The Artifact (49 page)

The
Forum Romanum
was a huge open area paved with large rectangular granite tiles surrounded by merchant stalls and shops under porticoes with multicolored awnings extending from the roofed buildings behind them and supported by decorative columns interspersed with statues of famed statesmen and generals. This was the central district in which public business was conducted, political opinion and gossip of every nature exchanged among professional and upper classes of that thriving metropolis of one million citizens, freedmen, servants, slaves and paupers ruled by Emperor Tiberius Caesar.

I did not see more of that splendid Roman capital nor hoped to do so, for once interred in the bowels of the worlds largest and most famous amphitheater, we would leave the city through the same route or not at all. My first sighting of the
Circus Maximus
⁷⁵
loomed above us as the cheers and screams of two hundred thousand or more spectators erupted within, as we entered the broad shadow cast down from arched walls and dark, familiar
carcere
below, sending an involuntary chill through my bones on that warm spring day.

Upon settling into the barracks Fabian had rented for us under the stadium, we soon learned from the members of neighboring
familiae
that the citizens of Rome, thrilled by the bloody gore of hundreds of humans and thousands of animals in a single day, were far more sophisticated than their counterparts in the provinces in their penchant for the unrelenting, merciless slaughter of men and beasts. Since my initial observation of that mindless exhilaration stimulated by those awful games, I have never been able to reconcile the lust for cruelty and bloodshed with a society that produced some of the finest writers, orators, architecture, roads, aqueducts and libraries, plus countless little ways to increase the ease of daily human existence.

Nubian and I trained for three days before the first contest was scheduled for our
familia
. Hidden behind the retaining walls of the arena, we were allowed to watch other gladiators hack each other to pieces. The first few contests were a sobering example of the vicious aggression of those murderous professionals that we had rarely seen in the provinces, the spectators an equally menacing source of death in their callous, facile call for the execution of cowards, incompetents and yesterday’s heroes alike.

Fabian decided to open with his strongest contest: Nubian and me. His strategy was to either establish a solid standing for his troupe immediately, or if we failed, to reconsider his options. As fate would have it, we were scheduled to appear late in the day, after the crowd had witnessed a series of uneventful chariot races and several hundred unarmed
noxii
and captured Gauls who had been dispatched too quickly by starving beasts, followed by a procession of inept gladiatorial pairings in which they demanded the killing of every loser.

As Nubian and I entered onto the sand from our opposite corners, the voices of the insatiate crowd began a growling a low murmur of disapproval at the prospect of a crippled, runt
retiarius
pitted against the monstrous black
secutor
. The tone of the crowd became querulous, however, when we stood shoulder to shoulder and our first opponent trotted from a
carcere,
the spectator shouts increasing to standing approbation as four more swordsmen from other
familia
ran toward us. That match against those five deadly men was one of the shortest, yet most exhausting contests I had spent in all of my five years on the sand, resulting in those terrifying murderers in faceless brass helmets startling my sleep with a full sweat almost as often as the nightmare of my first kill.

The match was more equal than ever. Fighting desperately back to back, Nubian became completely occupied by two adversaries, myself battling another pair, and the fifth circling his four comrades awaiting an opening to inflict a disabling blow. Because of that dancing threat, I dared not use my
rete
to fully ensnare a man, for another would certainly pounce while I was thus engaged. So I was forced to use it to trip them or pull down their shield for a clear thrust with my
fascina
. Despite the screams and chants of enthusiasm from the spectators, I was tiring quickly and believed the longer we fought, the greater the certainty we would perish. I shouted the Aramaic word to end it immediately, and Nubian’s response was a downward chop that smashed the round wooden shield of the
Thracian
to splinters, then a backhanded swing between
manica
and helmet that nearly severed his head from body. During the next few minutes, Nubian mortally wounded another, and we disabled the remaining three in rapid succession: a
myrmillo
clinging to Nubian’s legs, another kneeling before me, blood flowing in full stream from the
provacator
under my net. When my senses returned, I heard an unusually ambivalent crescendo from the crowd, in part disappointment at the swift defeat of our opponents, depriving them of a prolonged bloodier fight, part anger at our adversaries for succumbing, and a unanimous call for the deaths of our three wounded opponents, mingled with a thin thread of esteem for our victory.

An imploring look from Nubian gave me no alternative. He could administer a death blow to a man who threatened his life, but was still incapable of murdering an unarmed man prostrate at his feet unless the crowd would demand his own life if he refused. I pulled my
pugio
⁷⁶
from my belt, and in a sudden uncontrolled rage at the screaming audience, Nubian, the failed gladiators on the ground, my circumstances, and my own weak mind, I thrust deep, merciful cuts into three spinal cords in seconds.

Back in the barracks, Fabian watched closely as a physician washed and sutured a gash in my cheek I had failed to notice, that ran from left ear to the point of my jaw.
Retiarii
are one of the few gladiators who do not wear helmets, and our specialty is recognized among the cognoscenti by the scars on our faces or loss of an eye. I had earned other cuts and gashes on my body over the years, some on my skull under my thick thatch of tightly curled hair, but until that point had miraculously avoided major disfigurement to my visage. Since my beard grew light and sparse even at twenty-three years, I had always shaved it and decided to continue that gentile practice even as the surgeon sewed me, in spite of the broad, raised scar he promised.

I rested for several days before resuming practice with Nubian, listening carefully to the new tactical instructions our special
doctore
had devised with Fabian to counter even more powerful competition than our first deadly
Maximus
quintet we were sure to face in the future. At the end of a fruitful but tiring session the following week, a slave came to summon me to the
lanista’s
office. Fabian bid me to sit, which I correctly surmised did not portend well for the conversation at hand.

