Fallen Warrior (Fallen Trilogy book 3)

by Williams, Tess

  I narrowed, and marched off directly in the route of the largest training platforms. The first person I passed—a Warrior headed in the opposite direction—I asked whether he knew if there was any sort of special training going on today. He replied that he didn't, but that he'd heard quite a bit of noise coming from the south-eastern platform.

  I moved off towards it, still frowning, especially once I heard the sounds for myself. And it wasn't just that, there were Warriors, some Yanartians even, crowded around the area. The same amount that might usually be expected to be training there, or eating on the pavilion, only they weren't; they were all watching something on the platform. Interspersed with them were chimera, and two I noticed straight-away. Yurei and Luffie, their attention equally focused on the spectacle, which was strange, because they didn't usually find the same things interesting.

  Still pushing my way forward, I caught sight of Minstrel, standing half as short as everyone else, lifting himself higher by mounting up the railing.

  I reached him, touching his shoulder straight away. "Minstrel, what's all the fuss?" I asked, half-lightly, shifting in beside him as I spoke, and then looking out at the platform.

  I blinked a few times, to make sure I was seeing properly; then my light expression and any sort of light feeling I'd been experiencing fell off.

  The platform was almost completely abandoned. There were some groups of trainees in the corners, but they'd frozen to watch the two men that were anything but still. One was dressed in a Warrior's uniform, with brown hair, and his mace switched out for a plain Cirali sword. The other was dressed in black from head to foot, wielding the same sort of sword, with his decided way of moving. And the both of them were striking out against each other. I couldn't see Cole of course, but from how red and breathless Gael appeared, I could only guess that they'd been at it for a while; and if I suspected they'd kept to the center of the platform I was wrong. Even as I watched, Cole was forced backwards, almost to the edge of the rink, so that I held my breath as he deftly hopped backwards up a crate, then on to land on the railing; a move which Gael then copied, until the both of them were balancing on it precariously, slashing back and forth with the ocean a drop beside them.

  I would have liked to pretend that they were only practicing, but the energy of their strikes made this difficult. I had hardly seen such complex footwork from either of them before, and worst of all, they didn't look as if they planned to stop. In fact, I wasn't even sure they noticed anything else going on around them.

  I looked to Luffie, who was sending me something about how I should have listened to her warning that I wouldn't like it. While Yurei was also having her add that Gael had no plans of killing Cole.

  I doubted that Cole had any plans of killing Gael either. But I still frowned as I turned back to watching them.

  I was sure I'd seen quite enough of fighting for one lifetime.

  CYRIC:

  I really hoped that Gael wasn't exemplary of the battle prowess that the Cirali Warriors possessed, because if he was, we might just as well quit the war ahead of time. I could have beaten him half-asleep. Did everyone assume it was just as easy to fight in Kanthian robes—with one's peripheral vision all cut-off—as it was to fight in armor? It wasn't. And yet he still couldn't get the better of me. I'd realized about ten minutes in that I could beat him if I wanted; if I only allowed myself to get angry enough, but I had no desire to. I was enjoying this opportunity.

  Who would have guessed that simple, thick-haired, Gael would have suggested that we fight? And then shown himself so quickly eager to do so? But he had, and he still was. And where he'd started out smiling every so often, I could tell I was beginning to wear on him. Then poor, second-ranked Gael would be too tired to be sharing thoughts with anybody.

  A crowd had slowly gathered around to watch us; by now it was large, and not at all something I was unaccustomed to. In fact it felt distinctly familiar. Only the Yanartian crowds didn't cheer or call out for killing blows so often, and there weren't any handmaidens in the lot— but it still got my pulse racing, and made the idea of losing impossible. Maybe I was just Cole the Kanthian. Maybe I didn't look great, or talk great, or have my own rank. But I was still the best fighter. Even in Shaundakul, I'd had that. I would always be the best fighter.

