Page 22 of Thawed Gladiator: Varro

“Yes. It would be a privilege, a dream come true in a thousand ways to hear your first-hand accounts. But, Varro? I think what I really want to know about isyou.”

Since I awoke, I’ve gone from hating this woman as much as I hated Domina to tolerating her, to wondering if I might someday let my guard down around her. But something about the sincerity of her statement combined with the silk in her voice makessome of the bricks disappear from the wall I’ve erected between us.

Although I was born in Hispania, I was in Rome long enough to consider myself a product of Rome. I givenothingwithout receiving something in return.

“Why don’t we play a game, you and me? For everything I tell you aboutancientRome…” I wonder if I’ll ever tire of teasing her about that. “You tell me something about this world I’ve dropped into.”

“Sure. That’s fair, Varro. What do you want to know?”

“Do you have any food that’s edible? I’m still starving. All I’ve had to eat in two thousand years is peaches.”

Laughter peels out of her, and her eyes crinkle in happiness. How have I gone from delighting in ideas of how to kill her to making jokes?

Chapter Twenty

Laura

Before we left the men’s tent to enter the large multi-purpose room, I practically had to arm wrestle Varro to put on a shirt. He finally chose a clean one that’s so tight it hugs his broad chest and muscular shoulders like a glove. That man’s body could drive a nun to sin. All I have to do is remind myself of my terror when he wrapped his hands around my throat the other night, and I find it easy to ignore his sex appeal.

I announce his choices as I paw through Tony’s recently unearthed stash. “Chili with beans.” When he cocks his head, I translate to, “Spicy beans and meat. Barbecue beef, which is beef in a sweet sauce. Chicken, noodles, and sauce. Beef in a… hard corn shell. We call them tacos.”

“Do they taste like food?” His facial expression is skeptical—forehead furrowed, eyes narrowed, and mouth slightly twisted in a questioning smirk. That face would be more at home on a toddler being ordered to eat his peas than on a gigantic gladiator.

“They’re not what you’re used to, but they’re all we’ve got. And sorry to tell you, at some point rations will be so low we’ll be sharing them. Then you’ll wish we had more.”

“Myapologies. You pick.”

I grab the chili with beans package, getting ready to shake it to get it cooking in its little pouch. “My mom had a saying. ‘Beggars can’t be choosers’.”

“Yes. Good point.” As the food heats, he adds, “Your Latin isn’t bad, for it being anancientlanguage.”

“Actually, we don’t call it an ancient language. It’s considered a dead language.”

Shit! The minute that’s out of my mouth, I wish I could grab the words and shove them back inside. I don’t need to see the shocked and saddened look on his face to know I totally fucked up. “Sorry!”

“Dead?”

“Um. Shouldn’t have said that.”

“What does dead mean?”

I don’t want to say it. It’s so final, so terrible. How would I feel if someone told me I’d been transported so far into the future that no one spoke English anymore? Those words would be like hearing nails being pounded into my coffin.

“Laura?”

“It means no one speaks it anymore.”

Perhaps I’ve hit him with so much shit he’s inured to it by now. His face shows nothing, but maybe that’s the point. I’ve stunned him into silence.

“H-how long?”

He’s done so well. Just that slight stutter tells me how much this conversation is costing him.

“It hasn’t been used in daily life for aboutfifteen hundred years.”

His hand reaches out, flailing, as he seeks something to lean on. I pull the generator close enough that he can lean on its handle.

Looking around as if he just woke up, he gestures to my room and asks, “Is that where you want me to sleep? I need to lie down.”

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