The match that he watched was between Torga and one of the Urufen warriors, over an Urufen female that looked very young. It was a decent fight, but Torga was more than a match for his opponent and broke the warrior’s arm two minutes into the fight. He threw his opponent to the ground and kicked him off of the center mound, laughing. Several others seemed upset over the match, especially the few Urufen males, but Torga had no other challengers and the crowd went wild as he threw the fur-collared girl over his shoulder and left the yard to return to his cell.
The whole thing frightened and excited him at the same time. This sort of thing would never be allowed in Rellizbix and before he had been thrown into prison, he would have never considered competing in something like it. He barely tolerated the training he was forced to go through with Zakk and Hemmil. Now he was glad for that training. Without it, he would not even have a chance in the Gulag. As he was, Helkree was certain he would be killed immediately.
He committed himself to an extreme regiment of training. The calisthenics and strength training he was forced to do under Hemmil’s command were repeated, over and over throughout the day. Raegith pushed himself to exhaustion before the morning meals were put out and forbid Helkree from protecting him in the yard. Hugar was not the only inmate who wanted a piece of the foreign boy and most days Raegith could barely get a mouthful of food down before someone was pulverizing him. He did not fight back; instead he focused on how to take the punishment. He did not want any of them to know he could fight until it was too late.
Helkree assured him that as long as he refused to fight back, they would not kill him. Death in combat, even in a prison brawl, was an honor and as long as he refused to fight, he would not be granted an honorable death. They always stopped just short of killing him and Helkree had to perform certain favors for the guards just to get bandages and tape for Raegith. Finally, on the eve of the next Gulag, Helkree told him he was ready.
When Raegith woke up to the sounds of the first few revelers filling the stands, he felt unready for it. He could barely keep his morning meal down. He filed into the yard with all of the other inmates. He saw some who were already drunk and others who worked cramps out of their muscles. The Rathgar all looked so much larger than everyone else; it was impossible for Raegith to imagine beating one of them. None of them looked as nervous as he was.
The scheduled fights, between known fighters and champions were always the last events. To begin the Gulag, there were always opening fights, where new combatants would enter for prizes offered up by guards and offer or accept personal challenges. The first match was over a beautiful Lokai girl put up for wager by Torga in an open challenge to all fighters. She was slender and tall, with light silver hair that hung down to her buttocks. Her violet eyes were large and her dark skin had a slight indigo hue to it. Torga took the mound immediately and the crowd roared, only to be devastated when no one dared accept his challenge. Boos and hisses rained down on them from high above as Torga looked around, smiled and left the mound, keeping the girl there as a prize. The match was opened back up and two other Rathgar took the mound as Torga began placing bets on the match with those around him.
Raegith watched as the two combatants lumbered around the mound, trading a few blows to the arms and chest before they collided and dropped to the ground. They rolled about, hitting each other however they could, each trying to choke the other out. The fight was long and drawn out, blood spilling from both as they tore at each other. Finally one of them, a Rathgar with longer black hair, beat the other into submission and wearily rose to his feet. The crowd cheered and the Rathgar, not realizing the extent of his injuries, tried to emulate Torga and toss the tall Lokai woman over his shoulder, but he ended up collapsing with her on top of him. She rolled off, her lilac gown getting stained and pulled away in a revealing manner and the whole place lit up with laughter. Several other women took the mound to help the winner to his cell as two women dragged his opponent off and to the corner.
More matches went on and Raegith watched them all, never getting up the courage to enter any of them. He watched the brutal, thuggish fashion in which the Rathgar fought and the nimble dance-like nature of the Lokai. The Urufen had a more feral fighting style, going berserk and dropping to all fours. Many of them were better fighters than Raegith had seen in his brief time outside the walls of Forster’s Keep. Even Hemmil would find such a sight daunting. The trophies continued to drop in value until the prizes were foodstuffs that were much more appetizing than the gruel they served twice a day in the meal line. When a whole loaf of bread was offered up, Helkree nodded to Raegith. It was time to climb the mound.