  I jumped down from the railing, and backed up into the platform. Gael did the same, but he was much slower, getting exhausted, and I had a moment to see that Ellia was now one among the crowd. Once I'd ducked a blow from Gael, I glanced at her again. I wanted her to be smiling, or at least looking impressed, but she wasn't; she was frowning. Typical Ellia. Was I surprised? No. I'd seen that face a hundred times over.

  She just didn't understand. Maybe women couldn't. Gael even got it after all, didn't he? What good would I be to her if I couldn't even prove I was good enough to beat this one Warrior? I went on striking against Gael, all the more vigorously, but I heard Ellia's voice in the back of my head.

  Why must you get so angry about it, Cyric? Who cares what Slark says about you, Cyric. I like you, Cyric. Just ignore him, Cyric.

  I scoffed, landing a hard swing that forced Gael to duck back, but then I looked at her again. She was still frowning, still with her brow dipped. This time I noticed Minstrel standing beside her. He was frowning too, but he wasn't watching me. He was looking at her.

  I narrowed, and then I almost got side-swiped by Gael and had to jump back, but by then I didn't need to see Minstrel's expression anymore or Ellia's. I understood what it all meant in an instant.

  He was frowning because Ellia was frowning. Ellia was frowning because she was unhappy. She was unhappy because she didn't like what she was seeing; it was making her unhappy. I was making her unhappy.

  I remembered what Minstrel had tried to tell me about rhyming and smiling and all of that, and I hadn't understood it then, and I'd given up, but now it made perfect sense. It was simple really.

  This battle was making Ellia unhappy. Whether there were good reasons for it, whether I was the best fighter or not, or who had started it, or whether I should have been expected to refuse or not—what did any of that matter when I was taking part in something that was making her unhappy? And I didn't have to. I could do just the opposite instead. I could do like Minstrel did, without rhymes or lyres or any of that, if I only just....

  I looked back at Gael, grimacing.

  He was swiping with his sword, and I'd spent most the last minute losing ground because my mind had been so occupied. He really wasn't a terrible fighter. He was probably one of the best on Yanartas, as good as any Warrior I'd faced as an Akadian, but I could still beat him. I could still beat him so easily.

  My grimace turned absolutely full, then I looked back once more at Ellia's face, then I held out my sword for a block, my grip loose.

  With a loud ring Gael struck, and my weapon took off into the air then landed on the platform, clattering as it skated across the wood. By the time I looked back at Gael, his sword was at my neck. He was panting, hair hanging in his face, while I hardly kept my breaths calm myself. If I'd thought that my body had rebuffed me for misdirecting my bowshot, now it was viciously angry; like a swelling in my chest, shooting through my veins; it had almost kept me from abandoning the fight altogether.

  Gael wasn't smiling as I'd expected, when he moved his blade back from me.

  The surrounding Yanartians were clapping, not anything so loud as what would have followed a battle in Akadia, just scattered acknowledgment; but they were clearly pleased one of their own had won. I looked for Ellia, but I couldn't see her.

  "That was some sort of fighting," Gael said. "I didn't for a second think it would go on that long. Is swordplay so common in Kanth?" He said all of this out of breath, but likewise incredulous.

  "Hand-fighting," I replied; honestly, seeing as there was no further point in posturing. He'd won. I'd lost. If he was as simple as I was, we both knew what it meant.

  "It must be all the climbing," he said, sti
ll disbelieving. "I didn't think you were tiring at all. You have forests there don't you?"

  I shrugged confirmation.

  He nodded. "The climbing then. When I train, I always have the short-winded Warriors practice it. But maybe I'll have to join them. For a while, I thought..." He cut off, smiling at first, but then frowning, looking at my hand, then looking at my sword.

  I was swallowing, still settling my breaths, when two chimera landed beside us. One Yurei, the other Luffie, and beside the latter Ellia came marching up, stopping with her hand on Luffie's neck.

  "Well, that was some display," she said, not looking happy at all. So much so that I narrowed. I stopped the fighting, didn't I? Be happy, Ellia.

