The Imperium Game

by K. D. Wentworth

  “DEAD?” she murmured, twining her fingers in Pluto’s curly black hair. “HOW INTERESTING.”

  “AS INTERESTING AS YOU CARE TO MAKE IT, MY HEART.”

  She called up a ball of raw, crackling power and tossed it from one hand to the other, then absorbed it back into herself, feeling the surge as only a sensuous tickle. “THEN WE SHOULD HAVE A GREAT DEAL OF FUN INDEED.”

  * * *

  An air of bewilderment and unease layover the city as Kerickson walked back to the Temple of Jupiter. Even though the Saturnalia had almost begun, shutters were closed and heads were cast down as players passed each other in the street. Since Mars’s earlier rampage, people were afraid.

  And well they should be, Kerickson thought. That wasn’t supposed to happen. He paused for a moment after crossing the Via Ostiensis, trying to decide on the fastest route back to the Forum. On his right loomed the murky depths of the Subura, home to the lower-class players who either couldn’t buy themselves into the Game at a more distinguished level or didn’t care to. From what he had seen over the years, many of them played thieves, rogues, and murderers with such relish and abandon that they had obviously found whatever it was they sought in the Game.

  But even so, no one had ever been killed for real. He turned away from the Subura’s streets with their fake murderers and choreographed thefts. He wouldn’t find his answers there.

  “DESPAIR NOT, HERO. YOUR ANSWER LIES CLOSE AT HAND.”

  A small brown owl landed at his feet, staring up at him with wide gray eyes. Minerva again. Kerickson’s hands knotted into fists. “Go away before someone sees you!” He stepped around it and crossed the street. “I have to find Amaelia.”

  The owl fluttered into the air and landed again a few feet ahead of him. “SHE RESTS NOT ABOVE, BUT BELOW, CRUELLY SLAIN BY JUNO’S ANGER.”

  “Dead?” He stopped, his feet frozen to the cobbled pavement. He should never have left her!

  “GAME-DEAD,” the owl said, then hopped closer, turning its head to examine him with one bright eye. “SHE HAS GONE TO THE UNDERWORLD. YOU MUST SEEK HER THERE BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE.”

  Relief flooded through him. “What do you mean, too late?” She ought to be safe enough—the Underworld was only a holding area for players who had been killed. He had been down a number of times himself, when something had needed a bit of tuning up. It was a pleasant enough place, although somewhat on the gloomy side. “No one will hurt her there.” Some of the tension seeped from his shoulders. “I’ll go after her once I find Micio’s murderer.”

  “SHE IS NOT SAFE.” The owl fixed him with an unnerving stare. “EVEN AS WE TARRY HERE, SHE IS IN GRAVE DANGER.”

  “From what?”

  “FROM WHOM.” The owl flew up into the branches of a tree and blinked down at him. “SHE HAS FALLEN INTO THE POWER OF ONE WHO HATES HER. SHE MAY NOT SURVIVE TO PLAY AGAIN.”

  “But—”

  “TURN BACK TO THE SPEAR AND CHICKEN.” The owl clicked its beak. “SEEK HER BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE.”

  “The Spear and Chicken?” he asked, but the owl disappeared with a slight pop. He stared around at the closed and darkened shops. If he had his Management Game bracelet, he could have gone down there, but the only way he would be admitted below now was to get killed himself.

  The owl reappeared and beat its wings in his face. “THE SPEAR AND CHICKEN, DOLT!” Then it vanished again, leaving behind only the bare tree limbs.

  But what in the name of Hades was the Spear and Chicken? Mystified, he tried to remember if he had ever heard of anything by that name before, but nothing came to him. Sighing, he decided to risk the Imperium Directory. Even if it gave his location to the City Guard, he could probably duck into the Subura and hide out.

  He looked over his shoulder. The street was deserted, so he punched the silver button on the nearest oak tree. The access panel slid up. “Warning!” the voice said. “Use of this device will result in a loss of one authenticity point.”

