The Emperor's Knives

6

Marcus rose before sunrise, having slept fitfully. Sitting on the bed, he mused briefly on Scaurus’s final words in the officers’ meeting the previous evening.

‘Last night we did a great service to Rome, gentlemen. We removed a dozen of the most depraved men in the Senate, and with a little luck we will have knocked a large enough hole in their ranks for a little fresh air to get in. And, let us not forget, we have also dealt out justice to the third of the men who slaughtered our colleague’s family. However …’ Marcus had already known what was coming next. ‘I can see no way that we’ll be able to bring that justice to the fourth of them. For one thing we no longer have the dubious services of the informant Excingus on our side.’

‘And for another, the bastard lives in a gladiatorial ludus among hundreds of men who revere him as their unofficial leader.’

The tribune took a sip of the wine he’d broached to celebrate their victory of the previous evening, nodding at Julius’s comment.

‘Quite so, First Spear. And so it is with regret that I am forced to concede that, for the time being, we will have to wait for an opportunity to arise. I hope you can understand my caution in this matter, Centurion?’

Marcus had nodded.

‘I can only profess my gratitude at the support you’ve given me so far, Tribune. To do anything else would be churlish.’

For a moment he was convinced that Scaurus had not fully believed his show of acceptance, but at length the tribune had nodded, raising his cup again.

‘Very well then, gentlemen! To victories gained, and one last victory to come!’

The officers had raised their cups, echoing the chorus, and Marcus had done the same despite his utter clarity as to what he had to do the next morning. He dressed in the darkness, having laid out the tunic and boots he intended to wear the previous night, and silently made his way to the bedroom’s door.

‘You’re leaving without saying goodbye?’

He froze at the door, realising that his stealthy exit had failed, then turned back and sat on the bed beside his wife.

‘I thought we said it all last night?’

Felicia sat up and knotted her fingers in his hair.

‘Not everything.’ She kissed him hard on the lips, her eyes wet with barely restrained tears. ‘You know you won’t come back this time. You know that once you’ve killed this man, his followers will tear you limb from limb. You know all this, and still you go to take your revenge no matter what the cost will be, despite the fact that this man Pilinius’s death has left you just as empty as the two you killed before him.’

He shrugged helplessly.

‘I still have no choice. Any day now we’ll be posted away, either back to Britannia or to whichever of the empire’s borders is creaking the loudest, and I’ll never see this city again, or finish the act of vengeance that I’ve begun.’

‘I know …’ She sighed. ‘I could have stopped you. I could have told Julius what you’re planning and he would have confined you to your quarters under guard, but the wall of resentment that would have been erected between us would have been too much for me to bear. So go.’ She turned her face to the wall, angrily wiping away the tears that were rolling down her cheeks. ‘Go and take your revenge. I hope it brings you some measure of satisfaction before you die …’

Marcus shook his head.

‘There’s no pleasure for me in this. But neither is there any choice …’

He stood up, stroking her hair one last time and left the darkened room, pacing silently through the house with his boots held in one hand. The little dog scampered across the tiled floor, eager to play, and he squatted down, submitting to the creature’s excited licks and nibbles at his fingers before making his way to the front door with the animal at his heels. Opening the door, he stood in the darkness for a moment before sitting down to pull on his boots.

‘You really are stupid enough to do this then?’

Marcus started, his hand reflexively reaching for a weapon that wasn’t fastened to his belt before relaxing again, as he realised who it was that had spoken.

‘Have you been waiting out there all night?’

Dubnus paced out before him, his face all but invisible in the starlight.

‘I was hardly going to risk walking up here from the barracks in the dark, was I? If I hadn’t been waylaid by thieves, I’d more than likely have slipped in the contents of some dirty bastard’s toilet and broken my back.’

The Roman stood, shaking his head at his friend.

‘Well you’ve wasted your time, unless you’ve got half a dozen men waiting in the shadows, because nothing less is going to stop me from doing this.’

The big Briton laughed quietly, his guffaw rich with dark humour.

‘Stop you? I know better than that! I’m not here to stop you, you idiot, I’m here to come along with you and watch your back. I’ve heard what happens to the new boys in these training schools, and-’

Marcus’s interjection was vehement, his hands held up in a gesture of flat refusal.

‘No! You’re not coming anywhere with me! This is my fight, and not worthy of your sacrifice!’

His friend put his hands on his hips.

‘Oh, you think so, do you? You think I’ll stand meekly aside and allow you to march off into the darkness, never to be seen again?’ He leaned forward, putting a broad finger in the Roman’s chest. ‘Well you can think a-fucking-gain, brother, because I’m coming with you whether you like it or not. We can either stand here and discuss the matter until the sun’s up, and Julius finds out about this plan of yours, or we can go to this ludus of yours together now. You can choose.’

Marcus eyed him darkly for a moment.

‘You realise that you’re condemning yourself to almost certain death in the arena?’

The Briton laughed again, but his previously hard-edged jocularity had softened to the fatalistic tone of a man contemplating his own impending demise.

‘I’m a soldier, Marcus. I face death every time I line my lads up to take their iron to whichever set of blue-nosed bastards it is we’re fighting. And besides, unlike most of the other men we’ll be fighting with, I’ve killed more times than I can remember. Trust me, you and I will cut a swathe through those fuckers the likes of which will be celebrated for many a year.’

His friend looked hard into the Briton’s eyes.

‘And when the time comes to cut that swathe through prisoners of war who’ve been shipped back to Rome for the purposes of providing the people of the city with a spectacle? Or to kill men condemned to death in the arena?’

