by M. L. Greye
His laughs turned into sputtering coughs, and he fell backwards onto the rocks. She twisted, staring down at him. His eyes landed on the moon above them, and his laughing stopped. He looked stunned to see it, as if he hadn’t expected it to be there.
After a moment, he said, “It’s not that sort of dance, either, Emry.” He moved a hand behind his head, his gaze still on the moon as he laid there on his back.
“Do you like what you see?” Emry mused.
Declan’s gaze shifted to her, and this time the smile he gave her was real. “I do.”
An unfamiliar warmth spread through her, and she found herself smiling back at him.
And maybe it was the way he looked at her, or that they were alone in the moonlight, but she smirked and said, “Good. You’re free to come back and admire me whenever you wish.”
His smile faded, and his face took on that shuttered look again. “Free,” he repeated softly. “If only that were true.”
Emry frowned, but just when she opened her mouth to ask what he meant, clouds covered the moon, casting the riverbank into darkness. She glanced up at the sky for no more than a second. Yet, when she turned back to Declan, he was gone.
:::::
“Destroy the Blue,” Simon muttered to Declan, leaning in closer – as if they were friends rather than taskmaster and slave. “I have a bet to win.”
Declan curled his upper lip into a smug sneer, rather than one of disgust. He wanted to recoil back from Simon’s order – from him standing so close. It was revulsion that rolled through him and not the desire to please his master. Yet, he still said, “With pleasure.”
He wanted the Back Rubes to think he enjoyed beating the less fortunate – the weak. If they assumed he liked what he did then they wouldn’t look too closely at where he hurt them. Because he did the same thing to every person he fought.
Fiona stepped onto the round, rolling her shoulders. She was in a new tunic Declan had never seen her wear. He knew she’d been in a tent now for a couple months, but she didn’t seem too eager to upgrade. Her breath billowed around her in hot puffs as she brushed back her white blonde hair with one hand.
After about a week in the camp, she’d chopped off her hair to her chin. It’d since grown an inch or two. She usually held it back with a wide swath of cloth tied at the base of her neck. Not today, though.
Declan approached her with that dark grin plastered on his face. Fiona only frowned. They were friends. But there was no such thing as friends on a round in this camp. At least, not when the Back Rubes were watching.
Simon had Declan and Rand fighting with blades almost everyday now, telling them to make each other bleed. Rand had yet to win. He’d managed to scratch Declan’s side the other day, since Declan still had yet to earn the leathered armor Rand wore. But then, Declan had sliced Rand’s shin, winning the match. Rand was still limping around. Simon knew Fiona could take Declan in staffs any day, so for them to duel … Fiona’s Main must had riled up Simon to get Declan to duel Fiona.
Fiona’s Main shouted for them to begin, and Declan hesitated for just a heartbeat, analyzing what she did first. He’d never faced her ability to ability before. From facing her at staffs, he knew she was nimble and flexible and quick. And creative.
She closed her eyes for half a second, when she opened them again her pupils had widened into large orbs – like fish eyes. Water filled the round, coming up to Declan’s waist, but contained to just the round. She’d done it to slow him down – well, somewhat. Declan tapped his speed as she appeared in front of him – moving fast through the water.
Her fist connected with his jaw, and his head reared back from the blow. He dodged her next swing at his gut and jumped back from a kick to his head. She meant this duel to be literal hand to hand combat. In a pool of icy water. Declan gritted his teeth, ignoring his throbbing jaw and swung a clean one-two at her face. But she’d dropped beneath the surface of the water so swiftly he missed. The water had swallowed her up at Teal speed.
A sharp kick to his side had him swiveling around with a growl. Fiona – above the water once more – jabbed for his shoulder, but Declan twisted just barely out of the way.
Pushing himself into that abnormal speed range he’d been delving into for months now, Declan swung at her head again. His fist hit her cheek, and she flew backwards beneath the water. He made to step towards her, but she’d somehow already recovered because her leg swiped his ankles, causing him to fall backward beneath the water’s surface. The moment his head went under, he was pushed flat onto the round. Fiona floated in the limited space above him – still fully immersed beneath the water.
