Freelance Heroics (8 page)

The Gate of Life cranked open, and Gavi emerged. She was lost in thought, trying to figure out how to get the jump on her opponent, when the crowd’s reaction shook her from her reverie.

They’re going nuts.
Whether from the drink or the previous matches or Houkians’ love for the underdog, the crowd was going bonkers. Gavi faltered as the adulation hit her.

An idea occurred. Gavi drew her sword, pointed it at her still-distant opponent, and gave the universal signal for
You’re going down!

The crowd went
wild.
Gavi felt a mixture of excitement and fear, the adrenaline-borne delusion of
Maybe I can do this . . .
battling with her “realistic” voice saying,
Well yes, but probably not.

Cóstan smiled as Gavi reached him. “The crowd seems to be on your side today.”

Gavi returned the smile, though hers was sheepish. “Sorry about that. I thought I could use a little wind at my back.”

Cóstan chuckled. “By all means. Let’s have a good match.”

“Yes, thank you.” The two moved into position.

Gavi closed her eyes. She could feel the crowd’s energy like a physical force around her. It was different, being down here. She had been to the games before, and there was a feeling of oneness to being part of a crowd all focused on the same thing, especially when they were rooting for the same side. Now she was at the middle of it. It was simultaneously uplifting and intensely isolating.

She took a deep breath. Gavi knew she could handle the crowd in one of two ways. She could be sensible and ignore them from now on like Raedren did, or she could continue acting like Mazik. Of the two, being sensible and serious was more her style.

But if I do this the safe way, I’m going to lose.

Gavi thrust her sword into the sand. She raised her arms to the sky, her face serene as if she was drawing power from the crowd. The noise intensified. Then she grabbed the tie holding her ponytail together and ripped it away, letting her hair fall loose.

Gavi began bouncing from foot to foot like a prizefighter itching to begin, and took up her sword. She thought of Mazik, and imitated one of his roguish grins. She felt ridiculous. The crowd loved it. Cóstan gave no indication of how he felt, but if he knew anything about how she fought, he would know it didn’t start like this.

“Let’s get this final match started!” said the announcer. The crowd roared. “Whatever happens, this is it. Challengers, are you ready?”

They both nodded.

“Attendees of the great Kitpicc Gladitorial Arena, are you ready!”

The crowd shouted until they began to go hoarse.

“Then let the seventh match between Vector’s Cóstan Sūréjà and Team Kil’Raeus’ Gavi Ven’Kalil—”

Bwaaaaaaaaang!

“Begin!”

Gavi let loose a blood-curdling battle cry that split the air and made spectators jump. This time Cóstan did react. He flinched and almost covered his ears, until he remembered the spell hovering over his right palm. He stopped, aimed at the now-charging Gavi, and fired.

“
Ichn ir ukk—Swiftness!
” Gavi’s body blurred as her speed increased twofold. She dodged and used her sword to bat the incoming spell away.

Cóstan stepped back, but it was too late. By the time Gavi slowed down to her normal speed she was only a step away. While her Swiftness spell went on cooldown, Gavi lunged, and Cóstan raised his weapon to parry.

“What a charge! Mis Ven’Kalil is not cowed by Mas Sūréjà’s power!” said the announcer. “Look at her fight! She fights like a demon out of hell!”

And she did. Gavi attacked with unbridled ferocity and a reckless abandon that was unlike how she normally fought.

She was scared, really scared! Gavi had never fought someone this powerful alone.
Well, maybe a few drunks back in The Joker, but they were never serious about it.
She silently cursed her lack of skill with protection magick.
If I get hit once, this is over.

So she didn’t get hit. With a numb realization, Gavi realized she was doing better than expected, and far better than she had dared to dream. She was driving Cóstan back, her blunt blade striking at his barriers as his own sword missed her more often than not. She realized this in a kind of daze, like her mind was watching her body as the crowd cheered and Cóstan faltered.

Then a barrier appeared at Gavi’s shins, and she pitched forward. She recovered, but valuable seconds were lost. She lunged at Cóstan, aiming at his head—and connected, but there were more barriers now. Gavi hacked them apart, but they were coming up faster and faster now.

