Dacius freezes in the doorway of the arena, his nostrils suddenly filled with the scent of the sand in the arena, and more than that, the other smells too -- the iron and copper from blood spilled in the last bout, the thickness of sweat on the air, men's sweat and animal musk and dust from the beastmen's feathers, their furs, their bristles, their hairy coats.
"Go, slave," growls the enforcer in his ear, though he doesn't crack the whip -- he knows that it isn't disobedience that makes Dacius freeze in his place, is not insubordination.
He can hear the roar of the crowds in the arena stands, hear people screaming and cheering, whistling and calling and crowing, spinning noise makers and blowing on horns. The sound is so loud and so cacophonous as to be almost like a wall he cannot pass through, and he stumbles but works his way through it, walks forward and feels the sand under his feet.
The grains that touch him through his sandals are hotter here than through the gates, the sun having warmed them.
He is a taster, Braco had told him when his name had been drawn from the pot -- he will not die here on the sands, will not be harmed beyond cuts and bruises and the bulge of his come-stuffed belly.
"If you're very lucky indeed," one of the other trainers had told him, scarcely able to hold in his laughter, "you'll come away from this ploughing of the ages with the furrow in your belly sown with seed. You won't be made to fight in the arena at all, if you prove fertile -- they'll display you on the balcony beneath the emperor's, ply you with food and fine wine and pleasant potions as pups grow and mature inside you. They'll bet not on your loss or victory, or the manner in which you'll die, but on what brood will crawl out of your cunt when the time comes."
He'd finally laughed, then, and slid his hand over the back of Dacius' neck, squeezing, pressing his thumb down between Dacius' shoulders and making him let out a breathless noise as Braco had rolled his eyes.
"Will that, um," he'd managed to say, stumbling on the words, and Braco had met his gaze.
"The labour and birth too," Braco had confirmed, "before the crowd in the arena."
The shield is too heavy on his arm, and he isn't used to walking with a spear in his hand -- it's too long for him, and too heavy too in contrast to his usual dagger. He is normally a performer in amongst the lesser-trained chorus, dances and sings and gyrates before the crowds with a mask on his head, hiding his face.
They are laughing at him as he moves into the centre of the sands, but not just laughing -- they are crowing and jeering, and he might not be a brothel whore anymore, the place of his birth, maturity, and manhood absorbed by the state to repay its debts, but even with too much sound on all sides to make out the specifics of the language, he is experienced enough to recognise the tone.
It is desirous. Lustful. Triumphant.
The men and women in the stands around him will wank themselves raw tonight to the mere sight of him in the leather lacing that covers his body, that weaves and knots over his thighs, his chest, around his arse.
The cheers explode into a deafening roar as the gates to his each side and before him open and the beastmen rush out -- giant wolfmen with rippling chests, their tails sticking out from beneath their armour to let them keep their balance; gnolls wearing only harnesses over their breasts, wielding great axes and huge swords; lizard men with shining scales, weaving as they move, rapid of step and with the flares about their heads flickering.
Dacius doesn't even know which of the huge, hulking warriors about him who flicks the spear out of his hand, nor throws the shield from his arm. It happens so quickly it could easily have been one man or two, but it matters not.
He is stripped of his defences in half the time it takes to blink his eye, and in half that time again, he is swept from his feet and into the air.
