"Tickets," the guard demanded.

Tarragon scratched his head and smiled at the eight students that grouped up behind him. "These are today's fighters."

The guard assessed the students. Their jackets ranged from yellow to blue, a couple of the fourth-year students having joined the impromptu amateur circuit. The guard looked long and hard at the three Yellow Jackets in particular before shaking his head. "They don't look like fighters."

"Well, you don't look like someone who knows what an opportunity is. None of these students have ever fought in the Bowl before, so you get to meet them before they're famous. Come on, kids."

Tarragon pushed the students past the gate one by one as he introduced them. "Chive here has a pepper spray that could down a bear. Sherry's deadly with the dough. Fern and Fennel are twins, but their magic couldn't be more different. Sorrel's an ace with seeds. Yarrow has enough acid to level the stadium. Barley could get kicked by a horse and keep going. And Archie can shoot a blueberry through the eye of a needle."

"Nice to meet you," Archie muttered as he was pushed past the guard.

"And in case you don't recognize me from all the champion's busts around the place, my name is Tarragon. And we all thank you for letting us through."

The guard grunted, shook his head, and looked for the next attendee.

Archie looked up, up, up the travertine archways that caught the shine of the sun as they stretched toward the sky. He had been to The Serving Bowl twice before, and it had seemed grand both times, but this time was different. He grew up on stories of the arena's legendary fights. Now he was the story.

His heart beat faster with each step as they navigated the tunnels beneath the arena floor and ended up in the fighter's lounge. What once seemed like a gathering place of legends now seemed like a waiting room of anticipation.

"You okay?" Barley asked.

"Oh yeah." Archie grinned. "I'm ready for this."

And it was a good thing that he was. The amateur fighters were immediately beset upon by a young woman with a bun of blonde hair that was as uptight as she was. If Archie so much as blinked, he'd miss one of her rapidfire words.

"Alright, everyone, our fighters are here! Tarragon, you're late. Elva, go tell Clover that we're ready to start in ten minutes. We need to rush with our first matchup. Who are my first two fighters? You and you? Okay, Miller, take these two to Pomary and get them set up. You! Quit gawking and get out of the way."

She pushed Barley aside. Archie scrambled to move before he had to receive this woman's manic energy. He leaned against the back of a couch and watched the chaos.

"Fighters! Fighters!" The woman filled the room with her clapping. "Listen up! We're on a tight schedule! Tight! That means I want to see five minute fights, tops! Tarragon, have you trained them how to pace these fights?"

Tarragon squirmed. "Well, I mean, I taught them how to fight. I—

"You're useless." The woman held a finger up to Tarragon and got back to barking orders. "Fighters! Listen up! Your purpose is not to win, it is to entertain! You're all unknowns, so you need to take turns attacking at first. Let everyone see your spells. Then ramp it up, try to finish things off at three or four minutes. Preferably not in any horrific ways. People are fine with blood, but they tend to draw the line at bone. One of you uses acid, correct?"

Yarrow raised his hand. His eyes looked wild and frozen as if they couldn't blink.

"Okay, and you are facing…"

"Me," Barley said.

"Okay. We'll put you two third, but we'll need to get you with Pomary early to make sure the Competitive Spirit takes. Where's my environmental storytelling team?" She snapped her fingers as many times as she could before a couple of older Chefs dashed forward. I need you to get some extra trees ready in case this kid burns all of ours down. We want at least eight. Tall, and—which one of you is Archie?"

Archie jumped with surprise. "That's me."

"Okay, great. What did the Tamani trees look like?"

Archie's mind went blank from the pressure. "Uh…"

The woman clapped in his face. "Hello, Archie? The trees?"

"They were, uh, not really like trees. More like…collections of light."

The woman put her hands on her hips and sighed. "Okay, if they were trees, what would they look like?"

"Uh, tall? And thin and golden. Ethereal."

The woman puffed out her cheeks and looked at the other two Chefs that cowered under her gaze. "Can you work with that?"

