Blood Games

PART II Chapter 8

  HER FATHER'S HOUSE was cold. Olivia sat in a corner of what had been her mother's room, three stolae around her shoulders, a single oil lamp burning while she tried to read from the scroll she had brought from the library. Her attention wandered, but she was determined to postpone as long as possible the time she would rise and climb into the bed that waited against the far wall, for the blankets were thin, the mattress hard and the drafts through the room on this chilly night conspired to keep her awake. She hoped to make herself sufficiently exhausted to sleep, no matter how cold, how uncomfortable the room.

  She sighed as she tried to make sense of the faded Greek letters on the scroll. Her knowledge of the language was adequate but not scholarly, and in the poor light she had a great deal of trouble deciphering the tale.

  In the month she had lived in her father's empty house, she had felt hope ebb within her. At first she had been delighted at what seemed an escape from her husband's increasingly violent demands, but that had proved not to be the case, for when the need was on him, he would bring men to her here. He no longer bothered to hide while she was ravished, but stood nearby, watching critically.

  A spot of moisture dropped onto the scroll and she wiped it away angrily. She would not weep! That had been her decision on the day that Vespasianus came to Rome, almost a month ago. All Rome spoke of new beginnings, and she had decided then that hers would be to abandon her futile sorrows. Her hands trembled on the scroll and she made a soft, strangled cry in her throat.

  She looked up swiftly, hoping that those Justus had set to guard her had not heard the sound. They reported everything to him, and it had become increasingly important to her that he should not learn how much anguish he had caused her. She waited, hardly breathing, for the sliver of light from the hall that would show the servant she had come to think of as her jailer. There had been a sound beyond the door, she knew it, a slithery sound as if something had slipped along the floor. For one panic-filled moment she feared that Justus had decided to visit her again, bringing her some new horror.

  The door opened at last, the slice of light amber in the gloom. Olivia shrank back into the shadows, trying to make herself as small as possible, or invisible.

  A dark-cloaked figure stepped into the room, and a voice she thought never to hear again said, "Olivia. "

  She dropped the scroll as she got to her feet. "Saint-Germain. " Slowly she came across the room toward him, her voice husky with fear. "How did you get here? You must leave at once, before they find you. Oh, my love, I've missed you so much. "

  He held out his arms to her, and wrapped her within his cloak, close to him, his face against her hair as she, in sudden fierceness, clung to him. "Olivia. Olivia. " With one hand he tilted her wet face up to him. "Olivia," he said again as he kissed her with a strange, quiet passion drawn from the depths of his soul.

  When she could speak again, her words came in impulsive little starts, spoken hardly above a whisper, and all the while her hands plucked nervously at his tunica, as if wanting to reassure herself that he was not the product of her imagination. "How did you get here? How did you know where to look for me? You mustn't stay. How did you get in? They'll hurt you if they find you. They'll tell Justus. Saint-Germain. Help me. Oh, my love, help me. " Without warning she started to cry, great ragged sobs wrenching out of her. His arms held her securely while the worst of her tears raged through her; then he lifted her easily and carried her across the room to the bed. As he walked, his heeled boots made a sharp report on the cold marble floor. When he had put her on the bed, he lay down beside her, his body close against her, his cloak spread over them both. He murmured quiet, endearing words to her while his small, beautiful hands smoothed the tears from her face.

  "No," she said at last, trying feebly to break away from him. "No. "

  "No?" he asked, kissing her eyelids. "By all the forgotten gods, Olivia, you are precious to me. "

  She winced as if in pain. "Don't. Don't say that. " Her voice had risen, and she quieted herself with an effort. There were those who were listening. He had to understand that. "Don't. If the guard finds us. . . "

  "That's unlikely," he murmured as he loosened the stolae she had knotted around her shoulders in a futile attempt to keep warm. "Your guard, by some curious happenstance, drank drugged wine tonight, and will not awake until morning. " He moved back far enough to get a clear look at her, and was secretly shocked by what he saw. Her face was thinner than ever, and there were new lines around her eyes and by her mouth that told more than words would of the suffering she had endured. There was a tightness in his chest when he spoke to her then, and though he tried to keep his words light, some of his anger and his concern colored them. "We have all night together, and there is nothing that the guards or Justus or the Emperor or Jupiter himself can do to stop us. I should have come earlier. I should have come when I found out where you were. I didn't want to take needless risks, but I see that I should have. "

  She put her hand to his lips. "No," she said, barely audibly. "Be quiet. There may be others still up. "

  "I'm not a fool," he reminded her gently. "No one else is awake. Only you and I. " His mouth touched hers, the open lips parting hers with gentle persistence. He pressed closer to her, feeling the lines of her body through the garments that separated them. "Olivia. " He had wanted her in all the days they had been apart, but now that he was beside her, his need was as sharp as steel within him.

