Chapter XVIII
XVIII
HE WAS HERE. It was done.
Telemachus hurried down the passage, his sandals scuffing the worn floor tiles, echoing off the bare stone walls.
Felix had really done it. He shouldn’t have doubted, hadn’t meant to.
He’d never have asked if he hadn’t known that the medicus would agree.
And yet somehow, knowing Felix had come through, that their plan had worked, sent an elated energy through his veins.
Possibility. Hope. They could do this.
Those emotions were chased just as quickly by the reality that there were hundreds, thousands across the empire imprisoned in ludi, forced to fight, to die, for the entertainment of others. So what was the life of one man?
Precious, and worthy of saving.
He’d not always believed such merciful things. But now was not the time to dwell on the past and its monsters.
Telemachus twisted into the doorway, to find the medicus bent over the bed, resolve tightening his mouth.
“Thank you.” Somehow knowing the plan had worked and seeing the proof before him sent emotion to his throat.
Felix gave a nod.
“Can we speak?” Telemachus lifted a hand, gesturing to the hall, and when Felix followed, he led the way to the small guest room the monks had graciously offered to him when he and Gaius had arrived in the city.
It contained a bed too small to support his frame, a blanket on the floor where he actually slept, and the leather travel bag slouched in the corner.
The pillow remained on the bed. Comforts were wasted on a man like him.
You do not deserve them. He pushed the thought away and left Felix in the doorway while he angled for the bag, speaking over his shoulder.
“I’ve made a list of the missing.” He pulled out a weathered codex and flipped it open, keeping it angled to hide his rudimentary scrawl. “Which Visigoths are held in the Ludus Gallicus?”
An unreadable expression flickered across Felix’s face, chased quickly by the clearing of his throat. “We have some, yes. Gaiseric, Ilona, Ruso—er, I don’t know if that’s his real name.”
Telemachus followed the list with his finger, pausing on several names. “Ilona . . . Gaiseric, of course.”
“You know them?”
He nodded. “Some of them are from other villages, but these . . . Gaius and I taught them the Scriptures week after week. Prayed with them.”
“You prayed with them?” Disbelief was palpable in his tone. Felix shook his head. “Sorry. I didn’t realize they were . . . that they weren’t . . .”
“As barbarian as you first assumed?”
Felix shrugged. “Life in the ludi can turn the most civilized of men into blood-hungry monsters.”
Yes. But it was not only the ludi that held such power. Sometimes the monster was a merchant. Telemachus cleared his throat, hoping it would also clear the memories, and gave a nod. “Who else?”
“There are so many others trapped within those walls,” Felix said, giving a hopeless shrug. “Visigoth, yes, but Gauls, Britons, Iceni, Alamani—”
“Their leaders are not bringing an army against Rome.”
“But are they not worth saving as well?”
Of course they were. What sort of question was that? He hated that they had to choose—but this was Alaric’s fault. If the Visigoths were not returned, Rome’s innocents would pay the price of his wounded pride. And Telemachus wouldn’t let that happen. Not again.
“It is Alaric’s threat to Rome’s citizens that makes them our priority for the moment,” he said quietly. “I wish we could rescue them all.”
Felix listed others while Telemachus hunted through the list and scratched marks beside names of the missing. So many lost. So many found. Praise be to God.
“A-Adelgard.” Felix’s tongue tripped over the name. He made a show of rubbing the back of his neck, brow furrowing as if he couldn’t quite remember if that was her name or not.
Telemachus’s breath caught and held, as if his own body couldn’t bear the hope. The dread. “Adel is in the Ludus Gallicus?”
“Adel?” Felix repeated, and this time, his voice really did sound as though he’d never spoken the name before.
“Do you know her?” Telemachus straightened and raised a hand to his chin, “About this big, and fiery enough to take a city on her own?”
The corner of Felix’s lips twitched. “That sounds right.”
Telemachus shut his eyes, a flood of relief rushing through him. That she was alive. That he could send news back home. “Praise the Father. I did not know she survived.”
“They call her the . She is the most sought-after gladiatrix in Rome. Surely you’ve heard of her?”
Recognition spread through him. He’d seen the advertisements painted on walls around the city.
He should have known she would be called the .
“Ah, yes. That is a name I have heard before.” And somehow that made it worse.
If she’d acquired the name and fame she’d sought, then release would not be an easy thing for her to want. She would resist. “Is she well?”
