Spartacus: Swords and Ashes

by J. M. Clements

  Their litter swayed and jerked as the bearers negotiated their way through the streets of Neapolis. The traffic all seemed to be of one mind, all litters and carts heading in the same direction. Cicero saw nothing but the backs of heads and headdresses, as the litter picked its way through the throng like an interloper in a school of fish. All climbing toward the same destination: the flag-bedecked, sail-topped arena.

  “I entreat you,” Verres said, “trust my word, you would not care to climb the hill. The long, winding, gentle slope would occupy you far too long, or the several steep stairs that run direct, would leave you wet with perspiration before the commencement of the games.”

  “Games that mourn Pelorus?”

  “Indeed. It grieves me to impart sad news, but Pelorus is dead. As executor of his estate, I discovered details of your arrival, and hence came to ease your journey.”

  The litter suddenly rose and dropped an entire foot, as the bearers briefly dodged a cart by clambering up onto the kerb. Cicero and Verres smiled.

  “Ease my journey?” Cicero laughed. “My passage was calmer at sea! Still, if you hold the estate of Pelorus, my dealings can proceed with you.”

  “Later. Our journey is near its end,” Verres assured him. “The arena and its delights are but moments away.”

  Cicero winced.

  “Delights not sought by me, good Verres.”

  “You speak not as a Roman!” Verres chuckled.

  “I think we may disagree on what makes a Roman,” Cicero replied with a shrug. “For me, it is not this… oddly barbaric custom.”

  “Barbaric? Noble games make us Romans! A tradition most cherished!”

  “Truly it is not, good Verres.”

  “I must disagree! The arena is our proud symbol of military virtue! Our manifest destiny!”

  Cicero snorted.

  “Of swords and ashes,” he said, flatly. “Of death and oblivion. Of ill will and joy in others’ pain.”

  Verres spluttered, unable to form words.

  “A quaestor says this! An emissary of Rome says this? Good Cicero, your boldness is Roman even if your words are not. I fear this litter may be struck down by an angry Jupiter.”

  “Jupiter cares not for games. Nor does any prime god.”

  “Now, good Cicero, I must protest.”

  “Then I shall mount my apologia. Which deity rules the arena?” Cicero smiled indulgently, signaling that he still regarded their conversation as a game, and not an argument.

  “What?” Verres shook his head, unsure of why he was being asked such an obvious question.

  “Which divinity rules the blood and sand? You shall have three guesses.”

  “Mars, of course.”

  “Not so! Mars rules soldiers and men of war. Presiding over men who fight for just cause. Mars is a god of Rome and Romans, not any rabble that takes up arms.”

  “I confess surprise,” Verres said.

  “I thought you would.”

  “Apollo, then?”

  “That lyre-playing peacock? Whatever for?”

  “He shines like the sun, he struts around the arena inviting adulation of girls and envy of men. Surely Apollo must be the true god of the arena?”

  “You think gladiators fight for vanity’s sake?” Cicero said. “They might take care with their appearance, and bask in the love of the crowd, but their minds are occupied with more than merely what eyes hold.”

  “You have me at loss. You speak of a deity? Perhaps gladiators claim patronage from some famous warrior of legend. Hercules, perhaps? Or Achilles?”

  “I said three guesses! Already you have had four!”

  “Very well. I concede defeat. Who is the true god of the arena?”

  “Nemesis!”

  “But she is a goddess!”

  “The daughter of Night! The queen of rough justice! The goddess of vengeance!”

  “I believe you not!” Verres said, but even as he spoke, he recalled the fixtures in the House of Pelorus.

  “Then become a quaestor of your own doubts,” Cicero suggested. “Wander within the warriors’ quarters and you shall see their cells adorned with rude statuettes and medallions. You shall see them laying coin for temple sacrifices and whispering her name as they walk onto the sands. It is Nemesis to whom they pray. Nemesis! The architect of spite!”

  Curious, Ilithyia peered over the balcony.

  “Rabbits!” she cried, clapping her hands excitedly. “Delightful!”

  Batiatus looked to Lucretia for support.

