At the far end of the temple was a narrow ladder leading underground. Atroxia's cries were coming from there. Nothing else was on this main level, no vase or statue or even a layer of dust as I would've expected to find after being buried for three centuries. The Malice was not up here, and probably never had been.
To retrieve it, Livia must have gone underground, into the temple's catacombs.
Before going down the ladder, I reached for Radulf with my thoughts and told him where Livia was hiding.
"You must take my sister back home," I said. "Aurelia too. Make her go with you."
A moment later came his response. He was connected to me through magic, but not to Livia. He could not find her without revealing himself. "If the Praetors know I'm here, a fight will start," he said into my head. "Nobody can fight while that temple is open. Do you understand?"
I understood. But understanding the risk did not mean I could control it.
It was decided that Brutus and I would go into the catacombs alone while my mother was held near the temple doors. I glanced back at her and forced a smile to my face. It was the complete opposite to how I really felt.
"May the gods go with you," she said.
And I nodded, again without saying a word. I could fake a smile, but every phrase of comfort seemed hollow, and might've given us both false hope. I turned away, regretting that I hadn't at least tried to say something.
As I descended the ladder, I debated whether to tell Radulf that Livia had the Malice. He would take a greater risk to find her if he knew that, but at the same time, his refusal to help right now made me angry. He should take the risk because Livia was his granddaughter. That should be enough of a reason.
"Can you create a light down here?" Brutus asked me. He held a torch in one hand, but it was flickering from the breeze coming down the ladder hole and had become dim.
I shook my head, which probably was a sort of lie. Of course I could create a light, but I wouldn't. I needed time for Radulf to get to Livia. So that meant, if necessary, I'd wait in here until dark, because then he'd easily be able to get closer to her. But I doubted Brutus would let me stall for that long. I probably didn't even have three minutes before he'd lose patience with me.
"Where do you think the Malice is?" I whispered to Brutus.
Because I had no idea where I should look, or pretend to look in this case. This underground room was vast and very dark, and thanks to my refusal to use any light, it was mostly bathed in shadows. Like on the main floor, there was little of anything down here. This temple was nothing but an enormous tomb. A place for Atroxia to die. No wonder she cried in my head the way she did. Of all the punishments I'd faced as a slave and all the violence in the amphitheater or events of the circus, nothing in Rome seemed more cruel than to have locked her in this room, dead to the world long before her body knew it.
"The Malice is meant to be worn. I'd expect to see it on the statue of a warrior, perhaps one of the god Mars." Brutus motioned to his forearm. "It will be made of silver and for the person who wears it; it'll extend from the knuckles halfway to the elbow. The carvings on it will be very fine, but most prominent will be a carving of Mars's wolf."
What he described was very similar to the armband Radulf had wanted to use as a trick. Maybe that had been a good plan before. Of course, even if we had fooled them, it wouldn't have lasted long.
I started to walk away, to search in any other part of this temple for what I already knew was no longer here. But Brutus grabbed my tunic. "If you think you can steal the Malice for yourself, then know this. I do not fear awakening the Mistress. If you try to get away with the Malice, I will wake her."
I shook my head at him. "If I find the Malice in here, I will give it to you. I don't want it."
"Call me Dominus," he said. "I am about to hold a most powerful possession. I have earned the right to be called by a superior title."
"Tell that to your dogs outside," I muttered. "You haven't earned that title from me." Then before he could answer, I moved deeper into the shadows of the temple, alone.
It was cold down here, and damp, but I shivered for entirely different reasons. The cries in my head were growing louder, so much that I knew I was walking toward Atroxia, or the Mistress. I tried not to go forward, but it was as if my body had become chained to her will.
Somewhere in my thoughts, Radulf was trying to break through, with warnings or information or I didn't know what. But I couldn't hear him, not anymore, not while the cries for help were so much louder.
