The flat ground gave way to a small rise with a stand of trees near the top. Berin made for them, pushing his way through the foliage and trying to watch where he put his feet so that he wouldn’t make too much noise. As he reached the far side of the trees, he paused, freezing in place as he looked down.
There, spread out below, was the army camp. From up here, it was easy for Berin to see the grid pattern of the tents, the empty spaces left by the training areas and the clusters of wagons around the supply centers. He could see the fortifications around the edges too. There were rough ditches lined with spikes and built up with earth banks, watch platforms, and posts where dogs sat chained, there to sniff out intruders. Berin found himself wondering if they were there to keep would-be attackers out, or to keep conscripts in their place.
Sartes.
His son was down there somewhere, lost in that tent city, impossible to spot when everyone in it was dressed the same way. Sartes would be down among the conscripts, mistreated casually, because that was what the army did. Berin had to find him. He would find him, both because he wanted his family back, and because he’d promised Ceres. He would bring his son out of there.
He took the first step, knowing he would risk his life, knowing his chances of success were slim—and knowing he had no other choice.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Stephania moved quietly through the castle in the early morning. She doubted any of the other nobles who had been at the party last night would be awake yet. Lucious would certainly still be snoring. Normally, even Stephania would not have woken so early. This was an hour for servants and their chores, not for those who commanded them.
Under other circumstances she would probably have had her maid beaten for waking her. Only the contents of the message she had received had her padding through the corridors now in jeweled slippers.
In a way, it was probably a good thing that no one else was awake right now. Stephania wanted to do this without too many prying eyes.
She met the woman who had come in a small receiving room, barely large enough to accommodate the couch on which she sat. Stephania couldn’t see her resemblance to Ceres, but even so, her servants had assured her that this was Ceres’s mother. To Stephania, she looked like any other peasant woman, her dress stained, aging and lined, made hardened and coarse by her life. At least the woman had the grace to rise and drop into a curtsy as Stephania entered. Stephania doubted that her daughter ever would, even at sword point.
“You are the woman who came to the gate, claiming to be Ceres’s mother?” Stephania asked.
“Yes, my lady,” she said. “Marita, my lady.”
She understood proper deference, at least. Stephania wasn’t sure that she could ever like someone related to Ceres, but it made this easier. Stephania gestured for her to sit, joining her on the couch without ever quite sitting close enough that she had to touch her.
“Are you here because you wish to see your daughter?” Stephania asked, watching the woman carefully. It wasn’t what the note had said, but Stephania was used to people lying. If a life at court had taught her one thing, it was that everybody lied. They lied for advantage, or to say what they thought people wanted to hear, or occasionally just because they wanted to cause trouble. Stephania had learned early to watch people carefully, to work out their real motives, and never to trust anyone.
Marita shook her head sharply though, and there was something about the sense of anger there that made Stephania want to believe the denial.
“I have no wish to see that… that creature,” Marita said. “Not when she has cost me so much.”
That was interesting, and not at all what Stephania had expected, in spite of the message. Stephania had expected greed perhaps, venality, but this level of hatred was… well, it was almost in line with her own.
“What did she do to you?” Stephania asked. It wasn’t that there was the feeling of a kindred soul here, obviously. This woman could never be anything like a noble such as her. Even so, she had the same sense of Ceres having done something to harm them both. With her, it had been the disruption of her plans to marry Thanos. What had it been for this woman? Stephania wondered.
“She cost me everything,” Marita said. “She cost me money that should have been mine. Money I got for her fairly! Then, when my husband found out, I was left with nothing!”
Briefly, Marita started to sob. Stephania sat and watched her for a second or two, gauging her there. Then she reached out to comfort the commoner, doing what she felt was a good job of hiding her distaste. Stephania was good at hiding what she felt, and who she was.
“That must have been hard,” she said. She tried to keep her tone even. “When you say you got money for her, you mean you sold her to a slaver?”
“I had to get something for all the trouble she caused over the years,” Marita insisted. Stephania could hear the defensiveness there. “My husband abandoned me, and she has always been difficult.”
She paused as though expecting some sharp rebuke. Instead, Stephania patted her hand.
“I understand how difficult it must have been for you.”
“It was!” Marita sounded almost shocked. “No one has realized that. My husband was so cruel. He shook me, and then he abandoned me! He just wanted to know where Ceres was, and our son Sartes.”
Stephania already knew where they both were. They were exactly where they needed to be. Ceres would be dying in the Stade later today, while her brother wouldn’t last long as a conscript. Briefly, she considered whether it would be worth getting rid of the mother as well, but no, she decided, that wouldn’t do anything to exact justice from Ceres for what she’d done, and Stephania wasn’t needlessly cruel.
“It sounds terrible,” Stephania said. “No one should be abandoned by the one she is promised to.”
That was one element of this woman’s story that she could relate to. The pain when it had turned out that Thanos had been given to Ceres had been an icicle jabbed into her heart, the cold slowly spreading through her until there was nothing left.
