Ithoke
"Are you nervous?" asked Ithoke the fearless, observing the trembling of his companion, or at least the man with whom he was sharing the cramped tunnel leading into Reznak's Pit.
His fellow fighter, the man with whom he had been assigned to partner in this bout, kept on shaking as he looked up at Ithoke. The fellow had a Naathi look about him, rangy and lean, with a kind of wiriness about him. If he survived long enough he might make a passable fast-fighter, Ithoke decided, though it was always hard to tell without seeing a man in action. He had been paired with Ithoke for a reason - so Ithoke hoped anyway - and Ithoke was a fast fighter himself, short and a little squat but with a turn of speed on him like a mountain lion, so it wouldn't have made much sense to pair him up with a beefcake for a bout with Goghor and Belaquo even if Ithoke was strong enough to pick up Belaquo Bonebreaker and toss him across the sands.
Of course, it wasn't really fair of the Masters to pair him up with a rookie for a bout with a pair of champions, and if he hadn't known what he knew Ithoke might have suspected that someone was trying to get rid of him. But the truth was that the Masters only had one eye on the pits these days, if that, and the other upon the Dragon Queen and her army camped outside the wall. Ithoke the Fearless wished her well; they could do with a bit of liberty around here.
The new man stared at him, and shook, and said nothing.
Ithoke leaned forward, trying to shape his face into something approximating a welcoming expression. Nobody had ever called him a handsome man, not even his poor mother rest her soul, the closest was Senella telling him he had a nice smile, but he tried to smile for the poor lad, to put him at ease a little. It was always rough being the new fellow in the pit, facing your first few fights, even if a lot of champions and veteran fighters preferred to forget that they had ever been rookies, wetting themselves at the thought of spilling their blood on the sands.
"Do you have a name, boy?" Ithoke asked softly.
The man stared at him, and said nothing.
Ithoke sighed. "I know, I know, you've heard the stories haven't you? New man arrives in the fighting pits, tries to make friends and everybody spits on him because what kind of fool tries to make friends with gladiators, right? And some big black Summer Islander says 'I might have to kill you in the morning' or something like that. But the truth is you need three things to survive in a place like this, and being able to fight well is only one of them."
The Naathi's eyes narrowed. "What are the other two things?"
"Ah, you've got a voice," Ithoke said. "I was starting to think the Masters had cut your tongue out. What's your name?"
"Anda," he muttered. "My name is Anda."
"Anda," Ithoke repeated. "Anda the Avenger? Anda the Awe-Inspiring? Anda Always-Valiant?"
"What are you doing?"
"I'm trying to come up with a name for you, for if you live long enough," Ithoke said. "Most people around here, their second name starts with the same first letter as their first, if you follow: Goghor the Giant, Belaquo Bonebreaker, Barsena Blackhair, Senella the Sea-Snake. I'm the exception, if I do say so myself: Ithoke the Fearless, you may have heard of me."
Anda shook his head. "No, sorry."
Ithoke's face fell. "You could have said yes, to soothe my ego."
"Sorry. So what are the other two things?"
"Hmm?"
"You need three things to survive here but only one is fighting skill," Anda reminded him.
"Oh, yes," Ithoke said. "The second thing you need here is honour. Honour and a little bit of showmanship."
"That's two things."
"But you need them both for the same reason: get the crowd on your side. Being a good fighter will win you matches, but nobody's lucky enough to win all their fights." Not unless you were Strong Belwas anyway, who had had the gods on his side considering he not only won every single fight but then got sold down to Pentos before his luck could run out. And now he was camped outside the wall with the Dragon Queen's army, which meant he was either the luckiest dog in Slaver's Bay or his luck was about to run out for good. Anyway, it wouldn't do any good to bring up Strong Belwas to the new boy. "If you want to survive the patches of bad luck you need to have the crowd on your side, and that means fighting with honour and putting on a good show.
"Remember, mostly these aren't the Masters watching us. These are ordinary folk who knock off after a hard day's work and want to get taken out of themselves for a bit before morning comes and the soul destroying cycle starts again." Ithoke paused, to reflect on how much luckier he was than so many of the so called free Meereenese, the ones who weren't lucky enough to live in pyramids. At least he never had to worry about where his next meal was coming from, and he got to do what he loved instead of what would put food on the table for his children. Of course, that was because he couldn't have children, but...best not to think about that. He had a pretty good life, all things considered.
