7
LYSANDER
The Ally Idiot
Cicero wins his racewithout true contest except in the fifth lap, where a Carthii-sponsored chariot nearly crushes him against the central spina. Leaving my Praetorians at the gate, I cross the staging courtyard to give Cicero a piece of my mind. Kyber wanders along behind, innocuous, but always searching for danger.
The courtyard smells of hay, manure, leather, and horses. The smells wake memories of Virginia au Augustus. Of all the Golds who came and went through my grandmother’s palace, Virginia was my favorite.
I feel a faint longing for her easy smile and unpredictable conversations. Certainly that smile hid a mouth full of daggers, but Virginia had a way of making you feel privileged to have lost to her in a game of chess or an idle bet on which songbird egg would hatch first in the garden’s aviaries. I wonder if she still has time to visit her stables on Mars, or if like me, this war has swallowed her up. She was always happier after a ride in the Palatine’s park. Come to think of it, so was I.
Arcades enclose the staging ground,providing shade and tables for the teams. Young Gold charioteers and the sordid entourages that inevitably orbit such scurrilous characters sip wine and play dice. Many toast me as I pass, but not the Carthii, who sneer and insult me under their breath.
Beneath the arcade bearing the winged heel of Team Hermes, Cicero inspects his reins system. He’s due to race again before midday and will race nearly twenty times before the games are through. All of them in that stupid little helmet.
Cicero senses my approach. Instead of turning, he joins the grooms in wiping down the horses. “Lysander, I know. I know. I know. I know.”
I chase him around one of his horses, Blood of Empire. “You promised me you would not race.” Blood tries to nuzzle me and nearly knocks me down in doing so.
My friend sighs. He peers at me through a tangle of golden curls. “My goodman, search your memory. I said I promised I would take yourrecommendationto heart, and I certainly did.” He touches his breast. “In fact my heart was so torn over the matter, I nearly sprained my wrists holding it together.” He tosses a sweat-soaked rag to a groom and extricates himself from the horses to sit on the step up to his chariot’s basket.
He accepts a silver cup of wine from one of his stewards, drains it, and calls for more. “Wine? It’s Thessalonican. Rath brought ten barrels.Gods know how he got it. Man knows his smugglers. Weird fellow, really. Always with the innuendos. Can’t tell if he’s trying to filch my purse or slag me.”
“You do recall that the charioteers of Rome were slaves?” I confirm as the steward refills his cup. “Rich, dripping in whores, but slaves still.”
“Is that your way of telling me that unlike them I have so much to lose?” Cicero asks.
“Your father doesn’t have the reins any longer,” I reply. “Your house is yours to guide. Your father—”
“My father lost his planet. Followed by his honor,” Cicero says flatly. “Then he spent his life and his favorite son to reclaim both. You know his fearful disposition, his frugal nature. But he loved this sport. The Hippodrome is in our blood.” His eyes go misty and far away as he looks up at the stone heights of the stadium’s southern face. “This sand belongs to me. I have no less to lose than the meanest slave of Rome. What concerns are there but honor? What is there to lose but life? You ask me to risk my life for you, your claim on the Morning Chair, when all know the odds against that. This is by far the safer sport!”
He sips his wine and casts me an imploring look. “You and my sister do not understand because the insides of your minds are ordered like the guts of a clock. My mind is a wandering, haphazard organ, but it is not without its own breed of order.”
His eyes drift toward the driver’s arcade, where the Carthii-sponsored charioteers lounge in the shade listening to one of their fellows play theharp. “Yes, vanity is in my nature, but it would mean very much to me if you would have faith that I am not being vainglorious. I will not have Mercury insulted by Venus carrying away the glory on a day meant to honor my father and the planet he died for. What would that tell our citizens? That Mercury will only be a shadow of what it once was? That Votum is the least of the houses of the Conquering? I race for more than mere laurels, dear friend. I race for the spirit of my people.” He nudges me. “Ourpeople.”
I enjoy Cicero’s candor, his general optimism, and his love of conspiracy, but it is his buffoonish bouts of bravery that I admire the most. Others think him flighty, a party boy more interested in the arts than war. Far from it.
It’s strange the friends we make. Cicero could not be any more different than Ajax, my best friend from childhood. Back then, Ajax was pleasant and self-conscious, while Cicero was a famed nightmare full of mischief, arrogance, and general trouble. Life since then has made Ajax a selfish braggadocio, grotesquely skilled at killing to prove he is not weak. While Cicero doesn’t mind others thinking he’s weak. And even when he thinks of his own interests manages, I think accidentally, to nurse along the interests of others. Yet still I miss Ajax.
I snort at the stupid power of childhood bonds.
“What?” Cicero asks.
I deflect. “Something your sister said months ago. If a charm offensive is needed, call on Cicero indeed. If it means that much to you, you have my blessing. Not that you need it.”
After losing both Cassius to Darrow and Ajax to Atalantia, I’m careful not to tread on my friends’ spirits these days.
“Youdosee me. I told Glirastes as much,” he says with a delighted smile. “Where is the old bag anyhow? Mayhaps I’ll dedicate the next victory to him.”
“He left,” I say.
“You chased him away, no doubt,” Cicero says. “You must be gentler with him.”
“I am gentle with him.”
“You are kind, but not gentle. Artists are sensitive about their work. And you’re his work of personal redemption,” he says. I frown. “He helped Darrow, didn’t he? The Storm Gods were as much his devils asthey were the Reaper’s. He has much to atone for.” He spots something over my shoulder. “Oh shit. Incoming cretin.”
“Centaur or bull?”
