Chapter 6

They called me Gemini now.

It started as a whisper from the crowd after the four-man bout. Then the guards used it. Then Pulcher, without humor.

By the end of the week, it was chalked beside my name on the wall of the betting hall.

GEMINI — 3 Victories. No Wounds. Odds: 4-to-1.

That last bit mattered more than all the blood.

In Rome, your name isn't born from valor.

It's bought in coin.

And I was becoming expensive.

The sun fell like molten gold over the yard. We'd just finished sand drills—evasion, short-steps, shield rebounds—and my tunic stuck to my back with sweat. Kesseph sat nearby, quiet as ever, polishing his sica.

Brannos hadn't spoken in three days. He trained like a beast now, as if willing his shame into muscle.

Pulcher stepped out of the armory door with a look I hadn't seen before.

Not rage. Not command.

Uncertainty.

"Gemini," he said. Not Novus. Not you.

"The dominus has a guest."

Lucius Varrus wasn't a man who bowed.

But I saw him standing straight-backed, fists tucked into his belt, eyes lowered in deference.

The man before him wore purple, but not the cheap dye of a merchant. No—this was the deep wine-drenched velvet that only old money could afford.

His sandals were gilded at the rim. His fingers bore three rings—one carved obsidian, one jade, and one simple band of white metal I didn't recognize.

He didn't turn when I entered.

"So," the man said, voice like smoothed marble. "This is the one."

"He's called Gemini," Varrus said.

The man turned. And smiled.

His face was elegant. Not handsome. Not ugly. Just crafted—like it had been sculpted and then worn smooth by decades of wine, firelight, and secrets.

"You've killed five men in three fights," he said. "With grace. With calculation."

"I was trying to stay alive."

"You succeeded in making others not stay alive. That's worth more."

He paced once around me, studying.

"Tell me, Gemini. If I offered your lanista ten thousand sestertii for you… what would you ask for?"

I didn't flinch. "To keep fighting. In a place where it matters."

He smiled.

"Then let's take you where it matters."

Varrus didn't protest.

Ten thousand was a price you didn't refuse—even for a freak.

But before I stepped from the yard, I turned.

"One condition."

The rich man raised a brow. "You want your sword?"

"No. I want the Egyptian."

Kesseph didn't react when they told him. Not visibly. But that night, as we walked from the ludus together—unchained, silent, watched by jealous eyes—he said only one thing.

"Why me?"

"Because you're not surprised by who I am," I said. "And you still haven't asked."

He didn't answer.

But he followed.

The villa was not in Rome.

It sat nestled in the Alban Hills, north-east of the city. A garden of cypress and marble, colonnades open to the breeze. Statues of forgotten gods stood like sentries along the path. Every column smelled of wealth, rot, and power.

This wasn't a gladiator stable.

This was a temple.

To the appetites of the elite.

Cassian Severus. That was his name.

A patron of games. A collector of champions. A senator with no seat, but influence that whispered into ears that did vote.

He owned six gladiators. Four Thracians, a bestiarius from Numidia, and a blind Greek with scars like tree roots who never spoke. Each more muscle than man. Each a weapon polished for display.

The training yard here was quieter. Smaller. Cleaner.

But I wasn't fooled.

Every inch of it had been built to observe. The walls were tiered with shaded benches. Not for trainers. For guests.

Cassian didn't train men.

He displayed them.

We sparred with blunted steel under perfumed skies. I fought a bestiarius once, a towering Moor who used a flail and net and moved like wind through fire.

Another day, I fought three retiarii in succession. I let them tire themselves out. Let the crowd of dinner guests gasp when I disarmed the last with a shoulder feint and took him down with the flat of my blade.

No blood. But drama.

I was learning what mattered to them.

Not survival.

Story.

Cassian watched every match with a goblet in hand. Always smiling. Always silent.

One day, after I downed a thraex with a spin-kick to the ribs and a mock kill-pose, I heard him chuckle behind his curtain.

"They'll love him," he said.

"The Colosseum will roar."

That night, Kesseph sat beside the mosaic pool, sharpening his blade.

"You're building something," he said.

"I'm building a myth," I said.

"They'll kill you for it."

"Only if I build it too fast."

He grunted. "You're still cursed, you know."

"I've made peace with that."

Kesseph stood.

"Don't make peace. Make use."

I stared up at the stars. They were old friends now.

The Colosseum waited.

And this time…

I'd walk into it not as Novus. Not as Gemini.

But as something Rome hadn't yet named.

Something they'd remember.

Three days passed before I saw the Colosseum

Not from the gutter, not through the feet of merchants or the haze of incense. This time, I stood beneath it.

No longer invisible.

Now announced.

The sun was cruel. It painted every flaw into the stone. But the crowd—gods, the crowd—moved like a living beast, writhing through archways, bellies full of wine and salt pork, hands stuffed with betting tablets.

They came to see champions.

To see men die properly.

And Cassian Severus had told them I was worth watching.

The night before, he'd summoned me to his study.

It wasn't a study in the Roman sense. There were no scrolls. No scribes. Just red velvet curtains, ivory chairs, and a single oil lamp that made his skin look like melted gold.

He poured wine himself. Didn't offer me any.

"You'll step into that sand tomorrow," he said. "And if you fight the way you've been fighting, the city will remember your name."

"Then I'll fight that way."

"No," he said, smiling. "You'll fight my way."

He didn't ask for much.

Not gold. Not loyalty.

He wanted one thing.

"Blood in the first minute," he said. "Not death. Just fear. Let the crowd know you can make a man scream."

"And then?"

"Then make him beg."

"To live?"

Cassian leaned back.

"To die."

I should've refused. Should've spit in his wine. Should've asked why a man with silver dogs on his walls and slaves who never made eye contact needed to see pain served like roasted duck.

But I didn't.

Because I knew the truth:

Cassian wasn't alone.

Men like him always gather at the edges of empires, sniffing for something older than coins.

And tomorrow, they'd all be watching.

Kesseph found me near the fire that night. We said nothing for a while.

Then he asked, softly,

"Do you feel it?"

"What?"

"The weight. The gods bending closer."

I thought about the Colosseum. About the ritual I'd seen there. The blood drawn in geometry.

"They're not gods," I said. "Just things that eat prayers."

"Then feed them well tomorrow."

I didn't sleep.

Not out of fear.

But because my mind was sharpening—paring away hesitation, pride, even memory. I reviewed everything: my stance, blade weight, foot angles on the sand, the curve of my sicae in sunlight.

And I built a plan.

Not just to win.

To be remembered.

At dawn, Cassian's litter bore us through the streets like some procession to war.

He didn't sit inside. He walked, smiling, robes trimmed in dark purple, nodding to lesser senators who bowed back with forced politeness.

"They think they're humoring me," he said. "Let them. They'll remember today. Because of you."

And then he looked at me—really looked.

"Do you know why I bought you, Gemini?"

I didn't answer.

"Because you walk like a man who's already been killed. And Rome loves to crucify its martyrs."

The Colosseum swallowed me whole.

The noise became air.

The gates were higher. The blood dried older. The dust finer, worn by centuries that hadn't yet come to pass.

They gave me a moment.

Then, the drums.

Then the gate.

And the sun.

And the crowd.

And the name.

"GEMINI," the herald cried. "THE TWICE-BLADED. THE MAN WHO DANCES WITH DEATH."

They roared.

And I stepped forward.

Knowing this was just the beginning.

Of the myth.

Of the story.

Of the curse they would cheer for—before they learned what it truly was.