Colosseum (24 page)

There is a great commotion behind Verus. The middle of the room is ready; the flames burn fiercely in the braziers, blackening the polished ceiling. The slaves have prepared a wide circle. In the middle of it stands Julia, alone and beautiful, without the blond man next to her. She awaits him, batting her eyelashes like a lap cat.

She has changed her dress.

The servants lift Verus up and slip off his red tunic, leaving him standing in leather bracers and loincloth.

The Briton feels his heart hammering in his chest.

He does not know what is happening.

Martial looks at him one last time.

“Possibly. But first you must survive tonight…”

Then the servants grab hold of the gladiator and drag him into the center of the makeshift arena, where the golden daughter of the Empire awaits him with lips slightly parted.

Her dress is light pink, so transparent it leaves nothing to the imagination. Julia is naked beneath it, but nobody seems to notice, not even her father, who glances at her with an air of boredom. Just another of his crazy young daughter's whims, you can bet on that.

On her feet a pair of
scabilli
, iron clogs that clatter with each step. In her right hand a pair of bronze
crotalia
, castanets used to keep time. The rhythm is energetic, the musicians having pulled out lively-sounding string instruments and drums from somewhere. Julia swings her hips as she sounds the castanets, their metallic sound filling the room, hypnotic and captivating. Around her, Iberian dancers shake their bottoms in a sinuous dance, originally modeled on the ancient rites honoring the goddess Astarte, but now an art form in itself, a mesmerizing ceremony of blood and sex. Prelude to orgy and chaos.

Verus is confused by the interlacing bodies, the dancers caressing the sixteen-year-old daughter of the Emperor as they howl sounds that speak of the sea and salty piety, of wine, fruit and sun. Julia's forehead pearls with sweat as she sways, nipples erect, a few inches from the gladiator.

The Briton is dazzled by the lascivious dance and the silent crowd enjoys the spectacle, the noblewomen aroused and the men swaying gently in their stupor, filled to the ears with wine.

Julia is love and innocence as she twirls around the servant who became a warrior. She touches his electrified skin, his desire rising unbearably.

Verus turns his head, the rhythm quickens, the dancers tease and rub in their fire-red veils, bellies as naked as the Queen of Sheba.

The cymbals clash more loudly, Julia's mouth ever closer to Verus's face. The gladiator imagines the imminent kiss, the contact of her moist lips, her shallow breaths.

Her tongue, her closed eyes. They are a breath apart, a caress, the space filled by deafening music.

The crazed roll of drumsticks on donkey hide, the castanets shrieking like nervous wet nurses. The twirl of the dance.

Here we go
.

Verus sighs and leans forward, but the kiss does not arrive. Julia merely smiles and shrinks away, then leans forward again, sleek and tempting. The dancers step aside and Julia retreats further, then disappears into the crowd. Verus try to follow, but the crush forces him back.

The great drums beat to the rhythm of war now, the air thick with anticipation. Verus is left alone at the center of the hall with bated breath, utterly lost.

A punch to the face brings him back to the world of the living. A black man as big as an oak tree emerges from the curtain that hangs around the banquet hall and begins hammering at his face.

Welcome to the war, gladiator.

Verus takes a moment to gather his wits, stunned by the treacherous attack.

A servant hands the black man a wooden shield and a curved
sica
. And then the same for Verus.

The throng heaves with feral grunts and shouts; he cannot see the beautiful daughter of the Empire anywhere, and the music has stopped. Actually, Julia has slipped upstairs to the balcony, from where she can enjoy the show undisturbed. Up there she go unnoticed but will be able to follow every blow, savor every movement. Awaiting her, hidden behind the discrete drapes, is the blond son of the She-wolf. The officer's breastplate he sports is shinier than a brass mirror: it makes him look like Mars himself, ready to dispense both war and love.

He places an arm round Julia as they stand on the wooden balcony decorated with crimson velvet. He slips his fingers between those of the girl, her anxious about the blood that is soon bound to flow.

Anxious about everything.

Down in the improvised arena Verus is quick to grasp what is happening: the black man is a fury, throwing himself into the attack like a raging gorilla. He is strong and tough, but lacks technique. He slashes when he should lunge, wasting his breath with sideswipes, quickly tiring.

