Chapter 9
The day after Ferox nearly strangled the man he was supposed to be teaching, he parried the clumsy thrusts of Achilles’s wooden sword with rote, mindless movements.
The novice wasn’t yet skilled enough to occupy more than a portion of Ferox’s attention when sparring.
Which was unfortunate, given that Ferox could use some distraction.
The specter of last night’s dream was far too fresh.
In the dream, he’d been standing on the banks of the Styx, icy water lapping at his feet. The sky above was both starless and moonless, a layer of impenetrable black. It didn’t feel like being outside on a dark night, but instead had a stifling quality, like heavy fabric.
On the other side of the river, Hector stood, garbed in a black tunic that grew wispy and insubstantial as the hem swirled around his knees. Besides the tunic, he looked as he had when Ferox last saw him. Covered in blood. Skull bashed in. One eye a mangled, gaping hole.
Ferox had always assumed that once a dead man crossed to the underworld, all his wounds would be healed. Seeing Hector like this, wounds as fresh as if they’d just been inflicted, rattled him. Was it possible that Hector would suffer these wounds for eternity?
Two words resounded in Ferox’s skull as he gazed at his friend. Your. Fault.
Hector wasn’t speaking, but the words bore his voice, the lilt of his Germanic accent.
Now, hours later while sparring with Achilles, Ferox could still hear those words. They echoed in his mind like the tolling of a bell. He dealt an extra-hard strike to Achilles’s shield, hoping the noise would drown them out. The novice toppled backward and landed on his rear with a curse.
Ferox stepped back, giving Achilles time to pick himself up. Across the training ground, Jason sparred with Lea, chatting amiably. Jason liked to talk as he practiced, and Lea flashed a rare grin in response to something he said.
For a moment, Ferox debated asking them what they thought about Hector and if he might still be suffering in the afterlife.
He hadn’t let himself mention Hector since his return.
Both Lea and Jason seemed to have mourned their friend and moved on, in a way Ferox couldn’t.
Because it wasn’t their fault Hector had died.
With Lea, there was another reason Ferox hesitated to mention their lost friend.
Ferox had long suspected that something more than friendship had grown between Hector and Lea, but he’d never dared confirm it.
He might be brave enough to face death in the arena, but he was decidedly not brave enough to ask Lea about her intimate affairs. Especially after Hector’s death.
As for Jason, his grief had taken the most practical shape.
Jason had pulled strings to face Hector’s killer in the arena and dispatched the man with the swift efficiency their friend had been denied.
Ferox wished he’d been the one to exact justice.
Maybe that would have soothed his guilt.
But at the time, Ferox had still been recovering from the minor injury that led Hector to fight in his place, so Jason was the one to avenge the killing.
Achilles was on his feet again, so Ferox positioned himself for another bout, pausing to correct the novice’s starting stance.
As they sparred once more, Ferox discarded the notion of mentioning Hector to his friends.
This was his burden to carry. Speaking to Lea or Jason about it would only reopen the wound, and this time, he could at least spare his friends that.
In the following weeks, Ferox threw himself into the project of training Achilles.
The novice wasn’t hopeless. His height and his left-handedness gave him a distinct advantage, and though he loved to complain about the tiniest things that bothered him, like a splinter from the wooden sword or chafing from his greaves, he seemed to take the training seriously.
Ferox intentionally went easy on him; since Achilles would fight another novice who matched his negligible skill level, it was more important to build mental and physical stamina to endure a longer fight than for Ferox to vanquish him in three thrusts of the sword.
They drilled endlessly. Ferox mixed bouts of sparring with exercises that would build strength, like running laps and lifting weights.
Teaching refreshed his mind of all the things he’d forgotten in his eighteen months of absence, and the hard training prepared his body as well.
He still worried he’d lost too much skill, but he’d soon find out.
Both he and Achilles were scheduled to fight on the opening day of the games.
Velia often observed their sessions, likely eager to see how her novice’s training was progressing.
He could always feel a prickle on his skin when she was watching.
It distracted him, but there would be ten times the distractions in the arena itself.
He could handle one small woman who made his skin tingle with awareness.
