Caster

by Elsie Chapman

  Tournament.

  The word and all its implications echo loudly in my head—so much for simply showing up at midnight and somehow getting all my answers. I should know it’s never that simple. If it were, then I wouldn’t be casting illegal magic while lying to my parents, avoiding a gangster’s henchman, and running from a suspicious cop, all because I’m trying to save the family legacy.

  And Navy was around last year. Had he been a fighter? I wonder how much I can get him to share about the whole thing while pretending I know exactly what he’s talking about.

  “Nope, no more keys needed, just the ring ones,” he says to her now.

  She takes out seven coins of each color—all but the black—and sets them down on the counter. “That’s two hundred and eighty marks.”

  Navy nods, places his marks on the counter, and slides the colored coins into his hand. “Should all be there, thanks.”

  So the black starters are key starters, while the colored starters are ring ones. And while the key starters are reusable—I cast on both the mall door and the elevator using the same black coin—the ring starters aren’t, considering how many Navy bought.

  I get the black ones being called keys, since they got me into this place. But as for ring starters, I’m still lost. I wonder if it’s connected to us choosing ring names. If it is, then us being fighters explains a lot—we must have to use the starters in a ring of some kind. But in a ring for … a match? A match consisting of … what, exactly? I guess I’ll find out soon enough. The registration guy said that the fight starts once fifty fighters are registered—I’m number thirty-eight, so that means there are twelve more fighters to go.

  It hits me then—I don’t have any marks. After Jihen found me this afternoon, I had to pay him what I made casting magic for Coral’s mind wipe. I haven’t had another buyer since.

  My heart sinks, and I start to dig my hand into my jeans pocket to check anyway. Now I do regret chucking that last mark at Jihen’s head, no matter how pettily satisfying it felt in its childishness.

  Navy pauses slightly as he passes me.

  Uncertainty flashes across his face as he takes in whatever he sees on mine. His eyes flicker toward the crowd before coming back, and he slows down to an actual stop. I can practically hear him stifle his impatience as he forces himself to be polite.

  Don’t bother, I almost feel like saying out loud. Seems like we’re only going to be fighting each other anyway—I bet it’s better for us to not even meet.

  “You lose something? You seem kind of distracted.”

  I shake my head. “No, it’s okay.”

  “I could help you look if you think it might be nearby or something …”

  His hope that I turn him down is so obvious I bite back my own impatience, then a wave of embarrassment comes. It makes me think of Rudy and how he was always so reluctant with whatever I asked of him.

  “I didn’t lose anything, I just—”

  I break off when my fingers hit the bulk of a folded-up wad in my pocket. Marks. But where did I—?

  Rudy’s wallet, that’s where. Now it comes back to me. Checking his wallet for accidental paper trails, then taking his marks because he would have wanted me to …

  I take them out and count—two hundred. Not too far off from Navy, who just spent two hundred and eighty and seems to know what he’s doing.

  I smile to let him know he can leave. “I thought I left all my marks at home, that’s all. Thanks for offering to help, though.”

  His return smile is tentative. “Well, good thing you didn’t actually leave them, then. Probably wouldn’t get too far tonight without any ring starters.”

  “Definitely lucky. I don’t think this is the kind of place that would let me buy on credit, either.”

  He laughs, and the sound of it is genuine, with a hint of rust in it that tells me he doesn’t laugh like this a lot, and I’m not sure what it means that I don’t feel very bad that I’m keeping him. I like how he doesn’t seem like he’s dying to get away anymore.

  Since he really doesn’t seem like the tattling type, I decide to take the risk and hint at how little I know. “Now I guess I need to decide what ring starters to buy.”

  “Oh.” He drops his gaze to his new ring starters, still loose in his hand. He gives me a look that says he’d almost forgotten why he was here in the first place, and wariness slides into his eyes. And I can tell the second where he might have considered saying more slips away, if it was ever there at all. His expression goes tight, like I’ve secretly pulled magic on him to make him talk.

