Leon awoke to the sound of muffled scratches on hardwood. Mice had recently taken up residence in the bleach-white walls of his first-year room, drawn in by Leon’s own neglect and the sheep’s cheese he’d smuggled from the Academies mess hall. “Scratch scratch” This time he heard the unmistakable sound of muted voices. Hushed and low, they broke out in between the sounds of scratching. Their low frequency rattled his heart, the terror reverberating and amplifying the shadows. His imagination transformed them into objects of horror and danger. His mind drew on the tales of the horrific monsters that his grandmother used to tell him about every night until his seventh winter when she had left him to join the great halls of Raek to work the forges of the gods who live below. She had told him tales of monsters who preyed on weak and irresponsible children, snatching them up and devouring them whole as they slept or else entering their nightmares and trapping them forever in petrified slumber to feed off their fear for eternity. “Scratch Scratch” the sounds intensified, building in tempo and fervor the way storm clouds darken, saturate, and swell before finally unleashing their deluge and violent fury. The darkness of his room seemed, now, to suffocate him. Where before it had heralded the comfort of sleep and rest, acting as a blanket of refuge against the weight of responsibility and abuse that farm work brought, it now pressed its weight heavily with its oppressive terror. It squeezed his heartbeat into a wild rhythm, trumpeting in his little chest as if it were trying to escape the recess beneath his rib bones.

His mind raced, swirling and perverting shapes of the once familiar objects of his room into objects of horror. Ever since he had arrived at the Academy, such nightmares had dominated his every night. In the beginning, they had brought him dark gifts of warm reeking urine which had stained his sheets. He remembered the fury of his instructors., how they had refused him clean linen, making him sleep in crusted sheets. It had almost killed him, as his open wounds which had been inflicted during hard days of training and sparring, had easily become infected by the unhygienic conditions. By the fifth night, he had become so feeble from fever and delirium that the instructors had finally taken him to the sickbay for fear of losing their investment. When finally, he had returned, he found his sheets finally replaced with fresh white linen. After that, it never happened again. But, the nightmares, the half-waking paralysis, the intense feelings of panic as his mind struggled to cope with his displacement… these had never stopped.

His window shutters revealed slivers of silver moonlight. They looked to Leon now like the terrifying glowing eyes of some creature, the mirror in the corner of his room took on the form of a great and gaping maw, the imperfections at its corners transforming into wicked teeth. The darkness of the reflection seemed empty and terrifying, like that of a great abyss. It was a darkness that swirled and devoured; desiring, he imagined, to swallow his very soul.

In this twilight moment of half-being, Leon felt as if he was rising from his own body, shedding his skin like that of a serpent, leaving behind an old and now useless husk in search of a new sleek, slender and strong vessel. In this state, he felt both vulnerable and powerful at the same time. Yet that great gaping maw of the mouth-mirror seemed to pull him towards it shiny emptiness, pulling him ever closer like the way Leon’s own mouth might suck at the claw of a boiled crab, pulling with intensifying force at the sweet and vulnerable flesh inside until, finally, he consumed it, leaving the husk of the once-powerful shell as nothing more than refuse.

A shout broke Leon from his half nightmare, jolting him now into true terror and action. The previous spell of paralysis that sleep had gripped him in was now broken, replaced instead by instincts of pure survival and self-preservation. Instincts that had been methodically and cruelly hammered into him over the last seven months. A loud splintering crack echoed out as the sounds of wood on wood clanged and clamored violently, violating the air of peace and tranquility of the sweet night air. Leon dove out of his bed, pushing his furniture against the door in a furious panic.

Nearly a year of regimented training exercises coupled with his recent growth spurt of his ninth summer supplied him with the necessary strength to push his most prized possession, a medium-sized bronze mirror, against the wooden door of his upper room. Leon dashed to his window, throwing open the wooden shutters, and peered below. He considered leaping to the rocks below but dared not risk it. Last summer, another boy from the academy, a classmate named Promo, had taken to chasing the wild donkeys who played and grazed the fields between the rocky hilled farmlands that dotted the Isle of Dalm. That boy had been kicked and later trampled by a particularly large jack, breaking his leg. Leon still remembered the ceremony of cleansing that the masters of the isle had performed on behalf of the academy. They had cast the boy from the stony precipice of the great cliffs as punishment for having broken his leg. What was more vivid to Leon than the memories of the broken, bloodied and mangled body of the young Promo, however, was the grueling hours of log duty the rest of the class had been forced to endure for allowing the academy to lose such an investment. Leon’s shoulders still bore the scars from the long splinters that had wedged their way through his shoulder blades. For a week after, the mere effort of lifting his arms had brought tears to his eyes. The lesson had been hard-learned, but it had been learned. The boys were a team, a unit and therefore they all bore the sins and successes of each other.

