Arena

CHAPTER 6

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING, MASTER?” HAMMEN hissed, his voice near to breaking with fear.

“Just shut up and do as I tell you to do.”

“You mean go back there?” He pointed nervously down the alleyway.

“Precisely, now move.”

“This is madness.”

“Chances are they still have someone watching this place in the hope that you might be so stupid as to come back again.”

“Only an idiot would do that, so don’t insult me.”

“You might have treasure hidden. They know you didn’t have enough time to get it the first time, so maybe you’ll venture it again.”

“There is treasure hidden,” Hammen said quietly.

“Good. So we’ll get it back. Now get moving.”

Hammen let out a slight yelp when Garth’s dagger poked him in the backside, sending him out into the middle of the alleyway. Hammen turned as if to go back, but Garth’s angry stare stopped him.

“So help me,” Hammen whispered while rubbing his injured parts. “I quit.”

“Is that official as of now?” Garth hissed. “Because if so, they’ve already seen you. Now get moving or I’ll leave you.”

Hammen, muttering a curse, started down the alleyway, moving furtively through the shadows, stepping lightly over the piles of offal, and hoping against hope that the Grand Master’s people were not still there. But again there was that sense, the street far too quiet. And he knew.

He wanted simply to try and run on past what had once been his hiding place, hoping that they would not recognize him and thus let him pass. But that was madness. They knew. They had seen him once, and they knew.

He reached the door and quickly opened it as Garth had ordered. Cursing, he stepped in, darting to one side as he did so.

The blow barely missed him, the club brushing within inches of his face. Screaming, Hammen dived backward, ducking under the table. As he rolled under the table he bounced up against something cold and stiff. It was his old friend Nahatkim; he could tell by the missing legs. His hand fumbled over the place where a head should have been, sticking in the congealed slime of blood.

At least he had the advantage in the total darkness. He felt a hand reaching past him, and with a quick grab, took hold and bit down hard, nearly severing the man’s finger. The hand jerked back, a loud howling filling the room. Hammen scurried out from under the table, moving toward the sewer bolt-hole in the back of the room. The demons take Garth, he thought. I’m getting out.

He reached the hole and dived into it headfirst… and straight into a hammerlike blow that sent his senses reeling.

Through a haze of pain and nausea he felt hands grabbing him from behind, pulling him out, while the man who had been waiting in the sewer laughed cruelly, striking him in the face yet again for the fun of it.

Pulled out of the hole, he was thrown down on the floor and a light was struck, a lamp flaring up.

His vision blurred, Hammen looked up at two leering faces. Though they were dressed in filth-stained leather, he knew these were not two simple thieves… they were warriors of the Grand Master, their well-fed faces looking down at him, laughing.

One of them leaned down and held a bleeding hand before him and then struck him again across the face.

“Don’t kill him yet,” the other hissed. “I want him when we’re done.”

“When we’re done,” another voice said. Through eyes that were starting to swell shut Hammen saw three more men come into the room, all of them obviously magic-wielding fighters, all three of them dressed in the multihued tunics of the Grand Master.

The three moved across the room, looking around disdainfully, one of them covering his nose with a scented handkerchief.

“Is it the same one?”

“I think so,” the one in the center replied. “Get him to talk. Find out exactly where One-eye is.”

The warrior with the bleeding hand snicked a dagger out of his belt and held it close to Hammen’s face.

“Can I start with the eyes?” he hissed softly.

“I don’t care. Just don’t cut his tongue out or kill him.”

For an instant Hammen wasn’t sure if the flash of light was blindness descending upon him or not. Then he heard the high, keening scream and felt the heat. There were more screams and the heat started to build, followed an instant later by a cool blast of air.

Hammen looked around the room, which was blurred and hazy, and it took him a moment to realize that he was in fact wrapped in a circle of protection while the rest of the room blazed with a white-hot intensity. His five tormentors rolled back and forth, shrieking, trying to beat out the flames that engulfed them.

Though the shield protected him from the heat, the scent of burning flesh still wafted through and he suppressed a gag. The five started to become still, curling up into tight, charred balls so that they looked like blackened dolls. The fire winked out as if the room had been washed with a blast of rain. Through the smoke he saw Garth emerge, a cold look of fury still in his eye.

