Chapter 92
Kip went to stand by Teia and Cruxer. At their prodding, he explained his conspiracy theory, and then, together, they watched it play out, exactly as he’d foreseen. Balder fought and beat Yugurten, then he fought and beat Tala, and for a moment Kip thought the boy would challenge him—and give him another chance—but instead, sneering, the boy challenged eleven and won.
That eleventh fight took a lot out of Balder, though, and he got smashed against nine. They reordered, and with Balder now at eleventh, Kip was moved down to thirteenth place.
Then Barrel was up. He fought as Kip had expected, too, skipping Aram and taking on fighters who were already out, and then skipping Kip, who spat at his feet. Barrel made it to twelfth, and lost to ninth.
Kip shuffled down to fourteenth. Aram challenged three up from himself, fifteenth, which was Erato. She was already out no matter what, so she conceded without fighting.
All Aram had to do was win one more fight, and if he did, Kip was out. He came up to the bar and looked over the prospects, standing almost directly in front of Kip.
“You coward,” Kip said. “You’re not smart enough to figure this out. Who did it? How much did they pay you to do this?”
A flash of fury came over Aram’s face, quickly smoothed away.
“You cheater,” Kip said. “What did you think, that you’re some modern-day Ayrad? Ayrad didn’t take money for what he did. He didn’t use a team. You’re shit compared to him. You’re going to skip me. Me. The one you were hired to block. You think you’re the best in the class, you think you’re better than Cruxer, but you’re afraid to take me on.”
“I’ve got a lot of fights to win today, Kip. I don’t need to tire myself on unnecessary—”
“So fighting me will tire you out? Thought you were amazing. Didn’t Ayrad fight everyone in the class on his way up? And you won’t even fight one fatty at fourteenth place. You’re a legend all right, Aram. Aram the Unready, we’ll call you. Aram the A-rammed.” Kip had no idea what the latter meant, he just made it up. “Aram the—”
Aram slammed down his token in front of Kip. “I’m going to kill you,” he said. He strode off into the middle of the circle.
Cruxer was at Kip’s side an instant later. “Brilliant, now, Kip, after the back kick, Aram likes to throw a roundhouse punch, either stomach or face. He gets a lot of power into that thing, but if you can sidestep and come in, he’ll be wide open.”
“I’ve seen it,” Kip said. “I’m just not fast enough to take advantage of it.”
“Time!” Trainer Fisk announced. “Come forward.”
“Anything else?” Kip asked Cruxer. “Please.”
“He’s a fast drafter, too,” Cruxer said weakly. “Watch out for that… You’re lucky, though, right, Breaker?”
“Very.”
“Breaker, forward or out!” the trainer shouted.
“That’s something then,” Cruxer said.
“I didn’t say it was good luck.”
Kip turned to walk into the center of the circle. Then he saw the worst thing in the world. A ripple of recognition passed through the assembled Blackguards and trainees as someone came to the front rows to watch. Gavin. Gavin was here. Prism Gavin Guile himself had come to see his son test.
And Kip was about to fail.
Of course he’d come now. Of course he couldn’t have come early enough to see Kip win the earlier fights. To see Kip do clever things. No, he came now, when Kip was out of ideas and out of luck. Just in time for Kip to shame him.
“Are you ill, Breaker?” Trainer Fisk asked.
Oh, and of course the Prism sat next to Commander Ironfist. Might as well let everyone down at once. Beautiful.
“I’m envisioning a great victory,” Kip said.
“You arrogant little shit,” Aram said, sneering.
“I didn’t say it was mine,” Kip said.
“Huh?”
“Not my… victory. Look, jokes don’t work when you have to explain the—Forget it.”
“Are you calling me stupid?” Aram asked.
Um, no, but shoe fits.
“I am going to punish you, Kip.” Aram said it in such a way that he clearly intended using Kip’s birth name to be offensive. Which it wasn’t.
“I think we really don’t understand each other at all,” Kip said.
“Enough!” Trainer Fisk said. “Colors?”
“Green and yellow,” Aram said.
“All colors,” Kip said. No reason to hold back now.
