Stranger Rituals

by Kali Rose Schmidt

  But the rest of the Vraka ate nice and normal foods. Like the overgivas she pushed through now.

  One street, emptier than the rest, was full of closed up shops with boarded up windows, nothing to see beyond the grimy glass but dirt-covered floors. But between some of those shops were alleyways, where people waited outside of doors tucked away, guarded by burly men. Scarko watched with disinterest as a woman begged to be let inside, clawing at a man guarding one such door. He shoved her roughly off him and she began to sob. Scarko realized it was a drug den—perhaps of troomla, known for its ecstatic effects—or, she thought with a flash of anger, raptum, taken from the blood of Vrakas. It rendered overgivas nearly comatose with pleasurable dreams. She wanted to gut the woman and the man where they stood down the alleyway, but she took a breath, clenched her gloved fists, and turned away. That was not what she was there for.

  As night came, the sun sank into the sea beyond the port city, the raucous noise growing steadily louder as more tourists docked their ships and more people escaped their homes—likely having slept off their drink from the night before. Scarko made her way closer to the port. She weaved in and out of the crowd that had gathered around a brothel and ignored cat-calls and whistles as she passed from the men and women soliciting around the street, tugging her hood over her head. She had the left the hat behind.

  It seemed unlikely any fight with Vrakas would be held by the port, in the apartments she had seen before. But if Vojtech said she should go there, she would at least give it a whirl. Not for the first time, she cursed Vojtech for sending her to Kezda. She was not an assassin. She was his guard, his soldier, and here she was searching for a street fighter.

  Penance, she thought wryly, is pain, Kadezska.

  The ports were strangely quiet, the sound of the city coming from the south, among the streets, shops, and drug dens. It was colder by the water, her breath coming out in clouds. She watched the moonlight spilling over the inky sea, the waves gently lapping against the docks. It was almost tranquil, serene after living in the desert for two years with nothing to see but an endless stretch of sand. But she wrinkled her nose as she drew closer to the sea. Even in the winter it smelled of fish, an animal she could never stomach the blood of.

  A few stragglers lingered in the dark shadows by the ports and the pier. She kept a hand on her knife at her waistband, but none of them seemed interested in her movements. And there were no blue eyes flecked with silver here, no horns. She kept moving by the docks, making her way to the apartment buildings she had seen when she first arrived. There was a ladder not far from the ground, on the side of one building. She could make a running leap of it, grab the rungs, haul herself up to the roof to observe from above. But as she made to walk toward the side of the building, she heard it: deep and low, the rhythmic pattern of music, the bass most audible in the dark night. And as she walked closer to the little fence that encircled the apartment entrance, she heard people—muffled cheers, shouting.

  As if she lived there, she walked through the short fence, strolled through the cobblestone walkway, and yanked open the door of the main entrance to the building. It was dilapidated, dirty. The paint on the walls of the foyer peeled in places. There were slick spots on the scuffed floor, and the staircases winding up on either side of the entrance were dingy, scuffed with dirt. A faint scent of sea salt lingered in the building. No one else was in the entranceway, the dim lamp flickering overhead. But the noise was louder here, the music more defined—a tambourine, the bass she had heard, and the sound of people stomping their feet. Voices filtered up from the floor, laughing, yelling, revelry.

  She walked quickly to the staircase, took the crumbling steps down two at a time, the noise growing louder. And there, at the landing, was a pair of double doors, flanked by two Warskian soldiers in emerald green uniforms, their dark eyes on her as she approached. The space was small, stuffy, the sounds of the party beyond louder still. She felt fear slide down her spine, but she shoved it away.

  “Can we help you?” the shorter soldier drawled, stubble on his chin. He couldn’t have been much older than she. She wondered if he had helped transport the Vrakas here, if this was indeed where the fighting took place. How many Vrakas had he killed? How many had he turned to fight alongside him?

  “I’m here for the fight,” her voice was lazy, drawled out. She smirked at them, something lascivious in her gaze.

