In the predawn light, Amaranthe Lokdon charged up the worn travertine steps of the ancient stadium. Her thighs burned, her calves ached, and sweat streamed into her eyes.
“Idiotic,” she muttered to herself between strained breaths. “Deranged...masochistic.”
A dark, round shape blurred out of the shadows. Instinctively, she lifted her hands and caught the heavy, sand-filled ball to keep it from slamming into her chest. Barely. She wobbled, the weight threatening to knock her onto the stone benches, but she compensated and continued upward. With a last burst of energy, she hurled the ball back to the shadowy figure that had appeared at the top of the stairs.
Amaranthe kept her hands up, thinking he might throw it again, but he propped it against his hip and waited. Legs trembling, she reached the top step and forced herself to stand up straight instead of collapsing in a sweaty, exhausted heap.
“Dedicated,” Sicarius said.
“What?” she asked when she caught her breath. Stars still lurked in the deep blue sky, and she could not make out his face, but it would not have hinted at his thoughts anyway.
“Your list,” he said.
Amaranthe waited for him to expound. He did not.
“You think I’m dedicated for being here, an hour before dawn, training with you? Even though I told everyone to take the week off because we’ve been working so much lately?”
“Yes.”
Figuring her pride had kept her on her feet a respectable length of time, she sat down on the closest bench.
“You don’t think I should be following my own orders and enjoying a relaxing week? I could be sleeping in or maybe planning for a day at the beach. It is summer, after all, and the weather is finally good. Yet I’m here with you, torturing myself. You don’t think I’m crazy?”
“In general, or for training?”
She scowled suspiciously at him.
A clank drifted up from the sand-covered floor of the arena below. A yawning man in city worker’s overalls shambled out of a maintenance door carrying a lantern. He headed toward the towering machine that controlled the Clank Race, a steam-powered obstacle course with a tangle of climbing walls, swaying nets, rocking platforms, and swinging axes. The contraption occupied half of the arena floor inside the running track, and boxing and wrestling rings took up the other half. The worker patted his pockets, cursed, and walked back inside.
“The athletes will show up soon to start training,” Amaranthe said. As a junior, she had competed in a smaller version of the Imperial Games, and she missed training for something as innocent as medals and honor. “I suppose we should go.”
“Yes.” Sicarius offered a hand.
Surprised, she gazed at it for a couple of seconds before clasping it. He pulled her to her feet gently and held the grip for a moment.
Amaranthe swallowed. A couple of months earlier, he had admitted he cared for her, but he had also said it would be a bad idea for them to act upon such feelings. Outwardly, she had agreed with him; inwardly, she kept hoping he would be overcome by emotion—or she would settle for lust—and tug her into his arms for a passionate kiss. Unfortunately, she could not remember having too many men overcome by lust because of her presence. Perhaps it was because she always wore her hair in a practical bun and donned utilitarian clothing more suitable to mercenary life than an evening out. Anyway, Sicarius wasn’t the type to be overcome by...anything.
He released her hand without a word and led the way down the steps. Amaranthe trailed him, wondering if she had imagined that pause. They followed a railing toward steps leading down from the elevated tiers of seating.
Sicarius stopped before he reached the stairs. A young woman climbed into view, blond hair and freckled skin illuminated by a pair of gas lamps burning on the landing. Though she wore the loose white togs of one of the athletes, she clenched a short bow in one hand and had an arrow nocked with the other. Her head turned from side to side, eyes searching the arena below.
A throwing knife appeared in Sicarius’s hand.
“Wait,” Amaranthe whispered, slipping past him.
Fear whitened the woman’s knuckles where she gripped the bow—this was no hardened bounty hunter.
Amaranthe held her hands out, palms up, and walked toward the landing. “Greetings.”
The bow jerked in her direction.
Amaranthe dropped to her belly, wincing as the hard edge of a travertine step rammed her chest. A clink sounded as the arrow skipped off the railing. Amaranthe sprang to her feet, hoping to reach the woman before she could reload.
Sicarius was already behind the woman, a knife pressed against her throat. The bow clattered to the stone floor.
