“Lia! Over here!”

  Leonotis flinched.

  Zola was on her feet, waving enthusiastically from a crowded bench, her bright smile a beacon he couldn't ignore. Beside her, Adebayo raised a hand in a more reserved but equally insistent greeting. They had saved him a spot. Trapped, Leonotis gave a weak, mechanical wave and navigated the crowded steps, the last of his hope for a quiet respite dissolving with each step.

  He made a conscious choice as he approached, deliberately moving to sit on the other side of Adebayo, putting the solid, steady presence of the wrestler between himself and Zola. He couldn't face her bright, honest energy right now, not after his strange, panicked outburst the night before. The shame of it was still a fresh sting.

  He sank onto the stone bench, pulling his cowl low and offering a mumbled greeting. Adebayo gave him a respectful nod.

  “A victory of impossible skill,” the wrestler said, his voice a low hum of admiration. “You have the heart of a lion, Lia.”

  Leonotis just nodded, unable to form a reply, his gaze fixed on the sand below.

  He felt Amara settle beside him, a sudden pocket of calm in the chaotic energy of the crowd. He didn't have to look to know who it was. The air shifted, carrying a scent that was both deeply grounding and dizzyingly intoxicating—the smell of jasmine and cool river stone.

  She had taken the spot directly next to him. His heart, which had just begun to slow, kicked into a frantic, hammering rhythm against his ribs. He could feel the warmth radiating from her, though they weren’t touching. He risked a sideways glance. She was watching him, her dark, intelligent eyes holding an unnerving intensity. They weren't just looking at him; they seemed to be reading the very air around him.

  Leonotis’s face flushed hot.

  He was acutely aware of every small detail: the way the sunlight caught the gold threads in her robes, the calm, steady rhythm of her breathing, the sheer, overwhelming fact of her proximity. His mind, which should have been focused on the arena, on Low’s impending fight, was a whirlwind of confusion and a strange, unfamiliar warmth.

  He was so lost in the sudden, suffocating bubble of his own awareness that he didn't even notice when the next combatants entered the ring.

  He missed the herald’s call.

  He missed the salutes.

  He missed the opening drumbeat.

  What finally shattered his trance was a sound.

  It wasn't a clash. It was an explosion. A scream of tortured metal and splintering stone that ripped through the coliseum, so violent and absolute that the entire crowd flinched as one.

  CRACK-BOOM!

  Leonotis’s head snapped toward the arena, his heart lurching. Shards of glittering steel and stone rained down on the sand like deadly confetti. In the center of the pit stood two figures, both now unarmed, their weapons having disintegrated in a single, apocalyptic strike.

  On one side was Low, her Grom disguise making her look as steady as a block of granite, her stance wide and unyielding. On the other was a giant of a man, his bare chest a tapestry of glowing blue war-ink tattoos. This was Kazimir Bloodaxe, a berserker from the northern tribes, his face a mask of pure, homicidal fury.

  “By the ancestors,” Adebayo breathed, his strategic calm momentarily shattered by the sheer spectacle of power. “I have never seen two axes shatter like that. The force required is… monumental.”

  Zola was on her feet, her hands gripping the railing. “He’s twice his size! How can Grom possibly win a brawl with him?”

  Kazimir roared, a sound that was more beast than man, and charged. He didn't run; he stampeded. His fists, each the size of a small boulder, came down like the snap of a crocodile’s jaws. The first punch missed, cracking a decorative stone at the edge of the ring. The second slammed into Low’s raised forearm with a sickening thud that echoed through the stands.

  Low grunted, driven back a step, but she held her ground. Her face, beneath the fake beard, was a mask of grim determination.

  “He is a landslide,” Adebayo murmured, his analytical gaze returning. “Pure, unstoppable momentum. There is no strategy in his attack, only force.”

  Kazimir rained blows down on her—on her shoulders, her chest, her arms. Low wasn't dodging. She was absorbing the punishment, her body a fortress of endurance, her feet planted in the sand as if they had grown roots. The crowd roared with every brutal impact, a visceral, bloodthirsty symphony.

  “Why isn’t he moving?” Zola cried, her hands curling into tight fists. “He has to dodge! He’s going to break him!”

  “No,” Amara said, her voice drawing Leonotis’s attention back to her. He looked over and saw that her gaze was fixed on the fight with a serene, analytical focus. “He is not being broken. He is measuring him.”

  Leonotis frowned. “Measuring him?”

  “Watch his feet,” Amara instructed quietly. “They do not move, but his weight shifts with every blow he lands. He is learning his rhythm, feeling the limits of his rage. This is not a contest of strength.” She turned her intense gaze on him for a heartbeat. “It is a contest of patience.”

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  Her insight was so sharp, so accurate, that it startled him. She saw what he saw, what he knew of Low’s true nature: the immense, almost supernatural endurance, the cunning mind that hid behind the brute force.

  Down in the pit, Kazimir was beginning to tire, his wild swings becoming slightly slower, his breath coming in ragged, furious gasps. He had thrown everything he had at the unmoving dwarf, and the dwarf was still standing. His frustration boiled over into a final, desperate charge. He roared, lowered his head, and lunged forward like a maddened bison.

  “There,” Adebayo said, a note of admiration in his voice. “The mistake.”

  “He waited for it,” Amara whispered.

  It happened in the blink of an eye.

  Just as Kazimir was about to crash into her, Low didn't brace for impact. She moved. In one fluid, shockingly graceful motion, she pivoted on her back foot. She didn't try to stop his charge; she simply got out of its way. As the berserker hurtled past her, she dropped her shoulder, seized the giant’s waist, and used his own unstoppable forward momentum to heave.

  It was the perfect application of a Laamb throw.

  The trickster using the mountain’s own weight to bring it down.

