Wolf’s Empire: Gladiator (72 page)

I picked the tiny crystals out of my eyes and wiped them from my cheeks. A small glittering cluster of tears shone in the palm of my hand. I'd woken up enough to realize that it was light. I was surrounded by light and I could hear the sound of a sputtering whine—an engine! I was up on my feet in an instant, fearing that we'd been discovered.

“Settle. All's well.” Julia's voice.

Julia was up on a rusted old transport tray, similar to the one that carried us to the contestants' quarters in Avis Accipitridae. The access panel to the engine was raised and Julia was crouched over it, tinkering with its guts, drawing from it the sound that had alarmed me.

We were in a vast cavern lined with rock, and an array of large stalagmites and stalactites jutted out from the ground and ceiling. The sun was rising. Its first light entered the cavern from small shafts high above, concentrating in the crystalline protrusions in the ceiling, from where it was refracted about the chamber again and again until the space was filled with soft light. The good news was we were not exposed. There was no way for anyone outside the mountain to see us.

“Where did that come from?” I asked Julia as I approached her transport.

She pointed behind me, and I turned to see in the far corner of the cavern what the darkness had concealed last night—a vast stockpile of rusty, rotting equipment. It looked like it had been there forever, and now I could smell the source of the mold I detected on the cots.

“Saturnalia came early,” Julia said, and she sounded genuinely pleased, as if all this junk were the finest equipment money could buy. “I don't know if this old engine will even go, it's in such bad shape, but I'm working on it.”

I must have displayed my doubts, because she continued, “It's this hand! It's not only much more sensitive than my other hand, I'm working easily with very fine wiring with very poor equipment, but it also generates its own energy. It's like working with a portable power pack.” She gave a nod of recognition to Lumen. “He's been standing over me, putting things in front of me to experiment on. The hand will take whatever the base function of a tool is and enhance its power and capabilities.” She hefted the arachnoraptor's transmission staff. “With something like this, the sky's the limit. The hand can power it to jam signals, boost signals, maybe even seize command of small ships and vehicles.”

I have put as much power as I could spare into her hand. It is an extension of the power in your pin.
The power I used to heal you and Crassus, to repair Julia's hand, it was all drawn from the energy stored in your pin, Accala. It too is a limited resource. You may use it to heal yourself in an emergency, but only once. Most of its power will need to be reclaimed, a backup if we fall short of energy. For now these are all the resources I can provide. I hope it's of some use,
Lumen said with a flourish toward the pile. It was the kind of move my brother would have made, and it made my heart ache.

“Don't look so despondent,” Julia said. “There are advanced weapons.” She paraded around the pile like a game show hostess, indicating what she'd uncovered. “Ion pistols and rifles. Bombs. Missiles. Swords, armillae, skirmisher parts. There's electronics, fine tools. I removed the blocks on all the armillae, and I can do a whole lot more. And you can do a lot with that,” she said, pointing to the bottom of the pile. I saw him at once. Orbis.

“I went to pick it up for you, but it started spinning as my hand drew near and nearly took my fingers off.”

I rushed to her side at once. Orbis retracted his edge to accommodate my hand, and then I was whole again.

Julia reached down and picked up my most recent suit of armor and pushed it toward me, but I backed away.

“I can't wear those colors again,” I said. “The mock hawk is dead.”

“Some armor, even this armor, is better than no armor. Besides, it might buy us time out there. They might mistake us for Sertorians.”

“No. I won't wear it.”

I was about to ask after Crassus when I spied him a little farther around the corner, with Concretus watching over him.

Crassus was wearing the breastplate of his old suit of armor, black and red, but not the greaves or arm guards. He hovered at the edge of the pile, near the rest of the suit, like a blowfly, dancing from foot to foot.

“I didn't want to put it on,” he said. “But I was so cold. Look, I carved out the red. I've undone the initiation of the precepts.”

He had, too. All of the crimson grooves had been roughly scoured clean. There was blood dripping from his fingers and I saw in his hand a rusty knife that he'd used to do the work. As soon as he saw my eyes upon it he dropped the knife to the cavern floor.