So the Masters said, anyway.
"Are you okay?" Anda asked.
"Of course, I'm fine," Ithoke snapped. "The point is…the point is that the world is crap, yes?"
"Um-"
"Oh come on, of course it is," Ithoke said. "Everybody out there in the world is just chasing money. Poverty. People starving in the streets. Fucking slavery." He held up his arms and rattled the chains around his wrists to make his point. "Whatever happened to honour, you know? Whatever happened to chivalry? There are no heroes in the real world any more and everyone knows it. That is why people come to see us. The pit out there, that is its own world. A better world. A world where we can be…look, it's like this: in here, we're slaves. Out there in that pit we are heroes. The world's greatest heroes, pitted against the world's greatest monsters and most diabolical villains. As a free man in this city you're nothing, the Great Masters will chew you up and spit you out. But in the arena, in the pits, you can be a god, bestriding the world and I guarantee, when you stand out there with ten thousand people screaming your name…you haven't lived until you've had that happen to you. But it won't happen unless you've got honour. Because that is what they want to see: honour, courage, virtue, fair play, things that don't exist in the real world no matter how much people want them to. We are here to show them what they used to be, maybe what they could be if they chose, but they won't. They're too scared."
Ithoke leaned back. "We are only heroes left in this world, my friend, and that isn't something to be afraid of. That is something to take pride in."
Anda frowned, creasing his narrow face. "What about the Dragon Queen?"
"What about her?"
"A lot of people would say she's a hero."
"She's got ten thousand Unsullied and three dragons," Ithoke said.
Anda blinked. "What's your point?"
"The point is where's the risk in that?" Ithoke demanded. "Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't mind snapping these chains in half, but it doesn't make her a hero for doing it. A hero puts their life out on the line, and I haven't seen her do that yet."
Anda was silent for a moment. "What was the third thing?"
"Huh?"
"There were three things, you've only mentioned two."
Ithoke nodded. "The third thing you need in this place is comradeship. You won't survive if the lads don't trust you. Like when we go out there, you ever fought before?"
Anda shook his head.
"So I'll be carrying you then, as well as fighting for myself," Ithoke said. "Don't get me wrong, I'll do it, but I need to know that you'll try and look out for me out there. Because if you're just going to leave me hanging, then…there's no reason for me to carry you either." Ithoke's face became grim. "In the pit, we're heroes, but outside the pit we're only slaves, and nobody is going to look out for us but one another. Understand?"
Anda nodded.
"Are you nervous?"
Anda nodded.
"Don't be," Ithoke said. "You've got the Ithoke the Fearless in your corner, everything's going to be fine."
"But isn't Goghor the Giant pretty tough?"
"I could take Goghor the Giant on with one hand," Ithoke bragged, puffing out his chest. "I need the other hand for Belaquo."
The door, the iron door, the dark portal that separated them from the pit without, the gateway out of the dark underworld in which they were presently entombed and up into the living world where they would stride the sands like heroes and write their names in legend and the memory of men, began to rattle. It opened, and a guard, a slave like them but one who simultaneously had more power and far less chance of glory, walked in. His name was Yurko, and he had a bit of a pot belly forming underneath his leather cuirass.
Ithoke rose to his feet. "Time?"
Yurko shook his head. "Match has been called off, Ithoke, it's back to the pens with all of you."
"Called off?"
"Nobody turned up," Yurko said apologetically. "Master says it would be a waste to risk losing one of you when the stands are empty."
Ithoke frowned. "Empty? People did know that I was fighting? Me, Ithoke the Fearless?"
"Oh, I'm sure that the whole city would have turned up if they knew that," Yurko replied with dripping sarcasm. "Look, Ithoke, in case you've forgotten there's a fucking army outside the walls, people are a bit concerned about it. Most of the men are up on the walls, who wants to see gladiators at a time like this?"
Ithoke shrugged. "Some people might be glad of the escape."
"Don't mention escape where a master can hear you," Yurko muttered. He leaned in. "But long live the Dragon Queen, eh?"
