The Wolf Esprit: Lykanos Chronicles 3
Chapter Thirty-Nine

While summer had been beautiful and mild, that all changed during the third week of August. As if overnight, a stifling head blanketed Rome, and it felt like everything had stopped. Shops were only open in the early morning for essentials; otherwise, the city went quiet as people did everything they could to stay still. In their homes, they assembled on lower floors, desperate for any degree of cool to be found, most unable to sleep.

Even I, usually grateful for warmer weather, stripped down to the lightest clothes I could stand. The heat made Duccio miserable, his body covered in a perpetual sheen of perspiration from which no amount of bathing could free him.

“Let’s take a walk,” he said around midnight on the fourth night of the heat wave. “I need to stretch my legs.”

Even at this hour, Rome was stifling, and I was slow to believe he meant it. But I soon found myself walking by his side through the dark streets, grimacing through the stench of the warm, wet rot locked in place by the humid air. On every corner, the street torches burned my skin, even twenty paces away, the fire compounding the city’s infernal heat.

The only upside was that the streets were nearly deserted, and we roamed without hindrance.

“I’ll never get used to this,” Duccio said. “The heat, I mean.”

“They say it’ll break soon, that it always does by late September.”

“My God…”

I grunted in agreement until I realized Duccio had stopped walking. He stared at a building a hundred paces ahead as if he’d seen a ghost.

“What is it?” I asked.

No answer came from his lips, but I sensed a powerful well of emotion overtake him.

The building he stared at was older than everything around her. The neighboring structures hugged her so tightly, they hid her from pedestrians on the cross streets, though her domed roof was much taller. In the moonlight and street torches, I saw an inscription across the front entablature held up by more than a dozen three-story columns. The Latin translated to Marcus Agrippa, the son of Lucius, three times consul, built this. They were words I knew but could not remember why.

Duccio stepped forward as if in a daze, seemingly unable to take his eyes from her. He never looked down as he approached, leading us to her doors. From his mind slipped images of this building, drenched in memories of another time. He’d seen this place before, but that made little sense to me.

Locked from within, Duccio unbolted the door’s simple mechanism with his mind. He pushed one of the massive two-story iron doors open just a sliver and slipped inside the dark beyond.

Following him, the unexpected interior seized my breath. Instead of the dozens of rooms this structure might have contained, we stood in what appeared to be an ancient church. The building contained a giant open space in which any neighboring building might fit inside with room to spare. It felt otherworldly, the air and sound changing as our footsteps echoed in the dark recesses.

Decorated in ways I’d never seen before, the building’s floor was a field of circles and squares in opposing shades of polished marble. Fantastic sculptures of men and women filled the walls, each several times a person’s size. Some appeared to be noblemen, and others seemed to be gods and goddesses. The eight statues stood in their own nave along the circular, columned walls. It was a strange assemblage, these mortals and immortals standing on equal footing to stare at one another as they loomed over us.

But more striking than all this was the colossal roof, an impossible marble dome that soared across the massive space. At its ultimate height was a round opening to the sky that allowed a broad shaft of moonlight to land on the wall behind us and brighten the room.

The oculus, Duccio’s mind whispered.

I knew the word, and the memories returned to me. Gabrielle had described it to me one afternoon during my studies. I’d seen a pencil sketch of it in a history book of ancient Rome. But something more—this place was special to her as well. Though she, too, had never stood here.

Pantheum.

Duccio’s whisper pulled me back from the otherworldly space in which we stood to realize there were tears in his eyes. He seemed overcome by despair, and before I could comfort him, Duccio left the room abruptly and returned to the street, walking home at an agitated pace.

The following morning, I found Duccio up and dressing when my eyes opened.

“We’re going out?”

My question pulled him from his thoughts, and he stared at me with confusion. It might have been my waking mind misperceiving him, but for a moment, I thought he’d meant to go without me.

“Just for a while, before the heat becomes unbearable, if you please.”