On the isle of Dalm, cripples were an affront to the Lord of Games. Broken legs and limbs meant they couldn’t fight. Since these boys were now property, the value of their lives rested solely on their ability to fight in the arena. A broken boy wasn’t even good enough for fodder in the Arena. Maybe, if it had been an arm or a cracked skull, but legs were a different story. Despite the education it afforded, the academy only truly cared about one thing, and that was coin. A loss of life in the arena yielded coins, and so, was deemed acceptable. A death without coin, however, now that was the gravest of sins. Leon dared not risk such heresy, and so he backed away from the temptation of the gamble leaping from the ledge presented. He might make the leap, but the chance of breaking his legs could doom him, causing suffering for his classmates for months. It was a price Leon knew he couldn’t and wouldn’t pay.

The battle continued below, the sounds of shattering clay and the tossing of wooden furniture shook the walls of the Barracks’ crude and simple construction. The scuffle intensified and he heard a sharp and stinging yelp cry out, the sounds of pain and fury filled Leon’s ears rattling his skull. As always, he felt the weight of the emotions behind them, angry and buzzing through his skull like a mountain of stinging fire ants swarming and biting and tearing all at once in murderous fury. Leon had learned through the years how to suppress these sensations, dulling them through his own will and concentration. Through rhythmic breathing and mental chants, he had learned to balance the thoughts and feelings of others that had laid a constant siege against his psyche since the days of his first memories. Still, the voices came from below and so were muffled and distorted beyond recognition, carrying with them only a vague semblance of meaning to Leon’s ears.

At once, Leon recognized the shouts of his classmates, their high-pitched snarls were distinct and piercing. They carried instinctual bravado which thinly masked waves upon waves of fear, rising in menacing and towering waves. The emotions rose in increasing intensity reaching peaked crescendos, before crashing back down in a drowning and destructive force on Leon’s psyche. The emotions of real battle proved too great and Leon sunk to his knees, and later to the prone position, writhing in mental anguish. Leon searched deeper inside himself, probing until he found a silvery shiny ember, dully glowing with a weak and faint shimmer the way the remnant coals of a once great and ravenous bonfire might crackle, merely hinting at the destructive potential hidden within.

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With careful determination and in a rhythmic pattern, Leon took controlled breaths. As he sucked in air, he drew within him the power of the emotions of those who fought below. Each exhale blew on the silvery spark within him fanning the flames of their power and filling him with fire. His fear and cowardice subsided, as did his pain. Leon clamored to his feet with renewed vigor and with powerful determination. He had harnessed this power before. The night after Promo had died, he had fed on the secret fear and despair of his fellow classmates. Argos, in particular, had provided him with enough fuel to create an inferno if he had wanted or had been less careful.

Argos was the biggest classmate. All the first years were the same age, but Argos had grown the fastest, reaching a height and build rare for boys his age. He was also the strongest among them even since those early days when they had first arrived at the academy, soaking wet, starving, and pathetic. The days before the shipwreck were hazy and cloudy for all of the boys, providing only the faintest of memories of the time before. None of them could remember why they had been on the ship in the first place or where they had come from, only that they were here and that they must learn and fight or else die. Yet, even since those earliest days, Argos had been the leader. Other boys his age, faced with such raw physical power would become bullies, exerting, and testing their strength and power over the other boys as an exertion of pent up desire for vengeance on the abuses of the academy. Yet, Argos had been different, taking up the role and responsibility as leader and guardian of the other boys in Class 3. In the training grounds, he fought with ferocity and unyielding passion whenever one of class 3’s members were in danger of losing a training fight with one of the other classes. His back was pockmarked with whip scars, the lessons of which seemed to be lost on Argos, who continued to bullfight his way into any fight he felt threatened the safety of his class three family. As such, the death of Promo had hit Argos like a hammer to the gut, shattering his will. It was Argos who had taken the place of Promo on the log drills, carrying the weight of two boys. Yet he had remained unphased physically, walking as if he were some ghastly reanimated corpse, intent on moving but without purpose or meaning. It was the tears and the pain in his room alone that had first caused Leon to discover the hidden ember of his soul and the power it held.

With the harnessed power of his silver ember, Leon now pulled away the furniture he had propped against the door. Their weight, which before had caused him great amounts of exertion to move, felt weightless now. Moving them seemed so trivial and effortless, the energy of the flames within his soul stirred with increasing inertia, whirling faster and faster into a fiery vortex of power deep within him as the battle below raged on. He knew there had been death, at least one classmate below had gone to join the halls of Raek deep below, he felt the power of it swell suddenly in an almost unbearable surge of power. Leon knew in an instant that it could consume him if he wasn’t careful.

