Challenges

by Sharon Green

  “They know we’re here, and they’re sending someone over to see to us,” Jovvi disagreed, only glancing in the direction of the people she spoke about. “They’re vastly annoyed with Twimmal for wandering off before his job was done, and I think he was supposed to bring someone over to us, but forgot. The man really is an incompetent, empty-headed fool… Ah, the someone is on his way.”

  Lorand glanced around casually, and spotted a young man strolling in their direction. His attitude screamed to the world that he was a noble, and one who considered himself really important, at that. Just what they needed in that madhouse, someone else to rub badly against their nervousness…

  “Well, it seems that you people were abandoned,” the young man said lightly when he reached them. “I’m Lord Ophin Ruhl, and I’ve been asked to direct you to the place where you’ll wait for things to begin. By the bye, do you happen to know where Lord Twimmal has gone? He surprised us by disappearing like that.”

  “He didn’t say where he was going,” Tamrissa responded with complete honesty, then put her head to one side while showing a childlike expression of innocence. “Twimmal can’t possibly be considered anyone’s lord, but you still use the title for him. Haven’t you people learned yet how silly you all look, calling ones like him the same thing you call yourselves? Or can’t you tell what a deficient Twimmal is?”

  “It’s—ah—something I believe they’re looking into,” Ophin responded with a great deal of discomfort. “Please follow me in this direction.”

  He indicated the way to the right before immediately moving off, and Lorand exchanged bland glances with the others before joining them in following. Tamrissa’s wide-eyed, empty-minded questions had left Ophin with very little to say—even if the man had wanted to defend his position. Arguing with someone who’s already shown herself willing to say anything but isn’t terribly bright can be very frustrating, not to mention embarrassing. Ophin had taken the easy way out, leaving Tamrissa with her point clearly made—and the young lord already rattled.

  They were led across the wide floor and through the crowds to the door in the righthand wall, and once they passed through it the noise level dropped abruptly. They’d entered a lamplit corridor of some sort, and Lord Ophin walked almost to the end of it before throwing open a door.

  “This is the apartment where you’ll wait to be called,” he said, gesturing them in past him. “Your robes will be brought to you in just a few moments, and you’re to get into them as quickly as possible. Oh, yes, and ladies, no petticoats, please. You’ll all be furnished with undergarments and sandals as well, and they’re the only things to be worn with the robes. Tea and snack cakes have been provided, and if you require anything else, speak to the person who brings your robes. Good luck, and I’ll certainly see you later.”

  And with that he strode away, obviously intent on putting enough distance between them that Tamrissa would find it impossible to ask any more questions. Lorand discovered that he wasn’t the only one chuckling as he walked into the room to look around. Vallant had entered first, and now he returned to close the door behind all of them.

  “I hope no one minds my hurryin’ inside here,” Vallant said then. “That big outer room had too many people, and the corridor was windowless and too narrow. This place at least has windows, even if they are too high up to be reached easily. I know I can reach them if I have to, so I can stand bein’ in here.”

  “If it becomes necessary, Rion and I will help you,” Lorand told him simply. He’d tried to imagine what Vallant usually went through in small, enclosed places, and hadn’t been able to do it. His favorite place as a boy had been small and close and almost airless. Picturing that safe and cozy place as a trap to be escaped from was completely beyond Lorand.

  “At least this room is big, and there’s another one just like it through this door,” Tamrissa reported from the left, where she peered through the door she’d mentioned. “It has a narrow, lumpy-looking couch instead of those chairs, but it’s just as big. And there’s a far door that probably leads to privacy facilities.”

  “All the comforts of home,” Jovvi remarked dryly, stopping in front of the large tea service. “Lorand, can you tell if they’ve done anything to the snack cakes and tea? I’ll be happier if we can save our own supplies for later.”

  “They seem to be against taking any chances at all,” Lorand replied after a brief moment of examining the cakes. “There’s something mixed in with the other ingredients that looks an awful lot like headache powder. You know, the kind that relaxes you enough to relieve your headache? It’s not enough to really incapacitate any of us, but it’s still there.”

  “And it’s probably there to distract us,” Jovvi said with a nod. “If we’re smart enough to check, we find that the cakes have been tampered with. That should convince us that they don’t intend to try anything else, so we’ll be off our guard. What about the tea?”

  “The tea itself looks all right, but I can’t tell about the water,” Lorand said, already having checked. “Can you see anything, Vallant?”

  “Yes, and I’m recommendin’ that we don’t touch it,” Vallant responded, staring at the service. “Tea water is usually almost … empty, so to speak, except for the tea. This water’s got somethin’ in it that makes it crowded, and I don’t like the looks of it. It reminds me of the drinkin’ water in a port I once visited very briefly. Most of the townsfolk were sick to their stomachs, not plague-sick but bad-food sick. Our cargo was already paid for, so we off-loaded it quick and got out of there—and got fresh supplies at the next port.”

  “So that settles that,” Tamrissa said, having finished her exploring and rejoined them. “We eat or drink only what we brought with us, and even then not until Lorand and Vallant look it over. How much time do we have left to wait?”

