Wicked Bronze Ambition

16

I stared down at the woman I would bury just days before we were to have celebrated our wedding. Anger simmered inside me without controlling me. I had avoided unreasoning rage, so far. I was more drained by my loss and was now approaching the gates of desolation.

Barate had traveled further along the sad road. He had started plucking halfheartedly at future plans.

He eased me farther back into the house, away from other ears. “This had to do with what we were talking about at Mother’s house yesterday.”

“Did it happen because I went to the Al-Khar?”

He considered before answering, “That doesn’t seem likely. That creature, Min, evidently caught Strafa coming home. I think she was here to tell Strafa that she’d been designated the Algarda Champion. Instead of Kevans.”

I had myself under control. My mind was working, some. I wanted to bark, “What?” and maybe something about why the hell Strafa when the whole tournament absurdity was always about kids busting each other up. .? Except I had enough rationality in stock to realize that I knew no such thing, I had just inferred it from what had been said at Shadowslinger’s place. Too, I wondered, “How come you know all that?”

Barate said, “I was on my way here to see Strafa about Kevans. . I came around the corner while it was happening. If I hadn’t shown up when I did, the big woman would have died, too.”

“You saw who did it?”

“No. Strafa was airborne but falling. The big woman was on her knees, cursing, holding her chest and bleeding. We’ll get into all that once Mother gets here. Strafa was still alive then. She begged me to tell you how much she loved you. She tried to guess who did it. Then she stopped breathing and her heart stopped. I couldn’t get anything started again. I don’t have the power. .” He stopped talking, took deep breaths, forced himself to become calm.

He did have that Algarda talent, an ability to manage emotion. To go cold as death when calm and calculation were needed.

He exhaled. “That one was still conscious. She tried to talk. She called herself Vicious Min. She looks mixed-breed, maybe groll, but I don’t think she’s from this world.”

“So that ridiculous tournament thing hasn’t even started and somebody jumped somebody else.”

Barate nodded. “Yes. I don’t think that breaks the rules. I don’t think you can cheat, the way Mother explains it. But this would come close. The selection of participants has only just begun and the contest is down a probable Champion, maybe has a Dread Companion dying, and has you, if you’re the Mortal Companion, potentially crippled by grief. That has to be an encouraging start for somebody.”

I tried channeling the young Garrett who crept through snake-filled, croc-infested swamps to find strangers to murder in nightmares gone by. That Garrett was always scared but never out of control. He got on with getting on.

Once a Marine. .