The crowd roared, a swell of sound that grew as one voice clamouring for the victor, hollaring to see the loser fall, the elf was swaying, it wouldn’t be long now.
The illegal back alley fighting pits always had a scent of their own. It had been decades since he’d sought them out, always on the move, the right words, the clink of coin, and the man would be given the next port of call, a tarnished soul to seek out. Big Arel’, Loveless Lucille, Skitter, Weasel, Chief. It didn’t matter. These were the nameless, faceless gatekeepers of the underground fighting pits, guardians of those who sought their fortune, be it in the ring or on the black books.
There had been efforts in the past to stamp them out, but in the long run it had been decided, better the peasants in there fighting each other, than outside fighting their betters. Cavel had been part of one of the strike teams. Raids lead on different locations. That’s how he’d found them of course. Some jumped up kid barely out his first century, handed a uniform and weapon and sent out to deliver “order” amongst the chaos hidden behind the glossy facade of the high kingdom.
He and three other juniors, led by a Agent so fresh the ink was still drying on his promotion, sent into the smallest target, thought to be little more than a book keepers, glorified paperwork whilst the big boys dealt with the main pits.
They should have turned back when they could hear the roar of the crowd, the yells of delight and the commentary delivered crisply deafeningly over the cacophony. But they were young, they were cocky, and they had no idea what they were walking into.
The door pushed open, a heavy set guard in full regalia looked up and offered a nod before returning to his pipe, the scent of thistle rich and sweet around him. Corruption ran rife in the city, and when it came down to it, everyone had a price.
This particular location was somewhere in the depths of the warehouses and smithies. Barely a stone’s throw from the guard house, a piece of forgotten dirt between the backs of buildings and long sealed alleys. The secret pathways every thief, street-rat, and Romulo fleeing a lovers husband knew all too well. Surprisingly often these places were close to the home of authourity, after all it is said, ‘the closer to danger, the further from harm’.
The space had been roofed, with whatever materials could be found. Mismatched planks, clay tiles, bundles of no longer culturally appropriate blue banners and flags, faded grey by age and exposure to what little light there was. The pit itself was dug into the earth, half the height of an elf, walled by posts and spikes, rusting metal, twisted wire and nets. Enough of a gap for combatants to enter, only to have their escape closed off by the crush of people battling to watch.
Whilst the pits were hardly the place for the law abiding, here were a few rules. Firstly no weapons entered the pit, no objects that could be construed or repurposed as a weapon, and no objects thrown in, unless the thrower wished the bruisers that guarded the Whisperer to demonstrate all the ways that object could be used as a weapon tested upon them. Secondly, you didn’t intentionally kill your opponent, whilst accidents happened, the pits weren’t keen to draw attention, and moving corpses was always such a hassle…
They’d burst through the doors weapons raised, the magi already calling arcane to her fingertips, the archers bow drawn back. Cavel spun his blades in his hands, charging forwards keeping pace with the agent and the swiftblade beside him.
He would never forget how the noise changed. And yet never quiet be able to put it into words. Whilst one angry mob baying for blood sounded much like another, something about knowing that as they surged forwards, they were in fact baying for yours, caused individual voices, shouts, and jeers dropped away, until only the primal howl could be heard, the roar of oncoming death, charging to the drum of your blood in your ears, your existence ticked away by the best of your own heart.
He felt the strike, something heavy and blunt to the back of his skull, the ground rushed up to meet him, and as the crowd turned from fury to laughter, the darkness swallowed him whole.
Thirdly, the Whisperer held final word. These Lords, but never ladies, of their own Kingdoms, had been lifted from amongst the poorest and most downtrodden, and elevated by the pits. Some were former fighters, a few owners of the forgotten scraps of land, and amongst the most respected were the menders. Healers and medics brought low by loss or circumstance, a habit for thistle or drink that made them too volatile for civilian hospitals. Others were sawbones of nefarious talents, and a sharp eye for a fresh test subject.
Cavel lurked near the wall. His worn leather frock-coat near the same colour as the dirt. He’d been drinking since he’d left 'Nea’s determined to blot out the sound of her shrieks that echoed in his head, her words hysterical, and callous and cruel. He should have stayed, have been better, a support. But he couldn’t. It had been a long night, one where were his life a tapestry, he had seen a loose thread and pulled it lightly, only to watch as the entire section unravelled to piles of jumbled nonsense, each as incomprehensible as the last.
