The Gladiator's Mistress (Champions of Rome) (9 page)

Her husband was dead. The notion left her numb. At the edge of her emotions, Phaedra sensed an unending sadness. Since she had become his wife, Marcus had served as her protector, her benefactor, and her teacher. True, their union had never been a perfect romantic joining. But life with Marcus had enabled Phaedra to change from a naive girl to a composed and competent woman. She wondered whom she would become without him.

Chapter 14

Valens

Valens sat in a tavern near the Senate building. People wrapped in cloaks against the light drizzle hurried past the open window. Women and girls held baskets and pots under their arms, and men stored scrolls in the folds of their clothing. A low fire hissed and sizzled in a brazier in the middle of the room and gave off more smoke than heat. Since winning his freedom two years past, Valens had spent many days enjoying a glass of wine and a meal in a tavern with people who still remembered his name and wanted to hear firsthand of his feats of heroism in the arena.

Aside from Valens, a handful of patrons sat at similar wooden tables. No one seemed to notice him.
So goes the way of fame.
He threw down a few coins and ate his last two olives, bitter from being harvested too early, and washed them down with dregs of wine. He stood and the wine rushed to his head. He held on to the table until the unsteadiness passed, then waved to the tavern keep as he opened the door to leave.

Sometimes he thought of buying a tavern of his own. Once his sister, Antonice, married, he would have more time. She was now sixteen annums. A troubled time in anyone’s life, made all the worse because it was she who had discovered their mother’s mutilated body in the apartment the two women shared.

After their mother died, Valens had asked for his freedom. His sister was young and needed the kind of guidance only a family member could provide. Paullus was a reasonable man, a good man, and had agreed to let Valens retire provided that he defeated his personal trainee, Baro, in the arena. It had been billed as a battle between the titans, and was with certainty Valens’s most famous fight. Even now, Valens suspected that Baro had let him win the match.

The last time Valens visited the arena, he had sat in the stands and watched as his mother’s murderer, and her former lover, had died
ad beastium
, torn apart by an African lion. He still blamed himself for not having taken better care of his mother. The apartment and money upon which to live was not enough. He should have known the men with whom she had spent her time. Perhaps if he had, he would have known that this man flew into deadly rages. At least Antonice had not been home at the time, lest she had become a victim as well.

Once outside, Valens wrapped his cloak closer to his body. The Senate crier came from the white-pillared chamber and began to climb to the rostra, a wooden podium set outside for public announcements. The crier slipped on the rungs, slick with water, and cursed before reaching the dais and calling for all to attend him. Valens cared little for politics, but with nothing else to do on this dreary day, he joined the small crowd and listened.

“Hear me well,” the man said. His deep, clear voice carried to all parts of the forum. “The Fates have cut the string that tethered the esteemed senator Marcus Rullus Servilia to this life. He arrived in Rome this morning after completing an official senatorial visit to Alexandria in Egypt. He died not long after his arrival from a prolonged illness. The funeral procession will begin at his house on the eighth day and end outside the sacred walls of the city. The Senate declares all of Rome to be in mourning.”

Phaedra’s husband. Dead.

Over the years he had tried to forget her, but could not. Or was it as he feared on lonely and dark nights as he stared into the heavens at Polaris—that he simply did not want to forget Phaedra? In the garden, on the night of her wedding, she had spoken
to
him. Not at him, or about him, as if he was not even in the room at all. For Phaedra, Valens had been a man, not a lowly slave or a famous gladiator. After he had met her, no other woman could ever rise to the measure she set.

The plebs of Rome loved to talk about the aristocracy. Although Phaedra was never the focus of a scandal, Valens had heard her name mentioned just the same. Having left Rome after her wedding, she never returned, although Valens was fairly certain that her husband had come back when the Senate held sessions.

Now Phaedra was in Rome. She had to be. Valens could not imagine the loyal bride he had wanted to kiss in the garden on her wedding night becoming the kind of woman who sent her ailing husband on a voyage from Egypt to Rome without her care.

