by Evan Winter
“Point! Point!” the Proven called out two more times, Tau’s barrage ending with him down five to nil.
“No matter, Tau,” the Governor said, stretching out his name like it was a dirty word. “Your mother will still love you. Just tell her the truth. You lost to a better breed of man.”
He was trying to make Tau angrier. He wanted him making mistakes, and it was working. Tau was furious, and even filled with fury, he couldn’t deny it—the Governor was the stronger swordsman.
RULES
Tau wasn’t going to beat him and tried telling himself justice did not depend on being military. He told himself he could go to Citadel City. He could find Kellan and put a knife in the man’s back. He could learn where Dejen Olujimi lived and slit the Ingonyama’s throat while he slept. He told himself Abasi Odili could die in a similar manner. He told himself it would serve, and he knew it wouldn’t.
Tau could not give peace to Aren’s soul by killing men in their sleep. No, he had to make it into the Ihashe. He had to win this match. He wanted revenge, needed revenge, and there was no price he wouldn’t pay to get it. So Tau channeled Jabari at his teasing best. The Governor thought he knew taunts, but no one could make you lose your head like Jabari could.
“I’ll tell my family,” Tau said to the Governor. “I’ll tell them I lost to a half-breed slough-skin whose real father, his hedena father, must have taken his mother in the dirt, on a raid.”
“Nceku!” said the Governor, coming fast for Tau.
Tau tried to fend him off but lost another point. He was down too many and worried there wasn’t enough time. He had to work faster.
“Did your mother like it, you think?” Tau said, disgusted with himself, his behavior, and his plan. “Rutting with a savage in the muck? How can the man who calls himself your father look at that marked-up face and not know you come from heretic stock?”
“You debased Low Common cek!” The Governor battered at Tau’s sword and shield.
Tau did his best to defend, gave up another point, and lowered his shield and sword to cover the bottom half of his chest and waist. The Governor was in a fervor, and though Tau was taking a beating, he wanted to hurt him more.
“Yes, yes!” squealed Tau, doing his best, that time, to imitate his childhood bully Chibuzo, who had been three cycles older. “Give it to me! Put a pock-faced hedena in me!” Chibuzo, the bully, had made it into the Southern Ihashe Isikolo. Chibuzo had died there, in training.
The Governor screamed and swung wildly. It was the swing Tau had been waiting for. He stepped closer, avoiding the heaviest part of it, sent a prayer to the Goddess, and took the blow on the side of the head.
The world exploded in a dazzle of multicolored light. Then Tau was on the ground. His helm had come off and it rolled in lazy circles beside him. Dazed and expecting another attack, he raised his sword, but the attack didn’t come.
“No! No!” the Governor said, pleading. “I didn’t mean—”
“The match is over,” the Proven told him. “We have a winner, by disqualification.”
“You can’t! He’s not deserving! You can’t—”
“What you can’t do is strike an opponent in the head,” the Proven told him. “The winner is five thousand forty.”
Tau had won. He was still in the contest and needed to prepare for his next match. He tried to stand. The world turned green and his eyes crossed. He squeezed them shut and forced his way up. He could do this. He would do this.
He stepped out of the fighting circle, his head feeling altogether too large, as the sights and sounds of combat swirled round him. He heard bronze clanging on bronze, shouts, screams, and points being called as the young Lessers of the South battled for the chance to become killers.
The Governor was still arguing with the Proven who had judged their match. He had to be carried out of the fighting circle by two full-blood Ihashe. Tau felt no satisfaction. The Governor was right. Tau hadn’t deserved the win.
In the nearest circle, a massive man, one of the biggest Lessers Tau had ever seen, was crushing his opponent, who quickly called for the Goddess’s mercy. On Tau’s other side, the match was more even. Two warriors hacked at each other like stonecutters. The fighting was all strength and bluster, no technique. Tau couldn’t tell who would win, but at least the world no longer looked bright green.
“Five thousand forty!” a new Proven called out. The man was standing two fighting circles away and calling Tau’s number. “Five thousand forty and five thousand three hundred ten!”
It was time to fight.
