handful of her hair and dragged her face close to his own, his bulbous eyes glittering with fury. ‘Lose that attitude, my lovely, or you and I will fall out, yes?’ He hurled her back to the ground and brandished the vine staff in her face.
‘Now, the lanista would like to see you.’
Lysandra glared hatred up at her tormentor. Spartan honour
— her honour — demanded that she rise and smash the leering, ugly face to a pulp. For a moment only, her mind coursed with bloody fury and she tensed, ready to spring up. Then as quickly as it had been lost, her control returned. She let the rage drain away and forced herself to nod in acquiescence. Time enough for revenge when she had been set free, she told herself. Then the filthy scum would be made to suffer for this insult to her person.
Stick wore an impassive mask as he gestured towards Balbus’s quarters indicating that she follow him. But the encounter had unsettled him. When he looked into her eyes he had seen arrogance and disdain, as well as complete lack of fear. In that moment he realised that he had not seen the like of this girl in all his years in and around the arena. He had hit her hard — hard enough to knock the fight out of most men. But the Greek had not been cowed and something other than fear had stayed her hand. The look on her face told Stick that, on another day, he would have had to put her down permanently.
The house of Lucius Balbus was the most opulent of all those Lysandra had noted when she first entered the ludus. Set farthest back from the training area, it was clean, white and richly decorated. Several large statues of Roman deities, and also a few local divinities, were represented in the flower garden that led to the abode proper. The centrepiece, of course, was an image of the emperor, Domitian. Painted and garlanded, it was a trifle over- done to Lysandra’s austere eye.
Stick glowered and left her in the care of a youth at the entrance to Balbus’s house. He was perfumed and pretty, his pale blue chiton far shorter than her own. The boy’s blond hair was outrageously coiffured and oiled, framing a plump, sultry, almost petulant face, a face that was used to having its whims granted.
‘Greetings,’ he lisped in Hellenic. She recognised the Athenian accent at once. ‘I’m Eros.’
‘Of course you are.’
Eros sniffed disdainfully and indicated that she follow him inside, tutting as her bare feet left dusty prints on the immacu-late marble.
The two made their way in silence through the house to a somewhat cluttered office area. The untidy sprawl seemed out of place in the otherwise sumptuous surroundings. ‘The master, Lucius Balbus, is expecting you.’ Eros flounced off, his disapproval evident in every step.
Lucius Balbus had long since acquired himself a niche in the entertainment market of Halicarnassus as the supplier of novelty acts for the great and frequent games of the province — the only lanista who specialised in the training of women for gladiatorial combat. Others dabbled and had women in their stables, but he alone could lay claim to a school comprised solely of female performers.
If he was honest with himself, Balbus had not expected his latest acquisition to survive; to fight as the dimachaera — the two-knife girl — required long months of training and this Greek had been with him less than seven days. She had been a timely arrival.
His regular fighter had come down with a stomach illness, rendering her unable to perform — leaving Balbus with the unthinkable prospect of a forfeited fee. The editor of the games would have been most displeased if the scheduled bill was disrupted at the last moment and was well within his contractual rights to hold back the coin on a no-show.
But Balbus had always been lucky. With a sense of fondness and reverence for Fortuna he pondered the events that had brought the new girl to him. As his caravan had travelled up the coast to Halicarnassus, his evening meal had been interrupted by Stick, excited and demanding to be seen. Grudgingly, he had consented.
‘Balbus, we are saved!’ Stick had announced as he rushed in.
‘The boys and me went riding down the beach to see if there was anything worth having washed up from the storm.’ Stick’s bulging eyes shone with excitement. ‘We found more than flotsam, Balbus!’
‘Spit it out, Stick!’
‘A girl, Balbus! We found a girl! Rightly, there was a ship caught in the storm. The wreckage was all over the beach.’ He leant forward dropping his voice to a whisper. ‘But it was a Legion ship, Balbus, there were swords, pila, standards…’ He trailed off, seeking the right words. ‘Everything!’
Balbus was not a man to miss an opportunity. ‘I trust you and the boys arranged to have the loot brought back to the caravan?’
Stick had looked insulted. ‘Of course.’
‘So what of some Legion whore,’ Balbus had wanted to know.
‘I take it you’ve had your fun ploughing a well tilled furrow? I don’t see how this ‘saves’ us.’
‘This is the thing,’ Stick said. ‘Some of the lads were going to take her. But she fought like a demon. Grabbed a gladius from the wreckage as they got close and set on the two nearest her.
Poor Tiro and Gideon… he shook his head with exaggerated remorse. ‘She finished them both like that.’ He snapped his fingers.
Balbus sat up from his reclined position. ‘She what?’
‘I’m telling you, Balbus, this girl is a natural, better than anything I’ve seen. No one was going to try to fight her alone on foot after what she did to those two. We ran her down from horseback and tied her up. All the while she fought like a Fury.’
‘You wouldn’t be exaggerating, Stick. I’d hate that,’ Balbus had warned.
‘I promise you…’ Stick had put his hand on his heart. ‘She can replace Teuta in the two knives; we won’t have to forfeit our fees!’
‘A consolation for the loss of Tiro and Gideon?’ Balbus asked ironically.
Stick got to his feet. ‘I never liked them anyway,’ he had said, and left him to his thoughts.
Lucius Balbus counted himself no fool and had taken Stick’s claims with a healthy degree of scepticism. Tiro and Gideon were often in their cups and perhaps an armed, desperate woman could just about have dispatched them with apparent ease. But now, this ‘Lysandra’ had impressed him in the arena, dispelling his doubts the moment she put up her blades. She fought with skill that went beyond natural talent; that she was trained — and trained well — was all too obvious. Strategy, timing and stamina had all been evident in her bout with the Gaul. The girl intrigued him and, for that reason alone, he had ordered her to be brought to him at the earliest convenience.
He heard Eros usher her to his office yet she wavered by the door, looking over shoulder at the retreating servant. He was irritated by her disregard for his position: a slave should not keep her master waiting. ‘Come in.’ His voice caused her to turn back.
Seated at the far end of the scroll-lined office, behind an ornate wooden work desk, he watched her approach with a critical eye.
Though ascetically pleasing, she did not possess the charms of the gladiatrix favoured by the predominately male fans of the female spectacle. For one, she was too tall, tall enough to look most men directly in the eye. Her hair, black as night, contrasted sharply with the white, almost alabaster skin. Her breasts were firm, yet were not of the size that was currently preferred by the arena connoisseur: the Northern European women were all the rage, voluptuous, savage and dangerously desirable. But it was her eyes that held him, the ice-blue gaze intent and alert. No, he thought, this one possessed the beauty of marble sculpture, serene and distant — an acquired taste for a refined palate.
‘I am pleased this misunderstanding is over,’ she said, interrupting his train of thought. ‘I can see that you are a wealthy man. I shall need to borrow some funds to return to Sparta.’ She raised a hand, cutting off the astonished lanista as he made to speak. ‘Never fear, Lucius Balbus; the Temple of Athene is not without means, and you will be reimbursed.’
Balbus gaped at her. ‘I beg your pardon?’
The girl smiled at him, her expression condescending. ‘I need money to get back to Hellas… Greece as you Romans call it.
My sisterhood will send you the amount in full when I return home.’
‘You are a priestess?’ Balbus faltered, unused to having the initiative in conversation taken from him. He was astounded by the girl’s arrogant assumption that she would be released merely because she desired it. Indeed, her very manner indicated that she was going through some sort of formality.
