by C B Samet
“Merciful Monks,” I swore. I scrambled to pull on a breastplate and vambraces. Only one of a dozen breastplates fit me—the rest were too large. As I tugged on leather shoes two sizes too big, I tried to ignore the stench emanating from them. One of them was caked in dried mud, which may also have been mixed with dried blood. I tried not to inspect them too carefully.
When the doors began to open outward, I lunged for a sword. I managed to also snag a dagger for my left hand. I stepped into the arena. The two men who’d pulled the door open, rushed around and pulled it shut behind me.
As I looked up, blinking at the brightness, I gaped at the enormous stadium rising up around me. Three-hundred-and-sixty degrees of spectators gaped down at me. There were more people in this arena than lived in all of Marrington. Men, women, and children of all ages watched in eager anticipation.
Laughter and pointing began. I supposed my size was laughable, but they were being plain rude. Then, my gaze landed on the emerging competition from the opposite side of the arena.
No wonder they laughed.
As a battle-clad Hunju giant—the largest I’d ever seen—raised his club, the crowd cheered.
My heart thumped wildly. “Stars and stones, Mal. I’ve never defeated a Hunju without magic.”
Mal stood beside me, appraising the beast. “You’ve sparred with Baird a thousand times. You’re agile and clever. Use that to your advantage.”
Agile and clever weren’t going to save me from the monstrous club the giant wielded. I thought of Windish—the foe I’d defeated twice. The first time, I’d cut the tendon behind his heel and spared his life. The second time, I’d transported him to the depths of the ocean and fed him to the sharks.
Both victories had required heavy use of magic. Currently at my disposal were a sword, dagger, and my whopping one-hundred-and-sixty-five centimeters of height.
The Hunju finished his crowd-rousing and turned toward me. I braced for a battle cry and charge. Instead, he peered down and made an exaggerated squinting gesture as though he could barely see me. The crowd roared with laughter.
Very funny. I was at least the size of a toddler to him, not a bug. But, by all means, if I wasn’t worth his time, I’d accept his forfeit.
He began gesturing to the crowd between the sole of his shoe, a closed fist, and his long, jagged club. Did they want him to crush me underfoot, pummel me with a fist, or clobber me with a club?
Too bad he wasn’t asking my preference. I’d settle for a game of chess with a side of wine and cheese.
The crowd seemed to want the fist, as it earned the loudest cheer. I wondered at how many had stood in this spot and watched people making entertainment of their death. If Mal’s scepter wasn’t cracked, would such gruesome sport be commonplace?
“The first thing we’re doing when the war with Bellos is over is reassembling your scepter.”
“As you wish. I’m with you for eternity, Abigail.”
I turned to gape at him, but he vanished. What did that mean? He couldn’t make a statement like that and then vanish. Did that mean he’d never leave me again?
The thought of him back in my life permanently gave me strength and courage, although I’d never admit that to him.
When the giant sauntered toward me, I readied my sword. The crowd chanted “Killer” which I suspected may have been his nickname. Unless I was wrong, and they were saying “kill her”. Also plausible.
Killer took a low swipe at my legs with an open palm. I leaped over his hand while driving the tip of my sword downward. As it sliced into his meaty palm, blood spurted.
Wow. They must sharpen these after each battle.
Killer roared in pain and brought his other hand down in a closed-fisted hammer.
I dove again, rolling to a stand, but the force of his hand hitting the ground knocked me off my feet. I inadvertently dropped the dagger. As I crawled away, sword in one hand and clawing at the dirt with the other, I hoped to put more distance between Killer and myself.
When the sun blocked out above me, I looked up to see his foot coming toward me. Apparently, he was swapping the pummel technique for the boot stomp.
Gripping the sword with both hands, I thrust it upward as his foot came down. He howled and jerked his foot back, only centimeters before it crushed me. Unfortunately, the blade jerked from my grasp as it lodged in his foot.