He’d started with Vinemaster Suntouched. It should have been a bad sign after being thrown out. He’d paid for the Hawk’s tab for the next fifty years, a blind eye was usually turned until he had to be carried home. After that he’d stalked from one bar to another, each establishment more dismal than the last. He avoided the Gilded Coin, he suspected “Firecloud’s friends don’t pay” didn’t extend to “Firecloud’s friends can try and drink us dry.” Alone. On a Tuesday Morning.
Besides, he didn’t want to explain himself.
By the fourth tavern he knew he should have been hammered. He shouldn’t be able to walk straight, let alone peruse the dusty lables of the spirits behind the bar. Not that it mattered, he suspected no matter what you ordered you got the same watered down moonshine brewed in a bathtub, whose other purposes included cleaning paint and stripping engines. Or maybe the other way round.
Either way a slow bubbling anger at everything wrong footing him had meant he’d bypassed drunk entirely, reaching stone cold sober, and outright livid, via the back roads.
Draining the glass he headed for the darkest corner, pulling up a chair next to a man in deeply cowled robes, his features hidden in shadow.
Cavel dropped a handful of coins in front of the him.
“Don’t swive me about, where’s the pit today?”
The robe moved, rolls of cloth slipping back to reveal an ancient and withered hand. Covering the coins the figure drew them back across the table into the concealed pocket.
Turning his head, sharp eyes narrowed, picked over every inch of Cavel’s visage. The twitch of a smile pulled paper skin taught as arcane runes in vivid blue bloomed across his throat.
“Well well well, the prodigal Son returns…” He Whispered.
He’d awoken, head pounding, dirt clinging to his lips. An incesant roaring drowning his thoughts as gradually he’d become aware of his nakedness. Shunting himself to his feet, he rubbed his hand over the back of his head, the raised lump nestled beneath his hair.
“And the Last one awakes!”
The voice boomed through the confined room, shaking dust from ancient timbers, rattling ill-fitting glass in rotten frames that looked onto brick walls. The man sat upon a chair, painted in flaking golds and mismatched yellows, it stood upon a makeshift Dias. Crates and boxes piled high and lashed together.
He was in the pit.
They were all in the pit. Around them the crowded audience bayed and whooped, jeering them, and sickeningly, in the case of the Emileja the Magi, and Sarawyn the Swiftblade, some of the gathered punters leered at the young females, whispering fuel enough for months of nightmares.
A sharp hushing sound rumbled, rolling over the crowd as they quietened. The man in his chair holding a finger to his lips while he waited, a cruel smile dancing as silence finally fell. He spread his arms wide, holding court as he began to speak once more.
“Well Well well. Ladies and Gentlemen, what an unexpected treat! Our fearsome five of would-be assassin’s are at last finally awake!”
The crowd roars as if on cue, before being silenced with a look.
“We of course know the rules of our little pit, do we not?”
“Whilst normally death is not an option, I shall wave it for such -honoured- guests. So tell them, What is the Sacred Rule of the pit?”
As the man in the chair swept his arms forwards, the crowd answered in a roar of unison.
Finally. The rule held above all else. Once the pit has been entered, Only one may climb out.
Cavel approached the goblin perched on a box, arcing an eyebrow lightly, before he turned his gaze in the direction of the pit. It wasn’t that he was surprsied, their race provided some of the best bookmakers in the business, and were reknowned for not caring what you did to make gold, so long as they got their cut. It just lent an inherent sense of ‘wrongness’ to the scene. No more alarming than coming home to find someone’s reupholstered your sofa, not malicious, but still, not how you left it.
“How many to clear?”
The goblin looked over and sniffed, wrinkling his nose, eyes narrowed and pricing Cavel up.
“You Fightin’ or Bettin’?”
“Fighting.”
“Pity, guy as drunk as you mus’ hah coin to burn. Four still to enter the pit, So that’s at least two fights af’ah this one, unless winner stay’s on, then it’s anothah four.”
“List me as Fifth.”
