Love of the Gladiator (Affairs of the Arena Book 2) (22 page)

They continued the meal, talking of other things. The clinic that Caius and Aeliana ran was doing quite well. It catered exclusively to the freedmen and women and slaves in Puteoli. Clients were encouraged to pay only what they could.

The effect of this was that, while a great many did not pay much (if they paid at all), other, more well-off clients ended up paying a great deal more because they understood the arrangement.

The clinic had new clients every day, and even wealthy patrons from around the town had started to donate money to them. It seemed the equestrians and nobility had noticed that when the poor were not quite as sick and injured all the time, the city itself seemed a nicer place to live.

There were less horrible sights in the streets, children behaved better when their parents were well enough to take care of them, and crimes of desperation to pay for excessive bills took a nosedive in frequency.

Sometime after they had finished their meal, each of them enjoying their full stomachs, the eunuch Iunius appeared at the door. He knocked politely, even though it was a cell, and the door was a simple metal grid with plenty of empty space.

“Ho, Caius. Medicae. It is nice to lay eyes on you once again.”

Aeliana brightened immediately. “Hello, Iunius. Lovely to see you. We have some bread here.” She rolled back the cloth over the loaf. “Would you like a piece?”

“I thank you, Aeliana. But I have business with our mighty Orion.”

“What do you want, Iunius?” asked Lucius.

“I have news for you, Lucius. I’ve had news for you for some time, you may recall.”

Lucius gestured at his gathered friends. “I can’t speak to you now, Iunius.”

“If you do not speak to me now, you may never.” Iunius's voice was earnest. “And that would be very bad for you, in many ways. I am not trying to grift you, my friend. Please. Hear me out.”

The eunuch held the bars fast, his hands gripping and re-gripping.

“He looks serious, Lucius,” said Caius. “Maybe you ought to listen to the man.”

And outside his cell, with the guards watching closely, Iunius began to tell Lucius his urgent news.

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P
ublius glanced up from his desk. It was buried in papers. Little Marius sat on the ground beneath him, pushing a ball against the edge of the desk.

“’Ello, Orion,” Marius said absently.

They must not have told the boy about who “killed” his mother, thought Lucius. He wondered how long Marius would have the same indifference to his presence.

Straightaway, Lucius could see the desk Publius used was much different than Porcia’s. Hers had been marble and gilded in gold in many places. More ornate than functional. Tiny, about the length across of a lamb. Publius’s desk, though, was solid hard wood. It had a bottom that showed no legs, and stretched nearly all the way from wall to wall. It was positioned in the corner, ensuring that when a person sat there, all there was to see was a blank wall and whatever work was laid out on the desk. With as large as the desk was, that was a great many papers indeed.

“Marius, go play in the garden.”

“You said I could be in here today, Uncle.”

“Yes, I did. Now I am saying something else. Go.”

Marius gathered his ball and looked up at Lucius with a great many questions in his big, brown eyes. He knew better than to ask, however. His uncle wouldn’t have approved the questioning of his will. As the paterfamilias, Publius's will was law in the house.

“You are supposed to be locked away,” said Publius.

“This whole place is a prison and you know it.” He shrugged. “One less man in a cell isn’t going to change the make-up of this place. You might just as well toss a few drops into a bucket.”

“You,” Publius said again, “are supposed to be locked away until you fight tomorrow. Are you going to tell me which of my guards to fire, or shall I have to flog you until you do?”

“I’ve come to discuss a different matter.”

“I don’t much care what you want to discuss, slave. You are—”

“The thing about being a condemned man, Dominus, is that you lose patience with all the people waiting to see you die. Hear me out, and I’ll tell you what you want to know about whatever guard you think you ought to punish because you’re being stupid.”

Publius frowned and set his papers aside. “Fine. I can see you don’t wish to be reasonable. What is it?”

Around Lucius's belt was a thick sack, heavy with coin. He tossed it onto Publius’s desk. Publius took a moment to examine the sack. He lifted it up, counted a few coins, and then lifted it again.

