Chapter 9

“ O h… Light ,” I whisper, snapping my mouth shut only when Nazar elbows me hard.

I don’t need to ask him why he’s chastising me. I know I should be more nonchalant, even as Talia and not Merritt. But these monstrous, impossibly immense Divhs are easily twice the size of Gent…well, the original Gent. Perhaps larger than whatever he’s become too. I suddenly can’t remember. Their shadows cover half the coliseum seats, and when they lift themselves to their full height, bristling and roaring with rage, they blot out the sun.

The creature on the right, the Fourth House Divh, looks like an enormous leather-skinned lion, but with hide the color of pale sky. Its skin is thick and covered with scars.

That Divh screams and flings its head high, then stamps its feet. Its head is a large shield-like platter and its mouth sprouts tusks at either corner. It has a half-dozen eyes spread over its brow, some directly in front, some to the side.

An answering scream comes from the other end of the field, and I jerk my gaze toward the noise, my breath stalling in my throat. The Sixth House Divh isn’t at all like its opponent. A long, sinuous lizard, it’s shaded deep purple in a violent series of arcing, rippling coils, and its wings expand almost to either side of the spectator stands. When it screams, it cranes its head far forward and its mouth opens, revealing a long red tongue—and a burst of fire.

The crowd bursts into another round of cheers, but a sudden knowingness sweeps over me, a call for my attention not to remain in slack-jawed wonder on the Divhs, but on an entirely different pair.

The warrior knights.

Nazar murmurs something beside me that’s lost in the screaming, but I don’t need his encouragement. I pull the seeing glass back up to my eye and stare.

The men have taken up position across from each other, their hands lifted as if they’re about to leap at each other’s throats across the broad gap between them. But they don’t move otherwise. At either end of the long field, the Divhs scream and roar. The warrior knights’ hands shift forward, and suddenly, chaos erupts, the sound of the lion’s pounding paws against the earth momentarily drowning out the noise from the crowd.

My eyelids peel back so far, I’m surprised my eyeballs remain in my head. Peripherally, I’m aware of the monsters racing toward each other, but the men have barely moved on the stands—barely moved, and yet are clearly locked in sudden, deeply intense conflict.

Somehow, Nazar’s voice reaches me, the priest leaning close to my ear. “Monsters capture the imagination of the masses,” he says. “The crowds. Warriors fight with their minds, and their minds are what direct their Divhs.”

“But…” The words die in my throat. They’re that connected that the barest twitch, the slightest gesture sends these mountainous creatures hurtling forward? Merritt always overacted, throwing his body forth and screaming his orders for Gent to follow. These men…

The warriors on the platform remain completely still, each with a left hand outstretched palm up, a right hand gripped in a fist at his side. They could be statues, standing there, but through the glass, I can see their faces. They’re set in fixed ferocity, glaring across the open space as if they are avowed enemies. My glance jumps to the center of the field where the Divhs collide in a rush of hide and bone, the winged fire lizard shifting to the right at the last minute, scoring its talons down the side of the pale lion. My gaze pings back to the men again. The sky-blue knight staggers back, a thin trace of blood blooming on his shoulder.

The crowd roars. First blood!

“They are that connected.” Nazar’s words batter my ear. “Life to life, death to death. You start the fight with fists and rods and sword, you end it with the mind. That is the way of the warrior.”

The attack in front of me is suddenly replaced by the image of Merritt and Gent dropping from the sky, falling to the earth, sprawling out in the wrecked clearing of the practice field. Gent had disappeared—died, I’d thought—as Merritt breathed his last. Then Merritt’s band had moved—moved with such speed and ferocity, and now I’m banded. I’m a warrior—a warrior with no clue of what these men are doing, no idea how?—

“You do know, Talia. Look.”

Whether Nazar is still talking, or the words are echoes of my own panic, I fix on the fighting creatures, my own warrior band tightening on my arm with a painful squeeze. I stare at them, and somehow—something opens up inside me; a door through which a thousand songs pour forth, each rising and falling in a hopeless jumble of noise, each building to a different crescendo.

One of the loudest of those songs belongs to the purple lizard on the field, I realize with a startled blink—another to the Fourth House’s sky-blue lion.

The fight is raging with furious intensity now. The deep-purple lizard spins around, but its tail takes a few moments longer to clear its opponent. The light-blue beast lunges forward with a powerful paw, wrapping its claws around the tail and flipping it upward.

I swing my gaze back toward the wooden platforms, and in my mind’s eye, the Divhs are superimposed over the warriors, their feverish battle overlaying the minimal, impossibly elegant movements of the knights. How can they…how do they?

But those answers aren’t important now. What’s important is the sudden, swamping connection I feel between these men and their Divhs, the weight of it nearly staggering me. The Fourth House warrior flicks his hand only an inch, but the Sixth House knight wheels back, staggering a few steps as his Divh goes crashing head over tail, making three full rotations before it regains its position and soars upward again.