“Wotcha name?”
A voice rumbled softly from behind Cavel.
“That is not for you to know Quickcoin, I will announce him. You’ll have chance to take the bets whilst Whisperer Adroit and I exchange places.”
The goblin’s eyes widened, looking past Cavel, who didn’t bother to turn as he spoke. “You’re taking over for me? I’m flattered.”
“Tsh. But I Wouldn’t miss it. The prodigal Son’s return after more than half a century? I do hope you’ll not besmirch your reputation.”
Cavel huffed shaking his head as he watched the Whisperer go. When he looks back at the Goblin, the creature was staring at him. The roar in the background pitched, the one named ‘Whisperer Adroit’ announcing the winner, and ordering the next fighter to prepare.
After a moment the goblin jumped to his feet, clearing his throat.
Cavel scrambled back away from the crate as the nasal voice screeched out.
“Ladies and Gentlemen! Patrons of the Pits! Whisperer Pernicious comes out of Retirement to Oversee an upcoming match against a Mystery Elf! Calling all challengers and Taking ALL BETS!”
There’s a definate shift, a clamour of voices, heads turned to seek out the newcomer, others stood on toes to follow the path of Pernicious with their gaze, watching the ancient elf as he approached the chair, Adroit leaned down to speak in hushed tones. Meanwhile the swell of the crowd descended on the goblin. Coin and slips of paper passing back and forth as money changed hands in expectation.
“And so, to our ferocious five, you have entered the pit. Only one may get out, and only once the others have perished.”
The protestations burst from the group, threats and warnings that “The Spire know we’re here!” and outraged shrieks of “You’ll hang!”. The crowd roared with laughter.
Cavel turned through shadow. Before they even knew what happened a crack sounded, one voice fell silent in their protestations, and Emileja lay dead on the floor. Emileja. The Magi. The only one of them not unarmed by the remove of clothing and weapons.
Fifty-Six.
The woop of the crowd and the roar of fury of the others started in unison. Sarawyn, the Swiftblade was closest to him, as she charged forward blinded by rage, Cavel waited, the moment she was in reach he grasped her, his wirey form always belied his strength, lifting her bodily he impaled her on the fence post. In a fraction of an instant, her expression flashed through confusion, then fear, before contorting into one of agony as she threw her head back and screamed. Two down.
Twenty Seven.
He gasped for air as he found himself in a headlock, swung round he saw the agent before him. Then the archer must have hold of him. That explained the grip. “Traitorous Cur,” the agent spat, as he balled his fists and strode forward. At the last moment Cavel tensed, tightening his abdomen to protect his organs as the flurry of strikes hammered into him in quick succession. The agent packed a mean punch. Trusting the archer to bear him, he lifted his legs and kicked out, sending the agent sprawling. Without thinking Cavel reached for the man’s fingers. An archer was no use without his hands, but there was only one way out, and Cavel was determined it wasn’t going to be ‘through him’. Wrapping his hand around the smallest finger he pulled untill it snapped, twisting it harshly. Thaerion dropped him. Without thinking Cavel turned, the archer had a good few inches on him, driving his head forward he closed his sharp teeth around the elf’s jugular and ripped his head back. The scream didn’t reach Cavel, nor did the roar of the crowd. Everything drowned out by the pounding of his own heart in his ears.
One hundred and Twelve.
He could taste the copper iron tang of blood. The crowd roared as the agent leaned on the wall and retched. Cavel stood centre and waited, blood drenching his hair, his face, his body, painted black in the dull light of the pit.
The Agent stood. Agent Dae’anneth. Freshly promoted just two days before. The bulkier man turned his eyes to Cavel, fixated on the form of the nightmare before him, not the bodies littering the floor. Deep within those arcane blue orbs, behind anger and betrayal, was fear.
‘Got You’.
Cavel paced out to the back room. There was always a back room. Where fighters prepared for what they faced, where losers were stitched up to go home, or in the cases of the foolish or desperate, go again. An unwritten rule had been instigated some five-hundred years earlier, you only lost three times before you weren’t allowed back in until you’d healed. It was the only way to stop the desperate from choosing death by pit over death by starvation. Sometimes the Whisperer’s would let them fight anyway, but over years they’d honed their craft, they could see through bravado to a fighter on their last legs.
