He was trying to think of lifesaving magic when a pair of strong, dark brown arms caught him just before he struck the ground. He looked into a man’s face: eyes so brown they seemed black in the bright sun, a flattened nose, a grinning mouth, and holes in both earlobes. His head was shaved.
“You don’t want to join us, lad, trust me, you don’t,” he told Arram, already walking back against the line of marching gladiators. The ones closest to them were laughing and slapping or punching the big man on the shoulder. Like him, they wore leather armor. Like him, they were oiled all over. Some were missing ears or eyes. These were the beginners, the midlevel fighters, and the old-timers, not the heroes of the arena. Some didn’t look at Arram; they were murmuring to themselves or fondling tiny god-images that hung on cords around their necks.
“Hurry, boy,” an older gladiator muttered to Arram’s rescuer. “Guards comin’.”
“You don’t want the guards catching you,” the big man explained to Arram as he quickened his pace. “They’ll whip you before they cut you loose. Is your family here?”
“Sitting in the copper section,” Arram said miserably. He had no idea how he’d get back to Papa and Grandda.
“Don’t fuss,” the big man told him. “We’ll fix it.”
Arram smelled something odd, like a barnyard thick with hay and dung. The ground under his rescuer shook. The boy looked up and cringed. Massive gray shapes approached, swaying as the sands thundered beneath their broad, flat feet. They waved huge, snake-like trunks painted in brightly colored stripes, circles, and dots.
He had never been so close to an elephant! One halted in front of them as the others followed the parade of gladiators. As the gladiator lowered Arram to the ground, the gigantic creature knelt before them.
This elephant was decorated all over in red and bronze designs, even down to its toenails. It eyed Arram with one tiny eye and then the other before it stuck out its immense trunk and snuffled the boy. Despite his lingering fear, Arram grinned—the trunk’s light touch on his face and neck tickled. Carefully he reached out and stroked it.
“This is Ua,” the big man told Arram. “Her name means ‘flower.’?” He pointed to the rider, seated behind the creature’s large, knobbed head. “My friend’s name is—” The name he pronounced sounded to Arram like “Kipaeyoh.” “It means ‘butterfly’ in Old Thak. Kipepeo,” he called up to the armored woman, “this lad must return to the bleachers— Where?” He looked at Arram, who pointed. By now his father and grandfather had shoved up to the rail, next to the kinder burly man. The one who had dumped Arram over the wall was nowhere to be seen.
“He must be placed there,” the big man told Kipepeo. “Can you do it? Quickly?”
“For you, Musenda, my love, anything,” the woman called. She blew the man a kiss, then sounded a series of whistles.
“Ua will get us all out of trouble,” the man called Musenda told Arram. “No yelping. Ua’s as gentle as a kitten. For now.” The elephant twined her trunk around the boy’s waist and lifted him. Arram yelped as his feet left the ground.
“Thank you—I think!” Arram called as Musenda trotted off to his place in line. The passing gladiators and elephant riders waved to Arram as they spread out in their ranks. Arram realized they were blocking the imperial soldiers who were trying to catch him. He clapped his hands over his face.
“Don’t panic,” Ua’s rider ordered. “She won’t let you come to harm.”
Arram lowered his hands and realized the elephant was too short to reach the top of the wall. “Her trunk isn’t long enough!” he cried.
Kipepeo laughed. Tapping the great animal with a long rod, she guided Ua to the wall just beneath Arram’s relatives. Frightened and excited at the same time, the boy grabbed some of the coarse hairs on Ua’s crown for balance, trying not to yank them. Then he prayed to the Graveyard Hag, Carthak’s patron goddess and, he hoped, someone who might look after elephants and boys.
Kipepeo gave three sharp whistles.
Slowly, groaning in elephant, Ua straightened and stood on her back feet. Arram gasped as she lifted him high with her trunk. Now he was within easy reach of his father and grandfather. He raised his hands. They bent down, gripped him, and hauled him up and over the arena’s rail.
On solid stone once more, Arram turned and shouted, “Thank you, Ua! Thank you, Kipepeo!”
His two adults scolded him loud and long as they dragged him up the steps to the copper seating, but they also bought him a lemon ice and grilled lamb on skewers once they got the tale of his short adventure out of him. They even helped him to stand on the seat between them as the lengthy line of warriors, animals, and chariots finished their parade around the arena.
The gladiators bowed to the emperor, thrust out their fists, and shouted, “Glory to the emperor! Glory to the empire!” The moment they finished, the elephants reared on their hind legs and trumpeted, the sound blasting against the arena walls. The crowd cheered, Arram and his family cheering with them.
Now the parade returned to the gate at the rear of the coliseum, with the exception of two groups of fighters.
“It’s a scrimmage,” Yusaf explained.
“It’s a fight between lesser fighters, like a small war,” Metan added. He was Arram’s grandfather, owner of their cloth-selling business. “The ones that need more experience. One team wears green armbands, and the other wears orange.”
“Have you a favorite?” Yusaf bellowed. The noise of the crowd was rising as people bet on Greens or Oranges.
Arram shook his head shyly. This fight was taking place right in front of the emperor’s part of the stands: he could not see much detail.
“Here,” Yusaf said, pressing a spyglass into Arram’s hand. “You ought to have a really close look at your first fight!”
Arram smiled at his father and raised the glass to his eye. Yusaf showed him how to twist the parts until he could see the emperor as if he stood only a foot or two away. Arram gasped at the flash of jewels on the great man’s robes, then swung the spyglass until he found the teams of fighters. Musenda was not among these gladiators.
A slave struck the great gong at the foot of the imperial dais, and the opposing forces charged with a roar of fury. They smashed one another without mercy, kicking and tripping when they were too close to swing their weapons. Arram stared, gape-mouthed. This was nothing like the self-defense lessons taught in the Lower Academy! One fighter, a tall, glossy-skinned black woman, was glorious, her spear darting at her enemies like lightning as she held off two attackers at once.
The crowd gasped. A gladiator wearing a green armband sprawled in the sands. A long cut stretched from the downed man’s left eyebrow across his nose; it bled freely. A pair of slaves raced forward to drag the fallen man from the arena as his opponent turned to fight someone else. The crowd booed their disapproval.
“Why are they angry?” Arram shouted in his father’s ear.
“They prefer more serious injuries,” Yusaf replied.
“But he couldn’t see!” Arram protested. “How can he fight if he can’t—”