Verus prances over the freezing flagstones but is not entirely lucid, overdoing a backward dodge and burning himself against a flaming brazier. He cries out so loudly and suddenly that even his adversary takes a step back, caught unawares.

The burn reawakens his drowsy senses, his brain slipping back into gear as his thirst for violence returns.

Anger becomes the his only lighthouse in the storm: Verus runs the
sica
through the ligaments of his adversary's knee, skillfully blocks a lunge and turns his shield into a mallet, smashing it into the jaw of his unfortunate victim. Two steps back to loosen his legs up, then a thrust that slices through the air, and the badly shaved cheek of his opponent.

Immersed in the darkness of the balcony, the well-groomed hands of the blond officer slide beneath Julia's gossamer dress. The girl lets him explore, biting her lip and feeling her sex moisten as Verus performs his duty with the
sica
. His fingers slide into her, thick and unhesitating, a little painful. A
nice
pain, though. The girl sighs, “Keep going,” and the son of the She-wolf slips his ring finger in as well. Julia's moans match the rhythmic movement of his hand, as the blood drips onto the mosaic below.

The African mastodon's shield crashes to the ground. He grasps the
sica
with both hands and launches himself into the attack with a desperate cry.

Verus dodges sideways but the tip of the giant's rusty blade finds his pectoral muscle, staining it red. The riposte is decisive: the gladiator buries his blade up to the hilt in the other's shoulder. The black fighter drops to his knees, squealing like a pig.

Up on the balcony the atmosphere is electric: Julia has grabbed the officer's sex, hard as a rod of iron beneath his short tunic. The girl is insane with desire but does not want to finish before the fight has. She lifts her dress, pushing her lover's hands away from her womanhood. Then she turns her back to the blond man, takes his cock in her hands and guides it slowly inside her, beginning to move slowly as he squeezes her breasts, breathing heavily.

The black man is on his knees, the fight is over but the crowd demands more.

They want the end; they crave it.

Verus removes his
sica
from the man's shoulder, drinking in the roar of the crowd.

Upstairs the handsome officer does not stop thrusting. Julia is almost there but she does not let herself go,
not yet
.

“Death!” she cries aloud, clinging to the balustrade. “Death! Death!”

Verus can barely see her and has no idea she is having someone else fuck her as she shouts.

“Death!” The cry is demented, desperate, avid.

The bovine audience, blind drunk and dripping with sweat, follows her lead without delay.

“Death!” the echo.

The black man trembles, the blond pumps away, the crowd presses around the combatants.

Ircius signals his gladiator to do what he came into the world to do.

The fire from the torches is unbearable.

Verus's hand hesitates, his knuckles gripped so tightly round the hilt of the
sica
they have turned white.

The Emperor rises from his throne: even he cannot ignore the voice of the populace. He stares at the Briton compassionately, without even deigning to look at the black warrior. The latter stretches out his neck, and the monarch lowers his eyelids.

All or nothing, Verus.

All or nothing.

Verus burns with anger, the emptiness embraces him like a strict mother. He raises his blade, yelling like Hannibal on the battlefield. Then brings it down, shearing the man's head clean off.

Silence.

And then, the explosion.

The rabble howls with delight; somebody, a little overexcited, vomits red and rolls to the ground.

The son of the She-wolf holds Julia's hair tightly at the nape of her neck. He pushes hard, one last time.

He comes in her angrily, flooding her with his contempt.

Julia has her brutal orgasm, screaming louder and clutching at the railing. A nail breaks and there is blood in the wood.

The pain makes everything better, death and life exploding as one.

Verus is left alone, dripping with innocent blood, beneath the affectionate gaze of Martial. A bitter taste fills his mouth, that of a condemned man.

I had never killed anyone in cold blood before.

He sinks to his knees in a dark corner of the hall.

He ignores the compliments and refuses the drinks.

He closes in on himself in a fetal position.

Where has he ended up? What is he doing? What is his place in this damned world?

Living is not enough, but neither is dying.

Forming in his empty heart is a huge clot of bone fragments, soft flesh, and dried blood.

The eyes of the slain black man stare at him vacantly, the severed head left on the filthy flagstones.

On a
triclinium
doused with wine, a man is crying out for his mother as he screws another guest. Someone is taking a piss in the corner, convinced that he is out of sight of the others.

