CHAPTER 29: FIRST BLOOD

Sarah stared at the ceiling of her dormitory room, watching shadows shift across the stone as clouds drifted past the moon outside. Her roommate, Helena, had been asleep for hours, her breathing deep and peaceful. Sarah envied her that peace.

’Tomorrow I’m going to fight someone.’

The thought kept circling in her mind like a vulture. She’d never intentionally hurt another person in her life. Even as a child, when the village boys had teased her about her father’s trade, she’d always run rather than fight back.

"May the best student win," Roderick had said, with that cold smile that made her skin crawl.

Sarah rolled over, pressing her face into the pillow. What did she know about fighting? About dueling? The only violence she’d ever been part of was when that man... when Lord Erick died and she...

Her hands clenched into fists as the memory crashed over her. The feel of time accelerating under her touch. The horror in the kidnapper’s eyes as decades of aging ravaged his body in seconds. The way he’d crumbled to dust.

’What if I do that to Roderick?’

The Academy had "comprehensive safety measures," he’d said. But what safety measure could stop someone from aging sixty years in two minutes? What if she panicked again? What if the same terror took hold and she couldn’t control it?

Sarah sat up abruptly, her nightgown sticking to her sweat-dampened skin. She needed answers. Real answers, not the pretty reassurances everyone kept giving her.

The dormitory halls were empty at this hour, lit only by glowing essence stones set into the walls. Sarah’s bare feet made no sound on the cold stone as she padded toward the common area where she’d seen other students studying late into the night.

The library wing stayed open around the clock—one of the Academy’s few mercies. Sarah pushed through the heavy doors and found herself surrounded by towering shelves and the musty smell of old leather and parchment.

’Where do I even start?’

She wandered the aisles until she found a section labeled "Combat Theory and Practice." Her heart sank as she pulled book after book from the shelves. Advanced Sword Forms for the Awakened.Essence Channeling in Melee Combat.Strategic Applications of Elemental Abilities.

Every title assumed knowledge she simply didn’t have. She opened Fundamentals of Dueling Etiquette and stared at the first page:

"The formal challenge having been issued and accepted according to Academy protocols, combatants should observe the traditional positioning as established by the Vanguard Code of Honor. The challenger takes the eastern stance, while the defender assumes the western. Both participants should demonstrate appropriate salutes as befitting their houses and rankings..."

Sarah’s head began to pound. Houses? Rankings? Salutes? She didn’t even know which direction was east in the dueling arena.

She flipped through pages of diagrams showing proper footwork, guard positions, and something called "essence flow patterns for controlled engagement." It might as well have been written in a foreign language.

’Everyone else grew up learning this,’ she realized with growing despair. ’While I was learning to measure wood and mix varnish, they were learning to fight.’

She turned another page and found a detailed diagram of "Proper Dueling Stance for Fire Essence Users." The figure demonstrated something called "the Vanguard Guard," with feet positioned at precise angles and hands held in specific configurations for "optimal essence flow."

Sarah stared at the diagram until the lines blurred together. She had no idea what essence flow even meant, let alone how to optimize it. Reading about combat techniques from a book wasn’t going to make her a battle veteran in one day.

’Maybe Kael...’

The thought struck her suddenly. Kael would know about this. He’d grown up noble—he’d have learned formal combat the same way she’d learned to sand wood smooth. She could find him, ask him to explain the basics, maybe even...

But what if he was already asleep? What if disturbing him made her seem even more pathetic than she already was? And what if he realized just how completely unprepared she was for any of this?

Sarah closed the book and rested her forehead against its leather cover. Through the library windows, she could hear the distant sound of voices from the dormitory courtyards. Other students, probably discussing tomorrow’s duel. Probably placing bets on how quickly Roderick would crush the upstart carpenter’s daughter.

She forced herself to keep reading. Advanced Sword Forms for the Awakened had a Chapter on defensive techniques that seemed marginally useful, even if she didn’t have a sword. Essence Channeling in Melee Combat explained something about "controlled releases" that made her think of trying not to let her temporal abilities run wild.

But every page assumed knowledge she simply didn’t have. References to "standard Academy preliminary training" and "basic essence manipulation exercises" that everyone apparently learned before they even got here.

’Everyone else grew up knowing this,’ she realized with growing horror. ’While I was learning to measure boards and mix stains, they were learning to fight.’

She flipped through page after page of combat theory, her panic mounting with each incomprehensible diagram. Footwork patterns that looked like dance steps. Hand positions for different types of essence projection. Breathing techniques for maintaining control during "high-stress engagements."