At the end of one long day, two days before the games opened, Velia hung back after Ferox dismissed Achilles. The training area had quieted, most of the gladiators having disappeared to clean up before the evening meal.
Velia glanced in the direction Achilles had gone. “Do you think he’s ready?”
Ferox swiped a scratchy cloth over his face and neck, mopping up the sweat that had gathered. “Ready enough not to completely humiliate himself.”
She handed him a waterskin. “You should give yourself more credit. You’ve worked wonders with him. I know he’s not the easiest to deal with.”
Her praise made a strange, warm feeling rise within him. He took a long swig from the waterskin. “He could be worse. He’s like one of those little dogs that yaps and yaps but never bites.”
Velia chuckled. “Those little white beasts that patrician ladies carry around? Gods, I’d pay a fortune to pit one of them against Nyx in the arena.”
Ferox snorted. “It would be a bloodbath.”
She reached out to take the waterskin from him. Their fingers brushed, and suddenly Ferox was back in that dingy alley, his arms full of her slight form, his senses overwhelmed by her closeness.
He jerked his hand back, but she hadn’t grasped the waterskin yet, so it fell to the dirt. They both bent at the same time to retrieve it, and their heads smacked together.
“Ouch!” Velia yelped and stumbled back, pressing a hand to her face.
Without thinking, he reached for her. Dis, what if he’d injured her? He’d broken men’s noses with his forehead before. His hands closed around her slim shoulders as he anxiously inspected her face for any signs of injury. “Are you all right?”
She blinked up at him, lowering her hand from her face. “Fine.” She’d tensed for a moment when he touched her, but now he felt her relax beneath his hands, her muscles growing supple.
He should let her go. He would, right this instant.
But his hands were still on her. He couldn’t seem to move them.
She gazed up at him. The fading light caught her blue-gray eyes, glinting like polished steel. Her lips parted, and he felt her body give an almost imperceptible lean closer to his.
Oh no. She was going to kiss him again. Right here in the middle of the ludus, where anyone could see. And he was powerless to stop her. She held him frozen, entranced by the wanting in her eyes, the heat of her body. She was a siren, without need of song to bewitch him.
Heavy footsteps sounded nearby, and finally Velia broke her gaze away from his. He found the will to release her, and she stepped back hurriedly as Achilles trudged toward them, on his way to dinner. He glanced at them with a raised eyebrow, but said nothing. Wordlessly, Velia followed him.
Ferox was relieved at the interruption. After all, the last thing he should be doing was kissing his manager’s niece in the middle of the ludus.
Yes, this ache that spread over him at her absence was definitely relief. Not longing, not hunger. Just relief, he told himself as he headed to the barracks.
The next day passed in a blur of final preparations for the opening of the games.
Velia was kept busy seeing to last-minute repairs to armor, collecting outstanding fees for tomorrow’s matches, and other tasks for her uncle.
She relished the activity, as it gave her little time to worry about Achilles’s first fight.
Finally, the business of the day was done. As dusk set in, she joined the rest of the ludus for the customary banquet held the night before the games opened.
The banquet took place outside in a public square, with tables and couches arranged beneath a red awning.
Torchlight flickered on glassware and silver, and the noise of conversation, laughter, and the occasional drinking song resounded against the walls of the nearby buildings.
This way, eager watchers could get an early look at the gladiators as they glutted themselves on food and drink.
For once, their restrictive diet was lifted, and meat, fish, and poultry were in never-ending supply.
In a break between courses, Velia rose from the couch beside her uncle and meandered around the perimeter of the space, stretching her legs. Her gaze lit on Achilles, his plate piled high with sausages, duck legs, oysters, and other delicacies.
She slid into the empty spot next to him. “You’re going to make yourself ill.”
Swiftly, she removed about half the food from his plate and dumped it onto the plate of his neighbor, who was deep in conversation with someone on his other side and didn’t notice.
“Hey!” Achilles protested.
“You’ll thank me when you’re not sleeping in the privy.” She didn’t begrudge the fighters their indulgences, but she wouldn’t take any chances with Achilles’s health tomorrow.