"Yes, we'll get right to it."

"And make sure the foliage is up high! We're not giving out scopes for an amateur fight, and I don't want to hear complaints about visibility! Tataki, you good with trees?"

"That's fine," a manly voice said from the other side of the couch that Archie leaned on. Archie's head whipped around to see Tataki laying with his eyes closed.

"Okay, everyone, you have your orders! We have Tataki and Melo going on in an hour whether these kids fight or not, so get to it!"

Archie carefully peeled himself away from the couch while eyeing the resting predator that laid on it. Just when he thought he got away without being noticed, Tataki breathed heavily through his nose.

"Archibald," he stated.

Archie let himself wince and worry while he faced away, but when he turned around, he took care to show no vulnerability. "I prefer Archie."

"So you're here as a fighter today." Tataki adjusted slightly but kept his eyes closed as if Archie wasn't worth that much acknowledgement.

Archie tried to put a proportional disinterest into his tone. "That's right."

"Still with the pasta and blueberries?"

Archie scoffed. For as flat as Tataki's voice was, it grated on Archie's nerves. Archie took the perhaps innocuous statement as a derogatory one. "I've improved at both, and I've become proficient with sugar."

"In what way?"

He didn't believe Archie. And if he did believe Archie, he wasn't impressed. And why did that bother Archie so much? Why did he care about Tataki's approval? Was it because Tataki was known to be the best fighter? Was it respect? Or was it disdain? Had spending a year with Nori's familial disdain rubbed off on Archie? No matter what the reason, Archie wouldn't let this man—legend as he may have been—talk down to him.

"I can maintain sugarskin far beyond my level. And I've started to find my groove with sugar rush."

Tataki took a gentle, long breath, his chest inflating until he seemed more like a balloon than a warrior. Archie thought he might have fallen asleep. Tataki's chest fell halfway before he finally spoke again. "You won't make it as a fighter."

Whatever remained of Archie's fear of this man disappeared. "Excuse me?"

"You just volunteered critical information to an opponent, putting you at a disadvantage."

Archie cursed at himself in his head, but he would not speak to his fault. "You're not my opponent."

Tataki folded his hands over his stomach. "Not today."

"So you know the category of magic I use. You don't know how I use it. How I apply it moment to moment."

"You don't know how you apply it moment to moment. You're still green."

"I've fought before."

"There's a difference between a fight and practice."

"No, I've fought. A real fight. Nori was there, too. Four of us against twenty tariaksuq."

Tataki finally opened a single eye and regarded Archie. He closed his eye and raised his eyebrows, impressed.

Archie scoffed as a realization hit him. "You're giving me advice. You're trying to help."

"You're a kid. And times are good. Neither of those things will last."

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

"So, what? I'm not the Harper clan's biggest enemy now?"

Tataki chuckled. "Our family's position is that Nori cannot be currently convinced to return to Uroko. If you can fight, all the better to be able to keep her safe."

Archie laughed back. "Currently? You really think she'll ever change her mind?"

Tataki was quiet for a moment. "One day, she won't have the choice."

"Now who's making the mistake? Telling me your family's intentions?"

"When the time comes, you won't be able to stop it."

Archie's smile faded. He wanted to punch Tataki in his smug face. Even as the thought struck him, he knew it was absurd, but he thought in that moment that he might actually stand a chance. "I've seen you fight. I know your moves, too."

"You've seen me put on a show. You think when my life is on the line that I'm impersonating an octopus? If you ever saw one of my 'moves,' you'd barely be able to track it before it killed you."

Tataki looked more at peace than ever. His nonchalance put the verity of truth into his words. Archie was full of hot air, but not so much that he didn't believe the fighter before him. He'd lose that fight just like he lost this conversation. He had nothing left to say. Fortunately, someone else walked up.

"Hey, Archie?" Sorrel shrunk into his shoulders and waved as he walked up. Archie couldn't believe that Tarragon had paired him with someone so meek. "I just wanted to say sorry before we got started."