The circle of protection vanished.

“Are you all right?”

“Not really, damn it. I think I lost a tooth.”

“I had to make sure they all came in. I knew they wouldn’t hurt you too much until then. I’m sorry.”

Garth laid his hands on Hammen’s temples and the pain washed away. He felt for a moment as if he were floating. He closed his eyes and then reopened them. His vision was again clear.

“Were they the ones who attacked you before?”

“I think so.”

Garth nodded, looking around the room.

“I’m sorry your friends’ bodies had to be burned like that.”

“I don’t think they really cared one way or the other,” Hammen replied coldly. “Besides, the pyre had some curs on it to be their servants in the land of the dead; it was fitting.” He paused for a moment. “Thank you.”

“It served my purpose.”

“I think it was more than that,” Hammen said, and Garth mumbled a soft curse and stood up.

“You want to collect your treasure? I think we better get moving. The fireball caught them by surprise, but it’ll draw attention. There’ll be others here in a moment, maybe more than I can handle.”

Hammen stepped over a charred corpse and went up to the fireplace. Reaching up inside, he pushed a brick aside, pulled out a heavy bag, and tucked it into his tunic. He started back across the room and then paused. He pulled the bag out again, opened it, fished out four gold coins, and quickly tossed them on the four corpses of his friends.

“For the ferryman,” he said to Garth almost as if apologizing.

“Let’s go. Someone’s coming,” Garth replied, moving away from the door and toward the back of the room. Hammen followed him, pausing for a moment to spit on one of the corpses of fighters and then went down the bolt-hole, Garth following.

“Take us toward the Fentesk House.”

“Why there?”

“Don’t you think they’ll cover the paths toward Ingkara?” Garth asked, and Hammen grunted in agreement.

Choking from the fumes, Garth followed Hammen through the stygian darkness, cursing as the sewage washed up over the top of his boots and poured down inside to squish between his toes.

“I can’t see you,” Garth whispered.

“Then strike a light.”

Garth pulled his dagger out of its sheath and held it aloft. An instant later it started to glow softly. He looked around and a chill washed over him. The sewer walls were dripping with slime. They passed a narrow side channel and the sound of rats echoed from it as they scurried away from the light. Hammen moved with a swift ease, turning one way and then the other, and Garth stumbled to keep up. And all the time the chill cut deeper into him. The walls seemed to crowd inward like nightmare memories in a dream from which he could not awaken. Hammen turned and looked back.

“Garth?”

Garth, startled, looked up but said nothing.

“What is it, boy?”

Surprised, Garth looked at him closely, struggling to control the shaking that racked his body. And as he looked at him there was somehow a sensing. It was in the old man’s rheumy eyes.

The nightmare drew in closer, as if now to consume his very soul. Garth sagged against the sewer wall, the dagger lighting his way waning to a mere flicker.

“Garth. What is it?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know.”

Hammen came up and, reaching out, grabbed him by the arm as if to hold him up.

“No, don’t take me. I want to go back!” Garth cried, struggling as if to break away, but his movements were weak, feeble, as if all strength had been drained away.

“Garth!”

Garth looked at him, his eyes wide.

“I want to go back!”

Garth stiffened, a gasp escaping him, and he doubled over for a moment as if he was about to vomit. He finally looked back up, his features drawn as if he were emerging from a fevered dream.

“What did you say?”

Hammen was silent for a moment.

Garth pushed Hammen away and the dagger glowed brightly again.

“Let’s go,” Garth said huskily, even as he wiped his eyes as if to sweep away what he had just seen, his hand coming away wet with tears.

“Galin?” Hammen’s voice was barely a whisper.

Garth looked back at him.

“What did you say?” His voice was quiet.

Hammen was silent and then he shook his head sadly.

“Nothing, Master, nothing. Anyhow, there’s a sewer cover just ahead that comes out behind Fentesk House.”

Hammen turned up into a narrow pipe that was so small Garth had to bend over and crawl on hands and knees. His breath was labored, coming in short, grunting bursts, the sweat beading down his face even though the sewer was chilled and damp like a tomb.

