Chapter I
I
NINETEEN MONTHS LATER
CITY OF ROME
Adel gritted her teeth and flung her shield up in time to block the barrage of swings.
The clash of sword on scutum echoed above the gasps and cheers of the dinner-party crowd clustered around the makeshift ring created in the courtyard of the lavish domus.
Lamp smoke, roasted meat, and the tang of wine spiced what little air she could breathe through her helmet.
Adel took a step back, her bare toes spreading to grip the cool marble as she prepared to launch the counterattack that would force her scarlet-clad opponent back across the ring and—if all went to plan—to her knees.
From all around, discordant chants of, “! Am-a-zon!” mingled with the boos and hisses for her opponent, Vesuvia.
Her people had never told stories of mock battles and dulled swords, nor revered warriors who fought but never died. But then, her people were not Romans.
Adel’s hot breaths steamed over her face, trapped inside the brass-plated helmet strapped to her head.
Sweat dribbled down her temple in a boiling stream, and she struggled to quell the panic of slow suffocation.
The only ventilation came through the small eyeholes covered in gilded mesh.
They were effective barriers—letting in neither sword nor fresh air.
She tilted her head, angling Vesuvia into view in time to emerge from behind her shield and block the next swing with her gladius.
Vesuvia’s expression was hidden by her own silver helmet, fashioned in the likeness of a moth.
Scarlet plumes rose above each ear and metal screens bulged over her eyes.
She was clad in a fiery red loincloth and matching breastband partially hidden by the small breastplate that only covered the top of her chest, her costume mimicking the destructive mountain of fire.
Though why Adel, outfitted as a legendary warrior woman, would be fighting a fire mountain instead of a Greek, she didn’t know.
She knew from experience, however, that no true warrior woman would go to battle with a bare stomach and a single leg greave.
No, that stupidity was for the leering crowd of men gathered around them now, erupting in unveiled suggestions and coarse laughter.
Adel steeled herself against it. Refused to let the sharpened barbs needle through the armor of her heart.
Their words were nothing to her. Actions were everything.
She took one more step back. Her costume, polished leather and lichen-green fabric, brushed the back of her thigh as she sank to a ready stance, preparing to launch the series of strikes that would force Vesuvia back across the ring.
She’d trained for this. Practiced long hours of sword drills and footwork.
Her handler had prepared her well. While Vesuvia struck fast, Adel was both quick and strong.
Her opponent would tire after this next series of moves, and then Adel would shine.
It was how she’d earned her name, her place, the long list of wealthy patrons who paid to have her fight at their dinner parties.
Earned coin by precious coin to save or spend on whatever her heart desired.
It was freedom. Security. Gained by her own two hands.
This party would pay well. And not a moment too soon. She’d need a new tunic to meet with—
A hand gripped her upper thigh from behind, sliding upward, fingers digging into her skin. Laughter erupted. Her focus slipped as fury rolled through her. How dare—
She swung her shield backward, slamming it against whoever had grabbed her. A torrent of curses against Mars and Jupiter streamed behind her as Vesuvia pounced with a battering of quick blows that sent her reeling.
Marble tile slammed into Adel’s knees. Her shield arm went numb. Through the eyeholes in her helmet she saw Vesuvia step backward, her sword swinging above her head in . . . victory? The edge of the gladius gleamed as red as the feathers in her helmet.
Red?
The room dropped into a ringing silence.
Adel’s gladius clattered against floor tiles laid in a basketweave pattern that reminded her of the war-daughters’ hair, plaited for the Easter celebration and woven with flowers.
A distant memory of laughter spun in her head, shattered all at once by the warning cry of a Roman trumpet.
Shouts, screams, pounding feet. A searing in her chest wrenched the air from her lungs.
In an instant, her senses roared back into full volume—heat, pain, the echoing bellows of the watching crowd who seemed as shocked as she was.
The never lost.
Breathe. She couldn’t breathe. Her mouth gaped. She reached up and clawed at the strap on her helmet, her fingers stiff and clumsy. She needed air.
“Hold still.” Hands gripped her underarms, holding her steady, as still others worked at her helmet and shield straps.
She fought against the hold, nausea swirling along with the faces of the crowd pressing closer.
She just needed a little air, and she’d be fine.
The helmet lifted away and coolness washed over her sweat-drenched hair and neck.
She sucked in a deep breath and lurched forward, her fingers closing around the hilt of her gladius. A hand landed over hers, stilling her.
“You’re done.” A graveled voice bit through the fog, words settling in Adel’s stomach with sickening clarity as she looked up to see a magister from one of the rival gladiator schools push through the crowd to grip Vesuvia’s arm and raise it high in victory.
The air felt struck from Adel’s lungs again.
Idiot. Idiot. Shame and anger coiled in her chest. Men were forever doing stupid things in the closeness of dinner party spectacles—as if highly trained women hired to fight for entertainment could be used for other things as well.
How could she have let one grabbing brute throw her focus?
An angry voice rose from the crowd. “This is not what I paid for!”
“It was his fault,” someone else shouted. “He grabbed the .”
The sounds seemed to fade in and out, edges of her vision blurring around the sight of a victorious Vesuvia being swallowed by the crowd.
She’d lost.
A chill replaced the fury of a moment ago, carrying fear with it. Had she brought shame on the Ludus Gallicus as she’d shamed everything else she’d loved?
