Imperatrix (Gladiatrix Book 3)

by Russell Whitfield

  ‘A drop in the ocean,’ Illeana said with a grin. She was enjoying the carnage – it was nothing like the arena but no less exhilarating. She understood now why old soldiers kept telling stories of their younger days: there were fights in the Flavian that she could barely recall, but this day would be scorched indelibly in her memory.

  ‘We’ve plenty dead of our own,’ Thebe was taut; it wasn’t a game to her. Illeana realised this and forced away her grin. ‘And you’re right – they are losing down there. Lysandra is losing down there. She’s being cut off! We have to move now!’ Thebe looked around for a runner. ‘Get the pipers to sound the refusal.’ The girl saluted and ran away. ‘Illeana, pass the word to your right and left – we back up the hypaspistai. We take it slow and we keep in formation. Understand?’

  Illeana was going to salute but thought better of it. ‘All right,’ she replied. ‘You hear her? ‘she asked the woman to her right. ‘The pipes are going to sound a refusal – and we are to back up the hypaspistai. Keep it slow and keep in formation.’ She repeated the same words to her left and soon after, the wailing of the Greek pipes signalled that they start moving. As they did so, the arrows of the Artemisian Priestesses began to fall with increasing rapidity, covering them. Everyone around Illeana started to march on the spot, so she did the same, feeling faintly ridiculos.

  ‘It’s to stay in time,’ Thebe told her. ‘Cohesion is the key – if we fall apart, they’ll be on us like wolves.’

  ‘I don’t know about that,’ Illeana glanced across at the Dacian allies who had backed away to the other side of the now almost filled ditch. ‘They look like they’ve had enough to me.’

  ‘Have you ever met a barbarian before, Illeana?’

  ‘Only in the arena. So yes. But briefly. Obviously.’

  ‘Ever known one to give in?’

  There was no answer to that so Illeana continued to march on the spot, willing to admit to herself that she was grateful for the rest.

  After what seemed like an eternity, she felt a shifting in the line to her left and little by little, the front began to turn on a very slight axis. It seemed as nothing to Illeana, but after some time, when she looked to her right she saw that there was wide space of churned up field becoming visible – they were moving away from the river on the straight line and lengthening to the diagonal – just as Thebe had said.

  But now she was looking almost straight ahead she could see that the southern wing of the army was in dire straits. The barbarians were leaving Thebe’s section alone – so they could concentrate on wiping out the stubborn resistance close to the river.

  It had ceased to be a game for Illeana because the truth of it was that it was only fun when you were doing the killing, when it was test of skill at arms, a contest of wits, guile and strength. But this was a vision from Tartarus.

  Even though they were far away, Illeana could see men hurling the Heronai to the ground, falling upon them like animals and raping them whilst the battle raged around them. Heads were cut from necks and raised up on spears, bodies hacked to pieces where they lay.

  And those were the lucky ones. Other women were being dragged away, screaming and begging, passed back into the horde for the gods only knew what torments to be inflicted upon them. Illeana vowed that she would die before that happened to her. She looked to Thebe. ‘We have to help them,’ she said. ‘Thebe...’

  ‘You shut your mouth!’ Thebe said, her eyes wet with tears. ‘We have orders – and I’m not getting everyone killed – which will happen if we break formation and charge down there. It’s over, Illeana. It’s our job to take vengeance.’

  Illeana nodded. ‘I’ll kill them,’ she said softly. Then louder: ‘I’ll kill so many that my name will be told as a nightmare to their grandchildren. Do you hear me, barbarians!’ she screamed, tears springing to her own eyes. ‘Do you hear me! Face me, you bastards! I’ll fucking kill you! I’ll kill you all. You’re all going to die!’ She looked to her left and to her right. She did not know these women: they were Lysandra’s and Thebe’s people from their Temple in Asia Minor. They had nothing in common save for one thing. Each one of them had walked naked onto the sands of the arena and survived.

  Each one a gladiatrix.

  ‘Fortuna!’ she shouted. ‘Contemptio mortis! Cupido victoriae!’ Good fortune. Contempt of death. Love victory. She shouted it again, and then again, banging her sword onto her shield until the cry was taken up by the Heronai and beyond, the rough baritone of Euaristos’s men. They shouted it, their challenge rolling across the field to the barbarians and beyond, she prayed, to Lysandra’s goddess on High Olympus.

