Blood and Sand Read online

  Self-disgust boiled in his stomach. The gods were taunting him. Wasn’t this the nightmare that resurrected itself every Samhain? He’d saved his mother by taking her life when the Romans came. Was he saving the Thracian by taking her freedom? Maybe a man’s crimes could be placed on the scales, weighed and measured for wickedness. So, he asked himself again—what did that make him? The possibilities made him shudder.

  Xanthus leaned his head back against the wall and shut his eyes. At least there was one other thing he could give her—his silence. No one else knew who she really was, and as Xanthus watched her sleep, he swore an oath to the goddess that he would never reveal her true identity. He would die before that happened.

  A soft knock at the door grabbed his attention. He wondered if it was Sabina come to save Attia from his vicious ways. He ignored it, wanting just a few more quiet moments.

  The knock came again, louder, more insistent. Then someone slammed a closed fist against the door.

  There were stumbling footsteps, and Iduma shouted, “You ass!”

  Lebuin laughed loudly. “Well you shouldn’t have had your ear to the door!”

  “Step aside, ladies,” Albinus said.

  Xanthus jumped to his feet just as Albinus pushed the door open.

  Attia was still fast asleep. Her slender figure was partially covered by the blanket, and her hair was spread out like a fan. She mumbled a word before turning over to face the wall. Xanthus thought it was probably the first deep sleep she’d had since she arrived.

  The gladiators were staring wide-eyed, completely still. And Xanthus had had enough.

  He positioned himself in the doorway, blocking their view and pushing them out the door.

  Albinus lost his balance and grabbed Iduma’s tunic. Iduma fell back onto Lebuin, who stepped on Gallus’s foot. Then they all tumbled to the ground. Only Castor remained standing, and he took a deliberate step back to separate himself from the heap.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Xanthus demanded in a harsh whisper, holding the door partially closed behind him. He didn’t want to wake Attia just yet.

  Albinus grunted and struggled to his feet. He pushed off Iduma’s face before standing and rubbing awkwardly at the back of his neck. “Time for training,” he grumbled.

  Gallus stood next but didn’t say anything.

  Iduma took his time getting up and thoughtfully scratched his cheek. “I didn’t realize the Thracian was so pretty. Fair as a princess,” he said, raising his eyebrows and giving an appreciative chuckle.

  Xanthus extended one arm and shoved Iduma back to the ground. He landed with a thud and a puff of dust while Xanthus turned back into the room and closed the door behind him.

  Iduma looked up at the others. “What did I say?”

  Inside, Attia opened one eye and glanced around. “What’s going on?” she mumbled.

  “Just some pests,” Xanthus told her. “Go back to sleep.”

  “Is it morning?” she asked.

  “Not yet.”

  But within minutes the training yard rang with the sounds of sparring gladiators, iron meeting wood, and blows striking their targets. Soft sunlight streamed in through the open window.

  Attia opened her eyes. “It’s morning.”

  They didn’t speak as she rose from his bed. Even after the previous night, the air between them still felt strange and new.

  Then Xanthus remembered something he’d meant to give her. He touched her arm as she passed, and she looked up with surprise but no fear. That was something, he figured.

  He reached onto the nearby shelf for the little knife she’d once threatened him with and laid it gently in her open palm. “Keep it hidden,” he said.

  She nodded once, turned, and left the room.

  CHAPTER 8

  Two days later, a small party arrived at the villa—Timeus’s sister Valeria and her children, apparently returning from an extended holiday in Naples. A holiday from what, Attia couldn’t imagine. But they carted along enough baggage to fill half of the main courtyard.

  Attia was sitting again on a window ledge on the upper floor, her bucket and rags at her feet. She had the little knife in her hand and was absently spinning it around and around, her fingers already familiar with the blade’s shape and weight.

