The young man slid on his shoulder guard. “Enjoy the opening ceremony.” Then he grinned. “It’s going to be your last.”
Jonathan’s empty stomach dropped. “Jelani?”
The young man finished buckling his shoulder guard. “The same.”
He turned away from the young man he would try his best to kill in a few hours. But the face remained, burned into his memory along with those of the others whose lives he’d taken. They danced in an unforgiving mosaic he could never purge his mind of, even in sleep.
Guards ushered the gladiators into a double column near a ramp that took them up to the arena floor. Jonathan pulled his helmet on before they emerged. The visor shielded his eyes from the sudden burst of natural light, and more importantly, his face from anyone who might recognize him.
The crowd erupted into the loudest cheer of the day so far, making the wooden deck beneath their feet vibrate under the sand. Seeing the amphitheater from the arena floor for the first time, it was easy to understand why most of the beasts were terrified of it. The roar of the crowd was like a physical force buffeting from every direction—fifty thousand people. The lower two-thirds of seats were filled with white togas and dotted throughout with the slaves that served them. The upper rows held peasants, plebeians, and women. Jonathan circled the arena with the other gladiators, though he did not preen and strut like most who saluted their amoratae. He scanned the crowd instead for a face that matched his own.
Emperor Domitian was difficult to miss, clad in a purple toga and gold laurel leaf crown in the pulvis. The gladiators waited while Caesar, surrounded by his praetorians, came to the arena floor for the probatio armorum. This was not for show. It truly was an inspection of the weapons. All blades must be equally sharp so the contests would be decided on skill and endurance, not faulty equipment.
When Caesar was satisfied, he and his guards returned to the pulvis and the gladiators to their holding area. Jonathan removed his cape and helmet to lean against the wall. The rough stone adhered to the sweat on his bare back while he waited for his match to be called. Jelani eyed him from across the cell as he made practice swings with an invisible net. In a matter of hours, one of them would be dead. It had to be Jelani. For the first time, Jonathan purposefully recalled memories of Nessa’s lifeless eyes and naked body huddled in shame to remind him why it had to be so.
The men were summoned in pairs, at intervals that held no rhythm or reason, much like the cheers of the crowd above. Some matches ended quicker than others, until only eight men remained. A guard reappeared, pointed to Jelani, marked the wax tablet in his hand, and pointed to Jonathan.
It was time.
He gathered his helmet and rose. In a ritual he’d performed a hundred times, he pulled the helmet on. The metal did far more than protect his skull. It silenced his mind, bound his conscience, and removed every thought but battle so that only the warrior within remained.
Jelani knelt before Jonathan on the sand, raising two fingers in a plea for mercy. Jonathan gripped his sword tight and held it ready while blood ran from his upper thigh, the only wound Jelani had been able to inflict with his trident. The emperor acknowledged the missio Jelani asked for with a sign of his own. Kill.
The young man accepted in the true tradition of the gladiator. He forced a leg up to kneel on one knee and raised his head without meeting Jonathan’s eyes. This was a kindness only another gladiator would understand.
Jonathan inverted his sword and poised the tip above Jelani’s exposed spine. He took a deep breath, held it, and willed the sword to fall. But instead of delivering the killing blow, his arms buckled and held. The battle Jonathan so viciously fought on the sand had moved inside his head.
The crowd that had cheered him for nearly half an hour turned on him, impatient for Jelani’s death. Guards advanced from the gate, two with bows and nocked arrows pointed right at Jonathan’s chest. The rest carried whips.
“Do not hesitate, thraex. They will kill us both,” Jelani rasped from the sand.
A loose crescent of guards formed around them. “Gladiator, the emperor demands the coup de grace. You will obey or you both die.”
If those arrows went through his chest, Nessa might as well be standing behind him. He had killed men before. An innocent slave and other gladiators in combat, most so grievously injured it was merciful to do so. But this was an execution. One without merit, for Jelani had fought extremely well. Jonathan had prepared for this moment for days, yet his arms refused to plunge that blade in. Do it. Do it now.
