I have just scrambled up the resting platform when Lord Thynos reaches the top of the victory tower and grabs one of the practice ribbons tied there. Inarsis is halfway up the ladder below him, calling up congenial curses whose crude nature makes me blush.
Lord Thynos scans the obstacles to find me. The rush of adrenaline after a challenging run always makes me a little cocky, something else I never reveal at home. I wave mockingly, but in truth I have done better than I expected.
He does not wave back.
I have nothing to be ashamed of, yet when Tana releases me to go to the dining shelter while sending the other adversaries onto the course to train, I drag my feet. Just as I feared, Lord Thynos and Inarsis join me. They pepper me with questions.
“Who trained you?”
“Why did you go to Rivers instead of Traps after you finished Trees?”
“Do you have a strategy for solving the maze?”
“Which was the hardest task in this trial? Which was easiest? Where did you falter?”
“My concentration,” I say. “I got distracted several times.”
Tana appears. Lord Thynos and Inarsis rise.
“She needs specifically to work on strength in addition to her regular training,” Lord Thynos says to Tana.
The men then walk away and Tana returns to the training ground, leaving me alone.
It takes that long for me to realize I have passed muster.
I am an adversary training in a stable.
I sit there with my mouth gaping like a fish for so long that my shoulders start to stiffen up. My whole life has been turned upside down, all the bad and the good churned together. Thoughts muddle around in my mind: Mother’s tears; the feel of the victor’s ribbon clutched in my hand; Amaya’s lovely cat mask that she threw in the flames; the way Father nods when he approves of something I have said or done.
Talon limps in and sits down. She props her ankle up on a bench; it is wrapped in seaweed. In the kitchen, Cook and her assistants clatter around, preparing the evening meal. The sun sinks toward the west. The piping strains of a flute ensemble serenade us from over the palace wall, elegant and haunting.
I collect my scattered souls, sucking in a big inhalation to calm myself. It is time to make an ally. “I’m called Jes.”
Talon nods to acknowledge that I have spoken.
“It’s a lovely practice ground. It feels new but it’s welcoming,” I add.
She makes no reply. Her complexion is flawless except for a smear of dirt on her chin. The mask of her expression tells me nothing.
I try one more time. “How long have you been training here?”
She looks away.
We sit in awkward silence while the sounds of training drift on the air. Finally she unties her clubbed hair and combs it out through her fingers. It falls all the way to her buttocks, so thick and silky that I can’t help but admire its beauty. I would love to comb it like I do my sisters’ hair while we talk and argue and laugh about anything and everything, but it seems impossible to ask her after she has rebuked me. She keeps her gaze fixed on the roof of the bathhouse as she braids her hair into three tails and then braids those three tails. Only the mercenaries known as Shipwrights wear their hair this way. It looks strange on a Patron woman.
The silence hangs so uncomfortably that I’m glad when the other adversaries crowd in to wash and line up for supper. I look around for Kalliarkos but he does not appear. Perhaps he has a court function to attend. No person can truly succeed as an adversary if they don’t devote their life to the Fives. He’s caught in the same way I was, between his dream and the pressure of those who command his life.
Tana brings over a brass cup and hands it to me as the others stamp their feet and whistle. It’s hard not to strut.
“You need a Fives name,” says Tana.
“Oh. Uh… people usually call me Jes, short for Jessamy. The flower.”
“No, no, you don’t get to choose your name,” she says with a laugh.
By now everyone has begun shouting out suggestions. I am grateful so few are lewd.
Just as they seem likely to vote on a stupid, sentimental name like Sailwing or Spinflower, Lord Thynos reappears with Inarsis. They are scrubbed clean and dressed in such silken lordly garb that they must be going straight to the palace. I can’t figure how a Commoner like Inarsis can accompany Lord Thynos as an equal.
Lord Thynos says, “I have already named her.”
Everyone shuts up. I’m so nervous I clasp my hands behind my back as Father’s soldiers do when at parade rest, but really my fingers are clutched in a death grip.
