by Kate Elliott
“How did you do that?” The speaker has a scrape on one cheek and favors his right leg, by which I recognize him as the man who contested me.
“Training. It was brave of you to try such an unfamiliar skill.”
“Is there a Fives court here?” They’ve become fledglings eager to test their wings although they are grown men and not gangly youths.
“There is a Fives court in every city, town, and village of Efea.”
Here too I see Gargaron’s strategy at work. Our allies are no longer just thinking about politics. They want something both worthless and priceless: an entry to this game. He needs me to make it seem thrilling and also desirable, something of Efea that they won’t be able to get anywhere else. After all, I am the adversary who conquered the king.
Soon afterward Neartos escorts me to a Fives stable adjoining the palace compound. The practice court hasn’t been defaced and the harness room still has gear folded neatly in baskets and cedar chests.
“Spider!” One of my trainers, white-haired Darios, hails me from the stable’s dining shelter. He was part of the Garon household that escaped Saryenia. He greets me with an enthusiastic slap on the shoulder but his good humor turns to a frown as he marks Neartos setting up sentries at the stable’s gate. “I hope you are well.”
“It’s complicated.”
There are six local adversaries at the table, digging into a pot of lentil stew and freshly grilled flatbread. And there is one adversary from Garon Stable here too. The highborn Saroese girl called Talon sits at the far end, alone, eating not from the common platter but from a bowl set aside only for her, exactly as she used to hold herself apart from the rest of us before. Her gaze lifts to meet mine. I’m not in the mood for her peculiar airs so I stare belligerently back until her face gets red.
“Spider, please eat,” says Darios in a tone more gentle than I deserve.
“Where is everyone else from Garon Stable?” I ask him.
“The Commoners did not come with us, as you may recall, and Princess Berenise had already returned the fledgling Patron boys to their families before that ill-omened night when the palace was burned down.”
“Now that I think about it, everyone in Garon Stable except you, Talon, and those fledglings were Efeans. Does that strike you as strange?”
“Lord Gargaron never involved himself in the stable. Lord Thynos and Tana recruited adversaries. I never thought to ask why they chose the people they did because they only chose promising ones. We assumed at first you came as part of Lord Gargaron’s negotiation with your father, that the general insisted you be given a chance to train in exchange for his military services, but then we realized how good you actually are.”
The instant the local adversaries discover I am General Esladas’s daughter, they fall all over themselves to tell me about the battle of Maldine: how enemy ships appeared without warning one day, how the town’s governor pretended to welcome them while secretly sending a message to a Stone Desert garrison under the command of Captain Esladas, how my father assembled a ragtag army with stunning speed from veterans and militia. But I can’t question the Efeans among them about whether there is a local resistance, or anyone I can persuade to rescue Maraya and Polodos from the ship, because Neartos sits beside me at meals and dogs my heels the rest of the time. All I’m able to find out is that every able-bodied Saroese man under the age of fifty in the Maldine region will leave with Queen Menoë’s army when it departs.
For three days I train, eat, and rest under the captain’s constant supervision. I’m given a tiny cubicle to sleep in, and a soldier stands guard outside.
The morning of the fourth day, our little stable, including Talon, is escorted to the Maldine Fives court. From the outside it looks exactly like every other Fives court, with circular walls and multiple entrances. The stairway down to the attiring hall is roped off. No supporters toss flower petals and ribbons at our feet. My gear is a mix of whatever I could put together from the stable, including a mask I’ve sewn from a scrap of brown silk. A boisterous crowd gathers, curious foreign soldiers as well as locals making a celebration of the trial, knowing the fleet and army will be leaving in two days.
Sixteen adversaries wait in the attiring hall, enough for four trials. To my surprise, the first three trials run without Talon.
Taking a break from warm-ups I approach her with my best attempt at a polite, comradely smile. “This is a big day for you. I didn’t expect you to be held to the last trial, since it is your first test. What mask do you wear?”
