Page 21

Chapter Twenty-One

M aya

The email notification chimes just as I’m finishing the gym’s monthly invoices. A new message from a name I’ve only seen in the news: Laura Turner. My stomach dips and squeezes. I’m not sure if I should be terrified or relieved.

Damian looks up from his journal, where he sits cross-legged on my bed. Even after sharing the space for weeks, the sight of him there still makes my heart skip. In our apartment, he still wears the too-small T-shirt that stretches across his broad shoulders as he writes in his journal, his expression peaceful despite our complicated circumstances.

“Trouble?” he asks, noting my tension.

“Maybe.” I open the email with trembling fingers. “Oh god.”

He sets aside his writing, moving to stand behind me in well-trained silence. His presence feels like a solid wall of warmth at my back. “Tell me.”

Somehow, even before reading it, I know the time for lies is over. Taking a deep breath, I read aloud.

“Dear Maya, I’m the archaeologist who discovered the Fortuna shipwreck last year in the Norwegian Sea. I imagine you’ve heard of me. Seems like everyone on Earth knows of the thawed gladiators.

“I’ve been trying to track down a… missing friend. Some of the best private investigators in the world have been searching for him. I had to reach out when I heard rumors about a new fighter in Vegas matching his description at a private match with you at ringside.”

My stomach sinks even further as she validates that Victor’s presence is no longer a secret.

“The other men we found are safe in Missouri, learning about modern life. They’re amazing people—especially Varro, with whom…” My heart squeezes as I silently read the rest of the sentence. “I’ve developed a deep and loving relationship.”

I guess it’s not just Damian; perhaps all the gladiators are irresistible.

“His friends and I desperately want to find him, help him. Thrax, Cassius, Lucius, all the others.”

It’s as if she knows I’ll read this to him, wants him to rest assured that he’s not alone in this incomprehensible tangle of confusion.

“But the pharmaceutical companies are causing serious problems. They’re offering huge rewards for access to preserved tissue samples. Some of their private security teams have already tried to break into our facility.”

My stomach clenches at having this level of danger confirmed by yet another source. Damian’s situation is even more deadly than I imagined.

“Please, if you know anything about him, be careful. These companies are dangerous. They don’t care about him as a person—they just want to study how his body survived two thousand years of freezing. If we’ve heard the rumors, so have they.”

My heart is thundering in my chest as I parse through all the repercussions.

“Call me at this number if you know him. I have resources and want to help. Laura.”

His sharp intake of breath is the only sign that the news is affecting him. When he speaks, his voice is carefully controlled. “It seems now is the time for the truth, Maya.”

“Yes. Yes. It’s far past time.” Turning to face him, I find his expression unreadable. “Please… sit. This won’t be easy to hear.”

He settles onto the edge of the bed, maintaining perfect posture despite the bomb that has already dropped and I’m about to detonate. My hands shake as I close the laptop.

“You didn’t arrive here by ship.” I force myself to meet his eyes. “The Fortuna never made it to Britannia. It went down in what we now call the Norwegian Sea. You and thirteen others were preserved in the wreck, perfectly frozen at the bottom of the sea.”

I almost end the sentence with the even bigger bombshell—that it’s been almost two thousand years, but I pause, giving him time to absorb what I’ve already told him.

Something flickers in his eyes—not disbelief, but a deep understanding dawning. “The cold,” he says quietly. “When I first woke. It went deeper than any winter I had known.”

“And there’s more…” I take a deep breath, steeling myself. “The Fortuna sank in what we now call 82 AD. You were found last year. You’ve been frozen for almost two thousand years.”

His face goes completely still. The only tells that this is affecting him are his flared nostrils and the muscle leaping in his jaw. For several heartbeats, he doesn’t even seem to breathe. Then his hands—those strong, capable hands that have never once trembled in all the time I’ve known him—begin to shake.

“Two thousand…” His voice breaks. He stands abruptly, moving to the window as if needing to see the modern world with new understanding.

“Everyone I knew.” The words come out hollow, distant. “Many of my brothers in the ludus . The children who snuck food to us before our fights. The temple priestesses who offered prayers before our matches.” His fingers press against the glass. “Not just dead. Dust. Centuries of dust.”

I move to stand behind him, close but not touching, giving him space to process the enormity of what I’ve just told him.

“They found you last year. Brought you to a facility in Switzerland. It’s far from here. They’ve been waking the others one by one, helping them adjust to… to this time.” The words feel inadequate for the magnitude of what I’m telling him. “But there was a problem during your revival. Someone sabotaged the power, and in the chaos, you were stolen. Brought here. Separated from your comrades.”

He turns to me, his eyes filled with a grief so profound it makes my chest ache. “My father once told me that a man could lose everything—wealth, status, freedom—and still maintain his dignity. But this…” He gestures to the world outside. “To lose time itself. To have the very earth beneath your feet become unrecognizable.”

His head tips in question, and he asks quietly, “What of Athens? The Parthenon? The temples to Athena and Tyche?” His voice cracks slightly on the goddesses’ names—patrons of his homeland, of wisdom and strategy, so central to his Greek heritage.