  “Do I alone find this to be time used to foolish end?” he bellowed.

  “I adore the rabbits!” Ilithyia declared, ignoring him.

  “I have never seen the like,” Lucretia said.

  “We have not seen a ludus coniculus in Rome for years,” Ilithyia said. “But I suppose it has yet to exhaust its novelty in the provinces.”

  Batiatus snorted in disbelief as the bewildered rabbits sat, unmoving, in the middle of the arena.

  “What now?” he asked. “Do we wager on where they shit?”

  “Just wait! Now they shall let loose the hounds!”

  Trumpeters on the orchestra dais burst into a brief fanfare. The crowd fell silent, until a final flourish from the musicians. Then, in unison, the dog-handlers released their hold on their animals, and barking with excitement the hounds charged at full speed toward the rabbits.

  Ilithyia screamed in peals of glee as the rabbits scattered.

  “See how they run!” she yelled. “Is it not marvelous?”

  Lucretia did her best to smile in mute agreement.

  “You can see a dog chase a rabbit anywhere beneath the sky,” Batiatus spat in disgust.

  “Perhaps in your rural retreat, close to the land as you are,” Ilithyia laughed. “But cultured Romans never get to see such rustic pursuits. And from above, too! A bird’s eye view indeed!”

  “You live in Capua,” Lucretia said to her friend through gritted teeth.

  “We have a Capuan residence, true,” Ilithyia said, her eyes not leaving the scene below. “But I think Capua a backwater. I shall be advising my husband to look for a new residence around the bay of Neapolis. It is so vibrant here, is it not?”

  She giggled again, applauding as one of the dogs pounced on a fleeing rabbit, its jaws closing in a deathly vice on the back of the creature’s neck. The dog skidded to a halt in the sands, viciously snapping its head back and forth, tossing its dying prey in a cruel game, whipping the broken body against its own flanks.

  “If a simple view from on high is entertainment,” Batiatus said. “Give me a moment and I shall descend to the arena to take a piss. You can watch from above with heavenly perspective!”

  “Tell me the truth or you shall lose your giant’s purchase,” Varro said, glowering up at Spartacus who still stood upon his shoulders.

  “Upon my life,” Spartacus replied. “There are dogs chasing rabbits.”

  His eyes widened at the sight of one of the rabbits dashing directly toward the grille, a pair of panting hounds close behind it.

  “That one will make it!” Ilithyia trilled, pointing. “See it run for the edge!”

  In spite of himself, Batiatus leaned over the balcony, and watched the chase, the dogs gaining.

  “A denarius on the dogs,” he said, folding his arms.

  “Ten on the rabbit!” Ilithyia cried, striking him playfully.

  “Run, little one!” Lucretia shouted, entering the spirit of the game despite herself.

  The pursuing dogs jostled for position, each shunting the other, their jaws snapping. Their contest for mastery was to their prey’s advantage, the rabbit pulling ever so slightly ahead.

  “Bite the little cunt!” Batiatus shouted at the dogs, a sentiment echoed by thousands all around the arena.

  One of the dogs tripped, rolling and yelping, leaving its companion to leap ahead in a new burst of speed. The rabbit charged for the hole in the wall, seeing only shadows and darkness and the promise of re
fuge from the fanged beast that was even now panting its hot, covetous breath against its hindquarters as-

  Instinctively, Spartacus jerked back his head as the rabbit plunged through the grille and into the chamber. It tumbled past him onto a surprised Varro. The dog smashed, yelping, into the grille itself, spattering Spartacus with saliva and blood, before stumbling back, its whimpers drowned out by the screaming crowd.

  Varro grunted in surprise as the falling rabbit bounced off his head and into their cell. He lost his purchase on Spartacus’s calves, and stumbled, falling. Spartacus was left dangling, supporting his own weight wholly on the grille, as Varro fell to the floor laughing.

  “Varro!” Spartacus called in annoyance. When it became clear that the blond giant was not coming to his aid, he dropped nimbly to the floor.

  “If this spectacle is what the people of Neapolis call a day at the arena,” he mused, “our fighting abilities shall hardly be taxed.”

