CHAPTER 24.

Ariella watched Floronius from the under the arch at the end of the arena. The baffling n.o.bleman Portius Cato had retreated, thankfully, so that she had nothing to distract her from her study of her opponent. She would fight today as a Retiarius, and had been practicing with the net since Drusus had told her. Floronius was a Secutor, heavily armed and relying on strength. Matches were often arranged thus, with strength and armor pitted against speed and mobility.

She had planned more than the movement of her feet and net, however. It would take every trick she could devise to win the crowd today. Drusus approached and she reached a hand out to slow him. "I will go out before Floronius, yes?"

It was the third or fourth time she had asked, and from his scowl it was once too many. "Yes, yes. Now worry about your fight, not your pride!"

She nodded and let him pa.s.s, then inhaled deeply and returned to her study of those still warming up.

She had done all she could to prepare, painting signs all over the city of Scorpion Fish, hoping they would come eager to see this new favorite. She would appear outmatched because of her size, but that was not enough to win their favor. She would need to be amusing, to capture their imagination, to make them laugh and to make them watch.

And Floronius-she had memorized every one of his standard tactics, studied his weaknesses until she knew them well. He was slow on the turn and heavy on his feet.

She braced a hand against the stone arch and felt her breath quicken. Could she kill him? He might die at the end of her trident in the heat of the battle, or she might pin him and look to the games' sponsor for his indication of death or mercy. It would be Cato in that box today. Would he want her to claim her victory, or would he want to spare her the unpleasantness of Floronius's execution?

She saw in her mind Floronius's grinning face as he stood over Jeremiah's fallen body. Heard his derisive laughter. Oh yes, she could kill him.

But there was a greater question she dared not ask herself. When she fought today, would she fight as Scorpion Fish, or revealed to the crowd as a woman? Had she convinced Cato to keep her secret, or would his infuriating need to interfere ruin her plans before she'd been given a chance?

All too soon the stands began to fill with excited townspeople, eager for the early entertainment. A few mock duels were staged to warm up the crowd, but before long the animals, kept starving and tortured under the arena floor, were released. The iron grills that barred their cells were swung open, slaves set fire to straw behind them, and terrified by flames and smoke, they ran up the ramps into the sun.

Ariella paced the corridor, only occasionally glancing out at the menagerie of exotic animals that snarled and attacked each other in the ring-bears and bulls, antelopes and jackals, hyenas and leopards-the entire arena seemed covered with skins and fur. Ethiopian bowmen in ostrich plume headdresses let arrows loose from upper tiers, and the roar of fallen beasts mingled with the screams of the crowd. And still they wanted more.

Though she was part of it now, still it sickened her. Boredom had brought them to this-a whole society that could feel nothing anymore, but death and s.e.x. Their common criminals were sentenced to the arena simply to fill demand, and still they wanted more.

More novelty. More cruelty.

What had been a blood sport had become a blood bath. Hors.e.m.e.n would hunt down armed men on foot. Terrified prisoners were tortured. p.u.b.escent girls raped.

More!

Ignoring the boiling heat and putrid stench, the crowds shrieked with pleasure. Women in the stands tore long gashes in their cheeks. Men beat their fists against the marble seating. "Kill! Kill! Kill!" Their tedious, purposeless existence found vent only here, intoxicated on blood and making use of prost.i.tutes in pa.s.sageways to satisfy their l.u.s.t.

Ariella braced a hand against the wall. Her stomach plunged then surged. What have I become?

Slaves ran past her with baskets of fresh sand and jars of perfume to pour on the arena.

It was time for the main event. Ariella noted the shift in the sound of the crowd. Her time was short.

Celadus and Bestia fought first, with the women nearly fainting over Celadus, and still Ariella paced. Both returned to the wide corridor under the seats, and Ariella did not even ask who had won. She could not see Celadus's eyes through his protective visor, and the scimitar he carried at his side made her fear approach. He had thus far kept her secret, but also kept his distance, and she had let him have it.

One more fight, Papus and Flaccus, and then it was her turn. She s.n.a.t.c.hed up her net and trident and ran to the entrance. Floronius stood there already, about to enter, but Drusus held him back with one hand and jerked his head toward Ariella. She nodded once in acknowledgment, then ran past the two, under the stone arch and into the hazy sun.

She stood at the edge of the sand, awaiting the sponsor's announcement, her breathing measured and controlled even while her heart raced.

And then his voice was there, carried across the vast arena, lifted to the red pennants that waved and snapped in the breeze at the upper lip of the stone circle.

"Scorpion Fish, the Retiarius!"

The crowd responded with a rush of noise, and the sound took her backward in the odd way memories sometimes happen, to a Pa.s.sover day in her childhood, when the crowds around the Temple had shouted thus-but with religious fervor, not bloodl.u.s.t.

Forcing back the memory, Ariella strode forward and shot her trident into the air to receive the acclaim. She took another four steps and pivoted, saluting the crowd behind her. A scream of Scorpion Fish! returned to her, an ardent female voice, causing the adjacent crowd to laugh.