She unfolds a mask embroidered with a stylized hawk.
“Are you originally from East Saro?” I ask, disconcerted by this reminder of the war.
Without answering, she fixes the mask over her face.
We are called into the ready cage. I’m handed the green belt, for Trees. Two adversaries I don’t know are given blue and brown while Talon ties on the red belt for Traps. I can’t stop staring at her hawk mask. Surely this is a clue to the mystery of who she is, and why she’s being allowed to run now when she was hidden away before.
Menoë’s first husband was the crown prince of East Saro, and his sister was Nikonos’s bride. I remember what Menoë told me that day when I rescued her from death:
Nikonos convinced them I was nothing more than a jealous and vindictive viper who murdered both my husband and his young bride out of spite and shame.
“Spider!” The custodian’s voice jars me.
I have to concentrate. I follow the custodian down a tunnel to the ladder.
The start bell rings.
I swarm up, push through the gate, and get my first look at Trees, set in a basic power configuration. No time for subtlety. Like Father on the Royal Road, I just have to punch through. So I climb, and I move well, strengthened by my time in the rigging. But just as I make the resting platform I hear the crowd roar as an adversary enters Trees behind me.
I look back and am shocked to see Talon. She is short, slender, and flat-chested; her lack of height is a disadvantage but she has less weight to haul.
I am not going to let her beat me on her first trial. I can’t believe she is through Traps already. Should I race on in the opposite direction or let her chase me? Deciding on the latter, I head for Rivers. Knowing she is behind me fuels my determination.
Even so, I stumble once in Rivers and take two wrong turns in Pillars, and so I am a little shaken by the time I reach Traps. I hear her enter Pillars by the shouts of the crowd. People cry out with a harsh hawk’s skreek for the mask she wears. I can’t tell if they are cheering her on or mocking her.
The other two adversaries no longer matter; they’re behind. For once I do not take the highest level through Traps to show off my flair. Pride compels me to throw in a pair of flips but I’m ashamed of my cautious performance as I climb the final resting platform overlooking Rings.
Big rings turn at different speeds in a classic configuration that forces the adversary to time them exactly right to make it through in the most direct line. This is basically the same setup as the very first Fives trial I ran, all those months ago.
My thoughts spin.
You killed Nikonos’s bride too? I asked Menoë that terrible night, wondering what sort of monster I had rescued. And she replied, No, he just thinks I did.
Talon is ahead of me, but she jumps to the wrong ring and finds herself spun so she has to head out again, losing time. I won’t make that mistake.
I leap to the first ring and work my way inward because Rings is the strength I inherited from my father: the ability to process multiple bands of information and see how they fit together. Talon was far enough ahead that her mistake sets her back but doesn’t defeat her. We hit the ground at the same time for a short dash to the ladder. For an instant I’m tempted to slacken my pace and let her go up ahead of me. It’s her first trial; she’s done well, and I can tell by the shine in her face that she wants to win, that it means something to her that I can’t even fathom. My hesitation allows her to get a s
tep ahead of me.
I will never let anyone win if it means I have to lose.
So I leap over her, grab the ladder above her head, and surge up to the top. The victor’s ribbon is nothing fancy, just a white ribbon that I snag and hold up as the crowd cheers. A few scattered voices chant, “Spider! Spider!” but more call out, “Talon! Skreek!”
The victory doesn’t taste as sweet as usual. I don’t linger on the tower.
She’s still standing at the foot of the ladder with a hand on a rung, having pulled off her mask the better to catch her breath. The other two adversaries stroll toward us through Rings but for this brief interval she and I are alone.
Do I dare ask where she comes from? If she is the East Saroese princess I now realize she might be? If Menoë and Berenise have been holding her back until the exact moment they need her to show their new allies they have something that once belonged to Nikonos but escaped him?
Before I can take the leap, she heads down the ladder into the retiring hall. The other two adversaries flash me the kiss-off sign and peer with interest as her head recedes into the darkness of the undercourt.
