“You send an alliance of sucklings and babes against gods and monsters,” Jupiter said. Marius could see his face now as Lucretius pulled him along. It was undignified, certainly. “You know the tale of Lucretius, boy? His sons are the three-headed dog that guarded Hades himself.” Jupiter laughed, his back turned to Marius. The pressure, though, around his neck, was incredible. He sensed that he was only a bare moment’s thought away from death.
“You are a fool, Jupiter,” Janus said from the back of the room. Jupiter now stood in the middle of the chamber, Lucretius just behind him. Marius could barely see Janus and the others, faces barely showing above a pile of rubble that had been carved out of the back wall of the chamber. Black scorch marks darkened the marble walls, and Marius wondered at the force of the lightning that had taken whole blocks out of the palace wall. “You rule over people with power, and you do so by abusing your own to create fear.”
“Fear keeps you in your place,” Jupiter said without any emotion. “Fear lets you know who is in charge of you. You, better than anyone, should know the value of fear. When your daughter was killed, you showed the humans responsible who they should fear more than anyone. Fear keeps the order. Fear of Rome maintains the Empire. Fear of us keeps the Emperor from straying. And fear of me keeps you fools from exposing yourselves so you don’t end up dead like that idiot of a girl of yours.”
Janus did not dignify that with an answer, though Marius knew the man must surely be boiling inside. Marius could feel the burn in his neck and knew that it was not from Lucretius’s grip on his throat. Seconds more. Seconds more.
Lucretius jerked a moment later, his grip slackening. His legs buckled, just slightly, but enough for Marius to get to his feet. He slapped a hand upon Lucretius’s mouth and pushed him down. The man’s strength was fading with his life, and he made to scream just as Jupiter sent another frenzy of lightning across the chamber. The noise drowned out Lucretius’s cry, and Marius stuffed his hand farther down into the beastly man’s throat. He felt strong teeth and jaws bite hard against his hand and ignored them.
Yes, take the pain and shut it away, his mother’s voice came, intertwined with Ennias’s, and the voices of all the others whom he had taken in the last year and made his own. They spoke in a chorus, as he did when he was joined with them. One will, one mind, wedded to his own in an unstoppable force.
He felt Lucretius sucked free from his body and thrown into the depths with the others. He sensed the fear, the abject terror in the man at the separation from his own body.
YOU WILL BE OURS, Marius said, his voice joined with those of the others. YOU WILL BE ONE WITH US.
I will not, Lucretius said. I will not!
The screaming lasted only seconds, the howls of an animal as it was picked apart by a pack of wild things. Marius’s fury was that of the ten people he carried with him, all their rage and anger and fear and pain collected over their lifetimes and their imprisonment with him, all his to command. He turned it loose upon Lucretius and the man broke in mere seconds.
YOUR POWER IS MINE, Marius said, Lucretius’s voice added to his chorus.
My power … is yours … came Lucretius’s voice for the last time as it dissolved into his own.
There was a flash of light around him as Marius came back to his senses in the throne room. Lucretius’s body lay beneath him, one of his hands still anchored on the man’s cheek, the other buried to the wrist in his throat. He pulled the hand free from the mouth as Lucretius’s eyes stared up at him, empty yet somehow accusing. And Marius stood.
“Your power is mine,” he murmured and felt the essence of Lucretius come to the fore with the rest of his subjects. His slaves.
His souls.
He flew at Jupiter, his broad back partially covered by robes. He slammed into it hands first, grabbing hold of him at the neck and smashing his face into the ground. He dimly felt the first shock, but it was weak and Lucretius’s power made it hurt not at all after a moment. He felt the flesh pull together where it had burned into his skin as he stared down at the back of Jupiter’s white hair as he ground the God of Thunder’s face into the floor.
“You have always misjudged weakness and strength,” Janus said, and he appeared from behind the pile of rubble. “You have always glazed over courage, over friendship, over the value of care and concern for others. You think decency is base and stupid, gratitude and loyalty the things of animals.” He limped across the throne room, and Marius could hear the screams of Jupiter begin in his head.
“You … cannot …” Jupiter muttered, his face against the marble floor.