A guard poked his head in the doorway. “All well in there?”
“We’re fine, Luca.” Nessa pulled the door closed and turned her amused grin back to him. “They told me you’d passed the test, but I think your grip might need work.” She laughed again and moved past him to set the basket down on the table and pick up the wet, broken pieces of clay.
Jonathan knelt down to help. “You surprised me.”
Her brown eyes met his as she picked up a bigger piece of the broken pitcher and held it up to him. “At least I had my clothes on.” Her smile stretched to her ears and then into her eyes. He wanted so much to carve that image into his memory, to hold as a talisman against the visions of her and Caius that filled his nightmares, together with the face of the innocent man he’d murdered. “I suppose I’m just clumsy.”
Her brow furrowed, likely wondering at his sudden gloom. After the broken pieces were piled on the table, she produced a loaf from the basket and settled on the stool as if she planned to stay a while. The bed opposite her was the only other place he could sit down. She tore a large chunk from the loaf and handed it to him. “What happened to your face?”
“Which part?”
She leaned forward to trace the scar on his cheek made by Caius’ ring. “Here.”
The concern in her eyes woke a longing for more of her touch. She took her hand from his face before his body could respond—thankfully. “Training.” That was neither true, nor a lie.
“Tao or Seppios?”
Jonathan ignored the question with a bite of the bread. The tender morsel was soft and tasted faintly of honey. Nothing like the dry crusts given them with meals. “Did Quintus send you?” He suspected Caius, perhaps Clovis, but Quintus was the safest way to try to find out without bringing up the monster that had scarred them both.
“No, but he let me come. I think he’s glad I finally wanted out of the medicus chamber and our quarters. I’d heard from one of the guards you would be remaining here, and I’ve missed you.”
He nearly choked on the swallow of bread. “You missed me?”
The pink in her cheeks deepened, but she didn’t look away. “Is that so hard to believe?”
It was, but he wouldn’t say so. Knowing her, she’d ask why.
“The way you rage against a God you say you don’t believe in fascinates me. And I wanted to see how you are.” She pulled two peaches from her basket and extended one toward him. “Quintus brought me these today. I was hoping to share them with you, and God has answered both my prayers.”
His fingers brushed hers together with the delicate skin of the fruit, sending a quiver through his stomach. “Both?”
“That we get to share them, and that you are well.”
“I didn’t say I was well.”
Her gaze roamed his body before returning to his face. “Nothing is bruised or bleeding, which is about all I had a right to hope for, gladiator.” She winked at him before taking a bite of her fruit. Somehow she could chew and smile at the same time.
He longed to ask how she seemed so herself after all he’d seen her endure. But asking would only remind her of memories he yearned to exile from his own mind. He bit into his peach to do something other than stare at her. The sweet flavor proved a pleasant break from the food meant to aid his conditioning.
Her posture relaxed and her hair fell forward over her shoulders. His fingers itched to touch the dark strands. Long hair was rare among women in Rome, especially slave women. Wigs were common among the wealthy, and Jonathan didn’t need to be skilled in mathematics to understand how one equaled the other. Her long hair was yet another thing about her that didn’t make sense. “Nessa, how did you come to be here?”
“Most of the guards here are as fond of me as Quintus. Sometimes we treat them or members of their family outside the ludis. They’ll usually permit me most anything when Caius is no concern, especially Luca.”
“No, I don’t mean this evening. I mean how you came to be here in the ludis with Quintus.”
“That’s a long story.” Her gaze fell to the fruit cradled in her lap.
“I’d like to hear it, but only if you want to tell me.”
When her head finally came up, the confident expression he’d come to depend on had returned. “Get comfortable. I’m not an orator like in the forum, so I might bore you to sleep.”
Impossible. He scooted closer to the wall and drew his knees up so his bare feet rested on the bed. “I’m ready.”
“I’ve already told you my mother was one of the captives Titus marched from Jerusalem. On the march she discovered she carried a child. God had given her a remnant of my father, and she prayed day and night I would be born healthy and strong. She was put on a slave block in every city along the way, but the hand of the Lord saw her unsold until she reached Pompeii. A lanista there bought her, intending to use her to reward the men, as Caius will sometimes do with his slave women.” She swallowed.
“The first time she was sent to a gladiator, she explained she was widowed and had only the baby she carried in secret. Raban had compassion on her and spoke to the lanista, insisting my mother be given other duties, which she was.”
“A gladiator commanded the lanista?” The notion was inconceivable.
“Raban was the champion and had a talent for getting his way.” She laughed softly. “I think perhaps I learned that from him.”
“You were close to him?”
“I was close to all of them. While my mother served them at meal times, I toddled after her wherever she went. The men all knew me, and looking back, I think for many I was a long-lost daughter or sister in some way. They spoiled me terribly. So did our lanista, who had no wife or children of his own. I think he had a great affection for my mother, for he often gifted her with jewelry and fine clothes. I was too young to know much more than that, but I remember. I also remember her being upset when Raban gave me a little wooden sword he had carved for me.”
She jerked on the stool like someone had thrown cold water on her. “Oh, that reminds me.” She reached into the basket on the table and her hand emerged with a thin leather cord dangling from her closed fist. “This belongs to you.”