  *

  ‘They’re all women.’ Amagê had dismounted and was lifting back a corpse’s head. The head almost came away in her hand, a livid and now bloodless wound carved deep into her throat. ‘The Romans must indeed be desperate.’ She grinned.

  Sorina’s mouth was dry as she surveyed the carnage. Up ahead, the battle still raged as the female defenders fought on, but it was in a lost cause. She too dismounted and walked amongst the long-haired dead. Red. Blonde. Raven. Mostly raven – Greeks by the look of them.

  She too squatted down by a body, a young girl in a foetal position, crying soundlessly, her guts spilling out over her fingers as she pathetically tried to hold them in and cling to life. There was a part of Sorina that felt she should end the girl’s suffering but then she looked again at the dead: hundreds, thousands of the plains-people, littered on the field. A ditch full of them and it moved, undulating as those still alive shuddered in unknowable pain. How many had this one killed, she asked herself. Let her suffer.

  She stood and walked closer to the fighting, her sword held loosely by her side.

  It was simple butchery now, but still these women fought on, falling one by one – the lucky ones. She walked by a man atop an enemy, ploughing her. The woman was not fighting back – she may have even been dead. Another was dragged down by a group, screeching like a harpy, punching and kicking till a meaty fist smashed into her face and sent her to the filthy earth. They started kicking her then, laughing as she tried to escape.

  The Greeks had lost their cohesion and fought now as individuals – and Sorina recognised them for what they were – arena fighters and, in or out of formation, they were still dangerous. She glanced across to the other side of the field where the rest of them were redeploying – they were most vulnerable now, but she could tell that the tribespeople were all but spent too. They had paid a heavy toll for so little gained. They had the numbers yes, but these Greeks had priced their lives dear.

  One of them – an officer if her tattered red cloak was anything to go by, was about to be mounted by a Getic warrior – he struggled to get beneath the tunic under her mail shirt. She had long, black hair and her face was swathed in blood from a bad cut on her head. Her eyes flew open and she clamped her thumbs into his eyes. The man screamed and the woman struggled to her feet and kicked him in the side of his head. She stooped and grabbed his sword and without hesitation brought it down hard, severing his head from his neck.

  Sorina’s heart nearly burst in shock. ‘Take her!’ she screamed, a thousand memories buffeting her mind at once. ‘Take that one! Take her alive!’ Those nearby heard her and they ran at the ravenhaired warrior. She was injured and dazed – and killed three more before they brought her low.

  Sorina offered a silent prayer of thanks to the Earth Mother, a feeling of bliss flooding through her despite the ruin of corpses around her. The warriors kicked and punched the Greek into submission, nearly knocking her unconscious and they dragged her before Sorina, forcing her to her knees. One man put his gnarled, knotted fingers into her hair, dragging her head back and forcing her to look up into Sorina’s face.

  Lysandra’s eyes. Those hated, ice blue eyes, stared up at her.

  ‘No barbarian army can stand against disciplined troops? Isn’t that what you said to me?’ Sorina raised her sword, wanting desperately to hack down and end it. To tak
e her revenge for what this woman had done to her. To Eirianwen. To her people. But to do so would be to deny herself proper vengeance. ‘What? No lecture from you, Lysandra? No quotation of great learning? I have defeated you . . . I, Sorina of Dacia – ’

  ‘You have not won yet,’ Lysandra said.

  As she spoke, voices floated to her from across the field mingled with the sound of thousands of swords clattering on their shields: ‘Fortuna! Contemptio mortis. Cupido victoriae.’ Fury rushed through Sorina and she backhanded the hated Spartan’s face. Lysandra’s head hung low and she spat out a gob of blood.

  ‘It would seem that age has robbed you of your vigour, Sorina,’ Lysandra said, her teeth pink and bloodied. ‘You had best kill me now. If you do not, you will regret it.’

  Sorina was tempted and her fingers gripped tight on the hilt of her sword. Every part of her screamed out to do it.

  ‘Who’s this?’ Amagê approached, her voice pulling Sorina back from the brink.

