The Emperor's Knives (45 page)

A stunned silence reigned for a long moment before the crowd found its collective voice, a cacophony as they screamed and bellowed their conflicting pleasure and rage at the result. Marcus looked over at Commodus who was holding on to the balcony rail, his knuckles white with the force of his grip. Before the emperor had chance to even begin to consider the verdict the crowd was howling for, Flamma bent to pick up one of his swords, raising it over his head and waiting until the hubbub had reduced to a puzzled hush in reaction to the unprecedented nature of the bout’s end.

‘
People of Rome!
’ The hush became silence, as the sixty thousand men packed into the arena strained their ears to hear what the former champion had to say. ‘
I came here today not to fight, but to die! My strength is used up
…’

Voices rang out begging their idol to deny his own words.

‘
It’s true! I have an affliction that I would wish upon no man, not even this murderer lying at my feet devoid of any honour.
’

Commodus stirred himself from his amazement.

‘
Archers!
’

Cleander was at his master’s side in an instant.

‘It might look bad, my Caesar, were you to have one of the greatest champions of the Roman arena that has ever been known shot down like a dog in the moment of his victory. Riots have begun over less, and the flames of public unrest are so much easier to ignite than to quell. And if you were to allow Flamma a moment more, I suspect there’ll be no need …’

Flamma looked up at the imperial box, as if he knew where to find the man he had trained to fight while still a boy. Marcus looked back at him through his grief-stricken tears, the big man’s words of the previous evening still echoing in his mind, the answer to the horrified question he’d blurted out when his mentor had agreed to give Cleander one last fatal day in the arena.

‘Why? Because, my lad, there’s a crab gnawing at my bones.’

Marcus had frowned, shaking his head.

‘A
crab
?’

‘I’ve paid the doctors the best part of a year’s winnings to understand what’s happening to me. If I were to take off this tunic you’d be revolted by the growth on my back, black and lumpy …’ He shook his head. ‘It was the last man I consulted, a man called Galen, who treats the emperor and takes the occasional case on the side when they’re “interesting”, that made my blood run cold. He told me that I am afflicted by what he calls “the Crab”, our translation of the Greek word “Carcinos”. He tells me that the growth will kill me inside half a year, and that I will die in agony as it invades my organs and destroys them. I can feel it eating me sometimes, a hot pain deep in my chest. My last fight is already lost, Marcus. The only question is whether I go out on my feet, or on my knees in supplication to the pain that grows stronger every day. Would you deny me a swift death, and a glorious exit from this life?’

He’d stared at his former pupil imploringly, and at length Marcus had nodded his understanding, his eyes wet with tears.

‘Good lad. And promise me one thing? Will you see to it that I’m buried with honour? Have a nice stone carved in my memory, so that my name will live on?’

As the former champion stared up at him, Marcus nodded slowly, raising a hand in salute. Flamma nodded to himself, turning back to address the now silent crowd.

‘
And now, my friends, my time to leave this life is upon me! Remember me with kindness, if you will!
’ His voice lowered, and the words barely carried to Marcus’s ears. ‘For a while you were all the life I ever wanted.’

Lifting the sword he placed its point upon his chest and tensed, then rammed the blade through the thin mail whose only purpose had been to disguise his ailment, pushing the point between his ribs and deep into his body, his agonised grunt the only sound in the awestruck arena as he tensed himself for one last effort. Cupping his hands around the weapon’s hilt he drew one last long whooping breath with blood pouring from his open mouth, bellowing an incoherent cry of pain, anger and, to Marcus’s ear, release from torment that echoed around the silent arena. Then, his body jerking in its death throes, he pulled the blade towards him until its hilt rested against his chest, the weapon’s point first tenting the thin mail that lay across his back and then ripping through it, a stream of blood running from the point to paint a haphazard pattern on the sand at his heels. Swaying on his feet for a moment, gazing around the arena with a silent rictus, Flamma the Great tottered and then fell face down, his body twitching.

Utter silence reigned in the arena, and Marcus clearly heard the chamberlain’s voice as he leaned forward to mutter in Commodus’s ear.