  “You’ll get your strategy down soon,” he says. “All fighters do.”

  “You’re right, they do. I’m sure I’ll figure it out, too.”

  Navy nods and moves away, stuffing colored coins into his pocket. “See you.”

  I almost call out “Good luck!” as he disappears into the crowd, but think about how that might sound sarcastic when presumably we’re going to be fighting each other.

  Unless we’re not. He had no ring name on his face. And I don’t know the rules for this tournament yet. I assumed only fighters could buy ring starters here, but maybe that’s not true. And the woman saying she recognized him from last year could mean almost anything.

  I approach the starter counter, even though I’m still unsure of what to buy. But I can’t wait any longer—what if I run out of time?

  The woman behind the counter is still bored-looking. “What would you like?”

  “Do you … have recommendations?” I know how inane the question is as soon as I ask it. Like I’m asking about a dinner special. I could just do as Navy did and buy some of each.

  But if he’s not a fighter here—or maybe not one any longer—maybe there’s a reason for that.

  The woman slowly lifts both eyebrows. “Say again?”

  I sense the red climbing up my neck. “I mean, do fighters usually buy one kind of starter more than the other?”

  She shakes her head. “Fighters buy what they buy. I really can’t say much more about ring starters than that.”

  “Okay, thanks.” It does make sense that she has to stay impartial and not have any suggestions. It wouldn’t be fair if she had favorites and still had to work with every single fighter.

  I stare at the baskets of coins, thinking fast, knowing I’m supposed to know how ring starters work. The woman’s gaze is unmoving from my face, and I wonder what she sees. I’m worried about being kicked out for sneaking in, but what if I’m not thinking dark enough? I could be a spy. Or working for a Scout. Something happening to me would send a definite message to cops hunting down certain kinds of magic.

  One of the spectators I overheard placing a bet put marks on whether a fighter would cast skin spells. Which means it’s reasonable to assume that each coin is just a different kind of starter. And that they work with this third kind of magic that I don’t yet understand, the same kind of magic that worked with the black key.

  Four colors—red, white, gold, and silver—for four different kinds of spells—skin, bone, blood, and breath. I’m afraid to ask which color coin stands for which spell, so I’m just going to have to guess.

  “Five of each kind, please,” I say, hoping my voice doesn’t shake. Her eyes are still probing, and I want to get away. I’m buying some of each as Navy did anyway, despite doubts about mimicking his strategy if he’s not a fighter. If Rudy would have had a different method, I’ll never know.

  “Need another key?” the woman asks.

  Navy didn’t buy another ring key, so I’m assuming I won’t need another one, either. “No, just the ring starters, thanks.”

  She sets the pile of coins down on the counter. “Five of each, for a total of twenty ring starters. That’ll be two hundred marks even.”

  I hand over every single mark of Rudy’s, and the gesture feels very final somehow. It lands somewhere in my stomach and sits there like a cramp. The gravity of the moment presses hard—passing over this last thing of R
udy’s is like losing my last tangible grasp on Shire’s secret life.

  I slide the starters off the counter and stuff them into the pocket of my jeans, not wanting to mix them up with my usual ones in my starter bag. I know the rules of full magic and of leftover magic, but not the ones of this magic and its specific starters. A quick escape in an emergency wouldn’t be so quick if I grab a starter that doesn’t work.

  I’m sure that they must be getting pretty close to fifty fighters by now. So I duck inside the food court’s washroom, remembering to listen for the bell that says the fight’s starting—if you’re late, you’re out. Only one of the five stalls is occupied, and I hop into a free one.

  I’m about to flush when the sound of quiet retching comes from the other stall.

  I wait, holding my breath, unsure of what to do. Ignore? Ask?

  “Um, you okay?” I finally call out.

  There’s a long pause. “Yeah, I must just be nervous.”

  Another fighter. She does sound nervous, her voice thin. And young. I peek down to see her shoes from beneath the stall.