Dubnus shrugged.

‘I’ll put their blood on the sand without a second thought. The barbarians should have kept their heads down, and the criminals either shouldn’t have committed their crimes or shouldn’t have got caught. Perhaps I’ll get to gut the bastard who stole my purse at the baths.’

Marcus smiled despite himself.

‘It sounds as if you’ll fit right in. And I’ve no time to be arguing. If you’re set on this?’

His friend slapped a huge hand down onto his shoulder.

‘I’m set, brother. Now let’s get out of here before we’re missed. You know that Julius would have us both chained up if he even suspected you might be stupid enough to go after this Death Bringer.’

Marcus shooed the dog back into the house and closed the door, taking a deep breath as he turned away. Dubnus stepped in close, putting his mouth close to the Roman’s ear.

‘You can still change your mind, Marcus. You’ve taken more revenge for your family than even I ever dreamed might be possible, and all three of the men you’ve killed in return for your own loss have died in agony and humiliation. You have a beautiful wife and child who will miss you every day for the rest of their lives. Is one more death worth that much to you?’

The Roman shook his head.

‘No. How could it be? But to the shades of my family, with only me to deliver the vengeance that they crave? That’s a different question to the one you’re asking. Come on, before my nerve fails me.’

They walked up the hill together in silence, Dubnus swearing under his breath as he stepped in the contents of a toilet bucket that had been tossed out into the street from a high window.

‘So what happens when we get there?’

‘You’re asking the wrong man. All I know is that the Dacian Ludus considers applications from potential candidates in the early morning of each working day. What form that trial takes, or what happens thereafter, I have no idea, other than being made to swear an oath that will reduce us to the status of slaves. Worse than slaves. After that they’ll give us whatever training we need to make us fit to fight in that …’

They had reached the hill’s shallow crest, and stood for a moment to stare out across the pink-tinged city to where the massive bulk of the Flavian Arena dwarfed the buildings around it, even taller than the towering Claudian aqueduct to its south.

‘It holds fifty thousand people on a games day, all baying for blood. Facing that will be a little different to taking on the barbarians, eh?’

Dubnus snorted.

‘The only difference will be that in there I’ll only have to kill one or two men to survive.’

The two men walked down the Aventine’s northern slope with the first hesitant bird calls echoing off the walls around them.

‘We’re sure that this man Mortiferum still lives in the ludus? It’d be a pity to give up your freedom and condemn us both to a lifetime of fighting only to discover that he’s packed it in and gone to live with some floozy.’

Marcus shook his head.

‘It’s not allowed. No matter how exalted a gladiator becomes, until he’s freed or buys himself out of his contract, he belongs to the school that pays and feeds him. Besides, why would he want to give up such cosy protection? I doubt he lacks anything …’

Staying in the deeper shadows as much as they could, the two men were soon walking past the eastern end of the Circus Maximus, the racecourse’s long run of grandstands stretching away to their left into the dawn gloom. Beyond the tiered ranks of seats rose the looming bulk of the Palatine Hill, crowned by the imperial palaces where Marcus had so recently witnessed the death of the man responsible for his father’s murder. Dubnus raised a hand, pointing at a sudden flurry of activity in their path.

‘Looks like some poor bastard’s fallen foul of thieves.’

A hundred paces or so further on, in the light of the torches which illuminated the eastern end of the Palatine Hill, a single man stood in the middle of a group of half a dozen figures, a tight knot of men who were hemming their victim in ever closer and allowing him no chance of escape. As the two friends watched, still advancing unnoticed, the scene exploded into sudden violence, as the gang’s intended victim decided that attack was his best form of defence, screaming what sounded like a military battle cry as he sprang forward.

‘Gemina!’

Lunging at the closest of his would-be assailants, he snatched at the man’s arm, neutralising the threat of the blade gleaming dully in the hand at its end, twisting the arm and tearing the ligaments that secured it to his assailant’s shoulder.

With a piercing shriek the stricken robber fell to the ground with his arm flopping, writhing in agony with the pain so unexpectedly visited upon him. The men gathering about their intended victim paused in their advance, their apparent leader brandishing his knife in fury, his words clear in the silent street.

‘You’ve fucking maimed him, you cunt! We was just going to rob you, but now you’re going to die slowly with your guts wrapped round your neck. We’re going to-’

Dubnus coughed ostentatiously, and the nearest of the robbers turned to find the big man standing less than a dozen paces from them. The gang leader stared incredulously at him for a moment before speaking.

‘Who the fuck are you?’

The Briton stepped forward another pace, his big hands hanging easily at his sides.

‘A soldier, friend. And this morning, it has to be said, a very generous soldier, because right now I’m willing to allow you to walk away from here with nothing worse than one maimed man. Raise a finger against me and you’ll all end your days begging for bread because you’ll be fit for nothing else.’

‘Take him!’

If the other gang members heard the shouted command they certainly didn’t spring to obey it, and Dubnus raised an amused eyebrow at the furious robber.

‘See, here’s the thing. You’ve already picked on the wrong man once this morning, and lost one of your number with an injury that’ll never heal, not that you’ll be feeding him, will you? And there are only six of you now.’

‘Six against two. We’ll take you down easily enough!’

Marcus stepped out of the shadows of the towering Claudian aqueduct behind the gang leader, having quietly paced around them while everyone’s attention was locked on Dubnus. He spoke, his voice hard as he stared at the men before him in disgust.