I rose and dressed quickly to follow him out. He moved through the streets at a brisk pace, saying nothing. And from his mind came more of the same melancholy that had silenced him last night. Upon arriving home, I’d asked if he was okay, but he didn’t answer and went to bed. Walking with him now, I said nothing. He’d been nothing like this in the short time I’d known him, and I tried to respect his space as much as possible.

We walked quite a way through the streets, always south, passing through a few different neighborhoods until the city seemed to stop, and an outcrop of ancient ruins appeared before us.

Not stopping, Duccio walked into the green and up a short hill. In time, he took us up distinctive stone paths, dilapidated but bearing all the signs of having been once expertly masoned. They meandered through lovely gardens, still tended despite the state of the surrounding site.

Unlike the surrounding city, few people were here, if any. We passed through a series of small buildings, most of which were shells of a former glory. Among them stood modern structures that housed artifacts as if the whole place were an outdoor museum. It explained why the ruins were deserted: this site was not yet open to the public this morning.

As with the building last night, Duccio knew this place, but what memories I could glean from his preoccupied mind were not his own. They felt too fragmented, as if they belonged to someone else who’d shared them with him while telling stories. And from the memories, the shell of the ruins was alive, whole, and thriving with people dressed in unfamiliar attire.

A tourist sign answered the questions I wanted to ask Duccio: Forum Romanum.

“Palatino,” Duccio said without emotion, as if he’d spoken only to silence my pondering mind. “The first of the seven hills of Rome.” He moved through the abandoned ruins until stopping upon an ornate terrace where the view silenced him for the rest of the day.

Below us, at the foot of the hill, stood a monstrous arena, itself in ruins, its massive walls crumbling on all but one side.

From behind, I sensed someone walking toward us, and I turned to see a man staring at me. The man dressed in gentlemanly clothes seemed to take in the ruins and peaceful gardens just the same as us.

“Good morning, signore,” I said. “Forgive me, but do you know what that is?”

As I pointed to the ruined arena in the distance, the olive-skinned man seemed perplexed by my question. He didn’t answer for several moments.

“Il Colloseu, signore,” he said. “The ancient colosseum built before Christ by Emperor Vespasian to entertain his citizens and distract them from his administrative and moral failings.”

When I stumbled to comprehend, the man smiled, “Gladiators? Surely, a young man has heard of the gladiators of Rome?”

And, of course, I had. The famous warriors brought here from throughout the ancient empire to fight each other for the Emperor’s approval and eternal glory.

“Marcus Attilius,” I said with enthusiasm. “Spartacus?”

“Yes,” he smiled. “Though neither man ever got to fight here. You’ve a strange accent. Wherever do you come from?”

I turned to Duccio, excited by the thought of gladiators, but realized he was glaring with disdain at the helpful man. More so, he was engaged in a silent assault, delving into the man’s mind to rip at the threads of consciousness and rearrange his memories.

The man’s jovial smile never left his face, but he stared back at Duccio incredulously.

“No, that will not work upon me, brother. What is your name?”

I caught a chill in the growing heat to realize this man was lycan. He stepped closer to Duccio, defiant of the attempted manipulation.

“Your name,” he insisted.

I felt my wolf tense with anger. To be exposed here in broad daylight at the city center seemed unfathomable, but I realized it was about to happen.

“Or must I rip it from…” As if unable to finish his question, the man’s voice died away as his eyes blinked wildly before slackening altogether.

Without losing the slightest control, Duccio reached into his pocket, pulled out a small silver pocket knife, opened its blade, and held it out for the man. The stranger took the knife from Duccio and raised it slowly to draw across his throat, slicing the tender flesh until blood flowed down his chest. His body trembled as his eyes rose into his head before his legs gave out. Collapsed on the floor, the spasms of blood quickly settled, and I sensed the man was all but dead.

Duccio drew me to him, running his hand softly behind my neck as if to calm me with his embrace. Without a word, he guided us away, back through the ancient ruins of Palatine Hill, down toward the modern streets, and off to home.