Blood of a Barbarian

by John-Philip Penny

  Vulcan did not waver much in his violent expression through all this, but I saw for just the flicker of an instant that my words had struck home to him, and he retreated with the oath: "You are just the son of a Eunuch, afraid to fight and die like a true gladiator. All your words add up to is fear, and it is good that you fear, because if we ever spar together, you and I, I will cut your throat -by the gods I will!"

  The other men, meanwhile, had gone back to their bathing and previous conversations, both disappointed and thankful that a real fight hadn't happened. There was not much entertainment in this life, and anything to relieve the boredom was welcome. And yet no one liked to see two gladiators fight with one another, except in the arena.

  Perhaps he was right, perhaps it was just fear talking through my words. I was new at this, and had not yet fully acclimatized to the harsh realities of life in a Ludus, nor to the various ways in which different men adapted to it. Some men, it seemed, men like Vulcan, took to being as agressive as they could, as a way of off-setting the brutalization that they themselves experienced every day. Other men lost themselves in the escape of gambling and women. Men like myself tended to withdraw, and to brood over our lives, sometimes praising, sometimes cursing their fates. Only time would tell which of us had a greater chance of survival in the end. Something told me though, that learning how to adapt myself to my surroundings, learning all that I could, would, at some time in the future, possibly mean the difference between life and death. One thing that I knew for certain, whatever I said about the death statistics in the arena, was that I planned to live long enough to gain my Manumission, or freedom.

  As I was leaving the baths, preparing to walk back to my cell, I was approached by one of the men who had been laughing at Vulcan's jokes. He was of middling height, and weight, and yet looked powerful beneath the fresh tunic that he had just put on.

  "Hail friend." he said cheerfully."My name is Titus, and I just wanted you to know that much of what you said back there was true. I have been at this life for over a year, and though we all think the things that you said, I have never met a man before who had the courage to state it."

  I studied this man for a moment, not sure if he was being genuine or not, but his steady brown eyes and suprisingly innocent expression seemed real enough.

  "I just can't stand all the boasting," I said. "I know it is hypocritical, because I also want glory in the arena, and all those things that go with it. I just can't see what the chances of any of us are. If my gods had meant for me to succeed in life, or those of any of us, than they would never have let us fall so low as we have, to be trapped here. My gods have abandoned me."

  "Come with me," said Titus, and he led me by the arm. At first I thought he might be leading me towards a trap, taking me off to a dark hallway or somewhere that Vulcan or one of his cronies could knock me about, or worse, but there seemed to be nothing suspicious in the man's demeanour, and so I took a chance.

  A moment later, we had entered a small room. There were no windows and the space was lit by two flaming torches on the wall. At the far end of the room was an alcove, and in this alcove there were half a dozen small statuettes of various gods. I knew little of these deities, and wondered why he had brought me here.

  Titus stepped forward, reached out a hand to touch each of the figures in turn on their heads, and then knelt down on the floor. A moment later he raised himself, and came and stood beside me again.

  "Your gods, who are they?" he turned and asked me with interest.

  I listed them off for him, not sure why he wanted to know: "Well, there is Woton, he is the Great Chief of blessings... Then there is Thor, of thunder, and Zio, of war..."

  "In my religion the God of war is called Mars," Titus interrupted, "and our Chief God is called Jupiter. And then there is the Goddess Fortuna, whom gladiators love because she blesses them with good luck, and Mercury, God of death and so on."

  "And what people do you belong to, that these are your gods?" I asked Titus.

  "They are Rome's. Did you not know that I am a Roman, Magnus?"

  "A Roman!" I said, suddenly dumbstruck, and not a little angry. "What on earth have you done to end up as a gladiator?!"

  "I have done nothing wrong, if that is what you mean. Unless you think that it is my fault that my father died at an early age and left my mother and brothers and sisters with nothing but a bankrupt fish mongering business. He died when I was fifteen, fighting for Rome in Brittania, and I have been responsible for my family ever since. I could have joined the army of course, but then it barely pays enough to support oneself, let alone any dependants, and so I decided to train as a gladiator, where I can earn ten times as much!"

  "But to willingly give up your freedom? That is mad. What good will you be to your family if you are dead?"

  "I am not so easy to kill!" Titus said with an infectious grin. "Besides, I trained at swordplay at my father's side by the time I could walk, and could probably show you a thing or two."

  I had very mixed feelings about what Titus was telling me. He seemed a likeable enough sort, but he still came from the other side of the camp, and in my world, if your didn't belong to the same tribe, than chances were you were mortal enemies. It seemed insanity to me that Titus would freely mix and mingle with men from all over the Empire who hated everything to do with Rome and who would gladly kill him.

  "I know what you are thinking," he said, "But don't worry. You will be suprised to learn that many of us in here are Roman citizens, most men in positions similiar to mine. We outnumber any single group of you barbarians." He laughed. "Once you become a real gladiator, you will realize that the old loyalties count for nothing anymore, and that all that matters is fighting skill, and your devotion to the brotherhood of gladiators."