  The other soldier, taller, bigger, the black military cap glinting with gold, returned her smile. Would any of them recognize her, as the girl who got away? The one with blood magic? No one had specifically come for her, and Vojtech said they probably thought her dead, buried in the desert sands. She had known few people within the palace walls, outside of other Vrakans, and the Praeminister.

  “Are you now?” the tall soldier asked in response.

  She walked closer towards them, closing the distance between them quickly, even as her gait was slow, slinky.

  “I don’t want to miss the main attraction,” she purred.

  The shorter soldier’s eyes widened. “Women shouldn’t enjoy death sport.”

  The taller one groaned, rolled his eyes. “Ignore him. He’s a pig.”

  She turned her attention to the taller one, her body leaning in his direction. She still wore the fur-lined black coat, the grey cloak of the Order underneath. It was probably just as well; her curves were little to speak of, her body straight, like a ruler. But they couldn’t know that by looking at her now.

  “And you?” she arched a brow.

  The tall guard smiled, and he pushed open the door. “Come see me afterward and you can find out.” He winked at her, and she tried not to gag as she sauntered past them into the roaring crowd beyond the doors.

  Bodies were crammed together inside the hot basement room, the peeling paint and scuffed floors the same here as they were upstairs. Scarko squeezed through shouting people, their coats scattered about the room, many threadbare and trampled on by the crowd. The lighting was bright, the tambourine player stationed by the fighting ring—a circular space that took up the center of the room, lined with Warskian soldiers in gleaming uniforms and thick ropes, keeping the roaring crowd back.

  No one glanced at Scarko as she pushed her way through to the front, unable to see inside the ring as it seemed everyone in the godsforsaken place was at least two heads taller than her.

  Because you are two heads shorter than everyone else, Kadezska, she thought, cursing her height.

  There were men and women. She watched a few barefoot children in the back of the room, play fighting amongst themselves.

  The Warskian soldiers, their own expressions stern and unmoved, held offering buckets and Scarko was surprised to see so much golden zed inside. She wondered how much went to fighters like Zephir, and how much made its way back into the Royal’s coffers.

  After elbowing her way in front of a portly man with a thick moustache, she stood as close to the ropes as she could get without pushing past a Warskian soldier, facing her and the crowd. He glanced at her, but then looked away. She noticed something like a pack strapped across his back, and in the hand not holding the bucket he had what looked like a flamethrower, connected to the pack. A cold fear, icy and consuming, went down her spine. She glanced at the other soldiers, dozens of them around the ring. The strange machines weren’t flamethrowers strapped to the soldiers; she had seen them at the palace.

  She focused on the center ring, trying to calm her heart.

  There was only one person there, a boy that couldn’t have been much older than she was, short and lanky with pale skin, a freckled face. He had red hair, shaggy and damp against his sweating brow. He was nervous, dressed in a too-large white tunic and rough spun trousers, he was looking out among the crowd jeering at him, his eyes wide, his hands fidgeting by his sides. People were screaming at him, spittle flying from their faces, as if he had personally harmed them. The hairs on Scarko’s neck stood on end at their hatred, but she willed herself calm, w
illed herself not to reach for her knife. It was boiling in the room, but she kept her coat on, not wanting to lose it in the wretched place.

  Then, suddenly, the tambourine stopped playing across the ring from her, and the musician stepped back, disappearing into the crowd. Scarko glanced at flecks of blood on the white center ring and felt her stomach rumble. A strange quiet grew over the crowd, and she watched the people around her look towards her with ravenous faces. For a moment, her heart thudded in her ears, and she wondered what Vojtech would make of her dying here, among this throng of people. Would he forgive his gods? How had these people known who she was? What she was?

  But then she turned, and realized they were watching the door she had come through.

  A large, burly man with a neatly trimmed beard, dressed in a tight black shirt and with a scowl on his broad face walked beside a tall, thin woman with a shaved head, the same scowl on her own face. The crowd parted for them, a hushed awe sweeping over it, and Scarko saw they had daggers visible around their waist. Behind them, a tall figure in a black wool coat, hood thrown over their head, swaggered after them. Scarko moved aside as the group came toward the ring, and she caught a glimpse under the hood—light brown skin, vivid green eyes, a straight nose, lips that looked swollen, perhaps from another fight.

