of battle, slaughter, and death. Before it happened, I knew it would.
“Look out!” I screamed. “Look out!”
The next moment, one of the Thracians hurled a spear into my Celt’s wheel—a movement so swift that it could easily have been missed by most of the onlookers. The spear broke, but jammed the wheels long enough to upset the delicate balance of the speeding chariot. The Thracian had timed his move perfectly. The chariots were just rounding the sharp curve at the end of the circus. The Celt’s chariot tipped on its inside wheel. As if by pre-arranged signal, another Thracian chariot sideswiped the outer wheel, and the Celtic chariot went over, spilling its rider onto the track, the spooked horse going wild and thrashing and rearing as it dragged the wreck behind it. The Celt on the ground rolled nimbly in an acrobatic display and dodged the wheels of the oncoming chariot and somehow made it off the track to the median.
He had also managed to keep hold of his spear.
Several grooms scurried out from the stable under the circus and struggled to catch the driverless horse. Once off the racetrack, they swiftly parted him from the wreck and led him away. An eerie calm fell over the circus as the chariots raced towards the opposite end of the ellipse from where the big warrior stood, clearly waiting. I could feel him sinking his roots down into the Roman dirt, sending them across land, across water to gather strength from his own soil, his own gods.
Now the chariots rounded the far curve and began to move towards the warrior again. He remained motionless, but the three crows circled lower and lower till they were only a few feet above the his head. The chariots were nearly on him now, the Thracian just ahead of the second Celt. The crowd held its breath; all you could hear in the whole valley was the sound of hooves and wheels, the cry of the crows. I thought I saw the warrior tap his nose. An instant later the second Celt sprang from his chariot and cleared the track in an amazing series of aerial somersaults. Then the big Celt roared his war cry, a deep bellow that made every hair in the circus stand up, that would have raised the very hackles of the mother wolf of Rome. The seven hills shook with its power. If the Thracian charioteer could have turned back, I think he would have.
But it was too late. The Thracian’s horse reared; the Celt didn’t even need to cast a spear. The chariot careened out of control, and the Thracian hit the dirt. The charioteers still driving headed for the nearest exit. They knew what was coming. The crowd started pouring out of the bleachers, a human flood as dangerous as a burst dam—or a tidal bore.
“Bran!” I screamed. “Bran.”
I started to struggle, clawing and biting the huge restraining force that thwarted my will until I was sobbing with desperation and rage. The arms that held me only tightened.
“Easy, girl, easy.” I realized my captor was Bone. “That’s a full scale Roman riot down there. We stay right up here. Does everyone understand? This is the only place we don’t risk getting trampled to death. Look, the purple’s already made it out. They have a private escape route. Soldiers will be here soon to clear out the rabble. We stay put till then. Red, if you’d stop bawling, you’d see that your man is holding his own. Trained fighter by the look of him. Matter of fact, I’d say he’s enjoying himself. And as far as I can make out at least half the crowd is on his side; they’re brawling with the other half. The rest of ‘em don’t know what they’re doing. We’ve got the best view here.”
I calmed down enough to see that Bone was right. My Celt, my combrogo—yes, I felt a surge of pride—was in great form. What is more, the crows were helping him, swooping down and going for the eyes of his assailants. When the soldiers marched into the circus, most of the crowd turned tail. The charioteers, with nowhere to go, stood quietly and futilely defiant. All except for the Thracian who lay, dead or unconscious, on the ground.
“Ladies, let’s go.” Bone still had both his arms around me. “Trust me, Red, you don’t want to see this part.”
“No, Bone, no. Please. I have to know what happens to him.”
Bone swept me up in his arms and started carrying me down the steep steps as if I weighed nothing.
The Forum Boarium, where we emerged and joined the milling throngs, was the oldest part of the city and the most squalid. There were filthy children everywhere begging or stealing from market stalls. One small boy was aggressively soliciting for a whore—his mother?—who’d set up shop in a fornice. (Now you know the origin of the word fornicate—doing it standing up in an archway.) There wasn’t an alley, recess, or shadow that didn’t have some trade. Every tavern and eatery has its own whores. Bakeries sent whores into the street to sell pornographic cakes and lure customers into cells in back. Bone guided us to a relatively clean establishment off the main thoroughfare and bought us wine and meat pastries, which I felt too sick to eat. All of us were subdued.
“All right,” Bone sighed when we had finished. “Who’s up for a visit to the athletes’ pens?”
I turned to look at him, startled. He avoided eye contact, clearly embarrassed by his kindness.
“Bone,” I said before I could stop myself. “I love you.”
With the dropping of coins along with Domitia Tertia’s name, we gained entrance to the aptly named pens—horses, wild beasts, and men all quartered in the cellars of a huge imperial insularium. Our progress was greeted with whistles, catcalls, and innuendos in all the languages of the conquered. When we reached the charioteers’ quarters I returned some of the insults eloquently and in three different dialects. The Celts were thrilled to have their lineages disparaged in their own tongue—or acknowledged at all, come to that. They promptly fell to their knees before me and begged to be of service.
“Siaborthe might as well die happy,” said one of the men when we told them who we wanted to see.
“Siaborthe?” I repeated. “Die? But he was fighting so well when we left.”
“Sure, he had the battle spirit on him. The rest surrendered, but he took on the whole century with his bare fists. Ah, if any of us here were bards, his fame would be sung and his story told to all the tribes for all time.”
I’m a bard, I almost said. But I wasn’t. I was a failed first year student turned whore and slave. If any bard knew my story, he would be silent for shame.
The men showed us to a cell. My charioteer lay on his side in the straw, his hands shackled, his face turned to the wall. His breathing was shallow and labored.
“Has no one tended him?” asked Bone. “Owners usually take better care of their investments.”
“Not when the purple thinks they’re dangerous,” said one of the men.
I knelt beside the charioteer. As soon as I touched him, I could feel that he was in critical condition, bleeding on the inside.
“Is he, Red?” Succula whispered. “Is he your father?”
I shook my head, because I couldn’t speak. It wasn’t Bran, thank the gods, but it was one of my combrogos, one of my people, big and brave as Bran had been, but much younger. And he was dying, dying in pain in a Roman prison.
“Can you do anything for him?” asked one of the Gauls.
“She’s a whore not a healer,” said Bone. “I’m afraid he’s past needing her services.”
“I think you’re wrong,