He glowered at her and pulled his plate closer, curling a defensive hand around it to ward off further incursions.
She distracted him from his irritation with a question. “The, er, woman I found for you. Was she all right?” The courtesan’s first visit had been yesterday, a reward for the effort Achilles had put into his training.
“She had all the necessary parts.”
Velia grimaced. “Keep talking that way and you’ll have girls lining up from here to the Palatine to fall into your bed.”
He rolled his eyes, then sank his teeth into the one duck leg remaining on his plate.
Velia was already tiring of talking to him, so she rose and sought a more pleasant dinner companion.
There was room next to Ferox, and she didn’t hesitate to slide onto the couch beside him, tucking her feet beneath her.
He wore a light blue toga for the occasion, and while he did look quite dignified, she preferred the sweaty, bare-chested version she’d become accustomed to seeing as he trained with Achilles.
Ferox’s plate was filled with only a moderate array of crispy chickpeas, flatbread, cheese-stuffed olives, and skewers of roasted vegetables. She raised an eyebrow. “You’re not having any of the meat?”
He shrugged. “Doesn’t agree with me.”
She grabbed his wine cup and looked inside. The wine was blush pink, well-watered. “You’re hardly drinking, either.”
Another shrug. “I don’t want a headache tomorrow morning.”
She stretched out on the couch next to him. She wasn’t used to dining on couches, and lying next to him like this felt oddly intimate—as if they were in bed together, not at a banquet.
In her experience, even the most seasoned gladiators strove to distract themselves the night before a match, and that distraction usually fell into three categories: food, wine, or women. Often all three. But Ferox wasn’t glutting himself on food or wine.
So that left women.
“You’re going to visit a brothel,” she realized aloud. Her stomach lurched. It would probably be the place they’d visited together; the manager had offered him half-price on any girl, after all. He’d be a fool not to take advantage of such a bargain. But the thought of him with any of those women…
He popped an olive into his mouth, chewing and swallowing before speaking. “Maybe,” he said evenly, shooting her a cool sidelong glance. “Why shouldn’t I?”
“Because…” That question required some consideration. To buy time, she reached out to help herself to a handful of chickpeas from his plate.
He looked askance at her pilfering but made no comment.
Because the thought of you with someone else makes me want to break something. Because I’ve wondered what it would be like to lie with you since the moment I met you. Because I haven’t wanted anyone like this…ever?
“Because it would be a waste of money,” she finally said.
He blinked at her. Leaning on one powerful arm, he pushed himself into a sitting position. “What do you—” He broke off to clear his throat, as if it had suddenly gone dry. “What do you mean?”
“Come back to the ludus with me,” she murmured, lowering her voice so none of their neighbors would hear. “Don’t waste your coin on a brothel.”
She didn’t care how brazen she sounded. He might die tomorrow. It was doubtful, but possible. And she couldn’t let him possibly die without taking him to bed.
All the reasons she’d ended their kiss now seemed meaningless. Perhaps it was still dangerous to muddle her relationship with the man she’d hired to shape Achilles into a successful gladiator, but none of that mattered when Ferox was about to face death in the arena tomorrow.
The rapidly shrinking rational part of her brain reminded her he was extremely unlikely to die, based both on his skill and the fact that he was beloved by the people.
But that rational part of her mind was easy to bury beneath the simple fact that she wanted him.
And this time, wanting him wasn’t about defying her parents or chasing a thrill.
It was about him—how she felt when he touched her, the way his presence drew her to linger near him whenever she could.
How many hours had she wasted watching him train Achilles when she could have been busying herself with errands for her uncle?
Ferox met her gaze. The shock faded from his dark eyes, laying bare a hunger that echoed the growing ache of need in her core.
Silently, he rose from the couch and helped her to her feet.
Velia anticipated the others were too occupied with their feasting and carousing to notice the two of them leaving together, but if someone spotted them, she hardly cared.
She had no reputation to protect, and she was no longer beholden to anyone’s ideas about how she should conduct herself.
Without a backward glance, she left the banquet behind, and walked with Ferox to the ludus.