  "Saint-Germain," she whispered, holding on to the last shreds of her resolution. "No, no, I can't. It's too hard, to love you, to have you with me, and then to have to subject myself to my husband. You know what he has done to me. I don't think I can stand this any longer, having your love when we can dare to be together, and then return to the demands that Justus makes of me. Don't ask it of me, my only, only love. "

  His lips grazed her neck. "I won't abandon you to your husband. I've told you that before. I won't. You must not ask that of me, Olivia. "

  "Then what am I to do?" she asked, feeling the full weight of her misery once more. "I can't continue this way. Each day is worse than the last, and sometimes I'm afraid I'll go mad. I haven't heard from my mother in years. Here I am surrounded by nothing but spies, who find my state amusing. There are only a few scrolls left in the library, and I've read each of them at least twice. Justus has left me nothing. Even the statues that used to be in the niches are gone. He says that I have no need of them. Saint-Germain, tell me. What am I to do?" This time she managed to hold her tears back.

  "You must leave him. You must come to me. I've told you that for over a year. " His hands worked to untie her clothes as he spoke to her in the dark.

  "But the Praetorians. . . "

  "If every officer of every legion and guard of Rome were in pursuit of me, it could not possibly make a difference between us. I don't say that idly, Olivia. I will have you with me, if I have to drag you through Rome by your hair. " In token of this, he tugged at the pins that held her long hair in an untidy knot at her neck. Eagerly, slowly, he spread her hair over the rough pillow. "Listen to me, Olivia. You are part of me. Nothing in the world can change that, except the true death, and that has yet to touch me, though it's had almost two thousand years to do it. " He was working loose the fibula that held her palla at the shoulder. "We've been together too often, too long for you to be free of me. " His parted lips closed on hers again, less gently now as he felt his desire for her well within him. As their kiss lengthened and deepened, her breath quivered.

  Then she pulled away, aching, her jaw tight. "I can't. My dearest Saint-Germain, forgive me, but I can't. " She tried to turn away from him, in the cradle of his arms. "Take what you need. I can do that, at least. It's what you must have. " She closed her eyes so she would not have to see the compassion in his face. "Don't torture me with false hope. It's too hard, Saint-Germain. I can
't keep on this way with you. It's too painful when I have to return to. . . the other. I wish I were stronger. . . "

  "You are strong," he said, moving to look more clearly into her face. "How many women do you know who could survive what you have? Justus' first wife is mad and his second dead. In spite of all that he does to you"-as he said it, rage pricked at him-"you have endured it. You haven't succumbed to his debauchery. You are sane. You are alive. "

  "No, Saint-Germain. Please. . . " She shook her head.

  He took her face in his hands. "Do you mean that? Do you want me to do nothing more than take what you think I require and leave you? Here? To this? Is that sufficient for you?"

  Olivia could not meet his penetrating eyes. "No. It's not enough. But what else dare I have?" It was more difficult than she had imagined to deny him. There was no choice, she reminded herself, as she had so many times in the past month.

  "Perhaps," he said in a low, caressing tone, "it could be enough for you. It would not be enough for me. "

  "It must be," she whispered as she reached to touch his good, loving face.

  "But it can't be. I am not like other men. You know that. That was why you accepted me at first. " With one finger he traced the line of her mouth. "I could never do to you what other men have done. Even if you desired it. Even if I desired it. "

  Hating herself for doing it, she braced her arm against his chest. "Saint-Germain, what can we hope for?"