The drunken antics are a lunatic's world of sexual encounters.

The Emperor has left the hall, but not before handing Decius Ircius a pile of gold coins.

Julia has disappeared, melted away into the sweat and seed of the blond man.

The party continues. All night long.

Verus weeps, unseen; he sobs with remorse. He misses the past, the dream of a better future. He misses Priscus. Hard to admit it, but he does. He wishes he were here, now. To speak to him for hours on end, like they did some nights at the building site. Or in the cells of the Ludus Argentum.

Life sucks. Verus wants only to go home.

Now.

But the party is endless, the orgy knows no limits.

The Briton crouches in a corner and promises himself: tomorrow, yes, tomorrow.

I will talk to Priscus, humiliate myself if need be. I want to start again. We have to start again.

Death is too heavy a burden.

The life we chose will kill us eventually.

He falls into a restless sleep, the pair of dead, empty eyes boring straight into his heart. Dead by his own hand. Slaughtered, without deserving it.

“Close your eyes, sweet prince, forgotten by all but the darkness,” Martial's voice is pure honey. He strokes the gladiator's head so softly the Briton does not even feel it.

He has just drifted off.

Even with murderers, Morpheus is merciful.

If you're alone, you'll be sad.

O
VID
,
Remedia amoris
,
583

Rome,
AD
80, June

SENSE OF GUILT, headache, puke and sweat.

That is what the morning after is for.

Verus awakens in a daze amidst the snoring carnage. The imperial residence dozes as the slaves clear away the remnants of the unholy banquet, everywhere the soft scrape of brooms. The younger freedmen struggle to help the rich to their feet.

Hangover is a real dirty trick.

The Briton's heart is swollen with pain, for what he has been and what he will be.

His head, though, is fairly clear: sleep has swept away the pollution of vice, the bitter tears, wine and rich meats. Fear has melted his hangover in a sea of worries.

But Verus has not washed, and blood still stains his hands.

His eyes are red and his mouth sticky from his uncomfortable rest. He stops a slave to ask for Ircius, but at first he does not understand.

“Decius Ircius the lanista! My master,” Verus insists.

Then the slave realizes who is before him and in the blink of an eye is treating the dazed gladiator with more deference: he recognizes the dangerous glint in the man's straying gaze, recalls his hands on the blade and the blade on his opponent's neck.

He remembers the blood, this young slave: he had had the job of cleaning it up at daybreak. Rags and elbow grease, knees rubbed raw on the cold stone floor.

“Your master left the house late last night, but the Emperor himself ordered that no one disturb your sleep.”

Verus was lost. He felt unease rasp at his throat: the new day was as green as bile.

“I'm awake now. And I want to go back to the Ludus Argentum. Ircius will be looking for me.”

The slave holds out his arms. “At least allow yourself a bath. It is all ready, we were only waiting for you to wake up so that someone could take you to the ablution chambers. A Caesar's hospitality is a rare thing for those like us, brother.”

Verus looks at the slight man in disgust: a bony Egyptian living off leftovers stolen from the kitchen, never getting enough sleep. Not yet twenty, but the first signs of incipient baldness showing already. A few scraggly hairs on his chest, an ill-fitting tunic, bare feet.

“I am not your brother,” says the gladiator, his voice deliberate and forceful. Then he turns his back, leaving without bidding farewell.

He takes a while to find the way out, but prefers not to ask for help. He is filled with anger and remorse. Not only for having taken the life of another, but above all because he has finally understood what Priscus has been trying to tell him right from the start:
You are at home. We belong to them.

The life of a servant—whether fate has put a sword or a broom in your hand matters little—is a barren and desolate plain. A windswept no-man's land.

Time does not exist, nor will or exhaustion. Sleep, wakefulness, even the basest of human urges—hunger, thirst, the need to urinate or to make love—all are at the mercy of the whims and moods of whoever is in command.

Muscles grow accustomed to flexing at the mere nod of another's head, the heart accustomed to breaking and bleeding on command, if the master grieves. A look from the
dominus
or an unclear thought, left open to interpretation, have the power to light up an entire day, or else to ruin it utterly: a servant's life is pathetic, Verus knows that for certain now. He walks along the corridors that have welcomed him in as an exotic animals worthy of contemplation, and notices the hunched backs of the cooks, already hard at work, the washerwomen with their cracked hands, the red fingers of butchers soiled with rightful death.