He stared up at her wide-eyed. Did she mean to try to drown him? He went to push himself up, but she laid a hand on his chest. “Hold back,” she said through the water, as if it were air instead. His face must have shown his confusion because she said, “Do not push yourself. Hold back so your Main won’t know your limit.”
Declan was running out of air so he jerked upright above the surface, swatting her out of the way. He came up sputtering. Fiona wrapped her arms around his legs, and he knew she meant to drag him under again. Her strength lay beneath the surface – but Declan’s was on land. He couldn’t go beneath again.
Letting his speed flow through him, he grabbed Fiona by the short strands of her hair and yanked her above the water. He then swung his free fist into her jaw, sending her flying backwards again, but this time beyond the round’s border. She landed on top of her Main, just as Declan had intended – to infuriate the man who probably had bragged to Simon, making Declan fight her in the first place.
Fiona and her cursing Main collapsed into a pile of wet limbs on the frozen ground. The water instantly receded, as if draining into the round itself.
Declan shook out his hair with one hand, spraying water, as Simon grinned at him. “For that, Sharpe, you can go pick yourself up a leathered top.”
“For that?” Declan’s gaze snapped up. He was being offered his first article of armor.
Simon flashed his teeth. “For sending Pite to the ground,” he barked out a laugh. Pite was Fiona’s Main.
Declan only nodded. He needed to change out of his now icy clothes. He tossed a glance at Fiona. A Ruby was seeing to the cut in her eyebrow Declan had given her. Fiona felt his gaze.
She glanced up, frowning. Not at what he’d done to her – Declan knew she knew it was the way life was in the camp. It was something else … maybe from what she’d said under the water. He turned his back on her and headed to his A-frame to change into dry clothes.
Fifteen minutes later, he went to claim his new armor from the infirmary. Whenever anyone won something it was claimed there. The Ruby there told him to trade in his tunic he had on. Declan blinked but pulled it over his head, subjecting his bare chest and back to the icy air. He could feel the goosebumps prickling his skin as the man handed back a thick, long-sleeved, black shirt. Declan yanked that on, and then the Ruby extended a short-sleeved, tufted leather shirt, also black.
Over the front and back it was padded, stitched into diamond shapes. It fit snugly around him, but was flexible – moving with him. Most importantly, it was warm. Declan couldn’t help but feel proud of it. The armor was another status symbol in the camp. Only the strongest wore armor.
Finished with the exchange, Declan twined his way through the tents to Fiona’s. Without any sort of greeting, Declan slipped inside. It was normal for the Stolen to slip in and out of tents and A-frames unannounced. Modesty and privacy were self-enforced.
He was surprised to find Rand already there, spreading some sort of paste over the half-healed bruises lining her jaw. Rand glanced over his shoulder at Declan before continuing his work. “You got her good.”
Declan rubbed a hand over his own jaw where she’d hit him. The pain had lessened, but a look in his mirror had shown him he’d gained a bruise himself. Not enough that a Ruby would do anything to fix it, though. “Did she tell you she tried to drown me?”
Fion
a snorted. “Not my fault you can’t hold your breath.”
Rand chuckled, and Declan asked the question that had dragged him into her tent in the first place, “What did you mean by holding back?”
Back Rubes held them captive by drinking their blood. They could feel when they grew stronger or when they weren’t trying – they could find them anywhere. It was like the blood of the Stolen was a tether through the world.
Fiona eyed Declan. “Hold back on how much you try.”
“And gain the wrath of the Back Rubes?” Rand snorted, dropping his hands from her face as he finished with the paste.
She leaned back onto one hand, putting some distance between her and Rand. “You can still improve while holding back.”
“How?” Declan demanded.
“The same way I do,” she retorted. “Push yourself beyond what is expected. Become the one testing your own abilities, and when you know you could do more, hold back. Give them the bare minimum.”
“Why?” Rand raised an eyebrow. “Why risk it?”