Ariella bowed toward her admirer, then trotted backward toward the center of the arena, swishing her net about her feet and her head until the crowd applauded.

But she was not yet finished. Years ago, as a child, she and her younger brother had played with a shepherd's rod out in the fields, practicing twirls and tosses until they would fall exhausted to the gra.s.s, laughing and dizzy.

Her hands still remembered the skill, and she dropped her net now, and twirled the trident once, twice, three times, faster and faster until it grew blurry, then tossed it up, up into the cloudy sky. The crowd seemed not to know what to make of this display, and it was as if they held their collective breath, until the trident fell from the sky, into her waiting hand.

And then, as she had hoped, as she had needed, they erupted into screams of acclaim. She hefted the trident above her head once more, s.n.a.t.c.hed up her net, and turned just in time to face Floronius running toward her across the sand.

She lowered her trident to the level of his midsection and let him come.

Floronius paused, still a dozen cubits from her, and waited for his turn to be announced. Cato's voice rang over the sand.

Is that concern for me in his voice?

And then a bell rang, and it began. Her first real fight.

Ariella circled Floronius, flexed at the knees, loose and ready to leap from his sword. Floronius was heavily defended, with a large shield, a heavy helmet with eyeholes, a protective arm sleeve and a leather greave for his forward leg. In contrast, she had only her net and trident and her only defense was a shoulder piece to protect her net arm. The match was about brute force versus trickery and speed.

Ariella placed the image of Floronius laughing at Jeremiah before her mind's eye again, let it build her hatred for him, called on that hatred to strengthen her arm and sharpen her wits.

It began well. She spun around him, counting on his slowness to come at him from the next position, to jab him with the three p.r.o.ngs of her trident, all the while keeping her nets moving around his feet, throwing off his balance.

But this must be more than Retiarius versus Secutor. This must be a show.

She backed away, then pointed to Floronius with her trident and began to lumber around him, slow and heavy, in an obvious pantomime of the larger fighter. The crowd recognized her farce at once, and howls of laughter rewarded her.

Floronius seemed baffled by her antics and turned a slow circle to watch as she pranced around him. Then, angered at the way she appeared to have amused the spectators, he rushed her.

She let him come, counted the beats, forced herself to hold, hold-even as he hefted his sword above her head and she saw the iron cutting a path through the thick air toward her head. Then a leap and a dart, and she was clear of him, leaving him to stumble over the place she had stood.

She pantomimed again, this time clasping a hand over her heart as though mortally frightened, and bending the knee to beg for her life. Given her clear superiority thus far, the townspeople shrieked with delight at her mockery.

But it could not be all farce for long. Floronius's rage built and narrowed his focus, and Ariella was forced to engage him with all her strength, dodging and sweeping until her arms grew shaky and sweat ran down her forehead, burning her eyes and salting her tongue.

Still Floronius did not weaken. How would she ever bring him down? True, he was slow on the turn, but his eyes were sharp, and she could not sweep the net without his being ready to leap it. They came together and then apart, together and apart, in a kind of sickening death-dance, and then Ariella saw it.

The look of hatred in his eye.

Her former confidence in Cato's mercy had been misplaced. Floronius need not wait for Cato's decision . . . not if he killed her during the match.

Her mouth was as dry as the arena sand, and in fact tasted of its grit, and the muscles of her thighs trembled. A moment of inattention, and she felt a sharp burn on her upper arm. Floronius's sword had sliced her, twice perhaps, before she had even seen it. She backed away as warm, sticky blood ran down her arm onto her hand. The trident grew slick in her palm and her arm weakened.

Still thrashing with the net, the first tickle of true fear swept her. Did Floronius see it in her eyes?

She managed to swing the trident in an arc above her head, to remind the crowd of her earlier performance with the long piece of iron. The applause still favored her, surely, but the sound wavered, like heat rising from pavement, or perhaps it was her hearing that wavered, for the sand also seemed to ripple and swell, and even Floronius's face blurred.

I am going down.

The thought came only a moment before she felt the sand smack her cheek. Every muscle seemed paralyzed and tears came unbidden, for which she cursed herself without mercy.

Floronius stood above her now, one foot on the small of her back and his sword p.r.i.c.king at the base of her neck.

She waited, unsure if her rival's hatred would outpace her sponsor's mercy- And unsure if she even cared.

CHAPTER 25.

Cato watched Ariella swagger into the arena, her trident lofted above her head, from the box reserved for the editores, the sponsor of the games, and his stomach churned over what was to come. Whether it was betraying Ariella or seeing her fight, he could not say.

Isabella tugged on his arm and offered him salted fish. She had wrapped the fish in fabric before leaving home, and the odor of it further aggravated his stomach. He pushed it away and kept his eyes on the sand.

The crowd loved her. Of course they did. This was her plan, the plan he was about to ruin. But even as the thought accused, he knew he would not do it. The G.o.ds help him, he could not betray her. So his first public appearance since declaring himself Maius's rival would end in ridicule, and his chances of defeating the monster slaughtered before he had begun.

Octavia was clucking her tongue beside him. "These fighters these days. They believe it's all about them, and not the fight. We are subjected to more personality than performance."

