In His Arena 1: Slave Eternal (11 page)

Lucan snorted. “If we retire.”

Hektor laid his hand on Lucan’s arm, his blue eyes clear and direct. “When we retire, it is good to have a useful occupation.” He smiled, and those eyes lit up like the morning sky. “People do tend to get tired of old gladiators.”

Lucan stared. “Old? You?”

Hektor laughed again. “Yes, me.”

“No.”

“Rest. I must go for a time.”

“No!” Lucan tugged down on Hektor’s hand until the man bowed his head. Suddenly, Lucan was gazing longingly into Hektor’s eyes, and Hektor was gazing into his.

He almost saw the spark as it jumped between them.

And then Hektor broke away.

“Rest, Lucan.” He pressed his hand on Lucan’s chest and laid him back gently. He looked once more at Lucan, and Lucan knew it was not his imagination that Hektor let his hand linger.

HEKTOR STRODE FROM Healers’ Haven. What was he thinking? Lucan was his charge, his novice, a hired job. Nothing more. And he was a Vulpinius. New or not, Stratos had to have gotten his claws into the boy. There was no way he wasn’t tainted by the slaver-priests of that fell house.

Hektor shook his head, ran his fingers back along the silkiness of his ponytail. He tugged to shake loose any remaining sand from the Theatre. The boy had to be a decoy, some wicked diversion devised by Stratos to see that Hektor’s attention was divided.

He knows I seek entry into the Grand Melee. He knows what I mean to do.

But why would Stratos care?

Frustrated, Hektor lengthened his stride. Never had he understood Stratos and his dark intents. He stepped out onto the tiers of House Actaeon. In these days—the days of the Empress—it did not ride as high as House Vulpinius, but the view was still breathtaking. More than three quarters of the Grand Palestra lay sprawled out in concentric circles below.

The Empress’s Theatre was emptying out.

Dusk was swiftly drawing down, and the crowds would be returning to their homes, leaving behind stray trash, abandoned clay tickets, and parchment programs. In the past, defiling the theatre was a crime punishable by death.

These days, the Empress seemed not to care if the people wanted to defile their own living space.

Arena was a huge walled city, built around the Grand Palestra as its hub. Everything stayed inside—the people, the livestock, even the refuse. Oh, they burned what they could, but it was never fast enough, the quotas allowed each house never large enough. And yet, it was impossible to blame any one group or house for the trash that trickled down to the lower levels of the Palestra. The houses each claimed a tier of the towering city, and each of the seven had at least one area with access to the Palestra.

Pursuing litterers in a city filled with its own refuse would be nearly impossible. In the morning, the noxii would pick through the garbage and ferry what couldn’t be used to the lowest tiers where it would rot, forgotten like the poor who lived in the shadows of the seven great houses.

It was the way of Arena.

Hektor saluted as a group of praetorian guard passed, their pikes glinting in the silver twilight. Their plumed visors made them look more like one of House Lucia’s mechanized contraptions than man. They did the Empress’s bidding without question.

Hektor ducked past and found the huge spiral stair winding down from House Actaeon to the training stables. Lucan would be fine resting where he was.

In my house. What am I doing?
Hektor could not shake the dread in his gut. Bringing a Vulpinius into House Actaeon. He had to be mad. After what Stratos had done to him? Hektor ran a hand along the back of his neck, feeling the expired mark like a tattoo rising with the heat.

The boy had performed well today. He’d shown bravery, courage, leadership.
He could be great. Make a real name for himself.

Hektor shook that thought off.
Stop thinking of him.
The Grand Melee was only two months away. He had never wanted it before. Always content to fight and win, to hear the glory of the crowd screaming his name and then to come back and luxuriate in Leander’s arms, in his presence, while he painted his landscapes of an idyllic countryside.

They’d retire there, Leander had said. After he made his fortune.

A month later he was dead.

Hektor strode past other gladiators, the smells of men exerting themselves, the sweat and blood urging him on, urging him to remember as much as he wanted to forget. Leander’s touch, his kiss, the softness of him beneath Hektor, and the hardness as he pushed into him for the first time in the dark of night beneath a sweltering moon.

He shoved the memories away, but not before a wild thought gripped him.
You could have that again. With Lucan.

No.
He walked into the rack room and took his longspear from its place on the wall.

