A/N: It's been a while… Sorry about that. Please R+R. The next chapter should be up soon, now that school is out!

Chapter Six: Sola (Alone)

She woke slowly, loud voices around her echoing inside her head, bouncing off the walls of her skull, and it hurt, felt like her head had caved in and somehow she'd lived through it. She couldn't quite open her eyes, couldn't quite move anything. The voices above her felt like they were coming from far away, but got clearer as she breathed in deeply.

"She's human."

"Are you sure? Maybe she's a vampire."

"She's human! I mean, look at her! She's breathing."

"Maybe she's possessed. Ethros demons-"

If she was a demon, she was relatively sure her aching head would have healed already. She took a deep breath and opened her eyes. "No, just human." Her own voice sounded unfamiliar, strangled.

She was surrounded by demons. Her stomach clinched. It was some morbid dream, surely, but in dreams, pain was never so vivid.

The one above her was too pale, skin tinted with green. His Latin was impeccable, except for the slight lisp caused by the huge tusks that descended from his mouth. The one beside him was a Brachen, spiny blue face curious. Behind them was an arc of various demons, some of which she could identify on sight, most of which she couldn't.

"They bring her in for a meal?" one of the unidentified demons snarled.

"Somehow I doubt that," a voice from behind called out. "Easier meals to feed you than the Slayer."

The word echoed through the room, passing along the curious arc, and repeated with more hostility and fear every time it was uttered. She stood shakily. She was no longer clad in her dinner clothes, the pretty red stola gone, along with her jewelry and hairpins. She wore only a thin, beige tunic, her hair was down around her shoulders, and the only jewelry she was wearing was a thick metal band around her wrist, like the ones the demons in the ring had been wearing.

"You're the Slayer?" the Brachen asked, looking more terrified than terrifying.

"Yes."

The green one grinned, saliva dripping from its tusks. "I say we tear her apart."

Most of them advanced, the Brachen and an all-too-human demon with pink skin and scared green eyes hanging back and shooting worried looks at each other. She fell into a fighting stance, ignoring the pain in her head, and prayed silently to Diana, to Minerva, the goddesses that she felt were kindred. She was ready to die.

A crackling noise spread through the air as a voice called out, "Boys!"

They stopped their advance and fell back, looks of fright on their frightening faces. Rubellia narrowed her eyes, wondering what could scare demons so much that they would stop their attack on a Slayer.

If she was expecting a huge, horned demon, she was sorely disappointed. The man that was revealed by the parting crowd of demons was short, plump, and hairy, thick lips parted in a smile that made her stomach turn. He was human. That also made her stomach turn. He took a step or two forward, stopping at a red line across the floor and calling out, "Rubellia Plauta."

She stepped closer to him. "Correct, domine. And who are you?"

"Nero was wrong about you. You certainly have manners of a sort." He opened his mouth, presumably to tell her his name, and then she struck.

Her hand snapped forward. The move was quick, and she should have had him by the throat in an instant. Instead, she felt completely paralyzed and lightning shot through her arm. She yanked it back, then stared down at the red line. The line. Her arm had crossed it, and the lightning had struck… She looked down at the man, eyes wide. "You're a sorcerer."

"Me? No, I am no sorcerer. I just run Nero's games." He tapped on his wrist, gestured to her bracelet. "Dear girl, don't try that again. There's no promise you'll come out of it intact." She didn't reply, just breathed, teeth clinched, chin high. He looked past her, addressed the demons. "The Slayer is a part of this establishment now. If any one of you damages a hair on her pretty head… well, then, you won't make it to twenty one."

Her eyes narrowed. "Twenty one?"

He didn't bother looking back to her. "Twenty one kills in the ring. And then you're free."

"I'm already free."

"Wrong, slave. Circumstance dictates otherwise. You're no better than them," he said, gesturing to the demons behind her, "or them," he finished, pointing at the slaves at the door, holding trays. "Now, eat, drink, make friends with your fellow slaves. Seize the day. Because tomorrow… You might not have hands." He winked, and turned away. "Dinner is served."

The slaves standing at the door filed in while the still nameless man walked away. The demons walked to the other side of the room; the dinner routine was obviously already established. The demons walking away all gave her looks, ranging from fear to hunger, but no one said a word.

Until the Brachen poked her shoulder, blue finger contrasting sharply with her pale skin. "You have to go eat." She stared at him blankly, and he blinked, said slower, "You have to eat." Still no reply from her, and he rolled his red eyes. "Food. Over there."