“This is a lot of money,” he said.

“Yes. Enough to buy a slave from your house.”

Publius favored him with a small scoff and a smile. “You cannot buy your freedom. You are condemned to die in the arena.”

“I know that, Publius.” He sat down and placed his hands on the table. “Let’s discuss the purchase of Gwenn from House Varinius.”

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D
own the hill and back in the cell blocks, Conall waited for Lucius. Aeliana and Caius already left, and the hour was late enough that Gwenn had been partitioned off to her cell. It was not necessary for Conall to greet him, and yet all the same Lucius was glad he had done it. The younger man knew all about Lucius's plan, having helped Lucius persuade the guards to let him up to the estate.

“How did it go?” Conall asked.

“Good. It’s all taken care of.”

“You really care about that woman.” His tone carried admiration. “I will miss her. I care for her also.”

Something occurred suddenly to Lucius. “I feel poorly. I told you to put your efforts into her training, didn’t I?”

“You did. And now she’s going to be gone, and you will be dead. Flamma has said he won’t refuse the rudis again, if they offer it to him. He says his body is getting too creaky.” Conall shrugged. “Everyone leaves.”

“You can...” Lucius stopped. He was about to say “you can leave,” but that was the wrong direction to take this particular conversation.

Conall had been depressed. Helping to train the women—and training under Lucius—had improved his demeanor a great deal. Now it was all threatened again.

“You had a terrible blackness not so long ago,” said Lucius.

“I did.”

“And you worry about its return, I imagine. That sounds frightening.”

Conall said nothing, but even that was enough of an admission for Lucius.

“Fight through it.”

Conall laughed. “Yeah.”

“No. I mean actually fight through it. Put everything into the fights. That’s what you have.”

“How is that different than what I was doing before?”

“Before, you were fighting and not caring whether you lived or died. I’m not suggesting that. I mean learn this craft. Learn it every way that you can. Watch every fight as if it’s your own. Learn from every loss and every win. Live, breath, eat, and drink fighting. That is the life you have. Fight long enough, and hard enough, and you can win your freedom. If you embrace it, if you accept it, your thoughts will never turn sour.”

“And what if I can’t do that?”

“I don’t know, friend.” Lucius patted him on the back. “Pray, perhaps?”

From outside, the gates opened. A procession of misery entered through them. Men and women shackled in chains, led by rough-looking men with torches and long spears.

More slaves. The last lot that Porcia had bought, Lucius intuited. Hadn't she said something about a princess?

“Who is that, I wonder?” asked Conall.

He pointed with his bearded chin at a particularly lovely dark-haired, brown-skinned woman who held her nose and head quite high. She did not look like a slave.

“How would I know?” said Lucius.

“She’s lovely,” said Conall. “I’ve never seen anyone so lovely.”

If Lucius didn’t know any better, he might have said Conall was smitten.

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T
omorrow, Lucius fought in the arena, and Gwenn fought with him. Perhaps he would die, but it eased her heart knowing that at the very least, she would fight with him.

She did not know what had pulled Lucius away so suddenly from his last meal. She imagined Iunius had important information indeed if it had managed to take Lucius from Aeliana's cooking, which was outstanding. She might have been upset that he did not say goodbye to her—but she would see him in the arena tomorrow no matter what.

Gwenn had just been settling down for sleep when Lucius appeared at the gate of her cell. It was locked tight—security extra tight after Publius's arrival and being on the night before the arena games, besides. Gladiators sometimes lost their nerve the night before a fight.

“Lucius?” she asked, sitting up. “What are you doing here?”

She rose up to meet him at the door, taking his hands through the bars. Though they held one another through the bars, she felt as close to him as she ever had. Just being in the same area as him brought back fervent, insistent memories of their coupling.

She
liked
the way he smelled, and damn it all, she had forgotten about that. Many mental preparations went into preparing herself for the way that he looked, the sound of his voice. But she had not remembered at all the way he smelled.

It was like campfires on the road. The sheer manliness of it sent a small shiver down her spine.