The words began to swim together. Sarah rubbed her eyes and tried to focus on a section titled "Dueling to First Blood: Safety Protocols and Emergency Procedures."

Academy duels are concluded upon first blood draw, loss of consciousness, or formal submission. Faculty oversight ensures participant safety through deployed barrier enchantments and immediate healing intervention...

At least there were safety measures. But what if her ability worked faster than their healing? What if she panicked and aged him sixty years in two seconds like she’d done to the kidnapper?

Sarah’s hands began to shake as the memory crashed over her again. The look in that man’s eyes as decades of life fled his body. The way his skin had wrinkled and his hair had gone white and then fallen out entirely. How he’d crumbled to dust while she watched in horror.

’What if I do that to Roderick?’

She pushed the thought away and kept reading, but the words were becoming meaningless. Her father had always said that any problem could be solved with the right tools and enough time to work. But there were no tools for this, and no time left.

A group of students passed by the library entrance, their voices carrying clearly in the quiet night air.

"...twenty silver on Veilmont. The girl’s got power, sure, but he’s been training for this since he was eight years old."

"Yeah, I heard she killed someone with her abilities. Actually aged them to death or something."

"That was an accident though, right? Like, a panic response? Totally different from controlled combat."

"Exactly my point. Veilmont knows what he’s doing. This isn’t about advancing his rank... it’s about making a statement."

"Poor girl probably doesn’t even know how to hold a proper guard stance."

The voices faded as the students moved on, but their words echoed in Sarah’s mind. ’Making a statement.’ Of course. This had never been about rankings at all.

Sarah stared at the open book without seeing it. Roderick could have challenged anyone above him for a smaller, safer advancement. Instead, he’d chosen her. The girl everyone was talking about. The carpenter’s daughter who’d been elevated to nobility.

’He wants to prove that blood and breeding matter more than raw ability.’

The trap was even more complex than she’d realized. If she lost—which seemed almost certain given her complete lack of training—it would confirm what half the Academy already believed: that she didn’t belong here. That her ranking was a fluke or political favoritism.

But if she somehow won... if she beat a trained noble through sheer desperate power... she’d have humiliated him publicly. And people like Roderick didn’t forget that kind of embarrassment.

’I can’t win,’ she realized with sick certainty. ’Even if I beat him, I lose.’

Sarah buried her face in her hands. In the village, problems had solutions. Broken things could be fixed. Hard work and persistence could overcome most obstacles.

But this wasn’t a broken door or a leaky roof. This was a world where people played games she didn’t understand, with rules she’d never learned, for stakes she was only beginning to grasp.

"Work with what you have, not what you wish you had," she whispered, repeating her father’s old advice.

What did she have? An ability that terrified her. Two weeks of experience with powers she didn’t understand. Complete ignorance about formal combat. And the growing certainty that tomorrow would end badly no matter what she did.

Sarah looked down at her hands—the same hands that had aged a man to death in moments of pure panic. Whatever happened tomorrow, she couldn’t let that happen again. Even if it meant losing. Even if it meant confirming everyone’s worst assumptions about her.

She stayed in the library until dawn, reading everything she could find about controlling essence abilities under stress. Not to win—she was beginning to accept that winning might be impossible—but to make sure she didn’t accidentally kill anyone while losing. She practiced breathing exercises meant to help with essence control. She memorized the formal words for yielding a duel, just in case.

Sarah didn’t have training. She didn’t have knowledge. She didn’t have the casual confidence that came from a lifetime of privilege.

But she had survived. She had an ability that, terrifying as it was, had saved her life once already. And she had the stubborn resolve that came from years of watching her father solve impossible problems through sheer persistence.

It would have to be enough.

As the first rays of sunlight crept through the library windows, Sarah finally returned to her room. Helena was already up, getting ready for morning classes.

"Couldn’t sleep?" her roommate asked, looking up from her desk where she was organizing her books.

"Not really, no," Sarah admitted, settling heavily onto her bed.

Helena turned around fully, her expression concerned. "Are you... I mean, how are you feeling about today? The duel, I mean."

Sarah looked at herself in the small mirror by her bedside. Her face was pale, her eyes shadowed with exhaustion, but there was something else there now. A kind of quiet resolve.

"Honestly? I’m terrified," she said, meeting Helena’s eyes in the reflection. "I have no idea what I’m doing, and everyone knows it. But I’m tired of apologizing for being here."

Helena bit her lip. "Maybe you could still... I don’t know, find a way out of it? Talk to the instructors?"

"No." Sarah’s voice was firmer than she’d expected. "Whatever happens today, happens. I’m not going to run anymore."

For the first time since accepting Roderick’s challenge, Sarah felt like she could breathe.