“Remove the shield.” That same low voice from earlier was closer, familiar. “I’ve got to get to her arm.” One of the medici from her ludus leaned forward, blocking her line of sight. The old one with sagging jowls. Sergius something or other. She’d never bothered to remember.
“What’s your name?” he barked.
She shut her eyes, teeth grinding against the pain roaring up her shoulder with fiery claws. “Do you not know?”
“Now isn’t the time for impudence.” His words slurred slightly, breath heavy with spiced wine.
“How dare you interfere with a fight!”
Pain or not, Adel would recognize the voice of her magister anywhere—though Ignacio was usually shouting at her, rather than a spectator.
A strange voice laughed. “Oh, come off it, trainer. It’s not like this is a real fight. They’re only women.”
Sergius’s fingers bit into her good arm, and a good thing too, or she might have leaped up and showed the brute what a woman could do in a real fight. Not a staged one like this had been.
“Hold still.”
Adel bit back a growl as Sergius peeled her skin from the bone—or perhaps he’d only wrapped a cloth over the wound. She couldn’t bring herself to look at it.
She’d lost. The weight of it slammed into her again.
“Drink this.”
A cup banged against her teeth, and she gulped wine mixed with something bitter.
“Get her up,” Sergius ordered. “Take her out.”
Hands slid beneath her arms and tightened, hauling Adel to her feet. Her head whirled and her stomach heaved.
Sergius scooped up his bag and stood by as one of her guards looped an arm around her waist. She pushed him away, gritting her teeth.
“I can walk. Let me walk. I am fine.” She lifted her chin. Only women. Even if her legs had been struck off, these Roman pigs would not see her carried out.
The guard withdrew his arm, though he hovered close. Adel elbowed him back. “I can do it.”
With a nod, the guard stepped in front of her and barked, “Make way.” He shoved a path through the gaping crowd as Ignacio shouted behind them about interference, and the lady of the domus shrieked that she’d been promised there would be no blood on her floors.
Evening air washed over Adel as they rushed through the front garden toward the gate, the coolness heavy with the scents of cedar and stone pine.
Adel’s heart had taken up residence in her arm, throbbing with each beat, every footstep.
Her gut heaved again and this time she pitched toward the edge of the path, dropping to her knees to empty her stomach beside a bed of scarlet geraniums. The flowers drew her eye, balls of bright flame against the dark foliage.
Her breath hitched. Were they truly so bright?
Or did they only seem so against the darkness?
“Come on.” The guard’s hands tucked into her armpits again.
As he hauled her to her feet, Adel shoved her fingers into the flowers, tightening around several spear-shaped seed pods.
They snapped free in her grip, and she kept her fist balled around them as the guard drew her back to the path and to the gate while Sergius marched ahead—on rather unsteady feet.
“Is the litter still outside?” he slurred.
“Should be,” the guard answered.
A wide-eyed servant stationed at the gate swung it open to reveal at least a dozen sedan chairs waiting in the street, surrounded by crowds of litter-bearers and attendants.
Adel’s knees wobbled as her guardians urged her toward the nondescript litter hung with plain brown curtains. She’d never ridden in it before. A ride back to the Ludus Gallicus in the chair meant injury. Failure.
She shook her head. “I can walk. I do not need the litter.” Something hot pulsed down her arm. Dripped from her fingers. Adel dared her first look.
Even in the dimness of evening she could see the bandage was soaked with blood. Running down her arm. Streaking her bare leg and dotting the short skirt of her green costume.
“I am . . . fine.”
“Now isn’t the time to be stubborn.” Sergius elbowed back the curtain, and the guard twisted her inside, pushing her down on the wooden seat. He backed out to allow a view of the medicus, crouching on the ground where he dug through his bag.
“Drink this. You wasted the first dose in the garden.” He pushed a bottle to her lips with a bruising force.
Adel swallowed the bitter liquid, gagging as Sergius tucked the bottle back in his bag and drew out a bandage.
“I lost.” She stared over his bent head at the domus gate where Vesuvia and her handler had yet to emerge.
They wouldn’t be coming out any time soon.
Vesuvia would be paraded around the party, receiving coins and gifts from adoring fans.
She would feast at the table with the hosts, eating far better fare than they served at the ludus.
Adel knew this because in the past, it had always been her.
“A stupid mistake.” Sergius wrapped another band of cloth tightly around her bicep. “You best pray the gods show mercy or you may never fight again.”
His words struck fear to her core. Not fight again?
It was incomprehensible. The only way to stop fighting forever was to prove herself worthy and earn a place among the magistri—or die trying.
To be unable to even try . . . That offered a fate worse than death.
She tried to respond, to argue that she had to fight, that there was no other option for her, but her mouth felt odd and heavy, words slurring.
He tied a knot in the bandage, tightening it with a tug that sent a lightning bolt of pain through her arm. She swung without thinking, her fist meeting his jaw in a blow that sent him sprawling in the street.
In an instant, one of the guards ducked inside the curtain, gripping her ankles and locking them into the shackles mounted to the litter. As if that would keep her fists contained.
“He’s trying to help you,” he growled.
Sergius spat and cursed, holding his jaw. “Hades take you, barbarian,” he muttered, glowering at her as the other guard pulled him to his feet. “You will pay for this.”