‘Fuckin’ Romans,’ Oenomaus sighed in his booming growl.
‘A sad but all-too-common story,’ N’Jalabenadou commented grimly.
Spartacus shook his head and frowned deeply, his countenance twisted with a profound sense of helplessness and frustration.
‘And now here I am, trapped in a prison that seems to have not a single weak spot,’ he murmured.
‘Do not harbour dreams of escape, Spartacus,’ the General cautioned. ‘They will only cause heartache. Trust me on this. I too long for freedom, but I know that the only realistic means of achieving it will be to survive long enough for Batiatus to hand me the wooden sword.’
‘Bah!’ Spartacus spat. ‘What chance is there of that? How many gladiators live long enough to get that wooden sword? How many, tell me!’
The General folded his arms across his broad chest and clenched his jaw, turning his face away from the others and staring blankly at the ground. His nostrils flared as he drew in a deep breath, and it was only after he had held the air in his lungs for a good few moments of silence that he replied, murmuring in a barely audible tone that spoke of hope that had been shattered to the point of irreparability.
‘I have been here for seven years now. In that time I’ve seen … two gladiators survive long enough to get a wooden sword.’
Spartacus shook his head and whistled softly through his teeth.
‘Two. Two out of hundreds who have died in gladiatorial matches. Do those sound like promising odds to you?’
The General’s intense gaze came to rest on Spartacus’s face, and despite his crushed spirit, sparks of anger crackled and flared in his obsidian eyes.
‘They are not promising at all, no,’ he muttered. ‘But they are our only odds. There is no other way.’
Spartacus grimaced, clenching his fist with defiant determination.
‘I refuse to believe that. I refuse! It cannot be the only way! And you, what’s wrong with you, General? Just the other day you were talking about how I should train hard and learn my fighting skills well, as they’d best equip me for a chance at freedom, yet now you are cowing away from that possibility like a beaten cur! Tell me, are you like me, or are you more like that sad mute imbecile Crixus in the corner there?’
‘I … I was being foolish when I said those things,’ N’Jalabenadou croaked, his tone bordering on hopelessness and utter defeat. ‘Freedom is … it is … we should not…’
At that moment a pair of teenage serving girls entered the dining chamber, each carrying a platter of fruit. This time the girls, both of whom were slim, dark-haired and tawny-skinned, were more modestly clad than they had been on the training grounds, dressed now in simple rough-spun tunics. This did not stop one of the guards, stationed at the entrance to the dining hall, from leaning his spear against the wall to free a hand so that he could grab one of the girls by her arm as she walked by. Crixus, who was sitting nearby on his own, stopped eating to watch the situation unfold. He stared with unnerving intensity at the guards and the girl, but his expression did not change.
‘Set that platter down on the floor, love,’ the guard grunted in a rough voice.
‘But master, the kitchen master says—’ the girl said in a demure titter, her eyes downcast and her hands trembling with a gush of fear at the guard’s sweaty-handed grip.
‘I don’t give a fuck what the kitchen master says, sweet cheeks. You put that fucking platter down now, coz I fuckin’ say so.’
The girl set the platter down on the rough floor and stood quivering before the guard, a tall, chubby man in his late thirties with a pudgy face and a fast-receding hairline.
‘By Jupiter, you’re a pretty one, aren’t you?’ the guard said, leering through thickly lidded slit-eyes at the slave girl.
He wore armour similar to that of a Roman legionary, and along with the spear that he had just leaned against the wall he carried a shield and a gladius, sheathed at his hip.
‘Let’s ‘ave a feel of them ripe little melons then,’ he drawled with a salacious grin as he groped her breasts through her tunic. The guard on the other side of the entrance watched this and laughed uproariously. Crixus, meanwhile, simply continued to observe the scene in cool silence, picking up a crust of bread that he chewed on slowly.
‘What’ll your missus think about that, eh?’ the guard chuckled in a harsh voice.
‘I don’t give a fuck, she ain’t ‘alf the looker this lil’ thing is, that fuckin’ sag-titted, dried-up bag! Mm, by the gods these are some firm, tight tits! Just like two ripe apples, they are!’
The girl bit her lip and stared at the ground, standing stock-still and trying to keep the tears at bay as the guard unabashedly squeezed and groped her breasts. He then reached down and slipped his hand under her tunic, seeking to extend his fondling to the slit between her legs. The girl gasped with shock, and her face crumpled into a twisting of disgust and anguish. Something flickered to life in Crixus’s dark eyes as he watched this heinous abuse unfolding mere feet from him, but his face remained a carven mask of neutrality.
‘Oh, by Jupiter and Mars and all the fuckin’ gods, there’s a tight lil’ hole down there!’ the guard roared with an obnoxious laugh.
‘Haha, wait until I’ve ‘ad a go at that hole, it won’t be so tight no more!’ the other guard rasped, his voice dripping with rapacious aggression.
‘Ha! With your cock? Not fucking likely, my friend. That little thing’s the size of my pinkie toe, it is.’
‘Fuck off, ya whore’s cunt!’
‘Oy, we want our fruit!’ Spartacus shouted, interrupting the guards’ banter