Hammen finally stopped and pointed up. Garth came up beside him, looked up, and saw the grating overhead. He stood up and slowly pushed the grating aside and peered out.

He pulled himself out and then, leaning over, reached down and hoisted Hammen up out of the darkness.

“Now where?”

“I don’t think going back to Purple is a wise idea at the moment,” Garth said quietly, even as he led Hammen over into the shadows opposite Fentesk House. He stopped at a small fountain and pulled off his boots, rinsing them out and then putting them back on, splashing water on his tunic and trousers to wipe off the filth. Hammen watched him and said nothing.

“They traced you back there,” Garth finally continued. “A report must have been turned in. And now, after our bit of revenge, they’ll swarm over it.”

“Thank you, Master,” Hammen whispered.

“For what?” Garth replied sadly. “If it hadn’t been for me, your friends would still be alive.”

“You couldn’t have known it would happen.”

“I should have.”

“But anyhow, for the shadows of my friends I thank you.”

“Shut up.”

“What happened back there?” Hammen nodded back toward the sewer grating they had just crawled out from.

“A spell, I guess,” Garth said hurriedly. “Now let’s go.”

“To where?”

“To Fentesk, where else?”

“Damn it, Master, not again.”

Ignoring him, Garth stepped out of the shadows and strode toward the front of the building.

“I demand that you open up your door and submit to a search!”

Jimak peered out through the small hatch set in the middle of the heavily bolted doorway into the House of Ingkara.

“You have no authority.”

Uriah peered up at the door, the dwarf fighter standing defiant and a flicker of light starting to swirl around him.

“I have eighty-nine fighters in here,” Jimak said coldly. “If you try anything, I guarantee you that when they are finished parts of your body will be raining down on this city for the next three days.”

Uriah hesitated for an instant and then looked over his shoulder.

“Open up, Jimak.”

The Master of Ingkara could not conceal his surprise that the Grand Master himself was outside the door. He had ignored the midnight summons to the palace but the fact that the Grand Master would then lower himself to come to the House of Ingkara in the hour before first bell was simply astonishing.

“I’ll not open up for you or anyone else,” Jimak replied. “You are breaking all the covenants of the Houses by appearing here and demanding a search.”

“Jimak, you know I have enough strength with my own fighters to take your House. They’re waiting just around the corner for my orders to blast their way in.”

Jimak turned his head away, spit, and then looked back.

“And three other Houses will storm your palace before daybreak. We might hate each other, but we’ll always stand against you if you attempt to break us.”

“The same as with the Turquoise House?” the Grand Master whispered.

Jimak looked over his shoulder and then back at the Grand Master.

“That was different. Besides, they wouldn’t ally with you against me.”

“And this is different as well. Now open up; I’ll come in alone. I lose face standing out here like this and I intend to regain it one way or the other. Now open up.”

Jimak hesitated for a moment and then stepped back, nodding to two of his fighters to remove the heavy beam that blocked the door. The Grand Master slipped through and the door slammed shut behind him.

“If I’m not back outside by first bell, this place will be a smoking ruin,” the Grand Master said haughtily.

“Are you that afraid for yourself?”

“I just wanted you to know how things stand. As for fear, I think there’s reason enough for all of us to be afraid right now.”

Jimak motioned for the Grand Master to follow him down the corridor and into his office, closing the door behind them.

“Now what is it?”

“How come you ignored my summons to appear before me?” the Grand Master snapped angrily.

“At midnight? I don’t give a damn if it was the Walker himself who commanded it. I am a House Master and I don’t answer a summons like that from anyone.”

“Well, please excuse me if I didn’t send a sedan chair over along with a phalanx of scantily clad women to throw flowers in your path, but it was urgent.”

“Those types of inducements are meaningless to me,” Jimak replied coldly. “Try them on Varnel-it’d work with him.”

The Grand Master settled into a chair without waiting for Jimak to offer the hospitality.

