Wolf’s Empire: Gladiator (69 page)

“… they've witnessed the proofs of my divine power, yet still these Viridians and their allied houses refuse to bow, to accept the inevitable supremacy of House Sertorian, and I know that out there many of their countrymen feel the same way. I'm going to educate these men. I'm going to teach them the lessons I've learned and see if I can discover any potential within them. Now that I've achieved the celestial realm, I'm going to look down on them from on high and burn them from heaven to earth, starting with their gods and priests, then their houses, then their families, and finally themselves. As to the consequences of continued resistance … well, that will be a surprise. We're going to hold a philosophical argument expressed in action. I'll leave it up to you to tell me if they have the right stuff, or if they pale in comparison against Sertorian power, the power we offer freely to those with the sense to seize it.”

“How could this come to pass?” I asked.

“Aquilinus was already poised to strike after the secret of the ambrosia was revealed. It wasn't just the barbarian city you brought down; after that, the whole side of the mountain collapsed and opened up. Aquilinus' hand was forced. He couldn't allow the emperor to get his hands on the ichor or your little friend here.”

“A coup. He staged a coup,” I said. This was a nightmare.

“You know how many dignitaries were on that station?” Julia asked. “The rich, famous, and powerful paid a small fortune for their seats, and now Aquilinus has them all in one place, to take all the wealthy and powerful men in the empire hostage in one fell swoop, including your uncle and Emperor Numerius.”

“But he can't just take over the Rota Fortuna and proclaim himself emperor of the galaxy.” And then it hit me. “It's the same as when he took this world. He launched simultaneous attacks on key Viridian bases throughout our province.”

“Yes, attacks on important capitals all over the empire. Regional magistrates and consuls have been imprisoned or had their homes bombed. And they can't do a damn thing about it. In Rome, the emperor left his idiot cousin Bucco in charge as regent.”

Bucco—that fool Marcus and I had laughed at in the Colosseum when he was thrashed by the Sauromatae.

“It turns out Aquilinus had already bought him with a dose of ambrosia,” Julia finished.

“But the Senate.”

“All the non-Sertorian senators who weren't swayed by Aquilinus' false promises were executed. He announced that since Caligula turned the imperial palace into a whorehouse and gambling den to raise funds for the treasury, it was the least he could do to offer the Senate house for the same purpose. He's had the senators' wives sold to the highest bidders from the Talonite houses and made the Senate floor the center of gambling on the outcome of these new games of his.”

“What of my father?”

“No word of him. I assume he's a hostage with the other spectators aboard the Rota Fortuna. They think you're dead, Accala.”

“I suppose that's something. They won't be looking for me.”

“And they won't be expecting you to ferry Lumen away from here.”

“You're right.”

“The way I see it, we've still got a mission to complete,” Julia said.

“Tell me more about the games. How many survive?”

“I can't tell yet. At least a half dozen Caninines. I only know for certain that Cato and Strabo Flavius were killed by the Ovidians in fighting on the surface before the coup, but I'm not sure if any Viridians made it out of the tunnels alive.”

“They were good men,” I said. That meant Marcus might still be alive. I prayed that Minerva had spared him. “If he's made a successful coup, then why continue with the games? Why not just wipe out the Caninines altogether?”

“I'm not sure,” Julia said. “Perhaps we'll find out when we get out of these tunnels.”

“Can you get me the current broadcast?” I asked. “I need to know what's happening right now.”

“Okay, but now we know the enemy is out there scouting, let's keep it short.”

I leaned in to hear the coverage of the games. Julius Gemminus' commentary was just audible.

“Brocchus Ovidius throws the ball to Marcus Calpurnius Regulus, who fumbles it. It's touched the ground. What ball is it? Wait. Yes, the Temple of Saturn ball, has shattered. That's going to cause some major rape and pillage back in Rome.”

Marcus was alive, thank the gods. But what the hell was going on?