He had to prepare, to train harder than he ever had. This time, he would not be anyone’s puppet. This time, he would fight for himself and take his opponents down to the Doomsayer’s Abyss with him.

And damn the Empress and her bloody Spectacles.

* * * *

Stratos slipped from the alley between the Healers’ Haven and an array of small merchant booths. So, Hektor took the boy to House Actaeon.
Interesting.
A small smile formed on Stratos’s lips.

He knew Hektor would never step one foot inside House Vulpinius again. Not after what happened with his lover.
Poor Leander.
Stratos shook his head in false ruefulness, and then darkness stole his mirth.
He should not have fucked with what was mine.

In the end, Alession’s Ebon charm had proved stronger than Hektor’s will, stronger than his love.

And while Stratos had reveled in the proof that true love was weak, a fragile thing easily broken, he had to admit… Letting the spell on Hektor burn out just as Leander was breathing his last was probably a touch of cruelty that was beneath even him.

Maybe.
He paused at a merchant cart to sample some salted dates. The savory-sweet taste struck his tongue and made his mouth water.

Alession loved salted dates. Before Stratos realized it, he had purchased more than he could eat. Fool, he chided himself. Tonight, as almost every night, Alession would be dining with her.

He shot a glare at the white-swathed balcony across the way. The Empress.

Hektor Actaeon might have burned out, but he hadn’t outlived his usefulness. After all, he was training the boy, and when the boy won the Grand Melee, he would stand before the Empress to receive his laurels. And then Stratos would invoke the power of the Ebon. Lucan would become his slave. The Empress would die. And Lucan?

Stratos crunched down on another date.

Lives were cheap in Arena.

Chapter Five

FIRST SKIRMISH

Every victory

In the Empress’s Theatre

Brought a gladiator closer

To gaining his name.

—Nefertari Amon Actaeon, of House Actaeon, the Warriors

“Move your feet!” Hektor bulled in, bashing with the shield, staggering Lucan back a pace.

Lucan squinted one eye against the impact and the dust their sandals kicked up. After two weeks of rest, his side was still tender, but that didn’t keep Hektor from putting him through his training paces.

All across the courtyard of the Ludus Magnii, trainers were running their novices through drills and mock-combat scenarios. Some fought with gladius and shield, others with net and trident. Others performed feats of strength, dragging heavy weights of stone behind them as their trainers whipped them faster with their canes.

At least Hektor doesn’t whip me.

The clash of Hektor’s sword against Lucan’s rattled up his arm and made his shoulder ache. The power of the man! Lucan took a moment to drink in the sight of him, muscular and sweating under the sun, stripped to the waist, all that tanned skin. Lucan wanted to run his hands along it, run his tongue along it, go to his knees before Hektor and—

“Stop daydreaming.” Hektor’s admonishment was soft, but his blow was hard.

He knocked Lucan sprawling, but this time, Lucan was ready. He touched one hand to the earth and used it as a pivot point. Spinning with the momentum, he launched back at Hektor. And now he allowed all his frustration and anger to drive him—the bout with Bull Neck, his resulting injury, the brutal training, the fact that maybe, just maybe he was coming to terms with what he wanted.

It had been weeks since he’d been in the arena. Weeks gone by that could have seen him victorious and claiming his trophy, or vanquished and being claimed as the prize. Such practices were natural in the arena.

And yet somehow, Hektor had arranged for Lucan to escape his duty in the Claim. He’d not had to plow Bull Neck’s ass that next dawn.

Secretly, Lucan was glad, grateful.

He didn’t want Bull Neck.

With a sharp battle cry, Lucan launched at Hektor, his passes wild but fueled by anger and passion. He forced the primus palus back to his longspear. In all the times they’d sparred, Hektor had never had to reach for his primary weapon. Instead, he subsisted with a dull short sword, and still every time he defeated Lucan.

Not today.

For the first time, Lucan was on the offensive. He attacked. His sword an extension of his arm, he parried and riposted, advancing toward Hektor and then retreating. It felt like an intricate dance of give and take. Him dancing in, Hektor darting back. The rhythmic cadence of their weapons clashing formed a rhythm like two heartbeats, one catching up with the other.

No. He didn’t want Bull Neck at all. He wanted—

And then his sword was at Hektor’s chest.

