A/N: Sorry for the delay—no time to write over the holiday or the week leading up to it. We're cruising toward the end here: probably just one more chapter, plus epilogue. I've been toying with the idea of eventually writing a parallel fic or series of ficlets that tells Myka's side of this story. Let me know, I guess, if you think that's something you might like to read?
edit: fixed a bad typo that affected the meaning of a sentence. (This whole thing is full of typos. I DO proofread, I promise, but apparently I do it badly. I'll try to go through and fix the whole thing at some point.)
TW: violence.
You shiver your way through the night in the cell without furs.
You aren't certain whether you sleep, but your mind travels deep into dark memories, indistinct as reflections in a pool.
You remember the smell of the wooden beam, your cheek pressed against it, arms wrapped around
the pull of heavy rope at your wrists, your weight pulling down and the metal hook lifting up
the first lash of the whip, stinging from your right shoulder to your lower left floating rib
the second, parallel and just below
the third, across, left shoulder to right rib
wet feeling of blood where the wounds intersected
arms tight around the pillar like a lover
seventh, eighth, ninth and your throat opens and grunts escape
after twenty you can't count; the sounds from your throat are sobs and spattering red across the wall before you
the voice, the infernal voice: bitch, harlot, killer, murderous cunt
knees cracking against stone floor when your wrists are unhooked; sliding face-down to the ground, arms still tied around the post
racking sobs of pain after the door closes
growing pool of red around you
door opens again, minutes or days later; a bucket of cold water on your head and then a fist in your hair pulls you up, wooden splinters in your arms, wrists hooked up again
his face close to yours, fingers pressing your jaw: "beg for mercy"
you don't
but you scream, you scream, you scream as the whip cuts skin desperate to heal
you are bathed in your own blood
"beg," he says
you think of your daughter and you won't
you think of your daughter and this, this pain, this is punishment for failing to keep her safe
this pain is penance you deserve
"kill me," you whisper, after days of this
"you don't deserve that relief," he spits, eyes red and wild and wet
he pushes your head back, pours water down your parched throat
"my wife wanted to live and you killed her; you want to die, so you'll live"
the whip comes up again.
\\
You would have done the same to him, if you could have.
You are alike, MacPherson and you.
\\
In the morning, sun creeps through your window like a thief come to steal time—the minutes, seconds of your life, however much or little remains. The gladiators are released from their cells and they file down the corridor toward their dining area.
The sun climbs and you watch the box of light travel across your cell floor. Nobody brings you food. You aren't hungry, anyway.
You aren't cold, but you shiver. The air warms, and you shiver. You palm the bloody stains on your tunic, and you shiver.
\\
When the lock on your door rattles, the sunlight square has travelled halfway across your cell door. You look up, toward the sound, but your only movement is to pull your knees closer, to present your shins as a shield between your soft parts and the intruder.
Artie doesn't acknowledge you with his eyes before he steps out of the doorframe. A different man walks in – younger, thinner, taller. The same manservant who shackled you in the armory, the previous week.
He steps toward you, another set of manacles in his hand. Wordlessly, you offer him your wrists, and wordlessly, he takes them. These are of a different design than the shackles you wore before, which were typically used on gladiators. A single thin rod rests against the back of your wrists and passes through openings in the ends of two u-shaped cuffs. These manacles are sleek and shiny and in good repair.
You are leaving the ludus, then, because these cuffs are designed to be seen.
The manservant fits a padlock through the end of the rod and then clicks it shut, once.
You wait for the second click—the one that latches the tongue in place—but it never comes.
"Follow me, please," he says.
You fall into step behind him. Artie closes the cell door behind you. "Tell the Dominus not to send her back here," he says. "She's been nothing but trouble for my fighters."
You follow the servant down the corridor and through the gate, into the hallway that leads to the armory. There, he pauses, and turns to face you.
"I've been told by a friend that you can be trusted to follow me not to hurt anyone if I free your hands. Is that true?"
"A friend?" you ask.
"Is it true?" he repeats.
You search his eyes, only to find him searching yours in turn, his gaze open and full. "Yes," you say, finally.
He scrutinizes you for a moment longer, tilting his head slightly to the side, then nods. "You're not lying," he says. The unlatched padlock falls open in his hand and he slides the rod out of the cuffs.
Without explanation, he turns and continues to walk down the corridor. You fall into step behind him, again.
\\
You turn the corner into the armory and a body collides with yours.
