Chapter XXI
XXI
ADEL RECOGNIZED THE DOMUS immediately from the manicured gardens and the way her stomach dipped in dread.
The man who’d hired Adel tonight was the same she’d noticed in the stands weeks ago who’d hired her to be pitted against Vesuvia.
Normally she ignored the men who came to watch the training, but this one had kept moving seats, edging closer and closer to the ring, like a lion on the hunt, until he sat in the front row, devouring the female fighters with a ravenous gaze.
He’d made her skin crawl, and it had taken every bit of willpower to block him out.
He’d handpicked his fighters for this evening’s matches, same as he had the last. Adel from the Ludus Gallicus, and Vesuvia from the Ludus Magnus, outfitted in fiery red and orange, gold jewelry polished to a molten sheen.
A rematch in every way except one. This time there was no winner chosen in the side room, no money changing hands.
This would be a true fight. Victor unknown.
They were made to parade about the room, endure grasping hands and sneering insults at their lack of proper femininity, and then recline on dining couches in the middle of the room, eating sparingly and shooting daggers at each other with their eyes. For the show. It was expected.
When the time came for sweets and spiced wine, the gladiatrices were escorted to a side room where their trainers stripped off the cheap jewels and short tunics and replaced them with armor.
Adel said nothing as she shrugged out of the blue fabric and lifted her arms to allow the armorer to outfit her with the usual small breastplate, fasicae, and manica. She accepted her gladius and scutum with a quick glance across the room. Vesuvia was outfitted in similar fashion.
The armorer pushed her toward the door.
Adel hesitated. “What about the helmet?” She peered into the armor chest and saw nothing.
“He specifically requested no helmets. Said Jovan owed him something extra after the blood last time.”
Adel bit the inside of her cheek. Imagine hiring gladiators to fight and then pitching a complaint because they had the nerve to be injured and bleed.
She gave a sharp nod and tried to channel the warming frustration into something useful.
It was not uncommon to request a non-helmeted fight.
The close crowd wanted to see expressions.
Fear, anger, pain, triumph—and also to be sure that the fighters they hired were the ones in the makeshift ring.
Vesuvia paused at the door and twisted toward Adel with a tight smile. “Let us hope your backside doesn’t ruin this match like last time.”
Adel raised a brow. “I thought you would thank me for letting you experience what a win tastes like. They happen so rarely for you.”
Vesuvia lifted her chin and stepped through the door with a swing of her hips. The room erupted in suggestive whistles and approving applause. Adel took a breath, trying and failing to calm the wild thumping of her pulse.
“She’s only here for her body.” The handler’s voice rumbled in her ear as he watched Vesuvia leave. “You’re here for your skill.”
The cheers for Vesuvia died down, and the trainer put a hot hand to Adel’s lower back and pushed her toward the door.
“Take her down. Make the ludus proud.”
The roar of the room echoed in her ears as Adel emerged.
She breathed in the excitement, the thrum of anticipation, allowing it to fill her veins with energy.
Her name hummed on the lips of the spectators, approval and anticipation shining in their eyes.
This was the part she loved, the part where she knew they loved her.
She let it fill her, like a cup full of cracks.
Brimming today, empty by morning. But she wouldn’t dwell on tomorrow.
The crowd parted slightly, allowing her a path to the ring in the center of the room, but not a wide enough one to allow passage that was free of grasping hands. She inwardly recoiled, hearing already the victorious shouts of those who had touched her.
Armor up. Feel nothing.
Poles and green cords marked a small ring. Tight, but workable. She took it in in a moment. Vesuvia already stood at the other end facing her. Waiting. Fire burning just below the surface of her eyes.
Adel stepped into the ring and the entrance was roped off behind her, the cluster of spectators pressing close. She angled her body to face Vesuvia, spreading her feet and adjusting the grip on her gladius.
“I have a special gift for you, my friends.” A man’s voice rose above the hum of excitement, drawing Adel’s gaze as well as those of the guests.
The dominus, their host, stood at the head table, a goblet of wine raised in a toast. He held himself like a falcon, an illusion of rest in his stance.
Left foot casually extended, but his weight resting on his right where he could launch himself forward in a split second.
It was the stance of a fighter. Adel could believe it of him.
