"House slaves will never be gladiators... something we are in short supply of." "We need fighting men." "Keys, quickly." "Release them." " Our ranks swell." " We will need more weapons." "Gratitude for your kindness." "Know that I have treasured it." "Is it true?" "Did you lay with her?" " Oenomaus..." "I would have you end the life of Gaius Claudius Glaber." "Glaber's own wife this very night leaves for Rome." "Your men are now mine." "Where do you take me?" "Please, I am with child." "Someone approaches." "Follow fucking lead and do not stray from it." "Come." "What brings you so far from road, brother, with one so ripe?" "An ancient horse gone to grass." "The woods offer shorter distance for my wife to Pompeii." "Shorter by a lifetime, if tread absent caution." "Spartacus and his fucks set upon a wagon not far from here recently." "Spartacus?" "Perhaps, we should be on our way, my love... unless similar misfortune fall upon us." "It appears it already has." "How did you come by that?" "Our horse, when it fell." "On the road to Pompeii, yes." "You have business there?" "Meat and bone carved for coin." "A butcher?" "Mm." "Fine dress for wife of such." "He's a gladiator." "I am the praetor's..." "Apologies." "Help me!" "Somebody help me!" "Help me!" "Ask any price." "My husband will see it paid for my return." "I seek no ransom." "You are going to rob me of my life?" "No." "It is not mine to take." "I could have speared him." "He was beyond your throw." "You know the distance better than my own hand, do you?" "I know many things regarding the great and powerful Spartacus." "Great and powerful?" "And kind and just." "I have peered into your very heart and know what it holds." "You would not have found content so pleasing, if you had chanced upon me in my youth." "Huh." "I stood more animal than man." "And what tamed the wild beast?" "Your wife, of course." "Apologies." "Take the life of Glaber's woman, as he took the life of yours." "See end to vengeance and with it the suffering of all caught between you and such desires." "I am to blame for her fate." "Had I not broken words with Gannicus, he never would have known Ilithyia was on the road." "An unfortunate slip of the tongue." "I thought only to convince Gannicus of proper path... to willingly follow your command and join the hunt for Spartacus." "The man is probably in league with the fucking Thracian." "They were both slaves under your house, were they not?" "Separated by a distance of years." "They never have met one another." "That we have knowledge of, not that it is a thing of matter now." "Gannicus now holds my wife and unborn child!" "If she yet draws breath." "No, he would not have risked all to take her from the city only to have her life." "She yet lives." "I feel her heart beating as though it were my own." "Your men must scour the countryside until she is found." "Such an area takes months to cover with numbers at hand." "Then send message to Rome for aid." "Word of this shall not spread beyond these walls." "But Ilithyia..." "Was snatched from grasp of a praetor of Rome." "I will not have the Senate whisper of how I could not protect my own wife." "A wise choice." "You must look towards your future." "You talk of politics?" "Ilithyia is valued friend and wife." "She holds the blessing of your child, and with him slim tether to Albinius's wealth, one which will be severed if she is not found." "Do not lecture on what is at fucking risk!" "Praetor." "You have seen it done?" "All trace of your wife's misfortune has been erased." "No one will know of it." "Good." "Gather your men." "Seppia, I would have a moment." "I would not raise voice in such manner with him again... if you wish to keep purchase in this world." "Absent Ilithyia's blessings, it is a place that I shall quickly tumble from." "I would never let you fall so far, my love, not while I yet treasure your company." "Good." "Now keep eye on angle of my shoulders." "It will give clue to my next..." "You learn quickly." "I have advantage of being taught by a god." "Again." "Harudes, you betray intent by bellowing like a crazed goat." "Nemetes, Saxa, take position." "Are we to use wooden stick in battle as well?" "Close mouth and heed Oenomaus." "I need no instruction." "I fucking know how to fight." "I instruct you not how to fight but how to win, so you do not find yourself again enslaved by the Romans." "First position." "Attack!" "Nemetes does hold argument, towards lack of proper weapons at least." "Fuck the gods." "You have taken Glaber's wife?" "No." "She has been delivered into my hands." "And they will see her to proper end." "Whore!" "Beg for your life!" "Your fucking throat!" "Whore!" "Is this our cause now... falling upon a helpless woman heavy with child?" "Glaber held no pity towards my wife... a woman far more deserving than the thing