Chapter 1

It all started out when I got that funny looking envelope in the mail one day. Inside was nothing but a short note and a very simple ring, a white gold band that looked a lot like a man's wedding ring. The note said, "Slip this ring on the little finger of your left hand and enjoy an adventure like you have never before experienced." That was all.

Hell, I don't know why I didn't just pitch the whole thing in the trash and go on about my life. Well, yes, I do know why—I was bored to death. I had been at the accounting business for several years and had gotten my CPA. I was making a fair living in a small town, but life had settled into a deep rut. I was not married and had no immediate prospects. I didn't even have a steady girlfriend. Here I was in my mid-thirties and had hit a dead end.

I had no idea what I was getting into when I slipped the ring on my finger. It was way too big for my finger when it went on, but, unaccountably, it immediately shrank to be a proper fit. The problem, now, was that there was no way for me to get it off.

A few moments after the ring settled into place on my finger, the whole world seemed to disappear in a cloud of smoke and a flash of bright light. The next thing I knew, I was stark naked and standing in a line of people, also naked, up on a platform. Other people in a crowd below me were bidding for my services as a slave.

I looked around in kind of a daze. I was surrounded by a crowd of people dressed like extras out of a Cleopatra movie. To my surprise, I could understand the language. All I could tell for sure was that I was somewhere in the Mediterranean area. I got that from the feeling of the weather that day and the appearance of the people that I could see. Beyond that, I had no idea where I was.

My body was much as it had been when I was at my physical peak while in the SEALs. That would make me physically about 22 years old, and I wondered where that extra 13 years had disappeared to. Oh, well, that speculation was for another time. The bidding had started at some ridiculously low level and seemed destined to stay there. I guessed that slaves like me were a drug on the market currently. From the comments that I could hear in the background, apparently I was mixed in with a group of prisoners from the losing side in a border skirmish. In other words, everybody in my group was deemed likely to rebel with fatal intent if the degree of servitude got too onerous. Therefore, the bidders were afraid of us!

Then, someone in the crowd came to the rescue of the auctioneer. He offered to buy all of us as a single lot for some number of silver pieces that still made us dirt cheap, but was better than the auctioneer was going to get for us individually. That was enough to close the sale, and we were marched off the auction block.

We marched through the streets of a town that looked just like those I saw in the boondocks of Iraq when I was assigned there as a SEAL. The difference was that I saw very few women, but the few I did see were not veiled. We were still naked, and I began to worry about sunburn. That's when I realized that my skin was a lot darker than it had been only hours before, but even a darker skin was not going to protect me for very long from that damned bright sun.

Fortunately, we eventually came to a stockade, and we were ushered inside. I immediately looked for as much shade as I could find and headed in that direction. Within the next hour we were fed some slop that looked like a barley mush that was none too clean. Nevertheless, I knew better than to turn it down, so I ate as much as I could get, though that was not enough to be filling.

Later that afternoon, I found out that we had been purchased to be a part of a major show in the local arena. It seemed that some local official was trying to curry favor with the townspeople by holding a "gladiatorial exhibition" in which we were to be the victims! Shit! That was not something I wanted to participate in, but it looked like the guards were ready for that and had their swords in hand.

I made a trip around the stockade fence that enclosed us and saw that there was no way to get out that could be managed in only a few hours. My only hope seemed to be winning the upcoming fight in the arena, but at the moment I had no idea how I was going to do that. Just before we went to bed, a man came in and announced that we would all be issued wooden swords and shields tomorrow morning and instructed in how to use them. Our new owner wanted to put on a good show, so he was giving us a "chance" to defend ourselves. Ha! Wooden weapons against steel and bronze—fat chance!

At least, I thought I remembered what I had learned in the SEALS about close-quarter fighting, so I probably had a better chance than most of the men around me. I had been very good with a knife and with unarmed combat, so I might be able to apply that tomorrow, since my opponents would not be expecting it.

We spent the next day going through the motions of how to hold a short sword and a medium size shield. The wooden sword was around 30 inches long (760 mm), so I had another option: I was pretty damned good at stick fighting, so I might get some use from that.

The wooden shield was a joke! The wood was too soft to stop a sword very well, and it would probably be chopped to pieces in minutes if the swordsman was in any way competent. However, even that had its uses if the opportunity arose. Things were looking up. However, I figured that I was the only one of the slaves who was going to survive tomorrow, and that was only problematical.

The next morning we were marched into the arena with our wooden swords and shields, but otherwise naked, and left to await our fate. A few minutes later, an Army detail marched in with all kinds of pomp and musical flares. The soldiers stood at attention and we lounged in whatever shade we could find, not much of it, while the local official gave a boring speech that was way too long. The crowd was getting restive, and I could see that he cut his speech short when he found that he had lost his audience. The official waved his arm and there was a blare of trumpets.

The soldiers started marching toward us and we knew that it was time to put up the best fight that we could. At least, the swords were of stout wood, even if the shields were punk. It looked like I was the only one of the crew who had paid attention to the instructor the day before, because I was the only one who held his shield like he knew what it was for.

When they got close, the soldiers spread out in a long rank of 23 men, the same number as us slaves. It was obvious that this was supposed to be a one-on-one battle, with each soldier assigned to kill one slave. That was better than I had hoped, so I prepared myself to meet the soldier advancing straight toward me.

Obviously, he was overconfident. I was supposed to be some local barbarian brigand who could throw rocks and that was about it, while he was a battle hardened soldier who knew which end of the sword to poke with. Man, was he in for a surprise!

I walked a little way toward my man simply to insure that I had plenty of freedom of movement. Then I stopped and waited for him to come to me. I might have gained something from the element of surprise if I had charged him, but I didn't want to give myself away too soon.

The soldier got very close to me and tried to press his shield against me. He then thrust out his sword as if to gut me in a single blow. That's what I was waiting for. I pulled my shield down to block his sword, and, naturally, the sword penetrated the punky wood a few inches. That was what I needed to make my first offensive move. To his surprise, I twisted my arm far enough to force his sword from his grasp. The sword was locked into the wood well enough that he could not hold on to his sword when I twisted.