Her fingers unfolded and his breath stuck in his chest. His mother’s horse head carving. He took it from Nessa’s palm and traced the rounded ears and eyes that had nearly worn away. His own burned with the threat of tears as he held the figure tight. “I thought I’d lost this.”
“Quintus cut it away when you first arrived. I thought it might be important to you so I put it aside but then forgot it. Forgive me for not thinking of it sooner.”
“Forgive you? I can’t…” His voice rasped with emotion. He slipped the leather cord over his head and the small carving rested over his heart once more. The horse head not only connected him to his mother and father, but was the only thing that truly belonged to him. Words were not enough, but all he had. “Thank you.”
She’d saved his necklace. She’d saved his life too, and he’d been angry instead of grateful. “For this and… for saving my life.”
Her expression softened. “God saved you.”
He wouldn’t argue. She meant well. “Thank you.”
She looked down, and picked at the skin of her fruit for a long moment. Finally she met his gaze. “I didn’t want to tell you, but that first night, while your fever raged, you would reach for your chest and call for your mother.”
Why didn’t he recall that, and what else did he not remember?
“Does your mother live?” she asked.
“No.”
“I’m sorry.”
“So am I.” Jonathan set the remaining half of his peach on the table. His hunger remained, but no longer for the food. He wanted to know more about this compassionate yet strong woman so much like Deborah. He settled back against the wall. “Tell me what happened next to the little girl with the wooden sword.”
“She lost her mother too.”
Jonathan sighed. Would he ever no
t say or do the wrong thing in her presence? “I’m sorry.”
“I was playing in the courtyard with my sword when the ground began shaking. Raban and the others stopped to stare at the mountain. It was puffing a dark cloud high in the sky. The strange cloud kept getting taller and the earth still trembled. The lanista was away so many of the guards left, probably to check on their families. Without the guards, some of the gladiators left. I don’t think they planned to return.”
Jonathan had heard the story of the destruction of Pompeii from his father, but never from someone who had been there. To his knowledge, very few of the city’s people had escaped.
“The dark cloud grew, swallowing up the other clouds and casting a great shadow over the city. I remember being scared because Raban looked scared, and he was never afraid of anything. He and my mother gathered in the barracks to pray with some of the others. It became like night, and pebbles started falling like rain, but they floated in the fountains.”
“Floating stone?”
“Of all different sizes. We’d never seen anything like it, and I’ve never seen it since. Raban grabbed me and my mother and took us to the master’s stable. With no guards remaining, no one stopped us. Raban put my mother and me on the only horse left and led us out of the ludis. The strange pebbles kept falling. It scared the horse—that and all the shouting people.”
Nessa’s eyes darkened. “Not all the pebbles falling from the sky floated. Some were large and heavy. I could hear them hitting the roofs. At the edge of the city, one struck my mother. She fell from the horse, me with her.”
She paused there a long moment. He longed to comfort her, but didn’t know how.
She took a deep breath and continued. “I didn’t understand, then. Raban knew she was dead and we had to leave her, but I couldn’t. I kicked and bit him, screaming the whole time. I’ll never know how he managed to get me back on that horse in front of him. We fled south, along with a few others leaving the city. With a horse we were faster, and Raban ran the horse hard. He stopped only once, to tear cloth from his tunic and tie it around our faces because there was so much ash and dust in the air we could barely breathe.
“Eventually the stone rain stopped falling somewhere on the road to Stabiae. It had been nighttime for so long, I didn’t know how much time passed. We reached Stabiae, but Raban continued south. He said God would tell him when to stop. When I first saw sunlight, I thought for sure we would rest, but he kept going. I was still grieving my mother, and exhausted like the horse. Raban had to lead it while I rode.”
A tremor passed through her and she paused. “Then it happened.” Her gaze went through him as if she were seeing her memories and not him. “The mountain behind me roared like a great beast. Another cloud spread from it and fell down the side of the mountain. I’ve never seen or heard anything like it to this day, and hope I never will again.”
She paused, another tremor passing through her. “Then the robbers came.”
Jonathan’s heart clenched.
“Five men on foot. They told Raban to hand me and the horse over and they would let him keep his life.” She hugged herself. “He drew his sword, told me to hold on, and slapped the horse so hard I felt it. The robbers grabbed for us but Raban fought them. The hand of God kept me from falling. I know that now. Then all I could do was clutch tight with my legs and hold on to the horse’s hair whipping in my face.
“We didn’t go as far as it felt at the time. Quintus and his father saw me as I crested a rise in the road. They were heading toward the fire mountain to see if they could help. I didn’t want to stop, because I didn’t know if they were bad men too, but the horse slowed, blowing and snorting, and refused to go anymore. I told them what happened. They put me in their cart and hurried to Raban.”
She hugged herself tighter. “He’d killed four of them. The other one must have run. Raban was badly wounded but still alive. Quintus and his father brought us back to their villa. They tried, but by sunset Raban was gone.”
“Nessa, I’m so sorry.”