“You’re claiming to be a full-spectrum polychrome, Breaker?” Trainer Fisk asked.
There was a right answer here. “Um. Yes?” Kip asked.
“Bad time to announce that,” Trainer Fisk said.
“What?” Kip asked. He’d thought it was the perfect time to announce it.
“Full-spectrum polychromes have such advantages over normal drafters that the Blackguards long ago established that to test their actual ability to be a Blackguard, they must be limited to share whatever colors their opponent chooses, plus one.”
“What?” Kip said. “So by my saying I could draft more colors, you give me less?”
“Precisely.”
“Well that’s bull—” Kip stopped, barely.
Trainer Fisk arched an eyebrow.
Kip scowled. “That’s very hard to take,” he said. He cleared his throat. “And I don’t think it’s fair.”
“I don’t think it’s fair, the Prism’s bastard says. You little bitch,” Aram said. “You shouldn’t even be here.”
“Aram, I don’t know who bought you off, but I’m going to crush your face,” Kip said. “You’re going to beat me today. No doubt. But I’ll be back.”
“I’m going to hurt you, Kip. I’m going to make you blubber like the fat little piggy you are.”
“Fuck you,” Kip said.
“Breaker,” Trainer Fisk said, “you are right on the line. Say one more word and you lose your extra color.”
“Word,” Kip said.
“Orholam damn you!” Trainer Fisk shouted. He grabbed Kip by his collar, and Kip heard the crowd gasp. “That’s it! You lose your extra color. You know, boy, you have a choice: are you going to be Kip the Lip, the loser who always has the last word, or are you going to be Breaker? I think you’ve made your choice for today. Maybe when you come back in six months you’ll be grown up enough to choose differently.” Trainer Fisk was seething. He turned to the crowd. Why was he so angry? Why was he so hostile suddenly?
Kip the Lip. He’d said Kip the Lip. Where—
Andross Guile. That would also explain why Trainer Fisk was so angry. He wasn’t angry at Kip; he was angry about Kip. Andross Guile was forcing Trainer Fisk to make it as hard as possible for Kip to pass—forcing Trainer Fisk to betray his oaths. It didn’t matter how. What mattered was that Kip was making what Andross Guile had asked Trainer Fisk to do all too easy. The trainer didn’t even look at Kip now, as he announced, “Kip Guile has claimed to be a full-spectrum polychrome. There hasn’t been one of those in the Blackguard for seventy years. There are rules. We’ve consulted them. Because of their innate advantages, full-spectrum polychromes get to choose only one color in addition to what their opponent chooses. For foul language, Breaker loses that choice. The colors for this bout will be green and yellow.”
Ironfist’s gaze was like a millstone. Kip looked away, and found his father’s. Gavin Guile looked disappointed already.
Damn me. Damn me. Kip the Lip. I played right into his hands. Kip Almost.
That’s who I am. Almost. I almost beat the Threshing, but I gave up. I was almost a hero, but I chose cowardice instead. I almost saved my village. I almost saved Isa. I almost saved Sanson. But I didn’t even almost save my mother. Hell, almost is generous. I haven’t almost avenged her. I swore I would. I took some little steps, telling myself I had to make it to the Blackguard to get access to the records in the library, but really, I’ve been happy to forget her. Some son. Some loyalty.
They might have conspired to keep me out of the top fourteen, but could I have really made it on my own? Probably not. Would I have made the top seven? Definitely not. The only good things in my life are the things that have been given to me. No wonder they hate me. I haven’t earned anything.
“Why little Kip the Lip, are you crying?” Aram said.
“I’m going to kill you, you motherfucker,” Kip said.
A backhand cracked across Kip’s jaw, staggering him. Trainer Fisk said, “Kip, one more word, and I’ll spare you the beating you’re about to get and revoke your chance to try again in six months.”
This time, Kip said nothing. He didn’t even spit out the blood in his mouth, lest Trainer Fisk misinterpret it.
“Trainer,” Aram said. “I’d like to withdraw one of my colors. I only need green.”
The trainer nodded and gave the order. Then he said, “Hands.”