  He sat back down, leaning against the wall, and listened to the distant chatter of the crowd. Outside, he heard the sound of the guards herding a new group of unfortunates toward a nearby cell.

  “Fresh warriors?” Varro mused, his laughter almost subsided.

  “Perhaps,” Spartacus said. “Or perhaps they demand we fight on the sands against ants and mice.”

  Partly illuminated by a shaft of light from the arena outside, the broken body of a dying rabbit shuddered, breathing its last before an audience of none.

  IX

  MERIDIANUM SPECTACULUM

  “What follows, Quintus?”

  “The usual midday spectacles. The old and the infirm, the weak and the inconsequential-all set alight.”

  “How dull. What has been provided for our midday repast?” Lucretia poked the trays of food, and largely ignored the action below, as the newly arrived Timarchides raised his hands for silence, and then bellowed out the coming agenda.

  “These games celebrate the life of Marcus Pelorus, honored resident of this town.”

  A few half-hearted cheers issued from the stands. Batiatus plainly heard some comedian in the stalls grunt “Who?” to cackles from his cronies.

  As Timarchides spoke, guards led chained figures out to a series of wooden posts-a dozen in a circle dotted around the middle of the arena.

  “It is fitting the first blood of the day should be shed in his honor, and in the attainment of justice for his demise. Those you see before you are slaves of the Household of Pelorus, sentenced to death, as is our custom for all slaves beneath the roof of a murdered master.”

  “They do not look particularly deadly,” Ilithyia observed, chewing on a walnut. “That one looks too old to carry a sword. And those are all but children.”

  “They did not actually murder Pelorus,” Batiatus said. “There is yet another fate reserved for them.”

  “You are the expert on gladiators, Batiatus,” Ilithyia laughed. “But their appearance seems to lack a warlike quality.”

  “They are not the gladiators of House Pelorus,” Lucretia said. “Their sentence is ‘to the sword,’ which the arena will assuredly take care of in the next few games.”

  “Then who are they?” Ilithyia asked.

  “Mere bystanders,” Lucretia explained. “In the house of a murdered master, all slaves must die.”

  “Seems a little unfair on the cook,” Ilithyia said with a shrug.

  “Then he should have made intervention to prevent the tragedy!” Batiatus said.

  “What of the stable boys, and chamber maids?” Ilithyia added. “Simply because some escaped bitch pulls a knife on her master.”

  “It serves as deterrent,” Lucretia suggested. “These slaves cannot be saved, but they can serve as example.”

  “That is one view, I suppose,” Ilithyia mused. “Imagine yourself a slave accused of small crime or indiscretion. If certain death awaits, then what do you have to lose? The thought terrifies.”

  Outside they heard the cheers of excitement from the crowd, and the shrieks of agony from the burning slaves. It was nothing unusual for the midday spectacles, and Spartacus and Varro ignored it, as if it were background music in a tavern, or the sound of children playing outside.

  A group of half a dozen slaves, marked with the thin welts of castigatory whips, huddled in the next cell. They were five men and a woman. Spartacus found himself unable to take his eyes away from the tattoos and swirls visible on those parts of the woman’s flesh that were bare. She saw him looking.

  “Have we met before this day?” she asked, as if no bars separated them, and no cage encircled them.

  “Perhaps,” Spartacus replied, “in the winter forests by the Istros. In the throes of battle.”

  “A warrior of Thrace,” she mused.

  “A witch of the Getae,” he observed.

  “How goes the war, Thracian?” she asked, leaning on the bars. “Have your Roman allies proved to be invaluable?”

  “As useful as your Getae witchcraft, it seems,” he said, and she laughed.

  “Our tribes were friends before,” she said. “Let us not be enemies now.”

  Varro snorted in derision.

  “You can start your own society,” he said. “Savages Together.”

  “What have you done?” she asked Spartacus, ignoring Varro.

  “Done?” Spartacus replied, baffled. “I have yet to do anything.”

  “Spartacus and I pursue the wild animals in the arena,” Varro said, quicker to ascertain her meaning. “We are the catervarii.”