  I could see that there was sense to what he was saying, and I found it hard to blame this smiling young man for the ills that his people had visited upon me.

  "And what of these gods?" I asked. "How will they help me in my cause?"

  "They will help anyone in their cause. That is the great thing about them. You believe that your gods only protect you within your own territorial borders, but we believe that ours are more powerful than that, and if you make offerings to them, and plead your case well enough, than they will hear your prayers, and will answer."

  "Which is the strongest of all?" I asked.

  "That would be Jupiter," said Titus.

  "Then it is Jupiter that I will worship," I exclaimed.

  "Whoa, hold on there," Titus laughed. "If you wish for your opponent to be killed, and not yourself, then you must beseech Mercury, God of death. And if you wish for good fortune, then as I said, Fortuna is your best bet. Jupiter is the mightiest of all, but sometimes it is better to go straight to a particular deity, rather than to hope that Jupiter will intervene with them on your behalf. I myself cover all my bases by praying to all of them."

  Now it was my turn to laugh. I suddenly felt a weight going off of my shoulders, and thought that I would like to confide in Titus, who I could see might become a friend.

  "You know, these last few days I have been thinking about the past, about my old life, and about freedom. Perhaps I have put too much value on it. After all, what was I before? I was a mercenary who fought for pay, and for booty. Then I was captured and sent to the mines. Truth be told, I am very lucky to be here at all, or to be alive. Romans usually just crucify people like me, or throw them to the beasts. Even if I got free, I would only go back to my previous life, for I know nothing else, and would probably be dead within a year, or less. This place is like a dream in some ways, unlike anything back home, and one can see that there are many fortunes to be made if one is clever. Perhaps I am still just a mercenary like before -nothing better, but nothing worse either. At least this way I have a chance of winning some real prize money. Perhaps Fortuna does shine down on me. I could not see it before, but am beginning to now. All I need to do is win the favour of these powerful divinities in order to
reclaim my life."

  I then stepped forward and touched the heads of all six of the gods, just as Titus had done, and then knelt down for a moment before the shrine.

  "We'll make a true gladiator of you yet," laughed Titus, as he slapped me on the back.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Spectacula

  On the next day of training, I recalled the words that Titus and I had spoken the day before, and felt that there was truth in them. While walking to and from the mess hall, and my quarters and the arena, I looked more closely at the many statues which lined the hallways and various porticos throughout the Ludus. There was even, I noticed, a statue at the head of one of the four fountains in the courtyard. All of these statues were meant to represent past gladiators who had been members of this school, and who had achieved great renown.

  While the sculptors had no doubt taken liberties in their depictions, both in the size of the men's stone muscles, and in their obviously idealized and Romanized features, they still must have been impressive figures both to look at and to watch in the arena. One man, it said at the base of one of the statues, was a Thraex, and he had won one-hundred victories in a row without a single defeat, and then died of natural causes. He was known to have been the greatest gladiator of his age.

  It occured to me that the important thing was not so much what other people thought of you, but how you thought of yourself. This hero, this champion, must have felt, during his short life, that he was some sort of demi-god, and no doubt the crowds would have shouted out their agreement with him on this point. Surely it was better to live for one day as a lion than a hundred years as a sheep. It was, I decided, worth showing these Romans just how well a man of the tribe of the Sicambri could train and fight and die! If I was to prove to them what I was made of I would have to one day become a champion, and perhaps even have a sculpture made in my own likeness, and to figure in the scribbled graffiti of children, and even to appear as a vision in the dreams of Roman women and men.

  Over the next weeks and months, I was taught many new skills by Doctore Furius. After our morning and afternoons training with swords and Palus, we spent the rest of the evening in the Gymnasium, a large courtyard, which was filled with various types of equipment such as weights and iron bars and sandbags, for use in training our muscles.

  Our days were divided into Tetrads, which means four day cycles. On the first day, we did alot of short, high-intensity work-outs. On the second day, we did many high-intensity, and more strenuous work-outs. On the third day, we rested, but did some very light exercises, while on the fourth day we did things at a medium intensity. It was thought that we would get the best results this way.

  At first, Furius yelled at us to try harder, and screamed in our ears when we did not seem to be giving our exercises the full effort they merited, but once we had learned what was expected of us, he mostly contented himself with walking around amongst us and giving instructions on how to do things more efficiently. Sometimes we did things together, in groups of half a dozen or so -things like Pankration, which is a form of wrestling. When I started out with Pankration, I was easily caught in the simplest of holds, but soon learned the right methods for squirming out of even the toughest choking grips. I had a gift for being able to outlast an opponent, and to let them weary themselves as we struggled on the ground, until I applied a knee twist or elbow-pin which caused them to yell out in pain. These fights were always ended when one person either raised a finger, or tapped the ground in surrender.

  Most of the time, we worked-out alone, or in pairs. Quite often I was able to pair up with Titus, whom I had become fond of. In many ways, I could not understand why I liked his company, because we were both so different, but the fact that he could always make me see the light side of any situation probably had alot to do with it. Together, we spent hours working with Halteraes stones, one of us lifting them over our heads, while the other pushed down on them as a form of resistance.