  Even from this distance, the family resemblance was clear. Like her brother, the domina had vivid blue eyes that stared out from a pale face. She was nearly as tall as Timeus and thin as a sapling, with narrow fingers that reminded Attia of twigs. Only when the siblings stood together did the differences between them become apparent. Valeria was probably more than ten years her brother’s junior, and while Timeus’s hair had turned white and silver with age, Valeria’s was still as curly and blond as a young girl’s. Her face was warmer, too. She looked like she was quick to laugh, with all the little lines around her eyes and mouth.

  A young man who was undoubtedly Valeria’s son dismounted from his horse. Attia’s immediate impression of him was of a boy playing at being a soldier. His light brown hair shone in the sun, and his face was soft in ways that were unlike either Valeria or Timeus. He was taller than his mother and uncle, slender but not thin. He wore a jeweled dagger at his belt that looked more like an ornament than a weapon. He quickly greeted his uncle before hurrying to a closed cart.

  Attia watched as he entered it, only to emerge a few minutes later with a large bundle of linen in his arms. She frowned. What the hell? Then she remembered what Sabina had said—that Valeria had children. Was that bundle of cloth one of them? Valeria’s son disappeared into the villa before Attia could get a better look.

  Bored again, she grabbed her bucket and went to another room and another window, one from which she could watch the gladiators in the training yard.

  Since her arrival, she’d focused all of her energy on surviving, on healing, on reclaiming her old self just enough to kill Timeus and, if need be, follow her family into the underworld. But now that she knew of Crassus, everything seemed to shift. She had so little left to live for except revenge. She hated Timeus, yes, and she consoled herself with the thought of killing him before she made her escape. Still, if anyone deserved to taste her blade, it was the bastard who’d murdered her father. She’d just have to find him first.

  She spun the knife around once more before hiding it in the folds of her tunic.

  In the training yard below, the blond, scarred gladiator was fighting. Attia knew that violence and ruthlessness simmered just below the surface of most men, but it was particularly plain in that one. She could see the anger etched into his soul as permanently as the scars on his skin. She didn’t fault him for it. She had been raised by violent, ruthless men. She had been trained to be one of them, to lead them. If anything, she was more like the gladiators than the rest of the slaves.

  When her mother died, Attia had felt like the world had broken in half, like she was straddling the abyss. She was the last of her mother, with a face so similar that it broke her father’s heart, and yet she was also her father’s daughter and heir. It fell on her to fulfill the destiny of the brother she would never have, and while her people gave their love without question, some still had reservations about following a woman into battle someday. Attia had relieved them of that doubt on her eleventh birthday.

  By then, she had been training for almost five straight years, memorizing the curves of blades and the weight of a full quiver. Calluses covered her hands, and her knees were constantly skinned from tumbling around in the sparring yard. For a while, even her hair was cut short for convenience and uniformity. She’d always been smaller, shorter than most. But her training made her strong enough, and a stranger might easily have mistaken her for just another Thracian boy if it weren’t for the names.

  They’d started out mildly—silly transformations like A-tik-tok or the Girl Prince—and eventually became completely new renditions, the favorite being Spattia, Spawn of Sparro. Attia still remembered the high tenor of their taunts, the sounds of
growing boys learning to be men.

  And then, one day, she snapped.

  One of the older boys had shoved her from behind, and she fell forward onto rough ground.

  “Spattia! Spattia!” he chanted. “Spattia! Spa—”

  Still on the ground, her hands buried in the dirt, she’d kicked back and up with all her strength, the heel of her foot colliding hard with the boy’s face. Everyone heard the sickening crunch of his broken nose right before he fell.

  The whole yard was silent as she twisted her skinny body about and leapt to her feet in a technique she’d made up on her own. She stood over the boy with clenched fists and fought the urge to kick him again. “My name is Attia,” she said to the boys and soldiers gathered around watching.

  Groaning, the boy covered his nose with his hands. His eyes stared at her with a mixture of fear and admiration. Only after he nodded did she step back and let him stand. He was almost a foot taller than she.