  Rose-gold sneakers, their canvas properly scuffed up. They’re cute, even if they’re not my style. But she’s definitely more a kid than a grown-up.

  “I’m nervous, too,” I tell her, trying to make her feel better. It’s the truth anyway.

  “You’re also fighting tonight?”

  “Yes, and I have no real clue what I’m doing,” I let myself admit. I probably should be more careful. But since Shire died, there’s been a lot I can’t talk about with anyone—using full magic might be the biggest thing—but there’s also all the stuff I keep from my parents. I can add killing Rudy to that list, too. And now, in this bathroom stall where no one can see me, I sense some of those secrets coming way too close to the surface, the ways they make me feel wanting to come out. “I’m still trying to figure out what I signed up for.”

  “Maybe I’ll just cast a shield spell so I don’t die, and wait everyone else out.” Her laugh is tinged with hysteria. “Exciting, right?”

  Die.

  A chill washes over me.

  The tile floor swims, and I brace my shoulder against the side of the stall. Rudy, you couldn’t have known, right? Couldn’t you have just made plans for a midnight date?

  “I’d do a shield spell, too,” I finally manage just for something to say. Though I’m not sure what she means.

  “Well, right now I don’t even care about winning,” the other fighter says. “I just want to make it to the next round.”

  Her secrets are just like mine, threatening to bubble over. Would she be saying any of this if she could see me? It’d be like her handing me her fighter’s psyche on a silver platter with the permission to take it apart.

  Want to exchange secrets? I’m nearly tempted to call out. You tell me what kind of fight this is supposed to be, and I’ll tell you I don’t belong here. Deal?

  But all I say is “Good luck.” I don’t really know how I mean it—not sarcastically, just as I wouldn’t have meant it that way when I nearly said it earlier to Navy. Maybe I do want her to stick around during this tournament. Or maybe it’s her secrets I’m wishing her luck with. I understand secrets right now more than I do this whole fighter thing, that’s for sure.

  “Thanks,” she says. “You, too.”

  She flushes and the stall door opens.

  I let her go without trying to see who she is. Which likely says something about my fighter’s psyche, too.

  Out in the food court, a loud bell rings.

  I rush out of the washroom, my heart drumming high into my throat. My nerves are raw, too close to the surface of my skin. I wind my way into the crowd, heading toward the center of the food court. The expectancy in the air from just moments ago has gone sharp, vibrant, and my blood runs faster along with it. Excitement, fear, a kind of thrill that I don’t fully understand but that’s formed anyway—I feel everything.

  The crowd is splitting up. Spectators go to line the walls and edges of the food court, cheering and clapping exactly the way crowds at events always end up doing. The tables and chairs being pushed to the sides make sense now, with people standing on them to see us.

  I stand with the rest of the fighters in the middle of the floor, being seen, waiting for whatever’s supposed to come next. I look at them, and terms like bow-out and knockout and shield spell run wild in my brain.

  Some of them are alone, like I am.

  And some of them aren’t. A red-haired woman in a bright yellow silk dress fusses over a fighter whose ring name is Luan. He’s taller than anyone else on the floor and has an artist’s well-muscled hands, and I have no idea if either is an advantage or disadvantage here—you can’t judge magic by its caster. The smallest person can cast the most powerful full magic, just like a physically clumsy person can have the most spell control.

  I watch them and think that they are lovers. But then the woman ties a pink silk ribbon around his upper arm, shakes his hand, and leaves, and I realize it’s something different. Boxers and wrestlers sometimes have managers, investors who make sure they get the right training and support—I guess fighters here have backers, too. Maybe Rudy was coming here to be someone else’s.

  The floor continues to thin. Soon there will only be fifty of us here in the middle.

  There’s Wilson, and Crawl, and Aimee. There’s a fighter named Doll who’s either got a condition that curves her back, or she’s an Ivor who’s managed to hide from the Scouts so far, her condition not dire enough that she needs to stop casting altogether. There’s Robson, whose smirk doesn’t hide the anxiety in his eyes. And more names, all flashing bright and white until they form a jumble in my head.