I still had agile and clever—though I could only keep dodging him for so long.
Killer yanked the sword from his foot and cast the now-bloody blade aside.
Panting from some mixture of fear and exertion, I sprang to my feet and raced toward the sword lying in the dirt.
Killer was faster. He clasped me in one hand and raised me off the ground, bringing me to eye level. My hands were trapped by my sides as he squeezed the air out of my lungs. I could feel myself turning purple as he suffocated me. Wriggling had no effect, except to smear blood from his wounded hand all over me.
His wound.
Spots swam before my eyes, and I had maybe seconds before I’d pass out. I maneuvered one hand, feeling the warmth of his blood and the break in his skin. I brutally dug my fingers into the flesh.
As Killer howled, he released me. Landing on my shoulder, a searing pain shot through my left arm and it went limp. I sucked in gasping breaths, as my vision blurred from the pain.
“Any bright ideas?” I asked Mal.
He didn’t appear, but he did reply. “Move faster.”
The weight of my dangling left arm throbbed in pain. Using my right arm, I bent my left arm at the elbow and tucked it inside my breast plate. That eased the pain enough that I could move.
I crawled toward the sword. “Very helpful.”
“You don’t die today,” he offered.
We had both seen the Waterlands’ vision a year and a half ago—some vague future death awaited me on a stone floor on a dark night.
“I wish it seemed that way from my current vantage point,” I told Mal. As far as I could tell, death seemed eminent.
A dark, smooth rock landed in the dirt in front of me. My heart leaped as I reached for the ruby red stone. My stone.
I didn’t waste time looking for who’d thrown it. After snatching it, I stuffed it under my shirt and wedged it between my skin and the breastplate. With my uninjured arm, I picked up the sword and steadied myself. The power of the activated stone coursed through me.
Beet faced and snarling, Killer pounced. Instead of retreating, I ran toward him and through his legs. I sliced into his heel. With the force of the Warrior Stone, the blade cut through his thick leather boots and into his flesh.
When he fell to the ground, the crowd unleashed gasps of surprise. Killer thrashed wildly on the dirt floor while struggling to stand. As soon as he got to one leg, he’d be after me again.
I had nowhere to run. The heavy, wooden doors where gladiators entered was my only exit point. Even with the stone, I couldn’t get them open with a dislocated shoulder. Even if I managed to create a crack to squeeze through, my adrenaline stores were depleted, and I wouldn’t be able to fight my way out of the castle.
My only course of action was to slay the beast—or be slain by him… unless.
Killer tucked his good leg under him to stand. While he used his concentration to keep his balance, I rushed in and sliced the tendon on his other heel. He fell to the ground, permanently disabled. Killer would live, but unless Boyo healed him, he’d never walk again.
I scrambled away from him, but not before he lashed out and backhanded me. The impact knocked the wind out of me and sent me flying across the arena. I skittered along the dirt before rolling to a stop.
Ungrateful urchin.
I’d spared his life.
My head lolled to one side as the pain in my side and arm throbbed in agony. Aside from the dislocated shoulder, broken bones were certainly now involved.
Killer writhed a safe distance away from me—and wasn’t clawing his way toward me.
&nbs
p; The crowd grew silent—I guessed battling their disappointment that both fighters were incapacitated, but no one lay dead. We’d failed to satiate their blood lust.
As I lay crippled and broken, a group of guards emerged and surrounded me with pistols drawn. I didn’t move. I couldn’t move. Immobilized by pain, tears welled in my eyes as they stripped me of my armor and my stone.
“Stay with the stone, Mal,” I instructed in a faint whisper.
If he followed it, maybe we’d be able to retrieve it at some point—provided I could walk again and escape.
“Consider it done.”
18
MALAKAI
I followed the stone—all the way to Porter Stout’s possession. He’d given it to a guard who’d tossed it into the arena in front of Abigail. Now, a guard handed the cleaned stone back to him.
