by Lydia Pax
As they did any amount of blood, the crowd roared with constant approval as they saw Conall’s form grow bloodier and bloodier still.
Today’s games had been initiated in honor of the summer season. There was also, as there often was, a temple constructed sometime years ago during this month, and a great many Roman battles won. Any one of these by themselves was reason enough for the imperial agents in Puteoli to agree to arrange games for the citizens; all of them together was cause for extravagant games.
And extravagant today’s games had been indeed. The morning had seen several elephants and lions fighting—sometimes against hunters, and sometimes against other animals. The executions at midday were more theatrical than usual, pitting the condemned prisoners in costumes and forcing them to act out ancient myths.
One unlucky sod had to try to play a lyre—judging from his playing, probably for the first time in his life—and “soothe” the wild animals in the arena. He did all right against the antelopes and the goats, but not nearly as good against the half-starved wolves released after a few minutes.
The Roman crowd, in their typical fashion, ate this brutality up. Leda did not understand it. She turned away from most of the gory brutality, unable to stomach the sights for long. The gladiator fights were better, if only because they had some reasonable semblance of sport to them that did not involve mindless slaying.
Most fights ended without the gladiators dying, which had surprised her from the many legends that spread to her of Roman society into Armenia. Gladiators were investments—spoken of as such, in fact, during the games by the various senators and especially the lanistas who she served wine to—and were not quickly dismissed from the mortal coil. It was impossible to gain back money on a man’s corpse, after all.
If Conall wasn’t careful, he would become such a corpse.
In the arena now, the secutor knocked Conall down again. And again, he got up—but slower this time. His grin remained, and he went on the offensive, swinging his swords wildly.
The secutor’s shield was driven down almost to the sand before he managed a counter-attack, kicking Conall hard across the midsection and driving him back once more with his ax. He nearly had Conall driven against the wall, where spikes protruded outward to keep gladiators from running away—or from scaling up into the crowd.
The most important people had the seats closest to the action, and so were awfully jumpy at the thought of a gladiator—such a lowborn sort—getting too close to their noble blood. In this way, seating in the arena was as structured as Roman society.
The box for the honored guests and their slaves was at one end of the elliptical arena, with prominent members of the local temples at the other. Men of noble and senatorial rank sat at the lowest level, closest to the action, with rich equestrians behind them. Behind those were freedmen, and then finally women and children near the top. It was a great metaphor for who was actually listened to and who mattered in Roman society.
But, as Conall dodged another blow from the secutor’s ax, all thoughts of the structure behind the fights faded away. She wanted him to win. She did not want him to be so smitten with her, and she did not relish his insipidly persistent company with all his heartfelt compliments and empathy—but nor did she wish him harm in the arena.
The secutor did. Once again he had knocked Conall down. He seemed to be enjoying himself. The larger man played to the crowd, not bothering to attempt to finish Conall off with the ax in his hands. He kicked Conall instead, directly in the ribs. Acoustics were impeccable in the Puteoli arena. Crunching sounds—Conall’s ribs breaking—could be heard throughout the crowd. Leda felt her stomach turn over. The mob cheered and booed, both. Conall had many fans, sometimes as riotous and reckless in the crowd as he was in the arena; but, the secutor—the fighting style if not this particular fighter—had many fans himself.
Leda gulped as she watched Conall struggle back to his feet. He had trouble rebounding from that blow, though still he tried. Broken ribs were nothing to walk around with. The wrong shift in the muscle or the bone could send a splintered mass straight through an organ—even the heart.
Because he got back up to his feet slowly, the referee had rushed in. He held a whip in his hand, and began lashing at Conall’s feet. The heavy stings compelled Conall to move and fight again. Another referee whipped at the secutor, yelling at him to finish Conall off.
Members of the crowd shouted at Conall to put up the sign for mercy—two fingers over his head. But Conall simply got up again, bloody and battered, and yelled at the secutor to attack him again.
It was like the crowd, urging him to take mercy, only drove him onward.
“Insane man,” she whispered, leaning closer to the arena, watching with her breath held. “Beast of a man.”
Chapter 4
At least three ribs broken. Maybe more.
Crowd practically ordering him to ask for mercy.
More blood spilled on his body than he knew what to do with.
The secutor stood tall, essentially unharmed.
And all of this just made Conall mad. He spat out blood on the sand and gestured for the secutor to attack.
The secutor, shrugging and shaking his head, did just that.
Only this time he did not knock Conall back. He thrust with the heavy, bladed tip of his ax, and Conall dodged and attacked—cutting away at the secutor’s cloth manica. As before, the secutor attempted to bash him with his shield, but Conall blocked himself, and dodged again when the secutor followed up with his ax.
It was as if the secutor was a child trying to hit his older brother. Every blow whiffed, and Conall continued to hack and pick at the larger man’s armor.
This man had thought for a good ten minutes of fighting that he had the fight won already. That was stupid. It was a rookie mistake, and it was an underestimation.
And that made Conall mad.
