Chapter 3
More than two months have passed since she’d fallen into this wretched world, May’s last week had ended, giving birth to a cruel summer, and even that had passed, but there had been no reply to her Patronus, each passing day meant a dwindling hope, a lifetime slipping away like meager grains of sands, the group that had accepted her —Scarlet Guard— traveled around a lot, after Corvium they’d escaped to a city called Delphie, stopping at something called The Whistle Points, it had taken four of those spots to confirm whistle was an underground network, where no operative knew each other, only a confirmation where one was stationed.
There were only two things common among the four: their surname and a red band tattooed on their wrists, Tristian who had been more often than not assigned with her (more to keep an eye on her) was a twitchy, skeptical man with a wicked sense of humor, and mean trigger finger, was their decoy, having a fake red band tattooed around his wrist. They'd already found the Whistle who lived here, Will, an old man with an even older wagon, selling stale, hard bread in this small village by day and running the black market by night.
Now, they walk across the crowded streets of Albanus (a small village called the Stilts by the locals), the air stinks with the smells of sweat under the heat of the August sun, despite the storm yesterday. The markets close as people make way to a huge arena in the city, Feat of Friday, where the rulers of this realm flaunt their powers, their reasons to enslave more than half of their specie.
(Apparently they’re humans, emerging about a millennia or so from now, but as a witch she knows a lot of those who look human but aren’t, despite their encounter with them in Corvium, she’s skeptical)
Farley and the rest stayed back, out of the village, while she, Tristian and Tye have been sent to mix in the crowd and watch the show the Silvers will put, they may use it to scare the red populace, but for rats in the walls, it was a way to discern those they were fighting.
The Silvers fighting would be from the High Houses, and the skills they show off in the arena of a village whose importance came from being the closest Red settlement to the King’s Summer Residence, would give them a way to discern their actual strength.
Would help them understand the hierarchy of the Silver Rule, because who would snoop so low to fight here and not in Summerton, would help them understand the unadulterated fear Silvers harbored for Red.
Unadulterated fear, because in a few days when the information about Norta’s military bases that Scarlet Guard has is put to use, the difference in strictness and cruelty would help them set a scale to use to topple the hierarchy.
Making their way up the stone steps, they looks around, assessing their surroundings, Security officers are everywhere, carrying long rifles or pistols, their black-and-silver uniforms and polished, grey-toned skin standing out in the crowd of rags and copper.
The inside of the arena is hot, the heat and the stench of sweat mixed with the humidity is, something. But the three look around, trying to find a place with shade, a vantage point and a clear route of escape. Tye being Lakelander and not used to the hotpot mess this is, sways on her feet before Tristian’s hand steadies her, finding a place they sit on the long concrete benches, near one of the exits, high enough that the Silver’s boxes provide a shadow and Zoya’s heightened senses can pick up on what they say.
Before coming here she had casted a localized notice-me-not charm on her face, making so that anyone who looks at her cannot register her scars or the color of her eyes, the same, she has done for the other two, hiding their distinct Lakelander and Piedmontian features.
“Ladies and gentlemen, Silvers and Reds, welcome to First Friday, the Feat of August.” The announcer’s bored voice echoes around the arena, magnified by the walls, the villagers cheer, either it is for the rations the Silver guards throw at them or they’re just excited to see silver blood spilled on the sand is lost to the three.
The announcer then introduces the two Silvers fighting, a Cantos Carros, a Silver from Harbor Bay and the other, Samson Merandus from the Capital.
In the sweltering heat they watch the ensuing bloodbath, how at first Cantos Carros seems to be winning, throwing Samson around like a ragdoll and then the Strongarm stops, and Zoya shifts in her seat, recognizing the way his body locks, muscles betraying the mind, the roaring crowd falls silent, eyes wide as they watch ahead, as the Strongarm’s sword pierces his flesh, as the sound of metal on meat echoes.
The match ends, and the crowd is ushered out by Swifts, runners who pass by in a blur to the normal eye, but she sees them push and prod the crowd, containing them in a close circle as the weight and force of the people behind ushers the ones in the front down the stairs and onto the streets.
On their way back, they see some boats float upriver, to Summerton, the Summer Residence of the Monarchy. More Silvers going up river compared to the last few years, the people in this village have said, wondering to themselves the reason. Tristian had managed to charm the information out of a guard, not a secret, nothing of their importance, just an event for the Silvers to choose their new queen, a Queenstrial.
When they return to their hideaway, an abandoned, overgrown post in the sparse woods, it is already sunset and Farley has already gone to met the Whistle of this town, instead of following the other two to the little clearing where Cara and Little Coop cook fish, Zoya moves to the river, a dirty, green thing, sparse of life, Tristian's suspicious eyes follow her, ignoring them, she climbs a tree and watches the waning moon, surrounded by stars and constellations, the only thing familiar to her.