Wolf’s Empire: Gladiator (88 page)

“Accala of No House! Abandoned by your own Wolves—outcast again!”

We slowed down. No use charging into whatever lay ahead until we heard what he had to say.

“Outcast, but you've managed to cobble together your own ragtag team, and you are the only competitors to reach this gate, so the games will continue.”

The media spherae were out again. Now that Aquilinus had failed to recover Lumen, he'd decided it was in his interests to start up the live coverage once more.

“We have seen the old emperor oversee the chariot races and bestiarii rounds, and the new emperor has instituted his re-creations, and now only the final round remains—gladiatorial combat. Two sides fighting, whittling down until only one remains alive. But it can all stop now. If you lay down your weapons, bow and swear loyalty to the emperor, then you will all be taken from here and returned to Rome without any harm befalling you. Accala, you will be permitted to carry out your sacred duty as a daughter, serving your father until his death.”

The space within the arch was filled with a projection of my father. On either side of him were Aquilinus' new Praetorians, the Crimson Inquisitors. The same torturers Crassus threatened to turn on Aulus back on
Incitatus
if I failed to obey him. Father was naked, chained between two posts, his scar-covered body exposed. They touched his chest with their shock sticks, holding them in place until he screamed out in pain.

“His pain can stop now,” Julius Gemminus said. “If you agree to stop this, to surrender and exit the tournament.”

I was in a bind. I was damned if I let my father die; a portion of the mob would turn against me for not fulfilling my duty as a daughter. And I was damned if I saw him spared and abandoned my teammates and my duty there in the field. This was about cutting away sections of my supporters in the audience.

“His eyes,” Marcus said. “Look to his eyes.”

My father's good eye was hard, unblinking. Stubborn, angry, unbreakable steel. He had the same eyes as mine, green and gray. They could pull the screams from his body, but they couldn't break him.

“Don't you want to stop all this? Your father won't die now. His death will take months. Come, remember your place. End this and live out your days by your father's side. You have no house to fight for. This is the end of the road for you.”

“I have no house to fight for, but I'm still a citizen of the empire,” I said.

I took the reins and drove the chariot toward the gate, Lumen by my side. Tears streamed down my face as I tried to shut out the sounds of my father's screams. Marcus, Julia, and Pavo sat in silence. This was my choice, not theirs.

“Come. Turn back,” Julius Gemminus said. “A daughter has even more of a duty to her father than a son. She must tend to him, make sure he is looked after in old age.”

I didn't need to ask Marcus or Julia how the mob felt. They didn't blame Aquilinus for this. He was the emperor, he could do what he liked. It was all on me: the unfaithful daughter. He had cast me in the role of the one undermining the most fundamental traditions of familial loyalty. I wondered if the chart even had scope to handle how low my approval would plummet. I had to break the mold of their expectations. I could no longer afford to be a daughter, the empire could not afford me to be a daughter.

I stopped before the arch. A red line across the path was projected onto the ground before me.

“If you cross that line, you're committing your own father to death,” Gemminus said.

But there was only one choice. No matter the odds and obstacles that stood against me, I had to move forward. An iron ball was turning inside my stomach, driving me onward unceasingly. If my enemies got in my way, I would crush them. The ball didn't care for the size of the enemy; it didn't care about threats or fear; it cared only about moving toward the end. I made its turning my chant, my prayer, my every thought, letting it crush doubt and hesitation, letting it destroy the little Accala they sought to bait and chain and torment like a slave, like a piece on the board. But I was past being moved and manipulated. I made my own choices, had to create my own game where I fashioned the rules. Father, I'm so sorry. I can't do this. I must do this.

I crossed the line, and passed through the arched gate, into the ruins of Lupus Civitas. The only light in the predawn darkness lay in the distance—Julius Gemminus' reinvigorated Colosseum. The fire-blackened ruins rose up about me, dark broken shades of once great buildings looming like dead birds strung up on a line. My father's screaming suddenly stopped. I resisted the urge to look back, to see him hanging dead by his bound limbs.

I was filled with a righteous white fire like a clean-burning fuel. I was a weapon, and nothing would stop me from hitting home.

