Free The Far Arena by Richard Ben Sapir

allowing a loser to live.
    I turned. He closed and gave me that planted foot, and my spatha was in and out of his throat like the snapping of a catapult before he got his ponderous shoulder and full body into his sword.
    His thrust came anyhow, weaker and slower for having been mortally struck, and I slapped it away with my shield and wrested off his gold helmet as his head went by.
    To the stands it looked as though I had just touched him gently with the tip of my weapon to keep him away and that removing the gold helmet was the greater labour. He struggled around on his hands and knees like a cow waiting to be mated, and I trotted with the helmet against my chest towards the 'Portal of Life' as though nothing were wrong.
    I did not wait for a signal of death from either the crowds or the vestal virgins, whose official responsibility it was to judge these matters, but who always followed the will of the crowd. They would pass their decision on to the emperor, who by tradition gave the final decision on life or death.'
    Domitian was not in his seats. No gaudy praetorian helmets with ornate plumes or brightly worked chest plates dotted the seething crowd where Domitian normally would sit. He had escaped through his tunnel, and the lack of praetorians there meant his retreat had been neat and successful.
    Already, the first to his seats to get his fruits and wines and any stranded goblets were having the life crushed out of them by those who followed for the pillage. There were no barriers to the crowds because an emperor's appearance at the games showed he was part of the people of Rome and, while a god, he was made of the same stuff as they.
    Three large men fell into the arena dragging a vestal virgin. Smiling broadly, I trotted waving from the arena, as though this were the grandest day of the empire.
    The mob shouted my name, but in moments they would tear at me to get an eyebrow for a souvenir or some other part they thought worth collecting. Mobs do not have leaders, even if they yell their names in praise. They only have objects in front of them, which they will either follow or destroy, depending on some mindless whim.
    This mob was larger than many city-states the empire had conquered. With a roar, the seats flooded out on to the sand, like a spring gusher down a dry riverbed. It was off, and I was through the Portal of Life just in time, where Plutarch had my armoured slaves ready and protective. They formed a wedge around me and moved me off down the arena tunnel, banging, pushing, and cutting.
    We passed the master of the games, screaming full lung that Rome, the sponsors, and he were being abandoned. If he survived this riot, he would be crucified at least. Officially, it was his responsibility to ensure that the games were successful and orderly. But he had undoubtedly accepted bribes not to complain.
    The patrician family had just as obviously reasoned that if a bribe cost them two and the elephants cost two hundred, therefore they would save one hundred and ninety-eight. That is, if they had the other hundred and ninety-eight to begin with.
    They had undoubtedly depended on the young secutor to kill me, thus making the games a success very cheaply. Like many brilliant, logical plans, it was more easily and swiftly put together unobstructed by the unreasonable block of what really happens in these situations. It was not hard to imagine them saying among themselves, 'Why hasn't anyone thought of this before, the fools ?'
    The master of the games should have known better but undoubtedly had succumbed to their logic and money.
    At my cubicle my slaves were already heaving vats of water at the heavy wooden door. They were wetting it down. Plutarch ordered the door shut behind us, saying if someone hadn't gotten here by now, it was too bad.
    'No,' I said. 'We'll wait.'
    We heard the mobs from the slit behind us where Plutarch had earlier looked for the imperial presence. The armoured slaves looked nervous to Plutarch.