Page 19 of Ironhold, Trial One

The compliment catches me by surprise, so that I stumble over the words, not answering for a moment or two.

“Thank you,” I say. “I guess there hasn’t been much to smile about.”

"You have to be strong," Rowan says. "You have to trust that you will get through all of this. Five sets of trials in the colosseum. That's all we have to manage to be free. But you'll never manage that if you won't fight."

“I’m not sure if I’ll make it even if Idofight,” I counter. “You can shift the ground beneath your opponents’ feet. The man you fought could summon flames to his blade. Even Naia can heal the wounds she suffers, so that she can keep going. I’m not sure what being able to talk to animals will do to keep me alive in a fight.”

“None of us is exactly an archon,” Rowan points out. “A few of us have more magic than others, but generally not the slaves, unless they’re dampened. There are those who survive here merely by making the most of what they can do.”

“And talking to animals will help how?” I ask.

I see Rowan shrug. “I’m not sure, but I’ll tell you this: I’ve seen people with a hint of beast speech before. They’ve all been glimmers, barely able to feel a hint of what the animal wants. With you, it’s more. Maybe you candomore.”

“I don’t know about that,” I say. “What you’ve described sounds like all I’ve managed to do in the past.”

“There’s more to it,” Rowan says. “I feel certain of it.”

I give him a pained expression. “Still, it’s probably not enough to let me survive my next bout.”

“Then you need to pick up a sword,” Rowan says. “You need to be prepared to use it. You have as much right to survive this as anyone here, Lyra. Seeing you punished like that was awful. I can’t imagine what it would be like to watch you die.”

He might not have any choice about that, though. This is a place where death is always close, and it feels as though my personal doom is approaching far too quickly.

CHAPTER TEN

“Swing lower, at the legs,” Rowan says.

A group of us are working out, training with the posts and with different weapons, each of us trying to find one that will suit us. The colosseum of Aetheria has its gladiators learn to fight in different ways that are both strange and spectacular, aiming to put on a show for the watching crowds, where its armies would probably just fight efficiently with sword, shield, and spear.

I am training with a net and trident. They feel strangely familiar in my hands, closer to the tools found in a fishing village than to the weapons of a soldier. I am forcing myself to use them, taking the advice of Rowan and Naia, knowing this I might not get a choice in any of this.

And against the posts, it is not so bad. I swing my net low, wrapping it around the base of the wooden post and yanking, knowing that in a fight the move would be designed to trip an opponent.

“Now thrust with the trident,” Rowan says.

I hold it ready but don't deliver that strike. It's all too easy to imagine a helpless opponent on the ground in front of me, my trident plunging home in their flesh. Even in my imagination, I can't quite bring myself to do it.

“You're still hesitating, Lyra,” Rowan says. “If you do that in a fight, it will give your opponents an opportunity.”

“Oh, leave her alone,” a young woman near Rowan says. She has flame-red hair and a muscular, athletic frame. She is practicing with two curved daggers, each shaped like a half moon and covering most of her fist. Her name is Zara, and I think she comes from the forests of the far west, out on the fringes of the empire. “She’ll do what she needs to do when the time comes.”

She sounds confident about that, but then, there is something ferocious about the way she moves with the daggers, slicing at the post again and again. She also has a series of glass vials looped on a slender belt that crosses her chest.

“What's in the vials?” I ask, grateful for the chance to avoid having to finish the attack that I’d begun.

She shrugs. “Water. That's my talent. I can control water. Which isn't much use if I'm in a dry arena, filled with sand, but the trainers say that if I carry some with me, I'll at least have a chance. And I'm going totakethat chance.”

She seems determined, as if challenging the world to try to stop her. A young man darts in, snatching one of the vials before she can react. It's the same young man with spiky hair who was using illusions before in the training bouts.

“Finn, what do you think you're doing?” Zara demands.

He flashes a grin. “You can't use your water if you don't have it.”

“Oh, can't I?” she shoots back. She concentrates for a second, and the vial he's holding bursts, drenching him. It's a wonder that he isn't showered in glass. “Come on, Lyra. We need to work on your wrestling and close fighting. You should move and dodge, but if someone gets close, you need to know how to deal with it.”

I can do that at least, because it's not the same as learning to kill. We move through the basic grips and holds together, Zara showing me basic ways to break free if an opponent grabs me.

“But you need a stronger opponent than me to test this. Rowan?”

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