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  “Falco is an odd man,” Thyestes said. “He is involved with Domidicus’ wife, Epione. She plays with him, something that might come back to harm her in more ways than she can imagine.”

  Titus knew Epione. She was a powerful and dangerous woman. “What do you mean?”

  “She bought Falco’s children while he was in the legion and secreted them away. With this power, she makes him fight, even though he was granted his freedom from his service in the X Legion. Now, he is under the lanista Gaius Marcus, but he really fights for her. She holds out to him the promise she will free his children one day. That day has never come.”

  Women. Titus knew they were like vipers. Domidicus was an ally, a powerful member of the Senate. A threat to Domidicus was a threat to the emperor. If Epione was undermining her husband’s position… Titus filed that thought away for the moment. There was also the issue that Gaius Marcus worked for him, not Epione.

  “Does she take any of Falco’s purse?”

  “No. She likes the power of controlling such a man. He has a reputation of being as good in the bedroom as he is in the arena.”

  “Is there a link between Falco and Cassius?”

  “Other than their service together? None that I know of.”

  Titus relaxed slightly. The thought of a general popular with the army and a gladiator popular with the people conspiring together had him worried. But hearing that Cassius was gardening and Falco was in a woman’s thrall reduced that fear. “What do you have?” he asked, indicating the doors beyond which those who wanted to see the emperor waited.

  “There is a most strange envoy from Delphi I believe you should see first.”

  Titus frowned. He knew the waiting hall must be packed with supplicants and envoys.

  Thyestes held out his hand and uncurled his fingers. A ring lay on the Greek palm. “It is Caesar’s.”

  There had been many Caesars, Titus knew, including himself now, but he knew from Thyestes’s tone who he was referring to. The first emperor, Julius himself. The ring was gold with a jewel set in the center.

  “The envoy had it. It is not well known, but Caesar did stop at Delphi on his way to Egypt to consult the oracle.”

  “The oracle did not warn him of Cleopatra,” Titus noted with a laugh.

  “Actually, I believe she did warn him of Cleopatra,” Thyestes said.

  Titus scowled. “What does this envoy want?”

  “She would not tell me.”

  “She?”

  “A priestess of the oracle.”

  Titus rubbed a finger along his bottom lip. Priestesses and oracles. He had learned they either lied to give false good news or were honest and thus delivered bad news.

  “Clear the chamber, then admit her,” Titus ordered.

  Thyestes emptied the room, then went to the double doors that were directly opposite Titus. The room between was lined with larger-than-life statues of all the previous Caesars looking down on those who came forward to see the present emperor. Thyestes rapped on the door, and they swung open, admitting a woman dressed in trousers and a short-sleeved tunic under a long, black, unadorned cloak. As the doors shut behind her, Titus studied her. She was tall, impressive looking, almost what he would consider Amazonian, and her red hair was quite striking, most unlike a Greek. He had seen some of the women of the Germans who fought next to their men, and she would fit in quite well with those maddened shrews who threw themselves onto Roman swords so their men could strike.

  “Most noble emperor,” the woman bowed at the waist but did not kneel as proper protocol directed.

  Titus let it pass. If she was one who delivered false good news, he would have her head on a stake on the walls of the palace. If she delivered bad news, he might also do the same, he mused.

  “What do you know that is so important you could not tell Thyestes?” he demanded.

  “My name is Kaia. I come from the oracle with grave news.”

  Not a sycophant, then, Titus knew. He was disappointed. He might have had some fun with her before having her head lopped off. He held up the ring. “Thyestes tells me this was Julius Caesar’s.”

  “The oracle gave it to me as a way to gain admittance with my message.”

  “It must be an important message,” Titus noted.

  “There is a threat to not only your empire but the entire world.” Kaia said simply.

  A half smile curled the left side of Titus’s mouth. “A most dire pronouncement. What is this threat?”

  “A Shadow grows in the land north of your province in Regnum Bosporus,” Kaia said.

  Titus waited. Bospora was on the north side of Ponus Euxius, the sea north of Persia. It was a poor region that he didn’t even really control other than on paper, a place of barbarians and little profit.

  “The Shadow is in the form of a gate to a terrible place. It opens every so often, and when it does, death and destruction spew forth into our world.”

  “Why should I be concerned about a shadow outside of my kingdom.” Titus asked.

  “Because its reach is far. It has already sent its power in the land under your feet. And it will grow stronger the longer this gate remains open.”

  “Where does this gate lead to?” Thyestes asked.

  “I do not know,” Kaia admitted.

  “How does it send power under our feet?” Titus demanded. “It there a god on the other side of this gate?”

  “Something with the power of gods is there,” Kaia said.

  “Do you have proof of this?” Titus asked.

  “The oracle has foreseen it. And it has happened before. My homeland in Thera was destroyed long ago by this Shadow.”

  Titus knew of Thera. He had sailed by there on his way to Palestine. It was obvious to anyone that the island had been smashed by some terrible force long ago.