that stands before you." "Whore!" "Whore!" "Fucking bitch." "Coin before cunt, you worthless shit." "Now crawl from sight." "Get up, you old cunt." "Linger yet a while, my good man." "We'll have the pleasure of your company." "What do you seek of me now, Syrian?" "Gannicus." "A gladiator of some renown in Capua." "He has been noted to frequent your establishment, has he not, partaking of wine and whores?" "Yes, Praetor." "I would have words with the man." "He is not here." "Then there must be some among you who have had cause to share drink and other distractions with him." "I would know of what he spoke, towards revelation of where he secrets himself." "And I would hope for another fucking drink and a whore upon my cock." "Let me ask it of you again." "Who among you has spoken with Gannicus?" "Disappointing." "Wait." "Wait." "I did see Gannicus break words." "Who was privy to them?" "My slave Marcia." "Where is she?" "Your fucking Syrian nailed her to a cross." "And I have yet to receive fair compensation for loss incurred." "Gannicus has taken something from me!" "And I will see it returned." "Put all to question." "Please do not do this." "Were those same words pleaded by my wife before Roman blade ripped her forever from my arms?" "I did not know of her." "My hands are unstained by the deed." "Your husband cannot claim such." "He is the one that condemned her to slavery." "She is gone from this world because of it." "And I will have equal vengeance." "You can not do this." "My child..." "Sura and I often spoke of children, of the family we would have, now forever denied me, as I now deny Glaber of his." "The child is yours." "You lie." "Would that my tongue made false noise." "Yet it sounds bitter truth." "Monthly blood ceased after you came to me in Batiatus's villa." "Lucretia had promised Crixus... a cruel jest." "It is a memory that lingers, is it not... of that night, of you inside me?" "Yes, as does memory of my hands upon your throat." "Then see to completion what they began." "Take my life, and that of your child." "And may your wife turn from you for what you have done, when she greets you in the afterlife." "Oenomaus does not seem lifted by your return." "I did not think to be embraced as brother." "Nor I, or to lay eyes upon you again in this life." "Yet here you stand." "Would that all things were so easily done." "I have seen the bond between you." "Whatever the cause for disagreement, it will pass." "I would do anything to rise in his eyes again." "Capturing the praetor's bitch is a fine start." "An impressive act, sure to further ignite our cause." "I seek only to end it." "It is done then?" "She yet lives." "I brand myself fucking enemy of Rome to deliver her to your hands, only to find them weak and trembling?" "I am not Glaber, able to strike a woman down for his crimes absent misgivings." "And what of the women crucified in the streets of Capua, tortured to death because they dare whisper your name, eyes bright with thoughts of freedom and rebellion?" "Take her life and end this now... or see countless more fall in the name of your cause." "Prayer alone will not provide guidance through these dark times." "We must look inward and find strength in heart's resolve." "So the gods turn from you, as they do from Ilithyia?" "They are always with us, their will felt in every breath, and every touch." "They guide our hands, compelling us toward proper course." "Gaius will be pleased to hear of it." "It is not Gaius who holds the key to Ilithyia's salvation." "I fear the gods have led you far astray then." "I command no army, nor can I conjure Gannicus before us." "Yet message from you would bring Varinius from Rome, and with him..." "Gaius was clear on the matter." "We are to tell no one of what has happened." "Words born of desperation." "He talks of shoring name while life's foundation crumbles beneath his feet." "Seppia." "Seppia." "You sought Praetor Varinius's affections once." "Send message and you could yet gain them." "Whims of a child." "Such thoughts have been set aside in favor of mature pursuits." "The day has been long." "I will see you beneath the covers." "We will revisit the subject with the morning sun." "Apologies." "I am not yet for bed." "I would check upon Gaius and offer words of comfort." "Are words all that you would offer?" "I am his guest in this house and wish only to pay tribute to generous host." "It's beneath you, Seppia." "The gods shall take ill notice." "Was it not their hands that saw my brother struck from my side, their providence that sheltered me beneath this very roof?" "Do you not see it?" "The gods have lead me upon path to Gaius, as their will has removed Ilithyia from it." "A quivering woman, and with child... she does not appear the deadly serpent you give voice to." "She is wife of the fuck that would see us all