‘Six against three. And from the look of it any of us could deal with a pair of you in the time it would take me to scrape a piece of shit off my shoe.’ He took a step closer, his eyes roaming across the closest of the robbers, and more than one man took an involuntary pace backwards at the look of hatred that he was playing across their wavering ranks. ‘Run now, or you’ll have to drag yourselves away with your elbows by the time we’re done with you.’

For a moment it looked as if the robbers might still put up a fight, but Dubnus settled the matter by stamping forward with a roar of anger, and in an instant their resolve disintegrated into a panic-stricken rout. Their intended victim looked about him for a moment with the expression of a man who had been cheated of something before turning to the Tungrians with a rueful smile.

‘It seems I owe you my life, gentlemen. I doubt that I could have seen them all off …’

Dubnus laughed, holding out a meaty hand in greeting.

‘You looked sharp enough to have made them work for it alright. Legion man, are you?’

The other man tilted his head, his eyes narrowing.

‘Why do you ask?’

The Briton shrugged easily.

‘Professional curiosity. I’m Dubnus, and this is Marcus, and we’re both …’ He grimaced at the sudden realisation of their changed circumstances. ‘Or rather we were, centurions with an auxiliary cohort in Britannia.’

‘Were?’

Marcus stepped forward and offered his hand in turn.

‘We’re on our way to the Dacian Ludus, to sign up as gladiators.’

The man they had rescued shook his head in dark amusement, holding up his hands in the face of Dubnus’s growing irritation.

‘Forgive me for laughing.’ He bowed to them. ‘I owe you both my life, and I won’t forget that debt. Perhaps I will have the opportunity to pay it off sooner than you think, for I too am bound for the ludus. I had thought to join the Gallic School, but the chance to join alongside two men such as yourselves isn’t one to turn up. I’m Horatius, former centurion with the Tenth Twin Legion and now simply a man seeking his destiny.’

Dubnus looked at Marcus, who nodded slowly.

‘You would be welcome to join us, although I will warn you, Horatius, that we seek the blood of a man who resides within the ludus, and while his death is nothing less than a sacred duty for me it is likely to end in my own demise, and that of any man that stands alongside me.’

Horatius laughed softly.

‘My life is already forfeit. By rights I should have died in Pannonia a month ago, and the gods have doubtless only allowed me to escape for the purpose of revenge. Although how I am ever to achieve that aim is beyond me.’

Marcus nodded.

‘Then we have the same aim, you and I. But I must warn you again, my success is likely to condemn us both to death, and quite possibly yourself by association.’

The former centurion nodded.

‘I’ll take that risk.’

The three men walked in silence beneath the aqueduct’s tiered arches, emerging a moment later into the huge open space that was the setting for the Flavian Arena. The massive structure’s stonework was catching the first light, its gaudy paintwork gleaming in the pale illumination, and to the arena’s left the hundred-foot-high bronze statue of the Sun God that had originally borne the head of the emperor Nero played its blank-eyed gaze down on them. They walked around to the arena’s right, and across the open square that stood between its eastern side and the training schools that fed it with gladiators.

‘The ludus is up here. And it appears that there are already enough applicants to provide the school with any recruits for a month.’

Marcus led the two men up a long flight of steps, at the top of which two dozen or so men were waiting in front of a gate guarded by a pair of burly men. The rearmost of the group of would-be gladiators opened his mouth to speak to the newcomers, only to be interrupted by the creak of the gate opening.

‘Silence! If you want to enter the Dacian Ludus then your first task is to shut up and listen!’

A hush fell across the waiting men. Marcus craned his neck, and could just see the stocky man who had planted himself in the gateway. The skin of his shaved head was riven by a long scar that ran from his right eyebrow to his left ear, the top of which was missing.

‘My name is Sannitus, and I am the chief lanista of this ludus. Whatever I say inside these gates is law, with no judge other than me and no right of appeal! If you want the chance to live under my law, you’ll have to convince me that you’re fit to enter these gates. So, if you want to enter the ludus, strip! I want to see your muscles, and I don’t have the time for you to undress one at a time!’

He waited for a moment while they pulled off their tunics to reveal bodies of all shapes and sizes, a few preserving their modesty with loincloths while the remainder were naked.

‘Now, one at a time, stand in front of me and show me what you’re made of.’ The men formed a jostling, buzzing queue, presenting themselves to the lanista in turn. ‘No, too fat. No, not enough muscle. Lift some weights at your local bathhouse for a month and come back. Yes, you look right enough.’ He gestured to the successful candidate to move off to one side, turning a forbidding scowl on the next man. ‘No, not you. I told you last time that you’re never going to be strong enough for the arena, although it seems I also underestimated your stupidity. Go back to the farm and stop wasting your time and mine here!’

The judgements continued, swift and merciless, with only three men admitted from the twenty or so who had presented themselves, until the would-be gladiator in front of Horatius was sent away disappointed, and only the three soldiers remained. Sannitus stared at them for a long moment, then shook his head slowly in apparent disbelief.

‘Every now and then, once or twice a year, the gods see fit to send something a little bit different to this gate, something I’ve not seen before. Last time it was a dwarf so vicious that we had to keep him locked in a cell when he wasn’t training, such a little bastard that the boys eventually got tired of his antics and decided that he should have the misfortune to fall on a spear during training. Before that it was a high-class aristocrat who’d decided to slum it for a while, and show off his virtuosity with a sword from behind the anonymity of a mask. He was good too, until he pissed off the wrong fish man and ended up with a foot of sharp iron sticking out of his back. And now …’

He studied the three men with a pitiless gaze.

