"Hah! Get on my knees and give him what he wanted? I'm Shanna the She-devil. Make me," she planted one foot on the collapsed Immortal's back and scoffed with a toss of beautiful golden hair, honey blonde with undertones of burnished orange and red. Naturally, Shanna's skirt had been meticulously tailored such that in this pose her skirt rode up to bare another delectable inch of naked thigh, her skin silky-smooth and hinting at the muscle tone beneath. It also came just short of flashing the crotch of her skimpy thong. This not only had the effect of conserving precious cloth (flax would not grow anymore as far south as Belistra, and leather was a precious commodity) but also highlighting the gladiatrix's erotic appeal at the moment of victory. A win-win solution indeed.<br/><br/>"He was one of the Immortal Assholes. That makes him a bad person. The legions serve for a living, the slaves are... well, slaves. The Immortals were chosen." Shanna wiped her sword on the Immortal's cape, wiped up the blood as much as she could with the soldier's cape, and dragged the body into the room, looking left and right to check if she had been spotted. She made a rudimentary attempt to arrange the corpse to give the impression that the Immortal had been pursuing someone fleeing through the window, to give any pursuers a false lead, but she had no illusions of fooling the Sorcerer-King's hunters.<br/><br/>For a moment, it occurred to her to ask Cyprus what happened to people's souls when they die, but she thought better of it. She didn't want to know, and she didn't plan on dying.<br/><br/>"You're right. We're leaving." Without looking back, Shanna stepped out of her door and closed it behind her. She tossed her hair again, squared her shoulders and started down the stone passage, putting an extra sway into her hips as she went. This was the first day of her life as a freedperson, Shanna told herself. She should be as happy as a wedded bride. "Help me out. You can still see and hear, right? You certainly enjoyed last night's show." She smirked in the direction she thought she last heard the disembodied god's voice. "Let me know if anything dangerous comes my way."<br/><br/>She started down the stairs. From here, she would need to pass through the training grounds of the<em>ludus </em>-- gladiator school -- then out into the open streets. Those she remembered only dimly, but she could see the towering city gates open for the passage of trade and troops. If she could just get past them...