In the back room he stripped his coat, his armor, his shirt. Bare chested he leaned against the wall and waited. He’d learned to read a crowd. The experienced ones did. They didn’t count a win until their challenger was face down in the dirt. The young and the cocky, they played to the crowd, as the cheers of admiration rose, they’d bask in their glory.
Always too late to see the other find their feet.
Once you were on the books, you couldn’t turn down a match. Didn’t matter if the guy you drew against was seven foot tall and hauled barrels for a living, or some thin streak of nothing, with nothing to lose but his teeth, and a bag of coin to put food on the table in his sights.
Cavel watched the sawbones as she finished her work. Women were rare in this game, some came to watch, few came to work. There were quicker ways of making better money, even if they did require them to lay back and think of Quel’thalas.
He wondered her poison. No medic sullied their hands like this out of the goodness of their heart. She put her tools away, hands steady. Not a drinker then. As she turned he smiled bitterly. Ah.
The Fall and the Thirst.
The left side of her face torn apart and misshapen, flesh necrotic in a ring around the socket halted by glowing runes containing the spread. Black tainted veins creeped over a skull too thin of hair, withered pustules bubbling skin. The high kingdom declared with the Naaru’s sacrifice rejuvenating the Sunwell, Quel’thalas had been saved, it’s people restored.
Not everyone in the city’s gutters held that to be true. The ‘wretching’, those sickly few caught on the line between the well and the lost, were rarely seen these days. Most of their number either succumbed or exterminated, the rest took themselves to exile and were hunted down one by one. Ironically those best prepared to survive the wilderness had been least likely to succumb to the sickness. But such was the way of things.
She looked to him, the deadened glow of her gaze spoke of thistle, but it wasn’t his place to judge.
“Not seen you before, first time in the pits?”
He had steeled himself for her voice, but when the rasping, mangled hiss came, the wave of revulsion and bile still rose.
He held out a small purse. She took it an arced an eyebrow questioningly as the silver coins spilled onto her palm.
“For the losers, and some for yourself, if course.” he explained.
A second eyebrow joined the first. She laughed coldly, putting the coins back into the leather pouch and pocketing it. “-Of Course- he says” she picks up her satchel moving to the next makeshift bay. A young man, barely out of his teens by the look of him lay still upon the bed, blood pooled at the corner of his mouth. “You’re cocky, I’ll give you that,” she called back to him and pressed her hand to the boys forehead, to his throat, and then, with a low sigh, pulled the sheet over the young man’s face. “So was he.”
Agent Dae’anneth Caucus might have been the larger elf but he moved like a damn snake. He kept himself to the lighter portions of the pit, never letting his gaze move from Cavel. Not that it made any difference, the Traitorous assassin couldn’t step through shadow again without it taxing him. He was not an elf naturally attuned to arcane arts, instead he paced the perimeter. He spat Thaerion’s blood into the dirt. He couldn’t be certain what had happened to the flesh between his teeth. He pushed the thought aside. He had to focus. The only way he left was through his superior, the only way he’d survive after was if none of the others did. He crouched, preparing to sprint.
His legs powered forwards, hand clawing through compacted dirt, hurling the dust into the eyes of the Agent, taking the split second advantage to bear him to the ground.
The pair fought for position, the slick blood coating Cavel meant Dae’anneth couldn’t hold his grip, each time his hands fastened, the thinner elf twisted free, leaving nothing but the sanguine slick of gore in his wake. The pair seemed matched, neither able to get nor keep the upper hand.
It is said in many battlefields, by those who do not give credence to the Light, that the gods played games with the lives of men.
But war is war, be it ten-thousand or two, every battle for survival is a singular one.
Those who trade in such superstitious tales, who saw the fight of five, would say that the Gods went and rolled their dice in this game of game of elves.
And Lady Luck delivered an Ace.
A miscalculated swing grazed past a jaw.
Cavel pushed the arm down across the agents throat, pinning it with his foot. He delivered his full weight, unrelenting until something snapped.
Dae’anneth’s screams were cut short as the mangled limb slipped tight across his throat, he writhed as Cavel’s fist flew down, crashing into his temple.