Raegith took a deep breath and pushed past the others to approach the mound. The entire crowd grew silent as he slowly walked to the middle and looked back at Helkree. She was whispering what looked like a prayer. The audience was either confused by his appearance or trying to figure out what the hell he was, because only a few bits of chatter echoed through the stands as he stood there, hoping no one else would challenge him.
Then another inmate walked up the mound; a Lokai he had not seen before and one who did not seem to have any females behind him. As the number of female cohorts was a sign of wealth in the Pit, Raegith assumed that the man was not of strong influence. The Lokai never looked at him, though, only staring past him. Raegith turned and saw a muscle-bound Rathgar approaching from behind him. Three of them were about to fight at once. Raegith remembered Hemmil’s lessons and moved to put both of them within his field of vision. As the Lokai and Rathgar neared each other, they both glanced over at him. The Lokai sneered at him and the Rathgar huffed his annoyance. Then they both began side-stepping, moving away from Raegith.
They aren’t even going to fight me? Raegith had been so worried about having to finally fight that he had not considered his untouchable status might still seep through to the Gulag. His anxiety completely drained away… and was replaced by humiliation. They did not even want to be on the same mound as him. He was not a threat.
The two squared off and began to fight each other. The Lokai was quick and agile, darting around and landing fast, accurate blows. The Rathgar shrugged them off, but got angrier with each hit. He swung wildly and the Lokai ducked each one, but was clipped by the last one. His white hair swirled about as he spun away from the hit, but it had dazed him. The Rathgar closed in and slammed the Lokai, knocking him into the air and across the mound. Raegith stood there, not knowing what to do.
“What are you doing?” Helkree screamed at him. “You can’t win just standing there with your thumb up your ass!”
Raegith looked around. Everyone had forgotten about him even though he was still standing there on the mound. He could continue standing there all day and it would be no different to them than if he were up in his cell. The Rathgar was beginning to get the upper hand on the Lokai and the guards were just going to give the bread to him as soon as he won. They might not even shoo Raegith off the mound afterward. They could just as well have each and every fight with him just standing up there, waiting on someone to acknowledge him. With the Lokai now in what looked like a violent hug from the Rathgar, Raegith was about to lose without even getting the chance to fight.
Raegith did not have a plan, exactly, when he ran up to the big Rathgar and hit him in the face. After the first hit, he took him to the ground with a blow to the leg and then immediately went for the face. The Rathgar was just as tough as Hemmil, however, and shrugged off the damage. Raegith took a punch right in the face that was hard enough to flatten him. His head bounced against the ground and he tumbled halfway down the mound. Then something unimagineable happened: he stayed conscious.
Despite the fights he had been in with Zakk and Hemmil and the months of beatings he had taken in the yard, he was sure that his first fight would end the minute his opponent hit him. It was an inexplicable expectation born from inexperience in real, life-or-death combat, but once he realized he could stand against his enemy and take a punc
h and that he would not immediately shatter and die, he felt… liberated. As the Rathgar bore down on him for bloody vengeance, Raegith got to his feet and spit out the blood pooling in his mouth.
“More,” he breathed to the wind and then smiled.
Then the Lokai came leaping in, both feet kicking into the Rathgar’s face. Raegith got to his feet and raced in. The Rathgar managed to catch the Lokai’s arm and leveled him with a punch to the face. Raegith had just found his resolve to fight and was not going to let the Lokai steal his glory. He dashed in, lifted off the ground and threw a punch right into the Rathgar’s mouth. He hit the ground and rolled past the big fighter, coming up behind him and kicked out hard into his spine.
The Rathgar folded backwards at the blow and cried out, clutching at his back and stumbling forward. Raegith was not some simple peasant scrapping for his life; he had received training. The basics of combat had been drilled into him daily by a Paladin of Rellizbix. He knew how to fight, he simply needed to break the lock and unleash the fury that had been simmering inside of him since the day he had been locked away inside Forster’s Keep.