  If he understood her, he chose to interpret her words in another light. "It's true that I can no longer serve you as another man would, but there are compensations. Would you like to spend all the night in loving? In seeking fulfillment and release in new ways, each unique, each wholly satisfying? There are myriad kisses to shower on you, touching that will bring sweet fire to the inmost part of you. Think of exploring the limits of your desires without fatigue and without disappointment. " He moved the three stolae and the palla aside so that he could put his hand on the curve of her breast, an ardent, protective gesture that brought her out of the remote place of her mind where she had retreated from his concern and gentleness. "Whatever you desire, Olivia, for as long as you desire it, that I can do. My stamina is the same as your own. Have you forgotten that?" He bent to her lips again and this time she did not resist him, but lay passive beneath his demand. "Olivia," he said at last, more with sadness than reproach.

  "I'm afraid," she said at last.

  "Of me? After all this time?" He leaned above her, the muted glow of the oil lamp on the other side of the room touching the edge of his brow, the side of his nose, the curve of his mouth.

  "I'm afraid of the things that I want. " Longing for him grew within her with sudden intensity. She closed her fists in resistance to it.

  "Why?" He had begun to pull her clothes away from her body. "Do you want to begin every hour of the night with a new expression of your love? It will be as you wish. I may never join my body with yours as others have, but my. . . soul. . . will share ecstasy with yours. "

  "And the blood?" Olivia asked, keeping the last little distance between them. "There is always blood. "

  "Yes. " His dark eyes held hers with their intensity. "And there always will be. It is my life. What in you, what part of you is more truly yourself, if not your blood?" He held her closer, lying close above her, the arch of her hip pressing his. "My only gratification comes through your own. My pleasure is entirely drawn from yours. If you take no delight in what we do, then I cannot know any. "

  Olivia looked up at him, sensing, as she did occasionally, the isolation he had lived with so long, an isolation greater than her own. "Saint-Germain. . . "

  "I'd forgotten many things in my life, Olivia. Or I'd told myself that they were too ephemeral to matter, since I have lived so many years, and the rest of humanity lives so few. But that was foolishness and bitterness. An eternity of loneliness is more wretched than you can know. " His arms tightened abruptly. "Let me love you, Olivia. There is so little else I can do. Let me help you put behind the bestiality of the men your husband has forced upon you, and his cruelty. If you cannot forget them, not even for the moment that we lie together, perhaps you can free yourself from the torment within you. We have been lovers for too long. I can't leave you. I can never leave you. "

  "What do you mean, Saint-Germain?" she asked, startled out of the weariness that had clouded her mind. She had heard an unfamiliar note in his voice, an implacable promise.

  "How many years have we been lovers? Five? And of those years, how often have we lain together in love, you and I? Thirty times? More? It requires six, possibly seven encounters with me and my kind before there is a change in you, a change that cannot be turned aside. "

  Her eyes had grown wide as he spoke. "What do you mean, a change in me?"

  "I mean, Olivia, that when you die, as you surely will one day, you will walk again, as I do, to live as I do, in the taking of blood and the giving of love. I told you this long ago, when we first began-I thought you understood. "

  Vaguely she did recall some of the things he had told her when they had first become lovers, a warning of some sort that seemed insignificant then. All that had mattered then was his nearness, the release he gave her and the consolation his presence gave her. At the time, she had not cared what he said, or what he had promised, so long as there would be no more abuses by men who ravished and degraded her for her husband's amusement. "I don't think I did understand. Be like you? Entirely like you?" She felt bemused as she looked at him, opening her entire being to him now in a way she never had before.

  "Entirely like me?" he repeated. "Very nearly. " With one small hand he swept back her lackluster hair from her brow. His smile was rueful. "Unlike me, you will not lose your capacity to enjoy your flesh as women do. "

  She made a face. "I don't think I want a man inside me again, ever. "

  "Perhaps," he said rather sadly. "But ever is a very long time and you are apt to see quite a lot of it. " He bent his head again, and this time his gentle, probing mouth touched her breast, passing over the nipples with a feather's touch, a light, elusive motion that drew all her desire after it.

  "How will I feel when I change? What will I be like?" After the first moment of doubt and revulsion, she found that the prospect of being like her lover had little horror for her. She had known Saint-Germain too long to find his nature disgusting.

  "Much the way you are now, Olivia. You will be stronger, for all those of my blood are stronger, and you will sleep less, much less. The night will be another day to you. You will learn certain. . . precautions, and will never want to be far from your native earth, although you can carry that with you rather than remain atop it," he said with a wry half-smile.