 

ACT VII

ARENA

Learn by this warning to do justly and not to slight the gods.

This man sold his country for gold, and laid her under a tyrant's sway;

he set up and pulled down laws at a price;

this other forced his daughter's bridal chamber and a forbidden marriage;

all dared some monstrous wickedness, and had success in what they dared.

Not had I a hundred tongues, a hundred mouths, and a voice of iron, could I sum up all the shapes of crime or name over all their punishments.

—Virgil,
Aeneid

XLVI

W
E PASSED THROUGH THE
ruins swiftly and approached the Colosseum. It was lit up like a cheap festival attraction. Now, instead of faux clouds and holographic pillars, Aquilinus had opted for a theme of damnation and fire. Beyond the entrance, a long stone tunnel led to the bright lights of the arena. Julius Gemminus' winged head appeared above us again.

“Welcome, welcome to the final round! Our arena spectacular! Emperor Aquilinus is proud to present the Arena of the Old and New Gods!”

Those very words lit up the sky above the arena in letters of fire. I snatched up a spear from the chariot's arms locker and climbed down to the ground; the vehicle was too wide to fit through the tunnel. Lumen, Marcus, Julian, and Pavo followed my lead. Above us towered large statues of the Blood Eagles, ringing the Colosseum, replacing the statues of the old gods that lay, broken and crumbling, beside them—great faces smashed, arms knocked away, bodies cracked with the heat of the bombs dropped on the city.

The ion cannon of the orbital stadium could still destroy us at any time. There was no choice but to move through the tunnel, toward the arena. Suddenly, the way behind us was sealed, not by a door but by a large fan. It began to spin, faster and faster, and before we could run the length of the tunnel, the air pressure sent us hurtling forward, barely able to keep our feet. The arena floor ahead of us was spinning too, fast like a children's carnival ride, so that as each of us was propelled into the circular arena, we were immediately flung and held against the outer shield wall by the centrifugal force. The wheel was turning so fast it was all I could do to grab Lumen by the hand and make certain we were not separated. I looked around as best as I could with my head pinned back. We were trapped around a spinning ring, separated from each other by energy shield walls that divided the ring into four equal wedge-shaped chambers. The walls were a transparent green—nonlethal energy fields. A thin layer of sand covered the arena floor. It must have been imported just for this. Its presence, not covered by snow, meant that the ceiling of the arena was sealed from the elements. In the middle of the arena there was another ring, also divided into four chambers, but motionless, like the hub of a wheel that stands still. Through the transparent walls of the energy shield that separated the inner from the outer ring, I could see our opponents for the final round adopting threatening poses as the editor introduced them each in turn.

Aquilinus appeared above the arena as Jupiter, and here were the rest of the New Gods: a half court, only six of the twelve Olympians. And they were more than straight copies of the old gods—these were underworld variations. Licinus was dressed as Mars in a horned helmet and blood-red armor with a black stripe running down his chest—the hellish River Styx. His armor gleamed new, spikes protruded from it, and his helmet was arched over the eyes with one long spine running down to protect his nose. War chain in hand, a spear driven into the sand beside him, Licinus was radiant; his armor was specially designed to emit a numinous glow, an artificial aura. Aquilinus was continuing with his bait and switch, giving the empirewide audience the chance to swap invisible gods for ones they could see. I had to convince them otherwise. Beside Licinus was Barbata in some cruel manifestation of Venus, with a mess of dark hair that writhed in snakelike tendrils as if it were alive—barely concealing her near nudity, partly snapping and grasping at the air around her, a Venusian Medusa. Mania, slender and young, was dressed in the gear of the huntress Diana: black armor, long knife at her side, and carrying a war bow with arrows that, Julius Gemminus announced, always found their way to their target. Castor and Pollux, the Dioscurii, stood ready to fight as one, two arms, one fighter, in black armor with red wings on their boots and helmets, depicting Mercury's speed and swiftness. In the place of their falx, the charioteers wielded a long knife with a triangular blade in the hand of one, and a shield on the arm of the other that had rotating energy blades spinning around its edge, ready to cut. By comparison, we looked old, dirty, wounded—suitable representatives of the ruined statues of the gods surrounding the arena—but which of the old gods our ragtag team was meant to represent, Aquilinus made no effort to explain.