  ‘Lysandra the Spartan,’ Sorina replied, her voice shaking with emotion. ‘I want her to suffer. She is their leader – she is the enemy of blood. I want her end to be terrible.’

  Amagê looked down at the arrogant face. ‘This is their leader?’

  ‘Are you deaf or just stupid, fat one?’ Lysandra laughed, a choking hacking sound. Amagê said something to Lysandra that Sorina didn’t understand, but Lysandra simply sneered. ‘An ape that speaks Hellenic,’ she said in Latin. ‘Did you train it, Sorina? Does it do other tricks –’

  Amagê punched Lysandra full in the face, a mighty blow that snapped the Spartan’s head back. Her eyes rolled and she slumped down unconscious. ‘Talks a lot, doesn’t she,’ Amagê said, shaking her hand to wave away the pain in her knuckles. ‘We’ll have our sport with this one later.’

  ‘I will interrogate her now,’ Sorina spat on the prone Spartan. ‘I’ll make her sing and tell us their plans.’

  ‘We already know their plans,’ Amagê said.

  ‘I hate her, Amagê, but she is a cunning bitch – who knows what tricks she has up her sleeve? Better that we get the information now.’

  Before she spoke, Sorina knew the Clan Chief would not be moved. ‘I need you with me, Sorina. You will have your revenge on this one.’ She gestured to the warriors nearby. ‘Take her! ‘she ordered. ’Keep her in one piece. If she gives you trouble, teach her a lesson. But I want her alive and unmolested – for now.’

  Amagê turned her eyes to the reformed Greek line. ‘We have to deal with them first,’ she said to Sorina. ‘But our people are weary. One last push – we’ll see if we can knock them over today.’

  ‘And if not?’

  ‘Time is our friend, not theirs.’

  They were worse than animals, Illeana thought, for beasts killed for a purpose. These savages were the sum of everything that was wrong with the human condition. Lysandra was famous in her condemnation of them and their ilk and now Illeana could see why. In Rome, a barbarian was away from his heartland and was cowed by the empire. But here, in the wilderness, he was unchecked and, played out before them in stark relief, was the fate that awaited the civilised peoples of Rome, Greece and beyond.

  ‘I can’t stand it,’ Illeana said to Thebe as the barbarians went about their grisly work of butchery, rape and mutilation. ‘Both what they are doing and the fact that I must stand here and let it happen. I have never felt so . . . powerless.’

  Thebe glanced at her. ‘Not a feeling you’re used to, I imagine.’

  Illeana nodded; it was true. She lived as she chose because her skill had earned her that right. But the horrors she was witnessing made everything she had done seem somehow petty and insignificant. The arena truly was a game compared to this carnage; it sickened and angered her in equal measure.

  Illeana could not tell how long it went on only that the air grew colder and the sky greyer. Then, from behind, she heard shouts and the clash of weapons. Battle had resumed on Euaristos’s front and, before them, the barbarians were now massing once again.

  ‘I didn’t think they’d try again today,’ Thebe admitted, tilting her head skywards. ‘It must be late in the day. But who can tell,’ she added. ‘As you said before, Apollo turned his face from here, Illeana.’

  Illeana heard defeat in her tone. They were outnumbered and in all likelihood, the cornerstone of their enterprise, Lysandra, was already dead in the carnage on the southern bank. Illeana had a place in her heart for the uptight Spartan. Though they had not known each other long, she realised that all these women had come to this place because Lysandra had asked them. She had given them everything – and they believed in her and her goddess. If Lysandra’s claim that Athene was with them and she had fallen – what fate lay in store for the rest of them?

  The answer lay in bloody, tattered ribbons across the field.

  ‘Let them come,’ she said, a little too loud, making heads turn.

  ‘I want them over here, in front of me so I can kill them. All we need to do is stand. It isn’t about numbers any more, it’s about will. We’ve all survived the arena. We’ll survive this. Bedros won’t let us down.’ Not much of a speech, she thought to herself. Lysandra would have done better. But Lysandra couldn’t help them now.

  Thebe smiled tightly in thanks. ‘She’s right, girls!’ she shouted. ‘Stand fast. Keep killing until they give up or we’re all dead. Hold the line – above all, hold the line! If we don’t run – we win. It’s as simple as that.’

