“The Zhiberian is on his own this time,” Borchus said in a voice that might have been a shout. Goll wasn’t certain. “We have coin to collect.”
“Not yet,” Goll heard himself saying.
“What?”
“Not yet.”
With that, Goll regained his self-control and shuffled in the direction of the general quarters. Men got out of his way, and he saw Skarrs, more Skarrs than he’d ever seen in one place before, swarming into the white tunnel. Gladiators watched them with faces full of confusion and excitement. The Madea and his own cadre of guardians stood up and peered in the direction of the tunnel.
It was there Goll stopped, to the right of the Madea’s raised stage and desk.
“You men!” He roared with the blood in his ears and madness in his eyes. “Listen to me now! Listen! Those of you who wish it, who want it, come forth and be known to me. I am Goll, the killer of the one called The Butcher of Balgotha, and I call on any… any who wish to join my house of pit fighters this day.”
Faces obscured by sooty half-light stared at him, roused by the sound of his voice, puzzled by his meaning.
“If you see yourselves as better than the man next to you, if you are clamouring for the attention of the established houses, then consider the stable I am starting. You will have a taskmaster, trainers, food, and a place to sleep. You’ll no longer be alone in the games, and you’ll be considered an equal to the house gladiators. It’s a hard path you’ve chosen, but if you wish, you don’t have to walk it alone. Join now, train with us, and we’ll fashion you into a pure pit fighter.”
“How much will it cost?” someone yelled out.
Goll turned in the direction of the voice. “Nothing.”
“You’ll take a portion of our winnings though?” asked another.
“Yes. But no more than any other house,” Goll answered.
“Weapons and armour provided for?”
That was a good question. “In the beginning, it might be difficult…”
“What do you mean might be difficult?” the voice demanded from the back. Goll struggled to see who it was, but there were simply too many. “The regular stables or houses or whatever they call themselves all give the best to their lads. Not something pulled or patched up from the dead. We can’t be expected to use shite all the time.”
“And you’d still be Free Trained in the eyes of the other houses,” another voice added with dreary candor. “You wait and see. You think them punces pound on us now for being here, wait until they hear of a house made of you lot. They’ll hunt you down like dogs on rats. Snap you up and grind—”
“What about drink?” shouted another.
“Drink?” Goll asked, feeling his brow knotting together in annoyed puzzlement.
“Well aye, drink. Beer, wine, that sort of thing. Would it be allowed?”
“No.” Goll shook his head, thinking it to be the stupidest question of them all. “You can’t expect to perform at—”
“Not for me then,” the speaker called out. Then the dam broke.
“What do you want? A lake of Sunjan gold?”
“Be all right now, wouldn’t it?”
“No spirits of any kind?” a different voice demanded.
“Fishhook that,” grumped another.
“That’s all thirsty work, you crippled shagger. Can’t expect men to do it all and not have a sip of something at the end!” protested someone near the front. Goll saw him, a filthy-looking brute dressed in only a soiled loincloth.
“Not for me!” someone called out, Goll recognized the voice as someone repeating himself, but louder.
“Aye that, the drink kills it.”
“The thought of them righteous bastards will be up our dog blossoms keeps me out.”
“Will I be able to work on my farm?”
The question stunned Goll, and he sputtered his reply. “No, you… you couldn’t manage both—”
The packed crowd shook at the edges as fighters drifted away or turned their backs and struggled from the center. More heads turned, and the unstable whole rippled and began breaking up.
“Too much, lad,” someone muttered close by.
“You’re asking a lot,” said another.
“Not for meeeee!” the tormenting voice screeched and crumpled into an unhealthy-sounding gale of giggling before drifting away.
Goll stood dumbfounded. How could this be happening? It was the opportunity of a lifetime! He was throwing open his house’s gates from the very beginning, and they were laughing at it. Free Trained. He shook his head in dumbfounded disgust.
The mob gradually dispersed amongst bursts of laughter, sly looks of contempt, and mutters of discontent. The day was young still, and there were matches to prepare for.
Goll couldn’t imagine what was going through these bastards’ minds.
But not all of them wandered away. Five remained.
Goll looked from face to face, puzzlement growing into subdued excitement.
“What then?” he asked.
“I’m for joining up,” said a big man dressed in a leather curiass, his muscular arms bared. His head was shaved clean and possessed a few dents as if it had been kicked about.
“As I,” said another, one of the shorter men staying behind. Slim, dressed in plain clothes and wearing a blade off his hip. “Seems you impressed a few, at least. I’m Junger of Pericia.”
Goll stared at him, working his mind around the accented Sunjan.
“I’m Sapo,” said a beast of a man. A paw of a hand rested on the shaft of a mighty axe. Even though he only spoke two words, Goll knew him to be a native Sunjan.
“What of you then?” the Kree asked of the others.
“I’m Tumber, from Vathia,” announced the man with the shaved and battered skull.
“Torello. Sunjan,” said another.
“Kolo. Sunjan born.”