The men reset, and I can both sense and see their incredible exertion, though it’s their Divhs who slash and tear. Both warriors are sweating through their tunics, however, their effort plain on their faces and their trembling arms.

“Great warriors don’t fight with their fists, nor with a stave or blade, for all that they may be wielding these when they go to war.” Nazar’s words are clearer now, closer. Somehow, his voice carries over the screech and howl of the crowd around me. “Great warriors fight with their minds. With their spirit and their hearts, yes, but mostly with their minds.”

“But how—” I stare at the dance of death in front of me. The lizard has shot in close to the lion again, has buried its long snout in the larger animal’s neck. It’s not a big snout, but the spot is a sensitive one. Both Divh and its linked warrior on the wooden platform wheel back, arms and giant forelegs in tortured concert as the beasts grapple in the open field.

The Fourth House warrior knight breaks first, bursting backward and wheeling away. Blood now flows freely down his neck, and his face is a ghastly mask of pain as his creature bucks and roars, trying to dislodge the lizard. A chance crack of the giant lion’s paw rakes across the lizard’s gossamer wing. Twin screams surge over the crowd, and it’s the Sixth House’s warrior’s turn to falter as the lizard finally opens its long jaws and blows back as if a puff of wind has caught it full sail.

This is a boon for the Fourth House Divh, but one that comes too late. On the field, the enormous sky-blue lion sinks to the ground, its forelegs trembling as it shakes its head, once, twice, clearly trying to get its bearings. The pain that reverberates from it is so strong, I can feel my own bones begin to quiver, and the band on my arm flares with another burst of heat.

On the platform, the men are affected as well. The blue-garbed knight of the Fourth falls forward to one knee. His right hand covers his left arm below the shoulder, only this time, his left hand comes up as well to form crossed arms over his chest. The purple knight of the Sixth, in contrast, remains standing, though he’s clearly wobbly. He raises both arms high, and a figure in long black-and-gold robes steps forward on the First House’s stone overlook. The figure lifts a horn to his mouth. A single clear note blows over the spellbound crowd, and everything stills.

Both warriors turn, their right hands finding their left shoulders. I hear their words in my own head, sending their Divhs back to their own plane.

The monsters disappear from the field.

The songs within me go silent.

Then the crowd catches me off guard with a new, startling roar. This time, they shout out a hero’s welcome as attendants exit the doors at the top of the wooden towers and rush toward the warriors, apparently to give them aid. Both knights are surrounded. I try to see what’s happening to them, but the crowd is surging around me now, the day’s spectacle apparently done.

“Wasn’t that great? Wasn’t it?”

Caleb’s at Nazar’s side suddenly, bursting with excitement as I cringe back, trying to disappear. “The most amazing opening exhibition ever, mark me plain. Only fools thought the Sixth House would fall because the flying lizard was smaller than the lion of the Fourth. They were wrong. I knew it from the start. Small is often better. Small is fast, small is smart.”

He bounces up and down. Rather than being irritated, Nazar turns to him, blocking me from view for another few seconds. “And why do you think that, Caleb?” he asks mildly. “Why is small smarter?”

“Because it has to be,” Caleb shoots back. “Big will make you pay if you’re not fast and savvy. Like Merritt with his trick with the cane, flipping it round so he could crack ol’ Hantor in the head. Boy’s brains are still probably rattling around in his skull. Where is Merritt, anyway—” he peers past Nazar and his eyes peel wide. “Oh, Light! Lady Talia, right? But…where’s Merritt?”

I sense Nazar’s gaze on me, but I have eyes only for Caleb. He’s now wearing another borrowed tunic, this one deep yellow, the sleeve cut in such a way to allow for the stump that’s all that’s left of his left arm, without calling too much attention to it. The tunic falls in folds around Caleb’s body, so that if he remains standing just so, you wouldn’t even know he was missing an arm. Is this the tunic of one of the Southern Houses, come to fight in the tournament? Should I worry about who else is paying Caleb…and for what?

“Caleb, yes?” I offer, my voice as quiet and melodic as I can make it. “Your service to my brother has been very kind.”

“He’s a fighter—a warrior even!” Caleb says staunchly. “You should get him to compete. No one gets hurt, not really, and not for long. It really is more for show.”

I nod at him with wide-eyed wonder, which seems to be the right thing. His obvious excitement pokes holes in my worries about him, at least for now. “There’ll be no more exhibitions today?”

“Nope—not sanctioned, anyway. They needed that one to test the battleground, make sure everyone could see and hear, get in and out fast. There’re more people here than ever before. They’ve widened the First House’s balcony too.” He gestures to the thick center ledge, still teeming with people, across the coliseum field. “So, um…will you and Merritt go up to the First House tonight? The culling begins tomorrow, you know.”

