Challenges

by Sharon Green

  So he just sat back and watched the scenery from the coach window. They now traveled in a familiar direction, which was into the city and toward the business district. Their first place of practice lay in this direction, and when they finally reached their destination it wasn’t far beyond the practice buildings.

  The stone edifice they stopped near had a large rendering of the Earth magic symbol, and broad slate steps led up to oversized double doors which stood open. A rather large number of people streamed up those steps, but none of them looked like members of the nobility. They were ordinary people, then, but what were they doing here?

  “Come on,” Meerk said, moving to the coach door and starting to get out. “It ain’t far, an’ you won’t even hafta go in if you don’t want.”

  Lorand got out and helped Tamrissa down, and then they followed Meerk up the broad slate steps. The husky man had stopped in front of a glass-covered placard near the open doors, and when they joined him Lorand felt shocked. The placard announced that a series of challenges for the position of High Practitioner in Earth magic would take place this morning, and a list of five names appeared under the heading of challengers. The second name on the list was Hattial Riven.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  “That must be what he meant the last time he was at the house,” Tamrissa said softly when she saw the name. “He insisted he was going to be taking the test again, but I don’t understand why this would be happening. If he’s only a Middle talent, how can he challenge for a High position?”

  “He can do it if he’s allowed—and encouraged—to do it,” Lorand replied in a growl very much like Meerk’s. “And a good reason for doing those things with him is that he can’t possibly unseat the Seated High. You don’t see my name on that list, do you? I’ll bet everything I own that the other four challengers are also no stronger than Middles.”

  “An’ prob’ly think they can do it, like Shorty did,” Meerk added sourly. “Always knew them sons wus pullin’ somethin’ with these challenges, but never could figure out what. Now I know.”

  “And I’ve got to try to talk to Hat,” Lorand decided aloud, reaching into his pouch for the two gold dins he’d prepared in advance. “You have my thanks for your help, Dom Meerk, and now you have the gold I promised you. You were right to think I would never believe this if you told me about it, but now I have to believe. Your part is over, but mine is just starting.”

  Lorand expected the husky man to take the gold and leave, but Meerk eyed him while weighing the gold in one hand, then he nodded in a way that said he’d made up his mind about something.

  “You’re okay, jobby,” Meerk pronounced, putting the coins into his own pouch. “Figured I’d walk away soon’s I had the dins, but now I think I’ll hang around fer awhile. Wouldn’t mind seein’ what happens, even if Shorty don’t talk t’ya. An’ he prob’ly won’t.”

  Lorand knew the man was almost certainly right, but he still had to try. There was a time when Hat had listened to reason, and if he’d sobered up, the time might come again. He nodded his thanks to Meerk, gave Tamrissa his arm, then led the way into the building.

  Most of the people streaming inside were heading for a number of stairways on the right, and Lorand could see more people coming inside from an entrance on the opposite side of the building. Three closed doors to the left, at intervals along the wall, had guards standing beside them. Even as Lorand watched, a man and woman approached the door in the middle and a man alone went to the door on the far end. All three people were dressed slightly better than the ones going to the stairs, and the man at the middle door handed something to the guard before he and the woman were admitted.

  “It looks like those who are willing to pay get the better viewing area,” Lorand murmured to Tamrissa. “I have two more gold dins with me, but getting in can’t cost that much. How do I ask for change?”

  “Since it’s probably a bribe rather than an admission charge, I have no idea,” Tamrissa murmured back, her lovely eyes dancing with laughter. “I’ve never asked for change when bribing someone. Why don’t you try showing the guard your bracelet instead? If it doesn’t get us in, we can worry about getting change then.”

  Lorand glanced at his left wrist in surprise, having completely forgotten about his master’s bracelet. It had almost cost him his life to earn it, but the object itself had been of no use whatsoever. That might not change, but at least it was worth a try. So he led Tamrissa over to the nearest door, and then held out his wrist.

  The guard did the first actual double-take Lorand had ever seen. He glanced at the bracelet with complete disinterest, then jerked his head back to take a real look at it. The bracelet was made up of tiny replicas of the Earth magic symbol cast in silver, each circle attached to the ones on either side by even smaller links. Tamrissa’s bracelet showed the symbol for Fire magic, of course, but hers wasn’t given full scrutiny by the guard. The man’s glance simply took in the presence of a bracelet on her wrist as well, and then he was opening the door with a nervous bow.

  “Thank you,” Lorand said with quiet dignity, fighting not to grin with boyish triumph. “And that gentleman is also with us.”

  After indicating Meerk with a nod, Lorand walked through the opened door. The guard hadn’t looked at all surprised that Meerk was with them, which probably meant he thought Meerk was their servant. Well, the mistaken impression wasn’t likely to do any of them harm.

  “Tamrissa, that was brilliant,” Lorand whispered as he looked around at the comfortable chairs lined up in rows behind a low railing in the center of the room. More than a few of the chairs were occupied, but most stood empty. “How did you think of the idea?”

  “There was a man using the door on the end, and he didn’t pay anything,” Tamrissa responded in a matching whisper. “The guard simply bowed and opened the door, so he probably recognized the man. That made me think certain people were allowed in without having to pay, and who better to fall into that category than a proven master of the aspect?”

