Only the Worthy

by Morgan Rice

  Before Royce could process his words, Voyt suddenly swung around with his foot and swept Royce’s legs out from under him.

  Royce fell on his back in the mud, winded, and blinked as he looked up at Voyt, who stood over him, shaking his head.

  “You focus too much on your foe’s weapons,” Voyt chided. “There are many weapons to a combatant. Swords, yes. But hands and feet, too.”

  Royce scrambled back to his feet and faced off again, breathing hard, wiping sweat from his eyes. Again Voyt charged, and again Royce blocked.

  As Voyt drove him around the clearing, this time Royce tried to pay attention to what he’d been taught. He focused on his feet, and he began to feel himself moving more quickly, a bit more agile. He realized that Voyt was right. He managed to sidestep two blows that would have reached him before.

  “Better,” Voyt commented as he slashed down, just missing his arm. “But still too slow.”

  “This field is mud,” Royce called back, slipping. “That’s what’s stopping me.”

  Voyt laughed.

  “And do you think I am fighting on water?” he rebuked. “We share the same ground.”

  He snarled as he charged Royce with a fierce combination of slashes, seeming to rain down on him from all directions at once. It was all Royce could do to block them.

  “Why do you think I brought you are here?” Voyt barked. “Do you think your opponent shall fight on a different ground than you? Do you think he, and he alone, holds the advantage? Do you think the Pits are made of grass and gravel? You’ll be fighting in mud. And you’ll likely die in mud. And from the looks of you, complaining the whole time.”

  Voyt let out a cry as he lunged again; this time Royce sidestepped and just missed the blow as Voyt went rushing past.

  Royce was surprised at his own dexterity.

  Voyt turned and faced him.

  “Quick,” he commented. “But another failure. You missed an opportunity. When you’re close, you must forget your weapon and use your hands. You should have grabbed and thrown me as I passed by.”

  As he said these words he spun around and in one quick motion elbowed Royce in the back.

  Royce stumbled forward, the pain blinding between his shoulder blades, and landed face first in the mud, winded. It felt as if a sledgehammer had smashed his back; he could scarcely believe one man could be that strong.

  A moment later he felt strong hands lift him to his feet.

  Royce stood there, face covered in mud, embarrassed, dejected.

  “You will meet me here tomorrow before dawn,” Voyt said. “Before the others wake. We shall try again.”

  Royce looked at him, shocked at the honor. He was filled with gratitude even while he was filled with pain.

  “Why me?” he asked again.

  Royce stared at Voyt and he found himself looking into the dark eyes the eyes of a killer. Yet they were also the eyes of a brave and true warrior, one Royce admired more than he could say.

  “Because I see myself in you,” Voyt said

  Royce wondered how that could be possible. Voyt was the greatest warrior he had ever met. And a leader amongst men.

  “If any one of this crop has a chance of surviving, it is you. The rest are already dead in my eyes.”

  Royce was floored by the compliment; he had no idea how he had even caught the attention of Voyt, who he had always thought looked down upon him. Yet at the same time Royce thought of Mark, and his heart dropped for his friend, as he imagined him not surviving.

  Royce stared back.

  “You really think I can survive?” he asked.

  Voyt stared back, deadly serious.

  “Probably not,” he replied. “Not for long. But if I can prolong your life a little more, that will be enough.”

  Royce was baffled by this mysterious man.

  “But why?” he asked. “Why do this for me?”

  Voyt glanced down, and Royce realized he was looking at his necklace. He then looked back to Royce.

  “For your father.”

  Royce stood there, completely baffled.

  “My father?” Royce asked. “My father is but a peasant, a farmer in a small village. How would you, a great warrior, ever know my father?”

  Slowly, seriously, Voyt shook his head.

  “Your father is the only man who ever defeated me. And the only warrior I ever loved.”

  Voyt suddenly turned and marched off, leaving Royce standing there, filled with wonder.