“Culling?” That word sounds ominous to me. I try to shake it off, but it slithers along my spine in a whispering mockery.

Caleb doesn’t seem to notice. “Make no mistake—today’s exhibition was one of the grander you’ll see. Not every warrior knight’s Divh is like those. Some are big like that lion, some are far smaller than the fire lizard. The warrior knights too are different. For some, this is their first tournament, and don’t even get me started on the banded soldiers. A few have never seen monsters as big as the ones down there today—but there’re even bigger ones than that.”

“Really,” I say faintly.

“The stuff of legends, I tell you plain!” Caleb says. He looks at me with sudden curiosity. “I hear Merritt’s Divh is larger than them all, though.”

I tense at the pointed statement, but he merely laughs again. “No matter. I now have money enough to spread some rumors of my own about the strength of the Tenth House.”

He pulls out a coin bag, and I leap onto the new subject, eager to turn the conversation away from myself.

“You bet on the outcome of the fight?”

Caleb preens a little. “Where there is a battle, there’s a bet. Never bet against a fire lizard if you’re thinking of making some coin yourself, though. Your money will have a way of eating themselves.” His eyes widen, and he swings toward Nazar. “You know, Merritt should come with me tonight, now that his face has healed up. The fires will blaze high, with the tournament celebration beginning in earnest. I hear they’ve summoned the southern houses. It’ll take a while for everyone to arrive, but the parties will start right away. The pickings are best earlier in the going—more money is spread out with fools ready to lose it. Where is he, anyway?”

I glance toward Nazar, sorely tempted by the idea of walking among all these warriors as one of them—not as a female. But Nazar, fortunately, is fielding Caleb’s enthusiasm better than I am. “We’ve purchased our men, Caleb. We leave tomorrow.”

Caleb snorts. “Those men won’t be ready to leave until midday, earliest. They’ll want to enjoy as much of the tournament as they can before you move out.”

Nazar shrugs. “Then perhaps Merritt can spare some time away. But Talia here…” He frowns, surveying me critically. “You seem fatigued, my lady.”

“Oh, I am,” I agree weakly, lifting a hand to bat at my hair. “I think—perhaps this is all too much to me. It’s all so much.”

“You’re staying at an inn in Trilion?” Caleb asks quickly. “It’s safer there, for sure. It’s a lot for a woman to endure big crowds like this, I bet.”

“It is.” I keep my tone gracious, even appreciative, to hide the fact I want to punch him.

“So, where’s your camp, Caleb?” I ask instead. The crowd has finally thinned enough to allow us to exit the stands ourselves and head back toward the distant ground. We stand and begin making our way down. “Where do you sleep after all the money has been made for the day?”

Caleb’s awkwardness is suddenly obvious as he wobbles on the stair. Once again, it’s Nazar who eases the boy’s way. “We have need of a squire ongoing, if you aren’t permanently committed elsewhere,” he says, gesturing to Caleb’s tunic. “Though it will be work, there’s money and lodging in it for you, here and at the Tenth House manor, should you wish.”

Caleb tries to appear nonchalant, but the look he turns on Nazar makes my heart feel suddenly large and ungainly, my throat too tight. “I could do that,” he says, sending me a quick glance. “My commitments elsewhere aren’t so good an offer as that. I’ll just need an hour or so to make arrangements. And then I could go out with Merritt, if he’s of a mind to explore.”

“An hour, then,” Nazar says gravely, and Caleb ducks away.

I swing my gaze to Nazar, whose face betrays nothing. “He had nowhere else to stay, despite his new clothes. You knew that.”

The priest shrugs. “Then so much the better that we had need of him. And if your concern about him is warranted, then so much the better that we can watch him.”

I nod, but I don’t like the way my distrust makes me feel, tainting the genuine excitement of Caleb’s eager words and earnest hope. Is this what it means to be a warrior of the Protectorate? To be constantly filled with doubt and suspicion, with the sense that every enemy’s eye was upon you?

For me, it seems it is.

We make our way back to our own camp through the crowds as the music starts up around us, flutes and drums and long horns drawing down the distant night.

It would be relaxing—almost fun, I think—except for the clear assessment and dismissal I receive, time and time again. The same men and boys who hours earlier would have assessed and taken my measure as a warrior now drop me into categories far less worthy of anyone’s time or attention. Irritation sparks and fans, and by the time we near our camp, I itch to pull the wig off my head, to swap out my gown for breeches and a tunic.

Fingers twitching, I reach for the belt of my gown when we’re a dozen paces away, then hesitate as Nazar hisses out a breath.

“ Fortiss ,” he mutters, and I jerk my gaze forward again. My blood freezes in my veins.

It’s Fortiss, all right, still dressed in his pageant finery. He’s seated himself outside our tent, propped against the grave shovel he’s driven into the ground, looking for all the world that he might happily remain there all night.

He’s here to see me, I’m sure.

But which me?