  Her cheeks were faintly pink with embarrassed excitement, which was one indication that she no longer touched the power. Last night her perfect skin hadn’t colored at all no matter what she said, but that wasn’t the time to remember about last night. Tamrissa alone was a stunning beauty, but Tamrissa touching the power was all but irresistible…

  Lorand put that thought aside for later, since they were now approaching the chairs closest to the railing. Beyond the railing was a large square area, most of it taken up by a low dais, also in a square. Between the dais and the railing was a single line of chairs, which went all the way around the floor on three sides. The fourth side, the one directly opposite to where they now stood, held a large, throne-like seat with no other chairs on the floor behind its section of dais.

  “Let’s sit here,” Tamrissa murmured, gesturing to three seats right near the railing. “The audience seems to be concentrated on this side, but not quite this close. I wonder if that means anything.”

  “It probably means we can expect sloppy magic-handling,” Lorand replied, following her to the seats. “If the challenger stands at this end and the Seated High throws something he can’t handle, there could be considerable spillover. But if we’re right about this contest, it shouldn’t be anything I can’t handle.”

  She nodded to acknowledge that as she sat to Lorand’s right, and Meerk, to the left, also nodded. Lorand had made sure to let Meerk hear the reassurance as well, and the man had accepted it as unquestioningly as Tamrissa. It was nice that the two of them accepted his word so readily, but the realization made Lorand faintly uneasy. If something should happen and he failed them…

  But failing people relying on him was out of the question for Lorand, so he pushed his doubts aside and occupied his mind with looking about a bit more. The second story was a gallery, and the section directly above where they sat was impossible to see. The rest of it, however, seemed much more populated than the ground floor area, and more people arrived u
p there all the time.

  A number of uneventful minutes passed, giving Lorand more than enough time to grow impatient. Considering the number of people in the gallery the challenge should already have started, but the participants hadn’t even appeared yet. Just as Lorand thought that, a door opened in the wall to the left, beyond the low railing. Five people dressed all in white, four men and a woman, filed through the door before it was closed again behind them. A scattering of applause came from the gallery, but the five people did no more than glance up at their audience.

  “They all look terribly nervous,” Tamrissa observed in a low voice as the five people came toward the seats right in front of the place they sat. “And that looks like your friend, although I can barely recognize him now that he’s shaved and had a bath.”

  The sarcasm wasn’t as sharp as the words suggested, as Tamrissa was absolutely correct. Hat almost looked like his old self, and he even seemed to be sober. The small movements he made looked very familiar, showing as they did that Hat was nervous and trying to hide it. Lorand waited until the five people were almost directly in front of him, and then he stood up. That brought about the second double-take of the day, when Hat glanced at him then looked back sharply.

  “Lor, you came!” Hat exclaimed in a low voice, his face covered with a smile as he stepped closer. “I couldn’t send you word about my great good luck, but hoped against hope that you would make it here anyway. I’m sorry you didn’t qualify for this, but now we can say at least one of us did.”

  “What makes you think I didn’t qualify?” Lorand asked with a frown. “But more importantly, how did you qualify? When you failed the first test, they told you to go home.”

  “But I didn’t fail the first test,” Hat replied with a short laugh, no longer smiling. “You’re the one who failed, and you’ve been complaining about it ever since. Can’t you even be happy for me now, Lor, when I’m about to win what we’ve dreamed about for years?”

  For an instant Lorand was stunned, to hear Hat saying things that should have been his to say. It wasn’t as if Hat were still drunk, so how could he believe—! The thought broke off as Lorand realized that Hat had been lied to in some way that had convinced him completely. He wouldn’t have fought the lie, after all, not when he wanted so badly for it to be the truth…

  “Hat, listen to me,” Lorand said quickly and earnestly, raising his left wrist. “This master’s bracelet is proof that I didn’t fail, not the first test or any of the ones following. They lied to you because you’re meant to lose to the Seated High, who seems to prefer to face Middles rather than anyone stronger. You have to—”

  “No, that isn’t true!” Hat snapped, raising one hand as he turned his face away. “You’re trying to ruin my chance, but I refuse to let you do it! I’m going to win this thing, and no one—not even you—is going to stop me!”

  And with that he turned completely away, to walk to his place among the others and sit. He hadn’t looked directly at Lorand again, but Lorand knew him well enough to detect a faint uncertainty in his bearing. That he meant to ignore the uncertainty was also clear, but at least it was there.

  “Lorand, you’d better sit down now,” Tamrissa said after touching his arm. “The officials in charge ought to be here any minute, and we know they’ll believe you.”

  Yes, they certainly would. Lorand was reluctant to just leave things like that with Hat, but other than dragging the smaller man out bodily, there was nothing he could do to stop what was about to happen. Except maybe one thing…

  “What do you suppose they would do if I stood up and challenged their mighty High as soon as he appeared?” he asked Tamrissa in a murmur once he was seated again. “There are too many people here as witnesses for them to ignore the challenge, especially if I accuse them of rigging things by setting up a bunch of Middles. It would blow their little scheme wide open.”