Roaring with frustration, the secutor swiped hard with his ax, clearing space. Then he gathered his legs underneath him and charged.
Conall had been attacking again and again, driven away each time and apparently doing no damage. But each attack had cut hard on the secutor’s armor around his arm. It was loose now, with large gaps showing.
The secutor swung, and Conall thrust his arm up in a mighty uppercut blow. His sword bit into the secutor’s wrist, spilling his ax—with the hand attached to it—out onto the sands of the arena. Standing dumbfounded, the secutor wavered and looked at his hand in the sands, far removed from his body. Conall was already following through, his other sword landing hard into the secutor’s exposed flank. He fell to the sands, dead.
Conall, bloody and battered, had won.
Hot cheers spilled out from the crowd, the sheer force of them vibrating heavily through Conall’s body. So much noise, all at once, actually made his injuries feel worse—but he ignored the pain and allowed the elation of victory to fill him.
He raised his sword up to the editor’s box, where he could see Leda standing in the crowd of senators and slaves. His heart raced faster, looking at her up there, than it had in the entirety of the fight.
She was the one he was meant to be with. The only one.
And seeing her looking back down at him, he could feel all anger melt away, at least for a little while.
Chapter 5
After the fight, Conall walked off the sands by himself. But, as soon as he was back inside the lower bowels of the arena, a pair of slaves was ready to help him back down to the medicae, Nyx.
Nyx was a broad, older woman with a thick mass of white hair she kept wrapped in a long pony tail that stretched down near to her waist. Her skin was tanned and leathery, her hands always sure, and her knowledge of medicine as broad as any person Conall had ever encountered.
She was well-used to seeing him after a fight, and had been prepared for his coming. She placed him on her table, the wood permanently stained with the blood of other fighters in the past (and probably much of Conall’s as well).
Her treatment started right away, righting his ribs and then quickly wrapping him tight with bandages.
Above them, Conall heard the crowd swell with cheers as the primus began. He struggled with his own swell of resentment as he heard it.
One day. One day, they’ll see me there.
“You were put through the wringer out there,” said Nyx. “How do you feel?”
“I feel…” said Conall, noticing for the first time how dizzy he was, “…victorious.”
Nyx snorted. She gestured for a jar of herbs from Chloe, her assistant, and then began to rub the herbs over the cuts on Conall’s forehead and shoulders.
“That was a low move from him,” she said. “Going after your ribs like that.”
“It’s all low moves in there,” said Conall. “That’s just how it is. I don’t mind that.”
“That seems like one thing you didn’t mind from the man, then.”
“What does that mean?”
Nyx stopped rubbing for a moment. “Do you really not know what I mean, Conall?”
His vision was fading. He was tired and the blood loss of the fight was finally catching up to him now that adrenaline had stopped flooding his system. She referred to the brutality of the win, no doubt.
“I won, didn’t I?”
“I don’t think you can survive many more wins like that one.”
He grunted in response.
“Tell me true now.” She leaned over him, grabbing him by the face and massaging her thumbs into the herbs she had placed along his temple and his nose. “You could have had him earlier in the fight, couldn’t you? Without getting hit so much?”
“Maybe.”
“I think you wanted to hurt him. I think you were mad at him.”
“Maybe I was. It doesn’t matter now.”
“And I think more than that, I think you wanted to show off how tough you were.”
She slapped his torso. Conall grunted in pain.
“Tough man,” said Nyx, shaking her head. “I think you were mad about what Diocles said, weren’t you? That a man your size could never win a woman? That she would know you weren’t tough enough?”
The thought had crossed his mind once or twice that it would be nice to shove those words right in that stupid Greek bastard’s face, yes. But he wasn’t about to tell Nyx that.
“What woman have you got watching you who you’re trying to impress so badly?”
Almost, Conall’s tongue loosed. The princess, he wanted to say. All I want is a princess.
All I want is to love her with every part of myself. We’ll ride one another for days at a time and start brush fires with our unceasing friction. I’ll leave her in as much want as she’s left me for more than a year…and then I’ll give her more.
But of course, he said nothing of the sort.
“You’re not going to listen to me,” said Nyx, “just as you haven’t listened to me in times past. But you ought to consider quitting while you’re ahead, Conn. This ludus could use a skilled doctore, and you’ve definitely got the skill for it.”
Conall shook his head lightly, but his consciousness faded. He’d been heavily injured, and his blood had better things to do than to keep him awake.
Chapter 6
“How did you like the match?”
It was late in the evening now, well after the games of the day had ended. The air was chilly and Leda, appropriately, felt chilled.
Inside the city, the citizenry swelled with libations and cheers, recounting their favorite bloodiness from the day. But outside the city, Leda was trailed now by Conall, attempting to walk after her in the road.
She raised an eyebrow at him. Clearly, he should be resting on the wagon. Probably he would not return to training for a month or more. Ribs and noses took time to heal.
She resisted the urge—strong and almost tangible, like a rope binding her—to force him down on the wagon. Maybe hold her chilled bones against the warmth of his body.