“She claims to love her life.”
Telemachus sighed. “Then the thought of going home will be difficult for her heart.”
“She’s usually offering to cut mine out.”
“That sounds like her. She has endured many . . . difficulties that are not mine to share.” Telemachus renewed his search in the codex, sliding his finger down a column of names and turning a page, muttering her name under his breath until he came to the final page.
He made a mark beside her name. “Lost no more.”
“And Wulfula.” Felix blurted the name as if he had a sudden burst of remembrance.
Telemachus wished he hadn’t. God forgive him. There was grace for everyone, was there not? God had extended it to him, of all people, so why should he withhold it from the most vile human being he’d ever laid eyes on? Second most vile, he amended, and remorse burned like acid in his throat.
He’d spent his years as a gladiator dreaming of the day he would return home and redeem his enslaved mother from the monster who’d fathered him.
Imagining that moment of revenge and redemption had fueled the strength and stamina to keep fighting, even though he hated how the violence tried to shape him into a cruel man like his father.
But when he’d finally returned, his mother was already dead.
And vengeance had only landed him in a tavern gutter.
“Wulfula is in the Ludus Gallicus?” The words emerged stiff and careful.
Felix nodded.
“With Adel?”
Understanding shifted across Felix’s face followed by an expression that mirrored Telemachus’s own feelings for the man. “The gladiators are usually kept separate from the gladiatrices unless they’re under supervision.”
Usually. A thin word of assurance. His prayers for Adel and the other women would grow more specific after today. And his rescue efforts would double.
“If I got you a heart, could you rescue another?”
“I don’t know.” Felix bit the side of his lip, considering. “Perhaps. But the pig heart only worked because Sergius was too drunk to help me.”
“I don’t know that I should praise the Lord for that, but part of me wants to.”
Felix chuckled and sobered as quickly. “If I can get more, conjure a plague or something, what is your capacity?”
Telemachus shrugged. “Many of the monks here have been rescuing abused slaves for years. They’ve set up a network to ensure they cannot be found and brought back. But we’ve only recently started using it for the Visigoth captives. How many more could we expect from you?”
“All ludi face off in the Ludus Magnus soon. Numbers will all depend upon the injuries.” Felix squinted in thought.
“I have a gladiatrix with a head injury now. Perhaps I can convince her to leave. If the run-ins with the trident continue, Gaiseric may be ready. Ruso is ready in heart, but he has no injuries to justify seeing me.”
“Adel?”
A flimsy hope, confirmed when Felix shook his head.
“I don’t know that she would leave. Though the harder thing might be gaining her trust.”
He’d feared as much. “Be patient with her. The sharpness of her tongue disguises a shattered heart.”
Felix said nothing. But it was the kind of silence that said he’d known this already. “What happens if we can’t free enough captives to stop Alaric?”
That was a question he and Gaius had debated late and long. What good would it be to risk their lives rescuing a handful of slaves if they still lost the city to a Visigoth revenge campaign?
“I don’t know if he can be swayed,” Telemachus admitted. “But we have to try.”
But perhaps it was not Alaric they should set their sights on.
There were two men playing at power here, and if they could not convince the one to relent, perhaps they might influence the other.
He’d been mulling over the option for a while now; each time he thought it through, it became more solid.
More viable. He’d met Honorius on several occasions.
Had been brought in to fight for a birthday celebration when the boy couldn’t have been more than five.
It had been one of Telemachus’s last fights.
He could still recall the slack-jawed wonder on the boy’s face as he’d watched and mimed Telemachus’s every move in the ring.
“I think . . . I must go to Ravenna.” Telemachus closed the book of names with a resolute thump, his voice growing in volume and certainty as he spoke.
“To seek an audience with Emperor Honorius, convince him to see reason, if not mercy. If he will not release the captives to Alaric, he must relent this public humiliation of them.” The more he spoke, the more clearly he saw the mission.
“Will he see you?” Felix frowned and raised a palm. “I mean no disrespect but you are . . .”
Telemachus lifted a shoulder with an understanding nod. “You are right. He may not meet with an unknown monk, but he will allow an audience with the Battering Ram of the East. Perhaps my old life was preparation for such a time as this.”
Not even he could question that. Scripture proved time and again that God had used broken lives to save His people. But it also proved that the hearts of rulers could be stubborn and hard.
“And if he will not listen?” Felix dared to question.
“Then we will adjust our position, and attack accordingly.”