  The Warskian soldiers nodded at the group and commanded the crowd to take a step back. Scarko did so, and the threesome that entered the room stood together on the outskirts of the ring, the redheaded boy in the center watching them, eyes wide.

  The group was only a few paces in front of her, the Warskian soldier closest to her the only thing between them. People were at her back, someone’s breath was hot and heavy on her neck, she was shoulder-to-shoulder with the crowd, but she kept her eyes trained on the man and woman, the hooded figure still in the wool coat.

  And then, as one, the man and woman flanking the figure pulled back the hood, took the coat off, and the crowd roared, stamping their feet, pressing Scarko closer, only to have the soldiers bark orders to stay back.

  “Introducing Zephir Crista!” the burly man with the beard roared and the crowd’s voices—shouts and cheers—enveloped his introduction in raw noise.

  The man that had been beneath the wool coat turned then, raising a fist in the air in acknowledgement of the crowd. He had dark hair, shaved close on the sides, his jaw lean like his body, a thick, dark tattoo of what Scarko realized was the reaper—a myth of the new god—on his neck. He wore only low-slung dark trousers, and black boots, like the boy’s boots, in the ring. His body was an assortment of scars and still-healing bruises, a cut above his lip, confirming Scarko’s assessment of the swelling there.

  His vivid green eyes scanned the crowd and came to rest on her. She did not look away, and she could have sworn he smirked at her. Did he somehow know what she was? After her encounter with the horned man, she wasn’t so sure the cloaks of the Order were a secret any longer.

  But she stared right back at the fighter and thought of how his blood might taste on her tongue.

  Another man, dark skinned and dressed in all white, hopped into the center of the ring, raising his hands in a gesture meant to quiet the crowd. After a moment, the roars fell nearly silent, only a fevered whispering among the throng. All eyes were on the man in the center, whom Scarko assumed would referee the match.

  “We are gathered here today to watch Vraka Thomas Mulda,” he gestured to the redheaded boy, and the crowd booed, “fight against Zephir Crista,” he gestured toward Zephir, who still had not entered the ring but was facing it, the two people flanking him, whispering in his ear. A pep talk, Scarko thought bitterly, rolling her eyes. Why did he need a pep talk for a guaranteed win? The redhead was no match for him if Vojtech’s vision held true.

  Applause shattered throughout the low-ceilinged room at Zephir’s name.

  “It will be a fight to the death,” the referee announced, turning to look at the redheaded boy. Scarko saw with a grudging respect that he had wiped the fear from his features, and he nodded at the announcement.

  The ref looked back to Zephir.

  He nodded his head towards him. “When you’re ready, Crista.”

  6

  Let the Games Begin

  Zephir entered the ring slowly, lazily, appraising the Vrakan boy. The ref left the center ring, hanging out by the ropes before the Warskian soldiers, most of whom still faced the crowd, but some had turned toward the soon-to-be fight, hands on their strange machines strapped to their backs.

  Thomas approached Zephir first, two steps toward him, hands still fidgeting by his side, his jaw set. Zephir smiled at him as they circled one another. The boy—a man, Scarko corrected herself, he looked the same age as she—watched the Vraka smugly, his arms crossed, chin down, as if Thomas wasn’t worth the effort to put his guard up. Surveying his prey. The Vraka, to his credit, did not cower. He splayed his fingers, and the crowd screamed—anticipatory bloodlust in their throats. The soldiers tightened their grip on the baton-like device connected to their packs.

  Scarko imagined, just for a minute, that the Vrakan boy turned his gifts on the crowd, decimating them all with whatever he was about to unleash from his fingertips. But there were scores of Warskian soldiers in emerald green, hands on their swords, on the other weapon. Scarko had seen them before. They spread mindeta pollen like wildfire, and if the Vrakan boy turned to them, it would take only seconds to subdue him with the plant. Still, Scarko wished he would kill a few, just a few, to show the overgivas what Vrakan magic could do.

