Spartacus: Morituri

pink- the work of the gods in all its livid majesty-but Batiatus was not in the mood to appreciate such beauty. He was looking down on Oenomaus, the doctore’s skin like gleaming obsidian in the fading light. He was holding up a small object, as though presenting an offering to the gods.

“What the fuck is it, a child’s plaything?” Batiatus snarled.

With a flick of his powerful arm, Oenomaus threw the object up to the balcony. Spartacus snatched it from the air and handed it to Batiatus. All three men peered at it, Batiatus wearing an expression somewhere between contempt and distaste. The object was a doll of sorts, its head the skull of a small rodent, a rat perhaps, with small black stones pushed into its gaping sockets to give it a simulacrum of beady-eyed life. Its body was fashioned from twigs and strips of coarse cloth, and embedded with hobnails, which gleamed like the shafts of myriad tiny daggers.

“If it is a plaything, it comes not from child’s cradle but from its nightmares,” Batiatus muttered.

“I believe it to be a fetish,” Spartacus said.

Batiatus scowled.

“A what?”

“A fetish. The Getae priestesses known to make use of them in ritual. The embodiment of evil spirit or their powers.” He paused. “Said to drain life from a man, if placed in proximity.”

Batiatus grimaced and threw the fetish off the balcony, his hand jerking as if the tiny object had suddenly squirmed in his palm. The fetish hit the sand with barely a sound.

“Hurl it from the cliff,” he ordered. “Let it drain life from rocks below.”

“Dominus,” Oenomaus said with a nod. He picked up the fetish without a qualm, strode to the far side of the training ground and tossed it disdainfully away.

“This will see end to fucking foolishness and superstition,” Batiatus said firmly.

Hesitantly Ashur said, “There is one further question for consideration, dominus.”

Batiatus’s scowl reappeared.

“And what is that?”

“How did such item come to ludus in the first place?”

VI

By the time Marcus and Hieronymus finally arrived at the villa, the party was well underway. Slaves wove through the unruly crowd, fulfilling the drunken guests’ every demand, but although everyone seemed to be having a good time, Batiatus had begun to fret that the two people he most wanted to attend might not make an appearance at all. As soon as they entered, therefore, he swept toward them with open arms, a grin of relief and welcome on his face.

“Welcome honored guests!” he cried. “The House of Batiatus greets you! The sight of you balms weary eyes!”

As Crassus looked around with what appeared to be an expression of mild disapproval, Batiatus beckoned forward a bare-breasted slave girl.

“Wine for these men! Quickly!”

He beamed as each man took a goblet from the tray the girl offered, Crassus grudgingly. He beamed even as Crassus took a sniff of the ruby-red liquid and crinkled his nose in disgust.

“Opimian,” Batiatus could not resist boasting. “It’s been said no finer vintage ever produced.”

Crassus took another sniff and then the tiniest of sips. Pulling a face he muttered, “It is adequate.”

Batiatus laughed uproariously, as if the nobleman had made the most hilarious joke he had ever heard. As he did so he glanced over Hieronymus’s shoulder and saw Mantilus, his teeth bared, staring back at him-or at least, appearing to do so despite his milk-white sightless eyes. The pale and somehow savage scrutiny of the blind man choked the laughter in Batiatus’s throat. He swigged wine to hide his discomfort and averted his gaze-but only as far as Athenais, the beautiful Athenian slave girl who Hieronymus had purchased for the outrageous price of six thousand sesterces as a gift for his house-guest.

Athenais was standing a few paces behind Crassus’s right shoulder, her skin still stippled with goose bumps from the cool night air. She was wearing a chiton even flimsier than the one she had been wearing in Albanus’s garden, but it was not the fact that the garment left nothing at all to the imagination that held Batiatus’s eye. As his eyes roamed admiringly over her body, he caught a glimpse of purplish-black bruises on the girl’s inner thighs. She caught and held his gaze for a moment, and then looked away with an expression of shame.

Though Batiatus was firmly of the belief that the role of a slave was to fulfill the needs of his or her master, whatever those needs may be, he felt an unfamiliar surge of sympathy for the girl. Of course, slaves must be punished for insubordination, and perhaps Athenais had refused Crassus’s advances, occasioning no option but for him to use force-but somehow this did not sit well with Batiatus’s prior knowledge of the man. Crassus was not known for his carnal appetites (though physical attributes such as Athenais possessed were doubtless difficult to resist; Batiatus fancied her allure may even raise the cock on a corpse), and moreover, despite his dour nature and fabled ruthlessness, it was said that Crassus treated his slaves with compassion unusual in a Roman; indeed, that he treated them not as chattels but as human beings deserving of respect. The bruises on the girl’s thighs, however, looked both old and new — some faded, some livid as the sunset he had observed from his balcony earlier-which to Batiatus suggested not an isolated violation, but brutal and persistent maltreatment.

Putting the thought to the rear of his mind, he turned his attention back to his revered guests.

“Hieronymus, allow congratulations once again on success at the games yesterday,” he said expansively. “A glorious and historic victory, to be sure.”

The Sicel merchant inclined his head.

“Pleasing start to fresh venture,” he admitted. “Though I confess myself a virgin in bedchamber compared to your accomplishments in the arena.”

“Then allow that in other endeavors of yours, I am but whore with flagging tits like sacks of grain,” Batiatus joked, with a bellow of laughter.

Crassus winced.

Chuckling politely, Hieronymus said, “Among lanistae, you are zenith to which all others aspire to rise.”

“You flatter with honeyed words,” Batiatus said. “Trust that my inaugural games as lanista were but pale imitation of your own.”

This was not strictly true. Batiatus had grown up among gladiators-his father Titus had been a lanista before him-and the transition from being his father’s heir to the inheritor of all that the old man owned had been a smooth one. It had been a simple matter for Batiatus to pick up the reins of his father’s legacy-which was not to say that the ensuing years had been easy ones. Gladiatorial sport was one which ebbed and flowed more swiftly than the tide. It required quick decisions, constant attention and an eye for accruing as much coin as possible from assets which were expensive and often brutally temporary.

“I judge that opposition was not as … demanding as expected.” Taking a sip of his wine, Hieronymus looked around quizzically. “Is Solonius present? I would commiserate with him.”

“Invitation was extended,” Batiatus replied casually, “but he has not yet graced us with presence. I expect him delayed with preoccupation towards filling gaps in his stable.”

Both men chuckled. Though Crassus, hovering like a vulture, remained grim.

Keeping his voice light, Batiatus said, “While Solonius’s warriors do not compare well with my own stable, I confess surprise at swiftness of their defeat. Upon the viewing I wondered what afflicted them. Forgive blunt words from humble lanista but they faced less experienced stock.”

Hieronymus shrugged expansively.

“I myself was surprised at their condition.”

“Do you gain insight towards explanation?”

“None.”

Batiatus looked hard at Hieronymus for a moment, and then turned to Crassus with a smile.

“Good Crassus, if I may, what is your opinion on the matter?”

Crassus’s face was like stone.