B007IIXYQY EBOK (121 page)

He began a grim battle to keep Gallus alive. The sense of futile struggle called up the desolate days when he fought to protect his father against Nero, and he found himself committing the same sort of desperate acts. He believed he survived these lapses into audacity only because he drew on the last measure of that great store of good will he had won for himself on the night he saved the Emperor’s life. In the Senate he gave a speech in praise of Gallus’ life and deeds, for which his colleagues thought him a reckless fool since it was counted fatal to praise a man Domitian had abandoned. He published and distributed anonymously a small volume of essays that included a work attributed to Gallus; in it Gallus praised Domitian’s recent social reforms. And he even laid his suspicions openly before Domitian, implying the harassment of Gallus was the act of some enemy who wished to make Domitian look the tyrant. Domitian seemed to listen, delivering one of his cleverest performances of the part of the faintly wounded, well-meaning ruler befuddled because he does not know how to manage his pesky subjects.

“Never forget,” Julianus warned once, “the Senate will outlive you. It would be tragic if you played into the hands of your critics and gave their historians reason to vilify your name.”

As he spoke, Domitian examined him with those cold, stale eyes that were not so much organs of perception as voyeurs of the soul, restless to uncover the secret shame of others. Julianus was not encouraged.

On a chill, clear evening in the month of
Aprilis
the novices learned their fate. All were assembled in the yard. A somber scent drifted indolently over the high wall in the wake of a passing funeral train—an essence thick and sweet as nectar, with an underlayer of rotted musk. It was the melancholy time when mourning shadows gathered at the base of the walls, and Auriane felt the old forlornness rising in her and knew it could only be healed by hugging close to Ramis’ hearth with Avenahar at her breast.

Avenahar, why do I see you in the mind’s eye as the babe you are no longer? You’re a child now, not a babe, with your own fate. You are old enough to know your mother left you, but not old enough to understand why.

Acco, the trainer who had replaced Corax, approached with a rolled document in hand; a torch-bearing assistant followed close behind. Auriane tensed as if at a warning rustle in high grass.

Acco was as unlike Corax as a graying dray-horse is unlike a disgruntled boar. He was a placid beast who never fretted over the size of his pasture; no one ever saw him in a state of agitation or anger. As he read the document, he masticated his words slowly, showing all the enthusiasm of a grazing animal. “Let it be known that on this day, the third before the Nones, you have been consigned”—Sunia gripped Auriane’s hand so tightly she feared the bones would crack—“to appear in the three days of games commemorating the victory of the Emperor Titus Flavius Domitianus over the rebellious Chattians, to commence during the festivities of Ceres…, it being thought fitting by Annaeus Verus, Imperial Procurator of the Games, that on these days honoring our Divinity’s glorious victory the greater part of the Chattian prisoners should be exhibited before the grateful people of Rome.”

Auriane saw several of the novices seemed unconcerned. The Sarmatian tribeswoman yawned, and the Numidian called Massa bent over to rub his leg, seeming more bothered by a blister caused by the greaves than the news that he was soon to fight to the death. But for most, Acco’s words simply meant their date of execution had been announced. It was the end of the frantic hope that somehow this day would not come. For her own part she restlessly cast her gaze down to conceal her eagerness. She felt her fate had caught her and hurled her forward with exhilarating force—odd and unaccountable fate that it was, to be charged by the gods to fulfill a sacred oath of vengeance in a Roman sand-pit with half the world looking on.

Acco stopped reading, turned his sad, equine face to them, and said, “In the next days we’ll select ten of you to take part in the grand chariot-procession on the opening day, and these will be fitted out in our colors of vermilion and gold and”—he paused to swat drowsily at a fly, seemed to forget entirely what he had been saying, then plodded on—“I say, these will practice again and again the presentation of arms before the Emperor until they can do it without bringing shame upon this school.”