Goll nodded at them, but then his attention was taken by a tower of a man emerging from the shadows with a great flowing mustache and beard, perhaps the tallest figure Goll had ever seen on two legs not made of stone. While tall, he wasn’t as meaty as the others and actually appeared on the edge of starvation, which caused Goll a twinge of dismay. An aura of menace emanated from his person, and the Kree wasn’t the only one watching this near-emaciated hellion approach.
Then Goll realized this lanky monster wore a necklace of crow heads.
“Brozz,” the man said in a low voice. His Sunjan hissed with a barely noticeable accent. “From Sarland.”
The Kree peered up at the Sarlander watchtower, took a breath, and studied each of them in turn. “You understand what you’re about to do?”
“You’ve made yourself clear.” Tumber nodded once. “I speak for myself, however.”
The others gave their answers in similar fashion, and Goll made a quick count. “Six,” he stated and felt pangs of both disappointment and eagerness. Big things sometimes came from such small numbers.
“Follow me then.” Goll shuffled towards the white tunnel.
“Where are you going?” Borchus asked him at his side.
“To gather our fallen,” he responded.
*
“Away from him!” Halm roared as he pulled himself from the archway, kicking up sand. The arena was a storm of sound with the weight of thousands of voices, heavy as a battering of mauls. He wasn’t certain the pit fighter had heard him or not.
Then Skulljigger turned about.
He held his bright and bloody sword at guard, stepping back as Halm came forward, but the Zhiberian leaped at him and caught him around the midsection. They crashed into the sand as if fallen from the heavens, sending up sand and dust. Skulljigger snarled and pushed a set of savage teeth away from him with one hand, discovering a hand clamping about his sword arm’s wrist.
They twisted and wrestled until Skulljigger got his legs under him and shoved off, rolling out from under the heavier Halm.
They separated, stood up, and glared at each o
ther.
Halm stood over the mess that was his friend, panting and dividing his attention between him and the pit fighter.
“You bastard!” Halm shouted and felt his words devoured by the deafening roar. Skulljigger’s lips moved, but he couldn’t hear. He gestured with his wet blade before flicking it, sending scarlet into the sand.
The Zhiberian looked at the crumpled form. There, blinking as if he’d just woken and wincing in a bloody fashion, Pig Knot saw him and smiled feebly.
“I’ll kill you!” Skulljigger’s words came across the waves of cheering, but something restrained him, perhaps indecision or the law of the arena, yet he still flaunted his weapons as if ready to use them.
“I’ll have your head,” the Zhiberian shouted back. Then he dropped to one knee, wanting to stop Pig Knot’s bleeding but simply not knowing where to start.
“You’re cut up bad, boy.” Halm forced cheer into his voice. “But you’ll live. You’ll be fine. Have no worries.”
Pig Knot said something then, and Halm lowered his head to hear.
But the Sunjan faded into unconsciousness.
All around, the roar of the crowds peaked, frightening in its intensity.
Then a rush of arena attendants and armed Skarrs appeared and surrounded the three.
46
The Gladiatorial Chamber members gazed on, their expressions unreadable as their accountant sat at a table before their raised panel and dutifully counted the gold coins before him. A cloth sack of money deflated while dull towers rose from the table. Goll watched it all, switching at times from the accountant to the Chamber members clothed in their regal robes of gold and white and appearing more than bored with the afternoon. Goll didn’t know what it took to hook the interest of one. A thousand gold coins on a table would make him stop and stare for a bit.
Behind him, Halm stood pensively, not wanting to be there and not the beaming picture of joviality he usually was. It had been a near thing for Pig Knot. The man had almost died from blood loss. As it was, he was still in the Pit’s infirmary, delirious and cut up by Skulljigger’s hand. The Zhiberian had come very close to crossing a dangerous line when he burst out onto the sands, and it took a complement of Skarrs to prevent him and Skulljigger from fighting over Pig Knot’s unmoving person. It was a good thing the pair didn’t have at it as arena rules forbade such unscheduled encounters. That would be a match for another day.
The first task Goll had given three of his new recruits was to watch over Pig Knot’s battered and bleeding form as the healer attempted to put him back together. Borchus had disappeared, and Goll ordered Halm and two others to carry their sizeable winnings directly to the Gladiatorial Chamber. Along the way Goll revealed that he had ordered Pig Knot to lose if he wished to be a part of the house.
“He’d best be a part of it then,” was all Halm said, absorbing the information in rather unsettling stoic fashion.
It had been a long walk to the Chamber and an even longer wait while the accumulated coin was being counted.
“That’s a thousand gold pieces there.” The accountant leaned back from the towers of coin with a sigh. “There are several hundred more left.”
Goll looked at Halm, who lurched into motion with an annoyed expression and gathered up the remaining gold.
“We have plans for that,” Goll said to the Chamber. “Now then… are we formally a house?”
“Can you sign your name?” spoke the oldest-looking one with the missing right ear.
“I can.”
“Bring the documents then,” One Ear rumbled and took a breath. Goll saw that the Chamber member habitually breathed through his mouth as though constantly fighting for breath.
The accountant produced another sack and started filling it with gold, removing the fortress he had constructed. An attendant came forth with a scroll, unravelled it, and placed it on part of the surface not covered in coin.