Ithoke shook his head, a slow smile spreading across his face. "And death to the masters."
Ithoke and Anda were led back to the pens, the little iron chambers, about twice as wide as a man's shoulder width and long enough to lie down in that the fighting slaves called home. Each one was lined with straw, to make a somewhat restful bed, though weariness was expected to do most of the work when it came to helping you get to sleep at night: come in after a hard fought battle and you could sleep on rocks, though it was better sleep on straw. The pens were cramped, but not too uncomfortable, unless you rolled over in your sleep and banged your head on the iron bars. A lot of dogs had it much worse, though some of the Masters' dogs had it much better.
It was hardly the berth of a hero, but then like he'd told Anda, they were only heroes in the pit. Down here they were just slaves. The pit was the real world, the world that mattered, the place where they stood under the gaze of gods and men and made themselves immortal with their deeds. This…this was the underworld. This was where they died each day, to be reborn anew with every fight. Here they were but shades, going through the motions of life, sleeping, eating, shitting. Out in the pit, only in the pit, only there did they really live as men were meant to.
For a few hours, every few days, they were more alive than any man in Meereen, than any man in the entire world. And then they died again, and descended into the underworld and to their cages.
The door rattled as it was unlocked, and clattered as it was shut and locked again with Ithoke inside, but at least they took the shackles off before they closed the door. Ithoke rubbed his wrists as he sat down on the straw.
"You're all still alive, and not a scratch on you," Senaera observed, lounging against the bars of her own cage as though she found them comfortable. "What, did you all catch a case of the pussies or something?"
The Brindled Butcher, crawling up and down the bars of his cage, clinging to the ceiling, laughed in that creepy, huffing laugh that he had. It sent shivers down the spine of Fearless Ithoke, in spite his name. He had never really liked the Brindled Butcher; he wasn't a man, no matter what Master said.
"The fight was cancelled," Ithoke said. "Nobody wants to watch a good fight now that they're about to have a fight of their own, apparently."
Senaera smirked. She had red hair, though most of it was shaved off except for a bit in the centre, which was long and stuck up like the fine of a great serpent, the better to match her name. Come fighting time her skin was painted in a mix of blue and green with swirling black stripes, though it always seemed to leave her sick afterwards, which meant she didn't fight as often as the rest of them did, since she needed more rest between fights. Her eyes…gods, she had gorgeous eyes, one blue and one green, both of them absolutely beautiful, like the sea themselves. Beautiful, even when they had mischief in them like they did now.
"Well, I bet you were happy about that, weren't you Goghor?" she called. "Bet you were glad not to have to face the mighty Fearless Ithoke in battle."
Goghor's cell was not big enough for him, he had to nearly double over in order to fit, but he still raised his mutton-head in order to glare at Senaera and Ithoke both. "Fearless Ithoke should fear me. Next time we fight I rip Ithoke's head off with bare hands."
"Say that when we're out of these cases, big fellow."
"Whatever happened to comradeship?" Anda asked.
"Comradeship is one thing, son, but pride is something else altogether," Herkhaz muttered as she shuffled out into the chamber, coughing a little as he walked between the pens carrying a wooden plate of rough looking slops for his supper. He was a dusky old Ghiscari, big and broad shouldered, with a muscular frame despite his age. Most of his hair was gone now, but his head was covered with a dark woollen cap so it wasn't really noticeable. His face was a little lined, and his clothes were rough, and hanging loosely off his frame so that they shook as he moved. "And a gladiator can't live unless he has his pride." Herkhaz sat down, and looked at Anda. "I don't believe I seen you before, you must be new."
Anda nodded. "My name's Anda."
"New meat," Senaera said, licking her lips. "You know we eat the dead around here."
"Don't tease him, Sea-Snake, he's a good boy," Ithoke said. "I've tried to-"
"You tried to tell him that we're the real heroes and all that bollocks, didn't you?" Senaera demanded.
"Bollocks?" Anda asked.
"Don't pay too much attention to Fearless Ithoke over here," Senaera drawled. "He's an idiot."
"I'm a romantic."
"That's what I just said," Senaera replied. The Brindled Butcher laughed again, that weird huff-huff sound as he hung from the ceiling by his feet.