Again and again the assassin struck.
The agent went still.
Again and again, his knuckles split on shards of bone.
The crowd fell quiet.
Again, and again, and again. The only sound heard was Cavel’s fists, as he battered the remains of Dae’anneth Caucus until nothing was left above the neck but pulp.
Dae’anneth Caucus. Agent of the Spire.
One Hundred and Fifty Seven.
Cavel staggered to his feet, looking down at the remains.
One squad lost.
Four lives cut short.
Eight parents recieving letters starting “Quel’thalas thanks you for your sacrifice.”
Three Hundred and Fifty Two years silenced.
Slowly a long, lone clap began.
Whisperer Pernicious spread his arms wide, an amused smile dancing on his lips.
“Well well well. A fast learner. Ladies and Gentlemen…” He flicked his hand, a gleaming piece of metal landed in the dirt at Cavel’s feet. He bent down and reiteved it.
“…Your Victor…”
His identifier.
“… Cavel Varandeth.”
They owned him.
And they knew it.
The roar of the crowd was building. The sonorous swell that merged into one cacophonous cry clamouring for the spoils, roars of the rightious who had backed the triumphant, despair lifted in vociferated voices to see the defeat.
The elf fell. It wouldn’t be long now.
Cavel ran a hand over his hair, braided tight and close to the scalp, wound in upon itself and tied in place. Hair was a handhold, braid a rope. Such easy advantages could never be handed freely.
Two of the imposing bruisers carried in a large elf, his jaw clearly broken, but concious. A man with the sense to know when to stay down. They drop the unfortunate soul into a bay. One left, the other turned to look at Cavel, a light sneer speaking how the bruiser fancied his chances.
“Winner stays on. You’re up against ‘Siege’. Miss Betide?”
The medic looked up. “Hm?”
“Clear a bed. Siege is going to eat this one alive.” With a low laugh the bruiser looked back to Cavel. “You’ll be called.” and with that, he left.
Cavel looked to the medic. “Really? ‘Betide’…?”
“The name the pits gave me after the fall and my family thought putting me down would be kindest, technically it’s ‘Woe Betide’, as in ‘Woe Betide any swivving Caitiff who ends up in my bays’.” She shrugs lightly. As a knock sounds through the makeshift wall she glances to Cavel, almost pityingly. “You’re up. And if you want some advice for Siege? Stay down. That elf’s a killer. I’ll see you in a few minutes hm?” With that she turned back to her work.
He made his way through the crowd, the throng parting before him. Seated atop the tattered throne was Whisperer Pernicious. He beckoned Cavel over. “Your arm. That’s new.”
“Death on the Installment plan.”
“You always were a good friend of the reaper. But that’s a weapon, the rules are clear-”
A deep booming voice called out. “Let him keep it, maybe I’ll rip it off and beat some sense into him.” Cavel turned arcing an eyebrow as the crowd roared with laughter. In the centre of the pit was ‘Siege’. An absolute beast of an elf, he had to be pushing more than seven feet tall. Broad shoulders and arms rippled with corded muscle. His blood red hair hung lank in sweat drenched rat-tails. Flared nostrils and eyes wild, he had the look of a beserker fresh off the field.
Pernicious frowned, eyes narrowed. He bent low, tone is hushed only for Cavel’s ears, the crowd lost to the showboating of Siege. “If he insists on tying his own noose…” He rests a hand on Cavel’s shoulder, “…he’s costing us money and accidents happen… I’ll reveal you -when- you win, can’t have you tarnishing your own reputation if you’ve lost your touch.” The Whisperer straightened up, gesturing forward.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, Patrons of the Pit. I have awaited this fight for a -very- long time. At Siege’s request I will allow our challenger to retain his arm. For this very special occasion, to celebrate my return, we shall be playing…” He leaned forwards, the crowd hanging on his every word, “…by one rule alone.” He smiles beatifically at the sharp intake of breath, “And that is?”
The crowd roared the answer as one.
Cavel climbed into the pit.
Woe’s ear twitched as the Whisperer’s voice boomed out, setting the Elf’s jaw had been but a moment, he was now sleeping off the regeneration potion she’d poured down his throat. Cleaning her tools she carefully packed them away. As the crowd roared the one rule she frowned. They couldn’t be serious?
