Mark of the Thief (9 page)

E
ventually, Felix led me to his home, a small wooden box behind a loud tavern and within perfect view of a much larger, fancier building called the Ludus Magnus, where the gladiators received their training. Felix gazed around the spare furnishings of his home and sighed. “It isn’t much, but it’s what I’ve been given.”

Maybe it wasn’t much to him, but I had trouble believing an entire room had been granted to only one man. One day, I would achieve something like this for myself. I would have my own four walls.

Felix picked up a tunic from his table and handed it to me. It was no fancier than my current one, but it was clean and would hide the mark on my shoulder.

“Thank you,” I said, already changing out of my old one. I couldn’t wait to be rid of it.

Felix next went to a cupboard and pulled out some drink, which he poured for me, and some bread and cheese. He placed them on a small table and then invited me to sit beside him on the floor. “Please,” he said, motioning toward the items. “Have all you want.”

All I wanted was everything he had set out, and more. But I didn’t reach for any of it. Not yet.

“Why are you helping me?” I tried not to sound as suspicious as I felt. “None of the other slaves are here.”

“Is that how you see yourself, Nic, as a slave?”

“Why does it matter how I see myself?” I folded my hands together. “You bought me. You ordered me to cage up a griffin who’ll go to her death in two days, and I obeyed, because you own me.”

Felix hesitated a moment before cutting a slice of cheese, which he held out to me. I popped a piece into my mouth. It was one of the most delicious things I’d ever eaten, and I quickly ate the rest. He cut me a second slice, thicker than the one before, and offered it, but this one I held in my hand. None of this made any sense. Slaves were never treated so kindly by their masters.

Then it became clear. Felix set down the knife and said, “I want to see that bulla now.”

Rather than answer, I ate the second slice of cheese. Not necessarily because I wanted it, but because I needed time to figure out what to do. I couldn’t allow him to take the bulla from me. And I wouldn’t let him give it to Radulf who seemed to know things about this bulla that I didn’t. If Felix intended to take it, how much of a fight would it require to stop him?

But refusing him didn’t exactly solve my problems. Maybe I lacked enough good sense to keep from stealing the bulla in the first place, but now that I had, I also had to acknowledge that I’d waded into waters that were far over my head. I needed his help. After a little maneuvering with my arm, I withdrew the bulla from beneath the tunic and held it up for him. I hadn’t looked directly at the amulet since hiding it. Now I realized the faint glow that had been there the first time I saw it was still there. I started to remove the bulla, then left it around my neck, just to be clear that it was mine. Which really, it wasn’t.

Felix leaned over and held the bulla in his hands. I waited for him to comment on its warmth or the vibration whenever it was touched directly, but he said nothing and didn’t even seem to feel the difference between this and any other object. Even the glow seemed to escape his attention. He merely brushed a finger over the initials carved on the front and the griffin on the back, then let it fall back to my chest.

“Do you know who that belonged to?” he asked.

“Caesar,” I mumbled. “It was his.”

“Did you know that Caesar used to claim he was a descendent of the goddess Venus?”

For some reason, that struck me as funny. “Such a powerful emperor claimed to come from the goddess of love?”

“Also the goddess of military victory. If Caesar was telling the truth about Venus, then he would have been more than a simple human. He may have even had some of her powers. What do you think about that?”

It wasn’t up to me to believe or doubt him. Nor could I see how it mattered. Caesar had been dead for almost three hundred years. Unless … unless he had become a god, one of the immortals. Unless he was alive enough to whisper warnings from inside a sealed cave. I had not stolen the bulla from Radulf. I had stolen it from Caesar.

I nodded and forced out the words that sat like a lump in my throat. “Yes, I believe that.”

“Good, because it’s true. Venus is the mother of all Romans. She smiled upon Caesar more favorably than any other Roman before or since. And even when he was young, she gave him a way to draw upon the powers of the gods.”

My fingers wrapped around the bulla. I was barely able to comprehend the full meaning of what he was saying. “This came from the gods?”

“Straight from Venus’s mighty hand to his. When Caesar was alive, this bulla gave him wealth, brought him military victories, and provided him with the power to unify Rome and become the strongest emperor the world has ever known. But he began to believe too much in himself, rather than in Venus’s power. His journals boast of his own abilities, not hers. In his arrogance, he removed the bulla and it became lost. Without the bulla, Venus’s protections gradually abandoned him. Soon after, he was murdered by his own senators.”

“My mother told me about that, sir. Only a few months after the assassination, a comet appeared in the skies for seven full days, bright enough it could even be seen in daylight. The people said it was Caesar’s soul, rising to join the other gods.”

“They called it the Divine Star. But its journey did not end with Caesar’s death.” Felix pointed to my shoulder. “That is the mark on your back.”

I leaned forward, certain I had heard him wrong. Was he saying that Caesar himself had marked me? Why?

Felix rested his arms on his legs and looked directly at me. “When I held that bulla, I felt nothing. But your hand is rarely an inch from it, and even now, you can’t let it go. Tell me, is there any magic left in the bulla?”

My heart pounded. I wanted to lie to him. A convincing lie would allow me to eat the rest of his food in peace, and then go back to Caela’s side. The right lie would end this conversation and any special interest in me. The problem was that I had more questions than ever before, and only the truth would get me any answers.

So I nodded. “There’s some magic left, but not much. I can feel it, but that’s all. Maybe when Caesar put the bulla aside, Venus’s power left it.”

“Or maybe the gods have waited three hundred years for someone else to pick it up. Someone with Caesar’s mark on his back perhaps. You got that mark from the griffin? She is a creature of the heavens, you know. Only something born of the gods could give you their magic. The magic is stronger than when you first felt it, correct?”

