The Blinding Knife
Page 45

But most of the Blackguard trainees were monochromes, and the odds of drawing their color on the wheel weren’t good, so most of the fights were purely hand-to-hand or weapon-to-weapon. Or sometimes the wheel would give them their color, but weakly, so instead of trying to draft a color slowly, they’d go for a straight fight. Not many of the children were able to fight effectively while also slowly drawing in enough light to be able to use it after two or three minutes of fighting. Most of the fights didn’t last that long.
The fighters got a lot better quickly, though.
The last fighters in danger began their fight. A muscular boy got unlucky and fought a blue-drafting girl in blue light. She used bars of blue luxin to choke him out before he could cross the distance to her.
When he got up, furious, instead of going toward her, he marched over to Kip and shook his finger in his face. “You! You’re worse than me! You should be going home, you lardass. Not me.”
“You’re right,” Kip said quietly.
“You’re damn right I’m right! Why are you even here? Because your mother’s some whore who spread her legs for Gavin Guile? You’re a bastard. I’m the son of the dey of Aghbalu! This is bullshit!”
Kip knew what he should do. He should punch the boy. Destroy him somehow with a ferocity that let everyone know, once again, that Kip was not to be crossed. He’d already done it with the bully Elio. Apparently once wasn’t enough. One story, people could disbelieve.
But Kip didn’t want to be the boy who was the crazy, erratic bastard. The one whom people tiptoed around because he might hurt someone with little or no provocation. He looked inside himself for that fury he knew was there for the boy insulting his mother, but today it was just an ache. He had no violence in him now.
“Is this what I am to be?” Kip asked. Some part of him wanted to weep.
“What?” the boy snarled. “I wasn’t done with you.”
“You’re nothing,” Kip said sadly. “And I’m less. I’m the violent madman.”
The other Blackguard trainees were gathered, of course, eager to see what would happen. The trainer, Kip thought, was notably slow to come break it up. Perhaps pecking orders were best established early in the Blackguard.
Kip stood up. He needed a spark of fury, but he had nothing. It was too hard to think of coldly sucker-punching another boy. Especially one who was rightly angry at him.
“Wait, wait, wait,” Kip said. “What’s your name?” I won’t fail my father.
“Tizrik, and you’d better remember it, you—” The boy’s eyes were suspicious.
“Tizrik Tamar, of Aghbalu? Tizrik!” Kip spread his arms out to hug the boy like he was long-lost family. “Tizrik! My uncle said—”
“No, it’s not Tamar—I’m—”
Kip embraced the boy, who tried to push his hands away, irritated. But then Kip seized both of the boy’s sleeves and yanked fiercely, throwing his forehead into the taller boy’s face. With his own hands off to the sides, trying to stop Kip from hugging him, Tizrik didn’t have a chance.
Face met forehead. Stuff crunched. Blood showered over Kip’s head.
The boy collapsed, mostly onto Kip. Kip pushed him off. The boy fell to the ground, his nose streaming blood even as he lay whimpering. His nose was crooked, clearly broken, his lips mashed. He more mouthed out than spit out blood, and a tooth came with the torrent.
Kip felt like he was watching himself from afar as he stepped over the boy and put a foot on his neck, holding him prone.
Murmurs and gasps raced through the crowd. Trainer Fisk pushed through them. He looked at the bleeding young man, then at Kip. “Chirurgeons! You, too, Kip.”
Kip was stunned that he didn’t appear to be in trouble, and apparently the others were, too. “But… but I haven’t fought yet today.”
“You’ve fought enough,” the trainer said, pulling Kip back away from Tizrik.
“He cheated!” Tizrik said, holding his nose.
Trainer Fisk said, “Blackguards don’t cheat. Blackguards win.”
Their questioning looks obviously irritated Trainer Fisk. “This is real life,” the trainer said. “Our coin is violence. Sudden, sharp, breathtaking, leaving no hope of revenge. That is what we do, when we must. Kip understands and some of the rest of you obviously don’t. That’s fine. We’ve got time to cut the rest of you deadwood out.”
Teeth bared, Trainer Fisk stared around at the young people. No one dared meet his eyes, not even Kip, who for some reason felt embarrassed, though he couldn’t have explained why.
“Next up!” Trainer Fisk shouted.
Kip was checked out by the chirurgeons, and as he’d known, nothing was wrong with him. But by being caught up with them, his space was passed. He lost two places as others above him lost challenges, but he realized that by not having to fight this week, his chances of staying in the Blackguard had pretty much been doubled. He had a chance.
But he was going to have to win some fights.
Chapter 36
Teia walked into the ring, praying. She was lean, with quick reflexes. Slippery. What she wasn’t was strong, not compared to the boys in the Blackguard. Luckily, the training favored cutting and slashing weapons. The Blackguard didn’t have any bias against crushing weapons—war hammers, bludgeons, maces—indeed, those were often the best against heavy armor. But those weapons weren’t safe to train with.
They could blunt the edges of a mace, but if one of the monsters like Leo—with the shoulders of a draft horse and arms of banded iron—hit you with a mace, it wouldn’t matter if you had pillows wrapped around it. Bones would break. So they didn’t train with them.
She supposed that the muscular boys thought that wasn’t fair. On the other hand, at least their colors might come up on the wheel.
And what would I do if my color did come up on the wheel? Stab it through someone’s neck and kill them?
The thought turned her stomach, sent shivers of dread down the back of her neck. She saw the look on that woman’s face again, dropping the melon, looking startled, not understanding that she was about to die horribly.
How had that happened?
Her opponent was Graystone Keftar. He was very dark-skinned, cute grin, green drafter. Nice boy. He’d flirted with her a few times. Already going bald, though. Tragic. He was short and athletic, a son of a rich family that had paid for him to be trained before he came to the Chromeria.
Graystone winked at her and spun his wheel. She grimaced and spun hers. Next time he flirted, she’d give him nothing. You only wink at someone you’re about to fight if you don’t take them seriously.
What’d the boys think? That she was training to be cute?
The wheels came up green or red. From Graystone’s self-satisfied expression, she knew it was green—dammit!—and rapiers.
She and Graystone took their weapons. He fumbled with his a bit, but she knew he was playing around. The Blackguards threw their trainees full into the water. If you didn’t realize that these fights were all about watching everyone else and figuring out who was good at what, you were wasting your time. The monthly fights were as much about scouting threats as they were about maintaining your position. Graystone was a competent hand with the rapier. Not good. He was much more familiar with an ataghan or other, heavier blades, and treated the rapier like those all too often. But he knew his basic blocks and stances.