  “I do not doubt the word of the oracle,” Titus said, “but I have learned that such words can have many meanings. Isn’t that the way you can keep all your supplicants happy?”

  “I am not here to make you happy.” Kaia’s eyes met his. “Tomorrow you will see the power of the Shadow not far from here.”

  Titus straightened. “What do you mean?”

  “You will see the power of the Shadow come out of the Earth itself. Then we will speak again. I mean no disrespect, Emperor, and I understand your reluctance to believe me, but tomorrow I think there will be no questions.”

  Titus glanced at Thyestes, then back at the priestess. “You speak very boldly in the presence of the emperor of the known world. You will stay in the palace tonight and tomorrow attend the games under the guard of my Praetorians. If I happen to miss this display of power tomorrow, I will have you placed in the arena for my amusement, and your head will adorn the wall of my palace tomorrow evening.

  “You will not miss it,” Kaia assured him.

  *****

  “I will let you visit your children after the games are over,” Epione said. “I’ve even been thinking of freeing them.”

  “You lie,” Falco said.

  Epione indicated for him to start rubbing her other foot. Falco was on his knees, his scarred hands working the tender flesh of her feet. They were in her quarters, adjacent to the Imperial Palace. Falco had come here after dark, and he knew he would be leaving before dawn, after he had performed for her.

  Epione laughed. “That is what makes you such a darling. All these other men, they are so afraid of being blunt, especially with me, but not my gladiator Falco. He says what he thinks, no matter what the consequences might be.”

  “Things cannot be worse for me,” Falco observed.

  “Things can always get worse,” Epione said. “You need more wine, I do, too.” She signaled for him to get the jug.

  Falco was already light-headed from the potent fine wine, nothing at all like the slop served at the gladiator school. As he poured, he considered the noblewoman lounging in front of him. She was older than he, in her mid-forties. Why she had chosen him to be her toy, he didn
’t know, and he regretted that she had ever laid eyes on him.

  He had been with her once, before he went into the army, and she had been waiting when he came back. That one time, as a slave, he could not refuse her, and he had never told Drusilla about it, although he knew that she knew something had happened. But they had both spent their lives in captivity and accepted, in the way those with no choice did, the things their lowly fate bound them to. The mistake he had made was using his special power of sense to please the lady, hoping that by doing so he might earn a powerful ally, which every slave could use. He had performed too well, he knew in retrospect.

  He had certainly never expected Epione to do what she had done after Drusilla died while he was in Palestine. Phaedra and Fabron were the only things he had to come back to, and she had taken them away.

  “Actually, my gladiator, I do not totally lie,” Epione said as he handed her a full chalice of wine.

  Falco sat and waited.

  ‘I will not free them. I am not done with you yet.”

  “When will you be?”

  She laughed and took a drink. “I don’t know. When it strikes me to. They have not earned their freedom like you did.”

  “What was not a lie then?”

  “I may let you see them. I think you think I lie about them. That maybe they died also with the fever as did your dear Drusilla, who you constantly mope over.”

  Falco had indeed considered that possibility, but he had not dared take the gamble that she did lie. Plus, sometimes he had visions of them, but he was never certain if he could trust those visions. “Where are they?”

  “Pompeii. With a trusted friend of mine.”

  Falco felt a fist thud into his heart.

  “I will allow you to travel there the day after tomorrow when you are done with the games. You will meet your spawn. And then you will come back here and continue to serve me.”

  Two days. Falco remembered the vision he had had. Of Vesuvius. If there were gods who determined such things, would they control the fury of the mountain for two more days?

  Epione lay back on her couch. “Now, more wine, my gladiator.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE PRESENT

  Pytor and Felix Shashenka saw the cooling towers first as the helicopter approached the Chernobyl Reactor. Three were intact, one was covered in a sarcophagus of concrete. This was not their first trip here. They had come many times before to pay their respects to their brother’s tomb, the mass of concrete enclosing Reactor Four.

  Today was different in one important aspect. They were here to conduct a mission. The twins were both officers in the Russian Army, both serving in the elite Spetsnatz commandos, and both had volunteered for this mission. But it was Pytor who had the cancer, and thus it was Pytor who would go.

  The helicopter landed next to Reactor Three, which was still in operation along with the other two. Pytor and Felix got off, each carrying a heavy backpack. Several soldiers were waiting for them, also Spetsnatz and heavily armed.

  “This way,” the major in charge of the security detail indicated. They followed as he approached the massive edifice of concrete that covered Reactor Four. Two soldiers flanked a steel door, which the major opened with great effort. They were in a tunnel that had been bored into the concrete. The corridor went ten meters, then ended in a room protected with lead shielding. Numerous video monitors lined one wall. Pytor and Felix put the packs down and went to the monitors. This monitoring station was highly classified and had never been shown to the foreigners who came to the area to check levels of radioactivity.

  “That’s the core,” the major said. “We had to send in a remote-controlled robot to put the camera in place.”

  But both brothers were looking at a different monitor, the one featuring the remains of the control room. There were several skeletons littering the floor.