Picking up her cloak she swiftly pulled it on, lifting the deep cowl to hide her disfigured features, she left the haven of her room. Climbing up onto an abandoned crate, she set her gaze on the pale haired elf as he climbed in. Despite living and working on the Pit Circuit, and dealing with the aftermath, she rarely watched the fights. She supposed seeing only the damage and never the victory stole the thrill of the ‘sport’. As she ran her hand behind her neck, she realised she was about to watch an elf die, and do nothing, yet she could not find the will to tear herself away.
Blood. Sweat. The stale urine of the loser, lost in fear or unconciousness. The pit had a scent all its own. Cavel rolled his shoulders and watched the grinning larger elf.
This was going to hurt.
Good.
As the elf ran for him, Cavel held his ground, hands raised, stance wide, he ducked and twisted out of the way of the first blows. He struck out with his left, the metal of the prosthetic caught the light before moving into the shade of Siege. Connecting hard with a satisfying thud and pained grunt from the recipient, he pushed away.
Siege kept coming.
Cavel ducked and swerved. “Tire them out” was always the advice given to fight a larger opponent. Kodosht. Men like Siege? They didn’t tire. He snapped his head back feeling the air move, the warmth of the fist that passed too close. He didn’t see the other before it was too late, crashing into his ribs it sent him sprawling. Cavel rolled onto his feet, darting towards the other before feinting left and going right. He opened his hand. The wicked claw tips carved through flesh and the crowd bayed at the first draw of blood.
The Whisperer lounged back on his throne. Elbow braced against the armrest, his fingertips coaxed the wirey white hair of his beard as he surveyed the scene below him. A quiet quirk of a smile ghosted his lips as the first blood was spilled.
It had been more than half a century since Cavel had last graced the sacred dirt of this hallowed arena. A habit put aside at the insistence of his Lady Wife. The man had changed a great deal in that comparatively short time. Thin to the verge of emaciated, the hair changed from raven black to white blonde, heavy scars old and new, and a gleaming silver arm.
But he’d lost none of his edge, he still moved like a dancer, beautiful to behold.
It was his eyes that had given him away in the bar. The boy had become a man in these pits, and they might dress him up, age him, scar him…
Pernicious idly wondered who had dared to lash the man, those scars were a new addition since he’d last seen him perform.
… but deep in those eyes was the predators gaze. The eyes of a killer, a man who murdered four of his colleagues in cold blood, simply to get a leg up.
The Whisperer winced as the Siege turned, his fist already moving as a blur.
Cavel had kept him on the move, blows had struck, mostly glancing, and others had been returned. He’d got the measure of the man, the way his stance changed for a fraction before the swing, indicating left or right, but try as he might he could not get past the others bulk. As the fist swung, he made a decision, bracing himself, he turned his head away, and let it strike.
Cavel staggered sideways, his ears ringing. Opening his mouth, a flash of relief rippled through him. Not broken.
Sound rushed back in, his attention focused on Siege. The elf backing up sharply, clutching the wrist of his right hand, gasping half screams half roars as blood dripped from mangled fingers, the bone of knuckles split through the skin.
Cavel dropped to a crouch, watching waiting, and not for the first time grateful for the plate in his left jaw. He drew his fingertips through the dirt. In the depths of Siege’s eyes he watched pain, twisting and contorting, only to watch it leap off into the great howling maw of fury.
Siege let go of his right wrist, breath huffing wildly as he left it hanging by his side.
“Caitiff! I’ll kill you!”
A flash of a smirk crosses Cavels lips. He didn’t need to retort, that expression was enough to tip Siege’s self preservation off whatever precipice it was perched, leaving only the primal scream in its wake. The elf charged forward.
Cavel didn’t.
As Siege closed in there was a flash of awareness. His opponent may be small, crouched, and -old-, but he was smiling… muscles shunting over one enough as he charged forwards, the fear that flickered in his gaze not enough to tear his body from its course.
‘Got You’.
