by T. C. Edge
Dom awaited the required agreement, before moving on.
“Good. Now, today Rufus will continue to instruct you on weapons and will help to acclimatise you to the conditions here. Today will be less humid than yesterday, though that is no good thing. Better to suffer the worst possible conditions here and get used to them, rather than having an easy ride and entering the arena half-baked. I can only assume, therefore, that Rufus will be taking you closer to the edge than ever.”
Dom looked down at his instructor, dark skin shining and veiny muscles rippling. He lifted his lips into a devious smirk and made sure all the trainees saw.
“I think you can all take that as a ‘yes’,” grinned Dom. “Now, tomorrow you will be assessed by the empress. I will confer this evening with Rufus and determine your final seedings. The empress, however, has absolute power to place you where she wishes in the games. They are her games, after all,” he added with a bitter twist to his voice.
His smile brightened and he shrugged off thoughts of his mother.
“I advise you, then, to perform as well as you can. The empress is often won over by grand displays of power. Impress her, and you may find your path to the latter stages simplified. She will be coming here to this ludus tomorrow evening. Train hard today and get prepared. The days are passing quickly now, and the warrior race is almost upon us.”
Dom passed the floor onto Rufus with those words, and without so much as a chance to let them sink in, the day began in earnest.
As the morning shifted along, the heat began to build. It was a heat not just of the air, not just a raising of the temperature within the yard, but a heat between the contenders too.
Few words were spoken between any of them. It had been made very clear to them all that, while they might either fight together or avoid each other in the early stages, their paths might well cross further on down the line. Consequently, an atmosphere of distrust had developed. It was not a social environment by any stretch of the imagination.
Most seemed to spend half their time training, and the other watching the others. All looked for weaknesses, performing their own assessments. And as Kira did the same, she knew full well that few would be giving all their secrets away, and that many might be either hiding certain powers, or not displaying them to the fullest extent.
Naturally, Rufus was keen to keep Shadow and Kira apart that day. They trained at opposite ends of the yard, though Kira regularly maintained one eye on her enemy as often as she could spare it. Shadow likely did the same, though if that was the case she didn’t see it. He was, in fact, unique among the troop in his attentions. While the rest kept a close watch on everyone else, Shadow seemed quite content in keeping himself to himself.
It was Finn, learning to get to grips with a range of different types of swords, who called attention to it. He and Kira had been paired to train together at one end, and had even been given access to proper metal weaponry and blades. It seemed as though Dom was quite confident that no one would go turning them on any trainee or guard, not now they knew of the terrible punishment that would result.
Looking over at Shadow as they battled with a couple of wooden figures, Finn began shaking his head.
“He doesn’t care about anyone else, does he? He’s like a robot that guy.”
“He is,” said Kira, snarling. “Flesh and blood body, but a robot mind. Back in Haven, they get their minds reconditioned to follow orders without question. He’s designed to kill people like us, Finn. That’s all he knows.”
Finn’s bright blue eyes narrowed.
“Hope I don’t have to face him. Hope you don’t either,” he added.
He smiled at her, his young, handsome face somewhat betraying their fate, if only for a moment. She knew it wasn’t wise to continue to speak with him, or further this bond they’d developed. I mean, what if they came face to face? What then?
“You shouldn’t worry about me,” she told him. “It’s dog eat dog here, Finn. You should keep your mind on yourself.”
“Is that what you’re doing?” he questioned.
“Well, yeah…obviously.”
“And if we had to fight each other. Would you kill me?”
The directness of the question threw her off her stride a little. It was an obvious query, and an obvious thought to have. Though, perhaps not the sort to fashion into words.
“I…I don’t really know how to answer that,” said Kira.
Finn stopped swiping with his sword at the wooden figure. He stared right at her.
“With the truth, maybe,” he said. “Come on, if we were drawn to face each other, would you kill me?”
Kira recoiled, uncomfortable. What sort of line of questioning was this?
“Well, no, not if I didn’t have to. You heard what Domitian said yesterday. You can ask for mercy, right? Just kneel and lift your index finger to submit. We don’t all have to die…”
“You think that’s true? I thought that was just for your friendly bout with Shadow. I get the impression that it’s death or nothing out there.”
Kira honestly didn’t have an answer to that. In fact, no one had quite clarified just what the rules were. Presumably, it depended on the bout itself, and whether the empress would allow it.
“I don’t know, Finn,” she said with a shrug.
“OK, well say you have to kill or be killed. Then what?”
“Then I kill…”
Kira’s words flowed without delay. They were instinctive, natural. Finn went quiet for a moment, and Kira immediately regretted them.
“I’m not sure I could kill you,” he said quietly.
Kira felt the need to clarify and back up her seemingly callous answer with a healthy dose of logical reasoning.
“Not even if you really had to?” she asked. “OK, so what if killing me meant getting a ticket home? Going back to your village. Being their protector again.” She looked at him for a little while, and saw the answer in his face. “You see, Finn. You’d kill me. At the end of the day, when you’re out there, it won’t matter who’s in front of you. Friend or enemy…you’ll kill them if you have to.”
