The Roar

Somewhere above, Leo could hear the chaotic cheers of the blood thirsty crowd. Their roar seemed to echo beyond the walls of the colosseum and out into the world; calling to the gods to acknowledge the sacrifice of the fallen and the valor of falling in battle.

Leo had been in the ring only once before and had fought with a group of soldiers who’d been able to work together to defeat the two giant Persians they’d been pitted against. Most of those soldiers were dead now, unable to win their freedom through surviving. This time, Leo was fighting on his own and trying to stay alive long enough to get out of this mess. A few short weeks ago he’d been shipwrecked as he’d tried to make his way across the sea to Egypt. He was still weak when they had found him. Not only ravaged from the storm, but from his encounter with a demigod. Some wounds took a very long time to heal.

However, he’d heard if a prisoner could survive three matches: one against beast, one against man, and one against the unknown, they could earn their freedom because the gods were on their side. There was only one god on Leo’s side, and he wasn’t certain she had much sway over the course of the battles.

He felt confident he could survive. After his past ordeals, he did have an upper hand against most enemies; his issue would be surviving in such a way the crowd did not suspect what he really was. Even after all these years, he was not back to full strength. His skin ached with the remembered knowledge of what had happened, and he was terrified his luck would not hold out if any of the gods beyond Hera noticed him.

The gate behind Leo began to creak open, allowing the sunlight to pour into his small dark cell. He squinted in the light, shielding his eyes with his arm as he hoisted his shield. With a short sword in his left hand and battered shield on his right, he stepped out into the arena. For a moment he felt deafened, the crowd was so loud his hearing nearly shut it out completely. In the brief pause, he saw a massive bull barreling towards him and he rolled out of the way, barely getting his shield between the horns and his right hip.

He felt the sliding impact of the horn graze along the metal as he dodged. Leo could sense the terror and anger in the animal but did not have time to reach out before the bull was baring down on him again. Leo jumped to his feet and used the butt of the sword to bat away the creature. He didn’t want to hurt it if he could help it but there were very few options about how this battle could go.

Leo scrambled to put distance between himself and the bull. Its eyes were blazing as it glared at its missed target. Leo was going to have to act quick if he was going to get out of this. But perhaps there was something else he could do.

He fell into a dance with the bull, slowly reaching into its mind and unwinding the threads of fear and anger tangled around clear thought. As he pushed and pulled the bull’s attacks slowed, not fully stopping or the audience would have them both slain for stealing their spilt blood. “Keep going”, Leo prodded inside its mind, “you won’t kill me, but maybe both of us can get out of here if this works.”

The bull took a few steps back and shook its head, clearing Leo’s words from its mind. Then raced forward with horns lowered, bellowing deeply in its chest. The right horn of the bull pierce Leo’s side as Leo’s sword found a space between the bull’s ribs.

Both man and beast stumbled apart, bleeding on the arena floor. Leo’s knees buckled and he fell heavily on his backside and lay staring at the blue sky. The roar of the crowd came and went in waves. He’d given them what they wanted, blood and glory and death. He felt himself being roughly jostled by whoever’s job it was to remove the bodies for the next match and his head shifted to look left towards the fallen bull.

It was old and tired and had asked for peace. With a tear in his eye, Leo had given the beast the one thing he had asked for in his final moments. He’d given him release without pain and without suffering. He’d slid his blade so it pierced its heart and it would never need to face the slashing, hacking, blade of scared gladiators.

Leo closed his eyes and let his mind fall away. His death wasn’t really death, something so mundane as being gored by a bull couldn’t be for a Titan of his caliber. Nevertheless, when he awoke in the next few days, he would be out of the hell known as the colosseum and once again start his journey to Egypt. He knew at least one of his sister’s was there, one of seven siblings, he had to stop. Perched on her throne, he would bring her down or die trying.