“Your choice.” The guard pulled the string of his bow tighter and straightened his aim.
A guttural cry rose from the man at his feet as Jelani sprung up and impaled himself on Jonathan’s sword, tearing it from his hands. It was too shallow to be a clean death stroke, and Jelani wavered on his feet, the way a wheat shaft cleaved at the ground will do the moment before it falls. An arrow protruded from his chest and another from his neck.
Arrows meant for Jonathan.
Jelani crumpled to the sand. Jonathan ripped his helmet off and dropped to his knees beside him. “Why?”
Blood ran from Jelani’s mouth. He coughed, spraying Jonathan’s chest in a fine, red mist. “Jesus said… love… our enemies.” Jelani’s dark eyes bored into his own. “No greater love… than this.”
His eyes lost focus, and the groan of death tumbled from his throat before his body stilled.
Jonathan fought to keep from screaming. It was Deborah’s voice that finished somewhere in Jonathan’s heart. To lay down your life for a friend. Deborah’s words, his mother’s words, Nessa’s words. The words of Christ.
Chapter 25 – Life
Jonathan propelled himself through the gate of life on stiff legs. His thigh wound still bled, but the numbness flowing from deep inside kept any pain away. At the spoilarium, he surrendered his armor and sword, flinching at the sight of Jelani’s blood clinging to it. Had he pulled it from the young man’s back? Had a guard, before handing it to him?
A slave gave him a wineskin, which he emptied in a single raise. Jonathan followed him to another chamber where a gladiator lay on a table, surrounded by blood. Quintus and another physician worked over him while Nessa stood at the end of the table, holding the man’s bare foot and from the tilt of her head, praying to her God.
As if sensing his gaze, her brown eyes met his. The look in her eyes reached through his numbness. She came to him without speaking, never taking her eyes from his face. Her arms surrounded him and her head came to rest against his chest, still splattered with blood. The sigh that came from her as she tightened her embrace echoed his own as he closed his arms around her. He held her, but the peace that normally flooded him in her presence didn’t come.
“Jonathan,” Quintus said softly. “Let me tend that leg.”
Nessa released him, and Jonathan caught a glimpse of her face before she turned away. No tears. He watched her from where he sat on a stool while she and Quintus tended his leg, but she deliberately avoided his gaze, and then his touch.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
She turned away and he grabbed the rolled sleeve of her tunic to stop her. Her violent shudder slapped him as surely as any hand would have. “Forgive me,” he whispered.
The glare in her eyes and the way she stiffened told him he’d made it worse.
“Nessa?” Quintus glanced up at her from below his bushy brows.
She dipped her chin and stood statue still while Quintus finished binding his thigh.
Was it the knowledge that because Jonathan lived, another had died? A gladiator hardly more than a boy. Did she see death when she looked at him? She must, for as soon as Quintus tied the last knot and returned to the gladiator on the table, Nessa followed.
Jonathan remained alone on the stool, watching her while she worked, which included avoiding his gaze. Even when the guards came to lead him away, she refused to look at him. He went to her, his world shaking more t
han it ever had. “Are you angry that I live?”
Moisture pooled in her eyes, which turned on him now, full of anger and pain. “If you think that you know nothing of me.”
“Then why?”
“Because you do not live. Not in the way that matters. I pray and I plead with God, and with you, that you return to your faith in Him, and you do not yield. God does not intervene.”
“Come, slave.” The guard put a firm hand on Jonathan’s shoulder.
She closed her eyes, crossing her arms as she turned away.
“Nessa, please.” He reached for her, but the guard grabbed his arm while another put his hand to the hilt of his sword. He wanted to tell her what Jelani had done, how his words were burned on Jonathan’s heart, but she kept her back to him. The hand on his arm grew more insistent, but Jonathan didn’t fight it. He didn’t have the strength or the will to fight anyone anymore. That realization filled him with fear as the guards tugged him along toward the long tunnel. He would have to find a way, or Nessa’s face would join Jelani’s in the nightmares he was certain would follow him to the grave.