"What for?"

"Well…" Sorrel winced and scrunched his body up even more. "I mean, I've heard you are really good, so maybe you'll beat me quick. But…if you don't…I'm sorry."

Archie blinked and shrugged.

"Oh, well….it'll hurt."

Archie's expression narrowed with confusion.

"That's all. Good luck out there."

Tataki let out a frustrated breath. "Neither of you will make it as fighters."

"Huh?" Sorrel looked over the back of the couch. "Whoa! It's Tataki! I'm such a fan!"

"I have a fight coming up," Tataki stated. "I can rest for the fight, or I can warm up for the fight. That's up to you."

Archie decided that he had poked the sleeping lion for long enough and walked over to one of either Fern or Fennel—Archie couldn't tell the difference.

"Hey, what kind of magic does Sorrel use? Tarragon said something about seeds?"

Whichever of the twins Archie was talking to, they weren't having it. They stared blankly at the ground and spoke in a mumble. "I'm not helping. Go away."

Archie backed off and looked around. The other twin seemed equally zoned out. As did the two older students that had returned. Even Barley seemed like a ghost. A strange energy took the air in the room and stagnated it.

That was right. This wasn't a friendly get-together. They were about to fight. To hurt each other and be hurt. And given Sorrel's premature apology, Archie might have been in for more hurt than anyone else.

"Alright!" Tarragon's energetic voice broke the stale atmosphere. "I'm headed up. I'll see you all when it's your turn!"

And then the last bit of positive energy was gone. It was just the fighters, a few staff workers, and the blonde woman. She snapped her fingers. "First fight, let's get going, people! Chive and Sherry, come on!"

The two oldest students were rushed out, but the room still seemed to get smaller by the minute. Archie waited and waited and waited. It had been different in Jakha. He had sprinted to battle because he had to sprint to battle. But now he could only wait. Nothing compelled him to fight but a desire to satisfy a personal interest.

He wanted the glory, but it wasn't about a younger Archie's obsession with legacy. No, this was different. Just like essence got damaged with each use, Archie's ambitions had gotten damaged each time he had told himself he would restore the Kent name. But now he had cleansed that rot from his soul. Even if he still wanted the glory and to be remembered, it came from a pure place.

But it didn't have a pure end. He was going to hurt Sorrel. Another person. Not a hulking beast rampaging to kill innocents. Another boy. Just like him. Someone with widespread interests and hobbies and friends. Someone still figuring things out. Archie imagined Sorrel screaming in pain as a blueberry shattered his arm.

And what if it didn't stop there? What if Sorrel kept coming? What if a few broken bones didn't stop him? What if Archie had to kill him?

A drink of Competitive Spirit would undo all of the damage. But that wouldn't change the fact that Archie had committed such a terrible act of violence to be able to kill.

Maybe this wasn't fun. Maybe Blanche had the right of it.

"Sorrel and Archie," the blonde woman called out. The boys walked over, unable to look each other in the eye. "We haven't been properly introduced. I'm Peach. I'm the event coordinator."

"Hi," both boys mumbled.

"Oh. You're the nice ones, aren't you?" Peach offered a sympathetic smile, looking at them as if they were innocent babies. "There are always a couple when we do amateurs. At least we only have one psycho this time around. Well, look, if you don't want to do it, you don't have to."

Sorrel lifted his gaze from the ground. "Really?"

"Sure. I mean, you're nobodies. No one cares about you." Peach shrugged as if she hadn't insulted them. "They're here for Tataki and Melo. You cancelling would just get them their red meat a few minutes sooner."

Sorrel looked over at Archie. "I still kinda wanna fight. If you do."

"Yeah. I do." Archie had come too far to back out now. He reminded himself that this was what he wanted. He was just nervous.

"Okay, well then." Peach rubbed her hands together as the sympathy disappeared from her voice. "Quit wasting my time, then. Let's get moving. This way. Time to meet Pomary."