  "Are you really from Dacia, then?" she asked, realizing that it might be a convenient fiction he had invented.

  "Oh, yes, that's quite true. I never lie about that. The Daci came after my people by a considerable time, however. The names we give the land change often, but the earth is the same. It was, he realized, almost a thousand years since his people had lived in the part of the world that was now called Dacia. "Occasionally I return there for the pleasure of being on my home ground, but it is much changed since my youth and almost everything is unfamiliar to me but the earth itself. " He looked away from her, saying almost dreamily, "The last time I was in my native mountains, they thought me a foreigner, just as you do. Those of my blood have become not memories, but legends. They've learned about the Greek lamia and confuse us with that. " When his eyes met Olivia's once again, they were sad. "My cherished love, there are almost none of my blood left, and they are scattered over the face of the earth like grains broadcast in a field. We are few and vulnerable, for all our strength. "

  She nestled closer to him. "I think I'll enjoy being like you. I want to be like you. " This was true. Until that evening, sh
e might have resisted the idea of such a change, but not now, since Justus had sent her to her father's empty house, under guard, with the threat of worse if she opposed him. She remembered vividly his description, a few nights ago, of the brothel in Syria that specialized in Roman women. She had tried then to convince herself that life as a prostitute would not be as bad as what her husband had already done to her, and the pain of it was hard as the blow of a fist. There would be no escape from that brothel, and there was no escape now from Justus, though Saint-Germain offered another way, one that pleased her. She lifted a hand to her eyes.

  Saint-Germain had watched the rapid, agonized changes in her expression. "What is it, Olivia? Have I upset you? Tell me. "

  "It's not you, Saint-Germain. Never you. My husband. . . "-the words were spat out angrily-"my husband said a thing. . . " She stopped, misery closing off her voice. "I have earned the right to my own pleasure, haven't I?" She did not know how wistful she sounded in the cold, bleak room.

  "Yes, if pleasure must be a right that is earned, you have done it. " He kissed the line of her brow. He was alarmed by the tone of resignation that had come into her voice. "Listen to me a moment, Olivia. You have never learned what it is to be moved as other women are. I do not want to give you up, not now. You are too much a part of me. There are things you must know, however, and a few things you and I must accept. In time, before you go to your tomb and walk again, you may want a man again. You deny that now," he said quickly, cutting off the objections that burst from her lips. "Not all men are like Justus. There will be those who will fire your blood and you will be drawn to them, when the bitterness and hatred have faded. You will be drawn to them, as you should be. Understand that, my love. You should desire others, and seek them. It is our life. "

  "But tonight, it is only between us?" Anxiety made her voice high and small. She had a dim comprehension of what he said, but she no longer wanted to listen. Now his nearness had become as inexorable a force to her as the moon to the tides. "The two of us, all night?"

  "All night," he promised her, feeling her senses quicken under his hands. "We will do whatever you wish. Do you want me to caress you and embrace you until you have your release of your own accord? That is your right, and you may ask it of me. Do you want me to search for new expressions of love? You have only to tell me, and it will be as you wish. You've been ordered too long. Be abundantly selfish, Olivia, and you will be more generous to me than you know. "

  "But is this mine?" she mused aloud. "Or is this something else, foreign to me?" She had wondered this from the first time he had come to her, giving her pleasure when she had expected the worst brutality.

  "Foreign. " He laughed, though there was melancholy in the dark eyes. "Do you think that this is any more foreign than what you have been subjected to? Is what your husband forces on you more human because there is semen on the sheets at the end of it?" Centuries ago that question would have angered him, but he had answered it many times and the distaste it once engendered in him was gone. Now it was only a matter of reassuring Olivia so that she could set her anguish, her doubt and worry aside.

