Wolf’s Empire: Gladiator (86 page)

I'm in trouble. My uncle has betrayed me.
I tried to transmit the thought clearly as far as I could.

I need you, Accala. Come.

“Lumen's northwest of here,” I said.

“There's forest that way,” Caninus said. “Once they get into it, it'll be all but impossible to track them at speed.”

“Full speed,” my uncle ordered. “Risk everything. We must catch them up!”

I pointed, guiding the chariots, and prayed Lumen knew what he was doing.

We traveled at breakneck speed, heedless of the risk. Half a mile later we caught sight of the first sign of fresh tracks that hadn't been covered by snowfall. Carbo ordered a wide configuration, a two-pronged advance with a half mile between each chariot, motion sensors and antennas extended to catch any quarry that fell between us. The chariots began to draw apart.

“Accala!”

Marcus! He tossed the release key to the manacles into the air and threw our weapons from the locker on his chariot out onto the icy ground, before my uncle thrust at him with his dagger. My bound hands grabbed uselessly at the key. It fell onto the chariot floor. I used my boot to lodge it against the starboard wall and then started to slide it up with the blade of my foot. Pulling back on the manacles to stabilize myself, I forced the black security key up higher until it was just in reach of Julia's outstretched fingers. She touched the key to my manacles. I pulled my hands free and returned the favor.

We jumped from the chariot before Caninus could stop us, and I snatched Orbis up from the ground while Julia recovered her staff. Marcus rushed to our side, gladius ready, tower shield projected.

“The dense trees will hamper the chariots' efforts to follow us,” he said. “Run.”

We fled into the shiny forest. I was back in the tunnel again, following my instinct, listening for Lumen's song. Faith. I had to have faith. Mind clear, no fear, or we'd be lost out here in the cold and die at the hands of the weather before our enemies even had to raise a hand.

Got to keep running. My feet were numb. I struggled not to slip on the icy ground. Marcus explained that it was he who knocked out Caninus in an effort to free Julia, but that in the process Crassus had broken free, stolen a gladius from Caninus, and fled with Lumen before anyone could stop him.

I strained to hear the song over my ragged breath and the blood pumping in my ears. It was getting stronger as we drew closer, but there was a second, fainter song, which seemed to come from a different direction, and now I wasn't certain which one belonged to Lumen. We continued on and kept together for perhaps an hour, managing to keep our distance from the Caninine chariots and avoid any major injuries, and then I heard Julia swear. Marcus risked turning on the light on his armilla briefly, and we saw that we'd run right into the skirmisher Crassus had stolen. It was abandoned, jammed in between two crystal trunks to prevent anyone easily taking it.

In the darkness ahead came a manic chattering. It was Crassus, talking to himself.

“I can't. The gods. You can't go against the gods. Infinite power means an infinite potential for punishment.”

We followed the sound and found two faint lights. One radiated from Lumen, and the other … it was Aquilinus. No god form this time. It was the proconsul I remembered from the podium when we first arrived on this world, and he was talking quietly to Crassus. It was a projection, a body of light cast from the black orb that was barely visible in the air behind him.

Crassus was like some ghost from the underworld. His body twisted, his fingers interlinked and turned inside out and behind him. His shoulders looked like they'd been dislocated by some invisible giant, but there was no one there with him, only the projection. He was crazed, his skin red from exposure, his eyes wide, staring at Aquilinus. In his hand was the gladius that he stole from Caninus. It was not his weapon of choice, but only Marcus could surpass him in its use. He was standing in front of what looked like termite mounds, tall icy protrusions like a forest of giant fingers in the middle of a flat clearing. Five rows deep in the mounds stood Lumen. He was holding on to one of the pillars with a small claw hand, looking like he was about to fall over. He was weak, but I couldn't see that Crassus had used any means to restrain him. Was he a prisoner?

“Gaius, you know my vision,” I heard Aquilinus say as we drew near. “You know what's at stake. This small creature is no god, not even a servant of the gods. He's just an animal looking to protect his own. Don't allow him to trick you, to disenfranchise you from the true Elysium that I will bring into being. Can you turn your back on the pleasure and pain that I can offer, having tasted of it? You know the pain makes the pleasure even sweeter.”