  “Just under two hours,” Jovvi told her after consulting a small pocket watch. “We ought to be able to survive that length of time without food or drink, so our supplies will be conserved anyway. I wonder how long it will be before they bring those robes. Changing our clothes will fill some of the time.”

  “And the special visitor we can expect will fill even more of it,” Rion reminded them. “We haven’t been given our instructions yet, and then they’ll have to position us all before it turns noon. With that in mind, we probably have less than an hour to actually spend waiting.”

  Those points were too obvious for anyone to disagree, so they all chose chairs and sat. Lorand found himself more comfortable than he’d expected to be, but the presence of the headache powder in the cakes should have warned him. The powder and the chairs were supposed to combine to make them sleepy, ruining the sharp edge brought about by nervousness. The nobles seemed to be covering every possible contingency, in spite of the fact that they shouldn’t need anything but the drug the group had already been given. Curious…

  By the time a knock at the door brought two servants into the room, Lorand had thought of a possible reason for the over-thoroughness of the nobles’ preparations. The drug they’d been given could well be a last resort, to be used only if everything else failed. But that would hardly do for the group meant to face their chosen Blending. The nobles would want to be very sure of their opponents, so a visit from someone with orders ought to confirm the group’s guess that they were indeed the ones…

  Except for size, the white robes and accompanying white sandals were absolutely identical. The undergarments were slightly smaller robes made of silk, and felt cool and wonderful against the skin. Lorand had expected that Tamrissa at least would go into the other room to change, but all sense of embarrassment seemed to have left the girl. She changed with as little fuss as everyone else, and when they were through they examined each other.

  “Now we really look like full participants,” Jovvi said, the first one to comment. “And I’m surprised that these things are so comfortable. I expected them to fit badly, which would have been another distraction.”

  “The cak
es and tea could have been put in here for any group they happened to assign to the apartment,” Lorand said, deciding to share his guesswork. “The robes, though, were clearly made for no one but us. If they’re this comfortable, we probably will get that visitor Rion mentioned.”

  He explained his thinking in more detail then, and everyone nodded their understanding.

  “That means if we do get a visitor, we have to be sure to link up,” Rion said then. “If the drug still held us we’d respond at precisely the same time, which linking will let us do without draining us.”

  Again everyone agreed, and, as it turned out, just in time. Another knock came at the door, and when Lorand went to open it he found the man who had been standing next to Eltrina Razas, waiting patiently.

  “I’m Lord Simin Dolf,” the man said smoothly with a smile. “I may be new to the ranks of those who have worked with you, but I’d still like to extend my good wishes. May I come in?”

  Lorand felt tempted to answer, “No,” and then close the door in the man’s face, but that was just a fleeting whim. It would do no good at all to put off what the nobles intended to make unavoidable, so Lorand simply nodded and then stepped back to allow Lord Simin entrance.

  “Looking at all of you, I believe I’m beginning to feel truly excited,” the noble said as he advanced into the room. “I hadn’t expected to be so deeply involved in this twenty-fifth year, and now that I am, I’m as delighted as a child. I believe I’ll sit here for a moment, so that I’m able to look at each of you well enough to remember details. This will be a tale to tell for the rest of my life.”

  Lorand reclaimed his own chair as the noble took one to the left, which gave the man the overall view he’d mentioned. The rest of the group had been seated when Simin entered, and Lorand wondered if the noble felt insulted over the fact that no one rose respectfully. If so, Simin hid the emotion well.

  “This is marvelous,” he continued to burble, still looking from one to the other of them. “I can’t tell you how much this means to me, as now is the time for all commoners to come to the aid of the empire.”

  Lorand froze where he sat as the Blending link instantly flared into being, Jovvi initiating the state with all the speed of her considerable talent. The very great temptation was there to Blend all the way to melding, but Lorand held it off just as he felt the others doing.

  “Now that’s a good deal better,” Lord Simin said without the burbling, suddenly looking like an entirely different man. “You filthy little nothings imagined that you were getting away with not giving me the respect you owe to all your betters, but you were mistaken. Right now I have orders for you, and after you carry them out we’ll see to your punishment for insolence. If you’re still alive, that is.”

  *Nice of him to tell us that our opponents will be out for blood,* their Jovvi part sent while Simin chuckled nastily. *Let’s see what else he lets slip.*

  “The most important command that I have for you is that you’re to understand you’re no match for the noble group you’ll be facing,” Simin continued. “You will keep up the pretense of being ready to contend with everything you have, but on the inside each of you will know and believe that defeat is all there is in store for you. In point of fact you will assist in your own defeat, but not in any obvious way. The victory of your opponents is to appear as nothing but superior ability. Is all that clear?”

  “At your command, my lord,” Lorand said with the rest of the link, almost contributing to a chant. Simin’s expression lightened, and he laughed with clear enjoyment.

  “That is exactly what you useless peasants are, at the command of every one of your superiors,” he said. “During the competition you will attack and defend with only enough ability to make your opponents look good, and then you will lose. If they decide to spare your lives, once you return to the gathering area you will report to me for your punishment. If they don’t decide to spare you, well, then I suppose you’ll get away with having been insolent. I now give you no choice but to obey.”