The senatorial crier ambled down the steep wooden steps of the rostra and made for the wide marble ones of the Senate chamber. Valens intercepted the man. “Halt,” he said.

The crier stopped and looked at Valens.

“I fought at the wedding of Marcus Rullus Servilia,” he said, not completely sure why it was important for him to share this news with anyone, and most especially the Senate crier.

“Ah, Valens Secundus. I attended that wedding. At the time we did not realize we were watching the two titans of Rome, Valens and Baro. I did not recognize you among the crowd just now. Apologies.”

“Most people imagine gladiators in nothing other than armor. I wore it for a while after retiring, but it chafed my arms.”

The crier stared at him for a moment and then began to laugh with a deep, clear voice. A flock of birds took flight, screaming as they rose into the dull gray sky. “Armor chafed his arms. That
is
very funny.”

“What do you know of Senator Rullus and his death?”

“Nothing more than what I just announced. He and his wife arrived in Rome earlier today, and the senator died within an hour of returning to his villa. He must have been holding on to life until he reached home.”

Phaedra was back.

The drizzle turned to rain, and both Valens and the crier shielded their heads with their hands. “Gratitude for the news,” Valens said.

“Armor chafes, ha,” the crier said as he climbed the Senate stairs.

Rain came down in sheets, and soon Valens found it nearly impossible to see the buildings at the other side of the forum. He returned to the tavern and settled at the same table he had left a few moments before. The barkeep glanced at him as he entered. Valens held up one finger, and a serving girl delivered a cup full of wine. None of the other patrons bothered to look up. His anonymity pleased him this time.

He wanted a moment alone to think.

Chapter 15

Phaedra

For two days Phaedra remained in her rooms and saw no one except for Terenita. She slept much, ate little, and allowed time to pass in a fog. On the third day, she woke before the dawn and ate a full meal. Somehow the continual rest had not only renewed her tired body but also filled the empty place in her heart and eased the heavy burden of grief.

After eating she pushed away her cleared plate and said to no one in particular, “Now I must wash.” Terenita stepped forward and clapped her hands as a signal that the domina needed a bath. Phaedra led the way through the warren of hallways until she found the baths.

Like all Roman baths, there were three pools—cold, warm, and hot. Scant light came in through the high and narrow windows, so tapers burned in their holders along the brightly painted wall. At the far end of the room, steam hovered over the surface of the hottest pool. Without waiting to be massaged, scraped, or rinsed, Phaedra disrobed and submerged into the final pool up to her neck. Pinpricks of heat stung the soles of her feet and her palms. She held her breath and waited for the discomfort to subside. Closing her eyes, she lay back in the water and floated just beneath the surface. The cool air caressed the peaks of her body like a lover’s kiss, and the face of Valens came to mind.

To think of another before her eight days of mourning ended shamed Phaedra and her husband’s memory. She cleared her mind of any thoughts, especially those that included lips on her flesh.

Marcus had taken the greatest care of her. Their match had not been of a passionate nature, nor had it taken on the ease of an intimate friendship. But for years it had been her life, and it had been far from unpleasant.

“Send a message to Fortunada inviting her here for the midday meal.” Amplified by the water, Phaedra’s words sounded too loud. She righted herself and sat on a stone ledge of the pool. Her face felt too hot, and it seemed as though she continued to float. She stood, and a moment later her senses returned entirely.

“Of course, my lady,” said Terenita. “I will see to everything.”

Five days of official mourning still remained. Yet it could hardly be considered disrespectful to meet with her dearest friend, especially if she stayed safely hidden behind the walls of her villa. Besides, Marcus, his death and his life, were what she wanted—no, needed—to speak of.

After her bath, Phaedra had her hair arranged with silver combs and then dressed in a gown of violet. Both seemed appropriately somber.

A small white sun hung high in a cloudless sky of soft blue. The air, unseasonably warm, was pleasant enough that Phaedra decided they should eat in the garden. A table, inlaid with golden wood depicting a wild cat of some sort, was brought out to a patio near the small dining room. Two sofas followed, one orange and the other green. The colors, so bright and vibrant, irritated her. Marcus was dead and everything should be dour. Or at the very least, they should match.