  Royce reached down and looked at his gold necklace as if never seeing it before, and for the first time in his life, a new thought crossed his mind.

  Who was his father?

  And who, after all, was he?

  6 moons later

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Royce stood over Mark and held the tip of his wooden sword to his friend’s throat as he lay on the ground before him, and smiled broadly. Mark, clearly disappointed, shook his head.

  “Unfair,” Mark said. “Can’t I win just once?”

  Royce lowered his sword and held out a hand; Mark took it, and Royce yanked him up.

  “You fought very well, my friend,” Royce said. “I just got lucky.”

  Mark frowned.

  “And all the other times?” he asked. “Luck?”

  “He has the edge because he cheats. Haven’t you seen?”

  It was a voice filled with meanness, and Royce turned to see Rubin step out from the circle of boys. The twins stepped forward behind him, and all three of them jumped down several feet into the muddy pit Royce had been sparring in—a replica of the Pits to come—and raised their wooden swords and faced him.

  “Let’s see how you can fight when it’s three on one,” Rubin added.

  “I shall have your back,” Mark said, raising his sword.

  “No,” Royce replied, stepping up alone. “It is my fight.”

  No sooner had Mark ascended the pit, when Rubin raised his sword and charged with a shout, the twins behind him, all clearly intent on killing Royce. The tension between them had been long simmering these past moons, and finally, it had exploded.

  Royce was ready for it. After all these moons of training with Voyt he felt stronger than ever, ready to take on ten boys if needed, and he had been prepared for an ambush since the day he had arrived on this isle.

  Royce raised his wooden sword and blocked the first blow, the clack of wood ringing out, then spun his sword around with lightning speed and jabbed Rubin in the stomach. Rubin keeled over with a whoomph.

  Seth reached him at the same time, slashing for Royce’s back, and Royce spun and blocked, then spun his sword around and struck upwards, knocking his sword from his hand. He elbowed him in the face, dropping him.

  Sylvan charged Royce, shouting, coming at him point out as if to run his sword through him. Royce sidestepped, slashed him across the stomach, then brought his sword around and brought it down on his back, sending him face-first in the mud.

  Royce turned to Rubin, sword point out.

  Rubin raised his hands.

  “I give,” he said, still on one knee.

  Royce lowered his sword—yet the moment he did, Rubin suddenly threw a clump of mud into his eyes.

  Royce, blinded, clawed at the mud, unable to see. The next moment he felt a boot in his chest and went stumbling back, landing on his back on the ground, disarmed.

  “FIGHT!” cried the boys up above, watching.

  A moment later Royce, still blinded and clawing at mud, felt Rubin’s heavy weight atop him, his knees pinning down his shoulders. He then gasped, unable to breathe, as Rubin’s fat palms wrapped around his throat.

  Royce gripped the boy’s wrists, struggling to breathe, but the boy had him pinned down.

  “I’ve always hated you,” Rubin seethed. He grinned. “And now the time has finally come to send you back to the farm from which you came. No one will notice you’re gone.”

  Royce heard a sound and saw Mark jumping down into the pit. He rushed forw
ard to save him—but the twins blocked his way and he fought furiously with them, trying to break through.

  Royce, desperate, losing oxygen, knowing he was going to die, felt that feeling again. It rushed through him, from deep inside. It was a strength. A strength he did not understand. He did not need to understand it, he realized; he just needed to give in to it.

  With a sudden surge of power, Royce managed to break his arms free of Rubin’s grip, turn, and throw him off. He then rolled and pinned him down himself.

  Royce choked Rubin as he himself had been choked. Rubin raised his arms and choked Royce, too. The two of them lay in the mud, the hatred coursing through them both, choking each other to death. Royce was losing air, but he took satisfaction in seeing Rubin losing more.

  Suddenly, Royce felt a boot in his stomach. He felt himself kicked and the next thing he knew he went rolling in the mud.

  He looked up to see several soldiers standing between him and Rubin, some stepping on Rubin’s chest, too.

