“I could guess it, you fools, but this is a game I know how to play. Very well then, what would your master have of me? Deliver your message while I still have patience for you.”

“He . . . our master said you were to forget the one Antonidus asked for, now that the general has been taken for slavery. He will have other names for you and will pay your price. He wants the association to continue.”

The figure let out a soft grunt of regret. “Tell him to name them and I will decide. I will not promise service to any man. As for the death bought by Antonidus, it is too late to call back the men I have sent. That one is dead, though she still walks unknowing. Now go back to your master and take your weak-stomached companion with you.”

The pressure disappeared and Cato’s servant took a deep breath in reaction, preferring the stench of the street to the soft odor that seemed to have sunk into his clothes and skin as they talked. It lingered with the two men as they made their way back to the open streets and a world that laughed and shouted, unaware of the festering alleys so close to them.

Chapter 37

                  CHAPTER 37                  

A crest of white-topped mountains lined the horizon. Somewhere between the teeth were the three passes they hoped to use to escape the wrath of Rome. The cold peaks brought an ache of homesickness as Spartacus looked up at them. Though he hadn’t seen Thrace since his childhood, he remembered scrambling on the lower slopes of the great range there. He had always loved high places where the wind was a constant force against the skin. It made a man feel alive.

“They are so close,” he said aloud. “We could cross them in a week or two and never see a Roman uniform again.”

“Until they come next year and tear Gaul apart looking for us, if I know them,” Crixus said. The man had always been blunt compared to the gladiator he followed. Crixus reveled in the reputation of being a practical man, allowing no dreams or wild schemes to detract from the leaden reality of what they had achieved. He was a short squat figure next to Spartacus, who still retained the litheness that suggested speed even when he was standing still. Crixus had no such grace. Born in a mine, the man was as ugly as he was strong and the only one of the gladiators who could wrestle Spartacus to a draw.

“They couldn’t find us, Crix. The Gauls say the land over the mountains is filled with battling tribes. The legions would have to wage war for decades and they haven’t the stomach for that. Now Sulla’s gone, they haven’t a decent leader in the whole pack of them. If we cross the Alps, we’ll be free.”