Jonathan rested in his empty cell, absorbing the quiet of the barracks beyond the wooden door. Most of the surviving gladiators had already departed Rome with their masters. Only Jonathan and a few other survivors belonging to the imperial ludis remained. When Tao left that morning to take the sand against Hulderic, Jonathan embraced him as a brother. If he did not return, as Seppios had not, Jonathan hoped it would be because Caesar granted Tao his freedom for defeating Hulderic. Either way, he would miss his friend and mentor.
Tao was more a brother to him than Manius had ever been. So was Seppios. Jonathan had wept for him in the dark that first night. If Tao had also, he didn’t know. Neither could bring themselves to speak of him. Gladiators die. Like lions and leaves. Jonathan’s sole comfort was Seppios had not died by Jonathan’s own sword.
Two weeks of solid rest were the most Jonathan ever had since becoming Caius’ marionette with a sword. He flexed his leg, noting the trident wound in its three parts was nearly healed. It amazed him how quick his body could recover when allowed to do nothing else.
His mind was another matter. Nothing could force Jelani’s death from his thoughts. The young man had taken the arrows meant for him. A sacrifice made more profound because Jelani gained nothing by it—except a more gruesome death. Like Christ. Now even without Nessa’s presence, Jonathan couldn’t escape thoughts of God.
Rapid footfalls sounded outside his cell door. They grew louder and then stopped. His cell door flung open. A trio of guards stood there, winded and breathing hard. “Make haste, slave. You’ve been summoned.”
Jonathan slid from the upper bunk to the cool stone floor. “By who?”
“We’ll explain on the way.”
The guard moved away from the door, and Jonathan reached for his sandals. “Way to where?”
The guard strode purposefully toward him and seized his upper arm. “Now.”
Jonathan began to protest until the other two other guards outside drew their swords. He allowed the guard to tug him outside his cell, and then the man shoved him toward the far side of the ludis. Another guard began to run ahead of them.
He followed at a jog, the wound in his thigh pinching, until a sharp point prodded him in the back.
“I mean run, slave. The mob threatens to riot even now.”
So Jonathan ran, with two guards ready to kill him at his back and one who led the way. He knew better than to slow down, but his mind was racing as fast as his bare feet into the tunnel that led to the arena. Why was he being summoned? His thigh began to throb, but he gritted his teeth and pushed on. From the other end of the tunnel, silhouetted figures ran toward them. The torches on the walls were too far apart to make out who they were at this distance.
“Wait!” The shout filled the stone corridor.
That voice. “Nessa.” Jonathan came to a stop, as she did.
Quintus lagged far behind her.
She grabbed his face in both hands, her eyes filled with tears. “Tao is taken ill. Caius sends you in his place.”
In his place.
A guard grabbed Jonathan’s arm. “We have to get moving. You hear them.”
In his place. They were sending him to Hulderic.
“Jonathan, please.” Nessa held his jaw tighter between her hands. “Repent and return to your faith in the Lord. Please.”
Another guard seized her arm and yanked her back so hard she cried out as her hands were torn from his face. Jonathan slammed his fist into the guard’s throat, dropping him like a stone. Swords pulled free of their scabbards and Jonathan spun and pushed Nessa behind him toward the wall. He shielded her with his body and watched the guards’ eyes for who would take him down first.
“Stop!” Quintus reached them at last, out of breath and clutching at his chest. “In the name of Jupiter, stop. Give them a moment.”
“We have orders. The mob—”
“A few moments more will not have them tearing apart the city, you fool,” Quintus bellowed.
The guards lowered their weapons. Jonathan turned and took Nessa’s tearstained face between his hands. He stored a vision of her deep brown eyes, even in tears, and his mouth descended on hers. She clung to him, returning the kiss that was everything he’d believed it would be the past four years.
Except for knowing he was about to die.
And if Caius were the man Jonathan believed him to be, so was she.
His anguish melted into his kiss, and he tasted Nessa’s own through the salt of her tears.
The hands were on him again, silent but insistent.