Finn took a moment to think, and then shook his head once more.
“No,” he said. “I don’t know if I would. I’m not like you. I haven’t given up on my humanity yet.”
The barb stung, and Finn’s eyes showed something resembling disappointment. But he didn’t know the world like she did. He hadn’t lived war for the last ten years. He was an innocent boy from the coast, a fisherman’s son with powers that would, if called upon, be used to drive people back. And that may be all he’d ever done.
Kira filled her lungs and considered her response. Finn maintained his stare, awaiting her reply silently, as the sounds of training within the yard seemed to fade just a little as they stood, hidden away in their little bubble.
“Finn,” she began, measuring out her voice, “you might just need to lose some of your humanity if you want to get out of this place. Have you ever actually killed a man?”
She saw his face change. Several years seemed to be added to his age, his complexion becoming something more familiar to Kira. He held the look of a killer in his eye.
He nodded, but said nothing.
“You see,” said Kira. “You’ve killed because you’ve had to. What’s the difference here? If you face me, then you kill me if you can…because you have to. Don’t hold back, because I won’t. Neither of us can afford to think like this, do you understand me. Don’t look at me as a friend, not there. There are no friends in this yard.”
That shadowy countenance continued to build, his bright blond hair darkening, his eyes doing the same. It seemed as though a storm had begun to gather above him alone, and Kira liked what she saw.
He wasn’t an innocent boy anymore.
“I understand,” he said. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe we’re better not speaking. It will be easier…if the time comes.”
His voice had taken on a glacial tone. And tha
t, too, was just what Kira wanted to hear.
Because aside from her wobble that morning, she was a realist. Having Finn following her around like a lost lamb was only going to weaken them both. She had to put him straight, and she had to cast him off. This was no place to be making friends.
“Hopefully it won’t come to that,” she concluded. “But, we both have to prepare ourselves for the possibility. If you want to get out of here alive, and you have to kill me, then do it. Promise me you will?”
He looked at her, and the darkness faded, and the innocence and youth began to return. And then, ever so slowly, his head began to turn left and right, and his eyes faded into doubt once more.
“Kira,” he whispered into the warm summer air. “I may look naïve, but I’m not. I know I’m not getting out of here alive…”
23
The remainder of the day and the night that followed was a lonely affair for Kira. She felt largely torn for how she had behaved during the conversation with Finn, and a little guilty for what she’d said.
Really, the chances of them meeting were slim anyway, and so it might have all been moot. Kira was well aware by now that, aside from Domitian’s contenders, there were plenty of others, most notably those acquired by Lucius, who they’d be far more likely to face. Given the sneering, arrogant manner in which he presented himself on the balcony, she could only conclude that he had some rather fine warriors up his sleeve.
That in itself gave Kira some odd, two-fold pleasure. If she was to fight in the arena - and the proof for that, she thought sarcastically, had become more or less irrefutable by now - then dying by the hand of some great, wild warrior from a faraway land wouldn’t be the worst way to go. As a warrior herself, Kira relished the challenge of battle, and couldn’t help but be slightly excited by what lay in wait, as perverse as she knew that was.
At the same time, she considered that Lucius’ crop might have someone capable of killing Shadow. If she died by some mighty warrior’s hand, then at least she could take solace knowing that that horrible, dead-eyed Stalker might soon follow suit.
The worst-case scenario, of course, would be Shadow ending up the overall victor. And that didn’t bear thinking about at all.
Still, she couldn’t help but feel bad about Finn. He trained alone, now bereft of the help she was giving him in handling certain blades, and seemed to lose himself into his own little world, much as he had when they met on the boat. The past few days had seen him creep from his shell. Now, Kira had kicked him back inside it.
Feeling guilty, she approached him occasionally and tried to offer some aid. He denied her each time, even if it might damage his chances on the sand. And each time, Kira saw the premature defeat in his eyes, backing up the words he’d said to her – “I’m not getting out of here alive.”
He was a realist at least, and only that morning Kira had uttered more or less the same thing to Domitian, her mood shaken by the defeat to Shadow. And still, though she’d perked up somewhat, she was quietly confident in the fact that her days here were likely numbered.
In some warped way, it was liberating. And perhaps the same was happening with Finn. It was a fine line, really, between believing you’re going to die and losing all hope, and thinking you might die, but fighting your damnedest to make sure that didn’t happen.
Kira was in the second boat. She was logical and highly aware of the challenge facing her, and yet would now fight tooth and nail to survive and get back home.
Finn appeared to be in the first boat, fading into despair, shorn of the single thing that might just have been keeping him together – his nascent friendship with Kira.
And, above all, that was the thought that Kira hated the most. She felt a responsibility to him. She felt like she had let him down. And yet, she felt like it was a necessary component of life here at the ludus too. It was an impossible situation to be in, and in truth one she didn’t want to deal with.
So, aside from her brief efforts to offer some limited olive branch to Finn, she decided that maybe this was for the best. And as the day went on, and the trainees were pushed to their limits, she slowly began to refocus on herself, and set her blinkers back in place.
