“Sorry,” I muttered, realizing my arms had tightened with tension, squeezing like a vice.
I’ll admit, he did climb well. He moved upward at a brisk pace, but nice and fluid, finding hand and foot holds easily. The moment he pulled us over the top lip, I scrambled off his back and flattened myself against the pillar’s top. It was hot from baking under the sun, but I hugged it nonetheless, feeling queasy.
“You are afraid of heights,” Fitallion remarked. “The rest of the format will be delighted. Finally, something that unsettles the unflappable Frost.”
“How was I supposed to know? The rest of Little Red is flat.”
“Sit still,” Fitallion replied, having the nerve to smile. He was finding the whole situation altogether too amusing. “I will come back up for you when it is time.”
“You’re not leaving me here! What if someone starts climbing up for the victory flag?”
“Then threaten to push him down. Though I suspect no one else will try. As you said, this planet is flat, so most will not have any climbing experience.”
I would have tried to physically prevent him from going, but that would have required moving. So in dismay, I watched him slip over the ledge and out of sight, leaving me alone. I don’t know how long I stayed there, but eventually I couldn’t stand not knowing. My heart still hammered in my chest, but after a few minutes, or hours (I really couldn’t say) I began to inch my way over, wanting to look down at my mates and see how they fared. That first glimpse of nothing, the space between me and the ground, the long drop down, it was too much. I jerked away from the ledge, bile rising up my throat. I cursed the war games then, and the military in general.
It was some time before I worked up the courage to look again. This time I didn’t focus on the ground. I focused on my mates. Watching them was a blessed distraction, and I felt my breathing even out as I settled in. Pumphrey had gotten himself a rifle-like gun and was positioned high up where he could easily pick off soldiers. Dutton catered to his wrestling abilities by wedging himself into a cleft in the rock where he took soldiers unaware, dragging them to ground. I could tell Roth and Lee wanted to make up for lost time, because they were all too eager for a fight. Stew was much the same, though I enjoyed watching him win his first flag. Truthfully, I enjoyed watching all of them. My mates were skilled, each in their own way, but they had something more. It showed in the way they carried themselves, with confidence, self-assured and unafraid. I’m not sure how, but I knew that sense of security was something Winslow had instilled in them over the months, and it set them apart from the rest of camp. But they weren’t invincible, something I found out all too soon.
Edwards’ waist was a flurry of white, but he’d overextended himself, and it showed, even from my perch up high. He leaned against the nearest surface, head bowed, vest soaked in sweat.
I tried to warn him, to get his attention, but he looked half-asleep, even when the soldier stumbled upon his resting place. Edwards straightened, but it was slow and stiff. The soldier sensed it and pressed his advantage. I waved madly, hoping to get anyone’s attention. It was Winslow who noticed, and when I pointed, he responded immediately. But by the time he got there, Edwards was pressed facedown in the dirt, panting madly as he tried to buck the soldier off his back. It didn’t work, and Edwards was the second mate on my format to surrender. I took comfort in watching Winslow chase the soldier down when he tried to run and collect a surrender flag of his own—it was undoubtedly for Edwards.
Swan was the third of my mates to surrender. Apparently it wasn’t just paint guns hidden among the rocks, because one of Gridleigh’s mates broke Swan’s nose and fingers with a wooden staff. They’d worked with blunt objects in weapons and combat training before my arrival, but usually both combatants shared the same weapon. Swan didn’t stand a chance, and as I watched him take blow after blow, I couldn’t help but wonder why he was waiting so long to give up.
I sat upright after that, pausing to let the rushing noise behind my ears ebb before scooting toward the edge. Having watched Swan drip blood as he was escorted away, I was angry with my passive role. I wanted to help, and I was ashamed to have waited so long.
The next time a soldier approached my mates, I whistled, pointing toward the threat. I kept watch in this way for a while, and it worked well, almost too well, because soldiers started to steer clear of our area.
* * *
Pop. Pop. A gush of red splashed over the stone just beneath my fingers where I gripped the ledge. Something whizzed by my head.