It has red hair that tucks under your chin and arms wrap around your body tight as a vine to a tree.
You wrap your arms around her before you fully process that it's Claudia, before you feel the wet on your neck, before you register that she's shaking, before you process her muttering "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I just—I missed you, I thought it would be safe and I just wanted to see you, and then he—and then he—"
She's inconsolable, body shuddering with sobs and you clutch her tighter to your chest, murmuring nothings into her ear, coaxing her to her knees with you and rocking her as you would rock your daughter.
"It's all right, Claudia, darling," you whisper. "I'm so terribly grateful that I got there when I did, and you weren't hurt." Suddenly you pull back, cupping her cheek in your palm and lifting her eyes to yours. "You weren't hurt, were you?"
She shakes her head, then looks down and to the side. She's blinking furiously and you realize how tired she looks. She is physically unhurt, but mentally frightened, fractured, and just for that—for the terrorized look in her eyes—you wish you had killed him. Marcus. The beast of a man.
You squeeze her shoulder. "It means a lot to me that you wanted to visit me. Truly."
She presses the heels of her hands into her eyes and then looks up, blinking furiously to stop the tears.
"Domina Myka said she's going to be there, today. I think that means there's a limit to how bad things can get. Right?"
Your lips part and you press them back together. "Surely, darling," you say, smiling tightly, as though you believe it.
\\
The manservant pauses by the door to the ludus servants' bathing quarters, expecting to wait outside, but Claudia grabs him by the wrist and pulls him in behind her.
"It's fine," she says to you with a smile, "Steve here isn't the type to be distracted by, you know, breasts."
"Claudia!" Steve exclaims, ducking his head nervously.
"Relax, Steve, it's fine. She—" Claudia jabs a thumb in your direction—"likes them well enough for the both of you."
Steve's surprised gaze shifts to you. You smile at him, a little, and shrug. He smiles back.
You wash the rest of the dried blood from your skin. When you're done, Claudia helps to rub your skin with fragrant oil that leaves your skin glistening, and she weaves your hair into a tidy braid. Then she hands you a fresh tunic.
You're being prepared, which can only mean that you're going into the villa.
The tunic is, again, the kind that knots at the back of the neck, leaving the thick, rope-like scars of your back exposed.
Steve steps forward, holding the manacles in an outstretched hand. "I'm sorry," he says.
You extend your wrists toward him, but he shakes his head. "Behind your back. Dominus's orders."
The click of the lock triggers the pulses, the jolts that travel from your chest to your extremities and back, like lava trapped in a valley. Your fingers itch for a weapon and your heels itch for a warhorse and you feel yourself tense and ready for combat, ready to protect yourself at all cost.
For a moment you think of perfect Myka and feel anger. It's her fault that you've rediscovered this—the ability to care about what happens to you.
With your arms twisted awkwardly behind you, the bar of the shackle pressed to the small of your back, you follow Steve and Claudia out of the ludus and up an exterior stairway. With each step up you become less aware of your pounding pulse, your racing mind. You hear a faint rattling sound and realize it comes from the metal of your cuffs vibrating against the bar that joins them. Resolutely, you pull your wrists outward until the pieces are pulled too tight to rattle. The narrow cuffs dig into the hollows below your wristbones.
By the time you step into the villa, you have reduced your feeling to nothing but the metal, cold and bruising.
\\
The exedra at the back of the house is a space for gathering, for casual conversation among friends and guests.
Pete is the first person you see as you approach; the skin of his broad, muscular back has been oiled, like yours, and his hair is neatly combed across his forehead. Even the bandages on his injured shoulder are evenly wrapped and new enough not to be marked with the stains of blood from old injuries. You wonder if his injuries are the reason his wrists are cuffed in front of him, rather than behind, like you.
You smile tightly and nod, ever so slightly, in greeting as you fall into place beside him. He nods back at you, just barely, face inscrutable.
Before you, in the raised, arced space of the exedra, are two divans, padded and upholstered in orange silk; between them stands a small table with a plate of dates and olives and an expensive glass bottle of wine.
Myka reclines on one divan and, to your surprise, MacPherson in the other. Bering, the Dominus of the house, is nowhere to be seen.
Myka, in a blue, brocaded gown, eyes lined with kohl, has never looked more Roman than she does as she reclines there, her teeth carefully peeling the sweet flesh of a dried date from its pit. You gaze at her for a long moment. A fleeting glimpse of green, filled with the warmth you hope she shares with only you, would reassure you, give you the strength to stand strong through whatever is about to happen. But her eyes remain fixed to the fruit between her fingers.
