Free Heart of the Gladiator (Affairs of the Arena Book 1) by Lydia Pax

been one of them.
    He approached the sand-dragging man, touching him on the shoulder. He was more boy than a man, with wild red hair and eyes the color of the sea.
    “It gets better,” he told him. “Much better.”
    “I don’t know...I don’t know how to fight,” said the boy. “They didn’t teach me anything. They just gave me a sword and expected me to hack and learn at a post.”
    Caius nodded. Better fighters got better training at better ludi. This one wasn't a member of House Varinius.
    “It gets better,” he said again. “You just have to survive. That’s all. That’s all that matters. Don’t try for anything else but that.”
    “But how?”
    With a shrug, Caius smiled. “Pray to Fortune for luck,” he said. “And when in doubt, attack.”
    These were the words Caius had lived by. And from the moment of being bought by Rufus up until he held his dead wife in his arms, he had believed every last syllable.

Chapter 13
    ––––––––
    T raining in the ludus continued, and just as Murus had promised, he did not go easy on Caius.
    Every day he woke, ate a light breakfast, and then readied on the sands. Training began immediately, and discipline never stopped.
    When he did something right, he got no more than a small satisfied grunt from the old doctore. When he made a mistake, Murus lashed him with the whip. When he appeared tired, Murus made him run across the grounds—often with a heavy, iron-banded log on his shoulders.
    This was the Hell Log—and Caius knew it well. Its weight and burden were legendary among the gladiators of House Varinius. Rumors abounded that the original lanista of the estate had ventured deep into the underworld to find the perfect tool with which to mold his boyish fighters into men of valor and honor. The joke was, after a few laps carrying the Hell Log around, death did not seem so harsh a fate.
    This was how Murus treated everyone else. And Caius was glad for it all—even the whip. A lack of that attention—even that negative attention—would have shown that Murus didn’t care.
    Caius received double-duty with Murus. The beginning of the day started with the gladiators fighting tall posts stuck in the ground. This was for attending to their posture and positioning, and making sure they could keep their defenses up when placing a blow. Murus oversaw all of this with the help of his other doctores, of which there were three.
    At midday was a brief lunch. It was the same food as breakfast—a thick barley gruel that kept the men strong and fit, with plenty of energy for their work.
    After lunch was training in sparring matches with the weapons of each gladiator’s style. Murus was the doctore for the thraex style, and so oversaw Caius again. If Caius dropped his shield too low, he was flogged. If he attacked when he should have defended, or vice versa, he was flogged. If he hesitated in his actions, he was flogged.
    Caius had to do his absolute best to not get flogged at all, which was the entire idea. The flogging hurt—enough to leave a few bruises on his back and shoulders—but would not leave permanent marks. The whip had a thick head, and would not cut the skin unless Murus wanted.
    It was a martial world he had re-entered, and it was unforgiving. But a whip in training was preferable to a sword through the gut in the arena, and so Caius worked.
    He would die in the arena, of that he was sure. But he would not be an embarrassment. He would go down with honor, or not at all.
    This routine went on for many days, and Caius felt little improvement. He ended the day beaten, hungry, and tired—and that was how he woke as well.
    In his free time, what little there was of it in the evenings and late afternoon, he tried his best to catch sight of Aeliana. She was the bright spot in a hard time.
    They had conversed—what? Twice? And yet there was a connection he felt with her that he could not deny. Every time he saw her his heart began to race and his mind