  ‘Here they come, then,’ Illeana said as a girl shouldered her way through the ranks, one of several who were offering bread and water to the fighters. She refused neither; though she felt neither hunger nor thirst, she knew that she’d need the strength it gave her to fight on.

  The Dacian allies came at a measured pace this time – no mad, ravening charge but a slow trot. ‘They’re tired too,’ she said to no one in particular. As she spoke, the first flight of arrows from the Artemisian Priestesses flew overhead and landed in the throng. Screams floated across the field to the Heronai lines and its sound seemed to lift them. Backs were straightened. Shields raised. Heads nodded.

  More shafts were loosed from the rear, but not with the intensity of earlier in the day: they were running low on ammunition, Illeana guessed. It was a good and bad thing – good because when they were out of shafts, they would add their weight to the defence. But she reckoned that they had killed more with their arrows than the infantry had done all day.

  She lifted her shield as the barbarians loosed their own arrows in response. They fell like ragged rain and there were a few cries of pain from the Heronai ranks as some of the barbs found their mark.

  Thebe grabbed her shoulder and pointed. ‘Look!’

  Illeana looked towards the river and saw ships speeding west, oars dipping in and out of the river like so many wings. ‘Supply boats?’ she guessed as she counted them. ‘There’s only ten. Not enough to evacuate us. And besides – they’re going the wrong way. Bedros will be coming from Durostorum. Look out,’ she added as more arrows came their way, the clatter of iron on shield louder this time as the enemy drew closer. She looked in vain for a response from the Artemisians, but none came.

  The barbarians began to shout and scream, brandishing their weapons, most still clotted and red with the blood of the Heronai. They made obscene gestures and taunts – Illeana was reminded of the mob at the Flavian.

  ‘They’re getting their blood up,’ Thebe murmured. No sooner had the words left her mouth when the barbarians began to run at them.

  Missiles were hurled at the Heronai lines, spears, axes and even stones as Illeana learned to her cost, one careening off her helmet stunning her for an instant. She took a step back and the woman behind her shoved her back into place. Illeana glanced over her shoulder and gave her a smile in thanks.

  ‘Here we go!’ Thebe shouted. ‘Hold the line! Just hold the line!’

  There was no more time for words as the lines collided and the sound of individual voices
were lost to the hellish cacophony of battle.

  ‘Go on!’ Amagê screamed. ‘Go on!’

  The tribespeople crashed into the Roman lines first on the eastfacing front, then to the corps of Lysandra’s gladiatrices. The line bowed at the impact, the cause of Amagê’s exhortations. She knew as well as Sorina that if they could break them on either side the battle would be over and the slaughter would be great and just.

  ‘I must get up there!’ Amagê said to her. ‘We must. We will lead them to victory.’

  Sorina nodded – though she could not get thoughts of Lysandra from her mind. She recalled that Eirianwen had once prophesised that the Morrighan – the goddess of dark fates had her hands on the three of them when their paths crossed. And so it was again: Lysandra was in her power; she was so close to vengeance that she could not yet take. Not till the battle was won. The Old Crow would be laughing.

  She drew her sword, hefted her shield and walked forward with Amagê who had her axe clasped in her hands. Behind them, Roman supply ships raced past the carnage, unable to do anything to help their beleaguered warriors. Good, Sorina thought. Let them flee. They would meet their fate at Durostorum when Lysandra’s bitches and their Roman friends had been put to the sword.

  Amagê forced them a path, pushing Sarmatian, Scythian and Getae alike from her path as she surged to the front. It was clear that she wanted to carry the day and soak herself in the blood of the invaders. So much so that she could not see the toll the battle was taking on her warriors.

  Men and women were being carried past them, all of them bloodied and crying out from grievous wounds. Sorina knew that Lysandra would have prepared her women well for this fight – she hated the Spartan, but she would not allow herself to underestimate her. And the proof was plain – her gladiatrices were inflicting far more losses than they were taking.

  Sorina thought to call Amagê back – to regroup and make their enemies wait out a night of ice and terror. Finish them in the cold light of day when the plains warriors’ morale and strength were replenished. But it worked both ways – giving the Greeks some respite might make the price in lives even greater; Amagê was right – they had the numbers to break them and they had to do it soon.