“This document is a legal and binding account establishing the House of, you must provide a name, on this day and year as witnessed by myself and the present Chamber members. As a newly recognized house, you are required to observe the laws and rules of the games each season and make right with the members present if and when a disagreement or conflict occurs with one of their own or an existing house which places both or more houses at odds.”
“Make right?” Goll asked.
“The language of the document,” the attendant answered at once, “means you’ll have the Chamber listen to any grievance you might have with another house and resolve the issue on the same day, allowing the Chamber to pass judgement. You agree to adhere to that judgement and not allow it to go beyond these walls or those of the arena.”
“I see,” the Kree said.
The attendant listed off more items of note in the document, some of which sounded very odd to Goll, and others he wasn’t certain of at all. He asked questions at points and received clarification from the attendants, all under the weary gaze of the members present. It was going on supper after all.
At the end, Goll fumbled with his crutches and signed his name.
“You must provide the Chamber with a list of fighters,” the attendant informed him.
“Ah. Active fighters?”
“All fighters, since the games are already in progress. If a man dies, the Madea will scratch that name from your house list, and you may not enter another in his place. If a man is eliminated from the tournament, he’s done for the season but may fight again next year. It’s your responsibility to provide us a fresh roster at the start of the every season. He may even fight in a non-tournament match if able to do so.”
“I understand.”
Goll provided the names as he remembered them and wrote them down with a fine feather quill.
“Careful not to use too much ink,” the attendant warned him. The Kree paused and nodded, intending to try just that.
“What will your name be?” a Chamber member asked him.
Goll thought about it for a moment. He had been going to call it the House of Goll, but the Weapon Masters of Kree would not approve of such arrogance. Greatness does not draw attention to itself, he heard them whisper in his head. He studied the names on the scroll and considered what the name would be.
Halm leaned in, meeting his gaze and sizing up the scroll with dark interest.
“What will it be, then?” the Zhiberian asked in a low tone, wary of the brooding council. “And did you add Pig Knot’s name to that document?”
“Of course I did.” Goll pointed.
Halm didn’t look. “Only checking.”
“You think I wouldn’t? He had to lose. It was the only way. The only sure way. Can’t you see that?” Goll insisted. “I’m not arguing about what Pig Knot did for us this day or his sacrifice. Don’t worry. He’ll be taken care of; on that, you have my word.”
Halm thought about that and nodded once, but Goll could see the Zhiberian was suspicious of him now.
“I have a name in mind,” Goll said eventually, hoping to change the subject.
“What is it?”
“The House of Eight.”
Halm’s face darkened. “You’re forgetting some.”
“Muluk and Pig Knot are done for this season. Probably for the rest of their lives.”
“You’re done for this season,” Halm said almost too loudly.
“Look. I’ve listed their names here,” Goll gestured to the scroll.
“I don’t care about the scroll. You should recognize them in the name of the house. This is the beginning, after all.”
Goll reconsidered and, after a moment, sighed. “You’re right.”
But then he relented and gazed upon the scroll, the quill drooping in his hand.
“Both of them bled for this, almost died for this,” Halm reminded him, unyielding. “They’re at the mercies of healers for us. For you. Best to remember that. You need to show those who remain that they weren’t forgotten. That they won’t be forgotten if they fall.”<
br />
Nodding slowly, Goll knew the fat man spoke the truth. And though Goll might never have believed it, Pig Knot had surprised him the most by actually following through and losing. It was a lingering question if Pig Knot would even survive the night, but Goll was grateful to the man.
He turned to the Chamber members.
“We have a name…”
“What is it?” a bored member asked.
Goll suddenly liked the name even more and caught his breath. This was a very special moment for him and for those behind him. He looked from one Chamber member to the next, holding his breath until he couldn’t any longer, the excitement building in his person, making his heart pound.
“We are…” he started.
And the thought became sound.
47
As the evening drew on, shadows detached themselves from the rows of shelved tomes surrounding Grisholt like black ghosts seeking to chill the old master’s bones. Long limbs, growing fat from being fed dying light, slunk towards, touched, and caressed his still face. Grisholt didn’t care. He was drunk. Sweet wine, bought with his stable’s recent winnings, soothed the lash of defeat. When news of the failed attempt at robbing the Free Trained had reached him two days ago, he sat and mulled and asked Ballan everything he knew. Caro was a right shifty bastard, the very reason why Grisholt employed him, and was wise enough to send his henchman with the bad news in his stead. But the real surprise was how one man had managed to execute six of his pit fighters. Naked even. It was beyond him. Caro had come exceedingly close to seizing the coin but had failed, and yet the failure didn’t gall Grisholt. The weasel appeared at the estate the next day with a sack of coin—coin he’d won from a bet placed on the Zhiberian’s head. A paltry sum compared to what was probably lost, but as Grisholt had to admit, it wasn’t a complete disaster. He’d rid himself of six men who were difficult to begin with, and his involvement with the attempt had died with them. Caro was trustworthy to the last, as were the men he employed beneath him.
131 Days [Book 1] Page 53
