“Well, to Ozorne,” Arram said, looking at Preet. He touched the warmth that was Varice’s charm. It was the only thing he carried in his belt pouch today.
“No, I am fairly certain she is devoted to both of you, in different ways,” Ramasu commented. “Of course, it would be a waste if any of the three of you were to marry at so early a stage in your careers.”
The word was like a hot poker in Arram’s ear. “Marry!” he yelped, his voice echoing through the tunnel. “No, sir, no, none of us are thinking— Well, Ozorne’s mother has brought it up, for him, but he doesn’t want to yet, nor do Varice and I! We haven’t even gotten certificates, and we all want to be masters of one sort or another!”
Ramasu glanced sideways at him. “In the world outside the university, many people are married by now, remember, and starting families. There’s no shame in it.”
Arram shook his head. “But there’s so much more to learn! I know I’m supposed to be advanced, but I look at what my masters can do and what is in the books, and I realize I’ve hardly begun to learn my craft!”
“I see. Forgive me—you’re at an age when many students discover that love, or their families’ marital alliances, are stronger than their studies.” Ramasu drew the wagon up. They had reached the gates on the other side of the tunnel. To their right were cells, large ones, barred with iron. To their left was a single great opening, closed by heavy wooden doors and locked.
Ramasu dismounted and touched a finger to the left-hand lock. It fell open. He pressed one hand to each half of the door. Both sides swung inward, revealing a shadowed interior. Returning to the cart and picking up a box, he asked Arram, “Would you do the lamps inside? Only those overhead, not the wall or ground ones.”
Arram gulped, then reached into the room with his power. To his great relief, the overhead lamps were huge metal braziers held in baskets of chains. Their contents were not charcoal but wax studded with a multitude of wicks. He didn’t have to manage a tiny light, but a small wave of flame that swept along the braziers until all were lit.
“Very good,” Ramasu said with approval. “A finely tuned use of your Gift. Now let’s unpack.”
In stowing boxes on shelves along the far wall, Arram learned the room. There were twenty stone tables there, all with gutters in each side like a butcher’s table. Arram gulped; these would carry away blood. There were new tall leather buckets at one end of each table, he assumed for trash.
“Twenty?” he asked, his voice cracking.
“Usually needed only when the emperor wants a great battle, or a blood feud has sprung up among the gladiators,” Ramasu said. “Once we’re done stocking the wall shelves, we will put surgical supplies and burn treatments on the shelves underneath the first ten tables from the door.”
Arram nodded. The healer would be able to reach what was needed easily, at least at first.
“Daleric is responsible for hiring and training runners,” Ramasu explained. “They will restock when they see you are low on supplies. If you need something, hold up your hand and a runner will come for your orders. They will also fetch us water, or tea, or even something to eat during rests.”
Arram couldn’t envision any time this day when he would want to eat.
“The bucket for discarded cloths, pieces of weapons, and so on is also useful for vomiting,” Ramasu said gently. “I know this will be hard, Arram. Do not be heroic. I have often done this on my own with Daleric’s people. Sometimes I work here with two mastery students. I—”
“Two mastery students!” Arram cried, as close to hysterics as he had ever been in his life. “Then why not at least bring another instead of using only me?”
Ramasu raised his eyebrows until Arram caught his breath. Then he said, his voice kind and firm, “Because I knew you would be enough.”
Later, as they listened to the clatter that heralded the approach of Daleric and his companions in the tunnel, Ramasu cast a shielding spell around them and murmured in Arram’s ear, “Mind what you say. There are listening spells here as well as the camp. And, son, if you have mercy for these people, once they’ve taken a sufficiently bad injury, don’t heal them completely. They will have to go back into the arena today if you do. Unless, of course, they demand to return. The others can finish their healing tomorrow or the next day.”
“Return to the games?” Arram whispered, horrified.
“Some do. Hekaja only asks that we heal them, not that we tell them what to do with their bodies,” the master replied. He touched his fingers to his lips and to his forehead in salute to the goddess of healing; Arram did the same. He had noticed the goddess’s image over the door to the tunnel. Someone had given her a fresh dressing of vivid paints, clearly an act of worship. Without thinking, his magic quick to his hand after days of constant use, Arram called up two small balls of light and sent them gliding to the figure. He silently asked the goddess to accept his gift. The balls hung in the air for a moment. Then each moved to one of the figure’s outstretched hands and remained, as if she herself worked healing magic in the room.
“Very well done,” Ramasu said, resting a hand on Arram’s shoulder with approval. “I did my worship this morning. I have to say, I would not have thought of this, but I will from now on. It will give heart to all who see it. Now, let’s try to get something to stay in your belly, if only for a little while.”
Arram would remember that day as a giant stinking roar in hot darkness, one where hands clutched his arms and hands and, once, his throat. Despite the wax plugs, his ears filled with the screams of the wounded and the dying. They were carried into the room on stretchers by soldiers or gladiators, sometimes by the very gladiators who had been trying to kill them a moment before. They were slung onto a freshly cleaned table, where the next free healer looked at them and judged whether to take this one himself or herself or to refer the case to Daleric or Ramasu.
He vomited into the bucket more than once.
The wounded called on their gods, mothers, lovers. They cursed the emperor and no one hushed them, not there. They begged for death and screamed for life. He learned the truth of what he’d been told, that newcomers were hurt first.
And not only the newcomers. Quomat, who had been married at ten and fought for years, died just as she reached his table. Arram growled and reached deep into his Gift, thinking to go after her spirit and bring it back. He couldn’t lose her to the Black God without so much as a fight!