Chapter 33
Introductions
Nine two-man teams went out onto the sands yet when the gate opens again only six boys return. Two full teams, and two individuals whose partners have been killed or otherwise too badly hurt to continue. There is a sort of triumphant air around the group of boys, though they have been robbed of their vibrancy and nervous energy.
The BlackMist soldiers don’t even bother to escort the slaves separately this time, they are too tired, too sore, and too few to cause any trouble on the way back to their cells.
I recognize all of the survivors either from past encounters of my own or from those pamphlet things which as promised have been showing up everywhere.
Striding in first is a flame-blessed in the fancy armor and colors of House Saffron. His name is Vel…something. Behind him comes the pig-boy and wind-blessed of House Tariff; Ariun and Corlin.
Next is another red-armored Saffron slave named Torrigen. A year and a half ago I ended his fifteen-match win streak by utter destruction. Finally bringing up the rear is a team with no colors or icons, barely any armor at all really. A proud little grin crosses my face and I give Tota and Kalon an approving nod.
Beside me Xael mutters something in his native tongue that I can’t understand but am pretty sure is a prayer of thanks when he realizes the pair have emerged relatively unscathed.
I might have been acting and taking all nonchalant to Xael but I’m relieved too. Moments after the gate had closed the smell of acid-burned flesh and screaming had filled the air. Surviving any melee requires at least a little luck. Adding some berzerk creature in the mix often takes skill out of the equation entirely.
“Demi-Hydra?” I ask the two boys as they get close.
“Mhmmm” replies Tota with a heavy sigh. Kalon offers a tired nod and the pair slump to the floor of the cell. I can’t blame them for their exhaustion. A demi-hydra might be smaller, have fewer heads, and lack the regenerative abilities of a true Hydra. It is still a two-headed lizard the size of a large horse that can spit acid in either streams or as a pervasive mist. It would have been a horror show out there.
“Good fucking job boys,” I say with a genuine smile. The last time I fought one of those things I had lost a lot of skin and almost my life. The victorious boys grin up at me from the floor and we start to chat about how exactly the melee had gone for them. When he thinks no one outside the cell can see Xael slips over and gives Kalon a quick but hungry-looking kiss.
After the awkwardly tender moment, my pit partner turns to me with a kind of stupid question.
“ So are we going to maybe run through a strategy for surviving this?” Asks the foreign boy. His face reveals his concern even if his accent makes every word out of his mouth seem somehow flat or unemotional.
I look at Xael like he’s stupid for a few heartbeats before reminding myself that he isn’t really a pitter. He got famous in his homeland for winning a lot of one-versus-one fights, not competing in the chaos of Far Mantyian entertainment.
I snort and shake my head. “ There is only one strategy for this kind of melee.”
“ What? Stay away from the monster?”
“Almost” I reply with a grim smile. “ Stay away from it and force the other teams into the thing’s path.”
When the BlackMist guards call our names the hunger that has almost reached debilitating levels inside me vanishes like it was never there at all. I don’t know how this stuff works but something about the excitement of entering a life-or-death situation makes you stop noticing things like that.
As the closest cell to the gate, we are last called. It’s just a result of chance yet I still feel a little swell of pride. Last to walk out in the final match of the day. For a pit slave, it doesn’t get much more prestigious than that.
The gate opens directly onto the sands of the pit, there is a walled-off staircase on either side leading to a pair of waiting areas for the guards that also double as armories for those of us competing. The stairs are only large enough for them to be traversed single file but even if you managed to get up there, that's where your path would end. It might only be a single stone wall between the armories and the closest rungs of the crowd but the wall in question is huge. Probably twice as tall and as thick as the ten-foot barrier that surrounds the pit.
There is nothing quite like walking out onto the sands in one of the primary arenas. The sheer scale of the architecture around the pit, the energy in the air, the sounds of a crowd the size of an army.
Then there is the way the ring of covered lanterns built into the pit wall casts everything in a flickering orange glow that almost seems like magic with how it illuminates the sands whilst not blinding the crowd. All of It together creates an experience that is simultaneously the most thrilling and most terrifying thing a person can experience.
These feelings only intensify when the high-pitched lady introduces us. I’m not sure if it's magic or some trick of arena construction but now that I’m out here her words are clear as day even over the cheers of the crowd. A BlackMist guard hands me my requested type two medium axe before retreating back up the stairs.
“And our last pair of rising young talents come to you from House BloodRock.”
The gate slams down behind us with a somewhat anticlimactic thud and we stride forward. I raise my axe, and Xael draws his thin-bladed sword to do the same.
“From the distant GodsRing, The consensus most handsome youth pitter in aaaaaaallllllllllllll Far Mantys!”
