CHAPTER 16 A BROTHERLY BRAWL
Despite the arrival of Lord Harriod Ball and his friends, as well as the king himself, the courtyard remained just as quiet as it had been when it had only been Joshua sitting waiting.
Though Lord Ball was whispering to his friends and casting a smug grin in Joshua’s direction.
“You know … you actually have a big advantage here,” Kat mused.
She had her legs stretched out and crossed in front of her with her arms folded over her middle as she scowled at the men across the sparring space.
“How do you figure that?” Piers asked on behalf of Joshua, whose earlier bravado had faded following his half brother’s appearance.
“He’s going to insult you and be a real pigarse during the match—most likely he’s going to cheat—don’t be shy about groin shots, Joshy,” Kat added. “But, back to the insult thing … You’re used to it, right? He’s been insulting you since you were a child.”
“Since my mother was pregnant with me,” Joshua clarified bitterly.
“Since before birth! So you already have heard it all from him. That means it doesn’t matter what he has to say; you can focus on fighting— Ooh. Or you could smile at him. That always works for me when someone wants to be annoying. Fools don’t know that I’m the Queen of Annoying.”
Joshua at least cracked a small smile at her musings. “You’re going to be an actual queen too.”
“No, no. Queen of Annoying takes priority.”
He laughed.
Kat grinned when she noticed him letting out a calming breath. Then turned to look over her shoulder at where Dante stood while his brothers were seated with Sir Cas.
“Where are Caleb and Broghan?”
“They said they had to finish something before coming,” Sir Cas answered innocently.
Kat opened her mouth to question the Daxarian knight further only to be interrupted by Lord Ball rising from his seat.
“Your Majesty, might I ask what we are waiting for?” he queried with his hand on his hip and his wooden sword tapping the stones impatiently.
Brendan looked at the lord without an ounce of emotion. It didn’t hint at any form of anger, or kindness … but that just made it all the more unnerving.
“We are waiting on the rest of Mr. Ball’s team.”
The nobleman’s eyebrows twitched, but he didn’t complain and instead gave a shallow bow.
Without Alina at the king’s side, Lord Ball was far more malleable.
However, Brendan Devark himself tended to be more impatient.
As the evening progressed, the courtyard fell into the shadows of the night, though at the very least the sky above them was a clear starlit backdrop as opposed to the oppressive clouds that had plagued the lands for more days than many wished to count.
Kat’s eyes began to glow, and stewards came out to light the braziers.
“Ashowan, question for you … If you see in the dark as clearly as you do in the daytime … how is it you can see the stars?” Piers wondered thoughtfully while they all stared up at the glittering abyss above them.
Kat smiled. “You know … no one has ever thought to ask me that other than my brother.”
“Ah yes … the mysterious other Ashowan … Interested to meet him sometime … Anyway, what’s the answer?”
“If I want to see the stars? Everything dims so that I can.”
“You mean you can control when you do or don’t see in the dark?”
Kat’s mouth twisted and she gave a small shrug. “Only with the stars. I can’t any other time. I’m not sure why.”
Piers stretched his mouth and nodded along thoughtfully when the door to the courtyard nearest their side of the sparring ring creaked open.
The first person to come out was the unmistakable shape of Sir Cleophus Miller with Pina already on his shoulder, her eyes gleaming in the night.
“I swear, I feel like she’s more his cat than mine,” Kat muttered under her breath to Joshua and Piers.
The two smiled in response, but Joshua was soon distracted by the line of men that followed the eldest Miller son …
“Wait, who are—”
“By the Gods.” Faucher gave a scoff of impressed disbelief. “Ball, do you know who all those men are?”
Joshua shook his head.
Dante, who had joined the group shortly after his father, stepped forward, his brows knit together but his eyes wide. “They are … They are all illegitimate sons of some of the noblemen in court …”
Joshua’s jaw dropped. “What?”
Cleophus had reached them then, with Caleb and Broghan behind him.
Kat peered at the faces that paraded in.
Some were men wearing humble clothes, others were knights … and then … there was Mage Sebastian.
“Sebbie!” Kat hollered brightly and waved.
The mage stared back at her flatly before rolling his eyes and ambling his way over to her.
“Lady Katarina,” he greeted dryly. “Your hair is a disaster.”
Kat blinked and her hand fell. She had completely forgotten that Piers had mussed it, and so she set to untying her hair from its ponytail in order to fix it while still facing the mage.
“I haven’t seen you in ages! How’ve you been?”
Sebastian sighed. “Oh, keeping plenty busy. Though it sounds like you’ve been just as active … Congratulations on your wedding.”
The redhead nodded along while she proceeded to finish retying her hair. “Yes, yes. Whose idea was it to have all the illegitimate sons here?”
“His Majesty invited them. Not everyone came of course, as not everyone was fine with publicly revealing their birthright, but … well, here we are.”
“What if Joshua loses though?” Kat whispered as inconspicuously as possible.
Sebastian raised an eyebrow at her. “I think the point is to show that we aren’t going to take our beatings quietly anymore.”
Kat widened her eyes and bobbed her head in approval. “That’s fantastic.”
