Ruso and the Root of All Evils

76

Tilla tried to steady her breathing, but the stench of animals made her gasp. The row of smoky torches stretching down the tunnel ahead did little to lift the gloom, barely revealing the figures of slaves moving about between arched recesses on either side. From somewhere deeper inside, beneath the middle of the arena, she heard a clang of metal, then the shout of an order and the squeak and grind of something being hoisted on a winch. An animal howl echoed down the tunnel. Tilla shuddered.

This must be where the creatures were kept before they were lifted up and thrust into the arena through trapdoors. As her eyes adjusted from the sunlight outside, she could make out the stripes of cage bars in some of the recesses.

She tightened the grip on her knife. There was no other way the man could have come. She was not far behind him, and if he had run away down that tunnel she would have seen him pass through the torchlight. He must have ducked into one of those black recesses. But even if she found him, what was she going to do?

It seemed nobody on the balcony except the Medicus had believed her. Nobody else had given chase when she ran after Stilo. She was sure the Medicus had been behind her, but even he had disappeared now. Whatever was down here, she was facing it alone.

Someone — not Stilo, it was the wrong height and gait — emerged from a side entrance hauling a trolley. As the slave approached, the eyes that glanced out of the filthy face suggested that she should not be here, but that he did not dare tell her so. She said, ‘There is a sailor in there. He is wearing a green tunic and he has two fingers missing. Have you seen him?’

The slave’s expression did not change. ‘No, miss.’ As he plodded past she tried not to look at the mangled and smeary creatures piled on the trolley.

She turned her head away from the source of the stench and took a deep breath. Then she murmured a prayer and ventured into the place where the spirits who lived under the ground were appeased with blood.

The stones beneath her boots were slippery and uneven. The first recess on each side was empty: she had been able to see that from the entrance. Beyond them, she flattened her back to the wall, trying not to think of the filth that might be crusted on it, and crept sideways. Beneath the gloomy arch opposite, she could make out the poles of brooms and shovels. Nothing rounded enough to be human. Nothing moving.

The roar of the crowd echoed through the tunnel, sounding like another great animal.

She slid one hand further along the wall. Her fingers rounded a corner stone with something cold set in it. Cage bars. Down at floor level she could make out pale wisps of straw. She waited, hardly breathing, but nothing moved. She checked the tunnel and then shifted further along towards the next recess, moving away from the bars in case there was something behind them with claws and a long reach.

What happened next was over almost before she realized it. The hand clamping on her wrist. The hopeless struggle not to be dragged in between the bars. The pain of her shoulder rammed against the cage. The screech of metal on stone tangling with the echo of her own scream: the weight of the body pressing her against the cage and the shock as the knife was knocked out of her hand. Then the smack of something hitting flesh. The grunt of pain and the sudden release. The footsteps, the shouts of ‘Miss!’ and ‘Let her go!’ as the two silhouettes that were racing towards her from the outside world became the Medicus and another man, both asking if she was all right.

‘I think so,’ she said, shaking off the filth of the cage and rubbing the pain in her shoulder. The man handed her back her knife and said something about being sorry and having to go. The Medicus had already set off down the tunnel, dodging round a couple of slaves with trolleys. ‘Wait for me!’ she shouted, running after him, ashamed to recognize it was because she wanted his protection, not because she wanted another fight with Stilo.

Beneath one of the far torches, the Medicus was shouting something at a slave carrying buckets. She heard the slave try to tell him he shouldn’t be there, and the Medicus say, ‘Never mind. Did you see him?’

Tilla jumped over the stream of water the slave had just sloshed down the tunnel floor. ‘What did you just tell that man?’

The slave looked baffled. ‘I said the one he’s chasing run out the far end, miss.’

When Tilla caught up with him the Medicus had already emerged at the far end of the underground chambers and clambered up on to the end of a row of seats. He was standing with one hand shading his eyes, squinting out across the packed terraces. A couple of spectators were complaining and leaning round him to get a clear view of the arena. Tilla tried to get up on to the seating opposite. She glimpsed hundreds — thousands — of dark heads along the curving rows before a couple of men shouted at her and tried to push her off.

‘Can you see him?’

The Medicus shook his head and jumped down to join her, wincing even though he landed on his good foot. ‘We’ve lost him. Are you sure you’re all right?’

She said, ‘Where will he go?’

‘A long way from here. Put that knife away, you’re frightening everyone.’

She looked round and saw the approaching steward.

‘It’s all right,’ the Medicus explained, taking her by the arm and steering her firmly towards an exit. ‘She’s with me. She just got a bit overexcited. It’s her first time.’

The steward said, ‘Yes, sir.’ He did not look surprised.

She said, ‘What will we do now?’

He took a left turn. ‘Go back to work.’

‘But what about that man?’

He steered her towards another staircase. ‘He’ll leave town. Maybe the Senator will send somebody after him.’

And maybe not. All her effort had come to nothing. The man who had murdered Cass’s brother had escaped. The Medicus was right: he could be anywhere out there among thousands of people. They would never catch him now.

His hand tightened on her arm and she noticed for the first time how badly he was limping. ‘You should not be walking around on that foot.’

‘You shouldn’t be chasing a man like Stilo on your own.’

She said, ‘Back in that …’ She had no name for it. ‘Back down there. Did something hit Stilo?’

He said, ‘Damn. I forgot to pick it up.’

‘What?’

‘My lunch,’ he said. ‘The Army teaches you to throw stones, but I reckoned that at that distance an apple in the eye would stop him just as well.’