to grave." "Yet not the man himself." "Crixus speaks of how she took Acer's life as fucking amusement of celebration." "Her heart is as venomous as Glaber's or any other Roman shit's." "A familiar song bleated from your fucking tongue." "You know my meaning, Lucius." "And mostly share in its low estimation." "Yet I would hold ourselves to higher standard." "Food for deadly prisoner." "Shall I draw her a warm bath as well?" "Consider meal for the child, unless you fear it shall take up sword against you" " from fucking womb." "Faded years soften wounded heart." "Calm yourself." "I intend no harm." "You are the one that came to aid when those animals turned upon me when I was brought in." "Do not clutch me to breast." "I shit with the rest of those animals." "For child." "At least you will not die of hunger." "You bear no brand." "You are a free man?" "I am of the Republic, as you and yours." "Yet you stand with Spartacus against it?" "I stand for what is just." "Just?" "Spartacus moves to destroy everything we hold of worth." "Then he moves too late in my regard." "Sulla seized my lands and those of my kin years ago, slaughtering any who resisted and giving what he stole as gifts to his most loyal of men, all of them fellow Romans." "Such a loss must weigh heavy in the passing of years." "I would see burden lifted." "And I mistake you for helpless, yet you have power to reverse the sun and see past reformed?" "My husband is a praetor of Rome and I of importance to him, being prized daughter of my clan, my child heir to its lineage and fortune." "Save vaunted words for grander ear." "I cannot free you." "We would both be absent fucking head before three steps could be taken." "No, I do not ask such a thing, only that you carry message imparting where Spartacus holds me." "You do not have to live this way." "All that was taken from you can yet be restored with but simple command from my husband." "The sum of my loss is no small thing." "He can see it paid, your life returned to you in exchange for mine and the child I carry." "She claims it yours?" "With passion of certainty." "She is a deceitful fucking snake, truth split by forked tongue." "Her words may hold such in this." "Do you recall the night in Batiatus's villa when you aided in transforming likeness into golden Apollo?" "To lay with the Roman woman Licinia." "She wore the mask of Diana." "Yet beneath it was not Licinia." "Ilithyia?" "Why did you not tell me?" "What purpose would it have held?" "None." "Nor should it hold any for you now." "Even if true, she tells you only to stay your hand." "She's a fool, knowing she carries heritage forever denied my own wife." "See Ilithyia to her grave... and tortured past buried beside her." "To make Glaber suffer as I have at his hand is a thing I have craved more than air and breath." "Yet in inflicting equal wound, how do I not become as the man himself... a man my wife would turn from?" "I was not certain you would desire this." "What man could not?" "It is not the offering that gave concern, rather your preoccupation with unfortunate events." "The fate of my heir does weigh mind." "And that of your wife's?" "A thing of lesser notice." "Is the bond of marriage really such a cold affair?" "There was a time the love between us burned hot, bright as noonday sun." "But day has turned to night... casting golden memories to shadow." "I would have you bask in the light, as a man of your worth deserves." "Albinius did not hold me to such esteem, nor the rest of the Senate." "Gaze into their eyes when you present Spartacus's head and see estimation soar... and my brother avenged." "Would that his death did not pain you so." "The sting lessens with each passing day because of you." "And I would return favor if your wife falls prey to Spartacus, as my brother fell." "Your chest overflows with coin and blood." "Both well earned by day's exertion." "What news of Ilithyia did labors bring?" "You have the praetor's ear." "Did he not already fill yours?" "His attentions toward young Seppia prevent me from breaking words." "Ah... the freshness of youth." "Is it a wonder he favors the caress of her tongue to the sound of yours?" "Her bloom will wither when Ilithyia returns." "You place great stock upon uncertain future." "You have not found path to Gannicus?" "Sadly, it remains obscured, though not through lack of noble effort." "Where?" "From there we moved from place to place... questioning with fist and blade... the answer always the same." "I will make sacrifice to the gods and entreat them for more valued response." "Let us pray together and seek divinity in warm embrace." "Ilithyia and the child she carries must be found." " If they are lost..." " What?" "Hmm?" "Will the sun no longer move across the sky?" "Will ivory moon plummet into frothing sea?" "Strike the bitch from fucking