I needed to see the Mistress, to reassure myself that she was still asleep, or better yet, that I really was only hearing an echo from three centuries ago, from before she died in here. Because soon, Brutus would give up his search, and he and I would leave the temple. I couldn't leave without knowing what had become of the vestalis.
There she was, just ahead, her body laid out on a small bed that was really only cloth stretched across a wood frame. A thin blanket completely covered her, but it couldn't have kept out the cold. I was already chilled and had only been down here for a few minutes. She'd have likely frozen to death long before she felt the effects of hunger or lack of air.
Her cries were pounding inside my head, ripping at my heart for their sadness, their desperation. And yet in some ways I felt better. Because she lay there so perfectly still, not even breathing.
Valerius had been right. The cries were nothing but an echo in my head.
I wondered how in three hundred years, she had not yet decayed into dust. Perhaps that was the curse Diana had given her, to preserve her body, forbidding her spirit to ever rest in the afterlife. Looking her over, I realized one hand had fallen out from beneath the blanket. For as long as she had been gone, the skin should have long rotted away, but her hand looked perfectly whole. I leaned over to cover it with the blanket, simply out of respect.
Then I caught my breath in my throat. Her hand was warm.
Atroxia was as alive as everyone had warned me. Alive, but asleep. I started to pull my arm away, but in an instant, her hand turned and caught my left wrist in her grip.
My breath released in a sudden gasp of pain. This was no ordinary grip, far beyond the worst that had been done to me by Sal or his brute guards, or even by Radulf in the fiercest of our battles against each other. The pinch of her fingers around my wrist had instantly broken the bones like they were nothing but brittle twigs. A wave of nausea swept through me as I fell to my knees and tried to stay conscious, more locked to her than any chain had ever been to me.
There was no other movement from her, not even a flutter of her eyelashes, as far as I could tell in this dim light.
Only her voice in my head. No longer crying, but saying with the deepest feeling of sorrow, "Help me."
With the pain in my wrist, I couldn't hold my thoughts together enough to answer her cries for help, but then, I wouldn't answer either. Clearly, there was a connection between us, just as Radulf and I were connected, but I didn't want to hear her. I never had. And giving her any reply would only strengthen that bond.
I froze in place, hoping as her body relaxed back into a deeper sleep, her hand would also release my wrist. I needed her to release it because I wanted to cry out for my own help, and I knew I couldn't. Whatever else happened, I had to keep her asleep.
Finally, footsteps were behind me, and Brutus brought his torch. "It's not anywhere," he was saying. "What are you -- oh!"
My head was down, trying to manage the pain. I didn't look up at him, but it wasn't necessary. He could see her hand locked around my wrist. He immediately understood.
"The Mistress is alive," he whispered. "I knew it!"
"We don't know what'll happen if she wakes," I said. "It could be bad for both of us."
Brutus pulled the blanket away from her face, though I couldn't see it. "She's just a woman," he said, obviously disappointed. "The stories I've been told of her greatness ... well, this isn't what I expected."
She wasn't an o
rdinary woman. If he could've felt the grip of her fingers, he'd have known that. In a better light, he might've seen the strain on my face as I struggled to keep breathing. With the bulla, I was stronger than I used to be, but even that wasn't enough to make her release me. Maybe she looked like a sleeping vestalis, but she was holding the strength and power of an angry goddess. Diana.
"I'm going to awaken her," Brutus said. "The Malice is nothing compared to her power. And when she wakes, she'll find the Malice for us."
"You will not wake her," I said. "I will destroy this temple over our heads if you try."
Brutus laughed, and even that bit of noise caused the Mistress to clench her grip. It might as well have been around my neck for the way her grip was suffocating me. Enough of this.
I had to get free and stop Brutus. If the Mistress awoke, none of us would leave this temple. I might not be leaving anyway. Even if I got my wrist free, I wouldn't be able to climb the ladder now.
I closed my eyes and pictured the temple's entrance, where my mother was. I saw it as clearly as if I was there, then felt the pressure on my chest as the room faded around me. My arm was released, and when I opened my eyes again, I was there, directly beside my mother.