Crassus looked at Lumen, his eyes desperate, filled with doubt.

“I've made my choice,” Crassus screamed. “Leave me!”

“It was never your choice to make, Gaius,” Aquilinus said. “Let me back in. You can't hold me off forever.”

Julia's hand closed on my arm. “Take him now, while he's distracted,” she whispered.

“Wait,” I said. “I want to see how this plays out.”

There was a part of me that had to know if Crassus could be redeemed. If he could fight his own darkness and addiction, then so could I.

“You know where you belong, Gaius. Bring the prize to me and I will raise you up to my right hand. No more Licinus. Together we will rule the galaxy.”

“Let me be, I beg you,” Gaius Crassus moaned. “I serve her now. I serve the gods.”

“She will not honor her word to you, and what of the others? They despise you. They will not show mercy. Only I give you a way toward triumph. How can you not choose the path to victory? What kind of a gladiator are you?”

“I will not,” Crassus spat, each word an effort; his body looked like it was about to break, to snap into pieces with involuntary contortions. “I am a Roman. It's not just about will and power. There's more to life than that.”

“You shall be punished, Gaius, most severely of all. I will make you deliver the slow torments that end Accala Viridius' life.”

“Julia. Take out that orb,” I whispered.

She reached out with her hand, and suddenly Aquilinus turned to look at us. The projection cut out, and the orb sped away before Julia could gain control of it. Aquilinus wasn't taking any chances; he wanted to make sure he was controlling the imperial conversation. No more free airplay for me.

“Crassus,” I said as I lit up the scene with my armilla's light.

He jerked around violently as if my words were like a hot stove he'd accidentally brushed with his hand. He stared at us, right into the light of the skirmisher without blinking.

“Stay away,” he warned, taking a step back toward Lumen.

“Don't let him get to you,” I warned Crassus. “I heard it all. I know you're on our side.”

“I'm trying my best, Accala. I'm trying so hard, but it's not enough.”

“I know. I feel the ambrosia hunger too.”

“How can you bear to live with it?”

“With what?”

“Doubt. Fear. Emptiness.”

“You can't spend all your life worrying about whether the ground beneath your feet will hold you up. You just have to walk.”

“I've never done that,” he said. “I've always been supported by the truth. What I thought was the truth. Then Lumen let me see Olympus, and all the things I thought were true before were turned upside down. Now, though, Olympus is like a distant constellation and my old, fixed stars are calling to me. Lumen won't show me again. He won't show me, and I can't keep going without it. When you stand in Aquilinus' power, you feel it like a torrent, like you're standing before the sun. Your mind is filled with heroic images, classical quotes, but afterward there's a down period. Like your whole mind is filled with poison and darkness. You feel possessed, your mouth spews pollution. Things I never would have thought of on my own, strange passions and base desires consume me. There's nothing but emptiness, and my body knows that if I give it ambrosia, I'll feel full.” Crassus' voice cracked, and he was hit by a wheezing cough. “When I saw the Hyperborean's light, I saw only clarity. But the pull of Aquilinus is too strong. He is a flame I can't resist. I see that now. I'm better off taking myself out of the equation.”

I searched for the right words. “You made your choice, Crassus. You've chosen the right path. Now you do what the rest of us do. Move forward and live with it. I don't know what that alien child is to me, but I know that I have a duty to protect him.”

“It's not enough,” Crassus said. “I've been here before. I'm weak. I'll stumble and betray you. I don't want to be Aquilinus' pawn anymore. He knows my weak spots, just where to apply pressure. I know I'll fold again like I have before. I told him. About the Hyperboreans and their plan to escape. He knows he can't let you reach Nova Olympus. And now your Wolves have already turned on you. How can we win? It seemed to me that every man for himself was the only way forward.”

“I don't like this,” Marcus said. “Let me kill him, Accala. I'll do it quickly.”

