Chapter 2

Rome stank.

That part hadn't changed.

Even before I passed beneath the eastern gate, I smelled it: smoke, tannin, piss, and ambition. The reek of a city that fed on its own poor and shat out senators. It clung to the stones like a second skin.

I entered with the morning crowds—no one stopped me. The guards at the Porta Esquilina barely looked up, too busy gambling over chicken bones and shouting at an old Gaul with a lame mule.

No one asked who I was.

Rome never cared who you were when you entered. Only what you could take, give, or lose.

The streets narrowed into twisting alleys of cracked stone and overhanging balconies. Children darted between carts, barefoot and shouting. Vendors hawked lentils, olive oil, wine cut with vinegar, gods carved from wood. I saw a man piss in a gutter beside a shrine to Fortuna, then cross himself and toss in a copper.

Faith is flexible here.

The buildings were wrong—too tall, some of them. Red brick where there should have been wood. Arches that defied what I remembered. I passed a basilica—not yet invented in this century, and yet there it stood, smug in its presence. And above it all, in the distance, rising like the jawbone of some sleeping titan—

The Colosseum.

I stopped in the street. A boy ran into my hip and cursed. I didn't move.

There it was.

Vast. Pale. Terraced. The Amphitheatrum Flavium—except that should be over two centuries away. Built by emperors who hadn't been born yet, to celebrate a war that hadn't happened.

But there it stood. Whole. Revered. Ancient even now, by the weathering of its stone.

I crossed myself before I realized I was doing it. An old habit. A later habit.

Was this my mind cracking?

No. The dust on my feet was real. The air was real. The hunger in my gut—real.

It was time that was broken.

I wandered for hours.

Not aimlessly—no. I drifted with purpose, as a dead man does at his own funeral. Letting the city speak.

Rome was louder than ever.

Men argued in the Forum over grain tariffs and auguries. A naked leper danced for coins near the Temple of Janus. A pair of consular lictors dragged a screaming debtor through the crowd, blood trailing from his heels. The crowd cheered.

Everything was sharper, more violent than I remembered. Not golden. Not yet. This was the age of wolves pretending to be men.

I passed beneath a fresco of Romulus and Remus suckling the she-wolf. Someone had carved a crude phallus into the wolf's snout.

That felt about right.

By dusk, I reached the Colosseum. I had to. Like a missing tooth in a familiar mouth—it demanded investigation.

It loomed above the city, impossible and perfect. The archways, the tiers, the iron grates—all just as they would be centuries later. Tourists would one day shuffle through here wearing plastic helmets. But not now.

Now, it was alive.

A crowd flowed through the gates. Lanterns lit. Men carried jugs of watered wine and trays of boiled eggs. I moved with them, head down, pretending I belonged.

Inside, the air was thick with incense and old blood. The sand of the arena was still being raked. No lions tonight. No gladiators. A different show.

Priests stood in a circle at the center, chanting in Oscan. Not Latin. Older. One held a lamb above his head, its throat already cut. The blood dripped onto the stones in careful lines. Not sacrifice.

Geometry.

Ritual drawn in arterial red.

Around me, the crowd was silent. Hundreds of faces. Not cheering. Not breathing.

Watching.

Waiting.

A woman beside me whispered, low and reverent:

"To bind the beast again. To hold the old oath."

Another voice, older, behind me:

"He sleeps beneath. The locks are weakening."

My stomach turned.

This was not the Rome I knew.

This was older than Rome. Wearing its skin.

I left before the ritual ended. My legs wanted to run. I made it only a few streets away before the shaking stopped.

And then I laughed.

Long and bitter.

What a joke it was. To be cursed with memory, only to awaken in a lie.

A Rome that was not Rome.

A Colosseum that should not be.

What else had changed? What histories had twisted while I slept?

Whatever gods played this game, they had grown bolder.

And I would find them.

I would make them tell me why.

The laughter died slow.

It left behind silence. Not peace—no. The silence of a hunted thing.

The kind I'd known in jungles, tundras, trenches. That moment before a spear leaves a hand. Before a bullet cracks bone. Time slows. The world leans in.

And Rome was leaning in now.

I needed information.