  Kazimir Bloodaxe, the landslide of a man, was lifted from his feet. He seemed to hang in the air for an impossible moment, his roar of fury turning into a bellow of shock, before he crashed onto the sand with a sound that shook the entire amphitheater. The impact sent a plume of dust and grit high into the air.

  For a heartbeat, the arena was utterly silent.

  The only sound was the wind.

  Then the explosion of noise hit like a physical wave—a deafening, unified roar of triumph, disbelief, and pure, blood-pumping frenzy.

  Low stood over the fallen giant, her chest rising and falling heavily. Her fake beard was slightly askew, her knuckles were bloody, and a fresh cut was weeping red above her eye. She was battered, bruised, but she was victorious.

  A wave of pure, unadulterated relief washed over Leonotis, so potent it nearly made him dizzy. He was on his feet, shouting with the rest of them, the name “Grom!” tearing from his throat, all his own anxieties momentarily forgotten in the fierce pride he felt for his friend.

  “He used his own strength to break him!” Adebayo shouted over the din, a wide, appreciative grin on his face. “He turned his rage into a weapon against himself! Brilliant!”

  Zola was jumping up and down, her cheers lost in the tidal wave of sound.

  Amara didn’t shout. She simply watched Low with a small, knowing smile full of respect. Leaning close to Leonotis, her voice cut through the chaos.

  “Patience,” she said, as if finishing their earlier conversation. “It is the strongest armor a warrior can wear.”

  Leonotis struggled to hear her over the frantic pounding of his heart.

  Jabara, waiting for the crowd to calm down from excitement, raising her arms to the ecstatic crowd.

  “Behold! The victor, by a feat of impossible strength and cunning—Grom Stonehand!”

  The roar that answered was the roar of a crowd that had just witnessed the birth of a new legend.

  Low raised a bloody fist to the stands, a silent acknowledgment of their cheers, before turning and limping toward the exit tunnel, leaving the unconscious berserker to the healers.

  The mountain had fallen, and the dwarf stood tall.

  The dust hadn’t even fully settled before King Rega leaned back in his gilded seat, the faintest spark of excitement flickering beneath his otherwise icy expression. The crowd's thunderous cheering rolled over the arena in waves, but the king listened only to the rhythm beneath it—the cadence of potential, threat, and opportunity.

  Kenya and Zuri stood a half-step behind him, each tense for different reasons.

  Zuri’s eyes tracked the unconscious bulk of Kazimir being hauled away by arena healers. Kenya’s mask was tilted toward the arena exit where the dwarf limped toward the tunnels with silent grit.

  Rega exhaled through his teeth.

  “Well,” he said dryly, “that was… unexpected.”

  Zuri glanced at him. “Your Majesty expected Kazimir to win?”

  Rega didn’t answer immediately. He watched the battered dwarf vanish into the shadows of the tunnel, his fingers drumming lightly on the armrest.

  “Kazimir was a northern berserker. Our troops have told me their kind do not fall easily,” the king said. “And yet this ‘Grom’ uprooted him like a rotten baobab. Either the tribes have grown weak…” His eyes narrowed. “…or we have truly underestimated the dwarf.”

  Kenya tilted her head. “Do you believe the fighter is hiding something? Strength like that is rare, even among seasoned warriors.”

  Rega didn’t look away from the tunnel.

  “This is the second time he displayed unnatural strength. Oh, he is hiding something. Several somethings.”

  Zuri’s fingers tightened around her spear. “Should we have him followed?”

  “No.” Rega waved her off. “Not yet. Whoever he is, he’s not clever enough to disguise his strength and foolish enough to enter my tournament. That means he knows nothing of subtlety, or he’s bold enough to think I won’t notice.”

  Kenya folded her arms. “Or perhaps he doesn’t care if you notice.”

  Rega gave a thin smile. “Then he truly is a fool.”

  The king turned from the arena, resting his elbow on the throne’s side and tapping a finger thoughtfully against his jaw.

  “But that throw…” he murmured.

  Zuri blinked. “Your Majesty watches fighting technique?”

  Rega shot her a flat look. “Zuri. I am king, not blind.”

  Kenya gave a low, amused grunt behind her carved mask.

  Rega’s eyes returned to the arena floor, his gaze sharp as a hawk’s.

  “That dwarf… Grom…” He shook his head. “No ordinary fighter could have done that to Kazimir. He used the berserker’s own momentum with perfect timing.”

  “Patience,” Kenya echoed Amara’s earlier conclusion unknowingly. “A trait rare in warriors.”

  Rega scoffed. “Or rare in dwarves.” He leaned forward slightly. “But if he used patience, then he used intelligence. And that interests me far more than strength.”

  Zuri frowned. “You think he’s connected to the other anomalies?”

  Rega didn’t respond, but the glint in his eyes said everything.

  “I think,” he said slowly, “that every year there are good fighters. But this year?” He gestured toward the arena, toward the crowd still chanting Grom’s name. “This year there are players. And pieces being moved.”

  Kenya’s mask turned toward him. “Pieces moved by who?”

  Rega shrugged with unsettling calm.

  “That,” he said, “is what we are going to find out.”

  The drums boomed again, summoning the crowd to order for the next match. Jabara’s wind-chime staff sounded faintly somewhere below, preparing her proclamation.

  Rega rose to his feet, his cloak catching the light like molten gold.

  “Keep an eye on the dwarf,” he ordered. “Quietly. If he is what I suspect… our problems may be larger than assassins in the dark.”

  Zuri bowed. “As you command.”

  Kenya’s voice dropped low. “And if he becomes a threat?”

  Rega smiled—small, sharp, almost pleasant.

  “Then,” he said, turning back toward the royal hallway, “I remove him from the board.”

  He stepped away, his guards falling into place behind him as the crowd roared for the next spectacle.