You close your eyes and call up the rusty image of your daughter's face.
Claudia slips into her position of deference behind Myka. Steve steps into the corresponding space behind MacPherson.
You find a crack in the tile floor and grab ahold of it with both of your eyes, a raft in the sea of silence that extends between the six people in this space.
MacPherson stands, eventually. He picks up an ornate walking stick—purely decorative; he needs no support in walking or standing—and walks toward you in slow, measured steps.
"When Warren sent word of your antics from yesterday, whore, I'll admit I was a little relieved." He pauses in front of you, briefly, and then begins to walk around you, like a python encircling its prey. "It seems your tendency to wreak violence and destruction comes from an endemic fault in your character, rather than merely my inability to restrain a belligerent slave."
You swallow and grit your teeth, but keep your eyes downcast.
"Still," MacPherson continues, "you are his slaves, so it was kind of him to invite me to oversee your punishment. With, of course, the support of his daughter, my beautiful fiancée."
You swallow hard, and try not to imagine his vile touch travelling Myka's skin.
He pauses behind you, not touching you, but standing close enough that you can feel his presence tingling against your skin.
"And you, gladiator," he continues, from over your shoulder. "When I gifted this-this murdering hound to you and to your comrades, it was with the understanding that my loss and her punishment could be for your gain." One of his hands, cold and slightly sticky with olive brine, comes to rest suddenly on your shoulder. "Look, gladiator," he says quietly. Pause. "I said look," louder now, and you hear the soft clink of metal on metal as Pete turns and follows the order. MacPherson squeezes your shoulder muscle now, tightly, just at the base of your neck. "She's quite lovely, isn't she?" The hand slides down your shoulder, creeps along your arm, curves down your hip, and you bite back the rising bile in your throat.
You hazard a brief glance up toward Myka, who hasn't moved from her divan. She's looking at Pete, now, not you. You have never seen her look so impassive.
"But I understand, gladiator, that you refused to share her. I would certainly hope that you were simply keeping her… services to yourself. But some of your kind have said you were protecting her." He steps back from you, now, granting you the tiniest reprieve of space. "Is that true? Were you protecting her?"
You glance up toward Pete and his jaw works fiercely, fists clenching in their bonds.
"Answer me, servus!" MacPherson yells, punctuating the word with a crack of his walking stick against the ground.
"I was trying to keep her safe with me, sir," Pete says.
From behind you, MacPherson chuckles. "Such misplaced nobility in a gladiator," he muses. "I don't know what you thought you were protecting her from. Venus knows the slut was as well-used as a poor farmer's plough-mule long before she came to this ludus."
You hear a sharp intake of breath and glance up again: it's Claudia, hands fisted tightly at her sides, teeth biting the inside of her lip in an expression of muted sadness and rage. You are unashamed of your sexual history which, by Roman standards, was prolific even before you were captured; the only parts you wish you could erase are the ones you never consented to, after you arrived in Rome. For a fleeting instant you wish you had taken an opportunity to talk to Claudia about sex; to encourage her to resist the Roman obsession with female virginity and so-called purity, to tell her to be the steward of her own intimate encounters.
Between you and Claudia, Myka sips at a goblet of wine, eyes trained on MacPherson.
"I'm going to give you an opportunity to correct your mistake," MacPherson says to Pete, as he steps around you, coming to stand in front of you again. "I wanted her punished and I'll give you the opportunity to do it right here, right now."
You keep your gaze fixed on the floor but you hear the soft clinking of chains, again, as Pete shifts on his feet.
"Go ahead," MacPherson says, stepping back.
You wait for the length of a heartbeat. Then another. And another.
"Come on, man!" MacPherson says loudly, his voice resonating through the atrium. "Here, I'll start the job for you—" and in the corner of your eye you barely catch the end of his cane as it comes up, and then down again, connecting with the soft backside of your knees. They buckle instantly and crash to the floor; you narrowly avoid pitching forward without the use of your hands to balance you.
Claudia whimpers again.
Myka has yet to acknowledge you, yet to even look at you as far as you can tell, and her distance is more than unnerving. Still, she can't possibly intend to force Claudia to watch whatever is about to happen.
"Domina, please, let your young handmaiden leave the room," you say softly, keeping your eyes downcast.