“I need you to listen to me for a moment,” he said, squeezing her hands. “I’ve got something important to tell you.”

“Oh yes?”

“I love you.”

“Oh.”

That was unexpected. Lovely. Wonderful. But unexpected, yes. She had thought, rather like their decision to not sleep with one another, that the decision to say
that
particular bit of truth was a bit more than they could handle.

“Oh? Is that all?”

Some slight horror had arrived in his face, but it was mock horror—a mirthful horror, knowing that she could not help but say the wrong thing.

“Oh,” she said again. Gods, she was smiling. Her man was behind bars and death was knocking at his door, and she was
smiling
.

And crying. Oh gods. He really was going to die. This beautiful, perfect man who loved her would be killed soon.

“I love you,” she said, nodding. “I do. I truly do.”

She leaned in and they kissed briefly through the bars. She was sure he could taste her tears.

“Good. That’s good. That’s...that’s amazing,” he said, laughing. “Then you’ll understand what I did.”

A thick bowl turned over in Gwenn’s stomach. That didn’t sound good.

“And what is it you did, you stupid man?”

“You’re not fighting tomorrow,” he said. “Or...ever. Unless you want to. You can sign up as a gladiatrix somewhere if you want, I suppose. But you’re a free woman.”

The impact of this unrolled in her mind like a long carpet. She wasn’t sure she understood it all right away.

“A what?”

“The investments that Iunius made for me? Some of them started to pay off. And pay off
well
. I would be maybe a rich man, at least compared to where I was, if I had any freedom.”

“And with that money, you bought my freedom.” She said it with disbelief.

“Yes. And there’s plenty more after that. I want you to have all of it. I'm having Iunius draft a will. You can go anywhere. Do anything. Make a life for yourself away from this place.”

“I
like
fighting, idiot.”

“Yes. But you don’t like being a slave. So, now you can have the one and not the other, if you really want.” He shook his head. “Or, you know, not be a gladiatrix. I think that’s a fine idea too. There are plenty of ways for a woman to hold a sword that don’t involve living in a ludus.”

They held hands for a long time, forgetting their food. God, she wished she could walk through walls. All she ached for was to slide her arms around his neck and draw him in for the longest kiss in the world.

She had been preparing to fight at his side, she realized suddenly. She hadn’t told him yet—there hadn’t been a good time. She was afraid to get in his head—something he would surely understand. But now...

“Now it won’t work.” She said absently, shaking her head.

“What’s that?”

“I volunteered myself to fight at your side,” she said. “I didn’t want you fighting alone. I wanted us to go...together, if either of us were to go.”

“Well.” He shook his head virulently, smiling. “We have really got to work on our communication skills. You did that without telling me?”

“There wasn’t time. I didn’t want—”

“To get into my head, all right.” He laughed, but then his face became very serious. “Well, you can’t. You remember what I said just now about signing up as a gladiatrix? You can’t do that. Not until after tomorrow, okay? I forbid it.”

Both her eyebrows shot up. “You
forbid
it?”

“It is forbidden,” he said again. “I don’t want you there with me. What happens to me tomorrow is my fate. It does not need to be yours. Let me do this for you. Take the money I have. Make a life for yourself. Please. Do this. Be alive.”

He had tears in his eyes.

She had to say yes.

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T
he day of the fight was cool as autumn continued its slow approach. This suited Lucius very well. He had thought of his death many times in the past, and more in the past week than he had ever had occasion to. It would be nice to die in the cool weather.

Perhaps in the shade, with a cloud passing by overhead.

Better the cool than the heat by a very long shot. He had seen dead bodies in the heat. They always seemed so uncomfortable.

Many other gladiators made the trip with him to the arena—the ones from his ludus due to fight that day, and the many, many more from the ludi all over the city and the region.

Senator Otho wanted these games to be an event to remember for a long time. He spared no expense. A great number of beast fights and hunts were to be put on in the morning, including one man who was supposed to fight a pair of tigers chained together.