When Acco dismissed them, Sunia’s knees slowly gave way. Auriane caught her up just in time to break her fall, and they sat huddled together on the sand; Auriane held her tightly to her breast. She said nothing, struck mute by unsettling visions of her own past.

The Hall ever burns. Mother, you lie so still. I am weaponless, I cannot help you. I spent seasons and ages building round myself a wall of iron. Now the circle’s complete—and I find myself weaponless once more.

Thorgild stood over them. “Sunia, you shame our people.”

“Get off from us if you have no pity,” Auriane replied in a soft, warning tone. Thorgild did not move, keeping his punishing gaze on Sunia.

“I think you hate her, Thorgild,” Auriane said then, “only because you see your own terror reflected in her face as in a pool.”

Something swiftly, furtively, withdrew in Thorgild’s eyes; Auriane saw anger, disavowal, then spirit-fright there. He took a step back, then sullenly spun about and joined the other novices as they moved silently toward the dining chamber.

“Thorgild!”
she called after, voice hoarse with pain. He did not turn round. Auriane suddenly had the sense her house broke apart.

Coniaric knelt by them in the dwindling light. “He acts the fool,” Coniaric said, nodding after Thorgild, “but he’ll make amends—do not bother over him.” He returned his gaze to Sunia. “What an unholy thing. They cannot be allowed to use her so.”

Their eyes met as they envisioned Sunia’s fate: With twenty-two other women novices she would take part in the reenactment of the massacre of the provisions women. The Chattian captives would defend the wagons against novices of the Claudian School, garbed as the men of the legions.

“If we could get her onto one of the morgue carts…,” Coniaric said in a low voice, casting a furtive eye about the yard.

It was Sunia who objected. “I would rather die in their stinking sand-pit than wander alone among this demon race.”

“She would not get farther than the gates, Coniaric.” Mustering a confident tone, Auriane said to Sunia, “I’ll go to Erato once more.”

She had little faith in these words as she spoke them. Earlier she had argued Sunia’s cause before Erato with no success, and it seemed now he had even less control over their fates. For now they were in the hands of the Imperial Procurator of the Games, the Palace official who arranged the spectacles at Domitian’s pleasure. If Sunia were removed, Erato would be obliged to pay into the Treasury an amount equal to her value or immediately replace her—and there was not time enough to train another woman. Erato had the usual anxieties of a man elevated above his station and was eager to prove his merit by doing everything with exaggerated correctness.

A guard snapped his whip. “You there. Move! This lash is thirsty for lazy blood.”

Coniaric hauled Sunia to her feet. Auriane took Sunia’s hand and pressed it to the sacred mold. Sunia gripped it tightly, drawing on its nether strength.

“Sunia! Trust in the power of my kin-luck. You will live. I swear by sun and moon, I will find a way.”

Further into that same night Auriane was taken to the west yard where Erato waited. The small, sandy expanse was lit with torches affixed to posts set out in the form of an ellipse. The single guard posted outside the door was a lifelong friend of Erato’s; he alone knew of these occasions. Erato feared he could not justify to the Finance Ministry all this time and attention lavished on one novice.

Auriane practiced in Samnite armor modified for her with a lighter shield. Erato judged this equipment most suitable for her—the double-edged short sword the Samnites carried more closely resembled the swords to which she was accustomed than did the Thracian swordsman’s long, curved blade. Auriane thought it unaccountable the Romans termed it
armor,
for all that shielded her from an enemy blade were the leather greave on the left leg, the arm guard on her sword arm, a plumed, richly decorated helmet and the oblong Samnite shield fashioned of wooden planks covered with bull’s hide. The chest was normally left exposed or covered inadequately by a short calfskin tunic such as Auriane wore. The people were not to be cheated of the sight of grievous mortal wounds.

Erato did not greet her; with brusque, angry movements he began to strap on his greaves, as if even these small acts took too much of his time. When he threw down his cloak, a collection of thin wax tablets fell out onto the sand.