The workers' eyes all look alike, darting this way and that with dampened flashes of haste and resignation. For those who serve there is no tomorrow. And if there is, it looks a hell of a lot like today.

The first breath of fresh air beyond the walls of the Palace is like a sip of water in the middle of a desert.

Rome is awake again, may the gods bless it.

The sky is blue enough to put Apollo's eyes to shame.

The muddy roads throb with persistent life; the night brought with it rain and clouds, washing away as much of the evil as it could. Verus walks disheveled and sweaty through throngs of every possible type of human being.

The streets leading to the
ludus
are bursting with deals to be made, judging by how much the seed and nut merchants are shouting. Hurried hand gestures cut through the deafening shouts of the crowd to indicate precise quantities. A woman waves her right fist, held in the horn sign: it means four hundred. With her left hand it would only have meant four.

The bustling Romans shout and push and point; their hands tell tales of numbers with an endless snapping of fingers. Verus understands little or nothing, unused as he is to buying and selling. He is a slave: nothing is his own, not even his destiny.

He lets the throngs push him further east, until the background of grain and vendors disappears and gives way to a bronze monolith with the look of a great, placid bull.

Verus is lost, having wandered far from the road he was following, but he does not care. His head is overflowing with thoughts, but no wish to make sense of them.

The Forum Boarium is the ideal place for ignoring the clamor of his mind; his sense of smell selfishly demands all of his attention. The young gladiator has just entered the cattle market, the kingdom of innocent blood. The statue at the center of the Forum is the lighthouse that guides those walking along the tortured little alleyways market out by the stalls.

The air is thick with haggling and the smell of animals. A potbellied midget grasps a brace of tough-looking hens, holding them up by their feet as if they were a bunch of garlic. They offer no sign of complaint, limiting themselves to pecking at their upside-down companions every so often. An old man approaches and hands the seller a few
assarii
in exchange for one of the birds. The midget frees one of them and, with a skillful gesture of the right hand, snaps it neck in a lethal merry-go-round. He passes the cadaver to the old man and pockets the coins contentedly.

Verus moves on.

The sound of bleating is very loud, coming from inside a pen where lambs stand trembling. There must be fifty or so, pressed in like customers looking for bread at the fifth hour.

In their cold eyes, the fear of those who
know
, their nostrils filled with the metallic odor of blood. The blood of their dead brothers; blood awaiting yet more blood.

On the work bench next to the pen sits a row of severed heads: sheep, goats, deer. Heads separated from their respective necks: the fateful shock of a knife to the throat, the grinding of iron on bone, the vacant stare.

Verus stares at the victims.

His stomach churns and kicks, beyond his control.

Clouds of flies hum menacingly around the head of a butchered deer, dark-red in color, tongue hanging limply from its mouth.

But Verus sees before him another severed head, the eyes of a black man on a rich man's floor.

Rich bastards.

The gag reflex starts at the base of his neck. It is too late, the bitter tide has already entered his throat. The Briton bends double, falls to his knees and vomits until his eyes are burning. His nostrils fill with mucus and who knows what else, his tears hideous and all too visible.

He vomits some more.

People step over him—too busy to care.

Someone kicks him in the ass, and he takes it without batting an eyelid.

The merchant's foot is a caress in the warrior's back. Not satisfied, someone else does the same, calling him “sissy.”

Verus jumps to his feet. Muscle memory takes over. The repetition of his constant training, the very essence of a gladiator: days spent at the training pole, sessions with the wooden
gladius
, the flexes, lunges, and sidesteps.

Again.

Again.

Now it all comes brimming to the surface in the blink of an eye, in that single, terrifying gesture.

His bulk looms a good two palms taller than the merchants who were in such a playful mood. His face is stained with mud, puke, and tears. His hands, chest, and clothes still bear the signs of last night's victim. He notices it only now—that was why the servant had so insisted he take a bath.

Verus feels bad for a lot of reasons. Rage boils all too visibly inside him.

The two merchants who taunted him are now scared shitless.

When he is in this state he scares the shit out of
everyone
.

The crowd parts to let the Briton continue on his way, finally free to go back and serve. Which is only right for someone who lives in chains.