  No one called her names again after that. Jezrael—the boy she’d fought—became her closest friend, nearly a brother. From that day on, Attia had often caught her father watching her with pride. He finally believed she would make a fine Maedi after all.

  That future was dead. But below the scars and the wounds that would never heal, there was still the spirit of a swordlord’s heir.

  Whatever it took, Attia knew she had to find Crassus. She had to make him pay.

  * * *

  The gladiators paused in their training to drink from the barrel of fresh water at the wall of the training yard. Gone were the jests and laughter from the days before. After what Albinus had said, their training had changed. It had to.

  Xanthus was sipping from his cup when he noticed his brothers go still around him. Their faces went blank and their hands tightened their holds on their cups. Even their eyes turned down to the ground, as though they couldn’t see or hear a thing.

  Turning to the archway of the training yard, Xanthus saw the reason why. He put down his cup and extended his right hand. “Welcome home, Master Lucius.”

  Lucius, Timeus’s nephew, glanced awkwardly at the others as he grasped Xanthus’s hand. Xanthus thought he was still too slender for a man of nearly eighteen. He turned Lucius’s hand over in his, examining the smooth texture of his palms.

  “No calluses,” Xanthus said. “You haven’t been practicing.”

  Lucius blushed. “Something I hope to remedy. How are you, Xanthus?”

  “The same,” Xanthus said, mostly for lack of anything better to say. “How’s your arm?”

  Lucius grimaced before tugging on his sleeve. A short scar ran along the inner part of his forearm from the time Xanthus had accidentally snapped the bone clean in half with the blunt end of a training sword. Timeus’s physicians had been forced to cut into Lucius’s arm to repair it.

  “I think it’s an improvement, actually. Women are always impressed by scars,” Lucius said.

  Someone snorted behind Xanthus—probably Albinus—but he ignored it. “You’re welcome to join us in training, Master Lucius,” Xanthus said loudly enough for the others to hear.

  His brothers had never been particularly fond of Lucius, though it wasn’t anything personal. It was simply too difficult for them to separate the boy from the family, to see him as anything but the heir to the House of Timeus. But Xanthus sympathized with Lucius. He’d been young once, too—untrained and green around the edges until Ennius taught him.

  Lucius looked at the gladiators, who’d moved farther down the training yard. “They really don’t like me.”

  “They’re gladiators, Master Lucius. They don’t really like anyone or anything, except perhaps fighting.”

  Lucius nodded. “Oh, that actually reminds me. My uncle asked me to extend a message. He says he hopes you’re enjoying your gift. What did he get you?”

  Xanthus turned away so Lucius wouldn’t see him grit his teeth. “Your uncle is generous with me,” he said simply. He led Lucius into the training yard and tossed him a staff. “Since you haven’t been practicing, we’ll start with the basics.”

  Looking slightly abashed, Lucius caught the staff and tried to ignore the glowers of the other gladiators.

  * * *

  It was midafternoon and warm. A weighty quiet had descended on the estate as the household took its brief daily rest. Attia cut through the western dining room to avoid the guards, thinking she could get to the upper levels and back to Timeus’s study unnoticed. But as soon as she entered the dining room, she found a young man struggling to lift a cup of wine to his lips.

  She watched him silently for a few seconds before speaking. “Problems?” she asked.

  His head jerked up, and his grip involuntarily tightened on the cup. He sucked air through his teeth, trying not to look like he was in such obvious pain.

  “I’m fine,” he said.

  Attia cocked her head at him as recognition dawned. “You’re Timeus’s nephew.”

  “Unfortunately,” he grumbled, frowning as he tried to get a better grip on the cup.

  That one response made Attia smile, and she decided that nephew or not, maybe she could spare him the benefit of the doubt.