  “At your command, my lord,” the chorus chimed out again, causing Simin to chuckle again. But if the noble had been able to feel what Lorand did from the group, chuckling would have been the last thing Simin would have wanted to do.

  “That’s my good little peasants,” Simin drawled. “You’ll obey me now, and later—if there is a later for you—you will obey me once more without question and without needing to be keyed again. And now you have my permission to return to the way you were … and so I’d like to thank you for giving me this opportunity. Now I’ll wish you good luck in your attempt, and leave you alone to rest and relax.”

  By then the noble was back to burbling as he rose to his feet, and Lorand rose as well to follow him to the door. Jovvi had released the link when Simin believed he was releasing them, and apparently the ruse worked perfectly. Simin left still burbling, and once Lorand closed the door he turned toward the others.

  “The fool isn’t even standing outside the door to hear whatever we might decide to talk about,” he reported. “His trace and life signs are strolling away back toward that open area, and in another moment or two he should be completely gone… There. He just went through the door.”

  “I’d say that that answers our question about which of our groups will be facing their darlings,” Jovvi said with a shake of her head. “If they were going to do the same to every group, he would never have come directly here and then left in the same way. Tomorrow will probably be another story, but today the privilege is ours alone.”

  “I suggest we pretend that he never visited us,” Tamrissa said, her extreme annoyance still clear in Lorand’s memory of the link. “The pretense will keep them guessing about what went wrong, and may even serve to get that useless garbage exactly what he deserves. If they think their plans are in ruins because of him, they may actually end him before they find out any better.”

  “I’d enjoy seein’ that,” Vallant commented, his light eyes looking very cold to Lorand. “There are men who are my superior in any number of ways, but none of them simply because he said so. We’ve got to do somethin’ about gettin’ rid of those parasites.”

  “We’ll have time to worry about it if and when we win the competitions,” Jovvi told them all as Lorand joined Rion in growling agreement. “Right now we need to relax, so let’s sit down and do it the way I taught you. We’ll all be forcing ourselves to relax, but we’ll gather ten times the strength we use to accomplish it. With me, now. One, two, three…”

  Lorand pushed aside thoughts of getting even and made himself join the effort to relax, but only because it was necessary. Once they won—and they would win—they’d go back to the topic of getting rid of parasites, and then they’d find the best way to accomplish it. That was something to really look forward to, almost as much as actually winning…

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  When Jovvi felt the last of the others finally slide into the calm lack of thought of relaxed meditation, she dropped her defenses with a sigh of relief. Between everyone’s nervousness—including her own—and the anger generated by that vicious pig of a noble, Jovvi had almost felt as though she were already under attack. If she intended to uphold her corner of the Blending, she needed the strength generated by relaxation even more than her groupmates. She forced herself to slide into it after them, and—

  And the knock on the door roused them all. It seemed as though only a minute or two had passed, but Jovvi’s watch told her it had been a little more than an hour. She felt marvelous and well rested, and the thoughts of the others showed they felt the same way. Simin had done them a favor by coming around so soon after the robes had been delivered.

  “All right, people, it’s time to go out there,” the young lord Ophin Ruhl announced when Lorand opened the door. “Follow me, please, and be certain you don’t dawdle. Tradition insists that the competitions begin precisely at noon.”

  There was still almost half an hour until that time, but Jovvi couldn’
t imagine dawdling even with twice the time left. She exchanged glances with the others as they all followed the idiot noble, relieved that no one seemed prepared to make an issue of it. Especially Tamma, who had pushed things a bit too hard for Jovvi’s complete peace of mind…

  But leaving the apartment and reentering the very large gathering area erased all thoughts of other things. Two other groups in white were entering from the opposite side, and with the two already there and waiting they totaled the necessary five. It was actually getting ready to begin, and Jovvi knew that if she’d had to perform on her own, she never would have been able to do it. Her balance was tipping wildly between excitement and apprehension, and only the comforting presence of the others kept her from doing something ridiculous, like screaming at the top of her lungs.

  “All right, people, I’m now supposed to tell you how you’ll be arranged,” Ophin said when they reached him where he’d stopped. Others like him, all wearing white scarves as armbands, were speaking to the other groups as well. “It’s been decided by the coin toss that your groups will be positioned out there first, and then your opponents will be placed opposite you. Please remember to keep your hoods on at all times, as the sun at this time of day can be extremely draining. Now we can get into line.”

  Jovvi saw now that the others had been lined up in groups, no two particularly close to one another. As she raised her hood in accordance with instructions, she also noticed that it was impossible to tell where Pagin Holter and his group were without using her talent. Only size differentiated one participant from any other, and there were several people the proper size. The others were very likely women, but even that was difficult to tell by sight alone because of the loose, shapeless robes.

  “I feel odd walking around without petticoats,” Tamma murmured as they took their places at the end of the line. “I feel as if I’m in a wrap and on my way to the bath house.”