Blood dripped from his brow. Auren blinked hard before it could blind him. The weight of a hundred eyes in the courtyard kept him from wiping it away—not when every one of them had come to see if he was worthy of standing where he stood. The red sting blurred his opponent, but he held his ground. Bleeding wouldn’t end the match. It never had for any heir before him.
Both he and Jori were still standing, the hard-packed earth scraping the bottoms of their bare feet. Jori’s nose ran freely, one eye swollen nearly shut. Auren’s breath came in sharp pulls, sweat soaking the front of his blue tunic. He could finish it now. Take Jori’s blind side. Win, like he was supposed to. Like they expected.
His toes dug into the dirt, muscles tensing to move. Jori coughed and spat, a bright red stain darkening the ground between them.
Auren froze.
Blood didn’t bother him. It never had. But the way Jori looked did—the uneven breath, the way he had to force one eye open just to see him. This wasn’t training. Training had rules. Control. Partners who walked away. This… wasn’t that.
Auren’s gaze flicked toward crowd, all three hundred members of the Bastion watching but his eyes found the council. The four who sat beside his father, faces like stone, but he lingered on Jun’s face. The Cadre commander leaned forward in his seat, his mouth moving as if giving orders Auren couldn’t hear. If he struck now, Jori would go down. The match would end. Everyone would see what they needed to see.
If he didn’t—
The thought didn’t finish, but it didn’t need to. He’d lived with it long enough. One mistake. One moment of weakness. That was all it would take for them to remember what he was before the spirits brought him here.
Not one of them.
The crowd shouted and Jori moved first. Auren saw the punch coming and flung out a hand to deflect. But Jori’s fist was a feint. Instead of striking, Jori’s fingers clamped onto Auren’s wrist like an iron cuff.
In one fluid motion, Jori dropped. His knees hit the ground with a thud, his body pivoting as he tucked his shoulder deep into Auren’s hip. The world tilted. With Jori’s weight anchored low, Auren had no leverage left; he was hauled over Jori’s back, the courtyard spinning as he was slammed into the dirt.
Auren flipped to his stomach and pushed up, trying to find his footing. He made it to his knees, but Jori was faster. An arm snaked around Auren's throat from behind, the older boy’s weight pressing his face into the dirt.
The crowd fell silent as Auren clawed at the forearm, his fingers catching skin and tunic as he fought for a pocket of air. He tried to pitch forward, to throw Jori off his back, but Jori leaned into the movement. He yanked Auren backward, his legs coiling around Auren’s waist.
Locked in Jori’s grasp, Auren felt the world begin to dim. The arm at his throat tightened, turning the courtyard into a blur of grey and shadow.