Tau walked over, swinging his sword and twisting his neck back and forth to loosen it. His opponent arrived at the circle as he did, and Tau tried to look like he wasn’t on the cusp of throwing up. The Low Common across from Tau had a bulbous nose, wore several heavy shirts in place of a gambeson, and was barefoot. He nodded to Tau and Tau returned the gesture. They stepped in the ring and raised their swords.
“Goddess smile upon you,” said the Low Common.
“Fight!” the Proven said.
Tau’s opponent lurched into a looping attack. Tau blocked. His sword was inside the Low Common’s blade and Tau lifted up and away, moving the man’s weapon out of position, leaving him unable to defend as Tau brought his sword down on the Low Common’s shoulder. The man cried out and darted back, but not before Tau swung again, smashing his blade into the Common’s upper arm.
He yelped and dropped his sword, and Tau stabbed him in the gut. He doubled over, fell to the ground, and curled into a ball. Tau stepped back, waiting for the Proven to call the match.
“He has a twelve count,” the Proven warned, encouraging Tau to batter the downed man.
Tau didn’t move and the Low Common wheezed his way to his knees before crawling for his sword.
“He gets to his feet and the match continues to two hundred,” the Proven said.
“Then it does,” Tau said.
The Low Common got to his sword, put a hand round its hilt, and looked up at Tau. He must have seen something. He stayed in the dirt.
“The winner is five thousand forty,” shouted the Proven.
The Low Common took his hand from the sword’s hilt, watching Tau, shame writ large across his broad face. Ihagu or Drudge were his only options now, Tau knew, but he felt too empty to offer sympathy, so he left the circle, looking for water.
It was a sun span before Tau was called again. His opponent was a High Harvester in a gambeson. The pitiable bastard bleated for the Goddess’s mercy after taking the first two hits.
Tau’s fourth match was a war that lasted the entire two hundred count. Tau and his opponent were drenched in sweat by the time it was over, and Tau had lost count of the points long ago. He almost wept when the Proven lifted his arm in victory.
Fighting back tears and exhaustion, he tottered out of the fighting circle and collapsed. He knew if he was called for another match, he would lose. He lay and sat, in turns, waiting for and dreading to hear his number, and it wasn’t until the sun was on its return journey to the earth that Tau heard someone beat the bronze gong that announced the end of the first day of testing.
He’d survived. He’d fought four matches and won them, though the first fight had been the most perilous. By all rights, the pockmarked Governor should be in his place.
Tau tried to take off his gambeson but couldn’t raise his arms. He left the sweat-drenched padding on and shuffled away. He had to find something to eat, somewhere to sleep. The next day would be harder. Everyone would be a survivor of day one.
BRAWL
Day two was hotter. Tau hadn’t slept much or eaten at all. His muscles ached, his head pounded from the blow he’d taken on the first day, and he was walking with a limp from a cramp that wouldn’t loosen. The Heroes’ Circle was just as crowded as it had been the day before, the failed competitors replaced with spectators come to see the “real” fighters. Umqondisi from both the Northern and Southern Isikolo had come too, scouting for ta
lent. Tau spotted Jayyed, and thinking back to Jabari’s words, he became determined to impress the man. He hoped the onetime Guardian Council adviser would see him fight.
“Five thousand forty!”
Tau stepped into his fighting circle and did not like what he saw. He was facing a stocky, bare-chested man with no shield. The man had raised welts over his chest, back, and arms from the day prior. He eyed Tau, looking him up and down, but said nothing. Tau tossed his shield outside the circle, though not in some misguided attempt at fairness. He hated fighting with the damned things anyway.
“Fight!” the Proven ordered, and they did.
The topless man held back, so Tau attacked, coming fast, looking to finish the fight early. The topless man was faster. He shrugged off Tau’s first and second strikes with the edge of his blade and sent a jab for Tau’s stomach. Tau parried and their swords tangled. The stocky man stepped in, grabbed the wrist of Tau’s sword arm, and bent it. Tau mirrored the move and they grappled, tripping and falling in the dirt. There was a scramble, a dropped sword, a head butt, a curse, a retrieved sword, and a heavy kick, and then both were back up, circling.