  “Not really,” Tamrissa responded with a sad smile. “Their first step would be to have you arrested and dragged away, and then they would explain that you were despondent over having failed to qualify for the challenge in the usual way. So you lied to yourself and made things up, caused a scene and forced them to restrain you, and all because you were disappointed. They would be sad during the announcement, and everyone would understand.”

  “Yes, they probably would,” Lorand was forced to agree after taking a deep breath. “And I would be out of our group permanently as well. But there’s got to be something I can do. I can’t just sit here and watch Hat get knocked down and walked over.”

  “I agree that they’re taking advantage of him, but don’t make it sound as though he’s entirely innocent,” Tamrissa stated, disturbance in her lovely eyes. “If he’d gone home the way he should have, he wouldn’t have been around to be taken advantage of. All this is his own fault, Lorand, and I refuse to see you lost trying to save him from his own stupidity. Again. Don’t you think it’s time to let him grow up and take what he’s earned?”

  Lorand wanted to protest that he wasn’t keeping Hat from growing up, but the truth of the matter was that he—and most of their friends back home—usually had. No one had considered it right to let Hat be blamed for things, even when he was the only guilty one. He was the smallest among them, a bit younger than the average, and very “sensitive.” Hat’s mother had told them all about his sensitivity when they were quite young, and had asked for their help…

  Their help in standing between Hat and the reality of the world. He was the youngest child in his family, and for some reason his mother had been determined to let him get away with murder. Her pampering of him had always seemed harmless, but that was what had brought him to where he was today. It was the day Hat would finally grow up, and Lorand just hoped Hat would be able to survive it.

  The next few minutes passed in brooding, and then the door to the left opened again. An official wearing the ancient robes of the Earth magic practitioner—all browns and greens and reds—entered slowly and with great dignity. Behind him came a man dressed all in white, the same robes but without the color. There were half a dozen others behind the man in white, but he was the one who held everyone’s attention. And the people all around were getting to their feet, so Lorand and Tamrissa and Meerk did the same.

  “Now isn’t that strange,” Tamrissa murmured, and Lorand turned his head to see that she stood frowning at the man in white. “I know it isn’t the same person, but that man looks just like the noble who approached me after that supposed competition. He was the man who was there when I finally escaped from that very first test situation.”

  “Why—you’re absolutely right!” Lorand exclaimed low. He’d had the impression that the man looked familiar, but hadn’t been able to place him. “He is the one who was there after my own first test! Talk about your rigged challenges. They let him watch everyone who comes through, so he’ll know who he does and doesn’t want to face. That means some of these challengers may actually be potential Highs, but certainly the weakest available.”

  “That also means we’d probably be long thrown out if it weren’t a twenty-fifth year,” Tamrissa said after nodding her agreement. “Or at least we wouldn’t be here. What does happen to those who qualify but are too strong to take a chance with?”

  That was a question which had been asked before, but there was still no clear answer to it. Lorand joined everyone else in sitting down again once the man in white had taken his place on the throne-like chair, feeling dirtied by having accorded honors to a sneak-thief fraud. And the man’s smug, self-satisfied expression suggested he really enjoyed the farce—which was only to be expected…

  “The Highest Practitioner in Earth magic bids you welcome to this challenge period,” one of the entourage in colored robes announced from the center of the raised square, both arms held up for attention. “The Highest will defend his Seat from five mighty challengers, the first of whom may now approach and prepare himself.”

  A man in the midst of the challengers rose t
o his feet, then he stepped up to the edge of the dais. He had to wait along with everyone else while four large containers were brought in and positioned between him and the Seated High, and although the challenger stood quietly, it was impossible for Lorand to miss how nervous the man was. It was like watching a tightly coiled spring that was currently unmoving, but which might explode wildly in any direction without warning.

  “What’s in those containers?” Tamrissa asked in a whisper, possibly the same thing being asked in the murmur that undulated through the whole room.

  “The two end ones are filled with soil, the second from the left has chunks of wood, and the one next to it on its right has iron ingots,” Lorand answered at once, already having satisfied his own curiosity in the matter. “They’re obviously props for the challenge, but I wonder how many of those five poor souls can do more than handle the materials.”

  “What more c’n anybody do but handle ’em?” Meerk asked in the same low tones, his expression peculiar. “An’ how’d you know what was in them things? All I get’s a lot of … smeared confusion.”

  “That means you haven’t practiced with your ability often enough,” Lorand told the man. “Practice lets you recognize the makeup of a lot of materials, separating them out one by one from the ‘smear.’ But as far as doing more than simply handling things goes, I’m very much afraid that that depends on how much strength you can bring to bear. We’ll probably find out rather soon just how true that is.”

  Lorand nodded toward the dais, where the men who had brought in the containers were now filing out again. The challenger looked more tightly coiled than ever, but a faint and distant amusement played in the dark eyes of the Seated High. He knew which of them was stronger, and it was that sneering amusement which suddenly made up Lorand’s mind for him. The results of that challenge might be completely predetermined, but everything happening before then was still subject to change without notice, so to speak.