Perhaps from the glint in his dark eyes, or perhaps in the way his wife sat stiffly beside him, like a silken rabbit afraid to move under the watchful eye of a hunter.
“I give you the and Vesuvia for your viewing pleasure!”
A cheer rose at the proclamation.
“Wine and cakes are served. Please find your seats and we will feast and witness the spectacle.”
The crowd receded like a wave from the shore, and a rush of gooseflesh prickled over Adel’s skin in the wake.
On full display for all to see. She tried to put the thought of hungry eyes and greedy hands out of her mind and focus on Vesuvia.
She was nearly the same height as Adel, but more slender.
Perhaps the gladiatrices at the Ludus Magnus were not fed as well as those at the Ludus Gallicus.
Adel raised her sword in salute to their host and Vesuvia followed suit, voices mingling as they spoke the traditional words: “Those about to die salute you.”
A lie if she’d ever spoken one. She saluted no one, and she wasn’t about to die.
Adel made the mistake of meeting the dominus’s sharp eye.
His brows lowered. Did he sense her defiance?
Or was there something else simmering beneath?
She shifted her focus to Vesuvia and loosened her knees, lowering into a ready stance.
Her opponent made the first move. Her hair, tied into a tail on top of her head, was dyed a flaming shade of orange. It streamed behind her like the tail of a comet, a river of lava. Adel’s costumer would have had a fit over the way it set a grayish tint to Vesuvia’s skin.
Adel caught the strike with the top edge of her scutum and shoved upward. Vesuvia pulled her own shield close to her body and blocked Adel’s swing.
They were mediocre moves. The opening sequence of every beginner gladiatrix—and by the firm set of Vesuvia’s mouth and Adel’s memory of prior matches, a trick. Adel knew she could best her, but the orange-clad gladiatrix would not go down easily.
Adel played the game, meeting her gladius blow for blow.
Steel clashing in her ears. Though Vesuvia’s skills were middling compared to the male trainers Adel worked with, her opponent moved her body with the fluid smoothness of a sensual dancer.
No wonder the dominus had chosen her. She would win over the crowd of half-drunk men if she could not win the match.
And let Vesuvia have them; Adel would gladly be rid of the greedy hands and eyes, so long as the win would be hers.
One more victory to her record would surely make Jovan take notice.
And if not notice, perhaps it would guilt him instead over the way he’d brushed her off in front of the magistri.
Her bare feet screeched against the marble tiles as she stepped backward in a three-strike retreat, then she shifted her weight and rammed her scutum forward, allowing room to advance.
Back and forth across the little ring, the fight a choreographed dance of shuffling feet and swinging arms that would go on and on unless someone changed the rhythm.
A bead of sweat trickled down her temple, stinging her eye and blurring her vision.
The gladii met in a clatter and held, each pressing against the other’s blade.
Adel slammed her scutum against Vesuvia’s and shoved her backward.
Vesuvia’s expression darkened, the flare of anger and exertion snaking across her chest and up her neck.
She stumbled back a step, then two, until she regained her footing and lunged forward.
Adel sidestepped the blow and spun around the gladiatrix, whose momentum sent her reeling toward the edge of the ring before she corrected and swung around, barely raising her scutum in time to block Adel’s next strike.
Had they fought long enough to satiate the client? Adel dared to cast a glance toward the dominus. He no longer reclined on his couch but rather sat at the edge, leaning forward, as if he might leap out of his seat and join them in the ring any moment. His gaze narrowed on her.
Time to finish this.
Adel forced Vesuvia into another shuffling retreat before leaning back at the last moment as if to allow an advance.
As Vesuvia’s leading leg came forward, Adel swiped it out from under her and landed a blow that sent her gladius skittering across the paving stones.
The crowd roared as Vesuvia landed on her back.
Gasping for air, Adel smeared her forearm across her forehead before raising her gladius in a victor’s salute.
Vesuvia’s handlers appeared and hauled her to her feet, escorting her from the ring.
Oh, but the room had grown stifling hot. Like fighting in the bathhouse steam room. Adel fought a wave of envy that Vesuvia could escape it. And yet, for the sake of another victory, for the love of the crowd, she could endure a few moments more.
The dominus stepped into the ring and Adel lowered her sword and bowed toward him.