"Why do you care?"

"I don't. I was just the last newcomer before they brought in that bloodsucker on the Ides, so I remember what it was like."

"Like to what?"

"Be so scared you can barely breathe."

She looked away from him. "I'm not scared."

"Liar." She saw him shake his head out of the corner of her eye, then he started to walk away. She let him go, then followed closely behind. Food- even if she had to eat it with a bunch of demons- was at least familiar, and she could use something familiar at this point.

She'd crawled into the corner with the food, a bowl of mush that she supposed passed for porridge. It looked worse than the rations her cousin Antonia's slaves got when they misbehaved. She would bet her life that it tasted worse too. But it wasn't poisoned and it wasn't full of blood or human organs. So she ate it without complaint, mind all the while working to find a way out of the mess that Nero had put her in.

The mess that Marcus had put her in.

Her head slumped against the wall, shoulders drooping, eyes slipping closed. It was the posture of defeat, and she had never taken defeat lightly. It wasn't like her. But it wasn't like Marcus to hit her over the head and sell her to her cousin as a gladiator, so maybe it was time for a change.

She grunted, shaking her head to rid herself of those thoughts. There was no use in dwelling on what had happened. There would be time enough for that once she escaped. If she escaped. The warrior in her wanted to jump again at the sorcerer's magical barrier, find a way through it. The tactician, the Roman, knew to wait and bide her time. And so she did.

The demons were well behaved. Small fights broke out around the serving tables, but for the most part, they ate in near-silence, then slipped back to their respective sleeping pallets, and curled up. She'd never seen demons act in such a way. It was strange to think that their fiery- albeit evil, she added with a sneer- spirits were broken. It didn't leave much hope for her, a mere human.

She swallowed the last bite of the mush, then pushed the bowl away from her and leaned her head against the wall again. She didn't think she could sleep, even with the slave-master's words of protection echoing in her ears. Surrounded by demons… Well, it was a new situation. So she just waited, eyes half closed, legs pulled against her chest.

She wasn't surprised when he came, heard his footsteps approaching, and didn't move a muscle, not even to open her eyes and look up at him. He didn't seem in a hurry to speak either, and they stayed like that for a few long minutes.

Until her patience wore thin and she stood up.

The vampire was leaning casually against the wall, human disguise and sneer in place. "Slayer…"

She cocked her head and looked at him. "And what do you want?"

"I find it fitting, you know. A taste of your own medicine, Slayer. No more better revenge than that."

"I'm here because I objected to Nero's new favorite entertainment."

"Morals. Integrity. I like that in a girl. Gives her blood a hint of-"

She hit him, and he laughed, then let the grin slip off his face. "So you're stuck here as well, with the demons you're called to kill. Poetic, isn't it?"

"Pathetic is more like it, vampire."

"Lucius," he said pleasantly, holding out a hand.

She took it warily. "Rubellia."

"A mouthful. I'm calling you Lia. I have less patience for long Etruscan names nowadays."

Her family was properly Roman, but she wasn't about to start in with another vampire about the logistics of her bloodline. "You must have made Nero very angry to get stuck in this place."

She'd caught him off guard, but he hid it quickly, his face settling into a bland mask of nonchalance. "Nero doesn't need a reason to capture and kill people."

"No. But you're not a person."

"Close enough for his tastes, I suppose. It's not always about morals or anger. It's a matter of fun and money." He pushed off the wall, circled around her. "The real question is… do you have what it takes to survive?"

"Kill twenty one demons?" She smirked, stepping closer to him, finding their heights almost equally matched. "That's not a challenge." Then she shrugged, ego inflating. "But it's not as though Nero is going to let me live. I refused him. You don't do that and live."

"Yes, well, I find myself in the same position, I expect. What are we going to do about it?"

He was too close. She had initially moved toward him, but she backed away when his unnecessary breath tickled her nose. Close proximity to a vampire was never healthy. "I don't plan on making it easy for him."

"I was thinking more along the lines of escape."

She had been thinking the same thing, but she didn't trust him. She smirked. "Good plan, bloodsucker. Did you find any keys laying around here, perchance?"

"You're not ready to trust me."

"I'll never be ready to trust you, Lucius."

"Never comes quick in a place like this," he said, slipping back into the shadows. "Let me know."

She watched his shadow fade into the rest of the blackness, then curled up on the floor again, and resumed her quiet vigil. But deep down, she already knew.

She wouldn't make it out of here alive.