  He held up his Game bracelet to be debited. “Directory Assistance. “

  The screen brightened into blueness, and the familiar emblem of the Temple of Jupiter appeared. “Imperium Directory. Where may I direct you?”

  “The Spear and Chicken.” Was it his imagination or did he hear feet running toward him in the night?

  “The Spear and Chicken is a disreputable establishment located in the heart of the Subura on Lynching Lane, not recommended for players above the class of freedman or anyone with less than five hit points.”

  The noise grew louder, sounding ominously like the clack of hobnailed sandals. He punched the button again, severing his contact with the Game computer.

  “Halt!” a voice cried behind him. “Halt in the name of the Senate and the people of Rome!”

  Down at the end of the street, he saw ten or more of the City Guard jogging toward him in precise formation, their swords drawn and held ready, their scarlet plumes bobbing in rhythm with their feet. Lowering his head, he dashed into the winding, refuse-strewn lane that led into the dark heart of the Subura.

  At first he seemed to be leaving them behind. The street, if it could be called by so lofty a name, twisted and turned, too narrow and cluttered for the guards to hold their formation.

  He dashed around one corner, then another, turning at random; he could find the Spear and Chicken later, when he was safe. He dodged a small fountain and leaped a pile of smashed crockery, straining for breath as his lungs insisted he was not in as good a shape as he had thought.

  He heard the click of boots on pavement, closer this time, as he skidded around another tight corner. His heart thudded. A shout went up behind him. Had he been spotted?

  Then someone waved at him from several buildings down, seeming to beckon him to safety. Reeling from exhaustion, he turned, blackness growing behind his eyes. Just as he reached the open doorway, a leg reached out and tripped him.

  HIS HEAD cracked against the door frame, and hands dragged him into a dark room that reeked of onions and garlic. The door slammed, and a second later he heard hobnail sandals clack past.

  Someone flipped him over and sat on his chest—he felt a great hulking weight and smelled something like dirty gym socks. “Such a treat to have yourself drop in, sir,” a low male voice whispered cheerfully while hands probed the folds and inner pockets of Kerickson’s tunic.

  “Stop—that!” He struggled, but that only made it harder to breathe.

  “Look at this, Bestia, love—silver!” Coins clinked. “And a bit of the bronze as well, but no gold.” His captor’s tongue clicked disapprovingly.

  Kerickson pushed one more time at the suffocating weight on his chest, then let his arms flop to the floor.

  “Hello, what have we here?” The man plucked the ivory-hafted dagger from the sheath at Kerickson’s waist.

  A light flared. “That’s lovely, dear.” A droopy-jowled woman nodded approvingly. “Put it with the rest of the night’s stash. Now . . .” She straightened Kerickson’s tunic, then wet one fingertip and scrubbed industriously at a smudge above his eye. “I’m sorry about that little crack on the head. Robbery, well, that’s just business. You’ve got to expect a bit of that if you poke your nose into the Subura at night. Man does not live by points alone, you know.”

  He stared into her round, grandmotherly face, trying to think. There was something . . . important . . . He had come here for a reason. “The—Spear and—Chicken, is it—far from here?”

  “The Spear and Chicken?” Her face twisted as though she’d bitten into a rotten olive. “Mercury above, are you one of those?”

  He lurched to his feet, then grabbed for the wall as the floor seemed to tilt.

  She snatched up her skirts as though he were diseased and backed away. “Get him out of here, Draco! Get him out of my house right now!”

  “But, Bestia, my love—”

 
She crossed her arms. “Now! You know as well as I do what happens to players that get mixed up with them.”

  “Oh, all right.” Looping Kerickson’s arm over his shoulder, Draco pulled him away from the wall. “But he doesn’t look like one of them.”

  Bestia opened the door, peered out into the chill darkness, then beckoned them forward. Draco dragged him to the threshold and tried to thrust him out into the biting night air.

  Kerickson caught hold of the door frame. “Which—way?”

  “Over there.” Draco pointed out a dim glow visible beyond the dark bulk of unlit buildings. “Three streets over, just past the busted fountain of Bacchus—but if you had any sense at all, you’d go home and pull the covers over your head instead.” He pried his hands loose and shoved Kerickson across the threshold. “So long, and thanks for the dagger.”

