“The moment you step outside that door—to go to his aid or to attempt an escape—the guards and the Ardeans will see you. They will arrest you. You will be crucified.”
“They won’t catch me.”
“Even if you make it to the arena, I already told you, Xanthus has to fight alone.”
“I’ll find a way.”
“I won’t help you get yourself killed. Not after everything.”
“I don’t need your help, Sabina. You know that.”
“Attia, please,” she begged. But she saw the steely resolve in Atta’s eyes.
Attia grasped her hands. “I would do it for you.”
With a sigh of resignation, Sabina helped Attia secure her hair under a tight black wrap that covered her head, neck, and most of her face. Attia used ash and soot to smudge rings around her eyes and across the bridge of her nose. Rory’s darkest linens were employed to fashion wrappings around her hands and wrists, while Lucius’s trousers, tunic, and boots clothed the rest of her in layers of black.
By the time they were done, Attia looked a bit bigger, a bit broader, and nothing like a young woman. Funny. This was how Attia had thought to make her escape. Now she was ready to run straight into the wolves’ lair.
“How do I look?” she asked.
“If someone stares at you too long, you might still be recognized,” Sabina said.
“I won’t be.”
Outside, the moon had disappeared behind heavy clouds. Xanthus must be growing tired, and dawn was still far away.
“Please,” Sabina begged, one last time. “Don’t go.”
Attia leaned forward to kiss the older woman’s cheek through the scarf that covered her face. Then she slid out into the night, gripping the lintel of the door and hauling herself up, using the deep pockmarks in the wall face to climb to the roof. She might as well have been a shadow, silent as she was.
She raced along the roofs of insulas and shacks toward the brightly lit arena in the distance. She could see them easily in the darkness—the hundreds of torches glowing from the depression of the stadium. And she could hear them—the excited shouts of men as they watched their brothers fight to the death.
When Attia reached the arena, she climbed to the top of the outer wall just below the balcony where Timeus sat with Fido, crouched down, and listened.
“It’s not possible,” Fido grumbled. “Seven men in a row? No one is that good.”
Timeus spoke through gritted teeth, but his words sounded slurred. “He is Xanthus Maximus Colossus. Of course he’s that good.”
Attia couldn’t disagree, but she still frowned with worry as she looked down onto the arena floor. To any other observer—like Timeus or Lucius or Fido—Xanthus looked resilient as ever. His breathing was slow and even. His green eyes were bright and alert. He fought with a ferocity that left the Ardeans gasping in fear and delight.
But Attia saw how he kept flexing his shoulders and hands. That slow breathing of his was intentionally deep and carefully measured. Only a truly experienced fighter would notice the signs, and Attia saw them all—the fatigue, the exhaustion. She knew he wouldn’t last till dawn.
Above her, Timeus stood, sending his chair toppling backward. “I’m tired,” he declared.
“The night has just begun,” Fido said. “Sit, Timeus. Drink!”
“Ennius, stay with my nephew,” Timeus said. “He may need some … advice as acting lanista.” Then he turned away, surrounded by his guards, and left the arena to the jeers of the crowd and the drunken supplications of Fido.
Ennius and Lucius said nothing, but Attia had a good idea why Timeus refused to stay till the end: He honestly didn’t know if Xanthus would survive this, and he couldn’t sit there and watch his champion fall.
Coward.
Attia looked out over the grimy, bloodthirsty faces of hundreds of Ardeans before slipping from her perch and working her way through them like a wraith. Between the wine and the excitement, no one paid her much attention. And when the next fight started, she found herself watching as spellbound as anyone else. But she kept silent amidst the cheers and taunts. She felt like she was holding a vigil rather than witnessing a death match.
The skin on the back of her neck prickled, giving her the unnerving sensation that she was being watched. Her eyes drifted back up to the balcony only to look straight into Ennius’s curious, penetrating stare. She wasn’t sure what had made him look down at her. Perhaps it was her stillness in the midst of the stadium’s discord. Perhaps it was the fact that her appearance was almost entirely obscured, though no one else had seemed to notice yet. Whatever the reason, Ennius narrowed his eyes before turning and making his way toward the stairs.
Attia hurried through the crowd to wait for him on the second-floor landing, wondering just how she would explain herself to him and hoping that he would somehow understand.
Ennius paused several steps above her. “Who are you?” His eyes narrowed with suspicion.
Attia didn’t answer, only took a step toward him.
“What’s your name? Your house?”
Still, she didn’t answer, but took another step closer.
Ennius’s eyes widened, and she knew she didn’t have to say anything at all. He hobbled down the last few steps until he was only inches away from her face. She could tell he was fighting the urge to grab her—probably shake her—but guards patrolled nearby, so he struggled instead to keep his voice even and his composure calm. “Are you insane? If you’re caught—”
“Sabina has given me this lecture,” Attia said quietly. “You can either waste time repeating it or help me.”
“Help you? Help you with what?”
“He’s been fighting for hours, Ennius, and he’s getting tired. You see it, don’t you?”
“You came to help Xanthus?” He couldn’t keep the astonishment out of his voice.
“Yes. Will you help me?”
He shook his head. “You are not a gladiator. You would get killed in the arena. Besides, even if you could help him, it’s not part of the deal. There can only be one gladiator for the House of Timeus, and he has to fight until dawn.”
“It’s my lucky day, then. I think you should be able to see the obvious loophole in that. You said it yourself, Ennius: I am no gladiator.”
“No, Attia,” Ennius said, shaking his head. “I can’t believe that you made it here unseen, but you have to go back. Leave before the guards catch you!”
“He needs me. I can’t leave.”
“I know you’re quick and apparently talented at moving in darkness, but this is no game,” Ennius said.
“You’re right. It’s not.”
“I could have you dragged back to your quarters.”
“You could.”
“You could be flogged or even crucified for this.”
“And Xanthus could die in that arena. Death is inevitable, Ennius. That doesn’t mean we should stop fighting.”
Ennius stared at her. “You would risk your life for him?”
“I suppose it was only a matter of time before I started to see him the way the rest of you do,” Attia said. “If you love him at all, you’ll help me.”
“Ennius?”
They both looked up to see Lucius and Fido leaning over the third-floor railing.
“What’s going on? Who is that?” Lucius asked.
Ennius sighed before turning back to Attia. “A contender.”