“Frost, get down!” Winslow bellowed.
I dropped flat, rolling away from the pillar’s edge. The noise continued, paint pellets raining down around me.
Then another shot rang out, louder, different. “Got ‘em!” Pumphrey called.
“Frost?” Winslow yelled up, unable to see me. “Did you get hit?”
I sat up, checking myself over. “No, I’m fine.”
I glanced down at him to make sure he’d heard me, but my eyes were snagged by a smudge of color moving through the formations. It was odd. The war games were winding down and the arena seemed quiet and empty. But there was no mistaking the format that jogged towards us, seven I counted. They must have grown tired and hungry (I could certainly relate) and decided to speed up the inevitable by challenging us outright.
Winslow had been watching me. He showed no surprise when I held up seven fingers and gestured off into the distance. He ran a circuit, collecting my mates to rush forward and head off the threat.
They left. All of them. They must have felt as though the flag was safe with me, but they couldn’t have been more wrong. The moment they were out of sight a voice hailed me from below. “They left you all alone.” I’d been so distracted, I hadn’t even noticed him slink up from the other side of the pillar.
I tipped my head over the edge, glaring down at the soldier as he circled the formation’s base, letting his hand trail over the ridged surface. I recognized him; he was one of Gridleigh’s mates. “Has your first surrendered?” I couldn’t help but ask.
He smiled up at me, but it wasn’t friendly. “No. Would you like to surrender?” he countered.
“No.”
He stopped circling, his hands reaching for the pillar. Grasping the wall, he pulled himself upright, finding a place to rest the tip of each boot.
I called to him, threatening, “I’ll push you down!”
He hauled himself up higher. “Not if I push you first.”
I jerked back from the edge, my mind reeling. He’d called my bluff! He was coming. I could hear him scuffing down below. What was I supposed to do? Wait for him to push me off? Even if he didn’t, I would still be forced to surrender the moment he was up here. There wasn’t a soldier at camp I could fight and win, certainly not one of Gridleigh’s mates. The fight or flight response exploded through me, overwhelming any bit of logic I might have cobbled together at that point. It was without any sort of plan, without even sparing Gridleigh’s mate another glance, that I laid flat on my stomach and swung my legs over the drop-off, gently shimmying until my feet caught.
My fear was all consuming as I climbed down, the feeling of emptiness that cupped my back indescribable. I wanted to dig my fingers into the rock, stay crushed against its surface forever. But I forced myself to move, step by step, eyes trained no lower than my feet. I knew I mustn’t look down.
It wasn’t until I was only yards from reaching the bottom that I relaxed enough to take in my surroundings, noticing the soldier’s absence. I’d had enough sense to climb down the opposite side I had seen him coming up, and it was my hope that we’d unwittingly passed one another. Perhaps he just climbed over to top and found it empty, I mused.
Something firm closed over my ankle and the next moment I was being pulled down. I kicked out wildly, trying to free my leg as I scrambled to hold on to the pillar’s
surface. The soldier didn’t let go, his bruising grip only got tighter as he tried to wrench me down.
“How about now?” he taunted. “Ready to surrender?” He hadn’t climbed the pillar. He’d been bluffing!
It occurred to me that my format teetered on the wall with me, the victory flag strapped to my waist. If I fell, they would fall too. “Help!” I screamed. “Help! Winslow, help me!”
The soldier growled in frustration and lunged, one hand closing over my thigh as the other gripped my belt, dragging me down until I fell. He landed on his back, and if that didn’t knock the wind out of him, then breaking my fall surely did. I hit heavily, my back and shoulders slapping against his chest. He groaned as I rolled off him, struggling to stand upright.
My mates were nowhere to be seen, but I would run and meet them. Only he’d recovered too quickly, reaching for me in an instant. I reacted just as fast, bringing my leg up between his thighs. He grabbed my knee before it touched his groin, his face twisted in anger and ugly.
“Surrender,” he threatened, his fingers gouging prints into my flesh as he held my knee captive.