“I have never seen a Patron woman run the Fives,” says Brown Belt, a brawny Saroese man with two rings in his ear to mark him as a former criminal allowed back into society.
“That was something, wasn’t it?” agrees Blue Belt, a young Efean man who speaks Saroese as easily as I do. He grins at me but doesn’t address me directly.
“Have a drink later?” asks the Saroese man, with Saroese manners.
“I surely would,” I say recklessly, even though I know Gargaron will forbid it.
Captain Neartos escorts me back to the stable. He’s chatty and cheerful.
“You were a bit shaky, not up to your usual standard, but that’s to be expected, considering your lack of dedicated practice time. I won a tidy sum on bets with those West Saroese soldiers. They just can’t believe a woman can beat a man.”
“Happy to be of use.”
Either my sarcasm flies over his head or he ignores it. “His lordship says to tell you he’s pleased with how you are playing your part.”
“What exactly is his game? Was I the lure to attract their attention so they would come to the court and see Talon for the first time?”
“You know better than to think I’ll answer that. Or to think there’s only one ring spinning at a time.”
It’s not yet midday and already scorching. I’m grateful to drink my fill at the dining shelter as Darios offers a few perfunctory critiques, although I can tell he is uneasy at Neartos’s constant presence.
“I’ve been told Talon and I are to sail with Queen Menoë south to Saryenia,” he says. “Does that mean you have different orders, Jessamy?”
“Jessamy’s circumstances have changed,” says Neartos.
“Captain.” I don’t want to beg but I don’t know how else to ask. “As I have been studying the Precepts in my spare time, I had a few questions to put to Lord Menos’s tutor. Perhaps as a courtesy, in reward for playing my part, I might be allowed to see that individual briefly.”
He shakes his head. “If you’ve quenched your thirst, you may go bathe, Spider.”
“Maybe send my victory ribbon to her as a token?”
“You may go bathe, Spider.”
I do as I’m told. Neartos stations himself at the entry. I disrobe in the outer room and scrub myself in the bathing room until my skin starts to feel raw, then go into the inner chamber and immerse myself in the soaking pool with my head tipped back to rest against the rim. The gloom washes over me like defeat.
Soft footfalls alert me. I open my eyes. Talon ventures in with a length of linen wrapped around her from armpits to knees even though the rest of us adversaries walk around naked without giving it a thought. I always assumed she had a Patron woman’s arrogance, not wishing Commoner women to see her body. Just as I’m about to congratulate her on her first Fives run, a voice from the entry startles us both.
“Why, yes, Captain, we will just go in,” says Queen Menoë.
Talon flinches with acute distress and loses her grip on the linen towel. It lands at her feet, and I try not to gasp but succeed only in slapping a hand over my mouth as I flinch.
Her torso is hatched with seamed white scarring all the way down her belly, just as Menoë’s is, scars of an abuse whose ferocity still has the power to rob me of words. Talon splashes clumsily down the steps as three women enter the soaking chamber.
“Here you are, Talessa,” says Menoë. “I wanted you to meet Princess Shenia, for I am sure you two will be thrown together a great deal now and I, for one, recall vividly that I never had the benefit of a single friend when I lived in the palace of East Saro.”
In private Princess Shenia has a bold stare and blunt manner at odds with her public modesty. “So you really are Princess Talessa of East Saro! Everyone thinks you are dead, murdered together with your brother, Stratios. What are those ugly marks on your body?”
Talon goes pink with shame. Of course I’m staggered by this revelation, even though I suspected it, but the rude comment so offends me that I stand up, grab the linen towel off the floor, and hand it to her.
“Excuse me, Your Gracious Majesty, we were not expecting visitors and did not dress for the occasion,” I say in my best Patron accent. My nakedness disconcerts Shenia so much she stops staring at Talon and scrutinizes the floor. Lady Adia, however, gives me a long look from my head to my toes that hits like a scalding splash of boiling water.
