Page 66 of The Thrice-Bound Fool

You can always find a rich, pampered bastard who’ll pay to see a strong woman break.

Now Scales bid, and another woman, and another man, too. These seemed of a different sort, and I guessed they dealt in fighters, as we had heard that slaves were made to fight in this kingdom. I was certain this was no good path to walk, but even more certain Galva would never be a whore. She soon confirmed this by shouting as much to the crowd, looking right at Pearly and pointing, too. But since she did this in Holtish, they none of them understood. Urkus cracked her a savage one on the fronts of the thighs with his flat stick, and when that didn’t get a grunt out of the cast-iron Ispanthian bitch, he gave her one in the shins so hard I thought he might have broken one.

But one thing I’ll say for Urkus; he was a master at causing his property agony without hurting its value. He broke neither her shin nor her will. She bared her teeth in pain, but gave him that look she has, the one that says she won’t forget you and you’d better hope she never meets you when she has a free hand.

He wound up to give her another one, and I couldn’t let it happen.

So I spoke up. I translated exactly what she’d said into my tongue, which I knew some of these karks understood a version of.

“I am a soldier, not a whore. I will fight with steel if I must, but any flesh you press to me will bleed!” I shouted. I pointed at her so they’d know whose words they were.

Now here came Urkus at me, and I ducked the first one, for I’m quick, but then he gave me a good one in the mouth. Split my lip like a melon and dashed a tooth out of me, the one behind the right canine.

But I’m a better whistler now, aren’t I? And I can spit beer at you just like a whale spits water.

I’m sorry to say I’m not made of the same stuff as Galva, so I fell into a pile, covering my head with my hands. I got a couple more bleedy welts across the back while I spat out blood and that tooth that once sat so pretty in my mouth.

But a curious thing began to happen.

The crowd clapped that arm-clap of theirs.

They pointed at her and nodded.

Especially the women among them.

I guess Star-Taker the geigon also understood Arvisk, or Galtish, for he was looking at Galva from where he sat stooped, holding his knees with his head lowered, the size of a house-crushing boulder. And did he not nod that great, wild, and noble head just so slightly? The Spanth never saw it, but I did, or thought I did—his eyes winking with love for her. It seemed he was thinking just how much the Erydoni would rue their sorry treatment of Azdra-Kopt if ever he found the courage one tiny, naked slave had shown in speaking out for herself and declaring what she would and would not suffer.

20The Ludus of the Green Devil

We were marched to a strong, square building with no windows. It had the look of a fortress, or a prison, and in fact it was something between the two. Its doorway was topped with a relief of two men wrestling, their muscly white stone bodies standing out against the orangey-red bricks of the walls. Sculptors here knew their work—you could see how the flesh of one man’s arm gave under the strength of his opponent’s fingers, the bared teeth of one wrestler crooked, the other with a broken nose, the suggestion of sweat on their brows. That wasn’t the whole piece, however. A statue stood on the roof, just over the relief—it was of a green devil, all spines and horns, jabbing down at the two combatants as if he—or she—were the one making them fight. The artist who carved the wrestlers was nothing less than a master. The devil-maker had not half that talent, and was no old master sculptor, as the devil had a new look to him. This place was old, but it had recently come to the ownership of someone vulgar.

We were in the Ludus of the Green Devil.

As we passed under a rusted portcullis and into shadow, I noticed the whole place smelled of sweat, and of blood, and of sun-warmed stone. Now a door opened before us, and we marched into the dazzling light of a courtyard, at the center of which was a square of black sand. On all sides, galleries, going up three stories. In the courtyard, hard men and dams of all shades and sizes, kynd to giant. These were the blacksanders. Gladiators. No geigons here, or none in sight; but a large cell taking up all three stories suggested that such creatures had called this place home before.

The fighters shouted as we walked in, half-cheer and half-challenge.

It was myself, Galva, the boy-giant called Birch, and six others, all of us prodded along by a bald, seven-foot quarter-giant whose name I had not yet learned but who had clearly gotten his baton and manners from the same shop that outfitted Urkus.

“Welcome,” said the woman in the enameled scale armor who had purchased us all. “Welcome to the last house you will live in. Let your dying begin.”

As the blacksanders cheered again, I translated this to Holtish for Galva.

She smiled.

Looking back on this smile, I’m not sure if it was at the thought of meeting her goddess soon or because she had been confidently told where she would die before and hadn’t.

I noticed one of the other slavies leaning close when I translated. Thirty-five-ish, had the look of a sailor, or a bugger, but I repeat myself. Anyway, he had the tattoos you’d expect on a salt.

“You a Holter?” I said, quiet as I could.

He nodded, but there was no warmth in him. He’d had a look in my mouth and knew I was Galtish, thus second-class. Bugger him anyway.

Our new owner went on.

“I am Verna Zan Zan, the sandmaster of this ludus, the Ludus of the Green Devil. I have paid in gold for you. Especially you,” she said, looking at Galva. “Now you will pay me in the breath of your labors, the sweat of your backs, and the blood of your wounds. You may not believe this, but I stood on the black sand. For debt. I used to gamble. I was fool enough to gamble away my own freedom. I won it back, because I’m an unkillable old cunt, though I am still fool enough to gamble. Each one of you is a throw of the ox-bones for me. Will this eastern smalldam win seven fights, let alone survive them, to recompense me for the fortune I spent on her and her shield? Or you, thickboy,” she said to Birch. “Will you win the three you must for me to break even? Or the rest of you,” she said to the rest of us. I stopped speaking Holtish to Galva now and looked at the sandmaster.

She looked back at me.