“I don't follow,” I said to Julia. “It doesn't sound like gladiator games. It's like…”

“It's like a game show contest. He's got them carrying out ridiculous frivolities for his amusement. Right now the Caninines are playing against the Talonites in a trigon tournament. I was able to pick up a little of the match earlier on.”

Trigon. I hadn't played it since the Academy. Players took up position at the points of a triangle and hurled the ball at the next player in the chain with all their might, right at him. If the thrower cast too wide and not at the catcher's body, then he lost a point. The catcher had to either catch the ball and then throw to the next player in the triangle with the other hand, or hit and rebound the ball back at the thrower. The catcher who dropped the ball or allowed it to strike the body lost a point. The best players used expensive, decorative glass balls because it raised the stakes and they had the skills not to drop them.

“But none of us are trigon players. We're gladiators,” I said. “What's he thinking?”

“It's to humiliate them. All the Talonite players have been given ambrosia, so they never miss the ball, but none of the gladiators actually seem to be getting killed. It's all about dragging things out so that the Caninines have more time to make mistakes and drop the ball. Each ball has the image of a temple within it. If they drop the ball, Aquilinus has the real temple destroyed, the priests and priestesses raped, tortured, and killed.”

“That sounds familiar,” I said, remembering Crassus' tutorials on
Incitatus.
“The slaughter of priests and priestesses where Aquilinus spurned the gods to avenge his slain father.”

“Right,” Julia responded. “From what I can tell, Aquilinus has instituted a series of historical reenactments that depict his rise to power through the ranks of House Sertorian. This morning the Caninines dropped the first ball, and Aquilinus ordered the destruction of the Temple of Mercury in Londinium, along with twenty thousand clergy. By the time I was able to tune in again, it was midday, and hundreds of temples throughout the empire had fallen. Each time the ball is dropped, Aquilinus dares the gods to strike him down and boasts to the audience they have nothing to fear, that they should embrace the Sertorian future.”

“So just then, the ball Marcus dropped—”

“They'll be destroying the Temple of Saturn in the Roman Forum as we speak,” Julia said.

Gods, what a loss. So many lives, and the buildings—ancient, irreplaceable, almost alive in their own way.

“How has he marshaled the forces to cause such havoc? I can't believe the citizens of the empire stand by and allow such atrocities to take place.”

“It's the citizens who are bringing them about. That's Aquilinus' bargain. He's using the games to leverage support. Those who wish to receive ambrosia, wherever they are in the empire, have to play their part by participating in the death and destruction. Average citizens are tearing the temples apart, brick by brick, joining in the pillaging and rape. Not all of them, mind you, but enough. Led, of course, by the Sertorians.”

“Aquilinus is forcing them to squeeze the trigger on the gun he's got pointed at the empire,” I said. “Then he can say the blood isn't on his hands alone. He's using the games to let everyone know that he's running the show. But high-stakes trigon? It's a farce. The audience won't go for that in place of real blood sport.”

“And not just that. He temporarily paralyzed the Caninine Alliance players and had them stripped and dressed in armor that depicted them as their respective gods. The Viridians have had to dress in women's armor to emulate Minerva, the Calpurnians' armor has onions and turnips attached to depict Saturn's agricultural powers, and the Flavian armor has little wings sticking out the back to symbolize Mercury.”

“Wait. The Viridians dressed in women's armor? And they did it?”

“It was that or be killed.”

Aquilinus was trying to break the surviving Caninines as he tried to break me—transform them, warp them with punishment so they accepted his precepts. Or perhaps he knew they never would bow and whatever nightmarish punishments inflicted on them were purely for the benefit of the audience—a demonstration of what would happen if they didn't comply with Aquilinus' demands.