  Voyt stepped up and shook his head, looking down at Royce as he spoke.

  “As much as I’d love to see you two kill each other, today is not the day. We have more important business.”

  Hardly had he finished speaking the words than a horn sounded. It was the horn of gathering. Something important was happening.

  Royce and the others got to their feet and gathered around Voyt. Rubin and the twins lined up on the far side of the circle, and Royce could see them fuming, vowing to get vengeance when the time came.

  “BOYS!” Voyt boomed, and they all fell silent as he demanded their attention. “On this day some of you will become men. You will survive the final test, and your training will be over. Others of you will die. Your initiation has come.”

  He paced up and down the ranks, and Royce’s heart pounded as he did, wondering what lay in store.

  “You will journey from here as a group, descend into the Cave of Madness, and retrieve the Crystal Sword. It is guarded by a Mantra, a beast that has killed many before you, and will kill many more to come. For you, those few who have survived these moons, this is your reward. This is your privilege. A chance for a life fighting in the Pits. And a chance for a glorious death.”

  Royce caught Mark’s look, his face filled with dread, as were the faces of the other boys.

  “Beyond the Fields of Ore lies the entrance to the cave. You will go as one, and you will learn, finally, to fight as one. For if you do not, you will surely die. You will need each other, more than you ever have. If you fight together, you may survive. Only the worthy will return. And it is only the worthy whom I wish to see again.”

  A group of soldiers stepped forward, and Royce noticed that they each held a weapon, draped in a cloth of scarlet velvet. Voyt nodded and they removed the cloths, and Royce gasped to see twelve stunning swords revealed, shining, with platinum hilts, crafted of a finer metal than he’d ever seen.

  Each soldier stepped forward and handed each boy one sword. Royce reached out and took his, holding the hilt with one hand, its blade with the other. He was in awe. It was a thing of majesty. Its steel was black, carved with the insignia of the Black Isle, while its hilt was flanked by long, silver prongs. Its blade was long and sharp, the sharpest he’d ever seen, made of a metal he did not know. Royce raised the sword, and it felt like lightning in his hands. It was the greatest weapon he had ever held.

  “These are the weapons of men,” Voyt said. “Not of boys. For it is men you have become here in the Black Isle.”

  He paced, looking them up and down.

  “Here, on the Black Isle,” Voyt continued, “we give our initiates swords before they are initiated. That way if you die, you will die holding your reward in your hand.”

  He paced up and down the ranks, and Royce examined the sword, gleaming in the morning light, and felt himself welling with pride. Whatever happened, whatever was to come, he had earned this, and no one could take that away from him.

  “In the Cave of Madness,” Voyt boomed, “you shall find the scabbards and swords of many boys who held swords like these before you, and who died before you. They are men, too. There is no shame in dying. Only shame in fear.”

  A horn sounded again, and as the group dissembled, Royce found himself exchanging glances with the eleven other boys, who all looked stunned. They all looked as if they were staring death in the face.

  A Mantra, Royce thought. He had read about them as a boy. A horrible and cruel monster. A beast of legend. He shook his head. There was no way they could survive.

  Slowly the group of boys came together, and as one, they turned away from the clearing and began the long trek across the plains. One foot in front of the other, they marched across the barren wasteland before them, under the cold, brilliant sunlight of another dawn. All walked in silence.

  They walked slowly, reluctantly, across the wasteland, even Rubin and the twins, for the first time not harassing anyone. It was a solemn death march across the barren rocks, each step taking them closer to the cave, somewhere at the far end of the isle.

  It was when the sun hung high in the sky that Royce looked up and stopped short with the others. They stood at the edge of a precipice. As he looked down, a gale of wind struck him in the face. Royce stood there, gaping with the others. None said a word.

  There below sat a massive mountain, and in its side, a gaping entrance, a hundred yards wide and high, to a cave. It appeared to be the entrance to hell itself.