He followed the Rathgar, drilling his kidneys with rapid-fire punches. The Rathgar righted himself and spun around, swinging hard with his giant arm, right for Raegith’s head. Raegith slipped the blow and caught the fighter with an uppercut right under the chin. Raegith kicked forward into his hip, buckling him and then grabbed his head and brought his knee up hard into the Rathgar’s face. The Rathgar pulled away and Raegith hit him twice with punches to the face before the man could react.
Then the Lokai was beside Raegith, attacking the Rathgar in tandem. They both attacked the legs, dropping the bigger man to his knees before a kick from each of them took him to the ground for good. The Rathgar did not get back up and the two smaller combatants both stood over him, their chests heaving and sweat beading off of them. The cheers of the crowd were dull in the back of Raegith’s mind as he looked down on his defeated opponent and then over to the Lokai.
The Lokai looked back at him and halfway smiled. “Not bad, Grass-hair.”
“Oh, so you can see me now?” Raegith asked, smiling.
Raegith spun on his heel and dropped to the ground, sweeping the Lokai’s legs out from underneath him. The unsuspecting Lokai hit the ground on his back and Raegith was on top of him. The Lokai tried to fight him off, but Raegith grappled his arms down to his chest and pinned them there. Taking advantage of the opening, Raegith headbutted the man in the face. When the Lokai still fought him he threw another headbutt and then another, until the body underneath him went still. Raegith leaned up and threw the opponent’s arms aside to show that he was unconscious.
“Fuck you!” Raegith grunted, wiping the blood off of his face with his forearm.
As he stood up, he heard the cries of the crowd above him soften and turn to jeering. Raegith looked up at them and then, in a similar act as Torga did to the first Trophy that day, he waved off the entire audience dismissively. The whole stadium erupted in fury as Raegith walked up and took the bread from the platform. As they walked away from the mound, Helkree pulled him close.
“I’ve never seen anyone piss off so many people so quickly as you! That has got me so hot right now.”
“They all hate me now. How is that a good thing?” Raegith asked, still hearing the uproar of the spectators.
“Hatred is much more powerful than adoration. They all love that dickhole Torga, but he no longer pulls a crowd. There will be twice as many people in the stands next month, all to see you… get the shit beaten out of you.”
Raegith and Helkree left the yard and walked up to his cell on the second level. His muscles were shaking and he felt much weaker than he should have. He recognized the feeling from the time he had tried to fight his way out of the tent where Onyx was being held captive. Boram had told him that it was the nerves and that all men got them after their first big fight. Raegith sat down on his bed as Helkree dipped his crude cup into the water pale and gave it to him.
Raegith drank deep and then gave it back to her, looking her over more closely as she dipped the cup and drank from it. No sooner had they finished their drinks before a shadow appeared in the doorway of the cell. Raegith jumped off his bed and turned, bracing himself for some sort of retaliation after his win, but there was no warrior standing before him.
Waiting just outside of his cell, staring at him with wide, violet eyes was a Lokai girl with a dirty and sullen face. Her white hair was short and matted and her skin was tight against her cheekbones. Like Helkree, she wore the rags of an unclaimed female and she looked nervous and twitchy. For a moment, Raegith and Helkree just stood there exchanging glances with the scared girl. When she did not speak or move, Raegith finally broke the silence.
“Would you like to come in?” Raegith asked.
The girl jumped and looked at him as if she had not even seen him there the entire time and was surprised at his presence.
“You… you speak my tongue?” she asked.
“Great, a Junie! Hell if we’ll ever be able to figure out what she wants… wait! Did you just speak her language?” Helkree looked at him with astonishment. “You can speak the Junrei’sha tongue? How the hell can you speak that?”
“Did I just speak a different language than I normally do?” Raegith asked. “What in Fate is a Junrei’sha?”