Surrounding us, an audience looked on in judgment. It had been generated by the vox populi—each ghostly avatar representing billions, the flickering forms segregated into house sections and a section for what appeared to be the robes of the various collegia.

“Behold the New Gods!” Julius Gemminus proclaimed.

The wheel stopped abruptly and we hit the deck.

I regained my balance and surveyed the scene as quickly as I could. It was the Wheel of Fortuna, the device the orbital station above us was named for.

“You wanted a battle of the old and new gods,” Aquilinus said, addressing me directly. “And so that is what I have created. The gladiatorial combats originated as funerary games, the gladiators were called funeral men. The fight was a ritual framed by the lawful rites of sacrifice. So in like mind, this last arena shall be the underworld funeral of the old gods, represented by Accala and her team. This is a landscape to test your argument. As the Olympians overthrew their parents, the Titans, and cast them into Tartarus, where the wicked are punished, my New Gods will overthrow you! Let us see if your gods are real and will stand by you now.

“This final match will see the conclusion of the bargain I struck with Accala Viridius before you all.” Aquilinus now spoke to the audience at large. “If my team loses, I will give up my throne. If she loses, she will see her house fall forever. Every Viridian will be declared an enemy of the state and subject to execution on sight.”

The audience of ghostly avatars cheered, going wild. They liked this. The mob had bought into Aquilinus' bargain. This was going to happen. The arena had become a little bit of Sertorius Primus, a morsel served up to the empire. A sign of what was to come.

Julius Gemminus continued. “You see before you three concentric rings,” he announced to the audience. “On the outer are four long chambers enclosing Accala and her menagerie. In the middle are four similar chambers for the mighty Blood Eagles.” The editor paused as the crowd cheered. “The third ring has at its center the winner's pedestal. This innermost ring is sealed off by an energy shield. One team must fall in its entirety for the field to be lifted. Then the victor—either the last person standing, or the senior team member, if more than one survive—will ascend the stairs. It is upon this pedestal that the victor will stand. The losers will be immortalized, fossilized into the ruined stadium as statues.”

Surviving the wheel and ascending the pedestal was traditional in the Sertorian arenas, the ultimate proof of worthiness to lead, the supreme sign of might and righteousness. This was a great gaming wheel whose spin would decide the fate of the empire. Aquilinus had no intention that I, or any in my team, should survive to ascend those steps. This game would be rigged. I couldn't allow Marcus, Julia, or Pavo to fall. We were going to get through this together as a team. Then, as Julius Gemminus talked away, I saw it. The sunken eyes, the yellow pallor. The Blood Eagles were all dressed up to conceal a weakness—ambrosia withdrawal. They were finally running short on ambrosia.

“They're weak!” I yelled. “They're out of ambrosia!” Separated as we were, I couldn't tell if my words carried to the other side of the shields. I had no more time to communicate my vital insight as, with a flourish, Aquilinus' projection reached down from above and set our outer wheel spinning.

“Round and round and round we go!” Julius Gemminus proclaimed. “And where she stops, nobody knows! Who will fight whom first? The moment the wheel stops, the shields that separate the inner and outer rings will drop, and the first round of matches will begin!”

The wheel started fast, but soon it began to slow, taking on an ungainly pace—an internal rotor was controlling the speed of deceleration. Aquilinus knew exactly what kind of a matchup he wanted.

As the wheel came to a stop, the outer and inner wedges lined up, matching opponent to opponent in the first round. Mania the Huntress was waiting opposite me, eyes shining. Pavo was facing off against Barbata in her Venus getup. Marcus against Licinus, Julia versus the Dioscurii. A trumpet sounded and the shield walls that stood immediately between the opponents disappeared, but the remaining shields separating each pair from the rest of the players flashed for an instant and changed from green to red—they'd been electrified. I tapped one of them with my spear tip, and it let off a mighty spark big enough for my teammates to see. The walls were now weapons in their own rights.