Hashim instantly elbowed his way to the front of the crowd, nine other competitors right behind him. Grabbing the side of the arena, he hauled himself up and over. He landed with a splash and immediately went for his weapon of choice—a short pole with a wickedly spiked ball at the end of its long chain.
Javan stepped away from the throng of prisoners who were being herded by the guards toward the same spot Hashim had used, each trying to scramble into the arena in time to find the weapon he or she wanted.
Gambling that the guards wouldn’t see him in time to stop him, Javan sized up his path, and then ran straight for the section of the wall directly between the competitors and the barrels full of beasts.
Someone shouted, but it was too late as Javan grabbed the edge of the short wall and leaped. Twisting in midair, he cleared the wall and landed with a splash. He dove forward, and water rushed over his head as he kicked his feet against the wall, propelling himself directly into the center of the arena where a pair of short swords were anchored to the floor with a stone. Several strong kicks later, and he was there. Shoving the stone aside, he grabbed the sword hilts, found his footing, and stood, his hands shaking as energy flooded his body.
The applause was deafening as he shook his hair out of his eyes and looked up.
All eyes in the arena were trained on him, though he caught several people glancing quickly at the palace steward, who stood alone in the royal box recording participation on his sheaf of parchment. A flurry of conversations erupted as the aristocracy realized the competitor who’d made the grand entrance into the ring was the new prisoner. He swept the crowd with his gaze, meeting their eyes and willing someone to recognize him.
Yl’ Haliq be merciful, please let someone recognize him.
As the rest of the competitors landed in the arena and rushed for weapons, Javan felt a chill on the back of his neck. He glanced at Sajda, fully expecting her to be treating him to her I’m-about-to-remove-your-vital-organs glare, but her expression was nothing but icy indifference. Craning his neck, he found himself locking gazes with the warden, who stood on the platform directly behind him.
He imagined there was something familiar in the way she was looking at him, and then shook it off. Of course there was something familiar. Sajda had given him the same treatment. Maybe this was where she’d learned how to intimidate others without saying a word.
Turning away from the warden, Javan swallowed a sudden lump in his throat and braced himself as two guards hefted a barrel and slowly tipped it into the wooden chute. The chute rattled and shook as a dozen venomous snakes slithered down its length and into the water. Javan’s knees shook as the jagged pulse of fear exploded into brilliant strands of terror. He forced himself to keep his feet planted when everything in him wanted to swim for the relative safety of a wall.
He couldn’t win if he played it safe.
The crowd roared with excitement as a prisoner close to the chute suddenly went underwater. Seconds later a steady stream of flesh-eating fish slid off the chute and into the water, and crimson bloomed where the prisoner had gone under.
Javan looked away as the two water dragons dove into the arena. He couldn’t watch the beasts entering the combat zone. He needed all his focus for the water.
Carefully scanning the area around him, he breathed deeply.
Fear out.
Courage in.
There. A pair of darting shadows whisked by his boots and began circling. Another big splash sounded from the chute as Javan held his breath and ducked under the water in a crouch.
The fish were plump silvery things with blue-tipped tails and yellow eyes. He watched carefully, timing their movements, and then drove his swords down as they came for his legs.
His swords each skewered a fish; but before he could stand, something large slammed into him and sent him sprawling.
He twisted, his back to the floor, and raked his sword tips across the belly of a water dragon. A few damaged scales spun into the water, but the moss-green lizard with the spiny ridges and thick fangs seemed unaffected.
As its thick, muscular body passed above him, Javan lunged to his feet. Something tore at his arm, and he stabbed a sword through another fish before flinging himself onto the fleeing dragon’s back.
The creature growled, a hoarse, guttural sound, and writhed beneath Javan’s grip. Its spiny tail whipped through the air, slicing into Javan’s back and sending an arc of water flying.
The water was turning murky with blood—from Javan and from other prisoners around him. The air was filled with cries of pain and rage and the thunderous clamor of the crowd above them.
Terror was a fire burning through Javan, screaming at him to get out of the water. To run because surely no punishment the warden could deliver was worse than the monsters that circled him now.
Ignoring the urge to run, Javan concentrated on the water dragon. The beast was nearly impossible to hold on to. It twisted, its dense body several handspans longer than Javan’s, and snapped its elongated snout toward Javan’s face. He flung his head back, wincing as the wet end of the creature’s nose scraped across his neck.
Panic flared, sending his heartbeat crashing against his ears. How did you kill a water dragon? The scales were impossible to penetrate with a sword.
The creature twisted again, and now Javan was holding the underbelly, which was just as well armored as the rest. Something brushed past his leg, and he prayed it wasn’t the lake crawler ready to swallow him whole or the worm with its distended jaw aiming for his exposed body.
Screams rose from a prisoner to his right, but Javan didn’t look. He had his hands full. The dragon was rolling like a barrel, its jaw coming perilously close to Javan’s arms. He loosened his grip and then grabbed on again as the lizard shot forward. The creature reared back and snapped at Javan’s head, and the prince found himself staring past a row of thick fangs to the soft flesh of the beast’s throat.
Yl’ Haliq preserve him, there was only one way to do this, and it was going to hurt.
As the dragon twisted and came at him again, Javan let go of its body with his left arm, aimed his sword, and shoved his arm into the beast’s mouth.
The blade bit deep, and the dragon’s jaw closed.
Agony blazed through Javan, raw and blistering, as the fangs sank into his arm. Raising the hilt of his other sword, he smashed it repeatedly against the lizard’s snout. The creature thrashed wildly, and Javan saw stars at the edge of his vision. But then the dragon’s jaw relaxed, and it gave one more feeble twist before going limp.
Trembling from the pain and the residual panic, Javan turned and caught the eye of the closest judge, a girl wearing a red tunic with a white sash, and heaved the body of the dragon toward her. She checked his armband and nodded once as he slid the two fish who’d stayed on his right sword into the water. He’d lost the other sword to the dragon’s throat. She wrote his score on the parchment she held while he turned to see what else he could kill.
The entire ring was in chaos.