"You want my advice, boy, you ignore all of these meatheads," Herkhaz said. "You want real advice, you come to me. Now, let me introduce you to the boys."
Barsena coughed.
"And girls, I was going to say," Herkhaz added. "The woman with the death rattle is Barsena Blackhair, the best beast-hunter in Meereen."
Barsena climbed to her feet, which her cage was just tall enough to allow her to do, and flicked her black hair so that everyone could admire its midnight lustrousness. "I fought for three days in the sewers beneath the city with a great blind crocodile, swollen and fat. I killed the bear that prowled the undercity of Astapor. I descended into the catacombs of Kings Landing and slew the ancient Beast that roamed that labyrinth, though his hide was armoured with the blades of those who challenged him before me. I am Barsena, and wherever my name is heard beasts tremble in terror."
"The Masters ought to talk to you about those dragons," Steelskin said, making Senaera laugh.
Barsena smirked. "If I wished dragons to be gone from the world…" she snapped her fingers. "They would be gone. I do not wish it."
"Nobody down here does, darling," Herkhaz said. "The big man over there, as you've probably guessed is Goghor the Giant."
Goghor hit the bars of his cage so hard they trembled. "Goghor is mighty! Goghor is strong! Goghor crush men's skulls between his thighs!"
"That is Orlos the Catamite, so if you see him bending over that's perfectly normal."
"Slander," Orlos cried in a theatrical tone as laughter rang out at his expense. He was a perfumed ponce, a eunuch getting fatter every day who specialised in spear fighting (it made a change from getting thrust into, as Senaera said). Ithoke was privately of the opinion that he lowered the tone of the arena somewhat, but he couldn't deny that the man knew what he was doing. "I will have you know," Orlos continued. "That I have been the comforter to Kings and princes. The magister of Pentos lay with me and wept when we were parted. The Red Priests of Volantis kept me a twelvemonth in their temple to sate their lusts, and the High Septon of the Seven-Faced God sold his crystal crown for one secret rendezvous with me. The greatest poet in the world wrote sonnets immortalising my fair youth, and you expect me to bend over and bare my arse to the likes of you ugly fuckers? You haven't got a chance."
"We love you really, Orlos," Senaera said.
"Oh, darling, I don't swing that direction at all."
"Then there's Camarron of the Count-"
"Every time I fight I see how many cuts I can make before I kill my opponent," Camarron declared, his voice rich and dripping like honey falling slowly off a stick. "My record is sixty three. Maybe you will help me do better one day."
"Don't scare him to death, he only just arrived," Herkhaz muttered. "And then there's Steelskin."
"Why do they call you Steelskin?" Anda asked.
"Because I'm a warlock who can turn his skin into armour," Steelskin said offhandedly.
Anda's eyes widened.
Steelskin cackled with laughter. "No, I just ain't never been cut before, so folk say I must have steel skin to protect myself."
"That there is Belaquo Bonebreaker," Herkhaz said, gesturing to the scarred, musclebound fighter in the cage to Ithoke's left, whose head was shaved bald save for an auburn topknot.
"When we fight, I break you," Belaquo said proudly. "Break your legs, break your arms, break your head. Break all your bones if I must."
"That's Spotted Cat."
"Rawr," Spotted Cat growled, licking his lips with an almost feline glee.
"Ithoke you know, the girl with the mouth there is Senaera the Sea-Snake," Herkhaz continued.
Senaera tilted her head, first this way and then that. "You know, new boy, you're actually not that bad looking. Hey Herkhaz, how about some conjugal visits. He's cuter than all these other baboons. For now anyway."
"He not be so pretty when I done with him," Goghor grunted.
"Get over the fact that me no want you, Giant," Senaera replied, giggling as she spoke. "What do you say, little mouse, do you fancy a taste of this pie?"
"Leave the boy alone, Senaera," Herkhaz muttered. "Well, that's about everyone-"
The Brindled Butcher hooted, throwing himself against the bars of his cage, rattling it with his fingers as he shook up and down, swinging from the bars.
"Sorry about that, Butcher," Herkaz said, a touch of nervousness entering his voice. "I, uh, I didn't see you there. That's the Brindled Butcher. He don't talk much but he understands what you say to him well enough."
