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Lucilla's Diary by C. Palmer ©2001 all rights reserved
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Part 5
Maximus is alive!
But, gods, he has fallen so cruelly low. He has become a slave, a gladiator.
And yet - he is still and always a General.
In Commodus' games to honour our father, as the gladiator known only as "the Spaniard", against all odds, he united the gladiators...
...and led them - his "Barbarian Horde" - to victory in the re-creation of the Battle of Carthage.
Commodus was so impressed, he went down to meet this "Spaniard" and I could not refuse Lucius permission to follow as he told me he had met "the Spaniard" at the Gladiator barracks and liked him.
When Commodus asked the "Spaniard" his real name, he replied only, "My name is Gladiator."
Something of the voice caught my heart, although my mind would not recognize it.
Then he dared to turn his back to Commodus.
Commodus was outraged, and demanded the slave reveal himself. It was then I learned Maximus still lives, and my heart soared with a relief that surprised me with its strength - until I also learned his tragedy.
"Father to a murdered son. Husband to a murdered wife."
The anguish in his voice was near matched by that in my heart - for him, and for myself. For my suspicions that Commodus, having murdered our father, is also capable of ordering the deaths of innocents - and thus my fears for Lucius - have been proven.
"Loyal servant to the true Emperor, Marcus Aurelius."
"And I will have my vengeance, in this life, or the next."
After that declaration, that threat, spoken as if an oath to the gods, I feared Maximus would yet be killed - executed - before our eyes.
Lucius' face betrayed that same fear. But the crowd, loving Maximus' victory, and perhaps pitying his loss of family and station, stayed Commodus' hand. They made a slave more powerful than the Emperor of Rome. For once, I found myself loving the mob. Maximus exited the arena in bittersweet triumph.
But in triumph for how long?
And what must I do to safeguard Lucius? For he is everything.
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