  “The hunters of beasts…?” she said, sadly.

  “It will be a sight to behold,” Varro said, his eyebrows raised conspiratorially. “Our gleaming armor, our flashing spears!”

  “It is a sadness that I will not be there to see it,” the woman sighed.

  Now it was Varro’s turn to be baffled.

  “Brother,” Spartacus said delicately, “they are in the cell before ours. They enter the arena first.”

  Varro inclined his head.

  “But,” he ventured, “no gladiators enter before us. Only-”

  Varro stopped short, not meeting the woman’s gaze.

  “Apologies,” he said. “I did not understand.”

  “Only the convicted criminals,” the woman said, “only those about to die. Nameless and forgotten. Remembered only for our crime.”

  “Of what crime do you speak?” Spartacus asked, curious in spite of the situation.

  “I killed a Roman,” the woman replied with a deadly smile.

  Varro sniffed and walked away. He sat on the bench and tightened the straps on his boots, as if the other cage and its occupants had disappeared.

  Spartacus, however, grabbed the bars and leaned in closer.

  “Whom did you kill?” he asked.

  “Marcus Pelorus,” she replied, enjoying the surprise in his eyes.

  “By all the gods,” Spartacus whispered. “You killed Marcus Pelorus?”

  “I slashed his throat with a table knife. I watched him drown in his own blood.”

  “Why did you do it?”

  “For a moment, I was free,” she said.

  “How far did you get?”

  “We gained but the top of the steps.” She shrugged.

  Spartacus stared at the dusty floor.

  “You will be next,” he said after a time. “When human torches burn out, the executions by beast follow.”

  “What will it be?”

  “Lions,” Spartacus said.

  “You seem sure of it.”

  “I have been told.”

  She nodded, thoughtfully.

  “Is there any hope?” she asked.

  “None,” Spartacus said.

  “You are honest.”

  “This is no time for deception.”

  “You speak true. But they will remember me anyway. If you show me how to fight.”

  Varro snorted contemptuously in the corner.

  “Me?” Spartacus said. “I should offer advice to a woman
of the Getae?”

  “I am already dead,” she said. “Show me how to take a Roman lion with me, purely for spite.”

  Spartacus recalled the many lessons of Oenomaus, and spoke as his trainer would have done.

  “You are not unarmed,” he said. “You have your chains. You have the sun and the folly of your opponents. You have the sand and dust of the arena floor.”

  As he spoke, he realized that his audience had grown. The woman’s fellow convicts now stood attentively before the bars that divided them, listening to his every word.

  “Any small thing can be used as a weapon. The arena is kept clear of stones, but look for what may have been left by those that came before you. Bones. Nails. Splinters.”

  She nodded.

  “Understand, too,” Spartacus continued, “that you are going to die. Nothing will change that.”

  The slaves grimly met his gaze.

  “We knew,” she said. “Inside ourselves, we knew that we would never make it far. But it was better to be free, if only for those moments.”

  “Then you will be free again,” Spartacus said. “You will be free for the time it takes for the lions to eat you.”

  “We will fight,” she said.

  “Fortuna be with you,” Spartacus replied.

  The heavy door to the arena swung open, and several armored guards came in. They unbolted the door to the neighbouring cell, prodding at the chained slaves, herding them toward the light.

  The woman looked at Spartacus as she was ushered from the cell, calling out to him as she and her fellow convicts were taken on their last journey.

  “Remember me,” she said. “Remember I was free for a few moments.”

  “Who are you?” he called after her.

  “I am Medea!” she called. “What is your name, doctore?”

  “My name is…” he began, but the great door had slammed shut.

  “She killed a Roman,” Varro said quietly. “A Roman like me.”

  “I have killed many,” Spartacus responded with a shrug. “As have you!”

  “All the same,” Varro said. “My opponents volunteered or paid for crimes past. Hers did not.”

  The wind drew the stench swiftly over to the balcony. There was none of the modest cedar wood and Asian spices of the recent funeral. Instead, Lucretia’s nose caught a whiff of seared flesh and singed hair, with the distinctive tang of cheap lamp oil.