Spells struck Gavi from the sides, and she could tell that Cóstan had realized she had no barriers save for her MPB. Smelling blood in the water, Cóstan pressed.

Now Gavi was on the defensive. She parried, swatting blasts out of the sky and hammering Cóstan’s defenses, but now that he had gotten ahead of her he was only gaining ground. He was using a lot of mana, but Gavi doubted he was concerned, judging by his calm, workmanlike expression.

The crowd gasped as Cóstan’s sword snaked past Gavi’s defenses and raked down her side from shoulder to hip. Were his weapon edged it would have split her open, but getting smacked with a heavy piece of metal still hurt. Gavi recoiled—and that’s when Cóstan raised his other arm and pointed.

“
Quick Shot.
” Suddenly the air around Gavi exploded without the mana having crossed the space between. She reeled, and leapt out of the way as Cóstan fired again.

Gavi looked at the distance between them. Half a dozen meters separated her from her opponent, open space she wouldn’t be able to cross without taking the spell he was preparing. Without her Swiftness spell—it was still on cooldown, as mandated by its god, and wouldn’t be ready for several more minutes—she didn’t have a chance to evade.

Snatching the holdout crossbow from behind her, Gavi cocked it against her leg and fired at Cóstan. Then she turned and ran.

Gavi dove behind the column a heartbeat before Cóstan’s spells struck. The pillar shook, stone eroding as mana splashed on either side.

The barrage stopped. Gavi knew this probably meant her opponent was preparing more spells, which was not to her benefit. Any advantage she had earned with her wild offensive was gone.

As she rested her head against the column, Gavi went over the situation. She was faster, younger, and more desperate than her opponent. She was pretty good at sneaking around, but that was useless here. She was limited to close range, save for her crossbow, which she paused to reload. She had cover, but it wouldn’t last for long, not when evocation spells can be made to curve in mid-flight.

Gavi felt a cold pit settle in her stomach.

When Gavi fought alongside Mazik and Raedren, she was sometimes able to forget how weak she was. No matter what Mazik said, it was mostly them compensating for her. Gavi didn’t think her friends were geniuses, and she knew they had worked hard, but they had been born with above-average potential, while hers was below average by far. If all three of them worked equally hard, Mazik and Raedren would learn the spell while she would not. So she had worked harder than them, but she could never catch up.

But here, she couldn’t delude herself. As the first of Cóstan’s spells curved around the column, forcing her to duck, her inadequacy was clear.

That’s when Gavi noticed the shattered column to her left. It lay where Mazik had pulled it down on top of himself and Rysha during the fourth match. The upper third was still in one piece, but the rest lay smashed, save for the short stump still bound to the floor.

A stubborn fire welled up in Gavi. She wasn’t ready to give up. Not yet.

She leaned her sword against her collarbone and turned around. Grasping the column with her free hand, she leaned to her right. Cóstan was standing a few meters away, and as soon as Gavi came into view, he opened fire. Gavi ducked back behind the column as his spell struck.

She kept going. Gavi shrugged the sword off her collarbone, and as she lurched into the open, hurled the blade with all her might.

Cóstan held up a barrier, though he was careful to keep his eyes on Gavi. The sword struck and fell away.

Cóstan watched as Gavi reached the shattered column and began searching through the debris. He arched an eyebrow. Though he had another spell ready, he stayed his hand. He was curious.
Maybe her friend left some kind of weapon.

Gavi stood up with a piece of rubble as big as a bodybuilder’s chest and hurled it at Cóstan’s head.

The crowd roared as sections of stone crashed down around Cóstan. He kept dodging, but between the projectiles, the cloud of shattered stone, and the suddenly uneven footing, he was beginning to take damage.

Gavi strained as she lifted another rock. What had seemed like a good idea a minute prior was already unraveling, as she realized she was spending too much time throwing to close the gap, and that she was running out of stones.

Gavi grabbed the largest remaining piece, the base of the column, and lifted. It didn’t budge. That’s when she realized it was still tethered to the ground.

Gavi tugged at the base again. It gave way a little. She leaned down to look at the metal bindings that held it in place.

They were coming loose. The bindings, which were like big metal tent spikes that had been driven into the ground, couldn’t go very deep without hitting the tempered metal floor that kept competitors from blasting into the Catacombs.