By the time night fell, all the contenders had once more emptied their tanks. The day had, as Dom had suggested, been less sticky and humid. Yet he was right on Rufus too, the instructor reducing their rest periods and increasing their workloads as the day went on.
No rest. Very little water. No shade.
A long, long day.
The night that followed was, on the other hand, short. With an exhaustion filling every member of the troop, they were taken back down into the dungeon to shower, feed, and sleep. Kira ignored the first despite the stink that had festered around her. She gorged on the second like a pig scoffing from a trough, losing all sense of propriety, something she had limited quantities of in the first place.
The third she fully indulged in. Creeping away to her bed down in a little alcove, she climbed aboard and disappeared almost immediately into the darkness of her mind. She slipped away with all manner of thoughts, concerns, fears and odd excitements crowding her head and trying to step into the light. Yet, the blackness was all consuming and all powerful. It surged forward and dismissed all thoughts, dragging her straight into a deep and much-needed slumber.
And when she woke, the cycle continued. And that day was the hottest day of all.
It was a big day for Dom, much as it was his contenders. The day of the official assessment by Empress Vesper, a ceremony that would determine just where each fledgling gladiator might be placed in the games.
He’d spent the previous day watching closely from the balcony, completing his own analysis in order to determine their seedings. When training was completed, he’d taken stock of Rufus’ advice and found that his instructor’s thinking was very much in line with his own, as it had been since the man from the south found glory in the arena and joined Dom’s team.
They spoke for some time up on the balcony, Dom sipping wine, Rufus sipping water, looking down to the sand as if the trainees were still there. The clear skies had given way to a nearly full moon, a cool breeze sweeping through the ludus and setting a pleasant atmosphere to their discussion.
Rufus, owing to his nature, took it all very seriously. Dom took it seriously too, though in a different way. He drank, reclining on a comfortable chair, as Rufus sat upright and stiff and took him through each of the contenders one by one. They were two very different men with one identical goal – to ensure that this ludus delivered a champion this year. Nothing else would suffice for either man.
The first two seedings required no debate at all. Shadow was to be number one, and Oom number two. Rufus, despite his slight animosity towards the Stalker from Haven, barely had a bad word to say about him, from a fighter’s standpoint at least.
“He’s a stone-cold killer,” he said. “Fast, strong, precise in everything he does, and incredibly well trained in combat, weapons and hunting tactics. He picks things up quickly too, and manages to analyse opponents and their techniques on the fly. I noticed that during the short bouts with Raven and Kira. Number one without a doubt. He’ll give anything Lucius has got a torrid time, I’m sure of it. Did you take a look at his stock, by the way?”
Dom had gone out that day with the intention of visiting Lucius’ ludus, arriving in impromptu fashion just as his rival had the night before. However, on getting near, he’d ordered his men to turn the carriage around and go the other way.
“No, I went back to the plaza and baths,” said Dom.
“Why?”
Dom shrugged.
“Reflex,” he said. “I couldn’t stand seeing his smug face again so soon. Lord knows I’ll be seeing plenty of him over the next few weeks. And, well, this year I’d rather be surprised. I’ll get to have a look at them during the pre-games celebration.”
“Yes but you won’t see them in action,” said Rufus. “They’ll just be on display...”<
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“It’s fine, Rufus, don’t worry. We’ll get a chance to form our strategies in time, my friend.”
Rufus was clearly doubtful. He always preferred to get intel on the other major combatants in the games as early as possible, so any potential weaknesses could be identified and considered. He liked to give his master’s gladiators as good a chance as possible of progressing, and that meant knowing all they could. Leaving it late wasn’t advisable, and he told Dom that with his expression alone.
Dom, however, wasn’t quite so thorough in such things as Rufus. He knew that the early bouts wouldn’t pair the better fighters, and they’d have plenty of time to dissect their opponent’s capabilities over the coming weeks.
It was a brief moment of contention in an otherwise collaborative evening of determining seedings. They quickly moved on. It was too late for anything else.
“So, Oom?”
The discussion turned to the giant, who slotted neatly into the number two spot. Again, he and Shadow had both been identified early by Dom, and both had turned out to be just what he’d hoped for.
“Yes, Oom could do very well,” said Rufus. “I’ve never seen a man that size move as quick as that, and frankly didn’t think it was possible. He moves like a man half his size, and nimble too considering. Paired with his strength, he’ll be hard to cut down.”
“Right. I completely agree. Now, who takes the third seed?”
This is where things got a little muddy. Dom had had Kira here before her showdown with Shadow, though remained convinced that the conditions of the fight didn’t suit her at all. Shadow might well have bested any of the others with equal haste, and was clearly fuelled by his distaste for her. She certainly shouldn’t be counted out of the running for the third position.
“Kira?” he asked, raising his eyebrows.
Rufus considered it for a few long moments.
The other possibilities here were Malvo and Leewood, though the latter was showing the occasional sign of trauma due to the cracked skull he suffered at the hands of Oom. His powers, which were more considerable than Dom had initially thought, would fade sporadically, and not due to the heat or the lack of water the trainees were forced to suffer. Even early in the day, well hydrated and rested, he’d experience brief bouts of dizziness that could make him vulnerable.