Tau’s left eye was swelling shut and the jagged cut Lekan had given him was bleeding through its scabs. The man’s head had felt like a rock when he’d slammed it into Tau’s face. At least the stocky fighter wouldn’t be as fast. Tau had kicked him in the thigh as hard as he could and the bare-chested brawler was favoring the leg.
Tau lifted his sword, keeping it parallel to the ground and aimed at his opponent’s chest. The brawler slapped at it with his blade, trying to keep Tau focused on the meaningless contact as he planned his next offensive. Tau didn’t give him the chance.
He came forward, sword point leading and punching through the air like a needle through cloth. His opponent skipped backward and Tau harried him, taking him to the fighting circle’s boundary. With no more room for retreat, the swordplay began in earnest.
The brawler yelled something unintelligible and attacked. Tau snarled and went for him. Blades connected; they repositioned, swung again: block, riposte, each looking for any advantage, any chance for a clean strike.
The brawler gave Tau a hard hit to the arm, Tau blasted him in the waist, and the man moved back, hunching over his injured core. Tau followed, smashing at him, the pressure forcing the brawler to his knees.
Tau had the advantage, but the match had taken a toll. He was wearied and could barely feel his arms or legs. He had to end this, and, roaring, he hammered at the kneeling man like an errant nail. Bang, bang, bang!
The sword fell from the brawler’s hand. Bang, bang, bang! Tau didn’t stop. He hit him on his arms and shoulders and clubbed him in the chest. The brawler fell over and Tau hit him and hit him until he heard the Proven’s shouting over the blood booming in his ears.
“Victory! Victory! Match over! The match is over!” the officiant screamed.
Tau backed away. The brawler was mewling like a newborn. Five, Tau thought. Five more wins and he was guaranteed a place among the Ihashe.
He wanted to laugh and didn’t have the energy. He had just gotten the joke, the one that had tickled the smiling Ihashe who had explained the rules the day before. Tau couldn’t win ten of these fights. Tau didn’t think he could win one more.
He made his way to the nearest bucket, cupped his hands, and drank, the cut on his face dripping blood into the water.
“Five thousand forty!” shouted a voice several fighting circles away. “Five thousand forty.”
Tau looked toward the shouting and saw the Proven and the fighting circle. He could leave. He was so tired. He could leave.
“Five thousand forty!”
Tau left the blood-tainted bucket of water and walked over. He was joined by the huge Low Common he’d seen bludgeon a man on the first day.
“Uduak,” the massive man said, pointing a thick finger at himself.
Tau looked up and into the muscular man’s bland, heavy-browed face. “Tau,” he told him.
The giant shook his head. “Nine,” he said, pointing at Tau’s chest.
“Nine?”
“Ninth fight,” he said, stepping into the same circle as Tau.
NINE
Uduak held a great sword almost as tall as Tau. On his other arm was a massive circular shield. He wore a full gambeson and was holding a bronze helm. The brute stuffed the helm onto his sweat-slicked shaven head. It covered him down to his neck and had a single piece of thick bronze down its center, protecting his nose.
“Shield, neh?” the attending Proven asked, as if he doubted anything would make the slightest difference to this match’s outcome.
“Yes,” Tau said. He didn’t like fighting with one, but he couldn’t imagine surviving a blow from Uduak’s great sword, no matter how much linen was wrapped around it. A crowd was forming and Tau knew they weren’t here to watch him.
“Fight!” the Proven shouted, and Uduak charged.
Tau tried to get out of the way, but Uduak’s great sword was too long to dodge, so he blocked with his shield. The contact spun him around, putting him on his ass, and the pain was instant. It vibrated up Tau’s blocking arm, into his shoulder, and down his back.
He jumped to his feet, scurrying away from Uduak, who came at him swinging. Tau blocked two thundering blows and could no longer lift his shield arm. He shrugged off the paltry protection, letting shield slip to the hot sand. Behind him the onlookers gibbered, cheering and jeering in turns.
“He’s done,” one of them said.