Using the bronze bull to get his bearings, he finds his way out of the spider's web of tiny streets, and slinks towards a fountain that depicts Neptune with a fishing net, but the gladiator pays no heed of the effigy as he scrubs his face in the icy water, rinses his hands and chest, then strips off his tunic, standing almost naked. He had hoped to wash off all the filth, but while his skin is left clean his soul is not. Now the son of the Island takes the road toward home, followed by appalled gazes of the locals standing in line with buckets in hand to fill up their water troughs. Home. Or better, the prison without bars that he has learned to call home.

With each step that brings him closer to his destination, Verus is more certain of what he must do.

A wise man, many years ago, told him that being a man is more complicated than it seems: it is about doing what you have to do when you have to do it, whether you want to or not.

In those days Verus did not understand what that stubborn, foul-mouthed old man Cormac—who insisted on being called “master”—was on about. But Cormac knew that sooner or later he would understand.

Now the British warrior knows that if he wants to find his place again in the world, he must bow his head, swallow his pride, and make the peace with Priscus. Life and death are too awful to face alone. Verus
needs
Priscus, needs his serious stare and his simple words that tell things like they are.

Verus has had enough of lies and anger.

Life in the arena is not
marvelous
. Killing a human being is not
magnificent.

Killing is shit, just like dying.

But that is all we have, brother. You'll have to get used to it.
It is as though he can already hear the Gaul's voice in his ears.

It has taken him a while, but Verus is finally realizing how Priscus's heart began to strain when Julia entered their lives.

The heart is a thief, and love a cursed jewel. Where emotions are concerned, the dance is never in time with the music. Verus has never been particularly bright, but now he knows that all the little pieces of the jigsaw of life are interconnected. Now the vast mosaic of life begins to take shape before his swollen eyes, streaked with dark tears.

Sergius's death.

The black warrior's death.

Julia's eyes at her father's house, her malice and her scent.

Priscus's anger, his distance, his suspicion.

Priscus has
chosen
to suffer, shutting Verus out of his world.

And Verus has allowed him to do it, Verus the unthinking blockhead, his thoughts clouded by mad dreams of Julia, blinded by impossible jealousy.

The beautiful Julia, daughter of the Emperor, may well have lost her head for Priscus the ice-man. But the Gaul's heart, rough as stone up until the day it decided to let in the kindred spirit of his brother from the sea, has been elsewhere for a long time.

Finally, Verus understands.

Without needing anyone to explain it to him.

Priscus
loves him
.

Or at least, loved him.

Before Verus ruined everything by believing himself invincible.

Before Sergius died. Before everything was sullied with blood, damn it.

Priscus loves him, no point in pretending otherwise.

And not in a brotherly way. This was the same kind of love that bound Patroclus and Apollo.

Verus does not feel the same way about Priscus, but he also knows that he does not want to live without him. There is a special bond: they might never be a single body, but they are certainly two halves of a whole. And he does not want to throw that away, especially now that he regrets everything that has happened.

The rich bastards, the unjust deaths, this shitty life.

The blood, everywhere, sprayed against the walls of his soul.

Verus quickens his step and feels the blood pulse in his veins—the Ludus Argentumis drawing closer.

No more cowardice, no more naivety. He will go to Priscus, right now. He will beg his forgiveness. He will embrace him.

They will talk.

By the gods, he will talk until the Gaul's ears bleed. He will get everything off his chest, will bare his heart and find his brother once more, his friend, his other half.

His feet fall faster and faster. Run, Verus. Run.

Breathing heavily, Rome slides past him like a waking dream. The first, hot rays of the sun, the morning feels like hope. Verus feels his nausea melt away as he draws ever nearer to the silver barracks.

The misunderstandings will crumble away, forgiveness will flower. It will not be love—not of the sort Priscus has in mind, anyway—but their brotherhood will soothe every wound. Verus
needs
to believe it is possible. He is running now, gasping life into his heaving lungs.

He cannot wait.

He shoulders his way into the
ludus
without so much as acknowledging his companions around the entrance. He smiles and calls Priscus's name at the top of his voice. Someone tries to stop him but Verus is a raging bull, charging into the dormitory and then the courtyard, even knocking at the armory door before he comes back outside, into the dust of the arena. Until he meets the cold and pitiless gaze of Decius Ircius.