Page 83 of Court of Talons
The entire coliseum goes quiet for a long, harrowing moment.
Nothing appears at the far end of the tournament field; nothing appears in front of the wooden towers. I shoot my gaze toward Rihad again, but his grin remains intact. At this distance, I can’t tell if he’s surprised or angered or?—
The air around me snaps tight, like a sheet whipped by a gale.
A roar of an entirely different kind booms over the tournament grounds.
The crowds might be screaming, or they might have fallen silent. I can’t hear anything above the torrent of sound rushing through my brain as I turn to witness the creature that Fortiss and Rihad have now summoned forth.
It’s the hugest monster I have ever seen. Nearly as tall as the coliseum is long, the creature looks closest to a scorpion, but with the head of a lizard and two sets of arms—one with clawed hands at its ends, the other tipped with the cruel pincers a scorpion would typically employ. Its body is covered with aglistening carapace all the way down to its viciously barbed tail, and four sets of slender legs brace its immense body. It rears upright and spreads its wings, its mouth opening horrifyingly wide to utter an enraged hiss.
My gaze leaps to Fortiss as he turns around to see the creature himself, but he shows no surprise. Instead, the two stare at each other a long moment, taking each other’s measure. Then the apelike Divh of the Fifth House screams, whether in annoyance or anger, I can’t tell. But that apparently is all the encouragement that the Lord Protector’s Divh needs.
The creature’s wings snap wide, and it launches toward the center of the stadium. The apelike Divh follows suit, only that beast’s gait is a loping, full-bodied lurch that looks like it’s throwing himself forward on the ground versus truly running. I focus on the center of the tournament field and only then notice that Fortiss and Rihad hold almost identical stances—Fortiss moving forward on the warrior’s platform and Rihad locked in place on his stage, their bodies taut, their expressions focused. Their eyes seeing something other than what is right in front of their faces. They’re both looking through the eyes of the enormous, winged scorpion, and they both grow wholly still as the two Divhs crash together in the center of the field. The fighting between the monsters is frenzied, and though the minutes stretch, both Rihad and Fortiss never move.
In fact, it’s the grizzled veteran of the Fifth House who finally breaks the spell. With a sudden shudder, he twists to the side, and I find my gaze jumping back toward the fight, where I see, to my horror, that the razor-sharp scorpion’s claws haven’t merely grabbed the Fifth House Divh—they’ve gouged the chest of the ape wide open. The wound is deep and vicious, and on the platform, the veteran warrior knight drops to one knee, blood blossoming below his neck.
My gaze shifts to Rihad, but his hand is out, staying the trumpeters who even now are pressing the horns to their lips. Instead, he watches, his face wreathed in feral glee as his monster swipes forward, its blow clearly aimed for the ape’s unprotected throat. At the last moment, the Divh jerks its pincer up instead, clipping its victim in the jaw and spinning the ape in a wide, tumbling arc.
I watch Rihad as he drops his gaze to Fortiss and see the fury in his countenance for a moment as the two stare each other down. Then the Lord Protector drops his hand and the tournament horns finally sound. Guards scuttle out to both men. Fortiss raises his arms in triumph even as the other man swoons on the stage, then both of them lift their left hands again to release their Divhs.
Huge, rollicking cheers roll through the coliseum as a new round of trumpets blare, signaling the end of the day’s competition. Rihad’s monster disappears immediately, but the other warrior’s Divh doesn’t. It moans pitiably, trying to scratch its way forward, only to see his warrior turn and slash his arm out a second time. Then it winks out, no one the wiser of its momentary defection from the rules…a defection born of trying to reach the very warrior who hadn’t been able to protect it.
I stand stock-still as the trumpets crash around me. Everyone is moving, pushing, shouting. The Fifth House Divh is mortally wounded—there’s no way it can survive that hit, no way that its warrior can either, I know it in my bones. I look up at the platforms, but I can’t see anyone standing there. The men have been cleared away like the evening meal.
Fortiss emerges moments later at the bottom of his tower, but the warrior from the Fifth House doesn’t appear. And when the guards come to take us to our horses and escort us to the makeshift tent camp outside the stadium grounds, the FifthHouse’s horse remains with his people outside the tower. They all look determinedly cheerful.
I watch for him the rest of the day. The warrior doesn’t return.
“He’s probably been taken back to the First House for rest and doctors.” Caleb leans over our table that evening at the open-air feast on the tournament grounds, his hands around a fat loaf of fruited bread, a steaming meat pie at his elbow. “No one wants to see injury in a tournament, least of all Rihad. And in this case, heliterallydoesn’t want to see it. Or, alternatively, they’ve spirited away the fellow and his entourage and horse entirely, and he’s getting patched up somewhere in Trilion. It’s not like he’s going to be able to fight any more in the tournament.”
“I don’t think he’s going to be able to fight anymore, period,” I say, staring into my own cup of wine. “He was hurt—badly. So was his Divh.”
“Divhs heal.” Caleb waves his hand.
“That one won’t.”
A burst of chatter and cheers sounds at the far end of the tent camp, and I squint that way. Fortiss has arrived, amid much backslapping and shoulder thumping. He accepts it all graciously, but his manner seems different somehow, reserved.
“He doesn’t look as happy as he might, for someone who just pulled off the impossible,” I observe.
“Who?” Caleb cranes his neck around until he sees Fortiss. “Oh, him. He was ordered to speak to Rihad after the day’s closing ceremonies, and I didn’t get the idea it was for a fatherly hug. Rihad looked seriously angry.”
“He did?” I keep my tone light. “You mean because of the fight?”
“Not the fight.” Caleb laughs. “Are you mad? The fight made Rihad the talk of the Tournament.Rihad, not Fortiss. Everyoneknew that Rihad’s Divh would be showing up today, but people had…forgotten, I guess, how big it was. I know I sure had.”
“How long ago did you see it last?”
He screws up his face in thought. “Well, I was pretty young, so I don’t remember much except the beast itself—and that it scared the stuffing out of me. Later, I learned the details of the battle. Believe me, the bards wouldn’t shut up about it. Rihad wasn’t fighting. Like this one, he was running the show, not participating. So that would have made it maybe…” He blew out a long breath. “Ten years ago, easily.”
“He would’ve still been in his prime, able to fight alongside the other warriors.”
“Well, he didn’t. But it’s not as if he didn’t try.” Caleb grins. “I remember the story now. It wasn’t the tournament proper, but right before. He summoned his Divh for an exhibition match. The other warrior fainted dead away.”
I stare at him. “He didn’t.”
“He did. But anyway, he’s not upset about the fight, he’s upset that Fortiss pulled his Divh off the Fifth House’s beast so quickly. He wanted more blood. But! I’m out of wine. And what sort of competent squire would I be if I didn’t keep us well stocked with wine?”