“Wait,” Phaedra said to the slaves as they prepared to leave. “Take these away and bring back two sofas that are the same color.”

“The housekeeper said to use these,” one of the slaves said. “There are no matching sofas, and these are in the best repair.”

Phaedra placed her hand on the back of the green sofa. It had been so like Marcus to not care at all about the color of the sofa upon which he sat, or if the seams had come loose or the fabric was ripped or had faded. “I suppose these will have to do,” she said, dismissing the slave.

Phaedra had not seen her friend since her wedding night. Over the years they had written to one another, but letters often took weeks if not months to reach their destination. By then, the news they carried was old.

Phaedra worried that their friendship was not strong enough to survive a prolonged separation. Yet the four years mattered not at all—upon Fortunada’s arrival, the flame of lifelong friendship sprang to life immediately. After embracing and crying tears of joy, both reclined on a sofa as a slave poured weak wine into goblets.

“You look dreadful,” said Fortunada.

Phaedra felt her shoulders tense at her friend’s too-honest assessment. “I feel much better than I have since returning to Rome.”

Fortunada picked up her goblet and took a sip. “How do you feel, then?”

“Dreadful,” said Phaedra, and they both laughed.

A plate of roasted pine nuts sat on the table between them. Phaedra pushed one from the edge to the center before picking it up and chewing slowly. She swallowed. “I miss him.”

“Did you ever love him?”

Phaedra lifted one shoulder and let it drop. “How can one help but love the person with whom they live, so long as that person is kind?”

Fortunada reached across the table and grasped Phaedra’s hand. “Then I grieve with you. It is a terrible thing to lose one’s husband, is it not?”

“It is.”

“Has your father spoken to you of another marriage?”

“On my wedding day my father promised that if I outlived Marcus, then I could choose my next husband,” Phaedra said. A thrill of excitement coursed through her veins and sped up the beating of her heart. She was now a woman who could choose her own path in life, or at least her next spouse.

“I congratulate you on your forethought. That promise may very well save you from a worse marriage than the one you just got out of.”

Although Phaedra understood what her friend implied, she still felt the need to defend Marcus. “My marriage was not bad.”

“But the next one could be worse,” Fortunada said, her tone biting.

“True.” She studied her friend. The lines around Fortunada’s light eyes spoke of sadness that had hardened into something deeper—anger, or bitterness, maybe. Phaedra knew that her friend’s life had been less than perfect while she was away from Rome.

Fortunada’s husband, a wealthy man from the knighted equestrian class, had asked for a divorce after six years of marriage and the birth of two children. He then quickly remarried another woman, a patrician with ample coin of her own.

All of this had been shared in letters, and Phaedra had many times offered her heartfelt condolences. Yet this was the first time they had met face-to-face. So focused had she been on her own sorrows that until that moment Phaedra had not thought to ask about Fortunada’s well-being. “I grieve with you, as well,” she said quickly, hoping it was enough to right the wrong.

Fortunada waved away the concern with a flick of her wrist. “After three years there is nothing to grieve. After my husband cast me aside, I returned to my parents’ home. I have my children with me. My father has never taken the family’s seat in the Senate, and therefore has no need for allies bound by marriage. I am, as you are, a woman with choices.”

“Are you happy?” Phaedra asked.

Fortunada touched the goblet and ran her finger up and down the stem. “I am content,” she said finally. “As of yet I have no hope for the future, but I have learned to enjoy today. My attitude about life has greatly improved over the last year. One day I will be happy.”

She breathed a sigh of relief. Her friend was not entirely a pessimist and would again bless the sun for its warmth and not curse it for the burn. Phaedra lifted her own goblet. “Then let me propose a toast. We are a rare breed, you and I. Women with the ability to set our own paths.”

Fortunada lifted her goblet and touched rim to rim. “To us.”

Phaedra drank, and although she still felt sorrow for having lost Marcus, it no longer felt bottomless. She took another sip and thrilled to the realization that she had her whole life to live, and it would be one of her own making.