"Did you just speak out of turn to my betrothed?" MacPherson's open-handed slap connects with your face just beside your eye, and this time you can't help it, your shoulder collides hard with the paving stone.
"Get up, servus, I didn't say you could lie down," he growls. Slowly—your hands still bound behind your back—you manage to worm your way back up to a kneeling position.
"I said get up!" MacPherson yells, so, a little shakily, you stand.
You hear his footsteps as he crosses the floor in front of you and goes to stand near Pete.
"I'll up the ante for you, gladiator," he says, conspiratorially. "Punish her to my satisfaction, and I'll have you manumitted. I'll be your patron. I'll set you up with a small plot of land to farm, perhaps. Just think, gladiator. Your sons could be citizens."
You look up at Pete, now, to find him looking at you. Then he turns his gaze back to MacPherson.
"What is your satisfaction, sir?"
Your stomach drops.
MacPherson shrugs. "Dead, or close to it. You can choose your own method, as long as she suffers."
Pete sets his jaw. "And if I refuse?"
MacPherson's eyes widen, as though the possibility never occurred to him. "If you refuse—well." He lifts the handle of his cane and presses it against Pete's injured shoulder; Pete winces and pulls back slightly from the pressure. "If you refuse, I'll see to it you're demoted to fighting status for the coming games at the Colosseum. How long do you think you'll last in the arena with two bad shoulders?"
You glance at Myka, desperate for some kind of connection now, just a brief moment with her gaze in yours, but what you find is the sight of her selecting a plump olive from the tray on the table and bringing it to her lips.
Defeat, then.
Without her protection, this is doomed to end badly.
"Do it, Pete," you say quietly.
"She speaks out of turn again!" MacPherson says, with a laugh and a flourish in your direction. "Will you stand for that, gladiator?"
You clench your hands into fists. "Pete," you say again, looking up at him. "Do it. It's all right."
His dark eyes meet yours.
"I'm sure I'm doomed anyway," you say. "After all the risks you took for me, let me give you the gift of your freedom."
You imagine MacPherson haggling with a trader over the coin value of your Christina.
Pete's jaw clenches. He shifts his gaze from you to Myka, and then lifts his eyes to the middle distance, like a soldier standing in rank. "I'll take my chances in the arena, sir," he says.
MacPherson explodes. "Has everyone in this ludus gone stark-raving mad?" he yells, and then the cane connects with your legs and your shoulders in quick succession. You collapse hard to the ground, first to your knees and then flat on your face, the impact echoing through your skull.
Distantly, you hear a young woman's voice gasp "HG!"
"She murdered my wife," MacPherson cries. You feel his fist in your hair as he grabs ahold and pulls you back up to your knees, his frantic, angry, desperate eyes dropping down to meet yours
"You're right," you say before you can stop yourself.
"Of course I'm right!"
"Sir," you say, quietly. "I killed your wife for taking the person I loved from me. Now you want to kill me for taking the person you loved from you. And—I'm sorry. For what I did."
It's only as you say the words that you realize that you do, truly, mean them. What he's doing to you - you 'd do the same thing to him, if you could, for what he did to your daughter, and you'd do the same to anyone who might ever try to harm Myka.
But MacPherson only scowls at you, his hand coming up to land a back-handed blow across your jaw that topples you to your side, head bouncing once off the stone. "My wife was a Roman, you blithering cunt! A thousand of your ill-bred bastard pups wouldn't be worth the clippings of her fingernails!"
"James."
Finally, Myka's voice, trickling into your brain through the ringing in your ears.
MacPherson stands up and looses a well-aimed kick to your abdomen and without the ability to protect yourself with your arms you can do nothing but grit your teeth and curl around the blow.
"James!" Myka's voice is louder now. "That's enough!"
But MacPherson is moving like a man possessed; he grips the hem of your tunic and begins to tear it up the side of your leg.
"That's enough!" and Myka's hands grip his shoulders at the base of his neck; she bodily hauls him up and several steps away from you. "I won't let you do this," Myka says firmly, standing squarely opposite him, one palm pressed to his chest.
But MacPherson refuses to be quelled; his eyes flash like a bull's, caring not what their target may be, as long as they have one. "Of course you won't let me," he barks. His cane clatters to the floor and his hand flies to her throat and suddenly he has spun her around; he's pressing her to the wall, a hand at her neck and his body flush with hers. "You, who must be the only woman left in Rome too prudish to share a bed with her future husband a mere two weeks before the wedding night!"