‘You’re all muscles, scars and tattoos, aren’t you lads, even you, the wiry one, combat trained and ready to fight at the drop of a handkerchief? Perfect for us, eh? No training needed, beyond a few short sharp lessons as to the dirty tricks that get pulled in the arena. You’re all expert with the sword, right, shield trained, and I’ll bet you can all put a spear up a cat’s arsehole at twenty-five paces. But here’s the problem, boys …’

He paused for effect.

‘You’re all spoken for. The army owns you, and any lanista that takes you on is risking losing his licence, his school and most likely his balls into the bargain if he gets caught fielding serving soldiers.’ He shook his head. ‘Sorry lads, but you’re too much of a risk for my liking.’

As he turned away Horatius stepped forward.

‘I don’t know about these two, but I’m already officially dead.’

Sannitus stopped, thought for a moment and then turned back with a quizzical look.

‘You’re dead? How does that work?’

The former centurion shrugged.

‘I got caught up in something that I’d have been best avoiding, if I’d ever known how to stay out of it. Now I’m just another anonymous body with all the right skills to make you a fortune in the arena. Try me.’

Sannitus nodded slowly.

‘I just might. You can provide me with your former name and rank, and I’ll make some quiet enquiries about you. In the meantime, you can come in with these three, and we’ll see if you’ve got the stones to back up that claim.’ He shot a glance at Marcus and Dubnus, neither of whom had moved. ‘I don’t suppose either of you are going to try to tell me that you’re dead as well?’

While Marcus was still weighing the best approach Dubnus stepped forward, his massive frame towering over the lanista.

‘We’re honourable discharges from the First Tungrian auxiliary cohort, bought and paid for.’

Sannitus frowned up at him.

‘Really? At your ages? Neither of you looks a day over thirty, and now you mention it, your mate here looks more like a twenty-year-old.’

The Briton smiled, rubbing his thumb and forefinger together.

‘Wars in far-off provinces tend to have some side benefits, once you get past all the obvious stuff like having to kill thousands of screaming barbarians who all want your cock for a belt decoration. Like gold. Me and my brother in arms here …’ He hooked a thumb back at the impassive Marcus. ‘We made it our job as centurions to be out in front of the legions when it came to hunting down the tribal chiefs who were stupid enough to start the whole thing. And when we captured Calgus, the biggest bastard of the lot, he was carrying enough gold to finance our release from service with plenty left over.’ He grinned down at Sannitus’s look of disbelief. ‘Our tribune took our gold and dismissed us honourably as too badly wounded to continue.’

‘You can prove this? You both have a diploma?’

The Briton shrugged easily.

‘We decided not to bring them with us. After all, you meet some right nasty types on the streets of this city.’

Sannitus pondered the two men for a moment, walking around them with a critical eye.

‘Not an ounce of spare flesh on either of you.’ He looked closely at Marcus’s face, then bent to examine Dubnus’s stomach. ‘Scars, some of them fresh too. What was that. A spear?’

The Briton nodded.

‘My century’s line was about to break, so I dived in and got run through for my pains.’

‘You? What happened to your nose.’

Marcus shrugged.

‘I was too slow winding my neck in.’

The lanista’s eyes narrowed, and when he spoke his voice was hard with suspicion.

‘He’s not from Rome, but you are, aren’t you? And I’ve heard that accent before, I hear it every time the rich boys come down here for their private shows. So what would a man like you have been doing in the auxiliary, eh?’

Marcus bent until his face was inches from the lanista’s, his face inscrutable.

‘My duty.’

He straightened, waiting for the trainer’s verdict with an apparent calmness that he was far from feeling. Sannitus looked up at him for a moment before speaking again.

‘Have it your own way. I won’t deny that the three of you would make an interesting feature in our shows, but I’m not the ultimate decision maker. Follow me!’

The six men hurried after him as he strode back into the ludus, and the gates closed behind them with a heavy thud, the guards promptly shooting home three massive iron bolts that made the heavy wooden doors well-nigh impregnable. Marcus looked about him, but found no clue as to the school’s purpose in its architecture.

‘Expecting an arena, were you? We don’t need one, rich boy. Let the other schools try to cover all the disciplines, we just concentrate on delivering the best fucking swordsmen anywhere in the empire. And we do it here …’

He opened the door into a long, wide hall with an open roof, gesturing for the would-be trainees to follow him.

‘One or two of you may be good enough to train for the arena as a member of this ludus, but before you get to sign your lives away you have to pass the test. Their test.’

He pointed to a group of men lounging against the far wall, all of them wearing a short tunic that came no more than halfway down their thighs.

‘These, gentlemen, are gladiators. They train in this hall, all day every day, until their bodies are like bags stuffed with rocks, and they eat like prize chariot horses, to put that nice layer of fat on them that a man needs in the arena. We train them until they could fight a bout with their eyes closed, so they’ll keep going until the last drop of blood has leaked out if they’re unlucky or stupid enough get wounded. All you have to do, if you want to join us, is to put up a decent performance against the man I choose from their number. If you put up a reasonable defence, you may just be good enough to win a place in the ludus. In which case you’ll swear the oath, reduce your standing in society so low that even the slaves will be sneering down on you, and you will become the property of the school, to be disposed of in any way I choose. So, who wants to go first?’

One of the men who had been ahead of the three centurions in the queue stepped forward, his voice clear and strong.

‘I’ll have a go, if you please, Lanista?’

The lanista clapped him on the back.

‘Good lad. Who shall we get to give you a try out? Pontus!’ One of the waiting gladiators got to his feet, picked up a wooden practice sword and walked into the middle of the hall. ‘Give this new boy a run around and let’s see what he’s got! Edius, arm him!’