“Your Majesty.” Lord Harriod Ball’s voice rang out once more, this time his anger was far more apparent. “Are we going to begin now?”
Brendan raised an eyebrow, his dark eyes all the more ominous as the torches that were lit by his chair flickered in their inky depths …
“I believe it is indeed time.” The king turned toward Joshua.
The young man gripped his wooden sword tightly in his hand and gulped.
Kat and Faucher each clasped a hand on his shoulder.
“Remember the strategy,” the military leader reminded evenly.
“Remember I don’t want to go to jail.”
Faucher looked at Kat, who stared back without elaborating.
Taking a deep breath, Joshua looked around at the faces that filled his section of the courtyard.
The illegitimate sons of noblemen, just like himself …
They stood with their shoulders back and their chins held high.
He nodded to them, then turned to the ring and stepped in.
Once more, the courtyard fell into silence as Harriod Ball sauntered in as well.
The two brothers strode to the center of the ring, and it was then that everyone could see the family similarities …
The same wide brown eyes, the same shape of their brows … Though Joshua’s face wasn’t as long as his brother’s and he stood two inches shorter.
“Thanks for giving me the chance to bestow a proper greeting, brother. It’s been too long.” Harriod smiled coldly.
“I think you should save your thanks for Lady Katarina. Without her slapping you, we wouldn’t be here.”
Harriod’s lip curled in a jeer. “You don’t have her to hide behind here.”
“I’m not hiding. Though if you prefer to fight her instead of me, let me know.” Joshua knew his voice warbled, and his brother looked as though he were going to smirk when he heard it, but his eyes happened to dart over Josh’s shoulder. When he found Katarina glaring at him with her arms crossed and her aura flickering around her angrily, he swiftly returned his attention to his opponent. The woman looked fully prepared to snap his neck.
“Witches are demons. Glad to see you’ve sold your worthless soul … I’m sure our father would’ve been wonderfully disappointed.”
“Not as disappointed as he would’ve been after he’d found out you’ve been married for five years without an heir.”
Harriod backhanded Joshua in the blink of an eye, but the young man had been watching every twitch in his brother’s body, and so instead of a full-contact hit, he leaned back and found himself only grazed.
Joshua drew out his wooden sword and backed up a step.
Harriod lifted up his own but remained in place. To some, the nobleman may have looked casual and unguarded, but the spacing and angle of his toes told the more seasoned audience members better …
Swinging his sword down with a substantial amount of his strength, Joshua aimed for his brother’s exposed right knee.
Harriod didn’t bother blocking it—as he proceeded to simply punch Joshua in the face.
However, he had underestimated Joshua’s aim and let out a yelp while stumbling as the wooden sword cracked smartly against his kneecap. This in turn gave Josh a chance to recover from the blow.
Wiping the blood from his nose, Joshua readied himself again. For some reason, getting punched in the face made him feel more assured in himself, as though the hit wasn’t as excruciating as he had been anticipating it would be.
He swung again toward the outside of his brother’s right knee, but this time he kept his elbow up to guard his face.
Harriod used the opportunity to swing his own wooden sword brutally into Josh’s exposed side, immediately winding him …
But not before Josh once again landed a hit on Harriod’s knee.
“GODS—” the nobleman blurted as he half stumbled away, his leg throbbing in the worst way possible.
From the sideline, Kat grinned while Faucher didn’t dare move a muscle as he watched.
He could tell Harriod hadn’t been taking the match seriously but that the current state of his leg was making him change his outlook …
Joshua shifted the grip on his sword and noted that there was a small, sharp pain with every inhale he took radiating from the ribs his brother had just hit.
He did his best to shove that detail out of his mind. He needed to get two hits in. One to make sure he fully fractured Harriod’s knee, and one blow to his brother’s head to ensure a win.
Harriod turned his body, protecting his injured right side by leading with his left foot, meaning his weight was distributed differently, and his eyes had turned murderous.
Sensing what was happening, Joshua turned his position to match his brother’s, and he didn’t shuffle forward as he had before. Instead, he approached slowly … carefully … If he moved quickly enough at the last moment, he could at least throw Harriod off-balance …
Two heartbeats passed, Joshua’s back foot planted itself and spread evenly in his boot to steady himself … then he lunged. He swung high instead of low, but Harriod had been prepared for either attack. He knocked the sword down to the ground with his own downward parry, which also pitched Josh forward.
With his body hunched forward in an unsteady position, Harriod wasted no time in crashing his fist against Josh’s ear, then seizing him by the back of the tunic, dropping his own sword, and proceeding to punch his brother’s groin.
Josh crumpled to the ground.
Panting, Harriod knelt his good knee on his brother’s chest, pinning him on his back, and hit him again.
By that time, Josh was at least able to raise his arm up to block the initial punch, but Harriod seized his wrist and utilized his extra fifteen pounds, further incapacitating his half brother. The nobleman’s left fist pulled back and crashed into the side of Josh’s face.
Then he did it again.
The illegitimate sons on Joshua’s side winced … It looked like a lost battle.
What had started as a duel ended up as nothing more than a brawl.
“To hell with this,” Kat uttered breathily, her aura already rising.
