Free Web NovelChapter 12: The Trident
Chapter 12: The Trident
The gate was still grinding upward when the eleven men poured through like a single wave of iron and desperation. They had seen what Agrippa did to the first seven. They knew waiting meant dying. So they ran at him.
The moment before the two parties met, Agrippa glanced up at the pulvinar, and something caught his eyes. Octavian noticed, and looked up too.
From the pulvinar, a man in a white toga raised a golden goblet. He was not old like Brutus. His face was lined but still handsome, his dark hair threaded with grey. He smiled down at the sand and tipped the goblet slightly – a toast. To Agrippa. To Octavian. To their death.
"Marcus Antonius." Agrippa hissed.
"He shouldn’t be your focus right now." Octavian cautioned.
Agrippa sighed, then raised his sword. Rage evident in his eyes.
Octavian raised his shield.
Then they were among them.
Two archers hung back, arrows already nocked. The rest closed in a crescent – swords, axes, a man with a heavy chain, another with a spear already bloody from someone else’s fight.
The first man reached him. A sword thrust. Agrippa parried, stepped inside, and cut. The man’s arm came off at the elbow. He went down screaming, as the stub leaked.
Agrippa didn’t stop. He was already moving to the next.
Alex watched from the holding area, his hands gripping the bars. The sand was turning dark with blood. Bodies were falling. And Agrippa – Agrippa was a machine.
’He’s not fighting anymore,’ Alex thought. ’He’s just... killing.’
An axe blade caught Agrippa’s shoulder. He grunted, turned, and drove his sword through the axe man’s chest, piercing his heart. Pulled it free, then turned again.
The man with the chain swung it low, trying to take Agrippa’s legs. Agrippa jumped over it and brought his sword down on the man’s head. The blade split his skull and stopped. His head was like a fountain. Agrippa yanked his sword free, and cleaned the brain residue on the fallen man’s tunic.
Two more rushed him from either side. He ducked under one swing, took a cut across his back that he didn’t feel, and killed them both before their feet stopped moving.
An arrow whistled past his ear. He thought they had missed. Then another. That’s when he realized that they were never meant for him. The archers were targeting Octavian now, trying to force Agrippa to split his attention.
Octavian saw the third arrow coming. He raised the shield – but it was heavy, and his arm was tired, and the arrow found the gap between his shoulder and the shield’s edge. It buried itself in his side.
He didn’t cry out. He just went down.
At that instance, everything went still for a fraction of a second that felt like eternity.
"OCTAVIAN!" Agrippa’s voice was a roar that cut through the chaos.
Alex pressed his fist against his mouth. ’No. No, no, no.’
Agrippa turned. The remaining four men – a sword man, a spear man, and the two archers – saw something in his face that made them hesitate.
It didn’t matter.
He was already upon them.
The sword man tried to block. Agrippa chopped through his guard and took his hand. The spear man lunged from behind. Agrippa spun, caught the spear shaft, and drove his own sword into the man’s throat.
Agrippa looked like the devil, with his blood bathed body.
The sight sent chills down the spines of every onlooker.
The archers tried to run. Too late. Agrippa closed the distance in three strides and cut them both down before they could nock another arrow.
Silence.
Agrippa stood in the middle of eleven bodies, breathing in great heaving gasps. His sword dripped. His arms dripped. His face was slick with blood that was not all his.
He turned to Octavian.
Octavian lay on his back, one hand pressed to his side. Blood welled between his fingers. His shield lay beside him, half‑buried in the sand.
Agrippa dropped to his knees beside him.
"Stay still." His voice was hoarse. "I’ll –"
Octavian shook his head. His eyes were clear. Calm. "No."
"Octavian –"
"Don’t." Octavian’s hand found Agrippa’s wrist. Squeezed weakly. "You know."
Agrippa stared at him. The arrow was deep. The blood was too dark. He knew...
In the holding area, Alex couldn’t look away. His eyes were wet. He didn’t notice.
Oseka stood beside him, silent.
"He’s dying," Alex whispered. "He’s the first emperor. He’s supposed to – he was supposed to –" He couldn’t finish.
Octavian smiled. Small. Tired. "You were always the better soldier."
Agrippa shook his head. "You were always the better –"
"Don’t." Octavian’s grip loosened. "Just... stay with me."
Agrippa stayed.
The crowd was silent again.
Then the gate ground open.
Three men walked out.
They were not large. Not obviously muscled. They wore no helmets, no armor – just leather tunics and swords at their hips. They walked slowly, unhurried, like men who had never needed to rush.
The crowd gasped.
"The Trident," someone whispered in the holding area. Then another voice. Then another. The name spread through the men like a cold wind.