  I spot Kylin, the fighter I listened to entering the tournament. She sounded so sure of herself and her expression says she still is. Her eyes are the same chestnut as her hair, and their gaze cool as she stares straight ahead, uncaring of everyone else still streaming away. I size her up, going from head to toe, and freeze.

  She’s wearing rose-gold sneakers.

  Oh.

  By the time I’m able to meet her eyes, she’s already watching me.

  Her face says she peeked in the washroom to see my shoes, too.

  Another oh.

  I’m debating if I should go over and say something—though what, I’m not sure, and she looks stunned enough that I can’t predict what might happen. Then I see Navy.

  His cheek is still blank. Not a fighter. But he’s with a guy who is. He’s about my age, blond to Navy’s dark hair, green eyes instead of hazel. His gaze is flat and unfeeling, while Navy’s has only been careful, wary. But they look enough alike anyway that I bet they’re related—brothers, half brothers, maybe cousins. Shire and I were so different, but beneath everything our bones were the same. We shared the same kind of magic, if not its control.

  The fighter’s ring name is Finch.

  I struggle to think back to where I heard that name tonight.

  Fifty marks on returning champion Finch to survive …

  So he’s why Navy was around last year, and why Navy’s back again. Not for himself. The woman at the counter remembering him being around last year’s tournament also makes sense now—Navy wasn’t memorable as a fighter, he was the champion’s backer.

  Navy ties a blue-striped ribbon around Finch’s upper arm, gives him a light punch on the shoulder, and leaves. Finch doesn’t bother to watch him go but instead turns to take in the crowd, like he’s expecting a reaction. Demanding it.

  They remember him. There are cheers of his name, a rise in the level of applause. I wonder how many people have bet on him tonight, how many marks are riding on him.

  Beneath the coldness, his eyes are empty, and a chill runs along my skin.

  Ghosts or promises or marks—but what if a fighter chooses to be here for no reason at all? Would they be the kindest because they have nothing to lose? Or the cruelest because of the same?

  Soon the trickling away from the
middle of the floor ceases and there’s no one left but us.

  Fifty fighters.

  The food court slowly falls silent, the final throat clearing and bit of applause fading into echoes.

  In one far corner of the crowd, a man stands up and begins to make his way toward us.

  His suit is a dark slate-gray, sharp and classy. As he nears, I see the black plum blossom print on his tie, a paler gray handkerchief in the jacket breast pocket. He’s in his forties, and he wears his dark hair slicked back from high cheekbones. Bright teal eyes take the time to meet each of ours in turn. It’s a single glance that tells me everything I need to know: Whoever he is, he’s the most powerful person in the room.

  He reaches the middle of the floor and comes to a stop.

  “Once, before the world banished full magic, it was full magic that helped create legends.” His voice is a low rumble, too soft to reach everyone’s ears. But somehow it does anyway, and his words hold the entire room rapt.

  “Fifty competitors and a contest of skills,” he continues. “Who would be the last caster standing? Who would be the strongest, fastest, most cunning? Who could fight honorably more than not? The ancient Tournament of Casters is why we still know legends such as Amani the Strong, Horvath the Fast, and Kelton the Clever. It’s why we know Etana the Cruel, who chose dishonor in killing in order to win.”

  The power I saw in his eyes—it’s the same kind that lines his words, threads through his voice.

  “When the age of full magic came to an end, so did the tournament. For hundreds of years, no more contests of full magic were held. No more legends were created. Only leftover magic was permitted.” Teal sweeps the crowd. “My name is Embry Rush, and as the Speaker of the Guild of Now, I’m here to welcome you to this year’s Tournament of Casters.”

  Loud applause breaks out, but I remain unmoving, stiff with disbelief.

  Nothing about this makes sense.

  There’s no such thing as the Guild of Now. There was only ever the Guild of Then. After the last of the original seven casters died, the Guild as it was died with them.