Faucher turned to stop her, assuming she meant to jump into the ring.
“JOSH!” She shouted. Everyone leapt back as her magic surged out in a flare before dying back down. “PINA IS TOO PRETTY FOR JAIL!”
Everyone on Harriod Ball’s side as well as the Troivackian king were too baffled to understand. What they couldn’t see, however, was when Joshua’s eyes snapped open at her call—a golden, magical ring that hadn’t been there before encircled his pupils.
Harriod, momentarily distracted by this, was caught off guard when, with his free hand, Joshua reached up, seized Harriod’s hair in a fistful, then used his entire body weight to throw his brother off him. In the next instant, he used his freed right heel to kick Harriod’s damaged kneecap, but before the nobleman could even finish letting out another shout of pain, a strong uppercut set his teeth rattling while he lost his balance and fell onto his side.
Joshua wasn’t finished. His eyes were wide and furious, his face pale under the splattering of his own blood. He seized his brother’s tunic and punched him again, kneed his groin, then clambered on top of him and hit him over and over. His hits were not as strong as Harriod’s had been, but the speed with which they were dealt dazed the nobleman too much to leave him time to react.
The flurry of motion was so fast, in fact, that it took everyone a moment to realize that Harriod was knocked unconscious.
“Mr. Ball!” the king called out.
Panting, Joshua stopped hitting his brother, but he still stared down at his bloodied face; Harriod’s fine green tunic was still clutched in a death grip in his hand. His own eye was swollen, and his nose most likely broken, but as Josh looked down at Harriod … the man who had hated him, tormented him and his mother … His hands shook. He leaned down and screamed into Harriod’s still face.
It rang out around the courtyard.
His pain, his grief, his desperation … It was a shout that ripped through a lifetime of suffering.
Joshua grew limp as he sat gasping atop his brother.
Then, Faucher’s gentle hand appeared on his shoulder.
“You’ve won.”
His lips quivering, Joshua rose to his feet, tears gleaming in his eyes as he glared at the men on the marquess’s side, but they all either sneered or looked away in boredom.
Save for one knight …
“The witch! She cheated! She isn’t supposed to shout during a spar!” He pointed at Kat accusatorily.
“I’m a woman! I get emotional!” Kat hollered back indignantly.
“Oh sure, that’s helpful to your gender.” Piers guffawed beside her.
“I’ll take a hit for women if it means I don’t have to apologize to that donkey-face.”
“Fair enough.”
The king stood from his chair, drawing everyone’s eyes to him and calming the argument.
“There was no magical aura around Mr. Joshua Ball. His strength was not unnatural. I see no signs of magic use.”
“Even if there were, I’m the one who challenged Lord Balls to a duel; it’s only fair!”
“It’s Lord Ball, Lady Katarina,” Brendan addressed his sister-in-law sharply.
“What if I were talking about the two of them?!” Kat argued.
“That was an incorrect sentence structure then, and you should have specified for clarification,” Mage Sebastian called from behind Kat.
Looking up to the sky and then over her shoulder, the redhead dropped her voice. “Will. You. Just. Be. Quiet?!”
The exchange was interrupted, however, when Joshua Ball stepped forward and faced the nobles who had sided with his brother, many of whom had tormented him countless times before. Then he looked to those who had come to stand in silent support. Then he bowed to the king.
“Your Majesty … I don’t ask for much … We never ask for much.” He gestured to his fellow illegitimate men. “We didn’t even ask to be born to our parents, but our birthright or lack thereof doesn’t mean we aren’t going to create something honorable of our own. We should demand what is fair for our efforts!” Joshua’s voice rose, the sheen in his eyes growing even brighter. “We have done nothing that should place the responsibility of our births on our heads. I’m going to fight, Your Majesty. For a proper place. A place of my own. Not my father’s, not my brother’s, mine. Can … Your Majesty … Can you respect that and acknowledge those efforts?”
Brendan stared down at the young man, who had a lone tear that had escaped his one good eye.
The king then proceeded to turn and peer at the noblemen on his left that were already laughing while glancing at one another. Then he looked to the right where the men supporting Joshua and Katarina stood stoically quiet, an air of pride and hopefulness emanating around them.
“It is a Troivackian ambition to declare you are going to fight for your power and your life. What’s not to respect about that? I look forward to seeing who will turn the tide and who will remain as they are.”
The vagueness with which the king spoke both confused and infuriated a number of people present since they couldn’t be certain about what he meant, especially as the king then stood and unceremoniously took his leave.
It was over.
Joshua had won.
“DRINKS ON ME, LADS!” Piers hollered, shoving his fist in the air, and all at once, the men and Katarina broke out in a cheering ruckus before they poured into the sparring ring. Sir Cas and Conrad hoisted Joshua up on their shoulders.
“How are you feeling up there, Josh?” Kat shouted over the excitement as she skipped alongside her peer.
Joshua smiled and lifted his face toward the heavens. The look of peace and contentment he bore was a sight many of them would remember for the rest of their lives.
“I feel like … I can face every eighth, ninth, eighteenth, and nineteenth day of every new moon … and everything will be alright.”