Porter fondled the thing the way a lusting man might fondle breasts. He sickened me. The entire situation sickened me.
“You seem angry,” Snake Eyes said.
“Furious.”
The brownie nodded. “You get a very reddish hue whenever Abigail suffers.”
“I hate being unable to help her.”
“And you clench your fists.”
I relaxed my fists, opening and closing my fingers. “I feel impotent.”
As he thought about my words, I wondered if he didn’t know the meaning.
“I think you’re more valuable to her the way you are.”
I blinked at him.
“Think about it. You’re the perfect spy in your current form. You can go anywhere in the world undetected. If you were physical rather than spiritual, you’d be like the rest of them by now—dead, or tortured, or fighting for your life.”
“But I can’t affect my surroundings.”
“That’s because you think the Champion needs you to defend her. She doesn’t. She needs to know the people she loves are safe, and plans are in motion to keep them safe.”
I turned my gaze to the floating brownie ghost. “When did you become so insightful?”
He shrugged and toyed with his shirt collar.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “You’ve been talking to Orrick.”
Affronted, he turned away from me. “I can be insightful on my own.” He hesitated. “But Orrick did also say you need to acknowledge your love for Abigail.”
I snorted, before turning and leaving the Prince to his chambers alone. Not alone for long, judging by the scantily clad concubines walking down the hall toward his room.
I turned and walked the opposite direction from them as I stuffed my hands in my pockets. “My feelings have nothing to do with her escape.” I gave Snake Eyes a sharp look. “And I never used that word. Only Orrick did.”
“Love?”
“Yes.”
“What don’t you like about it?”
“The weight.”
He looked at me as though I’d grown horns. “It’s a word. It doesn’t weigh anything.”
“It’s complicated.”
“How?”
“Loving something you can’t have is ludicrous. Preposterous. It breeds nothing but misery.”
“Hmm.”
“Hmm what?”
“Orrick would tell you you’re still thinking of the physical.”
I bit back a frustrated groan. “You’re suggesting I should still love her even if I can’t touch her?”
“No.”
“No?”
“You already love her, Mal. I’m saying you can give her your love even if you can’t touch her.”
“And what life does that give her? Me following her like a puppy dog at her heels while she sleeps alone? What?” I snapped out the last word as I stopped walking.
Snake Eyes cocked his head to one side as he regarded me. “I’m trying to picture you with floppy ears and a tail.”
I rolled my eyes and resumed my stroll.
“Anyway.” He turned his gaze back down the hallway as he floated beside me. “Your feelings are what they are. Let Abigail decide what she wants to do with them. Feeling your love doesn’t obligate her to anything more than being truthful about her own feelings.”
“We’ll see.”
I arrived back at Abigail’s prison room. She lay on the floor, her breathing slow and steady. I hoped she rested peacefully and wasn’t dream walking. Though I had no evidence of it, I worried she didn’t rest properly while dream walking.
As I knelt beside her, I inspected her shoulder. It had been healed. Judging by the way she curled in a ball on her side, I suspected her broken ribs had been healed as well.
How much more would she have to endure? Was this their plan—constant fighting? Did they want to break her down until she shattered?
I needed to know their plan. To learn it, I’d have to stay by the King until it had been divulged.
As I roamed the halls, I eavesdropped and memorized passageways. When I passed an open door to an office, I paused. Emerald, the Blue Gypsy advisor to King Artemis Stout, sat at his desk, writing in a journal.
I crossed my arms. “Oh, if it isn’t another scoundrel.”
Emerald stopped writing.
“I’m not a scoundrel.” Snake Eyes retorted.
“I’m referring to the fortuneteller in there.”
Snakes Eyes stared at me as though I’d grown a second nose. “But he can’t hear you,” he whispered.
“I am aware of that.” I walked into the gypsy’s room and gazed around the clutter of paper and books.