That would be a great way to find out if he really did smell like a smith’s forge all the time. And to see what his skin tasted like—particularly that spot on his collarbone.
Not that she cared, of course.
Her brother, Taniel, had been in a great many fights when Leda was young. He was always rallying against the brutality of the local guard on the populace of Vagharshapat, where the royal family lived.
Taniel, for all his passion, did not have much skill in the ways of fighting, and usually returned home from these protests with a battered body. Seeing Conall now, bandaged and bruised, reminded her of him.
It had been at least a week since she had written her last letter to the emissary in Roman Galatia. Taniel had been a prisoner for over three years in Antioch, staying as hostage in the custody of a local noble there.
The entire business was infuriating to Leda. She had been just on the cusp of his release when she had been sold into slavery because her father had insisted on being such a damned fool. Since her indentured servitude had started, she’d had to start from the very bottom.
A lower bottom, indeed, than where she had started to begin with. Roman law had certain privileges for the requests of royal dignitaries from client states. There was not quite as much sway for the arguments from a particularly eloquent slave.
Still, she tried. Her hands were stained with ink on the tips and sides of her palms. Perhaps there would be less work for her if she only petitioned for Taniel, but of course, Leda was not actually a fan of being a slave herself. She wrote other petitions—though less frequent—to her family and other Roman officials, asking for her own freedom. Sooner or later, someone would start to listen. Leda placed great stock in the value of a good argument.
Such work tired out her fingers. In the nights after writing her letters, she rested them in warm water full of salts. Nyx prescribed the method, and it worked well to relax her tensed hand muscles.
“I won.” Conall smiled. “I don’t know if you saw. Like I told you I would. You can take credit for it if you like, as we discussed.” He shrugged, and then grimaced. “I might take the brunt of the winning purse, though. I’ll likely need to buy Nyx a new office if she keeps fixing me up.”
Despite herself, Leda smiled. As soon as she did, she covered her mouth, coughing slightly. But it was too late—Conall had seen.
“Was that a smile?” he asked. “Are you…” he smiled broadly, “Can you understand me? Do you understand me?” His mouth hung open. “Have you been understanding me for a while?”
His excitement was clear. Suddenly, though, his steps started to falter. They walked behind a wagon full of supplies, and he put a hand on it, trying to stay up on his feet. It was evident that wasn’t enough. His legs lost strength and he started to fall toward the road.
Leda gripped him under his armpits and steadied his fall, but Conall was heavy with hard muscle and she could not hold him up alone. Nyx was there, though—had been walking behind them with suspicious eyes ever since Conall got up out of the wagon. She snapped at Chloe, and together, the three of them carried the semi-conscious Conall back to the wagon.
“Insane man,” said Leda. “Beast of a man.”
Eyes drooping with fatigue, he just smiled up at her. He held her hand, and she did not find it in her power to pull away.
Chapter 7
The next day, Conall was in his cell, put on indefinite bed rest until his midsection had mended.
His old friends Caius and Aeliana came to see him.
Caius was a former gladiator who had become steadfast with Conall during the time in the ludus they shared together. What Caius had with Aeliana, his wife, was something beautiful. Their relationship had given Conall hope for the world in a time when he had not possessed much otherwise.
Often, he fantasized about Leda being his in the same way that Aeliana and Caius were each other’s. That Leda was a princess hardly mattered to him—Conall had little real understanding of what it even was to be a princess. All he knew was that she
was a woman, a damnably beautiful one at that, and that his every spare thought focused entirely upon her.
When Caius won his freedom, he and Aeliana married. Though they visited from time to time, they were not a regular part of Conall’s life.
“How do you feel?” Aeliana asked.
Ever the medicae, she inspected his bandages as he sat on the cot. She operated a clinic in the town of Puteoli. Caius ran the inventory and management side of affairs while Aeliana did the brunt work of treating patients.
“I’m fine. Totally fine.”
“You have three broken ribs,” she said, frowning, “and that gash on your forehead is going to leave a scar.”
“I don’t mind it,” he said.
It was the truth. Oh sure, he didn’t like the pain. But for so much of his life, Conall felt as though he did everything he could think of just to keep pace in the ludus. Other gladiators were bigger, stronger, faster, or blessed with some god-given talent that Conall had never had. All he could do was work—and when he wasn’t working himself to capacity, he knew that he was falling behind.
And if he faltered, at all, if he stopped for a moment, then there a deep blackness waiting for him somewhere in his soul. He did not understand the blackness. It was some great bleakness of his soul, making futile everyday things like washing or eating—but he knew that staying busy kept it at bay.
And he knew that dedicating himself to an ideal was the best way to stay busy.
Fight through it.
That was the advice from another old, good friend, Lucius. A gladiator himself. And the advice had been sound.
Fighting was what Conall did, and a fighter was what he was.
But at times, even that dedication tired him. And being injured was a perfect time to rest. He held no expectations for himself while he was hurt. There was no impetus to train—because otherwise he wouldn’t be able to train in the future. All he had to do—his one duty—was to recover.