“Listen to me. We are a balance to each other. I rule this city and this land but my power is balanced not only by the princes of neighboring realms but also by the four Houses of magic fighters. No one of us is truly over the others. I am stronger than any two of you put together and you, if united, are stronger than I. We all know the game and we all play it. You are divided by your mutual rivalries and I insure that those rivalries continue. It is thus because the Eternal created it thus when the world was young and the power of the mana was fresh. But we must live here for our entire lives and the Walker comes but once a year to Festival.”

“Why are you boring me with this lecture?” Jimak interrupted.

“Because I am leading up to something. I fear that there is some new factor at play here, the same as what happened twenty years ago.”

“Oor-tael?” Jimak said quietly.

The Grand Master nodded.

“We destroyed them for their defiance of the wishes of the Walker.”

“He was merely a Grand Master then,” Jimak snapped, “so stop speaking of him in such reverent tones. He wanted to pierce the veil between worlds and frankly I didn’t give a good damn whether he did or didn’t. My tribute of mana was simply to get him out of my life and I’m glad he left. The only problem is that he chose you to be the new Grand Master.”

“And it should have been you, is that it?”

Jimak smiled coldly.

“No one of you four House Masters would have tolerated such a rise for a rival. As for the power of my post, Tulan is too cowardly, Varnel too consumed with fleshly pleasures, and Kirlen, she simply desired it too much.”

“And I am too hated by the others, is that it?” Jimak snapped.

“Something like that,” Zarel said smoothly.

“So you won the honor instead. The toady gets the reward.”

Zarel bristled.

“I did my job in his service and he rewarded it.”

“And you call the way you run things now as being better. At least under Kuthuman he was so preoccupied with his quest that he did not rule us too heavily as long as we cooperated. But you, you’ve corrupted the Festival for the sake of the mob, which wants more blood and yet more. I lost four good fighters in the arena last year and two more crippled beyond repair so that all they’re good for is keeping watch by some merchant’s door. How many death matches will you have this year to increase the betting?”

“I need money. It is that simple, and the mob bets more when there is blood at stake. Besides, your fighters desire it such as well for revenge against a rival and the hope of winning an entire satchel in a fight rather than a single spell. With such a fight they can gain in a moment what would take years upon years of labor and study.”

“And for what do you need this money? The buying of mana on the black market? The bribing of princes for the mana of my fighters who ever increasingly die of mysterious causes while out on contract with a claim that their satchels were lost? You wish to be a Walker yourself, isn’t that it?”

Zarel smiled.

“If that should ever happen, who would succeed me? Uriah, a hunchbacked dwarf? No one would follow him. Who would succeed?”

“So you imply that it could be me then.”

“Why not?”

“And you have undoubtedly offered it to the others.”

“I’m not so much of a fool as to encourage them to think thus.”

Jimak snorted disdainfully.

“Of course you’d offer the same to them. Don’t take me for an idiot. You’ll play us off against each other.”

Zarel laughed coldly.

“I might offer it to the others but would I be telling the truth to them? I already told you my reasons why the others aren’t worth of consideration, but you are.”

He paused.

“If you cooperate.”

Jimak laughed, shaking his head, but Zarel could see that his words had hit the mark. Jimak viewed the other three Masters with contempt and he would find it inconceivable that they might rise above him if Zarel should ever manage to pierce the veil. That is, if he could do it without the Walker finding out first.

Jimak nodded as if he had been granted information that was to be believed. But suppose, he thought, suppose I could betray this man to the Walker just before he did try his move or somehow bring him down? Then it would be I who was the new Grand Master, for he was right in that Uriah was not even to be considered for the post. Then I, in turn, could make my final move.

Zarel smiled as he watched Jimak’s features, sensing all that he was now thinking.

“You came here for other reasons as well,” Jimak finally said.

“Because there is something wrong here. This One-eye.”

Jimak snorted and smiled.

“He’s created problems for you, hasn’t he?”

“It is more than that.”

“I heard a rumor that three of your fighters now look like burned toast,” Jimak chuckled. “Is that why you are here?”

The Grand Master bristled.

“You know the law. Your killing of each other on my streets outside of the arena is crime enough. The killing of my own fighters is a capital offense.”