thought, as Glaber has already done..." "I am not your slave to lay fucking hand upon... a lesson I had thought already learned." "Apologies." "I question sincerity of the word." "Speak it again." "Apologies." " Again." " Apologies." "Your position in this house continues to spiral." "Soon I will be all that stands between you and dark abyss." "When that day arrives, you shall greet my breath upon your neck as precious gift." "Do you understand this, my love?" "Yes." "A gift from the gods." "Lucius." "Where do you go?" "To clear troubled mind." "I would have the same." "Let us walk together for a moment and break words." "The man unleashes wrath upon wooden form when I have risked all for him to seize vengeance and end this." "You take risk only to lighten weighted conscience." "I would not see more fall to foolish cause." "And I would not see my brother fall." "We no longer stand as such." "Is there no path towards mended bond?" "You cannot mend illusion." "Our brotherhood, the trust I placed upon you... a thing of lies and deceit." "Do you not think a day passes that I am not consumed by it?" "I would give my life for Melitta to yet own hers." "And I would gladly take it." "Then what stays hand?" "Do you and Spartacus straddle same uncertain ground, unable to take vengeance when it is placed before you?" "Your death would not see her again to my arms." "It would only serve as mercy, releasing you from what you have done." "Then I stand condemned till the afterlife takes me." "You stand for nothing, as you always have." "We must wait till Spartacus relieves us of charge." "Time passes too slowly." "We must be quick then." "This is how you stand guard?" "Apologies." "We were..." "Uh, we were..." "we were..." " we" " We were just... we..." "Take to your bed." "I will assume watch over Ilithyia." "Gratitude." "Please," "I would have more water." "It is a terrible thing, is it not, to live in want and fear?" "That is what it is to be a slave." "Please, for my child." "Is it true what you told Spartacus?" "I swear to the gods." "If Spartacus takes my life, the blood of his child will forever stain his own." "He is a good man." "I will not let him be destroyed by this." "I will not let him kill you." "You will help me?" "Yes, I will help you from this fucking world." "Have you lost mind?" "I move only to spare you from what must be done." "If you take her life, the deed will weigh every breath." "So you remove choice and invite such fate upon yourself?" "I would embrace it, to see your heart spared from the act." "You do not know my heart." "Spartacus." "Leave us." "I would have words now... and see your time here at an end." "You glow like the morning sun." "You must have slept well." "Hardly at all." "It's an unfortunate thing." "I would not deem it so." "I fear you shall." "Out." "I will not have you threaten in such a manner." "I do not move to threats, only to warning about the man you turn affections towards." "Your words will not turn me from him." "The time for them has passed." "Come." "I have something more tangible to show you." "Where is the praetor?" "In his chambers." "What's happened?" "A man comes with news of Ilithyia." "You claim to have knowledge of my wife?" "More than claim." "She is being held by Spartacus." " She lives?" " For the moment." "How do you know this?" "I have just traveled from the rebel's camp." "You stand as one of his men?" "I am no fugitivus, just a tired old man seeking what little peace he can before falling to eternal slumber." "Well, tell me where she's being held and you will be seen to great reward." "Your wife boasted of your generosity and promised the return of my lands seized by the bastard Sulla." "Ls such a thing possible?" "It is within my power." "And what of my own wife, my children, my brothers and sisters, all slaughtered in the name of Rome?" "Is it within your power to return them to me too, you fucking cunt?" "Lay a hand on me and your wife dies." "If I do not return within reasonable hour, she dies." "Any attempts to follow me... she dies." "What would Spartacus have of me?" "Gaius." "Speak." "You are to enter the city of Atella on foot, just before rise of morning sun, three of your men allowed by your side," "Spartacus to hold the same." "And Ilithyia?" "She will be returned to you afterwards in exchange for a single wagon heavily weighted with armor and weapons." "Give arms to the enemies of Rome?" "That is his price." "And if your troops are seen on the road to Atella," "Spartacus will not appear and your wife and the child she carries will be lost to you forever." "Did I mention the part about laying hands upon me?" "Let him pass." "I do not trust this." "Nor I." "Yet action must be taken." "Prepare a wagon." "Praetor, we can not aid them with means to forge further war upon us." "What choice has Spartacus