Each boy in turn let his finger be pressed firmly on the hellstone and then took their places, illuminated only in white light.
Then the lights were shuttered.
“And…” Trainer Fisk said. Kip started running forward. He thought he had the timing just about perfect—“Go!”
Kip was already airborne as the lights came blazing on. Flying side kick. And miraculously, Aram was still standing right in line.
The boy’s eyes went wide and Kip’s foot slammed into his shoulder and chest. It launched Aram backward.
Kip fell, but popped back up to his feet in a moment. Aram had been shot all the way out of the circle. He rolled over, coughed, and for one moment Kip thought he’d knocked the wind out of his opponent. If Aram wasn’t able to breathe for five seconds, Kip would win, just like that.
“One!” Trainer Fisk shouted, starting the count.
Aram jumped back to his feet and rushed back into the circle. Kip met him at the edge, determined to keep him out.
“Two!”
Back kick. It was fast. So fast Kip was lucky to jump backward out of its reach, which also meant he was safe from the follow-up punch, which also meant Aram got into the circle with no problem.
And there goes my chance.
Aram was still in pain, though, Kip could tell. Unless he was faking it to lure Kip into some kind of trap. On the other hand, why would he need to lure Kip into a trap? He had his color, speed, strength, and a lot more training.
As Kip moved in closer, Aram lashed out. A lightning-fast pop to Kip’s nose. Too fast to stop. It wasn’t hard, but it stunned Kip. Then Aram was on top of him. Kip didn’t see the move that cut his feet out from under him, but he fell on his side, hard.
Kip had gotten halfway up when Aram hit him with a green luxin baton across the back.
“Come on, Breaker!” someone shouted.
Kip struggled up to his knees again. And grunted as another baton cracked across his back. But he didn’t go down.
He saw the thought cross Aram’s mind: he could crack that baton across Kip’s head and put him out. But a shot to the head might leave Kip an idiot, and that would get Aram barred from the Blackguard forever.
For once, the rules were helping Kip.
Not knowing what else to do, Aram slammed the baton into Kip’s back again. Harder.
Kip looked up at him and grinned. Don’t you know what I am?
I’m the fucking turtle-bear.
With a roar, Kip came to his feet as Aram was winding up for another swing. He caught Aram’s hand in his own and pushed against him. Aram kneed Kip hard in the gut, but that only meant the older boy was off balance as Kip locked a foot behind his.
Kip landed on top of the boy, but lost him almost immediately. Aram slid around and got under one of Kip’s arms and started battering his kidney with his fists. Kip tried to push off the ground, but somehow he couldn’t get any leverage anywhere. Green luxin imprisoned his hands.
“I’ve got you, Kip. You feel that freedom?” Aram whispered harshly in his ear. “I’m giving you just enough so they don’t call the fight. Just enough so I can punish you.”
Pain stabbed through him, making it hard to think, impossible to plan. Aram let him slip a little out of the grip and then corralled him again, grinning fiercely.
Hands manacled behind his back as he rolled onto his side, Kip used the pain like hammer blows hardening his will. He stared up at the crystals above them, bathing them in green light—and fired tiny pebbles as hard as he could at them.
A fist crashed across his jaw and he rolled heavily onto his back. Then something cracked and the green crystal overhead shattered, plunging them into darkness and showering them with crystal rain. Kip had not only shattered the green filter, but also the mirror behind it that turned the light toward the practice field. Cries of alarm went up from the crowd.
Kip was ready for the darkness—and Aram wasn’t. He lost his grip on the open green luxin he’d been using as Kip’s manacles. The manacles broke open and Kip slipped out of Aram’s grip and swung an elbow toward the boy’s head that struck a glancing blow.
Then Kip was on his feet. He relaxed his eyes into sub-red, and he could see. Aram was on his feet, staring this way and that.
Kip slugged him in the stomach and stepped back quickly. Aram turned, recovered, grunting. Kip slid to the left and punched the boy’s kidney.