‘A little applause would set the right tone, my Caesar. A magnanimous gesture from the city’s foremost patron of the gladiatorial art?’

To his evident relief the emperor rose, clapping his hands together and looking about him at the crowd with an expectant expression, and the arena erupted into wild applause as their ruler’s gesture broke the spell that Flamma’s suicide had momentarily cast over them. Cleander turned to the Tungrians, his hands clapping in an imitation of the emperor’s gesture.

‘Well then, who could have predicted such a thing? It seems that at least one of our associates has exposed himself to such a result rather more than might have been deemed wise.’ Marcus and Scaurus looked round at a surprisingly sanguine Cleander, who was in turn looking with amusement at Julianus’s white face and twitching fingers. ‘My father taught me at an early age never to risk money I couldn’t afford to lose on any gamble where I couldn’t be quite sure of the outcome, but clearly the procurator there failed to heed any such advice.’

Scaurus smiled, nodding his head in reluctant respect.

‘You didn’t bet on a victory for Velox, did you, Chamberlain?’

Cleander smiled mirthlessly back at him.

‘Of course not. I’ve been waiting for Flamma to surface from wherever it was that he buried himself after the Knives took down his patron Senator Aquila, and in the meantime I’ve made it my duty to know everything I can about the man. Of course, it helped that the emperor’s physician had just diagnosed him with an incurable disease, a fact that inevitably came to my attention through one of his assistants who serves to keep me informed of the physician’s movements. Men who know they’re dying are capable of great self-sacrifice, and once Flamma knew that he had the chance to meet the senator’s killer in the arena, it wasn’t hard to guess what he had in mind. Velox may have escaped with his life, but his career as a gladiator is over, in Rome at least. And, since you ask, half of the throne’s money went on a Flamma victory while the other half was wagered on Flamma dying in the arena today – regardless of the result.’

‘The throne wins.’

The chamberlain smiled again.

‘In my experience, Tribune, the throne always wins in the end. And now, with that valuable lesson imparted for you to do with as you please, I think it’s time for you both to leave, before Commodus recovers from his upset sufficiently to recognise
you
, Rutilius Scaurus. He still talks about the tribune who had the gall to interrupt him in his own throne room, and were he to realise that you were here I wouldn’t put it past him to whip out that knife he carries everywhere and renew the discussion. And today is not your day to die. Perhaps tomorrow …’

Cotta met the two men at the bottom of the stairs that led from the imperial box to ground level, his eyes shining with unshed tears. Marcus paused, looking towards the Forum to the arena’s west.

‘Excuse me Tribune, I promised Flamma an honourable burial.’

Scaurus nodded.

‘He’s earned it.’ He looked at Arminus, who nodded briskly in reply to his unspoken question. ‘We’ll come with you. For once there may be some small value to be had from our inevitable escort of barbarians other than their entertainment value every time we see a working girl.’

Marcus led them to the Gate of Death, stopping at the cordon which restricted access to the tunnel leading to the spolarium. The arena guards moved to block their path, and Scaurus raised a hand to forestall any conflict.

‘I am Gaius Rutilius Scaurus, and I am here on the orders of imperial chamberlain Cleander to provide the body of Flamma the Great with a decent Roman burial.’

The leading man shook his head, his voice appropriately respectful but firm nonetheless.

‘I’m sorry, sir, I’m forbidden to allow any unauthorised access to the spolarium. You’d be amazed at the number of people who try to—’ He fell silent, having caught a glimpse of Marcus standing behind Scaurus. ‘Here, you … you’re Corvus, aren’t you? The gladiator who put on such a good show in the arena the day before last?’

Marcus nodded, smiling wanly.

‘I was.’

The guard’s face split in an unexpected smile.

‘I thought I recognised you! I was on duty when you came down here before your fight. My mates on duty in the arena said you put on quite a show! Did you know Flamma?’

Marcus nodded, a tight smile touching his lips at the thought of all the hot afternoons he’d spent having his sword skills drummed into him by the big man.

‘I knew him. He trained me to fight.’

The guard looked about him, his expression turning conspiratorial.