Siege was almost in arms reach when Cavel leapt, a handful of dirt hurled in the larger elf’s face, Cavel uncoiled like a spring. Boots finding purchase he vaulted over Siege, driving clawed fingertips and thumb into flesh either side of the spine, the slid through like a knife through butter, curling his fist as he landed he ripped backwards.
Several of the crowd screamed, others turning to retch as the whiplash snap tore the column of bone and sinew free.
Siege fell forward like a puppet with the strings cut. Cavel stood in the centre of the pit. His trophy in hand, he threw it forwards, symbolically hurled it at the feet of Pernicious.
Silence reigned, Pernicious gazed down over the crowd. “The Victor. Our esteemed guest. Most of you will not know him, indeed I barely recognised him when he came to me late this very morning. And yet, by show of hand, who backed him, purely because I had returned to watch?”
Woe watched with rapt attention. More than half the crowd raised their hands. Whisperer Pernicious had stepped back from the throne some years earlier. No-one knew how long he’d been doing it. Some said he was one of the pits founders, others rumoured he was their original champion. Either way he was still a showman, playing the crowd.
Pernicious ran his fingers through his beard. “Seen as I do not get chance to reminisce often, perhaps you shall indulge me. Everyone has their stories of the Pit. Fights of glory, told through the decades, indeed, I will be surprised if this does not become one of them. Perhaps the most enduring is the tale some nearly ten-hundred years in the telling. It goes by many names, The Ferocious Five, The Spire’s Raid…” His gaze settled on Cavel, “The Traitor. Each retelling has embellished or distorted to the point most consider it nothing more than legend, superstition told to warn the younglings not to throw their lives away.”
Cavel stood, hands clasped behind his back as he waited. He knew this tale too well. He still saw their faces in his dreams, one he saw more than most. Dae’anneth Caucus, the man whose name he had stolen, a cheap cover for a mission. A man so long dead that there was no chance of finding someone who had known him. A name the queen of fate had decreed would be his, eternal reminder of his capabilities.
Dae’anneth Silverflare. Blood Hawk of the first Escadrille. Echo of a reputation never built, a career never carved, a flash of fear in the depth of furious eyes. A weight of guilt forever moulded to his back.
He listened as Pernicious retold the tale of his first fight. Most of the crowd hung on his every word. One or two of the sharper minded had turned to look at him, pulling pieces together faster than the rest.
Pernicious pushed himself to stand. “But why have I bored you with this historical lesson, hm?” His smile curled as he theatrically swept an arm out to Cavel. “Ladies and Gentlemen, may I introduce to you, your Victor, the survivor of the Five, Cavel Varandeth.”
In the Silence that followed you could have heard a pin drop.
“Cavel, there are more on the books, will you stand down?”
He smiled as he watched the man, a subtle shake of his head was all the answer he gave. Pernicious gestured to the Bruisers. Two of them stepped forwards into the pit to remove the remains of Siege.
“But he’s got a weapon!” Came the cry if someone in the crowd.
Cavels head snapped round. “Then tie it behind my back and I shall fight one handed.”
Pernicious laughed. “Ladies and Gentlemen, it would seem, that our Winner stays on. Standard rules are back in play…”
The afternoon passed in a blur. Cavel rolled his shoulder, the strain of the straps binding his arm was starting to take its toll. It had cost him the fluidity of his movement, and enough of his defence that his body was marred purple and black with bruises that had landed. He watched his golden haired opponent circle him. The man wasn’t particularly tall, or imposing, but he gleamed. Cavel knew this would be his last fight, whether he went down as victor or victim remained to be seen.
His knuckles were bloodied, body screaming in pain. The heavy bloom dulling his senses. In the corner of his eye he saw a movement. Turning his gaze he saw him
Blood ran down his face, skin battered blue and green, souless eyes stared empty at him. As he moved through the crowd no-one saw him, his limbs twisted and jutting, the grinding of bone.
The lips twisted in a rictus grin, Dae’anneth Caucus leered over the pit. The rasping voice cut through the eerie silence.
“Got you.”
Cavel didn’t hear the roar of the crowd, didn’t see his opponent close in. He stood alone in the pit with the horror of his past.
The fist struck.
And everything went dark.
![:joy:](https://d1bg94bbsh66ji.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/joy.png?v=6" ":joy:")
)