The would-be trainee took a practice sword from Sannitus’s assistant and advanced forward to meet his opponent, who waited until he was within sword’s length and then set about him with a series of cuts and lunges which were clearly intended to find the limits of his ability to defend himself, giving the tyro no opportunity to strike back. After a dozen or so attempts to breach the triallist’s defence, he stepped up the attack, swinging the heavy wooden blade high and then low, aiming for head and then knees, and then, without warning, leapt forward and shoulder-barged his opponent to the ground, pinning him with the sword’s ragged point at his throat.

‘Not bad!’ Sannitus waited until the gladiator had pulled his defeated victim to his feet with a grin. ‘Doesn’t matter that he put you on your arse, given he was always going to beat you. That’s just one of the more basic tricks of the trade. Decent sword work though. Who taught you to defend yourself?’

The triallist handed his weapon back, standing to attention.

‘My father sir; he was a praetorian!’

Sannitus smiled.

‘Praetorian, eh? Well he trained you well enough for me to reckon you’re worth giving a chance to. Well done! Now stand aside, and let the next man have a try shall we? Nemo, your turn to show us what he’s got!’

The second candidate to step forward looked far less assured, the knuckles of his sword hand white on the practice weapon’s hilt, and his brow beaded with sweat despite the morning’s chill, and to Marcus’s eye it seemed that Sannitus gave the gladiator Nemo a meaningful glance before releasing them to spar. Where the previous triallist had been sufficiently self-assured to defend himself with some degree of proficiency, this man seemed out of his depth from the bout’s commencement, and within half a dozen stokes his opponent had tapped him twice on the arm and neck with his weapon’s point. Realising that he was rapidly losing his chance to join the school, he leapt forward with a scream and slashed wildly at his opponent, who simply ducked under the blow and jabbed him in the ribs hard enough that he subsided to the hall’s sandy floor with a dull groan. Sannitus gestured to his assistants, who collected the practice sword and set the man back on his feet.

‘Not for you, I’m afraid, not this time. Go and learn some sword skills if you want to pass this test, and don’t come back until you can defend yourself, eh?’

The failed candidate nodded glumly and was led to the gate, followed shortly after by the other remaining civilian whose assessment was equally swift and conclusive. Sannitus turned to face the three soldiers, smiling sardonically at them.

‘I’m tempted to get Mortiferum out of his bed to wipe that confidence off your faces, but I doubt he’d thank me, and he can be a right bastard if he don’t get his sleep. So …’

He turned to look across at the remaining gladiators waiting against the far wall.

‘Who shall we use for this … yes. Hermes, over here if you will!’

The biggest of them got up and strode across the hall, stopping a dozen paces from the group and folding his arms, waiting impassively for further instructions. Where the previous contestants from within their number had been encouraged by cheers that were only partially ironic, this man’s walk across the hall was greeted with nothing more than silence, the other gladiators staring stonily at his back. Sannitus signalled to one of his assistants, who promptly passed the big man a practice sword.

‘Let’s have shields as well, we don’t want anyone getting damaged. You, the legion man. Let’s see what you’ve got, shall we?’

Horatius nodded and stepped forward, taking the sword and wooden shield that he was offered and weighing them for a moment before turning to face his opponent. The gladiator scowled back at him, an angry pink scar marking one of his cheeks, and Marcus was left with the clear impression that he intended making the most of his opportunity to intimidate a potential new entry to the school.

‘Fight!’

At Sannitus’s command the gladiator leapt forward, eschewing any attack with his sword and choosing to punch with his shield instead, looking to use his superior weight to knock Horatius off balance. The legion man stepped back, barely resisting the blow with his own shield and encouraging the gladiator to step forward again, punching even harder as he sensed that the brutal tactic was unsettling his opponent. Horatius pulled back again, his step to the rear larger than the previous retreat, his right hand sliding back until the point of the wooden sword’s blade was almost level with his ear, and Marcus narrowed his eyes as he realised what was coming. Hermes stamped forward a third time, encouraged by the soldier’s accelerating retreat to go for the kill, but as he lunged into the attack, bent on smashing the wavering shield out of his way and striking at the reeling centurion with his sword, Horatius sidestepped smartly to his left, hammering his shield’s rim against the inside of his opponent’s board. Before the gladiator had time to realise what was happening, the soldier had sprung forward off his left foot with his sword arm’s elbow held rigidly before him, the blow flattening Hermes and leaving him momentarily stunned as he fell back onto the hard sandy floor.

Horatius reflexively raised his sword to strike at the fallen fighter, but a swift call from Sannitus stayed his hand.

‘Hold! You might do it that way in the army, but in the arena it’s more the done thing to hold a fallen opponent under the point of your sword and ask whoever is chairing the games whether he should live or die. And in this case you can give him a hand since he’s your new comrade. Welcome to the ludus.’

The victorious soldier dropped his sword and put out a hand to Hermes, but the gladiator rolled away from him, regaining his footing with an easy grace that belied his size, leaving his sword and shield where they had fallen. Horatius shrugged and handed his shield to Sannitus, exchanging looks with the trainer, who shook his head in mock sadness at the loser’s behaviour.

‘I know, he’s always been a miserable bastard. It’s just as well he fights as well as he does, or he’d have had the shit beaten out of him years ago.’ He turned away and muttered an additional comment to Edius, intended only for his assistant’s ears but which carried as far as Marcus. ‘And a good thing we’ve got Velox and Mortiferum to keep the prick in order, eh?’