“Athens still exists,” I tell him gently. “But it’s changed. The buildings you knew—some remain as… ruins, preserved as monuments. And the temples…” I trail off, not knowing how to explain two millennia of religious evolution.

He nods slowly, absorbing these losses one by one. His composure is remarkable, though I can see the profound grief in the set of his shoulders, the tension in his jaw.

“All this time,” he says softly, “I’ve been trying to understand this strange place, these odd customs. I assumed I’d been taken to some distant province, some far corner of the world unknown to me.” He turns back to me, his eyes searching mine. “But it wasn’t distance that separated me from everything I knew. It was time itself.”

He wipes his mouth with his palm, probably to hide the depth of his pain from me.

“And in all this,” he continues with sudden realization, “your father somehow became involved in my story?”

“The man who stole you hired him to help. But there was an accident, and the man died trying to move you to a new location. Dad panicked. He grabbed you and ran.” Guilt threatens to choke me. “He called me for help. I should have turned him in right away, but…”

“But he is family.” His voice holds no judgment. “And now we are all tangled in this web.”

“The pharmaceutical companies—rich people who make medications—want to study you. The preservation process, your cellular structure—it’s worth a lot of money to them. They don’t care about you as a person.” My voice cracks. “And Tony… he’s playing them against each other while using you for his fighting ring. Everyone wants to use you…”

“I understand now,” he says quietly. “The strange materials, the impossible machines, the different customs.” His gaze moves around the room, taking in the modern conveniences with new awareness.

He’s silent for a long moment, processing. When he speaks again, his voice carries the weight of two thousand years. “My father taught me that time is merely a human construct—that the gods see all moments at once, that wisdom transcends the boundaries of days and years.” His eyes find mine again. “Perhaps in that, at least, he was right.”

He takes a step toward me, and there’s something different in his gaze now—a deeper awareness, yes, but also a profound clarity, as if seeing through the veils of deception to something essential beneath.

“I’m so sorry.” The words burst out of me. “I’ve been lying to you since the beginning. Letting you believe you were still a slave, still bound by ancient laws… Slavery is illegal now.” I shake my head and close my eyes against the magnitude of what I’ve been doing to him over the past few weeks. There’s a special place in hell for playing with his mind like that.

He rises in one fluid motion, closing the distance between us. His hand cups my cheek with infinite gentleness. “You showed me kindness. Respect. Even when it clearly caused you pain to maintain the lie.”

“I let them treat you like property!”

“No.” His thumb brushes away a tear slowly tracking down my cheek. “You protected me while I learned enough to understand this strange new world. I knew you were hiding something. Knew this place… this time held mysteries I could not yet comprehend. But I trusted you would tell me when you could.”

Tires crunch near the curb outside, making us both tense. Tony’s men, doing their regular drive-by. The sound reminds us of the danger still surrounding us.

“What do we do now?” I ask softly.

“We continue our path until a better one reveals itself.” His arms tighten around me. “I will fight in Tony’s tournament, as expected. But now we plan not just for survival, but for freedom.”

“The other gladiators—they’re being helped to adjust. Given choices about their futures. You deserve that, too.”

“Perhaps.” His fingers trace patterns on my back. “But first, we must free ourselves from this web. And protect your father, despite his foolish choices.”

His desire to help my father, who was partially responsible for this shitstorm, hits me with a jolt. “Why do you care what happens to him? He got us into this mess.”

His smile carries ancient wisdom. “Because you care. And because every man deserves a chance to choose a better path.”

Perhaps another day, I’ll tell him how many opportunities my father has had a chance to choose better paths.

A key rattles in the front door—Marco doing his nightly check. We separate smoothly, years of training allowing us both to appear perfectly composed when he clomps up the steps and peers into the bedroom.

“Everything quiet?” he asks, suspicious eyes taking in the scene.

“Just reviewing tomorrow’s training schedule,” I say calmly. “We’ll need to adjust the intensity as we get closer to the tournament.”

After he leaves, Damian and I share a look laced with understanding. We’re still trapped, still in danger from multiple directions. But now we face it together, without lies between us. His hand finds mine in the darkness, fingers intertwining.

“Rest,” his tone is gentle. “Tomorrow brings new challenges.”

As we settle into our now-familiar positions in my bed, no longer maintaining that careful space between us, I realize something has fundamentally shifted. We’re no longer trainer and fighter, pretend owner and pretend slave. We’re partners in whatever comes next.

Laura’s warning about the pharmaceutical companies is like a physical thing. But with Damian’s warmth beside me, his quiet strength supporting me, even that threat feels less overwhelming.

Tomorrow, we’ll play our roles again. But tonight, we hold on to this moment of truth, of trust, of something deeper growing between us despite two thousand years of separation.

For the first time since this started, I fall asleep without guilt weighing on my conscience. Whatever comes next, we face it together—the trainer and the gladiator, the modern woman and the ancient warrior, each of us choosing our own path at last.