Page 61 of Kingmakers, Year One

It doesn’t help that the upperclassmen relish in tormenting us with gruesome stories of competitions past. It’s impossible to know which tales are accurate, and which are embellished for the pleasure of seeing our faces go pale. What’s certain is that every year, at least one or two students suffer some grievous injury, and several have been killed.

“Why in the fuck are we competing in this thing?” I ask Bram.

He’s been determined to become the Freshman Captain since day one, and he brings up theQuartum Bellummore than anyone.

“Because the winner is a fucking legend!” he says. “Nobody cares what your grades are, not really. This is the chance to prove your superiority over every other mafia family—the only way to do it outside of an actual war.”

He drags me over to the trophy hall in the annex of the Armory.

“Look!” His eyes gleaming with greed.

The hallway is lined with a double row of plaques, listing off the winning teams of years past. Each framed plaque includes a photo of the team Captain, in crisp black and white, giving them an air of timeless grandeur.

Bram points to the most recent winner: a black-haired boy with a ferocious expression of triumph, whose picture tops the last three years of winning teams.

“Adrik Petrov,” Bram says in an awed tone. “He won the last threeQuartum Bellums—every year but his Freshman year. He’s a fucking legend.”

“Who is he?” I’ve never heard of this guy. “An Heir?”

Bram chuckles. “That’s the best part—he’s not an Heir at all, he was an Enforcer. He’s one of the St. Petersburg Petrovs. But he’s such a savage that he’s practically taken over the city since he graduated.”

Bram lowers his voice, even though there’s no one else in the corridor with us, leaning over so his hot breath tickles my ear.

“Some people say he’s going to take over from his uncle, in place of Ivan Petrov’s actual son. That’s the power of proving yourself here.”

Interesting.

I don’t have a place as boss assured in Moscow, either. If winning the competition means something outside the walls of Kingmakers . . . it might be worth something to me.

And there’s another reason I want it.

I’ve seen how badly Leo Gallo wants to win. He’s an athlete, with all an athlete’s idiotic obsession with hitting arbitrary goals. He wants nothing in the world more than that stupid Captainship. Which means I want nothing more than to take it away from him.

He thinks he’s some kind of golden god. He walks around this campus like he owns it, and sure enough, the other students fawn over him until I could puke.

Even the teachers do it. They think he’s so funny and charming . . . I think he’s soft, like all Americans are soft. He was a big fish in a little pond. He’ll find out soon enough what it’s like to swim with actual sharks.

The most irritating insult of all is how Anna Wilk is always at his side.

There’s a shortage of women on campus. Some are pretty—but none can match the ethereal beauty of Anna.

I’ve seen girls looking at me. Even some of the female students in the years above mine. But I’m not interested in any of them. I want the best, or nothing at all. Anna is the best.

She’s the smartest as well as the most beautiful. She’s top of our class in grades—or she would be, if not for me. Our marks go back and forth, sometimes me on top, sometimes her.

The practical classes are different. There I’m vying with Leo Gallo all the way. Artillery, combat, reconnaissance, even scuba diving . . . if there’s a physical element, then Leo shows a maddening talent that seems to come to him without effort or practice.

Each age group gets one Captain: the Freshmen, the Sophomores, the Juniors, and the Seniors. Captainship will be determined by some arcane combination of scholastic performance, professor recommendations, and student vote.

We still don’t have a clear picture of what the competition itself will look like—until we’re called to assemble in the Grand Hall of the Keep in the sixth week of school.

The Grand Hall is vast and dark, its towering archways like the rib bones of some ancient beast. If we’re in the belly of a whale, then its heart would be the roaring fire in the cavernous grate at the far end of the hall.

The walls are hung with ancient banners of the ten founding families of Kingmakers. I don’t know all their names, but I see their sigils clear enough on the dusty tapestries: a pair of crossed axes, roaring bear, a mountain range with three peaks, a hawk on a field of stars, a golden skull with grimacing teeth, a sly red fox, a burning flame, a unicorn spearing a boar with its horn, a chalice of wine, and a griffin with its wings outstretched.

I wonder how many of those ten families still have descendants at this school? And how many even remember the mottos on their coat of arms.

I’m jealous of the students with a long family history. The only person in my family with any ambition, any honor, was my grandfather. Until he was murdered by Sebastian Gallo.

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