Two-World Traders (progression fantasy)

The Gray Academy's modest stone sparring ring seldom looked so grand as it did the day of the sparring competition. A few dozen collectors stood watching, circling the ring, some with keen interest, others with casual merriment. In Sailor's Rise, Elias had seen more people in a long queue at the Trader's Bank, but within the invisible walls of The Gray Academy, among its small, secret civilization, this green and gold audience was about as large as they ever got.

Elias could feel the weight of their collective gaze.

Even the sun had joined them for the occasion. Notably absent, however, were most of the high collectors, including Mr. Grimsby, whom Elias had stumbled into the night before. They had been told they would be here, and yet only High Collector Redcaller, who was officiating the tournament, stood anywhere in sight. This was strange, especially in the absence of an explanation or apology. The question had not even been raised.

Perhaps everyone was too busy trying to win. Elias was quite certain a group of onlookers in their late twenties or early thirties had taken bets. That was one way to collect relics, he supposed. He wondered if any of them had bet on Maria or Dion, the latter of whom at least possessed the air of competence. Both had been eliminated in the first round.

Despite sparring countless times together over the past few weeks, it was clear that some students were simply better suited to combat than others. While almost everyone had improved (save, perhaps, Maria), that also applied to the best of them: Elias, Harriet, Caius, and Keo. No one from their class, at least, should have been surprised that it was these four who made up the tournament's final competitors.

Elias was paired against Keo, Harriet against Caius, and the winners of these respective rounds would face one another for the honor of a prizeless victory.

Keo was as formidable as he'd ever been. It had taken Elias a while to figure out which school he would have belonged to, until eventually Keo reluctantly answered Valshynar, as he did not enjoy being judged according to such things. Perhaps Keo's greatest strength—one not captured within the five virtues of the Five Great Schools—was his relentless determination. Elias nonetheless bested the Southlander, who accepted his defeat with grace, though there had been some close calls. It was the first time anyone that day had truly challenged him.

The fight between Harriet and Caius was even closer, and more than once Elias believed the woman whom he watched affectionally was about to win. But that was Caius's unique talent: winning at the margins, with a precise cut that no one had seen coming save Caius himself. It was how he got Harriet in the end. What looked like another parry, her strikes coming fast and furious, struck her at an unexpected angle, wooden tip touching her neck. Harriet was visibly disappointed albeit eminently professional. The fault, as always, was her own.

Elias did not try to console her as she stepped out of the ring, resisting the temptation to rest a reassuring hand on her back. She would have recoiled from it.

And so the final round was upon them. Elias versus Caius. Again, no one should have been surprised. The pair had practiced against one another many times, enough that Elias had lost count of their wins and losses, of who had won more and loss less. It did not matter. The only victory that anyone would remember was yet to be determined.

Elias and Caius retrieved their wooden swords one after the other, the latter man lifting his above his head. Caius's high guard. Elias was used to fighting it by now, though there was another layer of this man and their myriad duels together that he could never quite peel away, no matter how many times they sparred: the feeling that he was fighting the brother of the man he had killed, that every swing felt like him fending off the truth, and every mistake like Caius might cut away the lie until the former was laid bare.

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All eyes were on them now, save for those of the surprisingly absent. Once they were in position, High Collector Redcaller looked at one combatant and then the other, eyes ticking side to side like a clock pendulum. "Begin," she said. She had never been one for pageantry.

For the purposes of this tournament, a fight was won only from a hypothetically mortal blow, or at least a debilitating one. Grazing an arm or a leg would not count, though—again, hypothetically—lopping one off might. It impacted the way some students fought. Faster fighters often preferred scoring easier cuts that would have slowed their opponent down in real combat, turning the tide in their favor. This was a common tactic with the rapier—poking tiny in holes in one's opponent—but swinging a hefty wooden stick was nothing like the dance of that weightless weapon.

Everything seemed particularly well suited to Caius, who had always loved his heavy swings, his unexpected finishers. Elias, who had fought life-or-death battles with a rapier, did not complain. He was not here to win, remember? Or had he forgotten that?

Elias attacked first—a whip-fast, almost rapier-like jab—trying to surprise his opponent. Caius hopped backward, easily staying out of range. The second and third swings were also Elias's. Caius was fighting defensively, as he often did with Elias, though perhaps even more so today, perhaps because he actually had something to lose.

Elias was searching for an opening and finding none, even with the assistance of his gift. Among the Valshynar, utilizing the sight was not cheating. It was expected of him. And no one expected it more than Caius, who moved like a rolling fortress, arms and eyes stiff and level.

When the taller of the two men finally made his opening attack, it was an ambitious one, meant, like all of his attacks, to end the fight then and there. It did not. Elias had stepped a foot too close as they were circling one another, and Caius had not hesitated. He swung hard and far, not toward where Elias had been but to where he would retreat. He nicked the toe of his boot.

It won him a smirk—but not a victory. The fight continued.

Elias needed a strategy. Caius would never give him an opening unless he was thrown off-balance, but the only way Elias could achieve such a thing was by fighting even more aggressively. It was risky. In one respect, it was exactly what his opponent wanted him to do—grow impatient and make a mistake—but Caius would expect him to hold back somewhat, to employ obvious caution, to fight as they had fought a dozen times before.

Elias reminded himself once more that he was not here to win, so why not have some fun? It might just work in his favor.

He lunged. Caius parried. Another swing, followed by a thrust that barely missed Caius's lean stomach. A subtle look of surprise flashed across his face as he overcorrected—as Elias grazed his forearm.

A smirk for a smirk, but again, the fight continued.

Caius adjusted to Elias's furious onslaught, ramping up his own aggression. A reverberating swing was blocked an inch from Elias, who responded seconds later with a strong swing of his own that would have ended Caius had his shirt been a part of his body. Everyone watched on with a keen exuberance. They were undeniably entertained, but were they impressed? Elias couldn't spare them a second thought.

So focused was he on his duel with Caius that he was apparently last to notice the northerner running down the hill toward them, an ascendant Valshynarian Elias had seen strolling the halls of the Gray Academy. He was yelling something, but his message was like a banner blowing in the wind, almost but never quite decipherable.

Caius stopped fighting first, lowering his wooden weapon as Elias did the same, waiting for the interruption. The sprinting northerner blasted through the thin crowd that circled the sparring ring, knocking shoulders without apology. Hands on his knees, he stopped and took two breaths before speaking again, ensuring everyone would hear him this time.

"They're arresting Dawnlight!" he yelled loud and clear. "They're arresting High Collector Lucas Dawnlight!"

Elias matched eyes with Caius, who appeared equally dumbfounded. High Collector Redcaller, meanwhile, gazed back toward the academy, making eye contact with no one. As for Harriet, Elias's petite partner appeared unusually pale.

One by one, people peeled away from the ring, many running toward the stone building looming large in the distance. Elias's fight with Caius would never know its winner, though he suspected a victor would hardly have been remembered anyway. Not as they ran from the bluff and up the hill as if trying to beat a storm. Elias could not quite keep up with Harriet.