Then, too soon, someone in the crowd cracked open a mag torch. No! Someone threw up a yellow flare. Kip tightened his eyes back to normal vision, and thought, Yellow, I can draft that if I’m—
But Aram’s first thought was martial rather than magical. He hit Kip in the nuts and tripped him.
Kip’s face bounced off the dirt, and then he was crushed by Aram’s weight as the boy jumped on top of him.
Aram pummeled both of Kip’s legs, hard punches right in the sweet spot in the middle of the thigh, rendering them useless.
Pain is nothing, pain is nothing, pain is nothing.
It didn’t matter what Kip told himself. This wasn’t pain; this was his body’s simple refusal to obey orders.
Think, Kip, think! One shot can end a fight.
One lucky shot. Orholam, please! Give me one lucky shot!
He flopped over onto his stomach. Even with the few grappling classes Kip had attended, he knew it was a stupid move. Your hands and legs—your weapons—go forward, not backward. Not well, anyway. He presented one elbow as what he hoped was a tempting target, and then convulsed his whole body, jerking his head backward as hard as he could, hoping to smash Aram’s face.
The back of his head glanced off the side of Aram’s cheek. Not enough.
The circle lit up again with natural white light as other mirrors were shifted onto the field, and the yellow light was extinguished. Kip’s one hope, dashed. He hadn’t even had time to draft the yellow. Green filters flipped back on.
Then Kip’s hands were trapped. Must have been trapped in luxin. A fist smashed his right ear. Another hit his left. Then his cheek. Then his mouth.
Right, left, right, left, right.
Kip was losing sense. But Aram had gone crazy. His leglock loosened as he concentrated solely on battering Kip to a pulp.
With a yell, Kip bucked and Aram lost his balance and fell forward. Kip wriggled to his knees, but Aram clamped down on him, smashing his fists harder and harder into Kip’s face.
Crying, stupid with rage and pain, blood blinding him, Kip roared and stood—lifting the older boy into the air, half on Kip’s back and half on his shoulders. He felt the boy stop punching him and his hands slip as he tried to collar Kip.
“You can do it, Breaker!” someone shouted.
The only thought in Kip’s mind was to crush Aram like a bug. Screaming over the sounds of Trainer Fisk’s incessant whistle, he lurched and threw himself toward the ground and—
Into a large red pillow. Inexorably, Kip’s limbs were pulled away, and Aram’s weight was borne away from him.
The clouds of dense red luxin faded, leaving Kip on the ground, still crying. Trainer Fisk examined him briskly to see how bad his injuries were, then stood.
“Aram wins. The top fourteen is decided. From here on up, we fight for placement. But Aram, you lost control. You damn near got yourself expelled. You’re done for the day.”
“No!” Kip shouted.
Trainer Fisk looked at him, then looked away, as if Kip was shaming himself.
Kip was weeping. Not from the pain, though everything was pain now. He’d been so close. He could have crushed Aram if they’d just let them finish the fight. He’d almost—
Almost. He was Kip Almost. Kip the Failure. Almost good enough. He was bleeding and weeping and snotting all over himself.
He looked up and expected to see Gavin leaving. Kip was an embarrassment. A weeping little girl where Gavin needed a son in his own image. Kip was nothing like his father. How could the acorn fall so far from the oak? Instead, Gavin held his gaze and beckoned Kip to come over.
Kip stood up and walked over toward the wooden bleachers where his father was sitting among all the trainees. He looked down, humiliated, humiliated by the tears dripping down his face, unable to stop, unable to hide.
Someone started clapping. Then others joined the one, and everyone was clapping. Kip looked to see if Aram was flexing or something. He wasn’t. Everyone who was clapping was looking at him. Him?
Kip rubbed his forehead, trying to hold himself together. Him? For him?
Ah fuck. He started crying harder. He’d wanted to be one of the Blackguards. They were the only people he respected. The only people in the world he wanted to be like. And he’d failed them, but they gave him this.
He took a towel, ostensibly to wipe up his blood. He covered his head. Someone put an arm around him, and Kip saw his father.
“Father,” Kip said. “I… if they hadn’t blown the whistle… I almost…”
“The boy panicked, Kip. That grip he was going for is a neck-breaker. And I think he got it. If they hadn’t blown the whistle, when you hit the ground, you’d have been dead.”