“Burn him,” another shrieked.
Uduak came on.
Trying to shake some feeling back into his arm, Tau danced out of the way of the oversized man’s next swing but had to use his sword to block Uduak’s follow-up. The collision of swords came close to tearing his weapon from his hand.
“Goddess!” chortled a faceless fool in the crowd, half-chewed food flying from his mouth.
Tau had to attack. He sucked air into his lungs, bellowed, and ran for Uduak. The crowd cheered and Uduak didn’t move. He stood there, tall as a mountain, and swung that great sword.
Tau ducked beneath the linen-covered blade and thrust for the giant’s gut. Uduak stepped off the line of the thrust and swiped at Tau with his shield. The shield belted Tau aside, lifting him off the ground and flinging him through the air. He hit the sand hard and the air was blasted from his lungs. Head spinning, chest burning, he rolled to his knees. Uduak was coming for him.
Tau couldn’t win, not against this. He thought to call for mercy and end the foolishness before the brute killed him. Instead, he stood. The crowd went mad. They would get to see blood.
Uduak slowed, stretching the moment. He pointed at Tau. “Nine,” he said.
Tau spat, tasting copper. “Cek your nine.”
Uduak swung his great sword hard enough to disembowel, linen wrap or no. Tau dove to the dirt, letting the swing spin the big man half around, and then Tau came back up, slamming his sword in the weak space below Uduak’s ribs. His blade hit the brute square, punched into the gambeson, and bit flesh.
With the linen around his sword intact, the superficial cut was legal, and Tau had blooded the beast. The crowd howled, their rapture rising to a frenzy when Uduak looked down to see where he’d been hit.
“Point!” said the Proven, flinging a hand in the air for emphasis.
Uduak’s eyes thinned to slits and his fingers danced over the hilt of that horrible sword. He banged the blade on the edge of his shield, pushing the circle of bronze farther onto his arm, and he came for Tau.
Tau gripped his sword with both hands. It wasn’t meant to be swung that way, but Uduak was angry and strong enough to kill him if Tau blocked wrong with one hand. Tau thought about playing keep-away. He was a point up, and if he could stay out of reach for the rest of the match…
Uduak must have understood Tau’s thinking. He was angry but smart enough to move forward with care. He cut off all angles of escape, giving Tau no
room to dance. Then he began to take Tau apart.
The first strike that Tau blocked rattled his teeth. The next almost knocked him out of the circle. The third he didn’t time well enough, and Uduak’s linen-covered blade slapped him in the shoulder, cutting him within the rules and flinging him to the dirt. The Proven called a point for Uduak and the match was tied.
Tau scrambled to his feet, but Uduak moved with speed, his sword already swinging. With no other choice but being chopped in two, Tau jumped toward Uduak and inside the deadliest part of the sword’s arc. When he was hit, he wasn’t sure he hadn’t been hewn apart anyway.
The blow sent him flying and he crashed into the packed clay of the fighting circle, tumbling head over heels until his helm popped up and off his head like a startled locust. Tau groaned and found he couldn’t draw a full breath.
“Point!” the Proven called out.
Tau was losing and the crowd chanted something guttural, ugly. “Uduak! Uduak! Uduak!”
On will alone, Tau got to his feet. The world was tilting, his chest was a maze of agony, and he still hadn’t caught his breath, but he lifted his sword and pointed it at the man for whom the crowd cheered.
“Cek your nine,” Tau said, sword arm quivering.
Uduak sneered and came on. Tau let him come and, at the last moment, he darted to the right, away from Uduak’s sword. Gripping his blade, Tau spun in a circle, hoping the momentum-powered strike would smash into Uduak’s side, break something, and finish the man.
Only, his sacrifice swing didn’t hit flesh. It clanged against Uduak’s blocking blade, jarring Tau to his seeds and making him stumble. Uduak jerked his weapon away, lifting his sword high but letting his shield drop. He meant to finish Tau with an overhead blow.
Tau stabbed out and over Uduak’s lowered shield but was too close for power. His sword nudged Uduak in the stomach, soft as a first kiss.
