Macro shook his head. ‘I’ve had enough of gladiator spectacles …’
Turning away from the arena floor in disgust, he directed his gaze towards the imperial box. The puzzle of where the assassin might strike at the Emperor had stalked the optio all morning. He’d risen at dawn, making his way straight to the empty arena to explore its tangled warren of passageways. At the end of his inspection he had concluded that although there were plenty of exits the killer could use to escape into the streets, the Emperor and his retinue were well protected. The ornately decorated box was situated on a raised platform on the north side of the arena, affording a prime view of the gladiator bouts. The box featured its own private steps leading down to a guarded passageway that had a separate entrance also manned by a section of Praetorians. Getting near to the Emperor would be incredibly difficult. Macro had considered the possibility that one of the senators or foreign dignitaries immediately behind the box might be the assassin. But he doubted that any of them were physically capable of breaking through the party of German bodyguards, grabbing the Emperor and plunging a blade into his neck. There had to be some other approach where the assassin would be lying in wait. But for the life of him Macro couldn’t figure out where.
‘This isn’t soldier’s work,’ he quietly seethed. ‘I should be training men, not helping out those Greek tossers.’
‘Oi! Get your hands off me!’ a voice cried above the general murmur of the mob.
Swivelling his steely gaze to the right of the exit, Macro spotted two spectators quarrelling over a seat at the edge of the gallery. One of the men had grabbed a seated spectator by a fold of his weather-beaten toga. The seated man shrugged off the hand and shot to his feet. Macro rounded on them both in a flash ahead of the Praetorian Guard, pulling the spectators apart.
‘What the hell is going on?’ he demanded.
‘This man stole my seat!’ the first spectator protested.
‘Piss off, I was here before you!’ the second spectator snarled throatily. He smoothed out the fold in his toga, glaring at the first spectator through glazed eyes.
The first man glowered. ‘This seating is reserved for the equites. If you’re one of us then show me your ring.’
Macro raised an eyebrow at the second man. ‘Well?’
The spectator looked away guiltily. ‘I don’t have it,’ he slurred. ‘I lost it in the tavern.’
‘Another lie!’ the first man fumed. He raised his finger and showed his ring to Macro. ‘The man’s an impostor. A pleb trying to pass himself off as one of his betters.’
Macro frowned at the second man. ‘It appears you’re in the wrong seating section, friend.’
The man flashed a withering look of contempt at him. ‘Who the hell do you think you’re talking to? Fucking freedmen,’ he added bitterly. ‘Bloody everywhere these days.’
Macro’s temper snapped. He reached out and grabbed the man by the neck, forcing him to face forward and look towards the arena floor. A comedy troupe was entering from the east portal, acrobats juggling balls and midgets dressed up in costume. The spectator recoiled in shock as Macro whispered into his ear, ‘Address me like that again and you’ll have the best view in the arena. D’you hear?’
The man gulped loudly and raised his palms in mock surrender. ‘Fair enough, mate. I’m sorry. You know how it is. Everyone’s trying to get a seat for the games this morning. The group fight is the talk of the taverns. It’s not every day you get two legends slogging it out in a free-for-all.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Macro hissed.
‘Don’t tell me you haven’t heard! There was an announcement in the Forum first thing this morning. A message from the sponsor. All those gladiators who were supposed to get ripped to pieces by wild beasts have been drafted into the group fight … including that treacherous shit Marcus Valerius Pavo.’
‘Stop spouting bollocks. I’ve heard about these group fights. They’re just a cheap way of getting rid of the scum. Dozens of murderers and fugitive slaves carving each other up with about as much skill as a blind Gaul after a skinful of wine. The organisers would never risk a proper swordsman in that chaos.’
Macro released his grip on the man before he could reply. Down on the arena floor the comedy routine was trudging off and an umpire marched purposefully out of the eastern gate, followed by a procession of lightly armoured gladiators. Macro spied Pavo at the front of the column, staring rigidly ahead as the crowd hurled abuse at him.
‘Gods, you’re right!’ he muttered. He experienced an acute stab of sympathy for his former pupil.
‘Told you,’ the spectator replied with a sneer. ‘Tell you what, I don’t fancy Pavo’s chances in this fight.’
Macro rounded on the spectator. ‘What do you mean?’
‘There’s quite a few who are handy with a sword who’ve been added to the programme. You’ve got your Egyptian swordsmen and your German barbarians. Amadocus is competing too.’
Macro felt his blood run cold. ‘Bloody hell.’
The spectator nodded. ‘Pavo being the champion gladiator, the other men will be desperate to give him the chop. I don’t care how well he fared against the wild beasts; he’s going to get slaughtered down there this morning.’
‘Right, you bastards!’ the umpire called out to the fighters as they wearily tramped out of the eastern and western gates and took up their positions either side of a chalk mark running across the sand. ‘Nobody moves a bloody finger until I give the word. If I catch anyone trying to get stuck in too early, they’ll be nailed to a cross before the day is out. Understood?’
‘Yes, sir!’ the gladiators chorused.
Pavo had awoken that morning Hades-bent on sparing his son from the same traitor’s fate he’d suffered, and his father Titus before him. Entering the arena to a wall of noise, he recalled the gladiator tactics he’d learnt under Macro. The men slowly assembled on the sand, sixty in total. Some grimly resigned themselves to their fate. Others shook their fists at the crowd in postures of tragic defiance. A short, stocky gladiator stood to the right of Pavo, visibly trembling with fear.
‘This is it,’ he croaked. The man had no teeth, Pavo noticed, and a branding mark on his forehead marked him out as a fugitive slave. ‘We’re bloody done for.’
‘First fight?’ Pavo asked.
‘And last,’ the man replied bitterly. ‘I shouldn’t be here. I’ve never wielded a sword in my life.’
Pavo felt his muscles tense as attendants distributed the weapons to the men, steeling himself for the imminent fight. Accompanied by a line of Praetorian Guards, the umpire made his way around the fighters in turn, pausing in front of each man to personally inspect the sharpness of his weapon. In an attempt to bring some order to the group fight, which often descended into a chaotic brawl, the men had been arranged into two teams of thirty apiece, with the teams distinguished by their weaponry. Each fighter on Pavo’s team was handed a curved sword two feet in length and a small round shield. The shield was smaller than the one he was used to in the legions and offered much less protection, and he was unfamiliar with the blade.
Their opponents on the other side of the powdered chalk line were equipped with two legionary swords but no shield. Both sets of fighters lacked body armour and protective helmets, wearing only their loincloths. He supposed the idea of the groups having contrasting weaponry was to force the gladiators with two swords, deprived of shields, to attack their opponents. Gripping his sword, Pavo noted a pair of German combatants on the opposite side of the chalk line conversing in their native tongue, their giant figures towering a full head over the other men, the swords looking ridiculously small in their hands.
The young fighter glanced in the direction of the imperial box. He saw Macro staring down at him from one of the exits, dressed in the manner of a simple freedman. The soldier nodded slightly at Pavo, who was struck by a sudden sadness that the veteran wasn’t fighting at his side today. Across from the optio a line of foreign dignitaries and imperial staff filtered into the imperial box through the private entrance and made their way to their cushioned seats. A black rage ran through Pavo as he spotted Murena and Pallas taking their places beside the Emperor. The imperial secretary sipped wine from a silver goblet while he stared impassively down at the young gladiator, his skin pulled tight across his face, his lips thin as if they had been carved out with the tip of a knife. Pavo’s heart burned with desire for revenge over the two freedmen.