Escapes! (14 page)

Matilda fought the urge to run, to dash through the encampment and be off! But she did not dare quicken her careful pace. She could barely see a few steps ahead in the storm. It would be too easy to stumble on an enemy foot or leg in the darkness. One false step would be their undoing.

Then, out of the corner of her eye, Matilda spotted a sudden movement. She froze and signaled to her knights to stop in their tracks. A figure was moving toward them through the darkness. Matilda prayed they would be invisible through the swirling snow. As the figure drew closer, she could see it was a sentry. But could he see them?

The sentry peered through the darkness, his eyes scanning back and forth in their direction. Matilda stood frozen in place, not daring to speak or move. The sentry blinked as if to clear his eyes, then started walking straight toward her.

The knight at her side silently crouched down and began to creep in a circle around the approaching soldier. As the sentry came closer, his eyes widened — he had seen them! He opened his mouth to shout, but a firm hand clapped over it. While the knight held him from behind, Matilda and her two companions moved swiftly forward.

Making a silent plea with her eyes, Matilda slipped a fistful of coins into the sentry's palm, and placed her finger to her lips. He blinked and nodded slightly.

The white-clad group moved on, faster now. Matilda could feel the wind pick up, and she knew the icy expanse of the Thames lay ahead. They were almost at the riverbank. A moment later Matilda placed a wary foot on the ice, and then her whole weight. It's solid, she thought with relief. She and her knights spread out and crept forward cautiously, testing the ice with each step.

Behind them the silence of the night was suddenly broken by loud shouts and blaring trumpets. Curse him, Matilda thought, the sentry must have raised the alarm! She pressed ahead as quickly as she dared. The wind swept around her as she moved across the frozen water, and she felt keenly how exposed she was — out in the open for everyone to see!

Or perhaps not, Matilda reminded herself. Her only hope was that their white clothes were once again hiding them from their pursuers. Without a backward glance, she kept going, struggling to keep her footing on the ice.

With a surge of relief, Matilda stepped onto the opposite bank. The clamor of enemy soldiers sounded distant now. How remarkable, she thought suddenly. To think I have crossed with dry feet, without wetting any of my garments, the very waters into which the king and his troops plunged up to the neck!

But her odyssey was far from over. Six miles of frozen countryside lay between her and her nearest friends. The four escapers trudged close together for fear of getting lost in the blizzard — through snow and ice, down steep ditches and up treacherous hills. Exhausted and frozen, they stumbled toward Abingdon, where supporters of Matilda's cause gave them horses.

They did not dare rest at Abingdon for long. Mounting their horses, the group galloped to Matilda's stronghold at Wallingford, where her allies welcomed her with astonished joy.

When Earl Robert heard of Matilda's daring escape he rushed to join her. He had been at Cirencester, trying to rally an army of supporters to march to her aid at Oxford. Upon Robert's arrival Matilda sprang forward to greet him, but was stopped in her tracks by the odd smile that played on her brother's features. As he stepped to one side, she saw what he had been hiding behind his back — her nine-year old son, Henry, brought with him from France. No other sight could have so restored Matilda's hopes. As she wrapped her arms around him, the past months seemed to slip away, forgotten.

Once Matilda's getaway was assured, her garrison at Oxford surrendered to Stephen's army. Stephen stayed a while in Oxford, bringing that rebellious part of the country under his control at last. And the townspeople and peasants of the ravaged countryside — always the first to suffer hunger and loss during a siege — began to piece their lives back together.

The chroniclers of the Middle Ages marveled at Matilda's cunning. One wrote, “Certainly I have never heard of any woman having such marvelous escapes from so many enemies threatening her life, and from such exceeding perils.” But for all her cleverness, Matilda was never able to take the throne back from Stephen. In time she was rewarded, though — when her son became King Henry II.

The Gladiator War

Capua, Italy, 73 B.C.

T
HE YOUNG
T
HRACIAN LIFTED HIS SWORD
to ward off the blow. Then another. Sweating now, he dodged around his larger, heavily armed opponent, looking for an opening to make a thrust with his own weapon. The combat was fierce, and the midday sun beat mercilessly upon the two men. Then, lunging desperately forward, the Thracian opened himself to attack. Quickly he swiveled behind his small shield, but it was too late — with a forceful blow his opponent's sword fell across his bare chest.

Panting, the young man stopped and looked down to where the weapon pressed against his skin, but drew no blood. In the heat of the contest, he'd almost forgotten — the sword was wooden.

But in the arena it will be real, he thought, as he let his own wooden blade and shield fall to his side. And I won't get off so easily then.

Standing nearby, his trainer shook his head and spit into the sand. It was his job to turn the slaves assigned to him into gladiators — men who fought each other with weapons in public spectacles. The young man's name was Spartacus, but to his trainers he was just another slave, like the rest of the outcasts who crowded the barracks of the
ludi,
or gladiatorial school.

To Spartacus, it seemed like a lifetime since he was captured by the Roman army in his homeland of Thrace, a land of nomadic shepherds. Bound in chains, he had been taken over sea and land to Rome, to be sold as a slave. Seeing that he was young and strong, his captors forced him to serve in the Roman army for a time, before selling him to be trained as a gladiator.