“His room is as messy as Abigail’s university office.” I smiled at the thought, but soon my heart felt heavy. Crithos wouldn’t be the same after an invasion, and I wondered if Abigail would ever be able to return to teaching chemistry.
“You’ve come, haven’t you?” Emerald spoke to me, making vague eye contact.
I startled, looking around and wondering if he was senile.
“I knew you’d come.” He sat straighter, still looking in my direction. “I’m not sure what you are, but you’re with her—the Champion.”
My mouth gaped open.
Emerald continued, “You are some sort of guardian angel over her.”
Snake Eyes snickered. “Mal’s no angel.”
I scowled at the floating brownie.
“You’ve been with her since she arrived. You’re trying to save her, even now.” Emerald’s voice held no trace of hostility.
“You can see and hear me?”
“I can faintly see you—a vague figure of a man dressed in black. And, yes, I can hear you.”
“How?”
“My Blue Gypsy blood lets me see spirits from time to time.” Emerald rose, closed his office door, and returned to his seat. He stared at one wall. “I’m glad she has you. She’s the key to stopping the King of Bellos. I don’t expect you—or her—to understand or trust my motives. I’ve been a slave to the King for decades, and I’ve seen what he’ll do to your people—your savages, as he refers to them. But my plan doesn’t require you to trust me, only to listen.”
He took a drink from a metal cup on his desk.
“What’s he talking about?” Snake Eyes asked.
“I’m listening,” I replied to Emerald. The knowledge that he could see and hear me thrilled me and troubled me. If he was an ally, then this connection could be vital in Abigail’s escape. If he was a foe, then he knew one of Abigail’s most powerful secrets—me.
“There will be an opportune time for her to escape, but that time is not now.”
I crossed my arms. “In the meantime, she’s to suffer and fight in these barbaric gladiator battles? While her friend is being tortured.”
“The suffering is all very tragic. For that, I’m sorry. I can only coerce the King so far before my actions come under scrutiny. Professor Potts will suffer, but I’ve ensured he’ll be healed by Boyo at the end of it. That’s all I can do for him.”
“And Abigail’s fight for her life?”
Emerald closed his eyes for a long momen
t, and I could see the glittering, green eye shadow dusted on them.
“The King seeks to know the extent of her abilities. How well does she fight with and without the stone? When her life is threatened, is there other magic at her disposal of which he needs to be aware? The alternative to his cat and mouse game is for him to outright kill her—that would doom us all to King Artemis’ conquest.”
I couldn’t argue that Emerald seemed to have chosen the best course of action under the circumstances.
“What is it you gain from her stopping King Artemis?” I asked.
“Hopefully, my own freedom. Hopefully, the leaders of Crithos will see fit to release me for my part in helping Crithos. Hopefully, his dethronement will save other Blue Gypsies from the attack Stout intends.”
I paced the room. “I have no choice but to trust what you say.”
“The truth I speak will demonstrate itself over time.” He cleared his throat. “May I ask: What are you, and how did you come to serve the Champion?”
“That is not something you and I are on congenial enough terms to discuss.”
I thought of his words about ‘leaders of Crithos’. Now that there was no Queen, I didn’t know who’d take charge. “Why not find a way to spare the Queen’s life amidst your scheming to stop King Artemis?”
“The King was determined to find and destroy Crithos’ weak point.” His green eyes drooped in sadness. “I let him think it was the Queen. The alternative was the Champion, and he wouldn’t have hesitated to kill her if he’d known it would be Crithos’ downfall.”
“You made the choice to have him sacrifice the Queen?”
“I did.”
“You’re close to the King. Why not assassinate him?” I glanced at Snake Eyes, who was on the gypsy’s desk rubbing a flattened palm over the emerald ring on his finger.
“I could—and I’d replace one dictator with another. Of King Artemis Stout’s five sons, two fled into obscurity, one died at sea, and Porter killed the fourth.”
“Killed his own brother?”
“Sibling rivalry at its worst,” Emerald confirmed.