Aram had gotten the grip. Kip had felt Aram’s arms locking into place. If Aram had killed him, Aram would have been kicked out of the Blackguard. Not that it would have done Kip any good at that point.
“I failed,” Kip said, not quite daring to look out from under the towel over his head.
“Yes,” Gavin said. “He’s better than you. It happens. Smart work with the crystal there. It almost worked. Now come on, let’s go watch. It’s good to learn from those who are better than you are. Looks like your nose is broken. Best to set it quick.”
Kip touched his nose gingerly. Oh, that was not the right shape for a nose. “Is that the thing where it makes that sound and I scream?”
“Try not to,” Gavin said. Heedless of Kip’s sweaty hair, he reached behind Kip’s head, holding him in place, and grabbed his nose, pulling on it.
Kip gasped, gasped, breathed. Orholam have mercy!
But he didn’t scream.
Sure, that’s the one thing I don’t fail today.
He followed Gavin to the bleachers, but the only part of what his father had said that stuck with him was “almost” and “He’s better than you.”
A green drafter chirurgeon brought superviolet-infused bandages and tended to Kip’s cuts as they watched the remaining fights. With tiny needles and thread of green luxin, the man stitched up Kip’s right cheek and left eyebrow, then smeared stinging unguents on those and several other cuts.
Then he gave him what Kip thought was far too modest a dose of poppy tea. Kip was glad he was sitting, because he didn’t think his legs were going to let him stand.
All in all, watching the fights was absolutely no good in teaching Kip anything because he couldn’t pay enough attention to learn. It was, however, a good distraction. Teia defeated a challenge, and then won two fights against boys who looked stunned at how fast she was. She ended up at seventh. Kip was proud of her. He could tell from her quiet grin that she was proud of herself, too.
They watched until the end. Watching Cruxer fight was art. He’d been bumped down to fourth by their “loss” in the real-world testing, too. He challenged third, second, and first—and won. Kip saw his father look over at Commander Ironfist, impressed. “He a legacy?” Gavin asked.
“Third generation. Inana’s and Holdfast’s son.”
“Should have guessed. They still alive?”
“Inana is. She’s been holding on. For this.”
“He’s amazing,” Gavin said. “He might even be better than you were.”
Ironfist raised an eyebrow.
Gavin grinned.
Ironfist grunted. It might have been assent. “If he lives long enough.”
“I should go see Inana,” Gavin said. “She was a gem.”
The scrubs began lining up for the little ceremony that would see them become trainees. Kip’s stomach turned. “Can we go now?” he asked.
Gavin said, “This is your friends’ moment of triumph. Think about someone other than yourself. You turn your back on them now, and they’ll remember it forever.”
Kip blinked. Blinked. I’m a self-centered brat.
“Yes, sir,” he said.
Commander Ironfist got up and went forward. All the scrubs were lined up according to their placement in the top fourteen. Except for Cruxer, who was down on both knees in the training circle, head bowed, one hand to his eyes and forehead in the sign of the three and the one, praying.
“Cruxer!” Trainer Fisk barked. He was standing in front of Aram at the bottom of the line, ready to pin the Blackguard pin to each scrub’s lapel. “Time to pray later.”
The scrubs were smirking, triumphant, accustomed to and amused by Cruxer’s quirks. They all stood proudly, hands folded behind their backs, stances wide, chests out. All around the training ground, the older trainees and the full Blackguards were standing up, coming to attention themselves. Standing the same way.
“Yes, sir.” Cruxer jumped to his feet and came toward the line. He was smiling, but Kip thought it was a tense smile.
As everyone was standing proud, Kip felt the gulf between him and them intensely. Outsider, loner, alien. They were all he would never be.
“Sir?” Cruxer asked, coming to stand in front of the trainer. He glanced coolly at Aram, who wouldn’t meet his eyes.
“Yes, first?” Trainer Fisk said.
“A Blackguard’s training is never done, but is the testing over for today?” Cruxer asked.