I pressed me knee forward, acting as though I meant to try again. The moment he shifted his weight to block, I brought the edge of my palm down, striking the base of his neck with as much force as I could muster. He was supposed to crumple—that was what Lee had said would happen. I must’ve been slightly off, because he only lurched forward, practically collapsing on top of me. Catching his shoulders, I held him upright, refusing to let him fall. Then I brought my knee up, and this time he didn’t block.
Winslow chose that moment to be the hero, running up the incline, a concerned expression etched across his face. I think when he saw me standing over the writhing soldier he realized what I already knew: the hero had arrived a bit too late.
“What ha—” he stopped. “Nevermind, it doesn’t matter. Just make him surrender so we can move on.”
I knelt next to Gridleigh’s mate. “Do you surrender?”
He cursed at me, a word so foul I blanched, turning to Winslow for support. His face had blackened, but he didn’t offer up any advice, allowing me to handle things in my own way.
I glanced down to where he was cupping himself and roughly tapped him there with the back of my hand. He seemed to get the point because he ripped off his flag and flung it at me.
Holding the flag helped the truth to settle—I had bested someone. I had actually bested someone! My fingers shook (but in a good way) as I clipped it onto my belt, proof of my accomplishment. I then transferred the red victory flag from my belt to Winslow’s, taking my time about it, enjoying his nearness.
An instructor had already been and gone, taking Gridleigh’s mate out on a stretcher. They must have been watching. I was embarrassed to imagine the instructors seeing the fight as it had played out. But now it was just the two of us under the pillar, taking a moment before we moved forward. Before we ended the war games once and for all.
Chapter 34
I rambled through the arena at a steady pace, making sure to stay out in the open. I felt eyes on me, the instructors in the towers, the spectators, all watching. They were probably wondering why Winslow had sent me on ahead, why he had separated his format in the final hour. For them it was a show as the numbers whittled down. Stew had been keeping track of the announcements, and there were only a few formats left. Gridleigh’s was one of them.
Ahead I noticed a mushroom-shaped formation. The column was overshadowed by an umbrella of rock that could shade me for a time. The day had been exhausting, both physically and emotionally, and it wasn’t over yet. I sunk against the adobe base, grateful for a reprieve from the heat. It was getting late, but the sun was stubborn, burning hot even as it fell toward the horizon. I put a hand over my stomach, trying to calm the churning hunger. They’d promised us a feast tonight. I just hoped my mates would feel like celebrating when all was said and done.
My eyes were closed. I might have even drifted off for a moment, but his voice pulled me from the edge of sleep. Expected, yet unnerving.
“You look tired,” he remarked with smug satisfaction. First Gridleigh stood not more than a pace away, a red flag dangling at his hip.
“I surrender,” I blurted.
He stepped closer. “I haven’t even touched you yet.”
Pushing myself upright, hands shaking, I hurried to unclip my flag. “Yes, that’s the point,” I answered.
The shove he gave me was so hard I didn’t have time to disentangle my hands from my waist, didn’t have time to protect myself. A bolt of pain flashed from my temple as it cracked against the rock, my shoulder next, but nothing after that because I collapsed. I felt a trickle of warmth slip down the side of my face. It bled into the white rag. Crumpled like me, it had slipped to the ground just after Gridleigh’s assault.
His face was a blend of emotion when I looked up. Anger and regret. Hate and shame. I wanted him to be a villain, wanted to hate him without remorse. But watching the emotions flit over his features, a contradictory mix, I knew things weren’t that easy. He swallowed once, his throat dipping up and down. It was the last sign of uneasiness on his part before his face went blank. It was the perfect imitation of Winslow, only it scared me. I had wanted him to be the villain. Perhaps he figured he might as well play the part.
“I saw an instructor not far from here,” I lied.
He knelt down beside me, watching with interest as I shuffled back. He reached out slowly, curling my messy braid into his hand. The ropey muscles under his skin twitched and danced as he pulled me closer. “I don’t believe you,” he whispered. “They can’t see us. We’re alone.”
I picked up my flag and threw it at him. “Take it, I surrender.”
