Page 98 of Court of Talons
“You lie.” He’s still seething, but at least he’s quieter now.
“About this? No.” I shake my head. “Tomorrow, I die a warrior, which I suppose is more than I deserve. But at least I’ll face that deathasa warrior. Everyone else who follows Rihad’s command on that field can live as cowards for all I care.”
“You’rewrong. Rihad won’t order the men to kill you, Talia of the Tenth,”—He says my name like it’s a vile curse—“no matter the filthy way you got your band. He might want it, but he won’t command it. Hewon’t.”
Fortiss remains furious, and beyond him, I can see Szonja again, her beautiful head turned to regard us, her intelligent eyes filled with an emotion I cannot describe. Pride. Sorrow. Pain. She’s not watching me so much as Fortiss.
Thereisa connection there, I realize suddenly. A connection that perhaps they both can find their way to, if they only try.
I swing my attention back to Fortiss and blink into the darkness.
He’s gone.
Chapter 41
In what seems an impossible feat of workmanship, two new wooden towers have been built overnight to accommodate the Tournament of Gold’s final four-man battles.
All along the path there are cheering crowds, from the First House gates at the base of the mountain to the coliseum. Now, as we stand on our platforms, the coliseum heaves and swells like a living thing. There’s never been a four-man battle in the past three hundred years. There’s never been a melee of Divhs, and the wide marshy plain between the stands and the First House’s mountain fortress is teeming with men as the warrior knights from yesterday’s battles gather here, waiting for another turn at glory.
This is a day that will forever change the world, Rihad boasts in his announcements to the crowd, dutifully carried from crier to crier around the stadium. This is a day no one will ever forget.
I can tell at a quick glance my father does not stand among Rihad’s cabal of spectators. No doubt he is drinking himself drunk back at the First House, lost in his schemes of how to capitalize on my imminent death. The idea of the warrior band transferring back to him sets my teeth rigid.
No. That cannot happen.
I scan the wide field and the stands beyond, noting Caleb and Nazar’s presence with the other warrior knight retainers. I’m glad but not surprised that Caleb is there, but my heart nearly breaks to see Nazar by his side. I’ve not been allowed to speak to either of them, and guards have ridden close the entire path to ensure that I don’t.
I’ve no idea if Nazar has been called yet to answer to my father, but ultimately, the man is a priest and answers to no one but the Light.
Still, my priest and my squire clearly remain alive, and for that, I’m grateful. Both men’s horses are festooned with green and silver sashes as well, the sight of which brought a sudden rush of tears to my eyes when I first stepped out into the sunshine.
Now those sashes are flying in the stands, along with banners of gold and black, sky blue, purple, sand and red. Banners of victory and hope in this mockery of a tournament. No one will know that it’s a foregone conclusion who will win this battle and who will lose.
Kheris stands on the platform to my right, ready to fight. My partner, who I know would as soon kill me with his own hands as consign himself to the limits of the tournament. He’s been scowling at me since the moment I took my place with the other combatants for this round. I don’t think he knows I’m female, simply marked for death. That’s enough for him.
The horns blast, and as one, all four warriors upon the stands curl our right hands to our hearts. We raise our left hands high into the air, and the coliseum erupts to a fever pitch of screaming as we hold our positions one moment…two…then summon our Divhs.
The roars of giants replace those of the crowd.
Gent’s awareness billows in my mind like an unfurling sail, and I can immediately see through his eyes as he swings hishead left and right, taking in the unfamiliar positions of the other Divhs—and the fact that there are three, not one to fight. Instantly, he seems to grasp the nuance of primary and secondary target. The ones to the far end of the field are the first wave of attack, but the serpent to his right is also a threat. My own skin prickles as he stares at Kheris’s Divh, the memory of the acidic poison on the creature’s skin raking through both my mind and Gent’s once more.
Then the monsters at the far end of the field race toward us.
I look to the man standing opposite me on the far platform, tied to the multihorned bull. Cheric of the First House isn’t looking at me but at a space beyond me, staring at the monsters pounding across the dirt. That’s wrong, though. The way of the warrior is strategy, and the strategy of one warrior against many is a careful dance of both the long sword and the short.
Nazar’s words flow back into me.“To beat one man means you could beat many, if your gaze is true and your heart ready.”
All at once, confusion leaves me. I hear Gent’s answering call, an undulating cry of both happiness and excitement. He welcomes the battle, I know. He welcomes the race, anyway.
For myself, I know what I must do. I lift my arms slightly, in the merest hint of the movement of this dance, and flow through the steps.
The Divhs clash in a sudden blaze of bodies and spirits.
The other two warriors have clearly been better prepared for this than we have. As one they attack Kheris’s snake, leaving Gent to swerve around in a wide arc, his opponent completely ignoring him. The serpent twists and writhes, and though I have no love for Kheris or his creature, I can’t let his Divh fail the way he would surely let Gent drop. To do so will mean quick death to us both.
Instead, I lift my hand and edge it backward. On the field, Gent changes course. He runs at both of the other monsters from behind. They can’t see him and aren’t expecting him in the face of the giant serpent’s full-on defense. Gent grabs the head of the bull and cracks it hard into the mouth of the much larger tusked cat, the second snapping instinctively down, maiming his own partner.
After that, Kheris’s snake rights itself and tears into the cat, the bull apparently impervious to her acidic skin. The cat’s screams shake the stadium, and Gent swings around to the bull, who’s still reeling from the blow to his head. Neither my Divh nor I hesitate as we did in our first battle. My mind and his immense form race forward in the spirit of the one cut, attacking and attacking again, and the bull suddenly sees Gent everywhere it looks, so large is Gent in its field of vision. Gent battles the bull down to the dust of the tournament field, and suddenly, after a long, deafening blast of horns, I come back to myself.