“The lust of these people for variety and mayhem is boundless,” he began. “I have lost three experienced, valuable men since we came here.”

The ‘value,’ I thought, was more the problem than the men, but I remained silent.

“A wealthy
editor
has approached me with an offer of 30,000
sistertius
.”

“Ten thousand
sistertius
would purchase your freedom,” he reasoned. “You could go home.”

“No.”

“I will give him 1,000
sistertius
.”

“He cares not for money.”

“If you kill him, I will add 5,000
sistertius
to your bonus.”

Fabian did not always relate to the inner workings of the human spirit, but he was not a stupid man. He pondered for several moments before his reply.

“If he will not kill you, the outcome could be
missus
or
stans missus
.”

I pointed at the ceiling and the muted thunder of the spectators over us. “Do you honestly believe that mob would let one of us live or call a draw?”

His expression hardened, and I realized he was under a great deal of pressure from some powerful Roman citizen. “You have taken the oath and will fulfill it on the morrow.”

“Or what, Fabian?”

“I will have you both stripped to your
subliagaculum
and fed to fifty starving lions.”

To his credit, I later learned that Fabian had been threatened with expulsion from the
Circus
Maximus
and every other amphitheater in the provinces if he did not produce the requested spectacle of the Black giant battling the diminutive, red-haired cripple. So be it. I informed Nubian of our fate slowly, with as much reassurance as I could gather, presenting the same rationale in even more positive terms than Fabian had used to couch the pairing to me. Yet despite his initial reluctance, the thought of us dying between the sharp teeth and claws of the same animals he had hunted with such élan in his homeland, forced his agreement. Or so I thought.

That night before our fateful match was passed in half dozing, starting awake in a full sweat, agonizing over every possible horrible split-second decision I would be forced to make on the hot, bloody sand in the morning. At one point, I woke in complete darkness, the candle between Nubian’s pallet and my own snuffed, only the bare outline of the exit tunnel visible at the far end of the barracks. A strange sensation caused me to reach out for reassurance of the black man’s presence, which resulted in my hand searching an empty blanket. I sprang to my feet, moving as fast as possible without my brace, stumbling over an unconscious guard at the tunnel entrance, increasing my gait in near panic as I spied an indistinct form kneeling huddled halfway down the passageway, his torso jerking in violent, irregular spasms as I pushed more speed from my twisted limb, cursing it and me and my God. I lowered my shoulder to slam the full impact of my body squarely against the back of the choking Nubian, dislodging the wet sponge he had stuffed down his throat to erupt from his mouth against the tunnel wall, out of reach of that sobbing, desolate, prostrate creature.

The
editor
who had coerced Fabian into scheduling our contest was Julius Cronius, Senator, a wealthy politician intent upon gaining popular support from his constituents by sponsoring seven consecutive days of games for which he had posted bills and hired no less than three hundred slaves to carry placards around the Forum and streets of the City announcing the weeklong festivities that were to begin with the contest between Nubian and me, about whom all of Rome had apparently been gossiping since our victory over five renowned swordsmen.

That morning, reports filtered down to us of tens of thousands of men and women in the white togas designating their exalted status as citizens of Rome clogging the chill, pre-dawn alleys and streets of the City, jostling one another for position to assure themselves of the best possible seats for the opening event. Below the stadium, Fabian observed his two sullen chattels in the equipment room, Nubian immobile in bare feet, a red loincloth cinched at the waist by wide belt of shiny brass. A slave tightened the leather straps securing his scaled metal arm guard, then wrapped quilted padding around his calves before affixing knee-high brass
greaves
around his tree-trunk calves.

I had been issued a blue
subliagaculum
held in place by a thick
balteus
⁷⁷
. Sitting with closed eyes, attempting to breath normally, I tried to relax the tension that threatened to cramp every sinew of my body, as my slave tied layered padding around my left net arm and both calves with strips of leather. He strapped my brace on the twisted leg, and finally bound the flared protection of the decorated tinned-brass
galerus
⁷⁸
onto my shoulder. I slipped my hand into the loop of the restraining cord of my net, the only weapon allowed in our quarters, as I watched a slave present Nubian with his large ornate shield and helmet of polished brass, its smooth surface designed to make my thrown
rete
slide off without snagging.

I slapped the big man on his back, and in Aramaic said, “Remember our talk.”

He nodded at my allusion to our conversation after his aborted suicide regarding my strategy to direct our contest with the same commands I had used to coordinate our paired battles against others.

“What did you tell him?” Fabian wanted to know.

“To fight hard and expect a draw.”

The
lanista
nodded uncertainly. “I was forced to do this.”

Within the hour, I would learn that he was not referring just to matching us against one

another in conflict. Fabian turned away quickly, and led us down the tunnel to an observation platform behind a restraining wall where we could see the entire sand and people filing noisily into the tiered seats opposite. As the sun rose behind us, a parade of public administrators, senators, magistrates, priests, augurs, idle and working rich, plus other dignitaries filed into the front rows surrounding the Imperial Lodge. Colorful flags and banners lifted in the soft breeze that often waned in the heat of the day; the section to be occupied by the Vestal Virgins protected from direct sunlight when sailors unfurled the huge colored awning over the first twenty rows from which spectators in preferred seats would lounge, as sweat-drenched contestants below clashed for their pleasure on the burning, blood-stained sand in the harsh rays of a blazing sun.