CHAPTER 20: ALLIANCES AND CHALLENGES

The rear quad gave me space. I rolled my shoulders, set my feet, and let Anchor Step pull me into the rhythm I trusted. Four in, hold two, roll out on three. Pulse only on contact. The ground said yes. The sabre moved clean on the exhale.

’Individual Combat,’ I listed in my head, hitting the first entry until my shoulders hummed. ’Don’t match speed with speed. Don’t trade power with power. Own the tempo. Make the ring a map you’ve walked ten times with the lights out.’

’Group Tactics,’ on the second entry. ’Weaker squad is only weaker until you give it a job it can do. Clear roles. Clean orders. Don’t try to be a hero; hold time for other people.’

’Magical Theory,’ on the third. ’Write what you know. Don’t lie to the page to look clever. Practical: small, clean Accord. Release clause. Make Liora nod once.’

’Crisis Response,’ on the fourth, hips turning, breath steady. ’Civilians first. Every time. Not because points. Because the world isn’t a game built to flatter you.’

The bell clanged for meal. I didn’t feel hungry. I went anyway. You do the small things because the big ones will eat you if you forget to feed the body that carries your plans.

On the way out of the hall after, I passed the commoners’ table. Lyra sat at the head of it by accident—no chair had been made for a head. People stood while she ate, asking, asking. She answered without a sigh. When a boy with ink on his sleeve stammered a fear about theory, she wrote a glyph on the back of his hand—one curve, two lines—wiped her pen, and smiled small. The boy looked at his hand like it was a blessing and went away less afraid.

She looked up as I passed. Eyes like clear water, tired and determined. I tipped my chin. She tipped hers in return. The small exchange held more weight than it should have.

Bed found me late and spit me out early. The morning will do that when you point your heart toward it.

They posted the Individual Combat brackets at third bell. Names lit the ward like scars. I found mine and didn’t show the face my body wanted to make, because the room didn’t need my drama. I had Marcus Ravencrest in Round Two if I didn’t embarrass myself in Round One.

Aldric Voss laughed loud when he read his line. "Blessed," he said. "Someone up there wants a show."

He glanced over his shoulder at me and let a smile play on his mouth. Not a kind one. Never a kind one.

I went to the yard to work until my arms stopped respecting me and then work past that. The Compass let me. It only murmured to drink water like a nurse with a grudge.

Twilight found me wiping the sabre and setting it home. The air had started to taste like iron and wet stone. The evaluation smelled like it had already begun even though the hour hadn’t struck.

I took three steps toward the door.

"Valcrey?" a voice said.

Gareth Blackwater stood in the arch’s shadow, hands linked awkwardly in front of him like he didn’t know what to do with hands when he wasn’t moving stone. He didn’t shuffle. He didn’t stare at his shoes.

"Got a minute?" he asked. "It’s... about tomorrow."

I nodded once and gestured to the bench. The kind of conversation that builds teams starts before anyone admits that’s what they’re doing.

’People and power,’ I told myself as we sat. ’Both lanes. Every day.’

The yard waited to hear if I remembered.

Gareth sat like a man who’d learned to take weight without making the bench complain. He rubbed the edge of his sleeve with a thumb and didn’t look at my face until he’d found the sentence he wanted.

"I’m not here to trade names for favors," he said. His voice had the flat music of the lowlands. "I’m here because I’m tired of watching the same boys make the same circles around the same flag and then pat each other on the back like it was new."

I liked him for opening with that. "So am I," I said. "What do you need?"

"Direction," he said. The word didn’t come slow; it arrived like a stone put on a table. "I can raise walls and keep them standing. I can make the ground say no. But in drills people shout three orders at once and then blame the dirt when it chooses wrong."

"Earth isn’t the problem," I said. "People are."

He huffed once, something like a laugh that didn’t want to be seen in public. "That’s what I thought you’d say."

"Show me your base," I said, standing. "Five minutes. Then I’ve got a thought."

We crossed to the circle. He set his boots, rolled his shoulders, and breathed like someone who dug ditches without wanting to be congratulated for the hole. He pushed his palm toward the ground. It answered up—a shoulder-high slab that looked like decision.

"Again," I said. "With less pride and more angles."

He did it again, this time with a corner that would catch a charging idiot and make him reevaluate his life choices.

"Better," I said. "Now, brace. Imagine a boar that someone with too much money and not enough sense thought would look good with plates."

He set two pillars instead of one, a hand’s width too far apart. I stepped through and tapped his elbow. "Closer. If the beast doesn’t scrape both, it thinks it’s a hallway, not a trap."

He adjusted. The air took the shape of a choke that I had held myself in caves that didn’t care what your name was.

We built from there. Not flourishes. Rules. Where the first wall goes if the first order is to keep a caster breathing. Where the second goes if the first fails. How to make a small man look taller. How to make a tall woman fight at a height that breaks her habits. How to let a commoner squad move like it had a spine.

Gareth didn’t write anything down. He didn’t need to. He banked it like coin and looked less tired every time something fit.

After twenty minutes he said, "You talk like you’ve done this when the ground ate people."

"I have," I said. "Different ground."

He didn’t ask. I didn’t offer. The yard didn’t need the story; it only needed the result.

"Tomorrow," I said, "if we end up on the same line, you don’t make walls to show me you can make walls. You make walls where I say and you keep them there until I say move. If I get the call wrong, that’s on me. If you get the wall wrong, that’s on you."

He nodded. "Clear."

"Good," I said. "Go eat. And find the girl with the ink on her fingers—Lyra. Ask her for five minutes on a stabilizer glyph. Tell her it’s for me."

He blinked. "She’s head of our lot, Valcrey, not my secretary."

"I know," I said. "That’s why you ask polite."

He stood. "All right." He shifted his weight like a man who’d decided something he wasn’t sure he had permission to decide. "Thanks."

He left with the steps of a man who had work and liked that fact.

I turned to the rack for another set when the ring caught the sound of measured footsteps and decided not to eat it. Marcus Ravencrest stood at the edge like the elegant shadow of a blade. Dark hair, sharp features, gloves that had never seen a spilled stew.

"Valcrey," he said, a small nod serving in place of a handshake. "You’re scheduled for second round. If you make it."

"If you make it," I said.

The corner of his mouth did not quite become a smile. "Fair. I don’t enjoy gossip, but I do enjoy data. Your improvement—" he flicked two fingers like he was brushing dust off a sleeve, "—is not noise."

"I’m not here to be noise," I said.

"Good," he said. "Because I enjoy quiet." His gaze flicked to the circle. "Light exchange?"

I slid the sabre out of habit more than pride. "Light."

We took positions. The world narrowed to footwork and breath. He moved like water that had learned to lie. Illusions are a discipline; good ones know how to make your eyes fight your ears. He feinted with a flicker—his shadow not quite matching the angle of his blade. My guard didn’t move. Tells aren’t insults; they’re invitations. I didn’t RSVP.

He tried sound delay next—footstep off a fraction from the hip turn. I let it pass. He adjusted, and the adjustment told me more than the initial trick. His fundamentals were clean. Illusions were the spice, not the meal.

We touched guards. I timed a heel pulse to the contact and let the saber slide along his, not against. He stepped back, not out of fear but to redraw the map. He liked maps.

We broke after a dozen exchanges without drawing blood or pride. He nodded the same small nod he’d arrived with. "Acceptable," he said.

"Likewise," I said.

"When the bracket puts us together," he added, "let’s settle it with something better than whispers."

"Looking forward to it," I said. I meant it.

He left with the same economy he’d brought.