“Ten pools of eight,” Ferg said in awe.

  “And one pool of seven,” Liesl added. “Eight-seven total. That’s an awful lot of combatants. Were there this many last year?”

  “Not that I remember,” Taryn said, “but it certainly didn’t feel like this many.”

  The second section was back in Darluth. They stood with Tammer at the long postings board that had been erected close to the grounds where the games would be held. It was the night before the opening ceremonies, and the rosters were officially posted. Tammer looked at the long list for swordsmanship alone and swallowed.

  “There’s even more in grappling,” Liesl noted, pointing at the notices further to their left. “There’s...ninety-six there.”

  The second section was quiet as they took it all in. Tammer looked further down the boards. Cross country had the fewest entries, only a dozen total, and that was a straight race; whoever won the race received the prize. Archery was next, and that had at least fifty entries. Horsemanship, though still low, had about twenty-four entries. That one wasn’t too surprising; only highborn and nobility entered horsemanship, as they were the only ones who could afford the horse, the armor, the training facilities, and the instruction to learn. Hand-to-hand always had the most competitors. It was easy enough for anyone to understand, regardless of social status, and it had the most glory. Tammer wasn’t the only one in Alfreyad who had grown up on stories of heroes engaging in dramatic, climactic man-to-man battles.

  “It’s not impossible,” he said quietly, running a finger down the list of names. “But it’ll be tough.”

  “It won’t be as bad as it looks,” Taryn said, quickly counting on his fingers. “Once you’re out of pools and onto the final bracket, you only have four fights before the final. Three if you do well enough in pools and you get to sit out the first rounds. And it’ll be the same for grappling.”

  “They only have so many rings,” Ferg said, peering around the postings boards to look at the prepared grounds. “This is going to take at least a week, if not more. You’ll have time to rest in between.”

  “And I’ve watched you beat Ferg’s ass at least ten times in a row in a single day,” Liesl said.

  “Oy!”

  Tammer grinned despite the pit in his stomach. Though he had appreciated the alone time he had all week, it was good to be back among his friends. He knew that they would support him in the games, but he had been dreading the conversation he needed to have with them when they’d all returned. Taryn was the last to get into Darluth, and Tammer insisted that they all meet up at the Rooster for a drink and a chat.

  They made many toasts to Gentren, probably too many; Liesl was swaying back and forth and giggling uncontrollably. Ferg and Taryn broke out into offkey ballads in honor of their late brother in arms, earning bemused looks from the patrons around them. Tammer nursed his first pint the whole time, waiting for a good time to broach the conversation. He made eye contact with the bartender and indicated that the next round should be water. He needed to make sure his platoon wasn’t quite so drunk.

  Eventually, they had sobered up enough that Tammer was confident they would all remember the conversation the next day. He cleared his throat and said, “I need to talk to you all about something.”

  He gave them a rundown of everything they didn’t know about the Linford incident; he hadn’t had a chance to tell them what the king had said nor what the Abyss had written on the note before they all left for home. They waited until he had finished to react, but when they did, all of them were outraged. The lighter mood from before was gone.

  “Fucking bastard,” Ferg muttered, taking another swig of his water. “I wish I would have wrung his neck when he was right there.”

  “I would have held him down for you,” Liesl said, shaking her head.

  “He was gone before we left,” Tammer said, running an idle finger around the rim of his glass. “No way we could have touched him.”

  “And you say that we don’t even get to be part of the manhunt?” Taryn demanded. “That it’s all left to the rangers?”

  “Our job is to protect the king,” Tammer said. Once that sentence would have carried a hint of pride. Now, it only had indifference. “Cadimus made that quite clear.”

  “This is bullshit,” Liesl said.

  “I agree, but what can we do?” Ferg said, slumping back in the booth. “At the end of the day, the best we can hope for is an opportunity to stab the festering shit if the rangers parade him around the streets of Darluth.”

  “About that,” Tammer said, studying the woodgrain on the table. “I...may have an opportunity to get into the rangers.”

  “What?”

  “What are you talking about?” Taryn asked. “An opportunity? There are never opportunities.”

  “The rangers answer to the king,” Tammer said, “and the winner of the games gets to ask a boon from the king, so long as it is within his power to grant.”

  Silence.

  “You mean to ask to join the rangers,” Liesl said.

  Tammer nodded. “I do.”

  “Is that even possible?”

  Tammer shrugged. “Can’t hurt to try.”

  “Unless the king takes it as a slight, then it certainly hurt to try.”

  “I don’t think he’ll go that far.”

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  “And if he says yes,” Ferg said, scowling across the table, “then that means you’ll be leaving us.”

  The other two stared at Tammer. He sighed. “I would be, yes.”

  “So we’ll get a new captain?”

  “Doubtful. I think they’d just fold us into one of the other sections. There’s only three of us left; no need to try finding two replacements, and our platoon was already undermanned.”

  “So we’ll be separated.”

  “Probably.”

  “The fourth section is hurting for men. I don’t know exactly how many, but maybe they’ll send all of us there.”

  “None of this is a guarantee,” Tammer interjected. “I might not win the games, and even if I do, then the king might deny my request.”

  Liesl took a sip of her water. “You’re doing this for Gentren,” she said. “Right? That’s the only reason?”

  Tammer nodded, then stopped. “Well, that’s the final push,” he said. “So many reasons are tied up into Gentren. The decision the king made after, the fact that he didn’t even consider us and how we would feel, all of it just brought into focus everything we’ve given up this far. I don’t want vengeance for Gentren to be another thing we have to lose.”