‘In that case, since you’re one of the family, so to speak, I’ll allow you and your friends to pass this once. Flamma was one of the old school, if you know what I mean, a true gentleman for all the years he was champion, and he deserves better than the nameless grave he’ll get here without anyone to look after him.’

‘And you’re sure that they’ll be coming this way?’

Excingus nodded, pointing down the hill past the Great Circus to where the Flavian Arena’s brightly painted walls caught the afternoon sun’s rays.

‘My spies saw Scaurus and Aquila walk down there earlier with no more escort than a few of Centurion Cotta’s men and a handful of hairy barbarians, none of them armed with anything more dangerous than whatever they can conceal under their tunics. It seems pretty certain that they’ll be coming back up the hill at some point, and when they do …’

Senator Albinus nodded grimly.

‘When they do, they’ll find me waiting for them at the head of twenty hand-picked men. Just pray to your gods that you’re right, Informer, or you’ll find that you’ve reached the end of my tolerance for your mistakes and misinformation. And don’t think you’re going anywhere in the meanwhile. You can join me for a refreshing cup of wine, and while we wait for my former friends to walk into the jaws of their fates, you can contemplate what I’m going to have these bloodthirsty individuals do to you should they fail to appear.’

The informer looked around him at the men Albinus had recruited to replace Cotta’s veteran soldiers, finding their stares locked on him like cats gathered around a mouse. He shrugged, doing his best to project an air of indifference.

‘I’m sure you’ll do whatever seems best to you, Senator. Although what my other client will think of my sudden disappearance might make for interesting conjecture.’

He allowed the comment to hang in the air, knowing that Albinus would be unable to resist the bait.

‘Your
other
client? You told me that you had abandoned Senator Sigilis, as he will imminently be arrested for plotting against the throne.’

Excingus allowed the ghost of a smile to creep onto his face, enough to establish some small edge of advantage without looking as if he was condescending to the senator.

‘Indeed he is. But it’s very rare for an informant to have a single client, especially a successful man such as myself.’ Albinus snorted his amusement, and the ring of men gathered around them smirked at Excingus’s irritated reaction. ‘In point of fact, I have two other clients.’

‘And if the doomed Sigilis is one of them, the other is …?’

The informant was unable to resist a smirk of his own, fighting hard to control his urge to shake his head at the senator’s lack of insight.

‘I’m not at liberty to disclose the name, but I’m sure you’ll work it out in due course, Senator.’

Albinus shrugged.

‘I don’t care who else you work for, Informant, just as long as the information I buy from you turns out to be a little more accurate than has been the case until now.’

Marcus walked out of the spolarium ahead of the four men carrying Flamma’s body, Scaurus bringing up the rear with Cotta’s men. The gladiator’s corpse had been washed clean of blood, the wounds that marred his legs and trunk tightly bandaged to prevent the escape of any more blood, and a coin placed in his mouth to pay his passage across the river Styx. Then, once the dead man’s body had been dressed in the armour he had worn for his last fight, the Tungrians had rolled it into a tightly wrapped thick linen shroud, and Dubnus, Arminius, Cotta and Lugos hoisted it onto their shoulders in readiness for its final journey. At the building’s entrance the guards stood aside to make room for the impromptu funeral procession, but Marcus found his path blocked by half a dozen men with Sannitus at their head.

‘We came to provide Flamma with an honourable burial.’ The lanista looked at Marcus and the men behind him with a grimace of distaste. ‘And instead I find the man who killed one of the finest fighters the Dacian school has ever seen carrying our brother away. What do you think you’re playing at, Corvus?’

Marcus stepped forward and went toe to toe with the lanista, his face hardening.

‘You heard what I told Mortiferum last night.’

‘I did. You mistakenly believed him to have been part of the murder of your family. What does that have to do with Flamma?’

‘Flamma was the man who taught me to fight. What you saw me do in the arena was pretty much all the result of his training, and in the process of teaching me those skills he became as close to me as my own father. Closer in some ways.’ He leaned in, his gaze locked on the lanista’s eyes. ‘You’re welcome to join me in providing him with a burial befitting his fame, but if you step into my path I will walk
through
you.’