I awoke with a gasp, retching into the sheets for what seemed like an hour before collapsing back into my sweat-puddled bed. “Ugh,” I turned over to stare at the art panels on the roof. Still half-asleep, I couldn’t make much sense of them. Swords and men and fire, the whole tiresome drama that you would expect in a grandiose palace guest-room.

Somewhere else in this palace, however, was a man like myself—a predecessor— sleeping by a tree trunk. Or inside of it.

I’d heard Juno’s laugh constantly throughout the night, and was entirely sure it was just stuck in my mind. This plane of hell that I’d been lured into would be my doom, I was sure of it. But then I thought of Lepidus and that comforted me. There was too much regret in our relationship, but it gave me comfort that I’d led my son well in life. I’d set him up as a respected man, with status and dignity. Whatever may come, at least he wouldn’t end up like me.

The hope gave me newfound energy to drag myself out of the bed and hop over to the washing basin. I tried my best not to make a mess, for the servants' sake, but another coughing fit attacked me when I least expected, sending me lurching forward and tripping over the pot. My feet kicked the metal and I crashed, along with a wave of soap water that splashed across the marble floor.

“Sons of Dis!” I croaked, twisting and floundering, now wide awake. Unfortunately. My white night-robe had soaked up the water by the time I wobbled up to my feet, and my nostrils protested at the stench of lemon or whatever it was they used in their morning bowls.

I had to dedicate an hour washing and scrubbing every inch of myself. Accustomed to warm water baths, I didn’t expect to like cold water at first. But given the blistering heat outside and my own disgusting state, the shiver inducing pours down my back were all the more welcome.

I carefully sniffed my fingers and my arm, hoping the lemony stench was gone. I could still smell it. Where was it coming from? Was the bathwater also—

Oh, you stupid old fart. I hadn’t cleaned the floor!

For all the organization and forethought my profession required, I could barely begin my day in a civilized manner. Any old maid would have advised me to clean the mess on the floor before I cleaned myself. How far had my mind gone down the abyss?

I remembered living terribly in my last few days in Rome. All sickly and depressed. The journey here had felt like a fresh start, so ending up covered in piss on my third day felt like my life was truly a farce. Every single moment.

What did I know about fighting and gladiators? Sure, I’d spent all my free time studying warriors of old, watching bouts and betting on violent brawls. I’d also made a list of all the greatest officers in the current legions and ranked them on order of skill and aptitude. Well, that could be useful…

I snatched an old tunic, wrapped it around a curtain rod and began wiping the floor around my bed. My night robe had done most of the work already.

The morning exercise was meditative, however. It gave me a chance to address my dilemma with a clear mind. As terrifying as Atia was, the task wasn’t as monumental as it seemed last night. Hadn’t I once investigated and memorized all four hundred slaves that belonged to the bastard Secundus? Gods, he’d been a piece of work… Never had a man brought so much misery to his household, even in death. Especially in death.

After one of his slaves had knifed him, the city had burst with patrician disgust. Romans wanted all four hundred of his slaves executed and it’d taken me a lot of politicking to get the senate to, at the very least, conduct an investigation before finding all of the slaves guilty.

And I, being his former biographer, had been entrusted with analyzing, studying and questioning every single member of his enslaved retinue. His household had been such a diverse world of peoples with different strengths and weaknesses and possible motives. How long had it taken me? And for what?

I collapsed at my bedside and leaned the make-shift mop away from me. So many years wasted fighting losing battles. Was this tournament going to be one of them? But I couldn’t really call any of my life’s struggles “battles”. My life was that of a foolish man jumping in a pool with sharks and trying to become one of them. Only to soon realize that he couldn’t really stomach the taste of fish.

After years of denial, it had been a long walk of shame back to the shore where nothing but obscurity and betrayal awaited me. As I closed my eyes, memories of crucified slaves invaded the darkness, and I imagined Hurek as one of them. “Poor boy,” I muttered. He would be another young man I was going to fail. Even if I took him to the final bout, Atia had nefarious plans for him.

But what was the alternative? Allow the Priestess to discard both of us as a failed experiment? No. If there is anything that I had learned working with Roman patricians, it’s that their world revolved around power and leverage. And the only path to that, at least for now, was to dominate the competition. Let Atia think that her plan was blossoming, and when I finally had more than just my pen and my wits at my disposal, I’d push for a final negotiation.

One step at a time. If Atia thought I was some sniveling collegiate bumpkin from the west, she was in for a surprise. Every win would come with a price for her. I will chip away at her leverage at every turn and gain some influence of my own. How different could Palmyra be from Rome?

I paused, taking a peek outside the windows. While there was familiar architecture abound, it was also strange in a way. Some odd colors here, some unfamiliar voices there. The air smelled clean, with the occasional whiff of spices or livestock. I didn’t lean any further out though and pulled the curtains close. The Palmyrene sun showed little mercy on my balding scalp.