The two Praetors who had been holding her started to react to me, but I had the advantage of surprise and dropped them both with a small burst of magic.
My mother pulled me into a hug, and though it was torture on my wrist to be pushed against her, I didn't protest. I had missed the presence of her love, and wanted it and needed it in more ways than I could count.
"Nicolas," she whispered. "If your father could see you now --"
Her tone was kind, but she didn't finish her sentence, and I wasn't entirely sure I wanted her to. This was not the kind of life my father would have hoped for me; I already knew that. And yet at the same time, I knew he'd never have wanted me in chains, slowly dying in the mines outside of Rome. I wanted to think he'd be proud of me for having come so far in my life. If where I stood was proof that I had come far.
"You have to run," I said to my mother. "I will shield you long enough to get past the Praetors, but once you get into the vineyard, a unicorn will be waiting there."
Her eyes widened. "A unicorn?"
"He'll take you to Radulf's home."
"Your grandfather's home?" Mother asked. "If you know about Radulf, then you probably know he was never ... happy to have me for a daughter."
"But he will protect you," I said.
"I won't leave you here," she said. "We'll go together."
I glanced back toward the ladder hole. Brutus was still in the catacombs with the Mistress, and I had no doubt of his evil intentions. "There is more for me to do here," I said. "But I won't be far behind you. Now run. Go!"
The moment she left the temple, I raised the shield for her, at the same time as I called Callistus to the vineyards.
The Mistress was no longer crying in my head. In fact, I no longer detected any feeling of sadness from her. That would've been good news, except that the emotion was being replaced. With rage.
With my left wrist held against my chest by my other arm, I crept back to the ladder.
"Come with me now," I called to Brutus, speaking no louder than necessary for him to hear me. "Or you will be trapped in here forever. I'm going to collapse the temple."
There was no answer from him, though I knew he could hear me. Softly, his voice rose to my ears. He was chanting. He was waking her up. There was no choice but for me to leave them both in here.
I sent out enough magic to cause the ladder to fall apart in splinters. Then I braced my wrist again and started running toward the door. Sunlight beckoned me out, but I needed no encouragement. Although it hurt to release my wrist, I aimed my good hand toward the entrance. The moment I was out, I would destroy the door and let the rest of the temple fall with it.
Just before I reached the door, it slammed shut, turning everything into perfect darkness. Darker than Caesar's cave had been. Darker than the mines ever were on the blackest nights.
Any magic I had offered for my mother's protection was shut off with the door, and I could only hope she'd had time to reach Callistus. Then I dug within me for all the magic I had left.
I released it in every direction I could, certain that the bulla was capable of penetrating the walls and giving me a way out. It had to be strong enough, for the same magic that had cursed this tomb also powered the bulla. One could not be stronger than the other.
Unless it wasn't Diana's magic. The Malice belonged to Mars, and Jupiter himself had ordered Atroxia to be buried here. If that was true, then this situation might be far worse than I'd realized. I was trying to counter magic that I couldn't even begin to understand and which was certainly far more powerful than me.
The Mistress was more powerful than me too. Surely she had attempted to escape this temple many times before and failed. I needed something stronger.
A sound like thunder began rolling beneath my feet, and then came a scream such as I never could've imagined. It tore through my head like fire, but also pierced my ears and into my heart, and I was certain the scream reached to the ends of the empire. I wanted to raise my hands to my ears to block it out, but my injured arm wouldn't help. There was nothing I could do but fall to my knees and let it echo throughout this room.
"Help me, please," I whispered to Radulf. But I knew already that he couldn't hear me. That within the closed doors of these temples, I was as isolated as she had been for almost three hundred years.
"It's been stolen!" a woman cried. "The Malice has been stolen from me!"
I crawled until I reached a temple wall and crouched as low as I could get. It wouldn't give me much protection, or really any protection, but I didn't know what else to do.
The Mistress was awake.