“And it happens every year anyhow. Our fighters are high-spirited. You really can’t expect us to contain over three hundred fighters in the days before Festival. Killings are bound to happen. Old rivalries, old grudges can’t be contained.”

“This is different. Think of it. Wherever this man has walked chaos follows in his wake.”

Jimak chuckled.

“And Brown and Gray are bleeding from it.”

“And you were next.”

Jimak paused, saying nothing.

“His trail led straight back here. At first I was tempted to storm this House to get him out, especially when you lied and said he was not here.”

“It was not a lie,” Jimak said coldly. “I searched for him after your summons, though admittedly to reward him. But he’s gone.”

The Grand Master nodded.

“That is what I finally realized. That is why this place is not engulfed in flames. Don’t you see he is setting us against each other and playing our mutual hatreds to some advantage? What he did was the perfect setup for you and me to be each other’s throats, me thinking that you were lying about his whereabouts, and you defending your honor.”

Jimak said nothing.

“He is not here then?” the Grand Master asked, his voice a hoarse whisper.

Jimak nodded as if he were barely paying attention, his thoughts someplace else.

“Fine then.”

The Grand Master stood up again.

Jimak suddenly looked up at him.

“Why?”

“Why? I’m not sure. I have my suspicions but I’m not sure and I don’t want to voice them till I know. According to the laws of the guilds if he is wearing a color, I cannot take him. Though I know he murdered three of my fighters tonight, I have no witnesses and thus no proof. Any of you Masters can resist me in taking him. But I want him and, I should add, the Walker wants him.”

Jimak shifted uncomfortably.

“And what is the offer?”

“Five thousand gold and no one will ever know that you gave him to us.”

“Are you that afraid of him?” Jimak asked, his voice edged with sarcasm.

The Grand Master paused and then finally nodded his head.

Jimak lowered his head and thought of the ruby that even now was in his lockbox, balancing the two against each other.

“Ten thousand,” he finally whispered.

The Grand Master smiled.

“I must assume the topic of their conversation is me,” Garth said quietly.

Varnel Buckara, Master of Fentesk, stretched languidly and nodded in agreement as he dismissed the messenger who had observed the Grand Master’s nocturnal visit.

“I suspect that another messenger will come here with an offer,” Varnel finally said.

“And?”

“It depends on the offer.”

“It might be good enough for the moment-but for the future?” Garth replied.

“Explain, One-eye.”

“The offer to Jimak is easy enough and that is why I left his service. Too consumed with his lust for gold. Such men are easily bribed. Perhaps even Tulan of Kestha can be bribed with an endless supply of some rare delicacy or wine. I’ve heard that for you it is women.”

Varnel chuckled.

“According to some sources, you have fifty right here in this House.”

“More, far more.”

Garth smiled.

“So what can he offer you? Another woman.”

“There’s always the exotic. Each is different.”

“And each is the same. Beyond that gold does not talk, nor does food. But a woman, especially one coming from the hands of the Grand Master…”

“Put that in the plural. It would take far more than one.”

“All right then. How could you trust them?”

“I’m not interested in trust,” Varnel laughed coldly. “I’ve never been that foolish and any man who is should be drowned as a mercy killing.”

“Trust or not, you would have someone whom the Grand Master had first laid hands upon and I daresay to take his leavings would be rather distasteful.”

“Virgins, my good man, virgins.”

“And they can still be handled,” Garth replied. “Beyond that, you would never know what enchantment they had been placed under. A hairpin into the base of your skull while you are lost in your ecstasy, a spy in your House to send information back to the Grand Master, perhaps even a gossip planted with the rest of your women to make them turn against you. More than fifty women are difficult enough to manage in the best of times.”

Varnel grunted softly, a troubled look crossing his features, and Garth smiled.

“So do you have a better offer?”

“I do not traffic in women,” Garth said coldly, a flash of indignation evident in his tone. “But I do traffic in winning.”

“Which reminds me,” Varnel rumbled. “You did kill one of my men.”

“If he was stupid enough to be killed like that in a street fight, then he was worth little to you. Your honor would be more than restored by having me wear your colors. Though money is meaningless to you, what I will win for you in the arena can buy many pleasures, pleasures, I should add, that would be untainted by the hand of the Grand Master.”