  She nodded. “In that case, if being reassigned is the sacrifice we have to make, then we’ll do it. For Gentren.”

  Now here they were, standing beside him as he assessed the mountain he had to climb. Taryn was already writing down the list of names from both events to see who was only competing in one. Liesl and Ferg hopped the fence and were studying the pitch, looking out for any hidden pitfalls and trip hazards. When the last bell of the day rang, they shooed him toward the competitors’ tent to check in.

  A throng had formed outside the tent, waiting for the flaps to open before trying to form an orderly line. Tammer was jostled many times, but it was usually followed up with a quick, “Sorry, sorry,” and all was well. Until he received a hard elbow in the rib.

  “Ow!”

  “Out of the way, Farmersson.”

  Tammer turned to glare at the offender, but he couldn’t find them. Until he turned his gaze downward. “Stae?”

  “

  Stae, actually. Now move.” She shoved another elbow into him.

  “Just wait,” he growled. “Nobody’s going anywhere. And I’m a captain, too, so watch your mouth.”

  “You and your section have been on leave for the whole week,” she drawled, stepping in front of him and knocking him backwards. “So until you are back in your armor once the games are completed, I outrank you.”

  “That’s not how that works.”

  She shrugged. “You can fight me on it,” she said. “See where that gets you. Expelled from the games at least, if not demoted.”

  Tammer took a deep breath and stared at the sky. “What are you even doing here?”

  “I’m competing. Obviously.”

  “In what event?”

  “You really need to ask that?” she snorted. “Hand-to-hand, obviously.”

  Tammer hadn’t seen her name on the list, but then again, there had been so many names it would have been hard to immediately pick her out. , he thought. Given her stature, Stae had always been underestimated, and she’d always met that indifference with an attack dog attitude. While he didn’t like her, he did respect that about her. She was tough - she wouldn’t have been promoted to captain otherwise - and she constantly worked on improving her skills in areas that were undoubtedly her weaknesses. As a shorter person, opponents had the advantage of reach. At least, that’s what they thought, until she bested them anyway.

  It would be a hard fight if he had to come up against her on the bracket, but he would find a way.

  “If you’re competing,” he said, “then that means you’re on leave as well. ”

  Stae’s family, from the little he’d heard, were from a respected family of blacksmiths somewhere in the Near End. Calling her by her surname wasn’t as pointed an insult as she had dealt him of the same nature, but it would still nip at her pride.

  She sniffed. “We are not going to be on equal footing here, Tammer,” she said, ignoring the slight. “You may be a burly giant, but I have far more finesse than you. The swordsmanship competition is .”

  “Are you as confident in grapple?” Despite her ferocity, grappling was always going to be an uphill battle for her.

  “You think I’ve been idle?” she demanded. “You’re not the only one who trains.”

  “I didn’t realize training helped you grow. Or if by training, you mean you’ve been spending some time sitting in a flowerpot each day and hoping for rain?”

  She sent him a scathing glare, but surrounded by a crowd, there was little she could do to respond. Instead, she opted for silence, and promptly ignored him. Tammer stood a little taller; he knew he had won once more.

  “A beautiful day for a tourney.”

  Once again, Tammer had to fight the urge to jump. He turned and sure enough, Abel Issa was grinning up at him. She took no notice of the wary looks everyone gave her, nor the distance they were all keeping. Even Stae, who had glanced around, was now avoiding looking in her direction.

  “A bit too bright,” Tammer said. “Visibility will be a problem. Hopefully tomorrow is overcast.”

  “I’m sure you’ll manage,” she said. “I saw your crew; are they not competing?”

  “No.”

  She nodded. “It’s always good to have a cheering section. I don’t have one, but that’s alright. It’d be more of a distraction to me. I function better when it’s quiet.”

  “I have noticed that you’re a much different person when you’re shooting.”

  “Arrows whisper,” she said, her eyes seeming to shift to someplace far away. “If you listen carefully, you can hear them telling you where they will go before you even loose the shot. But you have to be quiet so that you can hear them.”

  “Is that what you think?”

  She shrugged. “It’s something my teachers told me. I don’t know how true it is, but their advice has never let me down.”

  Tammer nodded absently. “Mine told me that I had the grace of a drunken deer when I held a sword.”

  Abel refocused on him and smiled, using a free hand to push her curls out of her face. “Hey, so long as drunken deer can hold their own, right?”

  He chuckled. “So long as.” The conversation lapsed for a minute. He shifted his weight between his feet, peering over the heads around him to see if they had started check-in. Abel was humming to herself, a song he didn’t recognize but that reminded him of tall mountains and deep caves and cold things. She was taking in the sights around her, her demeanor at ease - almost relaxed - but her gaze was calculating.

  “Are you still intending to follow your plan?” he asked.

  “Of course.” She was still surveying the crowd. “Are you joining me?”

  “I am.”

  “Good. Then I have some information to share with you once this is done.” She waved around at the mass of people. They finally opened the tent and organizers were calling for them all to form a line. “I’ve done a bit of digging, and I’ve got some information that you may find helpful.”

  “In what way?” Tammer was a large man, so he cut a clean path through the crowd. Stae was lost in the shuffle, thankfully.

  “We’ve both been riding a bit blind here,” Abel said, sticking close to his back. “The information I have should give us a better idea of what exactly we’re asking for.”

  Tammer nodded. “After you’ve checked in, come find me,” he said. “I’ll introduce you to the second section.”

  “Oh good,” she said, giving him another wolfish smile. “More friends!”