“You need armor,” I said, “and I don't see anything halfway decent here so wear it, but only as long as you remember exactly whom you're loyal to.”

“Yes, of course, of course,” he mumbled, and then burst out loud with excitement. “The gods will transform these weapons into mighty chariots and swords and spears that no one can stand against.”

Lumen just looked at Crassus, and he clapped his mouth shut. He was in awe of the small alien, like a timid schoolboy terrified of saying the wrong thing in class lest his knowledge be found wanting.

“Or not,” he said quietly.

“The gods! Pah!” Julia spat. “Whichever dog barks the loudest, eh, Crassus?”

Crassus avoided eye contact with her, but I could feel the tension between them.

“This is it, Crassus,” I said. “Be lucky you get any armor at all, because you don't get a weapon.”

“But how will I fight for the gods?”

“With your brain, I hope,” I said. “You said you could help us anticipate Aquilinus, and that's what I expect you to do.”

“Yes. Of course.”

I got down on my knees and dug toward the bottom of the pile, looking for some bits and pieces of armor I could cobble together into a suit. What were we going to do with all this junk? Try to find a working ion blaster and give it to Concretus? Even fully kitted out with this rusty gear, we'd hardly be a match for Aquilinus and his newly acquired orbital station.

And then, in among cracked and splintered breastplates and greaves, I found a full suit of battered armor. It was made for a man, but apart from that it was good. It was antique, from the time of the seventh republic, the same period Orbis was forged. Gods only knew how it came to be there. Perhaps it was carried over by some early settler family as an heirloom or souvenir of a past campaign. Instead of being constructed from the hybrid metallic alloys of modern armor, this one had a ceramic base with grooves of lapis negra woven through it in imitation of the bones of a rib cage. I'd never seen anything like it. It had its fair share of dents, but it was solid and useful and bone white in color. It may have been Viridian once upon a time, but any semblance of house colors had long faded away. I strapped it on at once and, aside from the uncomfortable pressure on my breasts against the flat chestplate, it fit well. It didn't take long to find a tattered cloak and worn belt, then ratty gloves and boots to match. The latter being timeworn and slightly moldy but still functional. Julia followed my example and found an old suit of armor that belonged to a legionary from House Atilian, an ancient, lesser house that still had its yellow and black colors. My armilla was there, and I forced Crassus to pass his to Julia—who set up a block on all functions except the shield and a limited-range radio while we watched—and he did so eagerly and without complaint, looking at me for approval like a dog after a treat.

When I went to clip Orbis to the side of my belt, I found my discus pulling up and away from me, toward the lapis bands in the breastplate. The attraction was strong, as if he were magnetized, and I ended up using two hands to resist the pull. I didn't know what was happening, but I didn't like it. I couldn't have my primary weapon disabled going into battle, and so I instinctively cast Orbis away, a long throw with no return vector, until I could work out what was going on.

Instantly, a black tentacle shot out from my torso and snatched Orbis out of the air, swung him about like a sling, and threw him back out on the same trajectory with so much force that Orbis sailed across the cavern and embedded himself into the solid rock. The unexpected motion of the suit almost knocked me over. Before I knew it, the long tentacle arm had withdrawn to the breastplate as if nothing had happened.

“What was that?” Julia asked, eyes wide.

I stared down at the armor and wondered how I was going to recover Orbis. This thing was alive. Just like Orbis. I had to get it off of me before it could do more harm.

“No! Leave it on,” Crassus yelled out, as I pulled at it. “They're discus arms. I've read of them but have never seen one in action. They are even rarer than your weapon. They work with your mind, not your conscious mind but your deep mind, to retrieve your weapon but also to help you cast it farther.”

Armor designed specifically for a discus wielder. Now, this was an enhancement. This might not win any wars, but it made me feel much more capable. If I could get the thing to work. I ran my hands over the smooth surface of the suit.

“You see,” he said. “The work of the gods.”

“A lucky find,” Julia said.

“When the gods are on your side, there is no luck,” Crassus pontificated.

