“I . . . I beg your pardon?” I blinked at him, thinking I’d misheard.
His expression, with the twitch of his lip, softened into an amused grin. “So that I might come to know you better, my dear,” he explained. “I can already see from your performance today why his warrior’s heart is drawn to yours. In time, perhaps, I may come to know better the woman who appeals to his soul.”
I’m certain I blushed a fiery shade of crimson, but he was kind enough to pretend not to notice.
As a gladiatrix—even one who’d just won the crowd in spectacular fashion—I was still infamia. A social pariah where the houses of the Roman elite were concerned. But not, it seemed, to the senator. In the few brief moments we’d shared at the Triumphs, he was kind. Gracious. Effusive in his praise of my martial prowess, and clearly bursting with pride over his son’s accomplishments. And in the months since that time, he hadn’t actively discouraged a relationship between Cai and me, although I hadn’t yet received that invitation to dine at his house in Rome. Mostly because Cai had been called away soon after to Caesar’s campaign in Hispania, and the opportunity hadn’t presented itself.
Now, though, Senator Varro was in the courtyard of the Ludus Achillea, and I wondered what in the wide world had brought him there.
“Well, Fallon?” the senator asked me for the second time. He gestured toward the heavy-axled cart before him. “What do you think?”
I stood there, staring. Lost in a moment frozen in time.
“Do you like it?”
An exquisitely sculpted marble frieze lay on the cart. It looked as though it weighed more than the team of oxen that had transported it there. It was a gift—commissioned for the ludus, to be placed above the main entranceway of the academy: longer than two tall men stretched out end to end on the ground, it was a breathtaking, lifelike depiction of a band of warrior women engaged in fierce battle, facing off against an opposing army of men, weapons brandished, mouths open in battle cries.
Senator Varro had generously funded the piece from his own overflowing coffers to commemorate the occasion of my victory in the Triumphs and the imminent passing of the Ludus Achillea into my sister Sorcha’s hands.
“Such things—such extraordinary occasions, and such extraordinary women—should be celebrated,” Varro had said when I’d first arrived, out of breath and trying not to look it, in the yard where he and my sister stood waiting for me.
Then he’d thrown back the canvas sheet covering his gift so that Sorcha and I could see.
“Sisters in arms,” he said, with a sweeping gesture. “For sisters in arms.”
In the wake of the Triumphs, it had become general knowledge that the Lanista of the Ludus Achillea was my sister, so I’d known Cai’s father was aware of our connection. But, as a Roman statesman, I wouldn’t have necessarily thought he’d consider it important. I wouldn’t have thought he’d consider it at all. But he clearly did. He had. And it made my heart beat a little faster, thinking that the father of the boy I loved could appreciate the kind of bond that Sorcha and I shared. It gave me small, secret stirrings of hope for another bond—the one between me and Cai . . .
I shook my head and dragged my attention back to the marble lintel.
The stonemason artisan who’d created the masterpiece was flapping about underneath the archway, directing his apprentices to erect the wooden scaffolds they would use to maneuver the heavy slab into place above the main gate. Along with ropes and, I suspected, a generous amount of swearing.
“It’s beautiful. That one looks like you, Sorcha,” I said, pointing to the main figure on the frieze.
My sister glanced at me sideways. “That was not the intent,” she said, deferring to the senator, “I’m sure.”
Senator Varro grinned. “A happy coincidence, perhaps,” he said.
I noticed the hint of a blush creeping up Sorcha’s cheeks as the senator pointed to the two main figures, facing off against each other at the center of the carving.
“It’s a representation of the legendary battle,” he continued, “between the Amazon queen Penthesilea and the hero Achilles at the Fall of Troy.”
“Like the tapestry in your room,” I said to Sorcha.
“A gift from Caesar,” she explained to the senator. “From when he and I first founded this ludus, together.”
“But this is different,” I said. “On the tapestry, the queen is dying.”
“She is,” Sorcha said. “That scene shows the moment of the Amazons’ defeat by Achilles and his men.”
“Like your first fight as a gladiatrix against Thalestris’s sister,” I said. “That’s why they called you Achillea and Amazona.”
Sorcha nodded, gazing at the marble frieze as if mesmerized. “Here, though, she’s barely even begun to fight. An interesting choice, Senator.”
“Caesar is, of course, entitled to his idea of the story’s key moment,” Senator Varro said pointedly. “I only hope you can enjoy my own humble interpretation as well.”
I glanced at the senator, surprised. There were not many men in Rome who publicly disagreed with Caesar, even when he wasn’t there to hear it. The only other man I’d seen do such a thing was Pontius Aquila. And Caesar still took every opportunity to remind him of that particular folly. Coming from the senator, such a thing was an impressive display of either confidence or recklessness. I wasn’t sure which. But if Sorcha, as Caesar’s own Lanista, was taken aback by Varro’s comment, she didn’t let on.
“Of course,” she said, gracing him instead with one of her rare, full smiles. “It is a generous and thoughtful gift. The ludus will treasure it. As will I.” She linked an arm through his. “You will stay and dine with us tonight?”
“I would love to, Lady Achillea,” he said, patting her hand, “but my business calls me home to prepare for a trade expedition. I only wanted to deliver this before I go.”
“A cup of wine, then,” she said. “At least.”
“If your delightful sister will join us,” he said, turning to me.
Sorcha led him toward the main house, saying, “Indeed. She can pour the wine.”
? ? ?
“It seems you made quite an impression,” Sorcha said later, after we’d walked the senator back to his horse and seen him on his way.
The dryness of her tone made me glance at her sideways. “I barely said a word!” I protested. “I was trying to behave myself. Like you—a proper Roman lady.”
It was true. I had tried. Although to what degree of success, I wasn’t sure. Sorcha, in her time living among Romans, had managed to figure out how to fit into their society. How to dress like them, eat like them, and navigate her way through their baffling customs and social niceties. Me? I’d sat there, a cup of wine in my hand, listening to endless small talk about politics and Caesar’s wars and senate squabbles, and the state of the Republic, and on and on . . .
When all I’d wanted to do was ask Senator Varro if he’d heard from Cai. How was he? When was he coming home? Did he ever mention me in his letters?