Chapter 121

The crowd was raucous. Whatever heights of elation the spectators had reached during previous rounds of the contest, nothing compared to this. The air felt thick with the breath and sweat of thousands; their screams and cheers were nearly deafening. As I looked among the stands, I saw faces in ecstasy, many flushed with the effects of long drinking. Banners were unfurled, whipping above the crowd with fury, with a desperation to be seen. My name flickered across the cloth far more often than any sign of my competitor’s. It was humbling. It was humiliating. This was the crowd of the common folk, drunk not just on ale, but on this brief, momentary chance to see one of their own succeed. One of their own—how pitiable it was that they had so little to cling to that they would see me as a symbol of anything.

I stood on the top tier of the platform. It was like a wedding cake, with a broad, flat upper level and a series of shelves radiating out to the arena floor. I felt exposed and overwhelmed. Yet, I also felt thrilled and excited. Above it all hung the question of what my actions today might mean for my father, for Harold, for the servants in my house, for me. But it was hard to let the sobering effects of reality dampen the sheer exhilaration coursing through me. I felt confident.

Lance stood opposite me, on the far side of the platform. The sheer force of the crowd’s screaming seemed powerful enough that I half-expected to see him lifted and tossed away like a leaf in a storm. He stood there, his expression distant. I wanted to say I saw fear, worry—the troubled face of a bully who knew he was about to be brought low—but no, that wasn’t quite it. He wasn’t untroubled, but the look on his face was more contemplative, difficult to decipher.

The center of the platform slid open, broad wooden boards sliding aside, silently moving against the tempest of noise from the stands. A mechanical platform rose from the bowels of the arena, lifting a group of figures: Mario, another priest, two attendants, and the bishop. And most importantly—the suit itself.

I stared at it hungrily, unable to tear my eyes away. I could feel my inner obsession rising to new heights as I gazed upon the object of my desire. It’s hard to put into words how I felt—how fixedly my eyes were drawn to the suit. I felt like a fox, ravenously staring through the wire of a coop at a plump and defenseless bird. Or like a castaway, clinging to debris, watching as the waves torturously brought the shoreline within reach. Or like a man starved of the touch of a woman, waiting obsessively for her to come to him.

Before my eyes, Mario began to touch the suit, his fingers working at a portion obscured in the cleft where the helm met the neck. Excitement sprang up inside me, my heart beating faster—not with fear, as it had so many times before, but with pure eagerness. I would make it mine. I would own that power for the rest of my life, see the world in all the colors the uninitiated never even knew they missed.

I pushed down the excitement, trying to calm myself. I remembered, with some shame, how I had used my father's whiskey to ease my nerves the night before. It had worked—too well. But as morning came and Harold knocked insistently on my door, the troubling weight of that choice lingered. I had gone back to that well, dipped into the soothing effects of alcohol to quiet my troubled mind. What bothered me most was how justified it had seemed at the time, and how unsettlingly guilty I felt in the cold light of day. Had I sought an excuse? Did I really need those numbing sips to ease my mind?

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

I bit my lip, the thought taking hold. My father’s life had come to revolve around the bottle. I had never feared it before, but the comfort it had brought me last night unsettled me just as much as it soothed me. It had been too easy.

My attention snapped back as the suit suddenly dissolved. I recognized the phenomenon—familiar by now. The suit melted into countless particles, surging like the waves of an angry sea, haloed and veined with strange, glowing purple light. The mass split and surged in opposite directions—one stream shot across the platform toward Lance, the other flowed to my feet.

I couldn’t suppress a gasp as I felt the particles make contact, crawling up my legs, encasing me. This would be the last time I would experience the suit coming to me, I swore it. After today, the moment of being without it would be over forever. Darkness enveloped my face as the suit closed around me. Then, the window of vision formed, and I could see all around me.

Almost immediately, the voice spoke in my ear. "Tiberius... You had me worried for a while there. I’m certain of many things, but I couldn’t be sure you would appear today."

I wondered if it meant that or if it simply wanted me to believe I had made it doubt. I spoke back with my mind, You know, we’ve talked before about how winning today would bind me to you, but we’ve never said it the other way.

The voice sounded confused. "What?"

You’re aware that you’ll be bound to me as well, I thought. You have your grand plans—wealth, power, changing the world. You offer me these rewards to help you with your quest, and I need to make my decision carefully because binding myself to the suit also binds me to you. But it binds you to me as well.

The voice fell silent. I watched the suit form around Lance. These were still the half-suits, not the full suits of a true Griidlord. Even as I waited for the voice to respond, my blood vibrated with excitement at the thought of what it would be like to experience the true ecstasy of the full suit.

Finally, the voice spoke plainly, seemingly without its usual veil. "Well said, Tiberius. Maybe you’re even more suited to this role than I realized."

I might have pondered those words longer if not for the intensity of the moment.

I said, "Enough of that for now. In a short while, we’ll have eternity to dicker about how we can help each other. For now, he is our only concern."

I could almost feel the voice’s attention shift toward Lance. It said, "He’s of no concern. You’ve surpassed him long ago."

The bishop raised his hands, motioning to the crowd for silence. I could see the frustration on his face as the wild hooting and incessant din continued, refusing to ease for him. He paused, unwilling to make a greater demonstration of his impotence before them. Instead, he nodded to Mario, whose hand slipped into the sleeve of his robe.

A deafening klaxon blared from every corner of the arena, twice as loud as the revelers. There were shrieks of surprise, mixed with short screams of fright and displeasure, but the crowd quieted. Not completely—there was still a steady hum of voices—but the rowdy roar had receded. The bishop straightened, preparing to address the crowd himself.

As I waited for what would doubtlessly be an endless drone of self-aggrandizement, the voice spoke again. “That boy… there’s something off about him.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

The voice spoke again, suspicion lacing its words, concern even running beneath them. “The other one, Lance. Something’s different.”