***

I arranged for my breakfast to be delivered to the palace library. It was cozy and surprisingly lived in, with signs of wear on the desk and chair, and the floor covered with a scuffed carpet. A cat lounged in the chair, staring judgmentally as I entered. The first thing I did was search the drawers and the papers laying on the table, looking for any clues of what my predecessor had been up to. Information and knowledge were my first task. Running blind into my new career would only see me landing face first at Atia’s feet.

There was a tiny voice from the door and I turned around to find a young girl holding a tray of fruit and nuts. Some milk spilled from a cup as she wavered, and I rushed to grab the tray from her before it all came tumbling down. “What’s your name, girl?” I asked, placing the tray on the desk.

She giggled and looked away shyly, “M-muhh,” she stuttered.

She probably doesn’t understand Latin. “Hurek,” I said to her, “Do you know Hurek?”

She nodded.

“Good, go bring him here,” I gestured, pointing to where I stood. “Bring him here, understand?”

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She nodded again, but didn’t move.

“Oh mitte, Cicero,” I said under my breath and turned to the cat instead. “Greetings my lady, can I have this seat?”

The cat blinked, and also didn’t move. “Shoo! Shoo!” I waved at its face and the stubborn creature hopped off the chair with a squeak and ran out the door. The servant girl went running after the cat as well.

“I asked nicely,” I grumbled and settled down on the desk, only to freeze at the sight of what lay in front of me. A plate on the tray was filled with red berries, the same kind I’d seen Juno and monkeys fight over. “Atia,” I cursed.

This was a clear message. A threat. The Priestess thought to intimidate me. I admit that my heart had fluttered at the sight, but I reminded myself that I was safe. At least for now. I was an official appointment after all and in the governor’s employ. Suetonius himself had sent for me. As long as I served my purpose and played my part, at least in public, there was no reason for Atia to treat me like Juno. Still, I wasn’t entirely sure how imperium was enforced this far away from Rome. And Atia didn’t strike me as an entirely rational person. There was a madness behind those eyes.

I judged whether I should eat the berries or not. If I didn’t touch them, she would surely consider her little jab a successful strike. “Give me strength, Mars,” I prayed and grabbed a fistful of the fruit, plopping them into a bowl of yogurt. After them went a handful of nuts and slices of banana.

I cleared the desk save for an unopened scroll tied with a blue ribbon. The paper was heavy, almost leathery, and unfurled fairly quickly as I untied the ribbon. Mixing the yogurt with one hand, I held up the paper against the sunlight poking through the rafters.

“Acta Diurna,” I mouthed. This was a local newspaper. Written in Latin mostly, with some Persian thrown in to name locations and people. One Latin name stood out though, and that was Suetonius. Followed by a diagram that represented the bracket system the tournament would use.

It was a fairly straightforward affair; the tournament was sponsored by Rome through the govern-ship, organized by the local collegiate guild, and judged by the ambassador from Rome; Suetonius. That would mean the old historian would be arriving soon. Any day now. Hopefully that would allow me to operate in the shadows while Atia played her games with him instead. Everyone would be too busy with the hustle bustle. Hopefully.

I took a mouthful of the yogurt and my tongue immediately cringed at the sharp taste. It’d been a while since I’d last eaten. A few more bites eased the dairy sourness and the sweetness of the berries flowed in. I smacked my lips.

“Rewards, rewards,” I muttered. What were they using to lure the fighters? Near the end of the column, there were figures that finally revealed the winnings; ten denarii for unranked winners, and a hundred denarii for ranked winners. Were there any ranked fighters in Palmyra? It seemed unlikely.

The top twenty ranked fighters in the realm were mostly around Rome, some in Egypt and Syria, and one in the Persian frontier. Hurek would fight the first one that arrived, given his patron was the governor himself. But I wasn’t so sure if ranked fights were the way to go. They offered more, sure. But they were also harder. And ranked fighters had the privilege to negotiate and even turn down unfavorable match-ups.

The final sentence of the news column declared that the final bracket of the tournament would offer various rewards that included land, jewels, official titles, and deplorably enough… freedom from slavery.

I pushed the breakfast bowl away. There was a sourness in my mouth and it wasn’t from the yogurt. My previous employer, Secundus, had had a distasteful appetite for human cock fighting. Though we’d connected on our shared interest of the martial arts, at least from a voyeuristic perspective, and discussed for hours the popular murmillo fighters of the day, I couldn’t help but notice his particular lack of empathy when it came to death.

