Chapter 25.5 The Challenge
Hamish comes hurrying over to her side then, and he commences setting up a makeshift triage area for his two surprise patients.
I leave him to it, focusing once more on the figures in the ring.
Marton stands by my side, close enough that I feel the heat of him all along my side.
Out on the floor of the arena, Araine is alone as she faces Besana, Inobar, and Edythe.
The others have petered off to take seats around the first few layers of the ring.
Something about the sight of Araine alone out there with the three of them begins to niggle at me uncomfortably.
She should not be alone.
"Stay here," I say to Marton.
"Tarah." He catches my arm as I go to step forward, but I shake my head at him.
I can see that it is on the tip of his tongue to start spinning reasons why he should go with me.
"Not this time. This is not for humans now.
"
"Be careful," is all he says, letting go of me.
He doesn't look happy.
I try to smile.
"Aren't I always careful?"
For some reason, that doesn't seem to reassure him.
Out on the arena floor, Araine glances over at me in surprise as I step up next to her.
Inobar bares his teeth and Edythe hisses, but Besana only smiles.
"Young Tarah, how nice of you to—"
I ignore her, turning to Araine.
"Are we going to get this started soon? Raku and Vakhrin could use a more comfortable place to heal.
"
Araine nods, amusement in her eyes.
Her next words are directed at me, though the others can plainly hear them.
"Just as soon as Besana can stop thinking of ways to stall.
"
Besana's minions hiss and spit like cats, and I see that Besana's eyes have a cold and killing light in them. But—
"She does look a little frightened," I say conversationally to Araine.
"How dare you—" Edythe begins.
Besana silences her with a hand. "Let the children make their childish taunts, Edythe. They cannot help it."
"Ooh," Araine whispers to me. "Do you think the old bat can hear us talking? I thought surely her old ears—"
Besana's entire body quakes with tremors, blue scale patterns moving under her skin. A sure sign that, despite her stony expression, Araine and I have gotten to her.
I laugh quietly, both nervous and amused at this game we're playing.
Inobar's eyes are hot murder on me. "Let the challenge begin," he says smoothly.
"The sooner all of these vermin are dead, the sooner the Trove will be set right again.
" He turns on a heal, and he and Edythe make parting bows to their lady before leaving her alone in the ring.
I am more reluctant to leave Araine's side. As soon as I do, the challenge really will begin. And then I might not see her alive again.
I have been certain all this time that I did not want a sister. That Araine wasn't mine anyway.
Now the thought that I might lose her before I have even known her fills me with dread.
And more than that . . . she has a son. She has Hamish.
And Raku and Jeksu and all the dragons and wyverns of the Trove who depend on her.
The entire future she has envisioned for our kind here, which depends on her as well.
Araine is important in a way that I have never been.
Important to so many people, in so many ways.
She cannot die.
"It's alright," Araine says quietly, seeing my distress. "A leader whose legacy ends with their death was no true leader at all."
"You are not allowed to die," I tell her.
Araine croaks a laugh. "Oh, very well then. I guess I had better not."
"You know what I mean," I say weakly. "You—" My hands rise and fall listlessly in the space between us. I am no good at emotions, not with anyone but Cherry. I do not know how to be a normal kind of friend, as I once told Marton.
Araine seems to have no trouble with it.
She grabs one of my hands, squeezing briefly.
"We will speak again when this is over. And if we do not, know that I have misjudged you.
I thought you selfish and reckless and bratty, at first. But you are kind, and you are brave, and you care greatly for the people in your charge. I would like to know you better."
"I—" My throat closes up, and it is painful to speak around. "I feel the same. About you. I wasn't—I was wrong, too, and unfair—"
"It's alright," Araine says again. "Be well, Tarah." She releases me, and her eyes tell me it is time for me to go.
"Be well," I repeat, in a hoarse voice.
And as I turn and walk away, I really think the word for the first time, about her: sister. It feels like a question that doesn't have an answer yet, but I hope it will.
Two steps from Marton, who watches me closely, I glance up at the stands, and I am surprised to see they have filled with spectators.
Not as many as there were when Vakhrin was fighting earlier, and the ones here do not cheer and shout in a rowdy display at they did then.
But nearly a hundred wyverns and dragons have filled the arena while I was distracted by Araine, and they look on with somber, expectant expressions, their eyes directed to the spot where Araine and Besana now face one another.
I pull Marton by the arm as I reach him, climbing up several levels of seating to get a good view of the proceedings. Jeksu leaves his brother's side to join us.
"What will happen now?" I ask him. Right now, Araine and Besana just stare at one another.