Cato barely heard his mother. Down below, in the section reserved for the elite, Nigidius Maius had turned in his seat to look at Cato, as if he could read Cato's dilemma from twenty rows away, and was even now glorying in his victory. Cato saw each detail of the arena in sharp relief, senses heightened. Maius's bushy eyebrows, the heads of his sycophants in a pack around him, even the details of sand and sword, of the next two fighters waiting in the wings for their own moment of glory.

But the fight was beginning, and all thoughts of campaign promises and rival candidates fled as Cato focused on Ariella, on her dark hair and muscled arms, on every thrust of her trident and swish of her nets. He stood and gripped the low stone wall. Isabella was pulling on his arm again, but he shrugged her off, and his vision narrowed until he saw nothing but the battle in the center of the yellow sand, and felt nothing but the stone ledge cut into his hands.

She was quick, that was certain. But Floronius had the advantage of size and strength. Wide in the chest, powerful arms. Cato felt each blow to her as though it were his own body, and his muscles jerked and twitched as if he were in the sand himself.

His earlier thoughts of the dance returned, and Ariella indeed could have been a dancer, so fluid and graceful were her movements as she leaped and twirled around Floronius, nets flying about her head.

The shouts of the crowd rose and fell with each blow, with each strike of trident and sword. When they were silent, the heavy grunts of the fighters pushed through the weighted air, reaching Cato and reminding him that it was not a dance, but a fight to the death.

His arms grew fatigued by the tight grip on the stone wall. How could Ariella still push on with her trident and nets?

But it could not last. He saw that now. Saw her weakening, slowing. She had only speed as an a.s.set, and without it she would fall. He watched her face for signs of defeat, but he was too far to read her expression.

Floronius delivered a kick to her ribs and Ariella bent over the blow. Cato started forward, as though he could put a stop to this madness. Heat sparked along his fingertips and he felt himself flush with panic and indecision. Torn between a desire to save her and a desire to honor her wishes, he shuffled his feet in the stone box.

Octavia smacked his arm. "Sit down, Quintus. You are making me nervous."

Beside her, Isabella chimed in. "Isn't he the same little fighter that had you so agitated at the last games, Quintus?"

The crowd sent up a gasp and then a shout. Cato watched in terror as Ariella backed away, her upper left arm blooming with the spread of purple-red blood. She used her other forearm to wipe sweat from her head, and gave only a glance to the injury.

Cato had known before the fight began that should Ariella go down before Floronius, he would certainly declare mercy for her. But the blood began to run down her arm to the hand that held the trident, and Floronius circled her like a lion preparing for the kill. It was likely this brute would make an end of her before Cato had the chance to intervene.

G.o.ds have mercy, she is going down.

He felt it in his own body even before the crowd sensed her wavering on her feet. A moment later and she was face-down in the sand, Floronius standing over her . . .

Somehow, impossibly, Cato found himself leaping the stone wall and running down through the tiered seating toward the arena wall.

The drop from the edge of the seating to the sand was no more than his own height, and it jolted but did not slow him. He ran past the arched entrance to the arena where Paris and another fighter waited. Paris watched him come, eyes wide. Cato spotted the scimitar in the fighter's hand and pointed as he ran. "Give me that!"

The gladiator looked down, held out the weapon, frowning. Cato s.n.a.t.c.hed the curved blade, turned, and ran to the two fighters in the center.

Floronius had put his foot onto Ari's back and his sword at the base of her neck. His back was to Cato.

The crowd had gone deadly silent at Cato's leap into the arena, and Floronius searched the stands to see why he was not cheered.

Cato yelled. It came deep from his chest, exploded as he ran, sword raised, across the sand at Floronius.

The fighter spun, his own weapon held out at his waist.

Cato did not slow.

The crowd screamed their delight.

Their swords met in a deafening clash of metal. They pushed apart and Cato gained his balance for another charge. A quick sideways glance revealed Ariella scrambling to her feet and pulling back.

Good.

He ran at Floronius once more, and their swords met again, the sound lost in the frenzied screams of the spectators.

Somehow he held his own. Calling on everything he'd learned by years of watching the gladiators, he thrust and jumped back before Floronius could strike. Some part of his mind evaluated the situation, aware that this was something he had dreamed of since he was a boy.

Aware that it was ludicrous and he was soon to die.

Just as he had known that Ariella could not have victory here, it did not surprise him when it was his own back in the sand, with Floronius's angry and confused face above him.

"What is this?" Floronius's voice was the growl of an abused animal. "Did you wish me to let you win?"

Cato inhaled, fighting the tightness in his chest.

Floronius seemed to sense his chance to perform. He lifted his voice into the air. "What shall it be, sponsor? Death or mercy?"

The crowd laughed at the irony, then waited for Cato's response.

Before he could speak, a flash of leather and rope, flesh and blood, flew across the sand. Ariella's nets whipped around Floronius's feet, and with a practiced yank, she toppled the bulky fighter. A moment later the p.r.o.ngs of her trident were balanced across Floronius's chest.

Again, the townspeople went wild. It had been a fight to talk about for years.