"The Trident," Oseka said quietly.
Alex looked at him. Oseka’s face was pale.
Agrippa looked up.
The men in front of him didn’t look like killers.
That was the first thing anyone noticed about them. No scars on their tanned skins, mapping years of arena fights. No bulk built from decades of weapon training. Just three tall men of average build, moving with the kind of quiet ease that suggested they had never once needed to try harder than necessary.
Samir was the one in the center. Lean, dark‑eyed. A thin scar running along his jaw, that was the only visible evidence of a fight he’d been in. He moved like someone who had decided long ago that stillness was more dangerous than aggression.
Karim was on his left. Slightly broader and shorter. His face completely blank in a way that was more unsettling than any expression could have been. He didn’t look at the crowd, nor at Agrippa. His eyes contained a hint of boredom.
Muktar was on the right. The youngest looking of the three. Almost gentle faced. The kind of face you’d forget immediately in a crowd.
Three ordinary looking men who had just watched eighteen people die, and walked out anyway.
Agrippa stood up. Slowly. His legs shook. His arms shook. But he stood.
"Still standing," he said to no one.
The three men stopped a few paces away. Samir tilted his head.
"You’ve done enough," he said. Not mocking. Almost respectful.
Agrippa raised his sword.
Karim held Agrippa’s gaze, and sighed. Then he drew his own blade.
They stood across each other for a few seconds.
Then Samir made his move, and the rest followed immediately.
It was over in seconds.
Samir made the first strike, knocking Agrippa’s sword from his hand. Karim followed immediately, with a slash that opened a gash across his ribs, before landing a spinning cut across the back of the knees.
Agrippa fell forward, but caught himself, and ended up on his knees.
Muktar stepped behind him. Wrapped a hand in Agrippa’s hair, and pulled back.
The crowd held its breath.
Agrippa’s eyes found Octavian’s body. Then he looked up at the pulvinar. At Brutus. At Mark Antony, still holding his golden goblet.
He spat toward them. The blood and spittle fell short.
Karim raised his sword.
"Agrippa –" Alex started forward. Oseka grabbed his arm.
The sword came down.
Alex heard himself make a sound. He didn’t know what it was.
Agrippa’s body stayed upright for a long moment. Kneeling. Head tilted at an angle.
Then it fell sideways into the sand. Blood spewed all over.
Silence.
Then the crowd erupted.
Alex stared. The sand was red. The bodies were everywhere. And in the center, three men stood over a corpse, wiping their blades on a dead man’s tunic.
’He gave up,’ Alex thought. ’He gave up fighting, after he lost Octavian.’
He couldn’t remember sitting down. But he was on the bench again. His hands were shaking.
’Two men that were supposed to shape history... gone.’ His breath became unsteady.
Oseka crouched in front of him. "Albius. Albius. Look at me."
Alex looked.
"Breathe," Oseka said.
Alex breathed.
The crowd was still screaming. Somewhere, Brutus was probably smiling.
The Trident walked back toward the gate, not looking back.
In the pulvinar, Brutus rose, and the crowd noise dropped immediately. Like a switch.
He looked down at the sand. At the bodies. At Agrippa’s kneeling corpse. At Octavian’s still form half buried in the blood soaked sand.
He took his time.
"Rome has spoken." His voice carried easily across the silence. "The arena is many things. A celebration. A tradition. A reminder." He paused. "Today it has also been a judge."
The crowd listened.
"These men were given their chance. The same chance every man receives under the Republic. The chance to prove themselves worthy." Another pause. "The arena did not find them worthy of mercy."
Murmurs broke through the crowd, in agreement.
"Let their deaths be a lesson." His voice hardened slightly, like the voice of a man stating facts. "Treason has a price. It has always had. And I promise you..." he let his gaze sweep across fifty thousand faces. "...what you witnessed today is mercy compared to what awaits any man who raises his hand against this Republic again."
Silence.
Then the crowd erupted. Feet on stone. Voices layering into a single roar.
Brutus sat down, picked up his wine cup, and took a slow sip.
Marcus Antonius leaned toward him from his seat and said something. Brutus smiled slightly, and said something back.
Neither of them looked at the sand again.
In the holding area, Alex sat on the bench with his shaking hands and watched two men treat the deaths of Octavian and Agrippa like a mildly satisfying afternoon.
Then Akosa appeared at the holding area gate, from behind.
"Boys." His voice echoed. "You’re up."
Alex looked at the gate.
At the sand beyond it. Still red. Still scattered with bodies the cleaners hadn’t reached yet.
He stood up, and began to shuffle out the gate, along with the other gladiators.
Rome hadn’t realized yet, but this was the moment a new history began to write itself.