"Now the challenge formalities." As he speaks, Araine lowers her head and shoulders in a shallow bow, and after a beat, Besana answers it with one of her own. Straightening up, they both turn their backs and pace off ten steps in opposite directions.
They do not take their clothes off, as I am half expecting, but swivel around to face one another.
In a flash, they shift, ripping through their clothing.
Araine blossoms into her terrific, deep green dragon from, and Besana into her sapphire colored wyvern form, crouching on her clawed wings and hind legs.
They both raise their heads to roar, a bellowing commotion that vibrates the stands, and on Araine's roar, a gout of flame bursts from her, shooting into the dark night air.
As one, the people in the stands begin to stomp their feet, a slow beat that starts out steady as a heart and gradually increases in tempo. As it goes on, Besana and Araine begin to circle one another, clawed feet scraping over the rough stone of the arena floor, their gazes locked.
The stomping of the spectators continues and grows until it is a mad, thrumming rumble, like an endless roll of thunder. Someone in the stands yells, a shout barely heard over the noise of the stomping, "To the victor!"
The cry is picked up and echoed a hundred times, in a hundred dissonant voices, "To the victor!" "To the victor!" "To the victor!"
Everyone who shouts immediately stops stomping, until there is no noise left in the stands.
When silence reigns, it seems to be a signal all its own. Besana lunges at Araine in a burst of unseeable speed, and their scales bang and scrape together as they clash.
I suck in a breath, heart pounding out a sickening beat in my chest.
But Araine is fine. With four unencumbered legs and a larger body mass than Besana, she holds her own much better than I did against the wyvern.
And their battle is almost too horrifically beautiful to watch.
Their deadly bodies—wreathed in scales and claws, teeth and spines, muscles bunching and unspooling with lithe grace—whirl together across the arena.
Lunging and evading. Pivoting and snapping.
This is what a real battle looks like, I realize. So much quicker and smarter and better than I ever fought.
"What does it mean?" I hear Marton asking Jeksu in a hushed voice. "To the victor?"
"To the victor," Jeksu whispers, eyes on the battle below, "go the spoils. It is part of the old tradition. It means the winner wins all, and the loser gets nothing. Maybe not even their life."
"Who do they root for?" Marton asks, craning his head to look at the Dragomira in the stands. "Araine or Besana?"
"Many of them have not chosen a side yet.
That has been the problem with the Trove for generations.
We are full of...small factions. With all different goals.
It is why we cannot get anything done. But Araine.
She has been trying to do what her mother and her mother's father never could.
To unite the Trove under a single cause. "
"What cause is that?"
Jeksu shakes his head. "The only cause there is. The good of all."
"But what does that...mean?"
"It means instead of fighting over what we can gain for ourselves, we think about what we can give. It means instead of holding on to old hurts and grudges, we think about what the future might look like. It means—"
Distracted as I have been by this talk, my attention is suddenly redirected below by a great oohh from the crowd.
Down in the pit, Besana has Araine pinned to the stone, on her stomach.
As I watch, Besana lowers her head, teeth snapping an inch above the membrane of Araine's wings, like she will tear it out.
Araine gives a bellow, and it comes out all flame. We lose sight of their struggle for a moment, nothing visible expect the bright orange glow of the fire swirling above the stones, rippling all around.
The flame dissolves, and Araine is tearing away, beating her wings to propel herself halfway across the arena before Besana has even turned, roaring her dismay.
Araine throws her head back for a throaty roar, which I read unmistakably as a taunt.
Besana launches into the air, and then the battle is airborne for several minutes, a new battleground for their impossibly quick and graceful maneuvers. I begin to wonder how the challenge will ever end, they are both so skilled and so fast.
But Besana grabs onto Araine's throat with her taloned wings, digging into the scales of Araine's stomach with her hind legs.
Araine bellows, trying to shake her off, trying to keep them both aloft with the power of her wings.
But Besana is too heavy and too strong, and they both go spiraling towards the ground.
Besana releases Araine's throat, opening her wings at the last moment to steer their fall. They are flipped around, and Besana lands atop Araine, Araine coming down hard against the stone, wings pinned beneath her. She barks in pain, and vicious glee shows in Besana's blue eyes.
But Araine is growling in the next moment, throwing her weight around so that Besana crashes to the ground, skidding away from Araine on talons and claws. Screeeee, goes the noise of her claws against the stone, and all the Dragomira in the arena wince.
Everyone winces, except Marton beside me and Cherry down below.
Araine is on Besana in a flash, jaws locked around her throat.
The same way that Inobar held me that day in the Werewood.
I see now how I should have handled it. Besana raises one winged arm, hooking around Araine's head, talons aimed at eyes.
