The Valiant (The Valiant #1)(90)

And Victory, in the eyes of Romans, had to look like Rome, like her legions.

Only fancier and showing more leg.

The whole spectacle was like that. The Roman side was entirely too shiny and, in my opinion, rather too pretty—with the notable exception of Damya, with her dragon-scale armor and fearsome, bulging muscles—and I’d never seen an actual Celt dressed as outlandishly as the tattered, feather-bedecked fighters from the Ludus Amazona we were up against. The games masters had decorated the arena with massive gilded eagles and billowing cloth to mimic ship sails at one end. On the other end, they’d erected towering, fearsome wicker statues made to look like the horned and demonically deformed wicked “gods” of the backwater barbarians. I would have been offended, but I barely noticed the trappings the moment after I entered the arena and the fight began.

It wasn’t really the battle for Prydain, and I wasn’t really Fallon.

I was Victory.

Which means I have to win this fight, I thought grimly.

The Ludus Achillea gladiatrices had already fought their way through the front ranks of the Amazona “Celts” when a peal of war horns sounded in the air. I sent my sparring opponent sprawling into the dust with a backhand swipe from the flat of my blade and turned to face the new threat. There was a rush of fresh warriors through the archway at the end of the Circus Maximus—along with chariots and fresh archers—but still no sight of Nyx.

I scanned the fighters and saw she wasn’t there. Even in a helmet or one of the outlandish costumes, I would have known her. It seemed the games masters were holding off on the appearance of the Briton war goddess, the fearsome Morrigan. But I did recognize another familiar figure in the crowd among the ranks of the Briton princes they sent at us. Mandobracius, the notoriously savage gladiator with his raven-feathered helmet and woad tattoos, led the charge.

“Aeddan,” I whispered through clenched teeth.

I ran straight for him, dodging other engagements as I pelted across the sands. In the back of my mind, I could hear his brother’s voice, distorted by fog and echo, from that horrible night. Aeddan saw me coming and raced to engage me. The visor on my crested helmet covered my face from the brim to beneath my cheekbones. He wouldn’t know who I was—to him, I was just another warrior, just another life to cut short, like Mael or Ajax.

The fact that I was female wouldn’t spare me, I knew.

I was Cantii. He was Trinovante. Our women had always fought and died alongside our men.

The twin swords Aeddan wielded flashed, throwing sunlight into my eyes, dazzling me. I’d almost forgotten that he’d fought dimachaeri style that night at the Domus Corvinus. I’d never realized that it was a skill that ran in the family. Aeddan was good—almost as good as Mael had been—forcing me to block a frenzy of blows with the kind of genius born of sheer desperation. My luck held, but it wouldn’t hold long. He knew how to fight me. He might even have known how to beat me.

But not today, I thought. Today, I am Victory.

When his next attack came, I feinted to one side and spun low to come at him with an upward dual thrust of my swords. He twisted like a viper to evade, whirling away in the instant before my blades hit home. It gave me a moment to breathe—but only a moment. All around us, the other combatants fought in knots of twos and threes. From all sides, ranks of archers fired volleys of arrows when the ferocity of individual duels waned, just to keep things lively.

When Aeddan came at me again, I backed away and stumbled. I fell onto my back, cursing. That should have been the end of me. But my tumble caused him to overshoot his mark, and his blades sank harmlessly into the sand next to me. Rocking onto my shoulders, I launched myself forward in an arc, landing in a crouch. Driven by the energy of the crowd, I ran recklessly toward him, chasing him backward with hewing strokes and howling like a Fury for his blood.

I ducked under his double slashes, which sheared a chunk of bristles off the horsehair crest on my helmet, and dodged around his left flank. I landed a blow with my sword on his shoulder as I swept past. It was enough to gouge a scar in his thick leather armor and shift him off balance. It also gave me time to catch my breath, or so I thought—

“Fallon, MOVE!” I heard Elka scream.

“Lugh’s teeth!” I swore and dove wildly out of the way as a spear pierced the ground right where I’d been standing only a moment before.

“Pay attention, you fool!” I muttered through a clenched jaw and dragged my focus back to the fight—just in time to see Aeddan charging toward me in a dead run, his two swords flashing. I slammed my own blades back into their sheaths and plucked Aeddan’s spear out of the ground. Wielding it like a staff, I swept it overhead and blocked the blows he rained down on me. Suddenly, a volley of flaming arrows arced overhead, trailing dark crimson smoke. We fought dead center in the arena, right in the thick of it, and Aeddan flinched as one of the arrows punched into the ground beside him.

I took advantage of the moment, ducked low, and rammed the butt of my spear into his side. The breath left his lungs in a whoof as he stumbled sideways, and I followed up with a series of swift, vicious jabs. One of them bit into the large, hard muscle of his thigh, below the edge of the armored skirt he wore. Not deep, but painful. Aeddan’s leg went sideways, out from under him, and he fell heavily to his knees.

The crowd cheered madly.

I raised my blades high up over my head, muscles tensed for the killing blow. Aeddan stared up at me through the grill of his helmet visor, but all he could see was the gilded Victory mask that hid my face. He had no idea whom he was fighting, but I didn’t have that luxury. I stared down into his gray eyes and lowered my swords. Confusion mingled with the pain in his gaze as I reached up and snapped open the buckle on my leather chinstrap, lifting the helmet and visor off my head. My hair fell down around my cheeks, damp and sticky with sweat, and the air was cool on my face.