  Gael's head jerked back in her direction. He cleared his throat.

  "Don't you have warriors to be training?" she put to him. "Should you really be spending your time sparring?"

  Gael swallowed, then glanced at Yurei, while Luffie was flicking her tail haughtily, so that I was sure there was an entire secret conversation going on between the four of them. From the expression on Gael's face, I didn't think that I should envy him.

  "I don't care why you did it," Ellia said, as if arguing with something. "You both stopped up the whole platform from practicing. Are we in a war, or aren't we?" This time she turned a glare on me as well.

  "I see you've already grown bored with helping me train. You're welcome to go back down with the other recruits if I'm too dull for you."

  "Please don't think that, princess," I argued immediately. "That wasn't it at all. Gael just offered to—"

  "You're going to blame Gael now?" she broke in, before I could assure her that we'd never meant to hurt each other.

  I shook my head. "No. It was my fault. I should have known you wouldn't like it. I shouldn't have done it. I'm sorry."

  These words sort of spilled out all on their own—and I hardly kept from adding "Ellia" at the end. But there was so much more than that I wished I could have said. That I should have seen that I was making her unhappy all those times before when I'd lost my temper with Slark. That I should have seen that it was making her unhappy that I'd never asked her to dance. Just dance, that simple, regardless of what it meant. Minstrel shouldn't have been the one to think of this first; I should have.

  Ellia had stopped short at my apology; she was staring at me, and now Gael was as well. And as if that wasn't enough, their two chimera were too.

  Ellia cleared her throat, while Gael narrowed, on my sword again, looking between it and me and Ellia.

  "It has nothing to do with whether I would like it or not," Ellia retorted. "It has to do with the training, and...."

  "Ellia," Gael interrupted a hand to her arm.

  She looked over at him with a still viscous expression, but he appeared so calm and serious, that for a moment, I thought he was going to tell her I'd given up the fight, which, from his behavior, I had a feeling he might have realized. Instead he nodded his head over to my arm. "I think Cole needs to be taken to the healers. Maybe you could show him there, then finish up yelling at him."

  Ellia narrowed, then she looked where Gael had nodded. I did the same. I hadn't realized before, but Gael actually had gotten a hit in on me. The cloth of my robes was slit across my forearm, and it was wet with blood underneath.

  Ellia's chest lifted; she appeared all the angrier.

  "I'm fine," I dismissed, covering it up.

  "That's just perfect, Gael," she snapped, turning on him.

  Gael put his hands up apologetically.

  "Why don't you go on and share you're new tactics with Lucian. We can make sure every recruit's had the chance to get wounded before they've even gotten a chance to fight."

  Gael took a breath, looking as if he wanted to argue, but he just pointed at me. "That's fine. I'll do that. But don't you think?..."

  Ellia glanced my direction. And then she scowled at Gael. "We'll see how you feel the next time Yurei wants Luffie to go up to the mountain. She'll stay with me, and he'll pester you for it. Then you'll think twice before you decide to worry over what you shouldn't." Ellia turned her glare on me, gave one sharp gesture that I should follow her, then spun around and stalked off. Luffie tilted up her head as if to validate Ellia's words, then marched off after her owner.

  Yurei set his eyes on Gael and gave a long, displeased, exhale.

  Gael frowned, then glanced at me and nodded his head in Ellia's direction, as if he'd be personally offended if I didn't follow her.

  "Cole," I heard repeated, some yards ahead.

  I wasn't quite sure of all that had just happened, but seeing as Ellia was calling for me, there weren't a lot of options. As Gael moved off to put away our swords, I raced after her. She'd already made it off the platform and with Luffie just beside her I couldn't do much besides trail them, but as soon as I got close, Luffie glanced back, looked me up and down, glanced at Ellia, then gave a gruff, snort, shifting out of the way and nodding her head up towards her owner. What? was everyone nodding me on all of the sudden?