Her eager question burst out before she could contain it. “You carry a library in your cloak. What is written there?”

He looked at her as if she asked the color of the sky. “A list of times for grain deliveries and of prices. Fascinating, no?”

“Your people leave nothing to memory. Your minds must be vastly empty.”

“
Vastly empty
,
is it? Why am I listening to this? Listen to me, Auriane, we’ve grave matters to discuss. It seems someone at the Palace has a grudge against you. You’re to be matched with a man. A certain Perseus. I know him. He’s more than passingly good—he won his first bout handily.” Erato watched her face to see if she was properly alarmed by this, but she regarded him with soft, bold deer’s eyes, quietly waiting for more. It angered him.

“Overconfidence killed more fools than lack of skill,” he said irritably, fumbling angrily with the buckle of the arm guard. “It’s past time you learned respect for the dangers you face. Listen or perish.”

“When have I not fought men?” she asked.

“Not the same. I don’t care how many raids you led or how many fellow barbarians you slaughtered out in the woods. This is different.
You’ve nothing to compare with this. Fighting someone in the forest wilderness and fighting a man who is cornered are as unlike as fire and water. There’s no one to back you up and cover you if you slip. There is no advantage of terrain to seek, nowhere to retreat to, and nowhere to hide, even if you are badly wounded. There will be only you and a man taller and stronger than you, who’s been trained exactly as you have been trained. A woman and a man—and fifty thousand people ready to crush you like a cockroach if you displease them. Now put aside that stubborn overconfidence and wake up before you find your entrails spilling out on the sand.”

She is hopeless or hopelessly mad, Erato thought. You would think I spoke of a contest of knucklebones.

“It is not meant to spite you. What you call overconfidence I call the grace of Fria.”

“The only goddess I honor is Victory and so should you. Now let me see your wrist.”

She extended her right hand and he lightly felt the wrist. “It’s still swollen slightly, but it’s better. Be careful with it in the next days. Don’t let anything strike it and do not lift anything. Now I’m going to give you a sword with a slightly heavier pommel to lighten the balance.” She took the sword from him; on this night their blades were fitted with leather guards.

Briskly he continued, “Tonight you’ll use a different strategy. I think you’ll find this Perseus, when you test him, will favor the first and second parries, and from what I’ve seen of him, I doubt he’ll vary them. Now, stand here.”
He was aware of how attentively those soft gray eyes watched him, and he had the uncanny feeling that, in spite of her seeming compliance, she tolerated him only because his instructions happened to coincide with some secret design of her own.

“Good…. I will play the part of Perseus. Begin by feigning weakness. My guess is, with this man, it will be the right way to open. He’ll draw you out to see what makes you parry. He will be asking what you can do. And you must lie.”

He took a position opposite her. “Start by limiting yourself to the first parry and the fundamental advance,” he went on, “and then wait. Let his confidence grow. Soon he’ll stop watching you so closely. Remember, too, you’ll be tiring him out—you’ll be facing a Thracian sword, and your man will be committed to broad, sweeping movements. Keep your parries narrow. Conserve your strength. And don’t thrust. Make him begin to wonder if you even know your weapon
has
a thrusting point. Save that for later. We’ll engage awhile, then I’ll cry out a signal. When I do,
come at me as hard as you can.
Spare me nothing. Come to kill. Do you understand?”

Calmly Auriane nodded. Aggravating wench, Erato thought. She almost looks bored by all of this.

What he had not told her was that he planned to teach her a lesson in humility. He meant to come for her at the same time, intending to catch her off guard with a vicious version of the vertical jump attack that he had perfected himself. It would probably knock her off her feet, and he hoped, awaken her to a healthy respect for the perils she faced.

They started sparring. She followed his instructions precisely. He let long moments pass, engaging her with an even rhythm that lulled them both with its monotony. Once he briefly reconsidered his plan, fearful he might injure her.

No. The lesson is too important.

Finally he shouted, “Now!”