Varnel nodded slowly in agreement and then looked over at Garth.

“You did, however, betray both Tulan and Jimak. Am I next?”

“Tulan is a pig and Jimak sick with greed. Given the way things currently stand between me and the Grand Master, I felt here at least I would be protected by a color that would not sell me.”

“You may wear Orange.”

“Thank you, my lord.”

“And if you betray me in turn, I promise you death will be a pleasurable release by the time I am done with you.”

“But of course, my lord.”

Bowing low, Garth retired and as the door closed he caught a quick glimpse of several naked forms coming into the room from a hidden doorway, a low grunt of expectation rumbling from Varnel as the door finally closed to guard his secret pleasures.

“I think, Master, that this move was foolish.”

Garth said nothing as Hammen came up beside him.

“You changed your clothes but obviously you didn’t wash,” Garth replied.

“One bath a year, whether you need it or not, is good enough for any man.”

As they walked down the corridor to the House barracks Garth looked around warily. Second bell had just sounded and the fighters were starting to awaken. As he passed he could hear the whispers behind him. Stopping to ask a guard for directions, the two went down a long flight of stairs, their noses soon guiding them to the feasting room.

Men and women fighters were already gathered around some of the tables. Garth went to a corner table, motioning for Hammen to follow.

“Master, I don’t see any servants eating here.”

“You’re eating here; now go cut me some meat.”

Garth settled down on a stool, leaning back so that his back was pressing against the cool stone wall. A moment later Hammen returned, bearing two plates weighed down with slices of roasted pork, and two heavy goblets of wine.

Garth pulled out his dagger and, cutting off a slice, he chewed on it slowly while watching the room.

More and yet more fighters were coming in and all were turning to look at him. A low buzz filled the room.

“I think there’s going to be trouble,” Hammen said softly.

“Are you worried?”

“After what you’ve put me through, yes, I’m worried. The entire House is in here.”

“Eat your meat and be quiet.”

Garth cut another piece of pork and chewed. The food was not as good as Kestha’s. Tulan’s culinary obsession was reflected in how his own fighters ate as well, but it was far better than what he had been used to over the years.

He ate in silence, watching the men and women who were now supposed to be his comrades. One of them finally stirred from his table, his stool falling over so that it clattered on the floor, and the room went silent. The fighter made a casual show of adjusting his satchel and walked toward Garth.

“Master.”

“Shut up.”

The fighter came up to the table, and several more rose from the same table and fell in behind him.

“Only fighters may eat here,” the man grumbled. “Servants and scum eat in the cellar.”

Hammen started to stand up as if to leave.

“Sit down, Hammen.”

Hammen looked over at him.

“Not again,” he whispered.

“I like his company,” Garth said, cutting another piece of meat and then chewing on it as if the conversation was finished.

“Get out of her, cur!” the man snarled, and he grabbed hold of Hammen by his collar and started to pull him away.

Garth looked up and the man let go of Hammen with a howl of pain.

“No magics!” someone shouted, and a lean, angular woman with flowing red hair came up and the others stepped back slightly at her approach. Garth looked at her, sensing that here without doubt was a ninth- or tenth-rank fighter who commanded authority over the others.

“No magics within this House against those of your color,” she snarled angrily.

Garth fixed her with his gaze.

“Then tell him to keep his hands off my man.”

The woman stood silent, hands resting lightly on her hips.

“You think you’re quite the fighter, don’t you, One-eye?”

“I get by.”

“If you want to get by in this House, then live by its rules. No magic is used against another of your color except in practice.”

“And the rights of my satchel and my property are to be respected. That man is my property.”

Hammen snorted disdainfully and fixed Garth with a malevolent gaze.

“He’s the one who killed Okmark in that street fight,” someone shouted from the back of the room.

“He was a fool to challenge a hanin that he didn’t know anything about and the death challenge was his offering, not mine,” Garth replied sharply. “Besides, he was an embarrassment to the House of Fentesk.”

An angry murmur swept through the room.

