Page 1 of Thawed Gladiator: Victor

Chapter One

Victor

This is nothing like the biting chill of winter wind. It’s a bone-deep frozen ache that makes even breathing feel like swallowing shards of ice. My limbs are leaden, refusing to obey even the simplest commands. Where am I? How did I get here?

Fragments of memory flash through my mind—a storm-tossed ship, theFortuna, carrying us north toward Britannia, then getting hopelessly lost. Waves almost as high as the Colosseum walls. The crack of splintering wood. Then… nothing.

I try to open my eyes, but my lids feel as though they have been sealed shut by the gods themselves. The groan escaping my lips sounds strange and raspy to my ears. Somewhere nearby, heavy, rapid footsteps approach.

My fingers find the worn coin hanging from my neck on a chain. The Goddess Tyche’s wheel beneath my thumb calms me. It was Mother’s last gift, pressed into my palm before the fever took her. The metal feels warm against my skin, a small comfort in this strange place.

Rough hands touch my face. I flinch at the contact. My warrior’s instincts scream at me to defend myself, but my body refuses to cooperate. Something cold and wet wipes across my eyes. I manage to crack them open, immediately assaulted by harsh, painfully bright light.

“Easy there, big guy.” The words escaping a man’s thick lips are gibberish, but a strange device in my ear translates them into oddly accented Latin. His face swims into better focus—weathered, anxious features framed by graying hair. “You’ve been through a lot.”

The light comes from nowhere and everywhere, unlike any lamp or torch I’ve ever seen. The walls are smooth and white as polished marble yet clearly made of some other material. Everything feels wrong.

“Where…” My voice cracks, my throat raw. “Where am I?”

“Safe,” the man says through the translating device. “Your ship was blown off course. You’re far from home, but you’ll be fine.” His eyes dart away as he speaks, unable to meet my gaze. He’s lying, though about what, I’m unsure.

I try to sit up, but my muscles scream in protest as a lightning bolt of pain pierces my skull. The effort leaves me gasping, sweat beading on my forehead despite the chill in my bones. My father’s voice echoes in my memory: “Accept what you cannot change, my son. Focus instead on what you can control.”

Drawing a deep breath, I force my mind to calm. I can’t move yet, but I can observe. The bed beneath me is strange—soft yet firm, covered in material finer than any I’ve known. The air smells sharp and clean, with none of the familiar scents of smoke, blood, or unwashed bodies I’d expect in any healing house.

“My comrades,” I rasp as I crane my head from side to side. “Where?”

“You washed up on shore. Only you and some… wreckage.”

Another lie, which leads to a hundred other questions. There were fourteen of us who went down with theFortunathat night. All dead?

The thought slices through me like a blade between the ribs. Flavius, with his booming laugh, who shared his wine ration when fever left me parched. Quintus, whose massive hands could snap a man’s neck yet were gentle enough to stitch wounds after hard training. Varro, who taught me to anticipate an opponent’s strike before they knew they would make it. Even Alaric, who couldn’t understand my refusal to kill, yet pulled me back into the ship when a wave nearly claimed me.

Brothers forged not in blood, but in the crucible of the arena. Now gone? Lost to Poseidon’s cold embrace while I alone survived? The weight of this crushes my chest more than any opponent ever could.

“You should rest,” the man says, fidgeting with something beyond my view. “You’re still weak from… the journey.”

Journey. The word mocks the horror of that night—the screams of my brothers as the ship splintered, the desperate prayers to gods who didn’t answer, the icy grip of water pulling us down. How am I here when they are not? What cruel fate chooses one man to live while thirteen others perish?

But Father—and life—taught me to choose my battles wisely. For now, I need to focus on regaining my strength. Everything else can wait.

“Aqua?”I rasp.

He holds a cup to my lips—not clay or metal, but glass so pure and uniform it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before. The water is cool and clean, with none of the metallic taste of a soldier’s canteen or the staleness of a ship’s water barrel.

As I drink, I take stock of my body. No injuries I can detect, just this profound weakness and lingering cold. My muscles feel weak, as though I’ve been bedridden for months, not mere days. How long did I lie here without thought?

The man—he hasn’t offered his name—watches me like a merchant inspecting his goods for flaws. He hovers near my bed, nervous energy radiating from his slight frame. Graying hair slicked back with oil, five days’ stubble on his jaw, odd clothing like nothing I’ve seen before. His gaze darts around the room, never quite meeting mine.

“The paperwork’s been done,” he says through the strange device in my ear that turns his words to Latin. “I own you now. Legally. Everything’s been handled.” He tugs at the folded neckline of his strange tunic.

My throat feels like I’ve swallowed sand, but I croak out the expected response: “Yes,Dominus.”

Relief floods his features, followed quickly by worry as I try to sit up and fail. “Just… just rest for now. We’ll figure the rest out later.”

I want to demand answers, to grab him and force the truth from his lying mouth. But father’s teachings center me again. Patience. Observation. Understanding before action. I let my eyes drift closed, feigning submission to sleep, but my mind races.

Nothing here makes sense. The light, the materials, the strange device that somehow whispers the meaning of his words into my ear—it’s all wrong. But panicking will solve nothing. Instead, I focus on what I can control: my breathing, steadying it into a warrior’s rhythm; my muscles, tensing and relaxing each group in turn; my mind, staying sharp despite my body’s weakness.

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