“So you escape, obviously.”
Rand snorted, and Declan frowned, remembering his first conversation with the Blue. “The only way to escape would be to kill our Mains.”
Fiona sneered, her pasted bruise scrunching up, “What do you think I’ve been planning since I got here?”
Declan experimented the next week with just how much he could hold back. He ran at varying speeds, beginning with going barely slower, then increasing it from there in small increments. He took a little longer to defeat his opponents. Let a few of them land a punch or some sort of injury.
It all seemed to be working fine until Simon told Declan he’d been lazy for too long that week and had to duel Rand. Declan had never fought Rand ability to ability before.
He had a panicked memory of Naria’s squished head flash through his mind. He didn’t want to get like that with Rand. Not that Rand would let it – Rand was a far better warrior than Naria had ever been. And stronger. No, Declan wasn’t expected to win this duel. It helped his goal to hold back, but then Simon offered him the leathered pants to match his shirt if he won.
Just like that Declan’s resolve to let himself lose dissolved.
Rand saw it in his eyes, too, because he frowned. His taunting sneer slipping momentarily. Sadness and understanding filling them.
One look at Rand’s eyes and Declan realized he’d rather lose on purpose than subject his friend to the possibility of death. A pair of pants wasn’t worth a life. No matter how Rand might wish for an escape from this camp.
Once on the round, Declan tapped his speed as Rand called out the wind, turning the air above the clay into a vortex of icy air. But Declan was faster than Rand’s growing storm. He blurred across the round and kicked Rand in the gut with both feet, sending both of them backwards.
Rand called down lightning into his palm. It ricocheted off his hand toward Declan, who had to twist to one side to avoid it as Rand jumped to his feet from his back, kicking his legs out to propel him upward.
Declan watched him. He moved so slowly. Declan realized with a start just how fast he really had become. He’d thought Rand to be fast, but as Declan watched him step towards him, he saw countless openings that Rand would never see coming.
Somehow, during the past few months, Declan had become so unbelievably fast there would be no stopping him … He could beat Rand, and he wouldn’t even have to tap his full strength.
With a growl at Rand, Declan dove toward him. Before sliding to a stop, he gripped onto Rand’s forearms and twisted – so hard he could feel they were on the verge of breaking. He paused when he realized if he yanked hard enough at his Teal speed, he could rip out his friend’s arms, and Simon wouldn’t be able to stop him.
That was why Kearns hadn’t stopped him with Naria. She hadn’t seen him move. Worse yet, she hadn’t felt him move.
Somewhere in the back of Declan’s mind something finally clicked into place. Like the last piece of a jigsaw puzzle. How had he not figured it out sooner? It was the reason why Teals were so tricky to control.
Advanced Teals – Stolen Teals – were too fast for Back Rubes to follow their movements. It was only when they hesitated that the Back Rubes were able to catch up. To notice what their Teals had done.
The revelation nearly sent Declan stumbling backwards. He was faster than the Back Rubes. Were they aware of the fact? Kearns and Simon had to suspect.
Hold back.
Fiona’s words rang through his head as he saw Rand’s eyes begin to widen. Because Declan had paused, he now saw what Declan had done. But Declan didn’t want Simon to notice he’d stopped to save Rand from injury – to feel his hesitation.
Rand had already thought the same thing. He pulled back his arms and swung one fist toward Declan’s side. Declan easily sidestepped it.
As Rand flung his body into a roundhouse kick that he again dodged, Declan realized his friend had already come to the same conclusion he had – Declan was faster than the Back Rubes.
Yet as Rand straightened, his gaze flicked to Declan’s. A silent request written in them. Declan winced. So much for those pants. He dipped his head, barely.
It was enough of an answer for Rand. It was time to end their duel. Raising one hand above his head, Rand called down another bolt of lightning and tossed it at Declan. He swiveled out of the way, but not quite fast enough.
Rand’s lightning seared into Declan’s shoulder, and Declan felt like fire was shooting through his veins. He screamed and swung out his leg, causing Rand to fall forward.