“I think I need to take a walk,” Hammen whispered, and he started to stand up.

“Stay where you are,” Garth snapped, and Hammen froze in his place.

“I heard you beat Naru,” the woman said.

“Yes.”

“Think you can beat me?”

He looked up at her and grinned.

“Care to try?”

With a mock sincerity she bowed, holding both hands outward in the ritual display of a fighter accepting challenge.

Garth made a show of cutting another piece of meat and chewing on it before finally standing up, extending his hands and bowing as well.

The woman led the way out of the feasting hall, Garth following. There was a clatter of stools and excited shouts as the other fighters fell in behind them. Ascending the stairs out of the hall, the woman turned left, going down a corridor paneled with a dark rich wood, and lit by high stained glass windows set into the ceiling so that the hallway was awash with color. Reaching the end of the hallway, she flung open the doors to a circular room a dozen fathoms across, the walls lined with benches, which were quickly filled by the other fighters of the house. The arena was occupied by half a dozen fighters, who were going through their morning exercises of weapons practice with lance, dagger, and throwing spikes. At the far end of the room several other pairs of fighters were sparring with spells, one of them struggling to use a team of goblins against his opponent’s dwarven warriors.

“Clear the arena,” the woman snapped.

The sparring fighters looked up and an instant later their minions disappeared into smoke and they withdrew.

The woman stepped out into the circle.

“Rules of the House. No fire, no creature of disease, and no spell which can go out of control or damage the House.”

“Is this match a mere testing, a wager of spell, or to the death?” Garth asked as if the answer really didn’t matter one way or the other.

“You know the answer to that,” she snapped. “Unless we have permission of the Master, it can only be a testing.”

“Well, do you have the Master’s permission?”

She smiled softly.

“Not yet.”

“Then a testing.”

Garth stepped into the neutral box at the far end of the arena while his opponent stepped into hers.

Garth waited until another fighter stepped forward as circle master and held his hands up.

The two bowed to him, then to eat other, and then back to the circle master. He clapped his hands three times and on the third clap jumped back. Like a panther the woman leaped into the arena and, as she did so, Garth reeled from the impact of a psionic blast that flayed the strength out of his body. He staggered forward, knowing that the spell was so powerful that it would in fact harm her as well, though the damage he would receive was far worse.

An approving crying of awed respect rose up from the spectators at the audacity of her move.

Garth finally waved his hands, erecting a barrier of protection to block the attack, thus conceding the offensive to her. Within seconds she drew upon yet more mana and wolves appeared to either side of her and a small host of goblins materialized in the middle of the arena. All rushed toward him.

An icy shadow filled the middle of the arena and there was a great rushing of air and a loud trumpeting.

A great mammoth stood in the middle of the fray, its feet trampling down the goblins. The wolves paused in their headlong rush toward Garth, recoiling and cringing against the side walls of the arena as the mammoth thundered, its heavy trunk flaying about to snatch up the last of the goblins.

There was another swirling cloud and out of it hundreds of rats emerged. Their hot red eyes gleaming with hunger, they swarmed toward the mammoth, leaping upon its legs, sinking their yellow razor teeth into it. More and yet more clawed their way up its sides, clinging to its heavy coat and burrowing in.

The great beast shrieked in pain, and Garth, mercifully, raised his hand and the creature disappeared. The rats that were clinging to it tumbled to the ground, dazed. And then they started to look around for something else. As if driven by a single hand they charged toward Garth and then as suddenly stopped. They turned and started back toward the woman and then paused, slowly turning back toward Garth.

The two wrestled, laying spell upon spell to control the rats, who weaved back and forth, while the wolves cowered and stayed out of the fight. First one way, and then the other, the rats were driven back and forth. Some of them started to collapse, twisting and kicking from the stress of the powers swirling around them.

The struggle continued for long minutes so that the arena pulsed and glowed from the power, neither fighter pulling in other spells, both attempting to control the rats as a singular demonstration of their ultimate power over the other. A hazy glow started to build up around the two, flickering with flashes of light, becoming so bright that those who sat nearest to them had to turn their heads away.