“You may continue your soak, Spider,” Menoë says with exaggerated condescension, “and indeed I wish you would.”
Furious, I sink into the water. Talon has wrapped the towel around herself.
“My dear Shenia,” says Menoë with a smile that skates right at the edge of mockery and yet does not quite fall over. “Perhaps you might give me and my mother a moment alone with Princess Talessa. Your ladies are outside, are they not?”
“Yes, they are watching the men practice. We are not accustomed to men racing about in front of women in so little clothing as people wear here.”
“It is very hot here in Efea compared to the kingdoms of Old Saro,” agrees Lady Adia placidly.
Shenia gives her a respectful bow and hurries out with a single backward glance at the blushing Talon.
“I will turn my back,” says Menoë to Talon. “I apologize for any discomfort you have felt. It was not my intention to embarrass you but it is the only way I could have a private word. If you don’t mind.”
I start to rise but Menoë shakes her head and I finally understand.
They want a private word with me.
Talon climbs out of the water, the wet towel clinging to her body. I nod at her, and to my surprise, she meets my gaze and nods back at me as to a fellow adversary, then goes out.
Lady Adia looks around for a place to sit but the only benches in the soaking chamber are the ones in the pool itself.
“I can bring you a stool from the bathing chamber, my lady,” I say.
“Do not bestir yourself. Are you pregnant with his child?”
I must stare like a simpleton because after a long pause she speaks more slowly and with hand gestures, as if she thinks I am deficient.
“Are. You. Pregnant. With his child?”
“Dearest Mother, you just heard her speak Saroese so you must know she understands you.”
“No, my lady. I’m not pregnant.”
To my absolute shock, she pats my hand with a weary smile. “I’m so glad. That way we won’t have to kill the baby.”
“Uh.” I struggle to find an answer but all that comes out are choked fragments.
“He chose you for himself, you know. Princess Berenise and Lord Gargaron brought in attendants and concubines and all manner of attractive young women, and young men too, but it was just that he didn’t want people choosing for him. He didn’t trust them.”
“You can scarcely blame him for that!”
“Ind
eed I never did. I admired him for it.”
Since this is the oddest conversation I have ever had, and in circumstances that quite defy belief, I keep speaking. “Are you glad he is king, my lady?”
“My dear child, I have learned to live one day at a time. Any day my son is still alive is a day I am glad.”
“May I ask you another question, my lady?”
She squints in a way that makes me think her actually nearsighted, a troubling difficulty to have in a world where people you can’t trust may get close enough to knife you before you realize who they really are. “Of course.”
“Dearest Mother, you don’t have to answer.”
“Let her ask, Menoë.”
“Why doesn’t Princess Talessa talk? She can’t have been condemned to an ill-wisher’s fate because her husband, Prince Nikonos, is still alive.”
“It is easy enough to explain,” Menoë jumps in. “The priests did indeed take me to the ill-wishers’ temple after Prince Stratios’s death.”
“Because you had no child by him. But if you did kill him, why would they not take you to the Temple of Justice rather than to the ill-wishers’ temple?”
“I made sure they couldn’t prove I did it. At the ill-wishers’ temple I was able to substitute another woman in my place by changing clothes with her. The priests do not know the difference, nor do they care. Women’s tongues all look the same to them.”
“You let Talon’s tongue be cut out to save your own?”
“She begged me to take her from the palace and away from Nikonos—he is an abusive beast just like Stratios—and offered her tongue in place of mine as an inducement. We have hidden her at Garon Stable ever since.”
“That’s a good story, since she cannot speak to confirm or deny it.”
“I believe it to be true,” murmurs Lady Adia.
Of course you would, I think, but I’m too prudent to say so aloud.
“It’s played perfectly into the brilliant plan Grandmother and I devised,” Menoë goes on. “Once Nikonos is dead, Kalliarkos will marry Talessa. Then the East Saroese will feel honor-bound to ally with us and the West Saroese against Saro-Urok.”