Not rumors. Not omens. Not wine-soaked ravings about sleeping beasts beneath the Colosseum.

I needed power.

And in this Rome—this twisted, hungry version of the Republic—there were only two kinds of men who earned attention:

Those who spoke in the Senate.

And those who bled in the sand.

The ludi—gladiator schools—were tucked into the underbelly of the city. You wouldn't find them on maps. You found them by following broken noses, missing fingers, and men with the calm eyes of murderers.

The most notorious in this district was run by a lanista named Lucius Varrus. A former champion. Retired with honor, then bought the school he'd once trained in. Brutal, but not cruel. Respected. Feared. His men rarely died without taking someone with them.

It took me two days to find it. I spent those days sleeping on rooftops and drinking stolen rainwater from cracked tiles. My body had begun to adapt—bruises fading faster than they should, cuts closing overnight. But the hunger stayed.

The curse never feeds you. It only keeps you alive enough to suffer.

When I found the gate to Ludus Varrus, it was guarded by a Thracian with a scar like a lightning bolt across his jaw. He held a short spear and looked at me like I was dogshit wrapped in a tunic.

"You lost, corpse?"

"No," I said. "I'm here to fight."

He snorted. Didn't move.

"You want to die, then?"

"Not today."

He squinted at me. Then—without warning—he struck.

The butt of his spear cracked across my ribs. I dropped. Breath gone.

Another strike came for my temple—I rolled, caught it on my shoulder. Pain exploded through me. I surged forward, half-blind, tackled his legs.

We fell in the dust. He was stronger. Faster. Trained.

But I didn't let go.

I bit down—hard—on his ear. He roared, twisted. Slammed his elbow into my face.

I felt my nose break. The warm gush of blood. Teeth loose. One eye swelling shut.

But I laughed through the blood.

"Still think I came here to die?"

He paused.

Then grinned.

They dragged me inside.

Lucius Varrus was smaller than I expected. Bald, lean, missing three fingers on his left hand. His eyes were coin-sharp and twice as cold. He looked me over like livestock.

"No name, no patron, no coin. You think this is a charity?"

"No," I said. "But I won't die quiet."

"What do you want?"

I met his eyes. Don't blink. They smell fear here like blood.

"A place," I said. "And a way to be seen."

That made him lean back. Amused.

"So you want to be a gladiator?"

"I want to understand why this city lies to me."

That wiped the amusement away.

He studied me for a long time.

Then motioned to one of his trainers. "Put him in the pit."

"Which of the recruits?" the man asked.

"Not a recruit. Give him Varinius."

The trainer stiffened. "Sir, Varinius is scheduled for—"

"I said Varinius."

The pit wasn't an arena. It was a training ring, circular and low, half-mud, half-stone. Blood had soaked into its bones. It stank of copper and piss.

Varinius was already waiting.

A murmillo. Tower of a man. Half-Hellenic, with a gladiator's calm and the slow smile of someone who knew exactly how this would end.

"You're not going to last a minute," he said.

"Probably not."

He lunged.

Steel flashed. I moved—too slow. The flat of his gladius slammed into my ribs. I spun, landed on hands and knees.

Again.

A boot crashed into my side. I rolled, coughing blood. Something cracked—rib, maybe two.

I smiled through it.

He paused. Frowned.

"You should stay down."

"Can't."

"Why?"

I forced myself upright.

"Because I already died once this week. I don't recommend it."

He attacked again.

And this time, I didn't block.

I let the blade slice into my forearm. Let it bleed. Grabbed the edge with my other hand. Pulled him close.

Headbutt. Once. Twice. My skull cracked his nose. Blood sprayed. He staggered.

I slammed my elbow into his throat.

He went down.

Silence followed.

Then, from above:

"Enough."

Lucius Varrus stepped into the pit. Looked down at me.

"You're either lucky, insane, or something worse."

I wiped blood from my mouth. "Does it matter?"

He nodded once.

"You're in."

And so, by dusk, I had a name again.

Not mine—not yet.

They called me "Novus." The New One.

I slept that night on a straw mat in the stink of other killers. My body screamed with every breath.

And yet I smiled.

Because the arena was sacred.

In the sand, all masks fell. Lies could not hold.

And I would bleed until the truth bled out with me.