Gavi put her back into it and pulled. With a strained
pop
the stakes gave way, and the base came away in her hands.

Gavi looked over at Cóstan, who was picking his way out of the rubble toward her. But his eyes had never left her. Gavi knew that if he wanted to, he could have attacked her already.

I’ll take it.
She held onto the stone base and dashed back to the column she was hiding behind before.

Now Cóstan did attack. Gavi held up the base as a shield to block his spells, wincing as her hands and arms were splashed with white-hot mana. She drew close, and then hurled the base the rest of the way and dove after it.

Gavi knocked two of the iron spikes off the loose base, then tossed it around the standing column until it was sitting on the other side, facing Cóstan. She ducked back behind cover and took up a stake in each hand.

The clang of metal could be heard throughout the arena as spectators craned to see what was going on. Gavi was using one stake as a hammer and the other as a nail, forcing the latter under one of the bindings supporting the standing column. The binding popped off. Gavi did the same with another, her head darting up to see what Cóstan was doing every few seconds. He took potshots at her, but he didn’t seem interested in charging.

The second binding popped free, and Gavi left them both where they lay. She kept the stake. Then she braced her feet against the wall, rested her back against the column, and pushed.

There was no ominous groan or screech of metal as the one-story column fell. It simply toppled, the other bindings breaking free as it fell.

Toward Cóstan.

Not that Cóstan didn’t have plenty of time to get out of the way. He barely had to jog—and then the falling column struck the other pillar’s base, the one Gavi had shoved in front of it, and it bounced and rolled, the column coming apart in three separate pieces as it struck. Now Cóstan did have to run, but he escaped unscathed.

Footsteps padded on the sand.

Cóstan tracked the shape moving along the opposite side of the fallen column, using it as cover. He aimed and fired.

Gavi hurdled the fallen column as her shield of stone crumbled in her hands, Cóstan’s spell tearing it apart. Cóstan readied another spell as Gavi reached into her pocket.

“
Ichn ir ukk—Swiftness!
”

Gavi drew back her arm and hurled the iron stake with all her might.

Cóstan doubled over as the stake slammed into his stomach. Even without an aura, Gavi’s augmented speed caused the stake to rip through Cóstan’s defenses and batter his flesh.

That’s when Gavi closed the gap and pounced. Cóstan fell to a flurry of stinging blows, and as the crowd roared Gavi drew her knife and knocked Cóstan’s sword away. Mana tore at her, but Gavi ignored it. She jabbed Cóstan in the solar plexus, spun him around, kicked his knees out from under him, and brought her knife to his throat.

“Do you surrender?” she said, her voice hoarse.

The crowd went wild before Cóstan could answer. The older man smiled. “You know, your knife doesn’t have an edge.”

“Yes, but it would still hurt,” said Gavi. “Plus, I’d really like to win, please.”

Cóstan smiled sadly. “Then I’m sorry to disappoint you.”

Gavi cried out as mana winds like she had never experienced hurled her away from Cóstan. Her feet actually left the ground as she tumbled, the knife falling from her hands as she was thrown toward the fallen column. Gavi landed with a painful crunch, her holdout crossbow snapping in half as she crashed into the stone, and was pinned there.

Cóstan walked over to her, and suddenly the winds changed direction. Gavi flopped onto the ground, the winds forcing her into the sand face first. Cóstan kneeled down and gently moved her head to the side so she could breathe.

“I apologize, but you really did quite well,” said Cóstan as he pulled her hands together. Shimmering barriers wrapped around her wrists. “I actually wouldn’t have minded seeing a new guild, but I gave you too many chances as is. Had I surrendered it would have been obvious I threw the match.” He smiled tightly. “Unfortunately, I’m not that kind.

“I won’t ask you to surrender, not after all that. I have to prove you can’t fight any longer, though,” he said as barriers wrapped around her ankles, pulling them together. Cóstan stood up as the winds ceased. “There we go.”

Cóstan crossed his arms as a ten-count began. The crowd roared. Gavi struggled against her bindings, to no avail.

“By the way, don’t be discouraged,” said Cóstan. “You’re on the cusp of being formidable. To do so much with so little . . . with a few more tools, you’ll be a force to be reckoned with.”