Trainer Fisk said, “Yes, of course, now get to your place—”
Cruxer said nothing, but he struck like a serpent, yelling his kiyah and giving his body the sharp countertwist that made his kicks so blindingly fast and powerful. Even Kip, who was looking straight at him, barely saw the strike. Cruxer’s shin, gnarled and calcified by years of kicking against posts, crushed against Aram’s knee. Crushed it backward.
The crunching squish of a joint being obliterated split the sudden silence.
Aram crumpled to the ground, gawping, gasping, eyes agape.
Cruxer dropped his hands instantly and stood in a narrow, nonthreatening stance. Given that he was surrounded by hundreds of men and women attuned to violence and accustomed to stopping it by the most efficient means necessary, that was wise. “Training accident,” Cruxer said loudly, coolly.
For a moment, even Trainer Fisk seemed as baffled as Kip. Finally he recovered. “What have you done?!” he shouted at Cruxer.
Cruxer’s voice was cool, mechanical. “Permanent injuries inflicted during testing result in expulsion. Injuries during training do not.”
“My knee! My knee!” Aram started blubbering. From the sound of his voice, he knew, like Kip knew, like everyone here knew—he would never fight again. He’d be lucky if he ever walked again. Knee injuries like that didn’t heal. Aram was crippled.
Cruxer spoke loudly, clearly, and unapologetically. “I’ve wanted to be a Blackguard since I could walk. I value this brotherhood too highly to let in a man who destroys unity rather than builds it, a man who takes money to destroy one of his own. If the cost to remove him from the Blackguard is that I, too, am expelled, so be it.” Emotion edged his voice for a moment, but he mastered it.
“What?!” Trainer Fisk demanded. “What are you talking about?”
“Aram’s the second best fighter in our class,” Cruxer said. “He took money to finish low. He took money to keep Breaker out.”
“He’s Tyrean!” Aram shouted. “He’s a bastard! I would have done it for free! He’s not one of us!”
“You would have done it for free? So you did do it for money,” Trainer Fisk said, aggrieved, disbelieving. He shot a look over at Commander Ironfist. A straight admission of guilt. How stupid was Aram?
“He’s not one of us!” Aram shouted.
“You mean, one of you,” Commander Ironfist said, low and dangerous, stepping forward. “Because you’ll never be one of us, Aram. Unlike Breaker.”
The last word sent a shock through Kip.
“Breaker!” Trainer Fisk barked. “You heard the man. We got room for fourteen, and I only see thirteen up here. Get in line! Double time! Someone get this trash out of here.”
“No! Noo!!” Aram shouted. But the chirurgeons were there instantly and they carried him away, blubbering.
Kip limped over to the line, not even close to double time, but he felt like he was floating all the way. How much poppy had that chirurgeon given him?
No, this wasn’t the poppy.
Commander Ironfist stood in front of Kip. He took Kip’s gold fight token and snapped it into a pendant. The front of the pendant was a black flame. “This is the Flame of Erebos. It symbolizes service and sacrifice. As a candle takes on flame and is consumed to give light and heat, so is a man who takes on duty. Day by day, we give our lives to serve Orholam and his Prism. Will you take this sacred duty, Kip Guile, Breaker?”
“I will.” Kip felt little shivers.
“And will you forswear other loyalties, and have loyalty first to this body, to Orholam, and to his Prism?”
“I will.”
“Then I declare you, Breaker, a trainee in the Blackguard.”
“Breaker! Breaker!” the crowd chanted.
Ironfist let them go on for a few more seconds, then quieted them and worked his way down the line.
The rest of the ceremony passed like a dream. Each scrub was sworn in, and then the older trainees and the full Blackguards gathered around them to congratulate them.
They eventually decided to go to a tavern that the Blackguards preferred—all drinks on the new trainees, of course. Before he let himself be swept out into the evening, Kip looked for his father.
Gavin Guile was standing where Kip had left him, ignoring for the moment a messenger who’d come to him with something or other. He had eyes only for Kip. The Prism wore a bemused smirk, but maybe it was more than bemused. Maybe it was a little proud.