  There arose an awful smell from the cave, blown on the wind all the way to here. Royce could feel the waves of heat, too, coming from what must have been its breath. He felt the tremor beneath his feet, heard the snorts of a massive creature lurking far below, somewhere in the blackness.

  He looked over at his brothers in arms, and from their faces it looked as if some of them had already died.

  Without another word, they all took the first step, descended together, as one, into the very depths of hell.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Genevieve stood in the bleachers, high up, towering over the crowd below, and looked away in revulsion as the crowd roared at the spectacle. The stadium shook as men and women jumped to their feet, cheering. She couldn’t believe the viciousness that so moved these people. What she would give to be anywhere but here.

  Genevieve turned to go when she suddenly felt a hand grab her arm roughly and yank her back.

  She looked over to see Moira, her sister-in-law, looking back sternly, unnoticed amidst the chaos.

  Moira quietly shook her head.

  “You are a noble now,” she warned. “Act the part. Unless you want to find yourself locked in a dungeon.”

  Genevieve stood there, numb, and slowly turned and looked back down at the spectacle. There, below her, was the muddy fighting pit, its steep walls rising twenty feet so its fighters could not escape. In its center, on the muddy earth, lay a man, dead, face up, a spear in his chest. Next to him stood another man, wearing a grotesque mask shaped like a lion. He looked up, raising his arms and beating his chest, soaking in the adulation of the crowd. He paraded around the pit like a peacock, having just murdered this man in cold blood.

  The crowd could not get enough, and each cheer was like a knife through Genevieve’s heart. She hated this place. Hated these nobles. Hated everything this savage kingdom was about.

  What she hated most of all were her thoughts of Royce. There, below, was his future, awaiting him. It was awful. Worse than death. And it was all because of her.

  Perhaps that was why Altfor had dragged her here, Genevieve thought. She looked over and saw him standing there, clapping, his face so smugly self-satisfied like all the others. She could hardly believe she was married to this man. Married. The thought turned her stomach. Six moons had slowly passed, too slowly, an agony of waiting to hear from Royce. Yet no word ever came. She did not know if he was even alive. Yet she dreamed of him every night. In most dreams he was reaching for her, his fingertips grazing hers, just out of her gr
asp.

  Genevieve sighed, shaking the thought from her mind. It could be worse, she told herself. At least Altfor had not made her sleep with him. He’d even allowed her a separate chamber, a separate bed, and this allowed her to feel like the prisoner she wanted to be. She wanted to share the isolation and pain that Royce felt.

  Genevieve looked over and noticed a girl standing on the other side of Altfor. She was young, and stunningly beautiful. Genevieve had seen her many times before, always getting close to Altfor. She saw her drape a gentle arm around his, and she noticed that her husband did not shake it off. The girl looked at him with love and affection as she batted her eyes up at him.

  “You’re a fool,” came a voice.

  Genevieve turned to see Moira staring at the girl with her.

  “He will find someone else, you know,” Moira continued. “He’s a man, and men have needs. They do not like to be scorned. Keep ignoring him, and you will be discarded.”

  Genevieve smiled.

  “Good,” she replied. “There’s nothing I wish for more.”

  Moira frowned and shook her head.

  “You still don’t understand,” she replied. “Nobles are obsessed with titles. You’re a wife now. You’re part of this family forever. Whether you realize it or not.”

  Genevieve struggled to understand.

  “But you just said if he tired of me, he would let me go.”

  Moira shook her head.

  “He would take another woman, true, yet you would never truly be free,” she replied. “They could never allow you to be out there, free, marrying someone else. Especially not Royce. Not after all this. It would shame them. They would hide you away somewhere. In a dungeon, most likely. Never to be heard of again.”

  “Good,” Genevieve insisted. “I do not wish to be free if my love is not.”

  Moira shook her head again.

  “You are a bigger fool than I thought,” she replied. “You are Royce’s only hope. If you are locked in a dungeon, what hope will he ever have?”