Arena by John Jakes

congealed inside me. I’d borne his insufferable conceit and bullying ways too long.
    “Want to wager on it, Greek? I doubt if you do. You have nothing better to put up than the hot gas that gushes from your mouth day and night.” So saying, I walked off.
    Fabius had watched the little scene with evident displeasure. One day there would be a reckoning between Xenophon and me. While he was not an easy enemy, I looked forward to it.
    Though none of us from the school was present to see, we could well imagine the clamor around the Circus Maximus as the opening day of the games approached.
    In the Vallis Murcia, that long cleft between the Palatine and Aventine hills, the arches around the outside of the great Circus would be jammed by thousands of slaves and freedmen fighting for one of the ivory tokens that would admit them to the wooden upper tiers of the mammoth amphitheater. Day and night the streets roundabout would echo with the croakings of astrologers, the sibilant whispers of child whores, the rumble of cage carts delivering penned and snarling animals to the warrens within the stadium walls.
    Thoughts of Acte receded from my mind in all the excitement. Only now and then did I entertain a painful hope that she might turn up on the night of the regular visit of the girls from Sulla’s. She did not. I spent the long hours completely alone.
    Next day, I went to Fabius. I found him fretting over a broken wheel on a cart loaded with lethargic brown bears. I asked whether by chance I had received any messages.
    “None,” he said shortly. “Don’t bother me with foolish questions, Cassius. The games are only two days hence, and there are a million things still undone.”
    Plainly I ought to forget her forever, I told myself. Concentrate upon the events of the next few days. I had never fought in Rome before. Much was at stake.
    The remaining two days blurred into a confused round of last-minute preparations. Then came the hot, bright morning when Fabius, finely attired, assembled thirty of us for the march to the Circus and the opening of the games of Nero, Princeps and Imperator.
    We walked in threes, Fabius at our head. We were clad in loose white smocks and a few cheap glittering amulets. As we neared the looming Circus we passed through cheering crowds. They scattered flowers before us, or occasionally let out a bitter curse if the person cursing happened to favor regular Dacian or Gallic gladiators. The sky rang with the thunder of thousands of voices. The roar seemed to shake the very foundations of Rome.
    Side streets were clogged. As we descended toward the tunnels beneath the stands, we passed long queues of citizens with ivory tokens in hand, waiting their turns to be shown their seats by the locarii. The Circus was the great leveler. All Rome’s business enterprises shut down during the six days of entertainment. Men were free to cheer, scream or insult each other, as they wished. The only social distinction was maintained by the seats they occupied. Senators and equites took the lower tiers of stone, their boxes draped over with rich cloth pavilions.
    Freedmen sat higher up on the wooden benches. The slaves were highest of all. How many jammed the great U-shaped structure I could not guess. My father told me once it was more than a hundred thousand.
    The arches outside were confusion. Street musicians played. Hawkers shouted. Bettors arranged wagers on the program of events. Praetorians in armor kept watch on the lines, so no thieves would slip back to the empty streets to loot. In the tunnels beneath the stands the confusion was even worse.
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    From wooden cages first dragged into the arena, then placed in barred niches all around the lower wall below the first tier of seats, animals screamed and clawed and vented their anger at penning. Lions snarled. Elephants trumpeted. Wolves howled. Ostriches made their queer sound.
    The Bestiarii dressed with the aid of handlers, in a long, dim passage at the