  As she slowly approached him, she saw the blisters raging across both palms. She’d had her share of aches and pains from her own training. Really, he should have known better. He could have at least wrapped his hands to protect himself from the rough leather binding on the practice swords. His injuries—if she could even call them that—were his own fault.

  When he caught her staring, he put his cup down and tried to hide his hands behind his back. Attia tried not to laugh.

  He grumbled again. “It’s not funny.”

  “Forgive me for not laughing, Timeus’s nephew.”

  “My name is Lucius, and these are serious wounds, you know. I could have died in the practice yard.”

  Attia nodded seriously. “Many warriors have succumbed to such hurts.”

  “I sparred with the Champion of Rome. That’s not nothing.”

  “It’s rather heroic, in fact.”

  “Perhaps you could make yourself useful then and help me bind these up.” He lifted his hands into the air. The blisters really did look angry. They’d already started to seep.

  Attia shook her head with feigned pity, and a short while later, she and Lucius were sitting side by side on a bench just outside of the dining room, Sabina’s basket of linen and salves between them.

  “You really should have asked Sabina to do this,” Attia said, sniffing cautiously at one of the jars. “I’m not a healer. You’ll be lucky if you don’t lose your hands entirely.” She took a generous scoop of the salve that Sabina had instructed her to use and began rubbing it vigorously into Lucius’s palms.

  He flinched and pulled away. “Gods, you might just take my hands off after all. Aren’t women supposed to be gentle?”

  “Aren’t men supposed to be fearless? Hold still. I can’t do this if you keep squirming.”

  He held his hands up and out of her reach. “You don’t need to rub so hard.”

  Attia raised an eyebrow and tried not to smirk.

  A deep blush worked its way up from beneath the collar of Lucius’s tunic. Lacking a decent response, he held out his hands again and only hissed a little when she touched the ointment to them.

  “You probably shouldn’t have practiced for so long,” she told him.

  “The gladiators train all day every day.”

  “Their survival depends on their training. Anyway, you’re not a gladiator.”

  “A man should still know how to handle a sword.”

  “Why? Your uncle has guards posted all over the estate.”

  “You wouldn’t understand. You’re only a—” He paused.

  “I’m only a what? A slave?”

  He shook his head. “I was going to say that you’re only a woman.”

  A harsh laugh broke out of Attia. “Well, that’s much better.”

  He shook his head agai
n, fighting another blush, and his shoulders seemed to sink just a little. “I mean no offense. It’s just that no one ever expects anything of women. You only have to look pretty and marry someone and give him children. But my father was the Legatus Lucius Bassus. He led an army through Herodium and sacked the mountain fortress in less than three weeks. He and Crassus nearly conquered Jerusalem. Vespasian became Princeps because of my father. I am the only son of one of the greatest generals Rome has ever seen. I am the last to carry on his name, to bring greatness to the house that he built. And…” he looked down and away. “And I’m nothing compared to him.”

  Attia had to swallow hard past the lump in her throat. She had no idea why he was telling her this, but she had to acknowledge the irony in the fact that she probably understood the weight of a father’s legacy better than anyone. She carried it with her every second of every day. No one but Xanthus knew who she was, and that was a blessing but also a curse. Her anonymity ensured her survival. But her father’s name would die with her.

  Lucius’s voice softened as he stared out over the wall. “Xanthus reminds me of him sometimes. Not in look or manner, exactly, but in other ways. I’ve never said this out loud, but I think my father would have liked to have Xanthus for a son. He’s intelligent and brave. Men would follow him straight into the underworld. Slave or no.”

  Attia pursed her lips and paused before asking, “Where is your father now?”

  “He died in Machaerus when I was twelve—the year my sister was born. It wasn’t in battle. He contracted some sickness. No one knows exactly what, only that one day he had a fever and the next day he was dead. Titus himself delivered the news to my mother.”

  “Is that when you came to live here? With your uncle?”

  Lucius nodded. “It’s been nearly six years, but this house still doesn’t feel like home.”