“Stop!” Simon bellowed as Rand crashed on top of Declan.
He hardly noticed. His body had broken into a sweat, and the muscles in his arms kept twitching uncontrollably. Rand rolled to the side and up onto his feet, brushing himself off.
“Better luck next time, Teal,” he smirked at Declan and walked off the round as a Ruby rushed to Declan.
As the Ruby relieved some of his pain and ceased the twitching, Declan began to tremble. Not from his injuries, but from what he’d just learned about himself. And that Rand knew it, too.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Glavenryl in the winter was miserable. It was as cold as the Kruth Mountains, but with a wind chill. In a region that was mild in the summer with cool, refreshing breezes, winter was downright unbearable. The wind was the worst. It was like having her skin sheared off with a blade made of ice while being encased in ice from a sadistic Pale at the same time. Emry had never been so cold in her life.
In the Summer, Glavenryl was all lush, green meadows of tall grass gently bending in a breeze. In the winter, it was just white and windy. She had no idea how this was the region where the bronze-eyed came from. Pale-eyed would have been much more accurate.
Her attire here matched that of Kruth but with even more fur. She still had the fur-lined leggings and boots, but beneath her wool tunics, she wore a long-sleeved under-tunic that was basically an animal skin turned inside out – the soft, thick fur brushing against her skin. She also wore a fur hat and a thick woven scarf in varying shades of red – the pigment Glavs produced for the rest of Enlennd, made from the terrseberries found only on their plains. Thick leather gloves covered her hands.
The buildings in Glavenryl were made of mud and straw, forming circular huts. Bleached white from the sun, they had roofs of clay tiles which had also been baked by the sun. Some were expansive – constructed of many connected huts, forming very large homes or offices or shops. Yet, most huts were simple with only a few connecting huts – one for a main living space, one for a kitchen, and one for each bedroom, depending on how many were in each family.
In the summer, the mud walls kept the huts nice and cool. In the winter, a blazing never-ending fire was required in each hut to make it bearable. The fires were contained in cast-iron stoves with long metal pipes for chimneys. The materials for the stoves had to be imported. How many stoves one had was correlated to the amount of wealth one possessed. The
compound belonging to her family had no shortage of stoves, but Emry was still constantly freezing.
In Glavenryl, land wasn’t an issue. Large collections of huts were common. Her family’s compound consisted of four clusters of four huts each. One cluster was a main living room and three adjoining bedrooms, which was where Emry’s security detail stayed. Another cluster was the Glav version of stables. The third cluster was a massive kitchen with a small adjoining living space and two connecting bedrooms for the servants. Then, the final cluster was Emry’s actual lodgings. There was a very small kitchen and maid’s room in one, where Fanny stayed, a cozy main living space, and then two adjoining bedrooms. Bathing rooms were connected to every bedroom hut, but those weren’t counted as actual huts in Glavenryl.
With all the huts being white, the clay roofs being gray, and the drifts of snow everywhere being white, the only pops of color were the red clothes Glavs wore.
Their food came from animals they kept in stables and whatever a local Green grew and sold. Greens were priceless in Glavenryl in the winter. It was the only way to get fresh produce.
The bright colored bell peppers and carrots on her plate came from a local Green. Emry skewered a steaming cooked carrot with a fork and bit into it, savoring its heat. She was eating her lunch alone for once. Fanny had been eating lunch with her since they’d arrived in Glavenryl a week before, but she’d decided to brave the wind and go with the cook to the local market – which was something to behold in its own right.
The market was a collection of merchant huts all joined together. Each hut had a door to the outside so one could go straight to a certain shop or wander between them without ever stepping outside. In the summer, the doors had all stayed open to the elements, but now in the winter, they were shut tight.
Oranges were a commodity. Glav parents were ecstatic if they had any orange-eyed because they’d have free heating. When their child became an adult, the child would never run out of work – at least not in Glavenryl, where summers were short and winters long. Cit would be well-loved here, if she ever decided to step out of Breccan.