“Why did you come here?” Stephania asked. “You said that you had information for me. Why bring it here though?”
“I thought someone should know,” Marita said.
Stephania could see, though, that it wasn’t the whole story.
“What else?” she asked.
Marita paused, looking embarrassed for a second. “When the slaver left with my daughter, he took all the money he gave me… I was tricked.”
“I understand,” Stephania said. She’d brought a purse with her, even though it was early. She’d guessed that it might be necessary. Greed was one of the easier motivations to understand. It was also one of the more common ones. She pressed it into Marita’s palm, closing her fingers around it. “Here. To help you now that your husband is gone.”
She felt the way the other woman’s hand clasped around it. Tightly, as if afraid it might be taken away at any moment. “You’re too kind, my lady.”
Stephania smiled back at her. “I don’t think I’ve ever been called that before. Now, tell me what happened.”
“After my husband left, I had nothing, so I went looking for Lord Blaku to see if I could get my money from him. He owed me.” Marita had a note of determination in her voice that Stephania found quite amusing. She didn’t know about this Lord Blaku, but she knew enough about slavers to guess what would have happened to this commoner if she’d found him.
“You went after him?” Stephania said. “Did you find him?”
The fact that she wasn’t dead in some ditch said that she hadn’t.
“I found what was left of him,” Marita said. She shook her head. “He’d been killed, along with his men. At first I thought it was bandits, but bandits wouldn’t leave this.”
She took out a ring, more expensive than anything a commoner like her could have afforded. It had an ornate “B” insignia on the flat surface of the top, along with an insignia that might have pointed to a noble house.
Stephania didn’t have to ask why Ceres’s mother hadn’t sold it. It would be too obvious that it wasn’t hers. The guards would have taken her in a heartbeat.
“That does seem unusual,” Stephania said in her sweetest voice. “What would you guess happened?”
“I don’t need to guess,” Marita said. “I know. I asked around. I found one of the slaves they’d been transporting.”
Stephania waited.
“My daughter killed Lord Blaku,” Marita said. “Slaughtered him and his guards.”
“Her alone?” Stephania asked. She wanted to be certain.
“That’s what they said, although she must have had help,” Marita said. That just told Stephania how little she knew her daughter. Stephania wasn’t going to give Ceres much credit, but she could fight. If she couldn’t, she would have been dead by now, and things would have been a lot easier.
“She killed Lord Blaku?” Stephania said. She lifted the slaver’s ring up to eye level. Was it her imagination, or was there a smear of dried blood on it? It wasn’t proof, not really, but what proof could there be for something like this? More to the point, how much proof would really be needed right now? If the story could be checked afterwards, if people could hear for themselves what Ceres had done, that might be enough.
“She did,” Ceres’s mother said. “I can point the spot out on a map, if you want.”
“Yes,” Stephania said. “I think that’s a very good idea.”
It shouldn’t have mattered. Ceres would be dead soon anyway, if Lucious’s man did his part in the Stade, but there was something unsatisfying about that. It was a heroic death, of the kind that people might talk about afterwards. Handled badly, Stephania suspected that it might even turn into a rallying cry for the rebellion.
This was potentially far better. If Ceres’s mother had sold her, then she’d been a slave according to Delos’s laws. If a slave killed their master, they could be killed and no one could question it. They could be flayed alive, whipped until they could stand no more of it, or simply strangled. They could take Ceres away for the kind of quiet death that would quickly fade from the mind, and any arguments could be quickly quashed.
Yes, let her have that kind of death. The kind of death that would inspire no one. Stephania stood, and Ceres’s mother stood with her.
“What will you do with what I’ve told you?” Marita asked.
Stephania cocked her head to one side. “I’m going to make sure that your daughter gets exactly what she deserves.”
Marita seemed to consider that. For a moment, Stephania thought that she might complain, or beg for some kind of leniency for Ceres.
Instead, to her shock, she nodded.
“Good,” Marita said. “I should have strangled her at birth.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Ceres woke early, standing and stretching out her tired muscles in the morning sun, trying to pretend it was just another day.
Though she knew that it wasn’t.
Her life would be at stake on this day. She would fight today, in front of thousands of spectators, against Lucious’s combatlord.
That thought brought with it a kind of clarity, because it was obvious that Lucious was going to pit her against an opponent she couldn’t beat. One that would ensure her death.
Ceres knew she should be afraid, but right then, she felt calmer than she’d thought she might. She half closed her eyes, feeling the warmth of the sun on her as she waited. The truth was that it didn’t matter if she died today. Sartes would be safe, because her father and Anka were going to find him. Rexus was dead, but the rebellion would continue. As for Thanos…
Ceres forced herself to breathe as she thought of him being dead, letting the air out slowly as she tried to get back to the still place where she’d been. She wasn’t sure she wanted to be alive in a world where he was gone.