Leon bound down the wooden stairs into the open training grounds below. In the open courtyard, among the litter of training dummies, a group of boys in class 4, faced off with the other members of class 3. They carried in their hand’s training swords but inlaid with long iron nails. Long and wickedly barbed, the metal-studded training swords jutted out menacingly. Murderous contempt seemed to peek through the darkness of half-lit faces of the boys of class four, partially illuminated by moonlight.

Class 4 had had a rivalry with Class 3 since the early days of the academy. The rules of the academy had stated that starting in the fifth week, class practice bouts would determine which class got served extra rations at mealtime. Under the leadership of Argos, Class 3 had easily won the weekly training tournaments each week. Only class 4 had come close, led by their own leader, a boy named Arkkon who led his class through a campaign of fear and intimidation in stark contrast to Argo’s strict but brotherly leadership. If they could take out class 3, they would finally gain access to the most precious commodity at the academy; rations. Despite his cruelty, Leon could see and feel what truly fueled Arkkon, fear, and hunger. In fact, the faces of all the boys of Class 4 were contorted into a determination that only extreme hunger could fuel.

“He’s unarmed!” shouted a boy, pointing a nail-studded training sword at Leon, who looked deceptively disheveled standing at the bottom of the stairs of the barracks, the other boys shifted into a defensive retreating position against their small 10-year-old opponents. It would have looked comical, with these two groups of children waving practice swords and spears and wearing training armor, if they hadn’t already felt the bite of these makeshift weapons. Blood seeped from several wounds on the boys of class 3’s thighs and arms where they had received lucky blows from the other children. Leon looked and saw the fire in Argos’ eyes as he rallied an advance on a separated group of boys from class 4, employing a well-trained spearman’s formation from the members of class 3, carrying training staves as if they held spear points.

Yet, these children were clearly outmatched, despite their superior organization. The lethality of the makeshift weapons outmatched nonlethal training equipment. This coupled with the murderous intent driven by extreme hunger and jealousy put the boys of class 4 at a distinct advantage. Argos knew he was doomed, but refused to back down, driven by an unyielding sense of responsibility to his comrades.

Leon opened his mouth as if to speak, but instead, a great and terrible flame shot forth, a culmination of the mixed emotions that assaulted him on every side. He dropped to his knees, but the flames continued to spew outward. They swirled first upward, then outward, engulfing all around him, searing flesh and melting skin. Screams rose upward, filling the sky with fear, horror, and agony. The high-pitched sounds of children dying intermixed with the sizzling of popping skin and boiling blood. Soon all these melded together, everything in Leon’s vision becoming flame. Leon felt himself, once again floating, leaving his body behind as he had done mere hours before in his half-dream. He rose upwards, feeling himself fill into the night sky. He felt free, freer than he had ever remembered feeling since he first entered the academy. The silence of the dead pacified him, filling him with a peace he had never before experienced. It was quiet for the first time in his life. If he had a mouth he would have laughed. Instead, he simply floated, rising higher and higher, the mountains and hills of the island growing smaller and smaller. Soon it became a green dot among the endless blue of the sea. Soon, this too disappeared, and he was once again among the darkness. He saw at this moment, the gaping maw of the mirror. It swallowed him, if he could, Leon would have screamed.

Leon awoke and tried to move but failed. His hands, he found, had been bound as were his feet. He opened his eyes and saw the metal bars of a cage. In the distance, he heard the bells of the arena. Instinctively he knew they rang for him. He had been granted this final reprieve, perhaps in respect for his power, a glorified death at the hands of the arena. Leon drew in a deep breath and felt once again for that faint ember of power deep within. This time, however, all he could hear was the screams of dying children. His nose was once again filled with fleshy soot, his mouth tasted of blood and ash. As his cage rose upwards, towards the sound of bloodthirsty cheers and murderous chants, he let go. The flash of real steel rushed towards him, the faces of the wielders of these vicious weapons obscured under expertly crafted animal-like helms. Leon let tears flow from his face for the first time since the shipwreck. He was still a child; despite the trauma and violence, he had endured. Leon let his childhood take over and he wept for his mother, her face blurry and obscured by the passage of time. In his soul, the ember faded, and he felt it die as the bite of steel pierced through his neck, shoulders, and abdomen, the steel tearing through sinew, blood, and organs. Blood spilled, soaking into the unquenchable sands of the Academies arena.