He turned back to the remaining triallists, grinning up at Dubnus.

‘You, the big bastard. Sure you want to go through this? You look too … well built to be quick enough for the arena.’

The Briton raised an eyebrow.

‘Would you like to put that observation to the test, Lanista?’

Sannitus shook his head with a wry smile.

‘Not today.’ He turned to shout a comment after the defeated gladiator, who was already halfway across the hall, glaring hard at his mates and silently daring any of them to make a joke at his expense. ‘Hey, Hermes! You don’t get off that easily! Come back and take those frustrations out on this.’ Shaking his head at Dubnus he gestured to the gladiator, who had turned back to stare at him with an expression that promised violence. ‘No, big man, I’ll have to pass on your offer, given you’ve got twenty years’ advantage on me. Today you can fight Hermes for the pleasure of our company.’

The Briton shrugged and stepped forward, accepting the practice weapons with a nod to the trainer and rolling his massive bearded head around on his bull neck before stepping forward and dropping into the familiar combat stance he had practised every day for the last fifteen years.

‘Come on then, Gladiator. Let’s see if you can succeed where ten thousand angry tribesmen failed.’

Hermes stared hard at him for a moment before stooping to collect his weapons, frowning in concentration as he stepped in to sword reach. For a brief moment the two men stared at each other over their shields and then, Hermes took a deep breath, blinked, and then threw himself forward at the Briton. Forewarned by his previous defeat that any attempt to bully the soldier with his shield was unlikely to bear fruit, the gladiator went to work with his sword instead, launching a flurry of blows clearly intended to find a gap in his opponent’s defences. Dubnus held his ground, parrying the attacks with sword and shield and watching the gladiator intently, waiting for an opportunity, but after a dozen fruitless attacks, Hermes stepped back, opening his sword hand enough to use his fingers to gesture the big man forward. Sannitus nodded in agreement.

‘He’s got a point, big man. No one goes to the arena to watch a fighter defend himself, they go for excitement! They want to see-’

With a sudden lunge forward, Dubnus covered the ground between himself and Hermes in a single big step, smashing his shield against his opponent’s hard enough to throw the gladiator backwards two paces. Once in motion the Briton’s attack was relentless, barging with his shield against his opponent’s board again, and a third time, before launching a furious series of sword strokes which took all of Hermes’s training and skill to deflect. With each desperate parry he stepped back again, unable to cope with the power of the soldier’s incessant sword strokes. Seeing his opportunity, Dubnus struck, swinging his sword high to force the gladiator to parry and then, while the other man’s sword was still raised in defence, stamping forward with two quick steps and hooking the ankle of his forward leg, smashing his shield hard against Hermes’s to send him sprawling onto his back. The gladiator tensed, ready to roll back onto his feet as he had a moment before, but froze at the hard touch of Dubnus’s sword at his throat.

Sannitus strolled forward, raising an amused eyebrow at seeing his man on the hall’s floor for a second time. A quiet chorus of sniggers and catcalls from the gladiator’s colleagues was silenced by a long stare and a blunt pronouncement from the trainer.

‘I’d like to have seen any of you cucumber munchers deal with that, so I suggest you all shut up until you’ve sparred with this monster …’ He turned to Dubnus, nodding approvingly. ‘Yes, that’s what the audience want to see! You’re in, now let him up.’

The gladiator stood, his face betraying the fact that the ground was clearly moving beneath his feet. Sannitus stepped close, whispering fiercely in his ear.

‘Disappointing, Hermes. Perhaps you’ll do better with the last of them. He sounds like an aristo, so I doubt he’ll have quite the same brutality as those two.’

The gladiator nodded, squaring his shoulders and turning to face Marcus, his teeth gritted in anger at his second defeat. Sannitus waved a hand, gesturing for the last of the triallists to join them.

‘Come on then, let’s see if you’ve got as much bastard in you as your mates.’

Marcus stopped just outside of the reach of Hermes’s sword and stood ready, both hands hanging easily at his sides and his eyes alert for any sign of an attack. Sannitus laughed, motioning his man Edius to give him a weapon.

‘You’re not stupid, are you?’

His answer was delivered in a deliberately dismissive tone, but the younger man’s gaze never wavered as he stared at Hermes.

‘Not stupid enough to let a man who’s already been humiliated twice by my brothers in arms have a free shot at me.’

Hermes sneered, but Sannitus nodded his appreciation.

‘You’ve got balls, I’ll give you that, Soldier. If you really are a soldier?’ He pursed his lips and looked the younger man up and down, shaking his head in apparent disbelief. ‘You really don’t look the type, do you? Sure you wouldn’t be happier up the hill with the praetorians?’

Marcus shrugged, keeping his eyes fixed on the gladiator.

‘I’ll let you be the judge of that.’ He waved away the shield that Edius was offering him. ‘I’ll take another sword, if it’s all the same to you.’

Sannitus shook his head in amusement.

‘You can defend yourself with your stick of celery if you like. I’ve never had a man elect to fight for his place with two knives before, and it takes us years of hard work with the best swordsmen to produce a competent dimachaerus, but if you think you’re good enough to fight that way then you just go ahead.’ He nodded to Hermes. ‘Ready?’

The gladiator growled his answer, his gaze locked on Marcus in a way that was clearly supposed to be intimidatory.

‘Let me at him.’

Horatius leaned closer to Dubnus, muttering a question in his ear.

‘Is he good enough?’

The Briton laughed softly.

‘Just watch.’

Sannitus turned to Marcus, who was weighing the two practice swords in his hands, still watching Hermes intently.

