The Blinding Knife(213)

“It’s a conspiracy,” Kip said quietly. “And they don’t even have to touch me.”

“What?” Cruxer asked.

“Cruxer, can I win against nine, or eleven?” Teia was at ten; he wasn’t going to take her on.

“Anything can happen.”

“How about against Aram?” Kip asked.

“No.”

“What happened to ‘anything can happen’?”

“Not anything,” Cruxer said.

“Kip, time’s up,” the trainer said. “Who are you challenging?”

For one mad moment, the green in Kip wanted him to challenge Aram—even though Aram was two spots below him.

That was stupidity. Kip could still be wrong. Or others might lose. It didn’t have to be the way he’d foreseen.

“Kip, challenge me,” Teia said, her tone flat.

He knew instantly what she meant. She’d let him win. He’d get in. It’s who you know, not how good you are. Kip wanted to get in with his whole heart. They were going to bury him. But if he got in by cheating, it would taint everything he ever achieved. He would be no better than Aram and his friends.

And if Kip and Teia got caught cheating—which the trainers always looked for when partners sparred—both of them would get bounced. For him, it would be embarrassing. For Teia, it would be a total disaster.

Yet she’d offered. She was a friend. A real friend. Better than he deserved.

Kip stepped forward and challenged number eleven, Rig.

“Kip!” Teia said.

He ignored her, didn’t look toward her at all even after he got into the ring. He asked for superviolet and blue for his colors. Rig had red and orange, but Kip knew he was finished. Red and orange weren’t helpful in the kind of training fights the Blackguard did, because there was no safe way to light an opponent on fire. The training was naturally biased against Rig, which meant that he could only be ranked so highly because he was a great physical fighter.

It wasn’t until Kip stepped into the ring that he realized an even worse blunder than picking Rig. He should have declared all colors. He had nothing to lose now. The whole point of not declaring the colors was so he could use them on his last fight, and in his rash idiocy and false heroism, he’d blown it. Teia had been trying to tell him—and he’d thought she was going to praise him for his nobility or something.

The whistle blew, and it went just as Kip expected. Rig would dart in and disrupt Kip every time Kip tried to draft, and soon he closed and they grappled. Rig slipped behind Kip, keeping his face down and batting aside every attack Kip tried with blue luxin until Kip was empty. Then Kip did the only thing he could think of: he filled Rig’s mouth and nose with superviolet while imprisoning his hands.

But the boy didn’t panic, didn’t move: he snapped the superviolet with his tongue and teeth and choked Kip out.

And just like that, Kip’s future was out of his own hands. He was twelfth out of fourteen. Rig helped him stand up. “Nice try there, Breaker. Best of luck making it in.”

But Kip knew he’d already lost.





Chapter 91





~The Master~




Tap. Tap.

Hurtled into the pitch blackness of the chamber, Kip still somehow knew exactly where everything was.

I memorized the room. That was it.

Tap. Tap. Tap. And in. Boom.

Kip? Something about Kip? Why did that pass through my mind? I cock my head to the side. Odd. Doubtless, the whelp is asleep on the deck, recovering.

I take my gloves off and try to suppress the rage that floods me at the sight of my hands.

Damn them. Damn them all.

Thin threads of red luxin glimmer in the darkness, veins of fire through the dross of my skin. I push back my hood.

Where is the boy hiding it? I’d had his room searched, hired pickpockets to jostle his tubby body. Nothing.

Rage crests and I ball my fists, clamping my eyes shut. I can feel the room growing brighter, hotter. I’m going to make it to Sun Day. To hell with it.

I’m going to go now and find him. I’ll beat the boy to death, injured as he is, if I have to. Maybe it is madness.

My hand is on the door before I remember my gloves and cloak. I pull on the gloves and snarl at the brief reflection of a man limned in red fire in the mirror. I pull the hood down and step into the hall.

“Captain!”





Chapter 92




Kip went to stand by Teia and Cruxer. At their prodding, he explained his conspiracy theory, and then, together, they watched it play out, exactly as he’d foreseen. Balder fought and beat Yugurten, then he fought and beat Tala, and for a moment Kip thought the boy would challenge him—and give him another chance—but instead, sneering, the boy challenged eleven and won.