  I slipped up past her anyways, bowing my head, and when I got to Ellia, I opened my mouth to speak.

  "No. I won't be letting you train with me today, if that's what you were going to ask."

  "I wasn't going to ask that," I argued, setting aside the fact that I had no plans of not training with her, "I was going to apologize..."

  "Again?" she almost interrupted, glancing over at me for the first time, but not pausing in her march. "Cole, maybe someone should tell you that if you're going to be so very sorry about doing something that you feel you have to apologize for it dozens of times over, that it would be better if you'd avoided doing it in the first place."

  "I think that that would be very good advice for me, princess.... Maybe better than you could guess."

  She stopped short to look at me.

  I craned back a little, chiding myself for saying that last bit. It had been ever since we'd come back from Karatel, that such things just came out when I didn't mean for them too. She'd spoken to me about Cyric, then I'd had to leave for the battle. When I'd gotten there so quickly, and after the way I'd behaved in her room, I'd thought she would probably guess who I was.

  But she hadn't. Then everything had happened with Gael... I was starting to wonder whether she didn't want to find out I was me. Maybe she didn't hate Cyric, but that didn't mean that she wanted me to be alive.

  No. It was just as I'd thought myself, back with Silos. I'd forgotten. Dying, that was what I'd deserved; it was the only thing if any that could absolve me. Maybe it worked the same way in her mind. She wasn't angry with me anymore—because I died. If I hadn't, then what would it matter that I did a few good things after so many bad? She would have to hate me again. And if I told her now? She'd be even angrier.

  "Is this the part where you go on about all the mistakes you've made?" she snapped. "You know, Cole, this might come as a surprise, but you make that pretty obvious just by the way you behave. Do you think I haven't guessed that you think you've messed up horridly in the years before you came here? In Kanth? Or wherever you've been? I have. What's the point about it. Everyone makes mistakes. I've done a thousand things wrong."

  I shook my head. "No, you haven't."

  Ellia took a breath. "You don't know anything about me. I have."

  "You haven't."

  "Yes, I have."

  "I do know you. You told me things. You haven't."

  "Cole—" Ellia took another breath, lifting up with her whole body, as if she were about to unleash a storm of shouting on me. But instead she just pressed her lips, then let it all out in a huff. "Oh, I have work to do. You're making everything impossibly difficult today, Cole. I'll let you walk yourself to the healers. You see that left bridge, just follow it until you reach the round cabin. Please, don't come for training later."

  "I don't need to go see the healers," I argued, "It's just a scratch."

  "It doesn't matter whether it's a scratch or what. It's bled
. Are you telling me that you're going to leave it like that all day?"

  "I have more clothes. I'll change. Then I'll come back to help you train."

  "I don't want you to help me train."

  "Why not?"

  "Because," she started exasperated, then she glanced between Luffie and me and let the rest out in a rush. "I'm not going to train at all today, alright? I already told Gael. Now will you just go to the healers."

  "I made you that upset?" I asked.

  She rolled her eyes, and spun on her heel to leave. I stopped her with a hand to her arm.

  "Where are you going instead, then?"

  "Cole, it's not you," she said. "You didn't make me upset. It doesn't have anything to do about you. You know when I was younger, I didn't mind sparring. I thought it was thrilling. Probably any normal princess would have liked to watch you fight. You didn't do anything wrong."

  "I did if I upset you."

  "Oh, you say the worst things, Cole!"

  She almost growled these words, while I retraced mine, wondering what had been wrong with what I'd said. If I was trying to make her happy, since I'd first begun, I'd despaired at it.

  And now she was marching off. I glanced at Luffie, maybe waiting for another nod, but she only let out a snort, then turned around, taking off into the air after only a few seconds as if she had somewhere to be.

  I gripped my jaw, then caught up to Ellia.

  "Can I come if I don't talk?" I asked her.

  She scowled to see that I had followed her, and it only turned more pronounced at my words. "I hate it when people don't speak. What could be more boring?"