I wouldn't get drawn into the debate on either side, wouldn't buy into it, not Lumen's talk or Crassus' madness. I'd made that mistake when I bought into my uncle's flattery. If there were gods, then they could get on with their business. I'd focus on walking the right path, and if that meant they would help us, then so be it, and if not, then I'd do this without them.

“I'm not sure I'll keep it,” I said. “I can't have an untested quantity in live combat. It took me years to master the basics of my discus; I don't have years to learn this. It might get me killed in the field.”

You should take the armor. It is the same as your discus,
Lumen said.
I can hear it. It follows the same song as your weapon. You'll learn to make them work quickly, I know it.

All the same, I needed a backup. I picked up the nearest weapon to hand—a gladius, the weapon for which the gladiator was named. It was old, plain, simple, and utterly reliable—a black blade with conductive strips that traveled the length of its spine on both sides, transmitting an electric shock that was generated in the hilt. It was pockmarked with rust that looked like the pattern of the Ursa Major constellation, but the rust was only cosmetic, no more than wear to the blade's surface.

Julia and I worked together, but we still couldn't free Orbis—he'd lodged in the ice so deeply.

“You have to use the armor,” Crassus said.

He's right,
Lumen added.
Think of it back at your side, on your belt.

I tried it, and straightaway a black arm, from the other side this time, reached out, pulled Orbis from the wall in a single jerk, and with lightning speed returned him to my side. This time I was ready for the action, and it didn't affect my balance at all.

“One side for casting, one for retrieving,” I said. “You're right. I think I'll keep this after all.”

Discus armor that synchronized perfectly with my discus. What could I have done in the arena back in Rome with a suit like this? Maybe it was a gift from the gods, maybe not. I wasn't going to think about the odds of finding such a thing, just think about the work ahead. One step at a time. All the same, it was hard to keep a slight smile from my face.

XXXVIII

W
E MARCHED OUT OF
the illuminated cavern and back into the darkness of the tunnels.

Julia came behind me, slowly riding the transport tray, which she had coaxed into shuddering motion. She was carrying a backpack, and over her armor she wore utility belts, with her own tools and the best tools she could find in the cavern. In her hands she carried the transmission staff.

“Ready?” I asked her.

“Ready,” she replied, and then, “Just don't dig any new holes for us to climb out of. We're in enough of a pickle as it is.”

I wished I could promise her exactly that, but the only happy outcome I could imagine was that somehow Julia lived and Lumen reached his queen and fled to safety. My life was already offered up on the altar to Minerva. I'd already let go of it to set things right. I only prayed it was enough.

Walking beside Crassus was strange. Aboard
Incitatus
he'd been more than handsome and powerful. He'd been regal, he'd had a noble bearing that was at least half the attraction. But now that was all gone. He was a simpleton, a madman, and yet somehow, strangely, there was an appeal in that too. It was the lack of responsibility, the lack of any burden weighing him down. I couldn't believe that I actually envied Crassus his madness.

After a short uphill march, the exit loomed ahead of us, a narrow crease in the rock face, through which streamed ever-brightening light. That light should have filled me with boldness, but I felt only hesitancy. There was a security in darkness. It would have been so easy to stay there, out of sight, unencumbered by the challenges ahead. One foot in front of the other, that was the only way. I kept my mind on my feet until we emerged into open space and found ourselves high up on the side of the mountain. Despite a strong wind, the air was a blessing. Cold but clean and sharpening of the mind. We'd left the underworld, survived one hell.

Julia had loaded anything that might be useful and that she could repair in time onto the transport tray. Most of the advanced weapons were drained of power and useless, and she had managed to salvage only some land mines. The rest she stripped for power and parts. Most important, we had armor and communications. The radios in our helmets worked well and integrated with our armillae. The tray had a rail running round it and controls up front. It was a third as slow as a war chariot when unloaded and much slower than that with equipment and armored people riding it, but it was still faster than us running at full speed, and so was essential to our survival. I asked Lumen and Concretus to stay out of sight in the cave mouth with the transport tray while we scanned the area. Ahead of us the level ground terminated, becoming a steep slope that ran down the side of the mountain to the valley below.