Free Fighting Fit by Annie Dalton

ready for the banquet. I helped her put on her new silk stola. I arranged her hair and secured it with ornamental hairpins, making it look as if her complicated braids were studded with tiny pearls. She looked lovely when I’d finished, except for looking so pale. She’d hardly said a word since we came back from the Games. I should get her to open up and tell me what was wrong, but I was in a daze myself, just going through the motions.
    Being an angel isn’t that different from being a gladiator, I thought bleakly. You might be bleeding inside, but you keep going. Your heart might be breaking, but you can’t let it show.
    That evening I ran about with the other house slaves, making our guests welcome. I brought warm scented water to wash the dust from their feet. I took ladies’ shawls and gentlemen’s cloaks. I plumped up the cushions on the couches, so our guests could recline like gods and goddesses, wearing their ceremonial crowns of leaves and flowers.
    But none of it seemed real. Not like Orlando’s face when he saw Star’s blood soaking into the sand.
    In the kitchen Reuben and two other slaves were helping with the preparations. Like all Roman kitchens, this one was a soot-encrusted hellhole.
    Can you believe that Dorcas had to cook this entire banquet over a wood fire, with no windows for ventilation? Plus the dishes Quintus had selected for his guests were just bizarre: peacock eggs in pepper sauce, milk-fed snails simmered with garlic, stuffed dormice. It was pretty obvious that Aurelia’s brother hadn’t designed his banquet to be enjoyed. He just wanted to impress his guests with how rich and important he was.
    Reuben grabbed me as I tottered past with a huge wine jug in each hand. “OK, so Orlando has other things on his mind,” he said in a firm voice. “And OK, so you’re upset. But get over it. You’re no good to Aurelia in this state and she’s the one Orlando wants us to watch.
    “I can’t help it, Reubs,” I wailed. “It hurts so much.”
    My angel buddy made me look at him. “Maybe Mel Beeby can’t get over it, but Helix can.”
    Sometimes I think Reuben knows me better than anyone else in the entire universe. It’s like he always knows exactly the right thing to say. As he spoke my angel name out loud, my buddy’s voice took on new powerful vibe.
    To my astonishment, I saw my name form in the air in glowing letters, right there in that sweltering garlic-smelling kitchen. No one else saw, but I gasped.
    And guess what? I was over it! I snapped out of my self-pity just like that. I wasn’t sad little Mel-with-a-broken-heart. I was an angel with a job to do.
    Reuben’s right, I thought fiercely. I can do this. I’m going to do this.
    I gave his hand a squeeze. It felt rough and calloused from his gardening, but still deeply comforting. “Thanks, Reubs. I owe you.”
    “I know,” Reuben agreed smugly. Without thinking he popped a nibble in his mouth and choked. “Yuck! What was that?”
    “Just hope it’s not a stuffed dormouse!” I giggled.
    I reached the dining room to hear a slave announce solemnly, “Quintus Flavius and Titus Lucretius!”
    I’d had my suspicions about Quintus all along, and the minute he walked into the room, I knew I’d been right. Quintus was handsome, even charming, but you could see the cold glint of cruelty in his eyes.
    Aurelia’s future husband followed him in. He was short and squat and his lips looked unpleasantly red through his beard. He handed me his cloak. “Well, well. It’s the little slave girl,” he said in a high thin voice.
    I almost fainted with terror. I knew this guy. I’d breathed his icky fishy-alcohol fumes. I’d felt his ugly vibes touch my angelic energy field. Titus Lucretius was our pervy night intruder!!
    I wanted to grab Aurelia and run right out of that creepy house and keep running until we ended up somewhere nice and normal. I was scared and disgusted, but I was angry too. Titus could have arranged to meet my