‘Ready?’

As he opened his mouth to answer, the gladiator took a deep breath, and, in that instant for which the young centurion had been waiting, he closed his eyes momentarily. Marcus stamped forward with his left leg and lifted his right, bent at the knee, snapping his foot forward and twisting his body to plant it squarely in the gladiator’s chest. The kick catapulted Hermes backwards to land hard on his backside, while Marcus stalked forwards with his swords levelled. His opponent scrabbled backwards, frantically retreating in the face of the weapons’ twin threats, staggering untidily to his feet with a scowl of fury.

‘Bastard!’

Marcus grinned for the first time, showing his teeth and smirking at the gladiator.

‘You need to do something about that blink. I doubt it pays for a professional fighting man to have quite such an obvious tell, do you?’ He flicked a glance at Sannitus. ‘If you really are a gladiator? After all, you don’t really look the type at the moment, do you?’

The trainer nodded wryly, realising that all he had achieved through his crude attempt to worry the young centurion a moment before had been to sharpen the man’s edge, but Hermes had clearly missed the point.

‘You cheeky young cunt! I’ll have your fucking liver out!’

Sannitus stepped forward, raising a hand.

‘Enough! We’ll-’

Hermes pushed past him with a snarl of rage.

‘Fuck off, Sannitus! This turd’s mine!’ He stormed forward, punching with his shield to take advantage of Marcus’s apparent lack of any means of defence, and forcing the younger man to dance backwards, away from his lunges. ‘Not so fucking clever now, are you boy?’ He attacked again, and this time Marcus feinted right before sidestepping left and steering away the gladiator’s blade with almost contemptuous ease, looking pointedly down at the gladiator’s exposed right leg as he did so. Sannitus shook his head in dismay, turning to look at Dubnus.

‘Am I right in thinking this isn’t going to end well?’

The Briton shrugged.

‘That depends on your man.’

Marcus backed away as Hermes bore down on him again, raising his swords wide.

‘It’s honours even at this point, Hermes. You’ve been on your backside, and you’ve chased me around for a while. We could just drop the weapons and call it a draw?’

The gladiator sneered over the top of his shield.

‘Fuckyou! Offering me a draw when I’ve got you running scared? I can smell the sh-’

He jerked to his right as Marcus leapt forward, realising even as he did so that the attack was only a feint, twisting desperately to counter the changing threat as his opponent sprang off his left foot and struck at his shielded side, realising too late that this too was bluff as the weak sword stroke merely touched the shield. Far too late, the gladiator realised that his abrupt switch of defence had left the entire right side of his body undefended, his sword nothing better than a forgotten and useless piece of wood in his right hand. The other sword hit his right knee with enough force to buckle his leg, and Hermes found himself lying on his back clutching his leg while his opponent turned away, dropping his swords to the sandy floor.

‘Bastaaaard! I’ll fucking kill you for-’

He fell silent as Marcus turned back and stooped quickly to take his throat in a hard-fingered grip. When the younger man spoke his voice was cold and matter of fact.

‘I’ll remember that. And if we ever, ever, meet in the arena with iron in our hands, you’d be as well to cut your own throat before I get to you, or you’ll spend a long time dying.’

‘Enough!’

Sannitus stepped in between the two men, pushing Marcus away.

‘I can usually spot the real animals before they ever pick up a sword, but every now and then I miss one. Like you, you monster.’ Marcus stared back at him for a moment before realising from the man’s tone that the term was intended as a compliment. ‘What’s your name?’

Resisting the urge to declare his true identity, Marcus replied with the assumed name under which he served in the Tungrian cohort.

‘Marcus. Marcus Tribulus Corvus.’

Sannitus nodded slowly.

‘Perfect. Every man needs a name for the arena, something that the crowd can shout out when you stand before them with your sword red with blood. Names like Velox, or Flamma, short names that the crowd can punch out in a chorus.’

He pointed to Horatius.

‘You’ll be “Centurion”. And you, Dubnus is it? Yes, “Dubnus”, that’s a good name for a crowd, short and simple. But you, my lad, since I predict you’re going to give my two best men something new to think about, we’re going to need something powerful for the fans to get hold of. And I think “Corvus” will do very nicely.’

‘It looks as if the young fool’s actually decided to go into the ludus after Mortiferum then?’

Scaurus spread his arms wide with a helpless shrug at his glowering first spear. A messenger sent into the city soon after first light, when Dubnus had failed to make an appearance at the routine dawn officer’s meeting, had confirmed what the first spear had strongly suspected.

‘And in his place you’d have done what, exactly?’

The fuming first spear shook his head in exasperation.

‘And in his place, would you have left your wife and baby son to fend for themselves in the almost certain outcome of your death? Would you have taken your best friend into the bloody ludus to die with you?’

His tribune sat back in his chair, contemplating the ceiling for a moment.

‘I doubt he had any choice in the matter. You of all people know just how stubborn Dubnus can be — after all, he put up with you as a centurion for several years, I believe? And in any case, you may be slightly premature in your certainty that they won’t-’

A knock at the door heralded the arrival of a soldier sent with a message from Otho, the day’s duty centurion. Saluting as smartly as he knew how to, mindful of his senior centurion’s ever judgemental eye, he stamped to attention and delivered his message in a breathless gabble.

‘Centurion’s respects, sir, and he has a man at the main gate asking to see you, sir! Man from the city, sir!’

Scaurus shot a glance at Julius to confirm that his subordinate was as bemused as he felt, nodding his assent. The first spear stood, directing an order to the waiting soldier.