  The door slammed. Kerickson squinted down the dark street. An unseen cat yowled, then leaped from a roof and pattered away into the darkness. Hands out, he shuffled forward through a sea of discarded wrappers and spoiled vegetables. Two steps later he tripped over a broken wine bottle and landed on a squishy lump that smelled like rotten meat. Trying not to breathe, he scrubbed his hands on his tunic and hurried around the corner. Was this area really as disgusting as it seemed? The filth appeared to be much more authentic than the last time he had ventured into the Subura.

  A few moments later he detoured a dark heap in the middle of the narrow street that could have been a fallen body. Then he passed a crumbling dry fountain and caught voices and faint strains of music that fell and rose on the night wind.

  He leaned against the weathered brick of an insula apartment building. Mortar crumbled under his weight and he nearly fell. He brushed his arm off, then edged toward the two-story structure at the end of the block. A steady stream of ragged men and women converged on it out of the darkness from all directions. He kept his eyes forward, not daring to look as several people passed him from behind.

  “Hurry up!” A hooded figure elbowed him aside. “Barbus is mad enough to eat chariots tonight!”

  Kerickson scrambled out of the way as more players plodded on toward what was apparently the Spear and Chicken. The yellow light spilling out from the windows and door into the narrow street seemed to be a beacon for every first-level thief and gladiator and daggerman in the Game. Inside, someone cursed. Laughter echoed into the night.

  This didn’t look like any legitimate Game scenario he had ever heard of. He looped a fold of his tunic over his head and made his way toward the peeling tavern.

  “Come on, move it!” A man gestured impatiently at him from the doorway.

  Lowering his head, Kerickson pushed into a crowded interior thick with the stench of unwashed bodies and ripening garbage. The paint was flaking off the walls and the lights were garishly bright. At the other end, a short, stocky man with a pouting lower lip stood on top of the bar, his stumpy legs planted wide in a heroic pose, his arms folded over a stomach that exceeded his belt. “Time is short, and we’ve got to get it all moved tonight.”

  Kerickson stared. It was the same man he had seen at Quintus Gracchus’s villa earlier—Publius Barbus.

  Barbus stared around the room until he had gathered every eye. “Let me catch one of you lazy bastards not pulling your share, and you’ll find yourself in need of a new throat!”

  A discontented mutter rippled around the room.

  “So.” Barbus gripped his hands behind his back and strutted down the wine-spattered top of the bar. “Now that we’ve got that settled, let’s get this stuff below before someone comes poking around and finds it. Not only will we not be able to get any more shipments out until the new Emperor is proclaimed, but we’ve actually had the police inside the dome.”

  Kerickson ducked down behind a tall, gaunt man dressed as a litter bearer. What sort of shipments were they talking about? Food and supplies were shipped into the dome daily, but as far as he knew, nothing but a few crafts went back out, and what possible difference could a new Emperor make?

  “One apiece.” Barbus pointed at a pile of gleaming blue plas containers, tumbled haphazardly in the corner. “And don’t drop them!”

  Muttering again, the crowd of men and women shifted, angling toward the crates. Kerickson flowed with them, trying to make sense of this whole bizarre scene. One by one each person picked up a footlocker-sized crate, hefted it to his or her shoulder, then plodded toward the back of the tavern. When his turn came, he picked one up and found it surprisingly heavy. He grunted as he settled it on his sore shoulder.

  “Bloody waste of time, this is!” The tall man in front of him looked back. Kerickson just nodded. The line of people shuffled forward and he moved up with them.

  “The name’s Hilius.” The speaker dropped back until he was almost even with Kerickson. His tunic, formerly fine white linen trimmed with green, was now threadbare and stained, his face lined with weariness, his stringy hair unwashed. “Haven’t seen you on this detail before. What do you think of Quintus Gracchus’s chances to become Emperor?”