left?" "There are always choices." "No." "Spartacus leaves but one path and I must travel upon it." "I am old but not a fool." "It was much to ask..." "entering the lair of the beast." "Oh, it was a great pleasure to piss in the face of a fucking praetor." "Spartacus." "Glaber agrees to the terms?" "I am for Atella, to see it done." "Yeah!" "Let us take his weapons and his fucking life!" " Yeah!" " No." "If we do not honor word, we prove ourselves no better than the Romans." "We shall hold to it." "If three are all that can be seen with you," "I would count myself among them." "As would I, despite the company." "I would join as well." "I would welcome no one as warmly, yet you have not healed from ordeal in the arena." "I would stand in his place." "For a cause you do not believe in?" "Oenomaus believes in it." "Perhaps one day I shall too." "Return with proper weapons and your lives." "It is madness to place trust in the words of Glaber." "I do not place it with him." "I place it with all those I take with me." "We will see this done together and gain means to strike Glaber and his army from this world!" "Spartacus!" "The old man claims you have my wife." "Cut from her dress, her scent yet upon it." "A thing easily taken from a body robbed of life." "My thoughts turned toward such a thing... blade parting flesh, her blood upon the ground, as my wife's blood was spilled." "Yet you do not claim her life." "I am not you." "I will not strike down a woman for the foolish acts of her husband." "You carved my name into a dead man's chest, make attempt against my life in the streets of Capua and then again in the arena, yet you turn from most assured opportunity to balance debt between us." "I turn from nothing." "One day soon I will have your life." "Bring the wagon forward." "I hold many regrets since first we laid eyes on each other a lifetime ago." "I pray this decision does not stand amongst them." "You will hold your wife again." "And she will deliver you an heir." "Yet when you gaze into the child's eyes," "I will forever be reflected there... in memory of how I spared them both." "I fear you are right." "You are not like me." "Your wife was the heart that beats within your breast." "You would have given all to see her live... while I would do the same to see you dead." "Kill them!" "Now!" "Take cover!" "Salvius!" "Give call!" "Fall back." "You waited long enough to give signal." "I cling to honor ignored." "Quickly, before they recover." "Take to foot." "I would stay awhile." "Lucius." "Go, before I come to fucking sense." "At least it's not a fucking Roman that takes..." "Do not let them reach the woods!" "Go!" "Go!" "You never intended to make trade?" "I intended to send Spartacus to his death... deserved fate he yet evades through treachery and deceit." "You will have him soon enough." "At price of wife, and the blessing she carries." "I would gladly pay the sum of the world to have his throat beneath my heel." "Ilithyia must return to this house." "The gods have..." "The gods can descend from their fucking heavens if they wish to see her live!" "In coming days I shall grieve the loss of wife and child and the fortunes carried upon her family name." "And we shall grieve with you." "I would see myself to bath and blood and troubled thoughts of moment washed away." "Go." "I will bring more wine to aid endeavor." "Do you know what he's done?" "What he felt he must, to see an end to Spartacus." "He has pulled the world to ruin, and with it reason for living." "Your reason perhaps." "My heart yet beats." "And what of your brother's?" "Gaius moves to avenge his death." "Then he should turn wrath upon himself... and see it done." "It's your brother's, is it not?" "I had thought his slaves took it with his life." "They stand blemished by neither offense." "How did you come by this?" "The gods led me to the truth, hidden amongst Ashur's treasures, stripped from the bodies of those who have died at his hand." "Ashur?" "He must have been there that night, when your brother fell." "Yet the villain moves only upon command of Gaius Claudius Glaber." "Much has been lost... the ones we have loved, the ones we thought would forever be at our side." "But in their passing, the chains that bound us to desires not our own have been struck." "And without such a blow, we would not find ourselves in each other's arms." "No." "We would not." "Kneel." "Please." "Do you know what it is to love, to be filled with light and hope, to see that blessing returned in kind in the eyes of the only one that could ever know the true depth of your heart?" "That is what your husband took from me." "I would take the same from him." "Yet... he chose vengeance against me over your life." "Taking it would balance nothing." "He does not love you as I loved my wife." "You let me live?" "Do not think it a kindness."