“Don’t be sorry, love,” Wavewaker smiled. “I’m not. State I left him in, he’ll never place those hands anywhere without invitation again.”
“But this is the price you pay?” Mia waved to the stone walls, the iron bars.
“A man must accept his fate, little Crow. Or be consumed by it. As gladiatii, our lot is better than most. A chance to win our freedom. Sanguii e Gloria, and all that.”
“But it’s not fair, Wavewaker. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Fair?” The big man scoffed. “What Republic are you living in?”
Shaking his head and smirking as if Mia had said something funny, the big man kept on soaping himself like all was right in the world. Mia reached for another perfumed bar as Bryn and Byern walked into the bathhouse, stripping off their loincloths and kicking their sandals loose. It’d been their turn to train down by the equorium, and Mia could smell the sweat and horse on the pair of them at ten paces.
“Ah, our brave equillai,” Wavewaker smiled. “The twin terrors, unequaled on the track, welcome. The Crow and I were just discussing the theater.”
“Four Daughters, what for?” Bryn scowled, sinking below the water.
“I knew an actress once,” Byern said, his voice wistful.
“What, that sugargirl who’d come through the village in the summers?”
“She wasn’t a sugargirl, sis, she was a thespian.”
“If she tugged you for beggars, she was a sugargirl, darling brother.”
Byern glanced at Mia and Wavewaker. “She’s talking rot now. Smearing my good name to make me look bad. I’ve never paid for it in my life, and the lass in question was as at home on the stage as a fish in water, I assure you.”
“The only acting she did was pretending that she fancied you,” Bryn scoffed.
“Respect your elders, pup!” Byern said, splashing his sister in the face.
The twins engaged in a brief water fight, Mia and Wavewaker backing away across to the other side of the bath so they didn’t get caught in the crossfire. Byern dunked Bryn’s head below the surface and she punched him in the stomach. The pair retreated to opposite corners, Bryn raising the knuckles at her brother and scowling.
“Are you two done?” Wavewaker asked.
“Aye,” Bryn said. “No, wait…”
She snatched up a bar of soap and bounced it off her brother’s head.
“Ow!”
“Now I’m done.”
“One turn,” Wavewaker declared, once hostilities had died, “when we’re out of this hole, I’ll take you all to a proper theater. Show you some culture.”
“Daughters know some of us could use it,” Bryn said.
“Keep it up, and I shall see you before the magistrate for slander.” Byern warned, splashing his sister again. Bryn retaliated with a sweeping arc of her hand, a great scythe of water hitting her brother and Wavewaker in the face.
“Sorry,” she smirked.
“O, you will be,” the big man replied, wiping his chin.
Wavewaker curved his massive hand and slung a shot of bathwater right into Bryn’s eyes. Byern stepped in to defend his sister, slapping water back and catching Mia in the crossfire. The girl joined in, and soon all four were going at it, fierce as whitedrakes, splashing and cursing and laughing. Wavewaker slung Mia clear across the bath into Byern’s bare chest, grabbed Bryn in a headlock, and proceeded to dunk her below the surface as she kicked and flai—
“What in the Everseeing’s name goes on here?”
Mia slung her sodden hair from her eyes, looked up to find Magistrae standing at the bathhouse door, hands on hips. She was dressed immaculately as always, long gray braid swept over one shoulder. Her voice bristled with indignity.
“You are gladiatii of the Remus Collegium, and here I find you, caterwauling and fooling like a pack of brats. This is how you honor your domina?”
“Apologies, Magistrae,” Wavewaker said, releasing Bryn’s neck. “A moment’s jest is all. The weather grows hot and the turns long, and—”
“And there are only a handful of those turns left before the Whitekeep venatus, and from there, the magni,” Magistrae snapped. “Do you know what it will cost your domina if you fail? The shame she will endure? Perhaps you think it wise to spend your time jackanaping, but were I you, I would set mind to the games, and what awaits you all if this collegium falls.”
The smile on Mia’s face died, the momentary joy she’d felt evaporating. The gladiatii hung their heads like scolded children. It was true what the magistrae said, and all knew it—if the collegium failed, they’d probably be sold off like cheap meat, and only the Everseeing knew who to. New sanguila perhaps, but more likely to Pandemonium. All their lives hung in the balance.
Maw’s teeth, it had been grand to forget it all for a moment. But Mia clenched her jaw. Hardened her resolve. She was growing soft here. Not physically—under Arkades’s training, she’d grown harder and fitter than she’d ever been in her life. But letting herself grow close to her fellow gladiatii was a mistake. Likeable as they might be, the men and women in the collegium were only pawns on a board. Pawns that would likely be sacrificed before she got to the king.
These people are not your familia, and not your friends, she reminded herself.
All of them are only a means to an end.
*
“Harder.”
Leona braced her palms against the wall and pushed her knees into the mattress, head thrown back. Furian had hold of her waist, his grip slippery with their sweat, her whole body shuddering with every thrust of his hips. The bedframe shook from the force of it, stone dust drifting off the wall and down to the floor.
“Harder,” Leona groaned again.
Her champion complied, bucking like a stallion. The dona reached back, clawing his skin, urging him deeper as he took a handful of her auburn hair and pulled her back, farther onto his burning length. Leona closed her eyes, rocked to her core and quivering, mouth open wide.
“Fuck me,” she breathed.
“Domina…”
“O, Daughters, yes.”
“Domina, I can’t…”
“Yes, finish it,” she gasped. “Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me.”
Furian slammed himself home a few more times then dragged himself free, his whole body rigid as he spent himself across her buttocks and back. Leona hung her head, fingernails digging into his skin, biting her lip to stifle her cry. Breathless, she collapsed facedown onto the bed, purring like a cat.
The Unfallen lowered himself down beside her, chest heaving, his body drenched. Though the bed was small, he took care not to touch her—it seemed the dona had little taste for postcoital affections. Leaning his back against the wall, he licked his lips and sighed, heart pounding.
“A fine performance, my champion,” the dona murmured.
“Your whisper, my will,” he replied.
Leona chuckled, rolled over onto her back. Wriggling her hips, she arched her spine and looked up at the man above her.
“Four Daughters, I needed that,” she sighed.
“No less than I,” Furian said. “I’d begun to suspect you’d forgot me.”
Leona cooed, smoothing his long dark hair away from his face, running her fingertips down his rippling abdomen. “Did you miss me, my champion?”