Wolf’s Empire: Gladiator by Claudia Christian and Morgan Grant Buchanan Read Free Book Online Page B

you must help it. To use it effectively, you must know not where your opponent is but where he will be when the discus strikes. Remember, while you’re waiting for the discus to return to your hand, you are unarmed. Sometimes your weapon will ricochet off an object or another opponent. Before you even cast the discus, you must have planned its course and anticipated your enemy’s attack. To do that, you must know all of the other weapons, their strengths and weaknesses, you must study your opponent before each match, calculate all of the potential strategies and ranges, or your discus will make a laughingstock of you.”
    After the first week, Marcus permitted me to sign the gladiator’s contract and swear the oath of the novice trio, solemnly promising that I would obey him and endure burning, flogging, and even death in order to learn his art. In turn, he officially accepted me into his school, becoming my lanista—my master and trainer.
    I was placed on a diet of calcium-rich stalactite powders to strengthen my bones and prevent them breaking, and I practiced with the team every day, before and after school. My male cousins mocked me for playing a man’s game, and my female relatives, whom I’d never bonded with due to their incessant prattling about fashion and matchmaking, made an extra effort to ostracize me, turning away to huddle and whisper if I passed them. They’d heard all sorts of gossip about me, most of it true.
    Gladiators mixed with the undercurrents of society. I learned that very quickly. Thieves and criminals, disgraced soldiers, ex-prisoners—they were always hanging about the gyms. Instead of shunning them like any well-bred young lady should, I befriended the ones who supplemented their arena income by engaging in even less respectable activities. From those men, and even a few women, I learned the art of scaling walls and breaking codes, gaining access to sealed rooms, and combat techniques that were deadly to opponents in the arena and on the street.
    During training time with Marcus, if I didn’t get a move the first time, I’d keep at it until I’d mastered it or twisted an ankle, sprained a finger, burned or cut myself. If I fell from exhaustion, Marcus would push me onto my back with his boot. “Get up. You said you wanted to be the best, so get up. You don’t get to be tired. No exhaustion, no giving up, no yielding. You want to fight because you’re a natural, you like exercising your innate power, but I’m going to push you until you hate being here. Until each day you will wake up in pain and fear at the thought of coming here. Then, if you can stick it out, you’ll come to a new place, beyond like and dislike, where you breathe battle, where the fighting mind saturates your every move. You must be the loosed arrow, no hesitation, a straight line between you and your target. Then, perhaps, one day you’ll be counted a real gladiator.”
    No complaints, I never spoke back to him. He wasn’t a cruel man, and I saw his gift for what it was—Marcus was the whetstone against which I sharpened myself until I could cut through anything that stood in my way.
    The men would hit me with their wooden swords during practice, leaving egg-size bruises on my back, arms, legs, and breasts. They’d goad me, insult me, knock me unconscious, and I kept going until, one by one, they fell to my discus and I earned their respect. Except for Marcus. I could never beat him, nor could any of the others in the gym. I asked the other gladiators why he didn’t give up being a lanista and enter the arena as a competitor. Even at his age he could have been a champion. They told me that although there was a rule that allowed the lanista of a gym automatic entry into any bout with any opponent (a rule originated to give impoverished trainers a chance to stave off bankruptcy and lure new students by displaying their skills), Marcus had