You're a little dizzy from the blows to the head but not so much that you can't make out Myka's feet scrabbling for traction as MacPherson lifts her against the wall, or the sight of his free hand pulling at the shoulder strap of her gown—
the room swims a little but you can make out the sound of Claudia crying quietly in fear; you see Steve cross the room to wrap her in his arms—
you have no use of your arms but you scramble to your feet and run toward them at the same time that you hear the clanking of Pete's chains beside you—
you drop and slide, feet-first, toward your nemesis, trapping his ankles between yours and pulling at the same time that you see Pete grab him by the shoulders and yank him away from Myka, who gasps against the wall—
and MacPherson spins and his eyes rest on you again and he dives at you, dropping to his knees and bringing his hands to your throat and pushing, pushing—
your heels scrape at the floor, desperate for traction, but you have no hands to fight him off—
Myka comes into view, looking down at you behind MacPherson's manic and furious grimace—
your mouth gapes, fish-like, desperate for air as darkness begins to creep in the edges of your vision and MacPherson's grip only tightens beneath his maddened eyes where too much white is visible—
Myka turns her back.
The darkness overwhelms.
\\
This isn't death.
You want it to be death, but this isn't death.
\\
Your eyes blink. Blink again. Open, closed, it makes no difference. You see nothing.
Your cheek is pressed to a cold stone floor.
The sound of dripping water echoes through the damp room, and it throbs painfully through your skull.
You test your wrists. They are no longer cuffed. You shift your legs and—those are chained, now. You pull a little, and they don't give. You're chained to something by the ankles, then.
Slowly, you flatten your palms to the ground near your head, and you press. Slowly, slowly, your shoulders, chest, head rise from the ground. You fumble your way into an awkward seated position, leaning sideways against a wall.
"Well well, look who's awake."
"Pete?" you say, squinting into the darkness.
"The one and only."
You hear the sound of chains dragging against the ground as he moves in his place.
"Is there—is there anyone else here?"
"No. Just you and me."
You rub your temples with your fingertips. "Where are we? How long was I unconscious?"
"A prisoners' cell. Still in the ludus, on the gladiators' side. And it's hard to tell from in here. About a day, I think."
Your eyes are beginning to adjust to the darkness. You are still wearing your tunic, and through the shadow you can make out dark stains in the fabric. Blood.
You run your hands over your torso, arms, legs. You are covered in bruises and tender places, but there aren't any cuts. The blood isn't yours, then.
"Why are we here?" you ask.
You hear chains sliding against the ground again, and make out distant movement in the shadows. "We're going to be executed at the Colosseum during the games coming up."
"Executed?" You feel like a fool, parroting his words, but at this point you aren't certain if you're awake or not.
"Yeah. You, me, and some hungry wild animals, probably."
It's ironic, perhaps, that execution was your goal, just a few short weeks ago; now, the thought is horrifying. Such a humiliating, pathetic death in front of an audience of thousands.
"Why?" you ask.
"For killing MacPherson," Pete says, sighing.
You shake your head slowly to clear it, but all that does is bring a new rush of throbbing pain. "Did we—did you—I don't remember killing…" your memories are quicksilver in your palm, constantly shifting and reforming under your touch.
"You didn't kill him. You were unconscious," Pete says, resignation in his tone. "And I didn't kill him, either."
Your eyes squeeze shut. "Then who—"
"Myka."
"What?"
Pete inhales sharply, then lets the air out slowly into the darkness.
"She stabbed him with that sword of hers, to save your life."
And now you're gallows-bound for it, and Pete is, too.
"She can't possibly plan to let us die for it," you say. "She—she wouldn't. She'll come for us."
"She's moved to Cosa, Helena. She's gone."
Your fingers clench, nails digging gouges into your palms. "Gone? Cosa?"
"Her father got home just after she killed MacPherson. She was kneeling over you, still holding that sword, all covered in blood, and she was just—she was frantic, Helena, I've never seen her like that. She was so afraid you were dead." Pete sighs. "But her father was mad. Really mad. And he didn't want his daughter branded a murderer. So as far as the city is concerned, you and I are the killers, and Myka has gone to live in Cosa with her sister to grieve the loss of her second fiancé. Claudia has gone with her, and that manservant has been threatened into secrecy."
You inhale. Exhale. Inhale again.
All of your pieces are trapped.
