Free A Mixture of Madness, Book II of The Bow of Heaven by Andrew Levkoff Page A

breaking out just a few years before I was taken from Greece. Most of the Italian states , who for centuries had been Roman allies, were of the opinion that Rome had begun to cheat them out of their share of the spoils of war. It had. Because of a handful of Roman laws, the Italian states surmised that their land was methodically and legally being taken from the innocent multitude and redistributed to the wealthy and avaricious. It was. And after all they had done to assist in the growth of Rome’s power and influence, the Latin allies felt they were deserving, at long last, of Roman citizenship. They were.
    And so, being thus thwarted and abused, after a time they went to war against the teat that had fed them and then been discourteously withdrawn. They lost. Before the fighting had ended, in an effort to dilute the rebellious Italians’ grievances, the senate passed a law granting citizenship to all former allies who had not raised arms against Rome. This occurred when Malchus and Betto were in their late teens. With more exuberance than forethought, the two friends who had grown up together on the same Perusian street, celebrated by breaking into a wine shop. Consequently, they were ‘encouraged’ by the local garrison to join its ranks. Due to the ongoing rebellion the hurdles of their both being underage and of Betto’s need for thick-soled sandals to meet the height requirement were amiably removed.
    Finding that they liked the life of a soldier well enough, they had joined dominus’ army as it rushed to Sulla’s aid to overthrow the tyrants Marius and Cinna, and had stayed on with him ever since. The only time the two soldiers shed their duty as part of the company that guarded the Crassus household was the year and half they had gone off with him to put down the slave rebellion lead by the gladiator, Spartacus.
    There being no other viable option , and here I use ‘viable’ in the literal sense, i.e. capable of remaining alive, I took Malchus’ advice, and now, almost three decades after my capture, I strolled with my companions past estates, expensive shops and other wealthy pedestrians traveling the paving stones of the privileged. Citizens nodded politely to me, shopkeepers gave me a warm greeting as I passed; a fruit seller tossed me a plum and smiled. I was welcomed here and accepted—there goes Alexander, chief slave of Marcus Licinius Crassus. What a lucky fellow! It was a brisk, sunny morning, and I smiled as I put the plum in Malchus’ outstretched hand. It was good to be alive.
    No, nothing sinister is about to happen; I truly was as thankful as a virgin chosen for the Vestals to be out and about, amongst friends and entrusted to dispatch a weighty charge. But then, being thankful implies the existence of a repository for this syrupy, effusive gratitude, and since my enslavement had cleansed me of any pretensions of belief in benevolent deities watching over me, I wondered to whom my respects ought to be paid. Unfortunately, the only name I could come up with was Crassus. He was as close to a god as I was likely ever to meet. Father Jupiter, indeed. To be a happy slave in a foreign land is to be as plagued with ironies as Hanno was infested with lice when we found him. One is a constant irritant that distracts your attention, fills you with frustration, nags at your enjoyment of any good thing, and if you have any self esteem at all, is a condition of constant humiliation and shame. And to be lice-ridden is a remarkably similar experience.
    Oh. I must correct myself, and I do apologize. Something sinister is about to happen. More than one something, in point of fact.
    Our route lay across the forum and then northeast. The first time I had seen its broad plazas framed by temples and civic buildings of brick and stone, my awe had been tempered by my exhaustion and malnutrition. Since then, every time my sandals trod upon its worn black stones, I harkened back to the day I had been dragged past the