  "I suppose it isn't important," she sighed. It was pleasant to lie back, Saint-Germain's dark woolen cloak around them for warmth, the sure touch of his small hands, gently persuasive, waking her senses. She let her mind drift as he clothed her in kisses. Now her arms felt softer, less wooden, and she breathed faster. A delicious anticipatory shudder ran through her as her legs opened to his questioning hands. Nothing he did was urgent. His mouth, his hands, the pressure of his body, all were unhurried, as restful and as sensual as the lapping of the sea. Olivia reached for him, sinking her hands in the loose dark curls to pull his face to hers. "It will take time, Saint-Germain. I'm. . . "

  "I have time. " He ran his hand lightly up her thigh, over the arch of her hip, along the line of her ribs, across her breast to her shoulder and down her arm. He saw some of her animation return to her face at last, and the tension and fear that held her locked in a shell of herself fell away from her as her garments had. "Ah, Olivia. " Now his lips were more insistent, his mouth lingering over hers, summoning the need that was hidden in her, parting from her slowly before moving over the same path that his hand had taken.

  The abysmal despair that had possessed her for so many days began to lift, like mist rising from the Tiber at the first morning light, turning from gray to silver to golden white before fading into the day. At last despondency loosened the dank hold it had on her mind. She gave a long, quiet sigh and her hands clenched and then opened as she gave herself over to the exaltation he found in her. Let me love you. Let me love you. She heard him say it in her mind as he had spoken the words so many times. Each time it had been a battle to accept him, to let her herself know the depth of her pleasure, and each time the desire for him grew stronger. She felt her body was made of light, glowing, a fire, a star, a luminous mist at dawn, that would disappear for elation.

  Deep within her she felt her senses contract so that the spasms that engulfed her were more frenzied than any she had ever felt. She cried out for the power and joy of it. In that cold little room she burned like the heart of molten gold.

  It was some time before she released him, before the tremor of her passion left her breathing, before her bones felt solid within her. She lay back, her eyes half-closed. Then, with a start she realized that he had not satisfied his own need yet. She turned to him, questioning. "Saint-Germain?"

  He laughed softly, the sound low and musical, his eyes smoldering as he moved off her. The faintly mocking cast to his face was gone. "Now, Olivia," he said in a tone she had never heard him use, one that was unrestrainedly happy, "now we can begin to love each other. "

  There were tears in her eyes as she opened her arms to him, but not for hopelessness or despair. This time she wept with poignant longing as her desire soared to new life. As his lips brushed the curve of her neck she cradled his head in her hands, the immensity of their rapture filling them both.

  TEXT OF A PROCLAMATION OF THE EMPEROR TITUS FLAVIUS VESPASIANUS.

  From the Emperor to the Senate and the People of Rome, greetings:

  On the suggestion of my older son, who bears my name, I am pleased to announce to you all that it is my intention of celebrating my imperial reign by causing to be built a new amphitheatre for future Great Games. I have sought the advice of those knowledgeable in such matters, builders and arena workers alike, and their recommendations have been weighed and evaluated most conscientiously.

  The location I have elected for the site of this amphitheatre is between the Esquiline and Palatine hills, where the lake in the gardens of Nero's Golden House currently lies. This lake will be drained, and in so doing will not only provide a superior location for the amphitheatre, but will help in the removal of that profligate Emperor's stamp on Rome.

  This new amphitheatre will be large enough to accommodate those who wish to attend the Games without the serious overcrowding that has so often resulted in accidents and injuries in the Circus Maximus, the Hippodrome and the Circus of Caligula and Nero. So that it will be easier for all those who attend to see the full action of the Games, the circus will have no spina to block the view of many, and a special track will be constructed for the chariot races outside of the major arena, surrounding it. No more will chariots have to race where battles have just taken place. This will be beneficial to the charioteers, and will speed the flow of arena activities.

  For those who worry about a conscription of slaves, I, as your Emperor, pledge to you that this will not happen. It is possible for us to use slaves already consigned to imperial use-the prisoners of the recently contained Jewish revolt. These prisoners will be given the task of building this fine circus. Before the end of summer, there will be ten thousand Jewish slaves in Rome to work on the amphitheatre.

  Our plans are set, and we can tell that this will be a circus unlike others.
This time it will not be necessary to cobble in improvements, for all the best architectural features have been planned, and the very latest in circus engineering has been studied for the construction of this amphitheatre.

  The draining of the lake will begin in April, and as soon as the ground is sufficiently dry, formal building excavation will commence. When the circus is complete, it will be the glory of Rome.

  Caesar Vespasianus

  on the fourteenth day of March,

  the 823rd Year of the City