Araine pulls back, ripping viciously, and several small projectiles go clattering across the stones.
I don't realize what they are until one slides all the way over to the edge of the ring below us, and I see that it is ovular, shiny, and sapphire blue. Those a scales. From Besana's throat.
The amount of force it must have taken to dislodge them confounds me.
Besana screams in outrage and pain, pawing at her neck, and I watch in wonder as Araine advances on her once more. But Araine is too confident, almost prancing with her wings high in the air, as she approaches the wyvern.
And Besana is faking. The moment Araine draws near to her, Besana lunges, jaws first. She leaps clear of Araine's face and neck, aiming above her back.
Besana's neck is fully extended, and Araine tries to go for it, but Besana finds her mark first. Her jaws come down with crushing force on the membrane of Araine's wing, and she rips.
Araine's cry of pain is the worst thing I have ever heard. Dark, blackish green blood blossoms from her wing as she stumbles, and the entire crowd makes a pained sort of sound, full of sympathy and horror.
I'm so distracted that when Jeksu suddenly tumbles forward on the steps in front of me, I don't immediately realize why. I mistake it for some horrified reaction to Araine's plight.
Then Marton cries out in pain.
And I look over.
And Inobar stands there, on the other side of Marton, his hand half shifted into wyvern form, glittering with long talons. Talons dripping red with blood. Human blood.
Marton crumples to the ground at my feet, one step below where Inobar stands, and everything in my head explodes.
There is nothing left. Nothing left in my mind. Nothing but the sound of Marton's cry and Inobar's talons dripping with Marton's blood. The smell of it on the air. Inobar's one eye glitters blackly at me, a twisted smile on his face.
But I don't care. Because he's already dead.
I've half shifted into dragon form without thinking about it, my hands claws, my body bursting partially from my clothes, hunched into something horrid and strange and hungry for blood.
"The boy should not have dared to come here," Inobar says. "To pretend to be one of u—uhh—ughh—uckhh"
He cannot speak, because my talons are in his throat.
Under my fingers, I can feel the fragile cartilage of his windpipe, the wiggling mass of his tongue.
I squeeze my hand into a fist around it, claws digging in.
Then I give a hard yank, and all the veins and the arteries, the muscles and tubes, everything that was inside of his throat is outside of it, held in my fist.
I look at the disgusting, bluish mass dispassionately. I open my hand to drop it, and Inobar's body falls backwards, his legs trying and failing to catch him.
There is a hole in his throat, and now both his eyes are glazed, staring up at nothing. His heart beats a few frantic last beats, pushing the blood up out of the wound in his neck. And then it gives up.
There is a commotion around me, people swirling in frantic chaos as they realize what has happened.
I can't quite hear what is going on, who is talking to me.
Someone grabs me by the shoulders, and it takes me a moment to realize it is Cherry, her pale, heart-shaped face staring into mine. She is saying something.
I try to pay attention.
"—fine, Tarah. Marton is fine. Inobar only grazed him."
The words echo meaningless in my head for a second, and then they begin to mean everything.
Marton is fine. Marton is alright. Marton is alive.
Inobar only grazed him.
I turn my head, and there Marton is, on the stands three or four wide steps below. Jeksu is holding him up, and Marton has one hand pressed to his left side as bright red blood rushes out. But his eyes are clear, and he is looking right at me. Mouth parted in shock.
Because I just killed a man right in front of him.
Just like I did for Cherry so many times. I didn't even think about it.
Someone tried to hurt one of the precious things of the world, and he had to die.
But Marton has never seen me like that before. He didn't know. He only heard about it. I do not know how to be a normal kind of friend, I told him. I have killed so many people, I told him.
You're not a monster, he said.
I think dragons are magnificent.
Dragons aren't bad, I said. Because I forgot, too. What it was like to be bad.
I forgot what it was like to be covered in blood. To know what I am capable of.
As my hand shifts back into human form, it is still covered in dark blue blood, the smell of it pungent on the air, metallic and ancient and wild. I wipe it on the tatters of my tunic reflexively, but I know the stain will not wash out.
A sudden shouting and roaring from the crowd draws my attention, belatedly, back to the battle. I look out on the arena, intentionally avoiding Marton's gaze. My eyes go to the two forms in the middle of the ring.
The blue wyvern is lying prone on the ground, and the green dragon has her head lowered over the wyvern's neck. As the dragon raises her head, I see something held in her jaws. Something bright blue and dripping.
The dragon flings the thing away from her, roaring and spitting fire, her maw wet with blue blood. The thing skitters and rolls across the stone with wet, smacking sounds, and I see that it is the wyvern's head.
Sister, I think at the dragon.