You will need him. We will need him,
Lumen said.

I waved Marcus away and moved slowly toward Crassus. I needed to talk him down; he was wild, unpredictable, and Lumen looked so frail. One thrust of the gladius in Crassus' hand and his life would be over.

Crassus suddenly realized that I'd almost reached him, and he flipped the sword around so the point faced his throat.

“Stay back. It's better this way.”

I don't know why I stopped him. I moved forward like lightning, pushing the center of the blade away before he could drive the point home into his neck. He fell forward awkwardly.

I went to catch him, and when he looked up at me I saw a different face. A face engorged with blood, a smile twisted with hate.

“Stupid bitch.”

The gladius shot out. There was not a fighter in the world who could dodge Crassus at this range. But it was not Crassus, so I turned. Orbis swept across my body, and my discus caught the tip of the sword, sending it aside so that the blade only pierced my side instead of my heart. A rush of pain seared through my body. Marcus was upon the possessed Crassus in an instant, punching him in the face, forcing him away from me. I staggered back, fell to my knees, hand pressed into my side, trying to stanch the bleeding.

“We can never escape who we are,” Crassus babbled mournfully, suddenly himself again and submitting placidly as Marcus pulled him to his knees, the point of his own gladius pressing into the place between Crassus' neck and collarbone. Marcus looked to me. The Sertorian would be dead the moment I gave the signal. “There's a spider weaving its web, and there's really no choice at all except to decide whether you want to be the spider or the prey caught up in the web.”

He had spoken of this before. His nightmares of spiders and needles inside his body, of an external force controlling him. He grabbed his head suddenly as if hit by a wave of pain, throwing himself forward on the snow.

“The needles,” he mumbled, “the needles.”

“It's in your mind,” I said. “There are no needles.”

“They're sharp. The talons of the hawk. So sharp. They rake the back of my neck, claw the inside of my skull.”

“Fight it, Crassus,” I said, as I struggled to my feet. My hand closed around his fallen gladius. “It doesn't have to be like this.” I was fighting for his soul, and at the same time I was fighting for mine, because there was nothing I wanted more right then than to pierce his heart with the blade.

“Listen, Accala,” he whispered, “Aquilinus can use his bombers to re-create the attack that started the war, bomb your little god from the air if he's left no other choice. Aquilinus thinks it might turn all their ichor in Lumen's body into ambrosia, but he's not one hundred percent certain and he won't take the risk if he can help it.”

Without warning, an ion bolt seared past my face and hit Crassus in the head. He fell hard, black blood flying from his head.

The Caninine chariots had found us. The scene was lit by their search lamps. Carbo stood at the front of his chariot, ion pistol in hand.

“Come. It's over. Give the child up,” my uncle commanded.

Marcus threw his gladius like a large knife. It spun through the air and I heard Nervo yell out in pain, and then the lights were pulling away as the chariot driver inadvertently tugged the reins, forcing the craft around.

As they turned, Carbo fired again, hitting Marcus in the shoulder and sending him spinning down to the icy ground. I couldn't look after him. We were all wounded. I had to focus on Lumen's survival.

“I think that's enough of that,” Quintus said. “Now bring the prize to me.”

In the distance, the hunting horns of the Talonites sounded ominously. Aquilinus had sent in his men after all.

“Come and get him,” I said to Quintus, backing into the cover of the forest of pillars. Julia followed, then Marcus got to his feet and moved beside me to form a barrier to Lumen.

Carbo, who had taken over the reins of his chariot from Nervo, signaled Pavo and Caninus to flank us, taking their chariots to the sides of the pillars. They could stop us from fleeing past them, but they could not come into the pillars without dismounting. They were forced to come in on foot.

“You can't win,” Carbo growled.

“I don't have to win. I just have to stop you from taking him until the Talonites arrive. You don't want that, so back off now and we all get to walk away.”

“You're bluffing,” my uncle said. “You wouldn't let them have him.”

We stood in a row, a pillar between each of us. Pavo and Caninus were pacing back and forth in the chariots like caged animals, desperate to come at us.