The thunderings that had begun at my feet were rising, shaking the floor and even the temple walls. The best of my magic had destroyed a wooden ladder, but nothing else I'd done had even left a scratch on the walls.
I was using the Divine Star to heal my wrist and it was having some effect with the pain, but I still couldn't move it or feel any magic in it. I had to heal it, and fast. I needed some way to fight against her.
Then the marble floor began to crack like it was at the center of an enormous earthquake. I expected the temple walls and ceiling to come down on me as well, but for now, only the floor was in danger.
I started to stand, although I had nowhere to go, but before I could get to my feet, the floor crumbled beneath me.
I fell back into the catacombs amidst a heap of rubble and dust. If my wrist had been healed at all, it was worse now. My entire left arm where I had fallen felt like it was on fire.
"Nicolas Calva, why did you come here?" That was the Mistress's voice.
I didn't answer. Instead, I put up a shield and tried to do what I could for healing. Then I sent a little magic into the air, asking for light. I didn't need much, but at least I wouldn't be blind down here.
Brutus was supposed to be around here somewhere, and then I saw him unconscious in the corner of the room. Whether she had done that or pieces of the falling floor had hit him, I didn't know. But it was hard for me to feel any sympathy for him since he was the one who had caused this trouble.
As I had caused it too. I could not excuse myself so easily.
With my magic, the room had lightened enough to see the Mistress walking toward me. Her white robes had grayed, perhaps from natural aging, or from her corruption. But her face was that of a young woman. She had narrow eyes that sloped upward at the outside corners and her crimson hair was in a braided bun with ringlets on either side of her face. When she spoke, her voice was low and commanding.
"Kneel before me, Nicolas."
I shook my head as I stared at the ground. "You are beautiful, Atroxia, and I have great respect for your power. But I will not kneel to you."
She waved her hands, and I felt myself hurl backward through the ai
r and I crashed into the catacomb wall. Without the bulla, a collision like that would've knocked me unconscious too, and I almost wished that it had. Dirt crumbled behind me when I fell back to the ground, landing on both knees, one arm, and a partially healed left wrist that collapsed beneath my weight. The pain it caused made my head swim with dizziness.
"Where is the Malice?" she asked. "You stole it from me!"
"The Malice is gone," I said. "It's out of your control now."
If she was enraged before, then that made it worse. She flung her arms apart, and it felt as if claws had scratched my chest, though when I felt for blood, there was none.
"I will find it," she said. "Weak human, you cannot hide it from me, not for long."
I didn't need that long. Only enough time to get the Malice from Livia, and use the bulla to destroy it. After that, the Mistress would lose too much of her power to be any threat to me, or to Rome.
She hit me with something that punched against my gut. I felt the pressure, but not the pain from it, but then I realized pain had not been her intention. Whatever she had done had collapsed my shield. I scrambled to raise it again, but couldn't find it within me. And I would've fought back, except I needed to preserve my magic for one last attempt at destroying this temple.
Behind her, Brutus was beginning to stir. He raised his head and then slowly got to his knees.
"Get on your knees," he muttered to me. "Nothing else will save you today."
"I will not be saved on my knees to her." Then I turned my attention to the Mistress. "You were a vestalis, the holiest of women. You betrayed that when you helped in the assassination of Julius Caesar. You are a traitor to the empire and to your vows."
A growl emerged from her now, a sound I had never heard from anyone. And with that growl, she threw a wave of magic that passed right through me, one that tried to steal my soul as it exited.
I punched back, but it only came at her like a breeze, and now she laughed. "Did you think you were strong, slave boy? What Diana put into that trinket around your neck is only a little play magic. But what she gave me, to keep me alive all this time, is real power. And once you return the Malice to me, I will show you the worst of it."
While she spoke, I had been looking around the temple for any hope of escape. Though it was still dark in here, my eyes had adjusted somewhat. Above me, I saw claw marks on the walls and attempts to scratch between the marble blocks, but nothing to suggest there was a way out.