ruling class. They all fight for what Sol, Belias, and I were given by birth.”
She knew the crowd watched her attentively now. She glanced at them and reminded them, “We fight to prove our worthiness to have what is our birthright already.”
“Women don’t rule. They are too soft,” someone called.
“Tell that to the fighters I’ve defeated.” Aya turned back to the gatekeeper who had started this argument. “I outrank you without winning, and even if Belias or someone else gets lucky and kills me, I will still outrank you.”
The gatekeeper bowed his head.
Quietly, she suggested, “Take a piss.”
He lifted his gaze to meet her eyes.
“Now.” She pointed at the dirt.
Eyes downcast, he obeyed. The alternative was calling for judgment, but he had insulted a ruling-class woman in front of several hundred witnesses—many of whom had heard every word. Some of those witnesses would speak, and so any judge at the carnival would rule against him. The right of class allowed her to offer immediate punishment.
“Kneel,” she ordered.
Just as the gatekeeper dropped to the ground, Aya saw Belias walking toward her. He raised his brows in silent question, but he knew not to vocalize that question in public—not that he had to ask. People in line were filling him in on the events that had just transpired.
Aya told the gatekeeper, “If I order you to drink from the ground, you will do so or face judgment. If I order you to ask for seconds, you will do so.”
The gatekeeper looked up at her. “What do you want me to do?”
“Ask me for mercy.” Aya glanced at Belias. “I have very few options, but if you ask me for mercy, this will go easier.”
The smile on Belias’ lips said that he understood that her words were for him too. He shook his head once; he would not ask for mercy. It wasn’t as if he thought he needed it, but she’d thrown the offer to him so that he could speak the word midfight.
The gatekeeper, on the other hand, said, “Mercy.”
“The difference isn’t in how cruel women can be.” Aya spoke louder now so that the line of people could hear her again. “If by action you tried to ‘remind me’ of what place some think a woman deserves, I would break you, but I won’t kill you for ignorant words. I can be a lady and still rule. One does not negate the other.”
A few people in the crowd jeered. Others cheered.
“The ground seems wet,” Aya said mildly, as if the urine-wet mud were a surprise. “I’d hate to soil my boots.” She looked down at the kneeling gatekeeper. “Do you have something I could step on so I can cross?”
“I . . . I have no coat, but”—the guard started to pull his shirt off—“I can offer you this.”
“That’s not good enough,” Belias said as he walked behind the gatekeeper, put a foot on the man’s back, and pushed him flat to the ground. Then, he turned to Aya and bowed. “Please.”
When she didn’t reply, he held out a hand to help her over the fleshly bridge that now spanned the puddle of mud and urine. “Your servant,” he murmured.
Aya ignored the proffered hand and stepped on the gatekeeper.
“I believe we need another gatekeeper,” Belias called. “This one is otherwise occupied.”
As Aya walked toward the ring, Belias assumed control of the crowd with practiced ease. She could hear him appointing a replacement and assisting girl after girl over the prone gatekeeper’s body. He had co-opted her example and neatly established his own dominance. Worse yet, he had done so with the same charm that had once made her grateful that he’d been chosen as her betrothed when she was born, the charm that made her fall in love with him, the charm that made her heart break when she refused their wedding ceremony. Aya pressed her lips together tightly to keep words better not said from boiling over. She’d entered this competition to change her future, to attain the power she needed to improve The City, and she was going to do just that.
THE MEN NODDED AT Belias as he helped the girls and women over the back of the gatekeeper. They gave him the attention befitting his caste and his fight standing, and he accepted it without drawing attention to it. Not everything has to be a show. Belias couldn’t get Aya to understand that. He could accept her need to make her way in the world, respected it even, but she seemed determined to choose the hardest possible path to do that. Highborn girls didn’t brawl in the street, and they surely didn’t enter death matches. If her father had survived a few years longer or if her brother were older, she wouldn’t have been able to risk herself so foolishly, but the way things had unfurled, Aya had achieved her majority—eighteen—and with no one to stop her, she’d refused their wedding and entered the competition. Once entered, there was no way out save forfeiture or death.
“I hope you kill her,” a girl murmured as she stepped gingerly on the gatekeeper’s back.
Belias remained silent. He’d entered the competition to prevent Aya from dying. If she weren’t so obstinate, he’d have teamed with her publicly. It wasn’t the way the contest was structured, but he was ruling class, and with or without these wins, he’d be a general in Marchosias’ government. It was what he had been raised to do. His father had died in the service of their ruler, killed by a supposedly tamed witch’s treachery, and Belias had been raised to know that he had two functions in his life: to fight as bravely and ably as his father had and to have sons to carry on their family line. Preferably with Aya by my side. She’d been chosen for him, selected for her lineage, and she’d been trained to fight in order to be strong enough to help protect his future children.
Unfortunately, his chosen mate had decided she’d rather kill him and a slew of other people than be by his side. A growl of frustration slipped from between his lips and caused an older scab to tremble as he took her hand. Belias offered her his most comforting smile.
She squeezed his hand. “Don’t go too hard on Aya. She’s doing what many of us wish we could. Things need shaking up.”
Belias nodded.
Too hard?
He wasn’t sure he could strike her with intent to kill. Of course if he didn’t, she’d be even more aggressive. There was no way to win this fight that wasn’t also a loss—unless Aya forfeited.
Once the last of the females crossed the gatekeeper, Belias turned to face the remaining line, bowed once, and then walked into the fight zone. The space for their match was clearly marked by a fresh chalk-and-salt circle. The wooden seats that spanned the fight grounds were almost filled, and the stink of too many bodies in the heat mixed with other equally unpalatable stenches.
“Forfeit, please,” Belias murmured as he came to stand beside Aya.
She ignored him as she slipped her arms out of her jacket, stretched, and checked her cache of weapons again. She removed a cloth-wrapped blade from her bag. Two knives were sheathed at her hips, and the hilts of two smaller knives protruded from her boots. Her left boot had a razor edge at the toe, and her left glove had jaw-busters built in.
He held her gaze as he peeled off his shirt.
Her right hand tightened on the hilt of the falchion she withdrew from its cloth, but she didn’t look away. The daimons in the crowd were watching for her reaction, but Belias knew she wasn’t going to give them—or him—that satisfaction.
“We can announce our reunion right now and walk out of the fight.” Belias reached out to touch her cheek, but she raised the wicked curved sword as if she’d start