  “Pretty good.” Kerickson clenched his teeth as he tried to shift the box to his good shoulder.

  Hilius nodded. “Mind, that was a class move, marrying the Emperor’s daughter, but I fancied one of the generals myself—maybe Lepidus, or that skinny little fellow, Porcius Titus, or even Oppius Catulus himself.” He chuckled. “Now there’s an old war-horse, if I ever saw one. They say he hasn’t lost a legion in the last five quarters!”

  Kerickson studied his companion as the line inched forward again. “You sound like you’ve played for a long time.”

  Hilius’s lips tightened into a thin, straight line. “I almost had enough points to advance to the plebian aristocracy three quarters ago, but that was—” He looked stonily at the solid mass of backs in front of them. “—before.”

  The crowd moved up again. “Before—what?” Kerickson grunted from under his box.

  “Before I was killed.”

  Kerickson’s glance dropped to the status light on the man’s bracelet; not red now, but green for the merchant class. He’d obviously had enough time to return to the playing field. “Yeah, that was bad luck, but three quarters is a long time. I bet you have almost enough points to make it that far again.”

  “You must be freshly killed.” Hilius studied him with narrowed eyes. “Or you’d know better.”

  “Know what?”

  “That you can’t keep your points.” The line shifted forward another fraction and Hilius moved after it. “Once they get you, all your points belong to them.”

  * * *

  “You can squat on this side of the river from now until next year, dearie.” Charon’s deeply lined face split in a broken-toothed smile. “But there’s no going back that way, not for the likes of you.”

  Amaelia glanced down at her status light, still red, of course. Mercury had tricked her. This wasn’t the gate to the outside world; this was the River Styx, bordering the Land of Shades.

  “What if I—” She swallowed hard. “—go with you, what then? Can I get out from the other side?”

  “That’s not for old Charon to say.” The old man waggled a skeletal finger at her. “I just rows them over.”

  Amaelia leaned back against the rocks and tried to think, but the sweltering air pressed in on her until she couldn’t breathe. Twisting her long hair into a knot, she lifted it off her sweating neck. Really, she had no choice. Another few minutes and she would pass out in this heat.

  Reluctantly, she walked down the steps onto the sweep of hot black sand that led to the rocks where the angry river surged and boiled, dark and oily, not like real water at all.

  “Hurry up!” Charon gestured with his pole at her. “You might have been an Emperor’s daughter up there.” His yellow eyes flicked upward. “But below, you’re just another shade, stupid enough to get herself killed,
and when you go back you’ll be a slave. Get used to it.”

  Lifting the hem of her long tunic, she crunched across the strangely metallic sand that had to be ruining her slippers with every step. But they probably didn’t wear slippers in Hades, she thought—they probably just ran around barefoot and forgot about authenticity until the quarter ended and it came time to play again.

  At the edge of the boat she stared up at Charon’s face. The bones stood out clearly through the paper-thin, yellow skin. Then she started to step into the boat.

  “Not so fast, there.” Charon blocked her way with his pole. “Not until I gets my coin.”

  “Coin?”

  “A copper will do, though silver is better, and gold will get you a bit of advice.”

  “But I—” She searched the inner folds of her tunic, her fingers finding nothing. “I don’t have any.”

  “Then you can’t come.” He crossed his arms across his ragged smock. “Charon only has to take those what pays their way.”

  “BOATMAN, LET THE WENCH PASS,” a reverberating, somehow familiar, female voice commanded so loudly that it carried above the roaring of the river.

  He turned around and stared across the oily, dark water. “But—”

  “LET HER PASS, OR FACE THE CONSEQUENCES.”

  Snatching his battered cap off, Charon bowed his head and muttered, “Friends in low places, eh? Well, that won’t get you as far as you might think, dearie. You just waits and see.”

  She shuddered, then stepped into the ramshackle old boat, seating herself carefully at the farthest end and hoping that she didn’t get splinters from the weathered wood. Putting his shoulder to the beached boat, Charon pushed it out into the current and jumped in at the last second, just as the waves sent it spinning toward the nearest boulder.