Amaranthe flung her hand out, saying, “Don’t,” but Sicarius had already paused, waiting to see what she wanted to do. A few months ago, he would not have. He simply would have killed someone—anyone—who dared lift a weapon in his direction.
Amaranthe straightened her shirt and walked forward. “Care to explain why you’re shooting at the shadows? In particular, the portion of shadows I was occupying?”
Rings of white shown around the young woman’s blue irises. She opened her mouth a couple of times but did not manage to speak. She could not be more than eighteen or nineteen, and with that pale skin she was not likely a Turgonian.
Amaranthe waved a hand toward Sicarius to suggest he could loosen his grip. He did not.
“He’ll only kill you if you don’t talk,” Amaranthe said.
“Accident,” the woman whispered, a faint lilting accent marking the word. “I was tense. My sister...someone took her.”
“Oh? Like a kidnapping?” Eagerness thrummed through Amaranthe, revitalizing her tired limbs even more than being shot at had. Was there some trouble afoot? Something her team could handle? Something that could earn them attention—good attention?
“Kidnapping.” The woman started to nod but winced when the movement drew blood. Sicarius kept his knives sharp enough to split the hairs on a flea.
“Let her go, please,” Amaranthe told him. “I do believe that’s a client.”
Though Sicarius had drawn the woman back into the shadows, to stay out of the light on the landing, Amaranthe had no trouble reading the cool expression he leveled her way.
“What?” she asked him. “It’s not as if you were going to spend the week sunbathing at the beach.”
Sicarius released the woman, but he did not put away his dagger. As soon as she was free, the girl clasped a hand to her throat and lunged away from him.
“We might be able to help you,” Amaranthe said. “My name is Amaranthe. What’s yours?”
“Fasha,” she said, still holding her hand to her neck. She eased closer to Amaranthe while throwing uneasy glances at Sicarius. “Are you...athletes?”
“We’re swords for hire,” Amaranthe said.
“Mercenaries?” Fasha tensed. “Lowlife dung-crawlers that work for the highest bidder? How do I know you’re not the people who took my sister?”
“We don’t work for the highest bidder, and I’m reasonably certain I haven’t mingled with dung lately. You?” Amaranthe raised her chin toward Sicarius.
He said nothing.
“He hasn’t either,” Amaranthe said. “He’s quite fastidious.” When neither person commented, she cleared her throat and got back on topic. “We work for the good of the empire, taking on missions that the emperor would approve of in the hopes of—” getting the cursed bounties off their heads, she thought, “—winning his favor. In fact we—”
Whistling came from the arena. The worker had returned, a box of matches in hand, and he was veering toward the furnace.
“But perhaps we should discuss it elsewhere,” Amaranthe murmured.
She led the way into the shadows outside the stadium. Despite her criticism of mercenaries, Fasha picked up her bow and followed. Sicarius disappeared, but Amaranthe trusted him to stay nearby. More than anybody, he knew how good she was at finding trouble.
Voices sounded—two male athletes walking past the stadium a few dozen meters away. Amaranthe chewed on her lip. The idea of a mission excited her, but it would be foolish to linger at Barlovoc Stadium after sunrise. Though a week would pass before the Imperial Games themselves started, enforcers were already patrolling the barracks and training areas to keep the peace amongst the athletes. That thought made her wonder why Fasha had not sought out the law for help.
“Can you tell me what happened?” Amaranthe asked.
“My sister and I are here from Kendor to compete. This is the first year your Games have been open to outsiders.”
Amaranthe nodded. She had read the article in The Gazette and knew Emperor Sespian was responsible for that. Though monetary rewards had never been a prize in the empire’s biennial competition, every young citizen dreamed of competing and winning. Also there had been instances of superb athletes sweeping the events and being granted a ticket into the warrior caste, something usually reserved for outstanding wartime performances. A foreigner would not be eligible for that, but the newspaper article had mentioned a citizenship prize for those who wished it—an offer that had traditionalists grumbling in cider houses across the city.
“She didn’t come back to the barracks last night,” Fasha went on.