  When I had started to exercise, I had already been a strong man, but over the months, my body began to change its shape altogether. My muscle groups were now much more sharply defined, and my strength nearly doubled. Titus was an excellent partner to work with, because even though he was shorter than I, he was just as powerful, and was very good at keeping me motivated. For the first time in my life, I had a relationship with someone that wasn't totally based on exploitation and selfishness. I genuinly cared what Titus thought of me, and craved his compliments and respect just as I knew he craved mine.

  He was also able to help me in other ways, since he had been here for a year longer than I had, he was able to navigate me through some of the trickier aspects of life in a Ludus, telling me, for example, which were the nastiest guards, and what some of the tips were to making this grinding life as easy as we could make it. Every day he had some sort of story for me. He seemed to know everyone in the Ludus, and to know their personnal business, and was able to fill me in on all the foibles and quirks of each of the different men. This was useful, as it gave me an insight into the characters of those whom I might one day face in the arena, and I was happy to receive any edge I might be able to get.

  The best part of the training, was the fact that it was so systematic. No one in my culture understood anything about the health of the body, other than that one must neccessarily eat and rest and do some sort of work if one was not to become fat. But these Romans seemed to have mastered the art of shaping the human body down to an art, or a science. First of all, the trainers knew that the purpose of all exercises must be to promote the kind of health and functional strength that would be useful for a gladiator, and which would make the shows in the arena last the longest.

  Thus, they divided up the training into speed, balance and agility, then brute strength, endurance and stamina. There were a number of activities which we took part in that were broken up into sections, so as to ensure the greatest possible success. We picked up heavy loads, and walked around, we jumped over obstacles, boxed, ran, climbed ropes, did sit-ups and lunges with sandbags on our shoulders, and hung from a beam for as long as we could. We also warmed-up before each session, and cooled down by walking at the end of the day, which was a way of preventing injury.

  This did not always work though, as one day when I was rolling a large stone in order to build up my shoulders and back, I felt something snap in my lower back. It hurt, and I asked to see the Medicis right away. He touched the spot and I jumped with pain and cursed. He told me that it was a bad injury, and that I would have to rest it, and do no more than walk for a couple of weeks. I could barely believe that it would take that long to heal, as I had hurt myself many times before, and was always fine again within a day or two. But the Medicis was right, and I was laid up in my cell for a full three weeks.

  During this time, I had nothing to do but to stare at the ceiling and wonder if I would ever be able to train and fight again, so painful was it when I moved. Titus, meanwhile, though he was not able to visit me, found a way to bribe one of the slave-girls to bring me some extra food, and to pass along a joke or two every few days. This invariably raised my spirits, which had begun to sink every time I looked down at my rapidly diminishing physical condition. I didn't know how I would ever be able to compete again against the other men who had not suffered any set-backs.

  However, after I had gotten to strength back, and was able to move around, I became more determined than ever to be fully healed, and did exercises in my cell until I was able to join the other men back in the Gymnasium. Once I returned, I was overjoyed to see smiling Titus again, and we quickly reestablished our previous friendship. Once I got back to full-time training, I could barely believe how hard it was, but over the weeks, was able to rebuild all of the muscle I had lost. In many ways, I was stronger and more determined than ever. During my time in bed I had longed to escape my confinement, and so had learned to love the daily vigorous routines we trainees were forced to do.

  Some days, the men all gathered for a game of
Harpastum, which involved getting past the enemy team, and into their end-zone with a small leather ball. I liked this game, but as fun as it was, mostly I loved working out with Titus. We tried to outdo each other, by picking up larger and larger logs, or doing more and more arm curls or squats. I found that to get the best results, it was sometimes necessary to do something until you could barely walk afterwards. One time, Titus and I each did three-hundred squats with sandbags, and could barely keep up with the others the next day. Still, the results were great for both of us, and our legs exploded with muscles.

  Sometimes, the strain of these work-outs was so great that we had to fall to the ground in a heap afterwards, just to catch our breath, but we felt it was all worthwhile to put in the extra effort. Furius, who had no tolerance for any kind of slacking off, and who would bite the head off of new recruits, rarely had a bad word for Titus and myself, and even Procurator Incintatus himself, who sometimes watched us train, commented favourably to Furius about us. I learned this afterwords from Titus of course, who knew everything.

  On rest days, we mostly spent our time in the baths, or gambling in the rest courtyard. Some of the men even wrote letters, but they were always Roman men, as the Empire was not about to deliver the letters of slave barbarians. I had never learnt to write, and besides, had no one to write to. Most of my family were either dead or scattered to the winds, and I had lost track of them long before I had ever been captured.

  I spent much of my time eating, trying to build up my strength on figs, porridge and the meat that had come from animals killed during the Venationes, or Beast Hunts, in the arena. We also drank a kind of pasty drink made of charcoal ashes and plants, and which restored our energy. When I was not eating, I tried to learn more words of Latin, with which Titus was able to help me. He joked with with me that even if I learned to speak like a civilized person, I would always smell just like a barbarian, and so would fool no one.