I couldn’t deny that. But stronger wasn’t necessarily a good thing. I hadn’t told Felix about the whispers in the cave, warning of the curse that came with this bulla.

Felix clasped his hands and said, “You come to Rome at a dangerous time. The foundations of our empire are crumbling, and we are so large that if we collapse, the entire world may fall with it. For centuries, the barbarians have run in fear, but now they gaze at our walls and see cracks have formed. We are not as strong as we once were.”

I pressed my brows together and tried to absorb everything he was saying. Having seen the greatness of Rome, it seemed impossible that it could ever fall. If it did, I couldn’t imagine anything but darkness would replace it.

Felix continued, “Emperor Tacitus can see the cracks in the empire, but he doesn’t know how to fix them. If only the gods would help him, but they have been silent. If he had a touch of their power perhaps …”

Felix’s voice drifted off as his eyes fell to the bulla. I wrapped my fingers around it, letting the vibrations travel up my arm.

“Sir, whatever you think I can do with this bulla, I can’t. I certainly can’t use it to save an empire.”

“Can you use it to save yourself? Because people have been searching for that object since Caesar’s death. Some want it to expand this empire, others want to destroy it. And if they know you can use it —”

“But I can’t use it! I’m nobody. Just a slave —”

“A slave who happens to be holding the most powerful magic the empire has seen since the days of Julius Caesar! And you’re right, Nic. You are nobody to this land. No one will fight a war to save you. No one will care if you fall. And if the enemies of this land surround you, even with that bulla, you will have no chance against them on your own.”

I felt dizzy. “No one knows I have it. Or even that it’s been found.”

“Not yet. But how long can something like this remain a secret? Do you think anyone would hesitate to kill you in order to get that bulla?”

My head was already swimming, but I croaked, “Then I will throw the bulla away. Destroy it!”

“Something created by the gods will not be destroyed by a mere human. Besides, if you are captured by the enemy, how much torture can you endure before you convince them it’s truly gone?”

This was what Valerius had warned me about. I was in a great deal more trouble than I realized. Because keeping the bulla would destroy my life. And getting rid of the bulla couldn’t save it.

“What should I do, then?” I asked.

Felix smiled. “Give it to Emperor Tacitus. Let him bear this burden for you. He can protect the bulla, and use it to destroy our enemies.”

“How? You can’t feel the magic. If he can’t either, then it’ll do him no good.”

“He believes the leader of his armies, General Radulf, will know what to do.”

“Radulf?” I shook my head. “He’s the enemy, Felix. He tried to get this bulla for himself. He would use it against the emperor, against all of Rome!”

Felix leaned forward. “How do you know that?”

“I heard him speaking to one of his men. He intends to destroy the empire!”

Felix waved a hand in the air. “We’d better hope to the gods that you heard wrong. General Radulf is extremely powerful. If he were to turn against Emperor Tacitus, that would be a cause for concern. But so far he has remained loyal.”

“He said he would crush this empire in his fist. Does that sound like loyalty to you?”

Felix pressed his lips together and frowned. “This will be our plan, then. Keep that bulla until after the games in two days — I suspect you’ll need it to control the griffin. But after the games, I must ask you to present it to the emperor. It will save your life, and save all of Rome.”

I clutched the bulla even tighter. I had stolen it from an emperor and no doubt it should be returned to an emperor. But if there was truly magic inside it, then I was starting to suspect it had begun to run through me as well. I couldn’t separate myself from the bulla any more than I could divide the two halves of my body.

Felix, however, seemed to consider the matter settled. He glanced out his small window and said, “It’s getting late. We’d better get you back to the venatio before anyone begins asking questions.”

He returned me to the ramp leading underground and sauntered away as if all was well. As if we didn’t just have a conversation that I knew in my heart would change my life, and possibly the fate of the entire Roman Empire.

Somehow, no matter how tired I already was, I doubted I would get any rest that night.

A
s expected, it was a long night. I stayed right outside Caela’s cage, talking softly to her whenever she stirred, and assuring her everything would be all right, though by now I knew otherwise. While she slept, I began fitting together an escape plan, a solution for everyone. If I left Rome with the bulla, Radulf would never get it from the emperor, and the emperor could not take it from me. And I would save Caela’s life.

Admittedly, a few details still escaped me. I needed a way to go back for Livia, which would be dangerous. Beyond that, how was I to free Caela from her locked cage? Although she had already torn the gold nugget free from its chains, the thick metal bars would be too much even for her.

By morning, my plan was no clearer than it had been the night before. I was put to work feeding Caela and then assigned to feed some of the other animals too. Although I had doubted it was possible, the tunnels smelled worse than they did the day before. I asked about mucking out the animals’ cages, but the older workers said it would be easier after the games. I knew what that meant and it made me sick to my stomach.

I spoke to each animal as I fed it and was surprised to find each one looking directly back at me. I’d never seen animals behave this way before. Either that, or they had never behaved this way to
me
. The animals weren’t given much food — they were supposed to arrive in the arena hungry, and mean. When nobody was looking, I added to their rations. Especially to Caela’s. If I had to handle her, she was the last animal I wanted to be hungry.

After morning chores, Felix appeared and motioned me over, almost like he was in a panic. His face was lit with anger. “How does the Senate know about you?” he sputtered. “I’ve told nobody but the emperor, and he’s told nobody at all. Who did you tell?”

“Nobody!” And I didn’t particularly appreciate his accusation, considering that I was the clear loser should anyone find out about the bulla. “What happened?”