“Still. That's not like them,” I said. Hell, it'd be funny if it wasn't such a damned nightmare. Viridian men in women's breastplates. How Carbo must have fumed at that. I'd have thought he'd have let himself be struck down rather than be feminized by Aquilinus. It was hard not to feel a sense of bitter irony. It was my own house that fought hardest against my doing anything martial with my life, and now its strongest competitors wore the garb of female gladiators, styled like modern-day Minervas. Aquilinus had a twisted sense of humor. But I could not underestimate him, mad as he was. He was playing for big stakes again—gambling that his strength and the prize he offered by way of the ambrosia would permit him to insult the gods without a single finger of reprisal being lifted by the citizens of the empire. And this was the ultimate insult, the ultimate bait. He knew that if the mob didn't rise up to challenge him over this, then they never would, that the people would accept his rule.

“And the Blood Hawks? Any mention of them?”

“Not a peep. From what I can tell, they're out. Dead from the fall when the mountain was destroyed.”

Good. Whatever was going on up there, I felt certain I could deal with it as long as Licinus and the others had taken a one-way ride to Hades' dark halls.

“I need to get up and outside,” I said. “I have to see what Aquilinus has done with the tournament. I can't formulate a proper strategy without more intelligence.”

“You're going to get us out of this?” Julia asked. “You got us into this. I'll admit not everything that's happened is entirely your fault—the ambrosia and the brainwashing were a lot to bear, and things took a strange turn with these aliens—but you went crazy, Accala, and now you owe your house and your uncle for what went down. You owe me,” she said, holding up her ice hand. “You have a debt of honor, Accala, and I'm gonna make sure that you pay it out in full. From now on, you'll do as I command. I was meant to take over if you went off the rails, and gods, did you go off the rails.”

“You're right.”

“You're agreeing with me? Well, that's a start at least.” She pulled me close to her and whispered, “I don't trust these Hyperboreans. Their city was impressive, but they don't speak, they don't have proper faces. I can't tell what they're thinking.”

“Well, I can, and I promise you, it's nothing diabolical. They just want to get away from here and take the ichor with them.”

“As long as they'll follow you, that's all that matters. Now show me you can follow orders. Kill Crassus now. While you can.”

I looked over at Crassus, coughing and shivering. He hardly looked formidable, and Lumen said there was a reason to spare him. But the Hyperboreans had been wrong before about the cruel nature of Romans, and I couldn't see what use he could possibly be to us in the state he was in.

“He's a serpent coiled and ready to strike, Accala. From what you told me, Aquilinus could take possession of him anytime he likes and endanger our mission. Do it now, then we can move on.”

“No! You'll need me.” Crassus came scuttling across the floor on hands and knees like a cowed dog. How did he hear us? “I do not beg for my life but for this chance to redeem myself before the gods. To serve them. I want to learn. I want to know more. I've made some terrible mistakes, done some terrible things, but it was the proconsul controlling me all along, and my addiction to ambrosia. When they used their needles, it took out all the darkness. There's not much of me left, but it's enough, because for the first time I'm free, just like you. Please, Accala, I want to serve them as you do. I don't want the poisoned ambrosia we've been sipping. I don't want wax wings. I've fallen back to earth, but this time I'll climb toward the gods the right way. I am not worthy to serve them, I am not worthy to serve their servants, these beings of light, and so I will serve you. I'll do whatever you say. Please trust me, there's no more Aquilinus. He's gone.”

“You can't fight,” I said to Crassus. “You're weak.”

He tried to stand up as best he could. His legs were like matchsticks compared to what they were.

“I can.”

“You can't,” I said. “So what use are you to me?”

“I can help you win the audience.”

“I can do that without you. You kept on telling me how good I was at shaping their opinions.”

“I can tell you secrets. Your uncle, he was feeding Aquilinus information all along. Anything you'd tell her,” he said, pointing to Julia, “would be passed on to my proconsul.”

“I'm no traitor!” the redhead said, stepping forward to strike him.

Crassus threw up his hands to protect himself. “I didn't say you were. It was the uncle.”

“I should kill you just for that,” I said. He was still trying to warp and control my perceptions.

“It's true. He wanted the ichor as badly as Aquilinus did. Each wanted to be in control of the raw ingredient for ambrosia. They worked together to keep you moving so you'd find the storehouse the barbarians were hiding.”