‘Who decides that?’
“The prodigy of prodigies! The two-time and current reigning champion of his homeland.”
There is enough space in the enormous pit that none of the nine teams present can claim their own little bit of space without anyone being unfairly close to the iron gate opposite the one we came through. The one the monster will enter the pit from.
“Xaaaaaeeeeeeeelllllllll Deboooooordaaaaaaant!”
I look around at the sixteen boys and one Itti’Atti who will be opposing me. Everyone here is professional enough that no one is making a move to fight before the match starts. Even I am interested enough in glory not to try something like that. They are looking to the opposing gate, all except the Itti’Atti girl. She’s facing that way, but her gaze is leveled firmly upward like she is examining something.
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I take a moment to trace her line of view up to the circular walkway that houses and supports the undeployed canvas covering. There is nothing and no one up there so I sink my own gaze back to the still-closed iron gate.
“Joining the boy with a face from your dreams is a monster of nightmare!”
‘Well, that's not very fair.’
We find our own little spot near the eastern edge of the pit and I resist the urge to crane my head around looking for the high-pitched woman.
“Known among pit slaves as The Beast of BloodRock and ‘Oh please gods it's eating me!’ This pitter has more kills on the sands than any youth walking the city!”
I still don’t think that’s true, but once she has said it that ceases to matter. The hisses and roars of the crowd mean it's true to them and that's all that will ever count.
“ But he simply calls himself Noooorrrrrttttthhhhh!”
When she screams my name I lift my axe and look up into the shadowed mass of the crowd.
‘Remember it. Remember me.’ I silently will towards the people I can only sort of see.
Once I feel like I've posed for long enough I drop the weapon to my side and paw my left foot across the sands. The feeling of the granules under my claws has its usual calming effect though the enormity of the moment steals more than a little of the effectiveness.
“Finally playing the role of the divine judge! You know them from their win at The Saffron Beast Brawl and as the second guardian in The Flame King Invitational Trials!”
‘Wait.’
“Known to some as the Walking fortress!”
‘No. They would have told me.’
“Feared and respected the world over. The Lantern Bearer!”
‘That pair of fucking bitches! I’m going to kill them’
“The Ettin Laaaaareeeeeen and Taaaaaaarneeeeen!”
The crowd goes berserk chanting the word ‘Lantern’ over and over again.
The gate starts to rise before a green-furred hand impatiently appears under it and shoves the ironwork portal up into its fitting.
A familiar figure ducks underneath the lip of the gateway and out into the arena. Laren and Tarnen, my supposed mother figures who only yesterday made my Crowning Day special are here standing in between me and victory. They won't hesitate to kill me on these sands. I know they won’t, The Lantern Bearer is a professional.
They are in their full battle gear. Huge metal plates chained to the ettin backed up by a makeshift shield that until a few hours ago would have been spending its existence as a door somewhere in the arena. Their other hand wields a spear that looks like it has aspirations of becoming a log.
The pair stand almost thirteen feet tall. A fact they take advantage of to entertain the crowd. With a surprisingly dexterous twirl, the ettin plunges the head of their spear into the sands and of all things reaches over the pit wall. Plucking an unlucky man from his seat with one hand the monster lifts his screaming struggling form to the head that I am certain is Tarnen and practically inhales the man's face in a sloppy kiss. He is returned to his seat, wet and disorientated but unharmed.
This naturally causes all sorts of hooting, laughing, and a few two-finger whistles from the onlookers. Having been in his position many times as a child I’d feel for the man if I wasn’t so consumed with my frustration at the pair of women.
I always lean into my anger when I fight. It helps me not think about how scared I am of the life I live, or I guess how scared I am of losing it. Seeing the ettin arrive without having even warned me they would be here has tilted the balance. The fear, the hunger for glory, and my ability to think logically, all is being eclipsed by my desire to hurt things. And if possible beat an explanation out of Laren and Tarnen.
On some level, I know that this isn’t really something to get angry about. The ettin is just doing their job no different from me, and knowing about their presence in advance wouldn't have actually changed anything. It’s just that the level in question doesn’t have a lot of access to my mind at the moment.
I wouldn’t say time slows down when the judge lady screams for us to begin. It is more like it freezes for a single heartbeat and in that moment I can see all my options and exactly how to make them a reality. The world unfreezes and I start jogging towards Laren and Tarnen. Someone is trying to get my attention by calling my name. Xael If I had to guess. I ignore him.
Around me, the teams are moving. They are all too well trained to just scatter, but they spread out into a loose semi-circle around the monster. It is the last moment that resembles something orderly before the pit descends into madness.