His story was a common one. As the Roman army conquered the lands around the Mediterranean Sea, more and more prisoners were shipped back to Italy to work as slaves for wealthy Romans. The Roman Republic's demand for new slaves seemed endless — they needed them to farm their huge tracts of land, to shepherd their flocks, to work in their dangerous mines, to entertain them.

And Roman taste in entertainment ran to the spectacular — and the violent. In a warrior state such as theirs, martial skill and courage were highly prized. The strongest and healthiest of the slaves might be bought by a
lanista,
a man who owned and trained gladiators — “men of the sword.” In giant amphitheaters these trained fighters would engage in armed combat for the entertainment of crowds, and the honor of the powerful men who paid for the spectacle.

For even more variety and excitement, gladiators with different fighting styles and armor would be pitted against each other. A lightly armed
retiarius,
holding a trident and a net to entangle his opponent, might face off against a slower, armored
secutor,
whose helmet and large shield offered some protection from the
retiarius
's three-pronged spear.

The rituals of the arena may have been dramatic, but there was nothing staged about the fighting. Contests were often fought to the death. The defeated gladiator's only hope was to appeal to the crowd and the patron of the games for a
missio,
a decision to let him live. But this was granted only if he had fought bravely enough to capture the spectators' sympathy. And they were not easy to impress.

For while the Roman crowds adored the performances, at the same time they held the gladiators in contempt. These fighters were the dregs of society, only slightly better than
bestiarii,
the slaves trained to fight wild animals.

Of course the Romans knew enough to keep a close guard on these men they had trained for combat but doomed to slavery. In the barracks that circled the
ludi
's sandy training yard, the fighters were locked in cells at night, their weapons secured in an armory well away from them.

Still, the Romans weren't unduly alarmed. Everyone knew Rome's army was all-powerful. And these slaves — riffraff from Gaul, Germany, Thrace, Syria. They couldn't be much of a threat.

No one seemed to realize just how desperate Spartacus and men like him were. What could he hope for at the end of his harsh training? After the discipline and punishments of the school barracks, with its stocks and chains? A banquet the night before the gladiatorial games. A few hours before the cheering crowds. What then? Some of his fellow slaves clung to the hope of winning their freedom — they'd heard stories of a few talented fighters who'd been set free. Or maybe they'd survive long enough to become trainers themselves.

But Spartacus knew the chances of that were slim at best. Most gladiators could hope to fight two, maybe three times in the arena before being killed. It wouldn't be long now before he was riding in a cart, on the way to his first combat. His first and perhaps his last. Yet what choice did he have?

Master and slave. It was the way things were, and always would be.

Wouldn't they?

In the days and months ahead, Spartacus would shatter this idea, and others the Romans held dear, forever.

Word quickly spread through the cramped barracks: There's going to be a breakout. Will you come? More and more of the desperate gladiators agreed, until 200 men were in on the secret.

It was the height of summer in the rich city of Capua in southern Italy, the center for gladiator training. For weeks, Spartacus had eyed the gladiators around him, sizing up these men from far-off countries — Thracians like himself, as well as Gauls, Germans, and Syrians. Some were slaves, some condemned criminals, others prisoners of war. But many of them were free-born, and still carried the memory of freedom. It had been easy to convince them to act.

Their scheme was bold and simple: to gather in the training yard, slowly, without raising suspicion. There they would grab the training weapons at hand and rush the guards. With luck they'd overpower them by their sheer numbers. Beyond that they had no plan, and no idea what would be waiting outside for them. For now, getting out was all that mattered.

But on the humid summer evening before the escape, terrible news reached Spartacus: someone had talked. Their master and
lanista,
Lentulus Batiatus, knew of the plan and who the ringleaders were. A local militia was on its way to make an example of the would-be escapers. The gladiators looked at one another helplessly. What could they do?

“We go now,” Spartacus replied firmly, “before the guards lock us in for the night.” He knew they still had a chance if they acted swiftly.

Over half the plotters slunk away to their cells, fearing it would be crazy to plunge ahead now that the plan had been discovered. Those left behind quickly weighed their options. Their weapons were locked in the armory, leaving them defenseless.

“Think!” hissed a Gaul named Crixus, keenly aware that armed officials could be on the grounds at any moment. “Is there nothing to defend ourselves with?”

“The kitchen — we can still get in there!” Spartacus cried suddenly. Storming through the barracks, the gladiators burst into the school's kitchen. They grabbed knives, forks, cooking spits — anything sharp that could serve as a weapon.

Armed now, they streamed out of the kitchen into the moonlit training yard. Barely slowing down, Spartacus stooped to pick up a handful of stones, and hurled them at the startled guards. With cries and shouts the other gladiators followed his example, and the guards raised their arms to shield themselves. In that instant the gladiators rushed upon them with their knives and spits.

In minutes they had broken out of the school and flooded onto the streets of Capua, their hearts pounding.

“Look!” Crixus cried, breathless.

The gladiators stopped in their tracks, openmouthed. Spartacus couldn't believe their luck. Before them were two wagons loaded with gladiatorial weapons, destined for a contest in another city! Seeing the gladiators, the drivers quickly jumped off the carts and ran. The escaped men eagerly snatched up swords and shields and armed themselves.