Spartacus: Swords and Ashes

a monster, I wonder?”

Even as they watched, the fighters in the arena faced a single, lone lion. The animal twisted in uncertainty, unsure of how it had suddenly become the hunted. Sensing victory, Medea hurled her spear, but the weapon flew wide, eliciting a howl of despair from the crowd. Varro advanced closer, with greater care, still herding with his lance, as the creature jerked away from him. It saw Spartacus dead ahead and launched into a desperate charge, heading straight for the slight, vulnerable human target on the sands, its jaws extending for the kill, its haunches tensing to spring.

It never saw the sword: The blade that had been in the hand of Spartacus was suddenly, unexpectedly, hurled through the air as a missile, and its point plunged deep into the chest of the beast even as it sprang. Its heart pierced midair, the lion fell, limp, the arc of its leap matched now only by the screams of the crowd, as the last of the beasts thudded to the ground.

Suddenly, all was silent, as Varro, Spartacus, and Medea staggered toward each other, seeking support. They crouched, leaning on their own thighs, catching breath well deserved, as the shouts of the crowd erupted all around them, transforming the audience into one massive, unending howl of praise.

“The lions are dead, the heroine yet stands,” Batiatus yelled above the noise.

“Heroine she is not, rather fucking murderer!” Verres shouted.

“Everyone in the arena is a ‘fucking murderer!’” Cicero said archly. “I am surprised that you are making such a discovery only at this moment.”

“This is not justice!” Verres railed.

“Such reversals should be expected when you leave justice to wild animals,” Cicero commented.

“Roman justice is for tomorrow,” Batiatus urged. “Today finds the justice of the mob.”

“They will do as told.”

“Would you command the tides, Verres?” Batiatus laughed.

He leaned in close, grabbing Verres’s arm forcefully.

“Only moments remain before crowd is lost,” Batiatus hissed. “Trust me, and be remembered as hero. Ignore me, and be forgotten absent virtue.”

“Something occurs,” Spartacus said, “on the balcony.”

“They speak of my fate,” Medea said. “Verres wants my death at your hand.”

“We serve and obey,” Varro said coldly, reaching for his sword.

“You will die-!” she spat, crouching ready to spring.

“It will not come to that,” Spartacus said. “It appears Batiatus will have his way.”

Verres pulled his hand away from Batiatus.

“Do what you will,” he spat. “I tire of this appeasement.”

Batiatus leapt up onto the band’s podium, his hands raised for silence.

“People of Neapolis,” he bellowed to the crowd, “you have seen a great warrior fight today!”

The audience roared in response.

“With hands alone, she began this day sentenced to death by beasts. But the gods, and two brave horsemen have intervened. In recognition of her prowess in the arena, and in a further test of her fighting spirit, noble Gaius Verres, editor of these games, decrees that her sentence should be commuted, ad gladium!”

He waved at the cheering crowd, grinning broadly, and gestured with careful deference to Verres, inviting further applause for the governor’s apparent wisdom. Verres rose and acknowledged the cheers with a half- hearted wave of his arm, sneaking a gulp of wine from the goblet in his other hand. He shook his head in resignation and sat heavily back in his chair.

“Ad gladium? Put ‘to the sword’?” Verres hissed. “We are going to have her killed anyway?”

“After a fashion,” Lucretia said, “her fate is put to the sword. She will fight and die another day.”

XI

PRIMUS

THE FIRST OF THEM WAS CLAD IN THE LONG DARK ROBE OF Charon, the skeletal boatman of the dead on the River Styx. He clutched a long pole, as if for punting his legendary vessel, and wore a bright white mask that showed nothing but the bare features of a human skull. The crowd acknowledged his arrival with a series of old gags-mutterings about friends and relatives due to meet him on the river, or pleas to be left alone until the end of the games. Charon played along, venturing close to the stands to point and leer at the front row, inviting their derision and their fear.

He found an old man in the eastern corner, and prodded at him experimentally with his stick.

“Not yet!” his victim laughed, batting away the punting pole. “You will see me soon enough.”

Charon held out a hand painted black with dots of white to signify human bones. He rubbed his fingers together as if demanding payment for the ferryman. The crowd laughed and jeered, and someone threw an apple core at him. The missile bounced comically off his head, and the ferryman looked left and right, then behind him in a pantomime of irritation.

Charon did no lifting, his presence merely signified the arrival of his minions, the harenarii-cleaners and sandmen, who marched briskly into the amphitheater to drag away the dead and the dying. Even as the boatman of the Styx taunted the crowd, and clowned beneath their debris, the cleaners dragged a cart into the center of the arena, hurling the bodies of man and beast alike onto it. Several lions, a smattering of rabbits, and the visceral remains of several human beings. Too big to lift, the corpse of the fallen horse was swiftly wrapped in chains and towed behind the cart as the cleaners dragged it from the arena.

A second cart of harenarii, pulled by two burly slaves yoked to the front, began a fast trot from the center of the arena, spiraling outward in ever widening circles, toward the arena’s edge. Piled high with fresh sand, the cart spread a new layer on top of the sticky wet residue of the morning’s combat. Their efforts seemed artificially effective-the sand was of bright, sun-bleached yellow, not the drab gray local ash it covered. The cart finally reached the outer edge, scooping up Charon as it went past.

The ferryman climbed aboard, brandishing his staff at the crowd in mock anger, pointing at various hapless individuals among them, as if to say that they were next for a journey aboard his boat. The cart made its final exit, leaving the arena decorated with a wide swirl of new sand, the underlay now forming a dark spiral within the lighter one.

“A pleasing effect,” Cicero said, looking over at the freshly sanded arena, “Resembling pattern of snail’s shell in sand.”

“It will not long be so arranged,” Batiatus said with a frown. “Effect ruined by gladiator’s first kick. ”

“By then, all eyes will be on fighting once more,” Verres said dismissively. “With only the primus of the day remaining.”

“Perhaps your skills as editor are more advanced than claimed,” Batiatus said generously.

He clinked his goblet apologetically against that of Verres.

“The credit is not ours,” Timarchides said. “A development pioneered by Pelorus himself when deal was struck with lanistae in Carthage’s new colony.”

“A deal? For what?” Batiatus asked.

“Sand,” Timarchides replied.

There were chuckles all around the balcony as the assembled dignitaries took this in.

“Truly?” Cicero asked. “This Pelorus sold sand to Africans?”

“In truth,” Timarchides explained, “Pelorus sent cartfuls of Neapolitan ash across with the grain ships as ballast. When they returned, he asked for a similar measure of local sand.”

There was a communal sigh of understanding.

“Making such effect possible in both arenas. Carthage gets a new color, and Neapolis also,” Cicero said, approvingly.