A bittersweet smile formed on her mouth. “Thank you. When I think of Raban and my mother, my comfort comes in knowing they are with the Lord and I will see them again one day.”
The paradise Deborah and his mother had taught him of as a boy. If it comforted her to still believe that, he was glad. “You must hate the men that took him from you.”
“It took me many years to forgive them, but I never hated them. God wouldn’t want that, nor would Raban and my mother. It was the hardest thing I ever had to do. Forgive them.” Darkness filled her eyes and she held her breath for a moment. “Well, second hardest.”
The peach in his gut turned over. He knew what she was remembering.
“I didn’t thank you… for your kindness that day you found me.”
“Don’t thank me.”
Her brow creased at the hard edge in his tone.
He hadn’t meant for it to be there. “I’m sorry.” For so much. “I’m sorry for what happened.”
“It was not your doing. We are only responsible for ourselves before God and each other. One day we will have to answer to God, and through the Messiah’s blood you can know God’s mercy. I can—”
“You and I are in need of justice, not mercy.” This time he didn’t mind the bitterness seasoning his words.
Nessa frowned and her gaze narrowed. “You can’t have both.”
“I don’t need mercy. I need vengeance.”
“We all need mercy, and vengeance belongs to God. Have you never sinned against God?”
He thought of the innocent man he’d slain weeks before. “It’s not the same as what was done to you, or to me.”
“But it is.” She leaned forward and placed her hand on the top of his foot. “We are all guilty and in need of God’s mercy and forgiveness. We have no right to take of that and not give it to others.”
“You forgive Caius?”
Her eyes widened and she drew her hand back. “Why do you speak of Caius?”
Curse his carelessness. The set of her face demanded a response. “It doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t have brought him up.”
“It does matter.” She leaned forward, the uneaten core of her fruit rolling from her lap unheeded. She grasped his hand in both of hers. “It matters a great deal. You must tell no one. Please, Jonathan. You must give me your word you will never speak of it to anyone. Even me. Please.”
He pulled his hand free. “I won’t speak of it again.”
The intensity of her gaze seemed to mine his soul for the conviction lacking in his tone.
It frightened him, and this time he replaced the guilt in his voice with purpose. “You have my word.”
She placed her hand on the back of his. “Thank you.”
Should he? No, and yet, he couldn’t stop himself. He turned his hand, savoring the slide of her fingers across his skin, until he could wrap his fingers around her smaller ones. Her hands healed, his killed, but for a moment they fit together. Intertwined, as their lives were. He could not fail her. Ever.
“Nessa,” a voice called from outside his cell. “It’s time.”
She withdrew her hand with a sheepish smile. “Thank you, Luca, I’ll be right there.”
Her brown eyes bored into his with the slightest tilt of her head. “Jonathan, who is it you cannot forgive?”
Their faces flashed in his mind, one at a time. “Someday I may tell you.”
“You’ll never heal until you forgive. Even then, it will take time for God’s peace to overcome the memories, but it can, if you seek Him.”
“God had his chance.” Jonathan swallowed against his tightening throat and looked away to the stone wall of his cell. “If He’s there, He abandoned me a long time ago.”
Suddenly her hands were on his face, forcing him to look at her. “God does not abandon us. He does not leave us, or forsake us. We turn away, and He allows us, but His love will pursue us. A love so strong He gave His Son for you. That Son willi
ngly endured crucifixion so that all who call upon His name and believe can live forever with Him. Don’t turn your back on that love.”
With his head between her hands, her pleading face a breath from his own, her words pierced his defenses. He felt a stirring in his heart and mind and raised his hands to hold her wrists lightly. Warmth he didn’t understand filled him. Not the warmth of desire, but the long forgotten hunger of a much deeper yearning.
The cell door opened, shattering the moment as Nessa released him. She backed toward the door, as reluctant to go as he was for her to leave. “I’ll pray for you, Jonathan.”
The guard gave him a cursory glance before shutting and locking the door. He remained crouched on his bed, leaning into the wall long after she left, replaying every moment of his time with her. Eventually the flame of the oil lamp on the table sputtered and died. Maybe it was the darkness that made him feel safe enough to try. Maybe it was for her, but he closed his eyes and bowed his head between his raised knees.
“God?” A heavy sigh left him and he swallowed. How long had it been? Eight years, except for the desperate pleas on the road from Rome. Memories of the steady diet of abuse on the long road to the shame of the slave block returned. With them Valentina’s seduction, destroying the life he’d rebuilt after Manius’ betrayal. Surviving execution, twice, so Clovis could cheat him out of suicide. Murdering an innocent man, and now having to fight and eventually kill again to profit the most evil man he’d ever known.
Where was God’s love through any of that? The love Nessa said would never stop pursuing him? If God existed, and truly loved him, He’d done a poor job of showing it.
Jonathan turned flat on the bed, not bothering to move beneath the blanket. He relived Nessa’s touch as she’d traced the scar on his cheek from Caius’ ring. Her hands when they held his face. The feel of her hand in his. He clutched his mother’s carving she’d returned to him and rolled over to face the wall.
There was a love he wanted to pursue him, but it wasn’t God’s.
Chasing the Lion Page 15