Lucan took a deep breath. He’d done it. He’d actually managed to get in on the primus palus.

“Well done.” Hektor nudged the blade from his chest and clapped Lucan on the shoulder. “You are ready for your first solo bout.”

Soft handclapping echoed nearby, taking them both by surprise.

Stratos stepped out from the shade of the portico, a cup in his hand. “Yes, very well done, Lucan. And speaking of your first bout… Come with me.”

“Wh-what?” Lucan stammered, but the look on Stratos’s face brooked no further argument.

“The odds-makers liked what they saw of you in the group bout. They’ve called for your first skirmish.”

Excitement and dread filled Lucan and warred sickly within him. The first skirmish would test whether he was worthy of participating in a full Spectacle, not just those entertainments, those Diversions. A true Spectacle.

“Now?” Lucan’s heart seized.

Stratos chuckled, not unkindly. “Yes. Now.”

Hektor angled his body in front of Lucan, as though to protect him. “Houses are not allowed private first skirmishes, Quaestor Vulpinius.”

Stratos’s smile was cutting, cunning. “Of course not, primus palus. I have arranged something in the Empress’s Theatre. How else shall the odds-makers know how to rank the fighters? And how shall the plebes know how to vote? Dear Elysia in Starshain, the entire system would crumble.” Humor tinged his voice, but his gaze was shrewd on Hektor. “There will be a few spectators in attendance, those who want to see man flesh vie against man flesh, but all for posterity’s sake. It will be nothing like a true Spectacle.”

His smile was rapacious as he turned his attention to Lucan. “That is an honor you must earn, young Lucan. Now gather your weapons and come.”

Lucan scrambled to do so, putting up his gladius for his net and trident. He paused to wipe the sweat from his brow. He didn’t look back at Hektor, but he could feel the primus palus’s disapproval.

Helpless, Lucan followed Stratos as he strode from the courtyards of the Ludus Magnii.

Several of the other novices turned their heads. A few nudged each other knowingly. The first skirmish was no small matter. How a novice fared and how the odds-makers rated him could set the entire course of his arena career.

As they descended from the gladiatorial school to the bowl of the Empress’s Theatre, sunlight fell around them, in golden rays across the tiers of the Grand Palestra. Below, the openings of the various vomitoria tunnels seemed to stretch and yawn open. Novices poured out of them and began to gather on the sands.

Some of the others were already in full bout.

Lucan looked up. The huge awning that normally cloaked the stands and the edges of the theatre was pulled back. The full fury of the sun beat down upon the contenders. Their bodies were already streaked in sweat. Their shouts reached him, the sounds of battle echoing.

“Hmm…” Stratos shaded his eyes to glance at the folded awning. “It would seem Her Imperial Majesty is not so gracious this day. Who would have thought such a thing?” His voice was mild, but his smirk betrayed his sarcasm. Without further comment, he turned back to the stair.

They descended the last tier and made their way toward the final stairwell down into the amphitheatre proper, Hektor trailing them, a dark look on his face.

Stratos grew even more smug, if such a thing were possible. “The odds-makers aren’t supposed to show favor to a novice before first skirmish, but…” He ran a hand through his tousled dirty-blond hair. “They have assigned you five-to-one odds.”

“What?” Lucan could not keep his panic down.

Stratos only shrugged and walked on ahead, leaving Lucan to stare after him.

Hektor’s deep baritone startled Lucan. “Your opponent is favored to win.” The primus palus kept his gaze on Stratos’s back, his sky-blue eyes bright with anger. His expression softened when he looked to Lucan. “Do not let that stagger your resolve. Odds-makers are not always right.”

They were nearing the lower quad, where the stairs came out onto the scorching heat of the theatre. Stray sand blew on the stairs, and Lucan toed through it as he fingered his net, double-checked the cord tied to his wrist. His trident was lead in his hand, his robes too thin, his right arm naked without his grandguard.

In the first skirmish, they were not allowed armor.

Stratos waited at the edge of the amphitheatre. There were thirty or forty rings dotted across the vast expanse of the glittering sand, the arena carved up to accommodate a bevy of novices and weapon styles. Some, Lucan noticed, had special handicaps, like blindfolds or special weight classes where the combatants were matched by size and strength.