Anda's eyes widened. "What is he?"
The Butcher roared, throwing himself against his cage with a clattering sound.
"Don't ever ask that, he doesn't like it," Senaera said. "And besides, its rude and all. There there, there there, calm down now. Calm down it's okay, I'm right here. Shh shh shh. I'm right here, that's it."
The Brindled Butcher looked at her, his blue eyes softening as she stared at Senaera. He was from Sothoryos, one of the ape-man creatures that roamed that mysterious dark continent, with brindled fur like a wild boar and little tusks poking out of his mouth. He had long arms, but short stumpy legs, which meant he dragged his knuckles a bit when he walked. But he could use a sword well enough, though Ithoke wasn't exactly sure how, and many a good fighter hand paid the price for underestimating him. His face...well he had a face even uglier than Ithoke himself, scarred and torn and all around downright nasty. Except when he was looking at Senaera, as he was now. Then...then all the violence seemed to melt out of him. He collapsed in a heap against the bars of his cage, staring at her as forlornly as any boy stared at his forbidden love. The beast looked upon the face of beauty and from that moment on he was as one dead, as the Dornish proverb went.
"Good boy," Senaera whispered. "There you go."
"And now you know all of us," Herkhaz said. "A right company of heroes, wouldn't you say? No, we're no heroes. We just fight because it's all we know."
"Whose this we?" Spotted Cat demanded. "When was the last time I saw you fight, old man?"
"At my age, I have to fight just to get up in the morning," Herkhaz replied. "My name's Herkhaz, and I'm charge of y'all knuckleheads for my sins. I have to take care of you until you die, or I do."
"Or until the Dragon Queen comes," Barsena murmured.
Herkaz chuckled. "Yes, that would be a sight to see, wouldn't it? A chance for the likes of us to socially advance? Nah, that won't happen. Meereen ain't like Astapor or Yunkai, she won't fall."
"Herkhaz still old since Strong Belwas last here," an enormous, fat brown eunuch declared as she stepped out of the darkness and into the light, followed by a score of filthy, stinking, dishevelled looking armed men, including one who was even older than Herkhaz himself, going by looks. "Herkhaz still talk too much since Strong Belwas here last."
Ithoke climbed to his feet. "Harpies of Ghis, Strong Belwas, is that you? What are you doing back here?"
"Strong Belwas here to fight!" Strong Belwas declared, pounding his chest. "Strong Belwas here to find fighters."
"Well you came to the right place for that," Senaera said with an eager grin. "What's the job?"
"Fight for Queen," Strong Belwas said. "Kill the Masters."
For a moment, the rarest of moments, all the pit fighters, be they ever so garrulous, were reduced to silence.
"Are you serious?" Steelskin said.
"Are you coward?" Belwas replied. "You fear to fight."
"No man lives who calls me coward," Belaquo muttered darkly.
"I'd rather die for freedom than die for the crowd," Anda said.
The Brindled Butcher rose to his feet, his mouth twisting, struggling to form the words. The Butcher rarely spoke, and when he did speak it was with the appearance of immense effort, and so when he seemed to be trying everyone gave him space to get it off his chest. "K...k...Kill...Masters."
Senaera nodded. "Kill the masters."
"Kill the masters," Spotted Cat said.
"Kill the masters," said Camarron.
"Kill the masters," said Barsena.
"All men must die," Ithoke said. "But for once, we need not die before they do."
"Valar Morghulis," the fighters murmured.
"Valar Morghulis," Belwas agreed, as she tore the bars of Barsena's cell with his bear hands. "Now come, we take this city."
Author's Note: Last time I cut out before a fight I then skipped the fight, but that won't happen this time. Next chapter will be the Battle of Meereen. I really like gladiators, and I have to confess that I was quite disappointed by the fact the way that they were treated in Dance (and the way things look to be heading in Winds, too), so the pit fighters will get a significant subplot in this story.
The idea that there are ape-men in Sothoryos comes form A World of Ice and Fire, probably as an homage to Conan the Barbarian. The Brindled Butcher is almost certainly not an ape-man, but I've been watching a lot of Planet of the Apes movies lately and I thought it was a cool idea.