Amaranthe’s shoulders drooped. That was it? The girl had only been missing for a few hours? “Maybe she found a handsome young man and spent the night with him.”
“No. She’s been training too hard for this. She may celebrate after it’s all over, but for the last week she’s been in bed early and up before dawn to train. Keisha is good. Very good. She’s won every race back home. She even beats the men in anything over a hundred meters. She’s utterly serious about winning here.”
“Did you try going to the enforcers?” Amaranthe asked.
“Yes, late last night. I returned from my evening run, and Keisha wasn’t in our room. Right away, I knew something was wrong. I went to the men who guard the barracks, but they were derisive. They said nothing got past them. And they threatened to throw me in jail when I mentioned...”
Amaranthe straightened, her interest returning. “The Science?”
“You...know about the mental sciences?”
“My team has had run-ins with practitioners before.”
“Oh!” Fasha’s clothing rustled as she brushed Amaranthe’s shoulder with a pat made clumsy by the darkness. It was an enthusiastic pat though. “Maybe you can help. The enforcers told me it’s forbidden to talk about magic—that was their ignorant word for it. Two breaths later, they told me magic doesn’t exist. If it doesn’t exist, why would it be forbidden to speak of it? Ignorant heathens.”
“Yes, the empire’s stance isn’t entirely logical,” Amaranthe admitted. “What did you actually sense? Are you a practitioner yourself?”
“No, but there’s a shaman in our tribe, and you come to recognize the Science being practiced when you grow up around it. I sensed...a definite residue. I believe something was done to my sister so she’d be easy to steal away.”
Amaranthe tapped her fingers against her thigh. “I’d like to see your room. I used to be an—” she stopped herself from saying enforcer, since that might not breed confidence in the girl, “—an investigator. Is it private, or are there others staying in there?”
“We paid for a private room.”
“Any windows?” Amaranthe supposed she would have to admit she was a wanted woman at some point and that she could not stroll past enforcers without risk of being recognized and captured—or shot.
“No, it’s a little room on the inside of the building.”
“Near a backdoor, by chance?”
“No....” Fasha sounded puzzled. “Does it matter? We can bring guests in.”
“My comrade and I are wanted by the law.”
Fasha’s lips formed an “Oh,” but no sound came out.
Amaranthe eyed the brightening sky. More and more athletes were on the road leading past the stadium, and the barracks would be an active place. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll think of something. Let’s go.”
Amaranthe had taken only a few steps when a dark figure appeared at her shoulder. She jumped despite the fact she ought to know better by now.
“We’re going inside the barracks?” Sicarius asked.
Now Fasha jumped and sidled several steps away. The brightening sky revealed Sicarius’s unexpressive angular face, his fitted, black clothing, and the variety of daggers and throwing knives adorning it. Fasha fingered her bow.
“It’s fine,” Amaranthe said. “He’s my most trusted ally.”
“That’d be more comforting if you hadn’t just admitted to being wanted by the law,” Fasha said.
“You didn’t think you’d find a Science-savvy mercenary team in the empire without a few eccentricities, did you?” Amaranthe asked.
“The barracks,” Sicarius repeated, cutting out whatever reply Fasha might have made.
“I’ll sneak by the enforcers and check it out,” Amaranthe told him. “I won’t be long. You can wait outside. If they try to drag me off to Enforcer Headquarters, you can be nice and provide a distraction so I can slip away. A non-death-causing distraction.”
“The last time you went into the enemy camp while I waited outside,” Sicarius said, “someone threw a blasting stick at me.”
“As I recall it was at the position you’d recently vacated, but, thanks to your hyper-vigilance, fast reflexes, and quick mind, you evaded the attack and were long gone when the cliff top crumbled.”
Amaranthe smiled, hoping to tease a light response out of Sicarius, something that might show Fasha he had a side that was not entirely dark and scary.
Birds twittered in the branches of trees lining the road. Thunks and whistles of steam came from within the stadium, signifying the Clank Race gearing up.
Finally, Sicarius spoke. “I see. Your plan is to flatter your way past the enforcers.”
Amaranthe’s smile did not fade. “If the plan doesn’t work, maybe so.”