“Junrei’sha?” the girl repeated, getting more excited by the second.
“What the hell are you, Raegith? The Junrei’sha are a weird group of Lokai who speak an outdated language and have weird, outdated religious shit they do. They’re weird and rare and nobody likes them… and how the hell can you speak their old-ass language?”
“I just seem to have a talent for it. What do you think she wants?”
“Well, you just won a whole loaf of bread and she looks like a walking skeleton. I don’t have to be able to speak a dead language to figure this one out, but I guess you could always ask.”
“You speak Junrei’sha?” the girl asked. She was leaning over the threshold of the cell, but did not enter.
“Yes,” Raegith answered, waving her forward. “I do. Come in and sit down. Tell me why you came looking for me?”
The girl darted inside the cell and sat down on the bed, looking out of the cell as if someone might be coming after her. Raegith looked as well, wondering what was going on. He turned back and the girl was looking at Helkree anxiously. She was fidgeting and making Raegith more nervous.
“Helkree, can you leave us be for a moment?” Raegith asked.
“Wow, you learn the way of the Pit fast, don’t you?” Helkree chuckled. “Just go easy on her. As tiny as she is, she’s likely to faint just from seeing it.”
Raegith rolled his eyes as she left. She could be very antagonizing. When he turned back to the girl after Helkree had exited the cell, he saw her pulling her shirt over her head and standing up to approach him. Her stomach was sunken and her ribs protruded against her skin. Her pointed breasts were barely raised against her chest. Strangely, she still had muscle definition that looked out of place for a Lokai girl. She placed her hands on Raegith and reached up to kiss him, but he stopped her at the last minute.
“Please,” she begged. “You will give me bread and I will do… things for you. Please, I have nothing else to trade.”
“Stop… just stop and sit down,” Raegith said, moving to sit her back on the bed.
The girl flinched away and looked at him with the same scared look she had at the doorway of his cell. She steadied herself immediately and then calmed and laid back against the bed, waiting for him. Raegith backed up and looked at the poor girl, so desperate for bread. Then he sighed and reached over for the loaf, breaking a piece off and handing it to her. She propped herself up on an elbow and looked at him curiously. When he waved it to her again, she reached out and snatched it, shoving it into her mouth hungrily.
“Thank you,” she said after she had finished. “If… if I could have
another piece, you can have me for the entire night. I won’t fight, I promise.”
“What? No, just… just, here, take another piece.” Raegith handed her another hunk of bread, which she ate quickly with a curious look. “Why are you so hungry? Do you not eat during the day?”
“The mush is unclean,” she replied with her mouth full of bread. “I cannot touch it; it is not The Path.”
“You have not eaten the gruel at all? How long have you been here?”
“For three of the events like today,” she replied.
“Three Gulags? You’ve been here for three months without eating?” Raegith asked, appalled and embarrassed at how unbearable his hunger pain felt after three weeks. “How have you survived so long?”
“Water is powerful enough to sustain me, along with meditation. If I keep my soul clean and pure, like water, then I will survive. That is The Path. It is difficult in this place. I have no energy left.”
“So you decided to trade flesh for food?”
“I am desperate,” she replied. “The Lokai and Urufen think my kind are foolish and would only humiliate me. Of what the Rathgar might do, I am scared.”
“I am from the north. Are you not scared of me?” Raegith asked.
“I am terrified,” she replied
“I am of the Kingdom of Rellizbix. I was, anyway. Now I am of nowhere. Do you know of Rellizbix?”
“They are the Destroyers,” she said. “They are the reason my people have vanished from this land and why all here are dying. How can you be of the Destroyers, yet speak our language? What demon are you and how long will you toy with me before we finish this deal?”
“A demon? You think I’m some sort of demon?” Raegith asked, chuckling.
“I know it,” she said, causing him pause. “I can see it inside you. I am only waiting for it to come out.”
Beyond the Hell Cliffs Page 21