  “They died instantly, the gas burning the flesh from their bones,” the major said. “A better fate than the ones who got a fatal dose and died the slow death.”

  Pytor and Felix knew one of those skeletons was Andrej. And they knew everything the major was telling them as Pytor had been the commander of the first group to watch the reactor. There was little doubt in both their minds that is when the cancer started. Even though the control room was heavily shielded, the entire area was still a dangerous place.

  “The orders I received--” the major began.

  “Yes?’ Pytor asked. He was now looking at the core. The black triangle was still there, as it had been since that fateful day in 1986.

  “Well, they said one of you was going in. Of course that must be wrong, is that not so?” The major was stumbling over his words.

  ‘No, the orders are quite correct,” Pytor said. He went over to one of the packs and opened it. He began pulling out pieces of a radiation suit.

  “But it’s hot in there. Even with that on, you’ll get a fatal dose inside of a minute. No one’s been in there since the explosion.”

  “I know that,” Pytor said as he began pulling on the suit, Felix helping. “Have you picked up anything new in the monitoring?”

  “There were some scientists here from the Academy of Sciences,” the major said. “They picked up indications of time fluxes coming out of the triangle.”

  “Time fluxes?” For the first time Pytor was surprised. “How do they know that?”

  “The time indicator on the video cameras shifts about. Sometimes running backward, sometimes making jumps.” The major pointed at the monitor. “Whatever you have to do in there, why not use a robot?”

  “There is not time to rig such a thing for what we want to do,” Pytor said. “Perhaps I should take my anti-radiation pill?” he added, referring to the placebo tablets that used to be issued to all Russians soldiers with the instructions that if taken, they would protect them from radiation. He pulled out the helmet and set it on his head.

  Felix picked up the second backpack and put it on Pytor’s shoulders.

  “Where is the new access point?” Felix asked.

  The major pointed to a steel door on the side of the chamber. “You go through there. Down a corridor fifty meters, then it turns left to another door. That door leads to the air chamber. You hit the red button. When it turns green, you go in. Then you reverse the process to come out, but--” the major fell silent. They all knew that once someone went inside, they could never come out. Even the remote robots that had been used over the years had to be left inside.

  Felix gave his brother a hand as they went to the indicated door.

  “Good luck,” the major offered.

  Pytor could hear his breathing inside the enclosed helmet. Sweat was already running down his back, and he knew it would get hotter. He almost laughed aloud at that thought: hotter. Soon he was going to be very hot indeed. The pack was heavy, and he had lost much strength in the last several months from the chemotherapy treatments. The doctors had given him two months at best, and they promised to be a very painful two months. Because of that, Pytor was actually grateful to be able to do this mission, to die doing something positive rather than wasting away in a hospital bed.

  They reached the airlock, and Felix hit the button. A steel door slid up. Before Pytor stepped in, Felix wrapped his arms around his brother as well as he could, considering the pod his brother carried in addition to his air tank. They exchanged no words; everything that had needed to be said had already been discussed. Felix turned the valve on the oxygen tank, sending oxygen to his brother, then he stepped back. Pytor went into the lock, and Felix hit the bottom, closing the steel door.

  Felix turned and walked toward the control to watch his brother conduct the mission.

  Pytor flinched as the inner door opened. He knew with that simple opening he was now the walking dead. He laughed once more. He had been the walking dead before he entered here. He stepped through. It was strange; there was dirt under his feet, the former outside of Reactor Four. He walked across the small open space toward t
he entrance to the control room. The world thought that the entire core and building had been buried under the concrete poured from the helicopters in the weeks after the explosion. But the black triangle had hollowed out a space, refusing to allow the concrete to pass, and when the concrete dried, the entire reactor was in the midst of an open space that made up the Chernobyl gate. Whatever field the triangle had propagated had subsequently disappeared, as the robots had been able to go in.

  Pytor knew the rest of the world wanted the other three reactors shut down, the entire place abandoned, but there were two reasons Chernobyl was still in business: one was the desperate need for the power, and the second was the need to monitor this space and the black triangle inside.

  Pytor felt his skin tingle, and he wasn’t sure whether that was real or a product of his imagination. Could it be the radiation, slowly seeping through the suit, or could it be the barrier of the gate? If he was indeed inside the gate already. This gate was different from the others for some reason. Pytor had met with Professor Kolkov, the Russian expert on the gates, and the scientist had expressed his own uncertainty about why it was different.

  Pytor didn’t care that it was different. He didn’t care about the science, Andrej had been the scientist amount the three brothers, and this thing had killed him. It was a matter of honor, an oath the three had sworn when Andrej had been the first to leave home, they would always be there for each other, and if anything happened to one, the others would revenge. Pytor had had to wait many years, but now he was taking the first step in that revenge. It would be up to Felix to complete it.

  Pytor opened the door leading to the control center and stepped in. The skeletons littering the floor were the first things he noticed. He knelt in the center of the room and pulled a bunch of daisies from the top of the pack and placed them there. They had been given to him by Andrej’s widow.