‘Very well, Soldier, ask Centurion Otho to escort him here please. Dismissed.’

Once the enlisted man had repeated the stamping and saluting expected of him and left the room, Scaurus sat back in his chair with a thoughtful look on his face, while the first spear paced across the room to look out of its window.

‘That’s even quicker than I would have expected.’

Scaurus nodded thoughtfully.

‘Quite so. Let’s hope that this infers good news, shall we?’

Otho himself showed their visitor into the office, his battered face set in a concerned expression. He saluted and withdrew, his hard stare at the back of the man’s head speaking volumes for the worry that had spread across the camp once the two centurions’ absence had become apparent. Scaurus rose gravely from his chair and paced around the desk, offering the visitor his hand. The newcomer was smartly dressed in a formal toga, his boots shining from the frequent application of wax, and his thinning hair was cut short in apparent defiance of the current fashion. A slave waited behind him with the look of a man who was used to keeping his mouth shut and his eyes and ears open, and he watched in respectful silence as his master bowed to Scaurus and spoke in a confident tone that gave Julius the feeling that he was a man well accustomed to getting what he wanted.

‘Greetings, Tribune Scaurus. I can only apologise for making such an unexpected visit, and for not sending a message in advance to request a meeting. I am Lucius Tettius Julianus, procurator of the Imperial Dacian Ludus.’

Scaurus bowed in turn, his disarming smile inviting his guest to share his amusement at the unexpected nature of the visit.

‘Greetings, Procurator, and welcome to what is for the time being a small part of Britannia transplanted to Rome, at least until we receive orders to march north again.’ They clasped arms. ‘This is my first spear, Julius.’

The other man bowed to Julius, and the big centurion gravely lowered his own head in reply. Scaurus gestured to the spare seat and walked back around the desk to his own chair.

‘Please do take a seat. Might I pour you a cup of this rather acceptable wine? It’s diluted, of course, in due deference to the earliness of the hour.’

Julianus tipped his head in grateful acceptance of the offer, sipping at the drink and nodding his approval. Scaurus tasted his own cup, barely sipping the watered-down wine before raising questioning eyes to his guest.

‘So, Procurator, how might we be of assistance to you?’

The visitor took a ring from his finger, passing it to the tribune.

‘As I say, I hold the rank of procurator, reporting directly to the imperial chamberlain, and I am responsible for the management of the Dacian Ludus.’

Scaurus inclined his head in recognition of his guest’s exalted status, looking at the procurator’s badge of office for a moment before handing it back with a respectful inclination of his head.

‘A weighty responsibility, Lucius. Especially these days …’

He left the statement unfinished, and the procurator took his conversational bait without hesitation.

‘How right you are. The emperor’s rather close interest in every aspect of the gladiatorial spectacle means that we have to produce the finest swordsmen in the empire if we are to satisfy his expectations.’

‘I can only imagine the pressure involved. But then you have those two brothers, do you not? Velox and …’

Scaurus looked at the ceiling as if trying to remember the other name.

‘Mortiferum. Yes, we do, and by the gods, they’re a superb pair of fighters, so good that I’ve bowed to my lanista’s suggestion and named them both as my first rank fighters despite the unusual nature of such an arrangement. However, and as I’m sure you can imagine, we do rather tend to go through the second and third rank men. So, when three candidates for the ludus present themselves together, and proceed, one after another, to comprehensively outfight one of my more effective men, well, I’m sure I can leave it to your imagination to work out what their potential might be. Not to mention their prospects.’

Scaurus smiled his agreement, raising an eyebrow to Julius.

‘Three men of such skill? I can indeed see what a gift that might seem. But of course, there’s always the risk of taking on a man who is in reality still a serving soldier. I can only assume that you examine each ex-soldier’s record with the very greatest of care?’

Julianus nodded.

‘Indeed I do. Which, as I expect you have already perceived, is what brings me here at such short notice. I have two men from your cohort in my ludus at this very moment, both claiming to have recently bought their way out of their commissions, and therefore claiming the right to take the oath.’

‘Ah.’

Scaurus’s expression went from relaxed bonhomie to shifty discomfort, and Julianus smiled sympathetically.

‘Ah indeed.’ He leaned forwards and lowered his voice, shooting Julius a conspiratorial glance. ‘Please believe me when I assure you that your own internal administrative procedures really are none of my business, and to be frank with you both, you’ve done me a huge service in freeing them up to seek their fortunes in the arena.’ He leaned back with an expansive gesture. ‘I can see them earning the ludus a good deal of gold. A very good deal of it. And some of that gold will, in time, work its way down to them with, I’m sure, the adulation of the crowd, the swooning services of a variety of grateful matrons, and so on. I’m sure we’ll all enjoy sharing in their reflected glory — you really haven’t lived until your female companion for the evening has spent the day at the arena enjoying the aphrodisiac effect of watching grown men tear into each other with sharp iron!’

He leaned back in his chair with a smug smile, and Scaurus leaned forward with an intrigued expression.

‘Now that I would like to see!’

‘And you shall, Rutilius Scaurus, as my personal guest when your men fight in the arena for the first time. I suspect that we’ll be making them part of a spectacle that will have Rome buzzing for days. Anyway, all I need to be assured of their freedom to take the oath is to see those two precious sheets of bronze that declare them both to be honourably discharged as citizens of the empire, with all the witness seals intact, of course.’

Scaurus shot Julius a swift glance.

‘Their diplomas?’

‘Yes indeed, that’s all. Just show me their diplomas and I’ll be on my way. You do have them to hand, I presume?’