“Excuse me,” Kiva hissed, not caring how Cresta had become multilingual, “but can you go back to the part about them killing —”
“It’s an empty threat intended to excite the crowd,” Ashlyn quickly assured Kiva. “They wouldn’t dare hurt —”
“They would.”
The two words, said low and serious, came from Naari. She then looked straight at Kiva and said, “Whatever happens next, you absolutely must not use your power in here. The kings covet magic, especially in their warriors, but like most people, they believe anomalies are rare — and they’ve certainly never seen healing magic before. If they learn what you can do, they’ll never allow you to leave Yirin. Do you understand?”
Kiva swallowed and swiftly nodded. She didn’t question why, after a week of Naari ignoring her, the guard was now worried about what might happen to her. Instead, she repeated, her voice hoarse with dread, “What’s the Arzavaar?”
Thembi stopped speaking, but then Ryuu started, his words prompting the crowd to shout and clap and stomp their feet.
Hurriedly, Naari shared, “Women in Jiirva are considered special kinds of warriors, often more lethal than the men. At ten years of age, every girl across the kingdom is presented to the Rakavan — the Elite Guard — and those who show promise are invited to attend their nearest arena for training. Almost all of them accept, since it’s a great honor to be selected — the greatest a Jiirvan family can claim. The girls with the most potential are then brought here, to the capital. Once they turn fifteen, their training ends, and they’re made to fight each other, for glory and riches — and for the crowd’s entertainment.” Her amber eyes scanned from the water ring all the way across to the fire barrier, then up to the screaming audience, before she finally revealed, “Arzavaar translates to ‘Warrior Trial.’ It’s what those women must undergo if they wish to advance beyond arena battles and become full-fledged Rakavan. It’s how they prove their worth — and it’s apparently how we’ll be proving ours.”
A choked sound left Kiva. “Warrior Trial? But we’re not —”
Something King Ryuu said caused both Naari and Ashlyn to reach for their weapons. The princess handed one of her swords to Cresta, and Naari pulled a long dagger from her belt and shoved it toward Kiva.
She didn’t take it.
Naari moved closer. “Our opponents will be desperate; they’re one battle away from everything they’ve spent years working toward — and once they nominate themselves for the Trial, they only get one chance to claim victory.” Her features were hard as she declared, “The Arzavaar is a fight to the death, Kiva. Kill or be killed — those are our only options.” Kiva’s mouth dropped open, but Naari wasn’t finished. “If you want to save Jaren, Caldon, and Tipp, if you want any of us to leave this place, then you need to survive. We need to survive.”
This time, when Naari held out the dagger, Kiva closed her numb fingers around the hilt.
“I can’t use this,” she breathed, staring at the deadly blade. “Not just because I don’t know how, but I’m a healer. I can’t hurt —”
“Just stay close to us,” Ashlyn said, shifting nearer. “We won’t let anyone get to you.”
Neither Naari nor Cresta showed the same level of confidence, their faces grim.
“Remember what I said about your magic,” Naari warned again. “No matter what, you can’t —”
“Friends from Evalon!” King Ryuu’s voice interrupted her, echoing loudly down to them in the common tongue. “In order to claim what you seek, you must first be proclaimed victors of the Arzavaar. Behold, your opponents!”
A near-deafening roar came from the crowd when the flaming barrier parted, revealing six women who stepped into the middle ring, the fire returning once they were through. They each had different skin tones — two tanned, two pale, two dark — but all were dressed in supple red body armor, their leather skirts and breastplates glinting with silver plating, their shins protected by shining greaves, their wrists strapped with metallic braces.
Six against four, Kiva realized, the dagger trembling in her hand.
“Your male companions have been warned not to interfere using their magic, or you’ll be instantly disqualified,” King Ryuu went on, and Kiva had a feeling he didn’t just mean they wouldn’t be given Sarana’s ring, the words fight to the death still ringing in her ears. “However, no such restrictions are upon you — or your opponents.”
One of the warrior-women grinned widely, revealing a mouth full of jagged teeth. At the flick of her pale finger, wind slammed into Kiva, Cresta, Ashlyn, and Naari. Not even Ashlyn could react in time to stop the magic from sending them flying.
“Now, now,” Ryuu tsked as the audience went wild, “we haven’t started playing yet.”
Kiva clambered back to her feet, amazed that none of her friends had stabbed themselves when they’d landed hard on the ground.
“She’s mine,” Ashlyn growled, her eyes slitted toward the still-grinning warrior.
Kiva repressed a hysterical laugh, since obviously Ashlyn should face the anomaly, being the only one of them with elemental magic.
But then a woman with flaming ginger hair smirked and summoned fire into her palm, revealing there to be two anomalies among them. Cresta had warned that the kings valued magical warriors, but this . . .
“Damn it,” Ashlyn hissed. “I’ll have to take her, too.”
Kiva’s heart had been pounding before, but now it was like a hammer in her chest. “If either of you have been hiding magic,” she said to Cresta and Naari, “now’s the time to say so.”
The look on Naari’s face said that only one person among them had been keeping such a secret — and that person was Kiva herself.
Cresta, too, rolled her eyes and stated, “You think I would have stayed so long at Zalindov if I could have magicked my way out of there? Only your prince was stupid enough to do something like that.”
Before Kiva could reply, King Thembi took over for his twin and said, “The rules of the Arzavaar are simple: there are none!” The crowd roared again, louder than ever, and then he declared, “May the best warriors win! Gantaark!”
Kiva didn’t need to know Jiirvan to realize that he’d just yelled the equivalent of “Attack!” because the six warriors sprinted toward them, their swords and spears and shields raised. The air anomaly thrust out her hand as she ran, attempting another attack, but Ashlyn was ready this time, and countered the move with a slash of her arm, causing the sand between them to erupt in an eye-stinging flurry. The ginger-haired woman similarly tried to send a burst of fire their way, but Ashlyn choked the air from the flames, snuffing them out before they could cause any damage.
For a moment, Kiva felt a glimmer of hope. The Jiirvan anomalies had never battled a Vallentis princess before — a Vallentis general. It might be two against one, but Ashlyn had a bloodline’s worth of experience — and power — in her favor. Plus, she alone wielded two elements, which she quickly put to use, cracking open the earth and forcing the six warriors to change their trajectory by leaping to the side, giving Kiva and her friends an extra moment to prepare.