Eventually, the guards came for her, hammering on the door in a way that made Ceres’s ears ring after the silence. They put chains on her to march her down to the Stade, although Ceres had no intention of running away now. She saw the way the guards watched her now, with a kind of respect bordering on fear. They’d obviously seen her fight the first time.
She’d walked the route to the Stade plenty of times now to practice, but it felt different when it was for an actual fight. Part of that was the sound. Even here, the cheers of the crowd filtered through, making it feel to Ceres as though she was inside the belly of a living thing.
They reached the preparation room, and the guards removed her chains. To her surprise, one nodded.
“Good luck.”
“Thank you,” Ceres said. It was hard, sometimes, to remember that even the guards were people. Had this one seen her fight the last time? Ceres shook her head. She had to concentrate on getting herself ready for what was to come, but that felt impossible when her mind kept going back to other things. The last time she’d been in the Stade, how her father would be doing, Thanos…
Ceres stepped deeper into the preparation rooms. She didn’t want to think about Thanos then, because it hurt too much. Paulo, her weapon-keeper, was waiting for her with her armor, a breastplate and kilt that left her limbs bare. Ceres knew that the idea was to have armor that protected the most vital areas of the body while still giving the crowd a chance to see blood on the sands. It made the fights last longer. As if in answer to that thought, Ceres heard the cheer that only came with the brutal end of violence. A minute later, the iron doors that led through to the Stade opened, letting guards drag a body back through. They abandoned it at the side of the room, probably expecting more to come.
“They tell me that you’re fighting Lucious’s man today,” Paulo said.
Ceres nodded, reaching for her sword. “Do you know anything about him?”
Paulo looked uncomfortable, and Ceres could guess why he was suddenly quiet.
“It’s all right,” she said. “I’d rather hear it. I’m sure Master Isel would say that knowing an opponent is important.”
Paulo smiled at that. “He says that you should know a foe like a brother.” Ceres saw the smile vanish. “But he also says that victory is born from confidence.”
Ceres understood. “It’s all right. I want to know what I’m dealing with.”
“The Last Breath,” Paulo said, and Ceres could see the flicker of fear that crossed her weapon-keeper’s face as he spoke about him. “He has been brought here from far to the south. He is larger than you, and stronger. He’s fast, too.”
Ceres shrugged. She’d guessed that he would be bigger than her. Most of the combatlords were. “The last man I fought was strong, too.”
“Not like this,” Paulo said. He shook his head. “The last time he fought in the Stade, he dropped his weapon, so he crushed his opponent’s skull to finish him. But he’s not just strong. The time before that, he fought Navencius. I’ve never seen anyone better with a trident than Navencius, but the Last Breath beat him in under a minute.”
Ceres swallowed. She’d watched the killings enough to know how much that meant. Trident players were normally hard to get close to, the fights involving them becoming long games of cat and mouse. To kill one of the best with that weapon so quickly was more than impressive, it was frightening. Maybe Master Isel had been right. Maybe it was better not to know.
“So I should avoid the trident then?” Ceres joked.
Paulo didn’t laugh though. Instead, he held out a sword in one hand and a long dagger in the other. “Better to stick to what you’ve trained with.”
“A dagger though?” Ceres said. “Not a shield?”
“A shield would just make you want to stand still,” Paulo said. “Trust me.”
Ceres did. All the people around the Stade had become something like a second family for her, and Paulo knew what he was doing. She weighed the dagger in her hand. It was long enough to be a threat at more than close range, but short enough not to get in the way of her sword as she wielded it. It was a good choice. She waited with the w
eapons by her side, while beyond the preparation room, the sounds of the crowd built. Two more times, the guards came back with bodies, while three other combatlords limped back with wounds needing to be stitched.
Finally, it was her turn.
Ceres waited for the iron gates to open, then stepped out onto the sand, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the sunlight. The chanting of the crowd hit her in time to the beating of her heart.
“Ceres! Ceres!”
Last time, the words had seemed to run through her, building with her own excitement. Now, though, that excitement felt buried somewhere under everything that had happened. The feelings from the night before were still there. She was there to die. She knew it. With Thanos gone, she even welcomed it. But she wasn’t going to give the royals the satisfaction of dying without a fight.
She stepped out into the middle of the Stade, looking around at the crowd. The terraced sides seemed even more crowded today than they would normally have been. Were those extra people there to see her? She looked over to the royal box, and sure enough, Lucious was there to watch. The others weren’t there though, as though seeing the spectacle of her fighting were somehow beneath them.
Horns blared, and her heart froze as she saw her opponent step out onto the sands.
He was every bit as huge as Paulo had promised, his dark skin bulging with corded muscle and worked with tattoos. He wore almost no armor beyond a kilt and short greaves, as if ignoring the possibility of getting hit. For a weapon, he held a staff that had crescent-shaped blades on either end. He leaned on it without acknowledging the crowd. Even his weapon-keeper seemed to be frightened of him, following along behind at a safe distance and looking to Ceres as though he was ready to run at any moment.