He released her, lest they take her from him again by force. She dissolved into sobs, and Quintus put his arm around her shoulders and cradled her to his side.
His gaze found Jonathan’s. “If I ever have a son I will pray to Jupiter he has your strength and honor.”
A guard prodded him with a sword, and Jonathan began backing toward the arena. There was no time. “You must protect her from Caius. Demand the truth from Clovis. Swear to me, Quintus. Swear you will protect her with your life from Caius.”
Quintus’ thick brow furrowed. “From Caius?”
“Enough, slave. We go now.”
Jonathan’s last vision of the woman he loved would be her anguished sobs in the arms of another man. One Jonathan hoped would learn the truth and protect her. They jabbed him again. He could stand his ground. Make them cut him down here in the corridor. Tell Quintus everything while he died and never set eyes on Hulderic.
Coward. He was still a Tarquinius. If he lost that, even in death, his enemies had truly won. He turned and picked up his pace. If he pushed harder, he could better warm up, and soon passed the guard in front of him. The ground shook under his feet as they neared the end of the tunnel. The mob was giving full vent to their impatience. Shouts and angry cries flowed down the tunnel like waves. Even the torches rattled in their wall brackets from the tremors above. Near the arena end of the tunnel, more guards waited, along with an army of slaves.
“What took so long?” a praetorian with a plume-crested helmet demanded.
“Apologies, Commander. We encountered a delay in the tunnel.”
“Get him up to the arena at once or I’ll make lamps from your skulls.”
Slaves surrounded him, each with a piece of his armor. The way they rushed to prepare him reminded him of being readied for Valentina. Then as now, he would be made to suffer—always for the selfish pleasure of others. And Nessa with him if Quintus failed. It was too much rage all at once. It poured through his veins, his lungs, and his mind.
Tao’s words came to him, unbidden. If it distracts you, clear your mind of it. If it fuels your focus, use it. Could he harness the rage and let it feed, not cloud, the warrior that would emerge when he took the sand? Would he have a chance that way?
He looked down.
He didn’t even have sandals.
The leg grieves we
re strapped securely to his legs. The heavy leather strap securing his chainmail shoulder sleeve was pulled across his chest and buckled behind his back. When a slave approached with a helmet, Jonathan took it from him. This he would do himself. The metal muffled the light and sound around him as it settled on the top of his head and he fastened the chin strap. His breathing slowed. His raging emotions yielded to the warrior summoned to the surface.
They handed him a sword, then his shield. The ramp to the gate of life shook like the boarding plank of a ship in rough tide as he climbed it. Fifty thousand people screamed for the match to begin under a cloudless sky. The sand burned beneath his feet as the trumpets blasted, but the familiar flow of battle-readiness coursed through him—until he saw Hulderic.
The man was a giant. He wore no armor and carried no shield, only a sword in each hand. There was no nod of respect for an opponent. Instead, he laughed.
If he’d come to play, so be it. Jonathan didn’t wait for ceremony or the referee. He charged, bellowing his best war cry as he churned up sand. Hulderic didn’t even raise his swords. Jonathan’s shield hit him square in the gut, and his sword was knocked harmlessly away by Hulderic’s in a sweeping move so fast Jonathan barely saw it through the eyeholes of his helmet. The crush of the impact stunned him. He bounced off Hulderic without moving the man even a pace.
Hulderic advanced, swinging both swords in rhythmic arcs.
Jonathan gave ground while the crowd jeered his retreat. He wracked his brain for a way to defend, much less attack.
Hulderic’s huge strides carried him ever closer, faster than Jonathan could back away.
Turn and run, or dig in?
Dig in.
Jonathan made his stand, shield high and close, sword at the ready.
Hulderic spread his swords like wings and swung them in toward Jonathan’s neck in the blink of an eye.
Jonathan dropped into a low crouch fast enough to avoid having his head severed, but not fast enough to miss the blow. The heavy swords struck with opposing force on both sides of his helmet. The vibration against Jonathan’s skull rattled him worse than the deafening sound. He shifted a bare foot to keep from going down.
Chasing the Lion Page 21
