her gender and looked to Jeremiah. “You told her.”
Europa snorted. “Told me what? That you are a young woman?” She patted Ariella’s cheek. “One does not need the gift of a prophet to see such a thing. Later, when you are ready, you can tell me what brought you to the arena dressed as a boy.”
Ariella sighed, overwhelmed with a mixture of gratitude and weariness.
“Come, Jeremiah.” Europa stood and gave her place to the old man. “Sit with her. Sing her songs of home until she falls asleep.”
Her old friend lowered himself slowly, carefully.
“You are well?”
He smiled. “I will be ready to train with you in no time.”
Ariella turned her head away from him. “I am not going back.”
“Hmm. Have you always gone your own way, Ariella? With no care for HaShem’s direction?”
She shifted and winced. “HaShem cares nothing for me!” It felt good to say it—to declare the truth. No more masks. She was a woman and she had set herself in opposition to the God of her fathers who had long ago abandoned her. Neither of these would she deny any longer.
Jeremiah brushed the hair from her forehead and obeyed Europa by beginning a soft song.
Ariella gripped his hand and closed her eyes, trying to recall better times. But she floated on a river of hopelessness, such as had carried her out of Jerusalem nine years earlier and deposited her at the feet of Valerius, where the true humiliation began.
Jeremiah’s voice rose and fell and became a prayer over her, spilled out in her beloved Hebrew as he rocked back and forth, his chants soothing, hypnotic. He sang and prayed of the prophets, of their promise of a Messiah to save Israel. And then his songs grew unfamiliar, words of redemption, of forgiveness and love and purpose, all found in this Yeshua, this Messiah he had claimed.
But Yeshua was not her Messiah. Had the prophets even spoken truth when they promised that the Creator would one day redeem? The God of Israel was not a good God as she had been taught. How could He be, with what had happened to His city, to His temple, to His people?
The anger built within her like a solid thing, pushing impossibly against the love Jeremiah claimed that the Creator had for her. Anger and love—two immovable forces in collision in her heart, the pressure almost too great to bear.
Ariella felt the tears slide from the corners of her eyes to the cushions, and she let them fall, let herself weep for Jerusalem, for her lost family . . .
For her future.
Vesuvius had given them the gift of their wealth, and yet they credited the mountain with little.
It loomed over Herculaneum, over Pompeii, over the towns that reaped its benefits unthinkingly, and rivers of magma beneath its surface churned and boiled.
Ironic that the towns that prospered because of its rhythmic spewing could also be destroyed by it.
How much of their riches had been given by the mountain? Granite, basalt, pumice—all formed by its cooling magma. Opals and sapphires broken loose from the depths and sent upward to be discovered. Fertilized soil where oranges, lemons, and grapes thrived like nowhere else.
And yet it was not appreciated. If they knew what raged within, they would show proper respect. But they wanted only its benefits, without paying the price.
There had been some who were thankful, once. A group of slaves, escaped from tyranny and led by one of their own, a gladiator. They had hidden in one of the craters until the army had come for them, and their leader Spartacus led them down the other side to freedom.
But that had been many years ago, and there were none who even looked up from their own lives long enough to recognize the gifts of the mountain.
They would soon regret their inattention.
27
Despite the strange outcome of the arena games, and the attention that followed as Cato made his way back through the city, he did not forget his errand as the sun set. The Christians had promised to take him to his sister. Lucius wanted to come, but Cato convinced him it was better for him to wait.
He was invited into the home of Seneca and his wife, Europa, but kept in the atrium as the slave went to fetch his master.
Ariella had not been far
from his thoughts since she fled the arena hours earlier. He stopped at the barracks, but Drusus shook his head, denying knowledge of her whereabouts. This seemed to be truth, as the lanista was furious over her disappearance, especially after the spectacle of the afternoon.
Could she be here, in the house of Europa? He had seen her in this home once, but would she come here after her injury? He longed to be certain that the cuts were not dangerous. Europa appeared, and almost he asked her about Ariella, but in the end held his tongue, unsure of what the woman knew of the gladiator in disguise.
“We must wait awhile.” Europa indicated that he follow her deeper into the house, around the stone half wall that bordered the gardens and into the colonnade that ran alongside it. “It must be fully dark before we attempt to get you into the prison.” She looked him up and down and smiled. “And we must get you other clothes.”
Cato looked down at his toga, wrapped and draped with fashionable precision. “What? Not the right attire for a prison visit?”
Europa ushered him into the triclinium where he had been that first night. “No one in your position goes there.”
“You do.”
She studied him for a moment. “I can see why Jeremiah speaks of you highly. I sense in your heart a strong passion for justice.”
Cato lowered his head. She had seen too much. “I only want to help my sister.”
“Your sister. The city. Those oppressed by evil.”
Cato shrugged. Wasn’t there a lighter topic?
She patted his arm and motioned for him to sit on one of the plump cushions placed on the benches around the low tables. “I believe you are still finding yourself, Portius Cato. And I believe the hand of God is on you, to use you for His purposes. We shall see.”
A chill passed through Cato at her words, as though she were some sort of oracle telling his future. He said nothing.
Europa’s husband, Seneca, joined him in the triclinium, and food and wine were brought to pass the time. Cato found the man fascinating and listened to his tales of fortune on the seas with delight. Ironic that Ariella had guessed correctly, though the fish symbol near the door held another meaning. But as the night fell, their mood fell with it, and the somber journey became their focus.
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