He slapped my hand, the sting ringing up my arm. “I don’t want your flag.”
“What do you want?” I asked, though it sounded more like a plea.
His free hand curled around the back of my neck, possessive and frightening as he touched strands of my loose hair. “I want to be your first choice,” he admitted. The intensity on his face was unexpected; everything he was doing was unexpected. This was never part of the plan.
I lashed out, hating the intimate way he rubbed my skin. I couldn’t stand to be touched by him a second longer. My arm was ineffectual, blocking my fist easily done. But it was my words that struck. “You don’t want to be my first choice,” I contradicted. “You want to be Samona’s first choice! And Bardzecki’s! You won’t rest until they love you best and even then you won’t be happy,” I spit.
I saw his fist clench just before he opened it to backhand me. I couldn’t even jerk away because he’d gripped my braid, holding me in place. My vision blurred around the edges, graying in and out. I should have kept my mouth shut, and I definitely shouldn’t have mentioned Samona. I’d just ripped open a black hole in Gridleigh, and already I regretted it.
He hauled me upright, fisting my vest as he abandoned my hair. I watched his fingers curl, his arm cock back, knowing what would come next.
“That’s enough,” Winslow said, cracking the moment in half.
Gridleigh’s face jerked around, though his fingers loosened not at all. “You can’t interfere or you’ll be disqualified,” he all but hissed.
“Interfere—no, intervene more like. She surrendered the moment she saw you,” Winslow answered in a soft but deadly voice. His eyes pointedly strayed to where my flag lay in the dirt, then shifted to my bloodied face. “It’s you who should be disqualified. How dare you!” His veneer was cracking, the core of him a burning anger. He paused, the gravity of his next statement underscored by the heavy separation of seconds. “Your father would be ashamed.”
Winslow had known that Gridleigh would keep his format’s victory flag, just as he’d known that Gridleigh would use the games as an excuse to seek me out. He’d even known just how to distrac
t his cousin, how to get him to release me. It all clicked into place as Gridleigh’s hands fell away, his body tuning up to charge, incensed and out for blood. He rushed forward, unthinking in his anger. Winslow bent at the last moment, catching Gridleigh in the chest with his shoulder, lifting him up off the ground.
He spared a brief glance in my direction as he struggled to hold Gridleigh, but his message was clear. I took off like a shot, scrambling out from under the overhang as I tried to untangle my surrender flag.
I didn’t hesitate to leave the two of them behind. Gridleigh’s hatred had never been about me, it wasn’t really about Winslow either. But he would never rest until they had settled things once and for all. If it happened to be on a grander scale, playing out in the war games, then so be it. Let the best man win. I didn’t hesitate because I already knew who that would be. So I left, running from the arena with my white flag held high.
* * *
Chaos reigned outside of the arena. Instructors were threading through the clumped soldiers yelling, “Return to your starting positions!” No one listened, not even me, but then, I had no idea where my starting position was. So I drifted through the crowd and for once nobody seemed to notice me. They were all too busy talking over each other. I caught snippets of conversation as I passed, but they were all saying the same thing, sharing the day’s exploits to anyone who would listen.
Someone tapped my shoulder. Snapping around warily, I saw that it was only one of Jackson’s farmer friends. What was his name? Maybe Bucher... Butler?
“Are you alone?” His face was openly concerned.
“Yeah, do you know where my mates are?”
“No, but I’ll help you find them,” he offered. I was instantly relieved. I hadn’t realized until that moment that I was uneasy, not used to facing the crowd alone. At some point I’d grown used to my mates shadowing me, especially Roth with his intimidating mass and faithful friendship.
“Thank you,” I told him sincerely.
Together we lapped half the gaming site before stumbling upon Swan. His face was swollen and bruised, both eyes runny and closed up. His nose had been bandaged, the tape holding it in place as it spanned both cheeks. In addition, he had three fingers splinted on his left hand. He looked awful, but I was glad to see him. I rushed through the hastily erected cots and wounded soldiers, hurrying to reach him.