Of course, I wasn’t surprised by his desire to shed slave blood—a common past time of his ilk—but being forced to notarize his daily arena visits had taken a toll on my mental well-being. And then finally, the dreaded aftermath of his assassination…

I rubbed my eyes, trying get the images of the impaled slaves out of my head. They execution had stretched down the colonnade from the Forum and the carcasses had been left to rot and spread disease. All for the sake of sending a message.

There was a soft knock at the door, and I looked up to find the giant fist fighter, Hurek. It seemed Merula had in fact understood and followed my command, after all. “Please sit, did you have breakfast?” I asked.

Hurek seemed rather hesitant but he shook his head, “No, uh…”

“Cicero, call me Cicero.”

The man scratched his chin and nodded, slowly. “Priest Ceeceroh.”

Oh mitte… “If you insist,” I sighed and gestured again for him to sit.

Oddly enough, he didn’t take a chair and instead, plopped himself down on the carpet by my feet. But then again, it was expected. Hurek was a slave after all and even this far from Rome, I’d imagine the custom for a servant to sit at their master’s feet was wholly ingrained. Custom, no matter how trivial, was inherent natura.

But I saw Hurek as an equal. His abilities, his doubtless thoughts, the way imposed his strength with his very presence. I never understood our people’s habit of demeaning a fighting man. I had to take every step to make sure Hurek was mentally sound and confident in himself. “On the chair, Hurek. Sit on the chair,” I pointed to the cushioned throne-like chair across the desk.

The man’s curious eyes lingered on me for a moment, and then to the chair. I quickly added, “If you want, of course.”

“I will stand.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

Hurek stood, and his head nearly touched the hanging lantern as he stretched. “I don’t want to sit anymore.”

Anymore? What on Mars did that mean? As in, never for the rest of his life? “Uh… here, have a banana.”

“Thank you,” Hurek replied and took the fruit from my hand. But he didn’t eat it, just held it there from the stem at his side. And that’s where our niceties gave way to an awkward silence. Should I insist on him eating it? Or am I over-thinking everything?

Gods, this conversation was more taxing than trying to decipher veiled threats from a conniving senator. I’ll just let the matter lie.

There wasn’t much else to study on my predecessor’s desk, just some boring correspondences, some lists of mundane tasks and materials to gather. None of it was relevant to my mission of helping Hurek this summer. So, I made my own list of tasks and materials. And chief among them was knowledge.

“Hurek,” I began, hoping to get straight to the point. “If I am to help you in this tournament, I need to know more about… well, everything. Who you are, your training, your upbringing, your most recent bout and most importantly, what you believe to be your strengths and weaknesses.”

I could have asked more, but there was only so much I could dump on the poor lad. Initially, I had the mind to ask him more about this city. About Atia, and the other local leaders. The temple of Baal had been in the back of mind ever since I’d entered the city, as it had been the most prominent building for miles around.

Hurek set down the banana and with a deep breath began a speech I’d never truly expected. “I am Hurekoy, son of Shamil of the Nokchi tribe. My brothers and sisters… taken by Corbulo in the first year across the Euphrates River…”

I was a little taken aback by the account. The young man was accounting the Roman campaign on Armenia and how his people were enslaved. This was not my intention at all, but I didn’t have the heart to stop him now.

Hurek spoke of his cousins, who were also fist fighters now for regional tournaments, but worked at the brick kilns beyond the walls. Hurek would have been working there too had Atia not commanded him to spend his entire time at the palace, under my tutelage. Whatever that means.

He spoke of wrestling and drinking as the most common pastime of his brethren, although he didn’t partake too much in the drinking. He prefers to keep his wits about him, that’s good. I can work with that.

“And when Master Julius left…” Hurek grew quiet when the Governor’s name came up.

“Left where?” I prodded.

Hurek shrugged, “I don’t know. He left and Juno is insane now.”

“And that brings us to the present, where I show up.”

Hurek nodded. “You’re not priest?”

“I’m afraid not, Hurek. I’m just here to help you fight.”

Both of us were quiet, and it stayed that way for some time. In another time and in another life, I would have been intrigued by the case of the city’s missing governor. Atia, being his wife, stood to benefit from a prolonged absence. If the marriage contract put his estate under her power, as was common in the Eastern world, the High Priestess was effectively a Roman magistrate, complete with a seat on the senate or council or whatever circus this city had set up where the rich, old men could pontificate. I had no desire to dig into the mess.

Hurek had also spoken of being taught fist fighting at a young age, and there was still something about his words that prodded at me. But how would I even begin to understand martial arts at a deeper level when I couldn’t practice it myself? I’m just a scholar, a biographer...

I suppose I had no choice but to approach it like one. Indeed, if there was one thing I was good at, it was listening and asking the right questions. And when I had all the information I needed, I could begin chipping away at it day by day.

“You said you were taught fist fighting,” I began slowly, “who taught you?”

***