  Thomas’s jaw was set, sweat glinting on his face in the bright lights.

  Zephir hadn’t moved from the edge of the crowd, seemingly pressing in closer around them even as Warskian guards held them off. Scarko chanced another glance at the people around her, gathered in the cavernous basement—men and women in threadbare clothes, a few in suits and dresses with fur hats even in the stifling warmth of the room, all eager for the bloodshed to begin.

  A Vrakan would die tonight. Who would care, Scarko thought bitterly? Did his family die, too? Were they enslaved? Was he forced into the Royal Army by his own mother, his own father? What would they think now, after he tried to escape or otherwise disappointed the Praeminister or the King, that he was sent here to this underground ring to die?

  Zephir flexed his fingers in fingerless black gloves, the taunt muscles of his brown arms flexing with the movement. Scarko’s blood boiled, her stomach clenched. But she forced herself to join in the giddy crowd so as not to draw attention from the Warskian soldiers, chanting his nickname, “Z!”, over and over in two syllables. The taste of it on her tongue was acrid.

  Thomas let out a roar that made the crowd scream at the top of their lungs, and then shadows spewed from his fingertips, a tangible darkness that shrouded the entire basement in shrieking chaos. Scarko felt the hair on the back of her nape stand up, and a strange hush sounded over the basement. Let them be afraid, she thought, let them see what we can do. Welcome them to the darkness.

  Scarko gripped the hilt of her knife beneath her cloak. Maybe this time, Zephir would be overcome. Maybe this time, the Vrakan would live, and she could help him slaughter the crowd. Maybe Vojtech’s gods were wrong. But just as her heart began to pick up speed as it did every time she was about to use her strange magic, the shadows cleared. Zephir stood in the same spot the boy had left him in, a look of panicked bewilderment on his pale face. Had he known of Zephir? Had he known his Skuggmat shadows would be useless against the fighter? It was as if Zephir had repelled the shadows just by being him. Scarko looked toward the tall woman and burly man that had guarded him as she walked in, and she could see only their profiles, placid smiles on their faces as they watched. It looked as if they had seen this many times before.

  Zephir took swaggering steps toward Thomas, panic etched on the Vrakan’s face as he looked down at his hands in terror. Where the shadows had leapt moments before, nothing came now, not even wisps of dark smoke. His Vrakan gifts would
not save him here. The Krystwo god he had been indoctrinated under in the palace would not step in. Neither, Scarko thought angrily, would the Vrakan gods.

  Zephir stood inches before Thomas, towering over him, and he smiled as he drew his fist back, then let it sail to the boy’s face. A sickening crunch sounded as blood spurted from Thomas’s nose and the crowd cheered.

  Scarko bit down on her own tongue. She refused to cheer anymore.

  The boy staggered backward, clutching his nose, and then he thrust his fingers forward again, wisps of dark smoke trailing from them. Again, the soldiers clenched their hands around the ends of the mindeta blower, and Scarko felt both rage and satisfaction at their fear. But it was that fear that had led them to be enslaved, that had led to this.

  Zephir advanced towards Thomas, and the wisps disappeared into nothingness. How could Zephir be immune to Vrakan magic, Scarko wondered. Had he consumed loads of mindeta before the fight? But it could make overgivas sick if taken internally. Not sick enough to die—she had thought of dosing the Praeminister often enough in the Palace—but too sick to fight.

  It didn’t make sense. Realizing that his gifts were futile, Thomas balled up his own fist and swung at Zephir, who didn’t bother to duck the punch, taking it literally on the chin instead without so much as blinking. The crowd gasped; Zephir hadn’t budged when the boy’s fist connected with his face. Scarko’s eyes flashed, and she wondered what it would be like to cut her palm and ring it around Zephir’s neck, right over the damned reaper tattoo.

  Zephir lunged toward the boy, ducking as he took Thomas’s legs out from beneath him, slamming the boy to the mat. The crowd cheered again, and Zephir let the boy scratch at his chest, his face. Surprised, Scarko noticed blood from one of the scratches on Zephir’s muscled body, right below his neck.