Suddenly there was an audible pop, not quite an explosion but rather a caving in. The rats turned and swarmed straight at Garth.

He lowered his head and stepped back into the neutral square. Still the rats came toward him and he stood with arms at his side. Even as the first of the rats started to leap toward his throat, the woman raised her hand and they disappeared. A loud cheer went up from the assembly.

Garth stepped back into the arena and bowed low at the waist. The circle master stepped back into the fighting area.

“Win to Varena of Fentesk.”

Again there was loud cheering and Garth straightened as she approached him.

“Good fight,” she said quietly.

“Good fight.”

Garth started toward the exit, ignoring the crowd of Fentesk fighters that pushed around him, laughing, going up to Varena. Hammen stood to one side.

“So how much did we lose?”

Hammen smiled.

“Nothing?”

“If you beat her, I really don’t think you would have gotten out of here alive and that would have included me. She was obviously a favorite and if she had not intervened, you would have had to fight them all over that man you killed the other night.”

Garth looked over at Hammen and said nothing as they left the arena.

A hand came to rest on his shoulder and he turned back to look.

“Good fight, One-eye.”

“You’re an excellent challenge.”

“We need to soak; come with me,” she invited, pointing toward a narrow flight of stairs. He followed her down, the air becoming damp and hot. They stepped into a small, dimly lit room filled with steam. The room was lined with alcoves; inside of each of them was a hot bubbling pool. Varena looked over at Hammen and stared at him pointedly.

“Hammen, either it’s in the pool or take a walk,” Garth announced.

“I’ll walk,” Hammen said, a bit of a leer lighting his features and he disappeared back up the stairs.

“He really does stink, you know.”

“It’s his way.”

“And you don’t smell so good yourself.”

“I had a little adventure last night and haven’t had a chance to completely wash off.”

Varena casually untied the cincher around her waist and pulled her tunic off over her shoulders. Garth found it difficult to ignore what he was seeing. He had assumed her to be almost boyish in figure, but realized now that the tunic had been deceiving. Next she stepped out of her trousers and loincloth as if he wasn’t even present and, folding her clothes up, she placed them on a stone bench, though she made a point of taking her satchel with her as she walked into one of the alcoves. Stepping down into the circular pool, she stretched out and floated, sighing with contentment, resting her satchel on the edge of the pool.

Garth hesitated for a moment, then undressed and, like her, took his satchel with him. He then walked through the swirling steam and into her alcove.

“Am I invited?”

She sat up and nodded.

“Just pull the curtain shut.”

Doing as ordered, he stepped down into the pool and stretched out beside her. Hot bubbles swirled up around him, smelling slightly of sulfur, and he let them massage the tension out of his muscles.

“That fight was a sham,” she finally said.

He looked over at her for the first time. She was sitting up on a bench in the water so that her body was fully exposed from the waist up.

He sat across from her.

“What makes you think that?”

“Every counter you placed upon the rats was just barely stronger than mine. You did no diversions. I could sense your mana out there in that first moment when I struck you with a psionic blast. You were as strong as me, that was evident.”

Garth said nothing.

“We should still be fighting up there and I suspect I should be losing.”

“You won.”

“That’s not good enough. Why did you throw it?”

“I didn’t.”

She smiled, the first time he had seen her do so, and he found himself smiling in return. Her light blue eyes seemed filled with amusement and curiosity.

“You won,” he said softly, “and everyone now knows it.”

“Did you think I was testing you for Varnel?”

“Of course you were! That’s your job, to test new fighters. You also were supposed to kill me but only in a manner that was not obvious, say after a long fight and we were both exhausted and it could be claimed that it was an accident. I daresay having rats tear my throat out while I was in the neutral box would be too obvious.”

She stared at him coldly.

“Your honor is intact, the others will accept me, the issue is laid to rest for the moment. You’ll have your chance at me later.”

“I think you could beat me,” she said quietly.

Garth smiled again.

“We’re inside a circle here, we have our satchels. Shall we try again or postpone such things for now?”

She looked at him, saying nothing.

Finally she stirred, slipping across the pool to where he was sitting, putting her arms around his shoulders and pulling herself in tight against him.