Archie exchanged a nervous look with Sorrel before following Peach out of the fighter's lounge and into the dark tunnels. They turned through an open stone archway into an earthen room filled with herbs and cauldrons and bookshelves and old, rickety wooden tables. A Black Jacket wearing a black bonnet stood by the fire and stirred a massive cauldron with an equally massive length of wood.

"You two know the way back?" Peach asked. The boys nodded. "Good. They're all yours, Pomary."

Pomary did not turn to greet them. Instead, she kept working at her cauldron. Her voice creaked and dragged like an old door. "I haven't been Pomary since I was a little girl. I prefer Pomegranate. But she prefers her time. Such a peach, our Peach."

The lanterns on the wall flickered and the smell of a strange spice filled Archie's nose. He rediscovered that initial fear he had when he had met Anise. Witches, the both of them.

"Well, come on, then," she croaked. Archie caught a glimpse of her old wrinkled face as she reached up to smack the handle of her wooden spoon against the earthen ceiling. Dirt sprinkled down, some into the cauldron, some onto the table next to it.

Both boys hesitated. But then Archie realized that the battle had already begun between them. He decided to be the brave one and stepped forward.

Pomegranate stuck an open hand in front of Archie's mouth. "Spit."

"What?" Archie asked. Pomegranate answered with a shake of her hand. "Okay…"

He spat in her hand.

"More."

Archie spat again. Pomegranate slid her spit-covered palm across the dirt on the table and discarded the slimy mixture into the cauldron. After a single stir of her great wooden spoon, she grabbed a knife off the table and grabbed Archie by the wrist.

"This'll hurt," she warned, but the blade was already cutting into his forearm. Archie winced and tried to wiggle away, but the woman was much stronger than her age should have allowed. She worked quickly, dipping her finger into a semi-clear jelly that turned red as she swiped it across Archie's bloody arm. She flicked the jelly into the cauldron with one hand as she slid a noodle patch to cover Archie's cut.

"Now the other." The old Chef motioned for Sorrel. As she repeated the process, Archie watched the noodle on his arm dissolve into his skin, leaving no trace of a cut at all.

He peered into the cauldron. The murky purple liquid halved with each stir until it could barely be scooped out and put into a bowl. Pomegranate added a few flakes of dried herbs into the smaller bowl and leaned back. As she looked at Archie, he couldn't help but wonder how long it had been since she had seen the sun.

"It's ready," she said. "Take a drink. And don't mind the taste."

Archie recoiled from the smell before he even got the bowl to his mouth. The taste was worse. Unwashed vegetables, grainy and sludge, hot metal. And that was the best of it. It hit his stomach like a ball and seemed to leak gas the way it made Archie think his body was inflating. He stumbled forward to set the bowl down. His skin felt tight all the way to his toes and fingers. It squeezed and squeezed and Archie's bones were going to snap.

And then it was fine.

"You, now. Quick." Pomegranate put the bowl into Sorrel's hands. He drank and groaned, his body going stiff as he suffered the same way Archie had.

And then he was fine.

Pomegranate handed each of them a little needle and pulled their arms next to each other. "Give each other a prick. Right in the vein. Enough to draw blood."

They placed the needles on each other's arms, but they both hesitated to press down.

"Sorry," Sorrel said at last as he poked a little hole in Archie's skin. The pain made it easy for Archie to reciprocate.

Pomegranate checked to see that they were both bleeding and pointed at two chalk circles in the dirt on opposite sides of the room. "Don't wipe the blood. Step into those. Keep your whole body inside."

They did as she said, and Archbie watched as the droplet of blood on his arm disappeared and the little hole closed up. "How does it work?" he asked. "How did you make it?"

"Ha! By the time I told you, you'd be half as old as me. All you need to know is that you won't be able to kill each other. If you do, your bodies will reset to this moment. Any injury you suffer in the arena will disappear once you step outside the ring. Well, mostly disappear."

Fear widened Sorrel's eyes. "Mostly?"

"Well, you might get a case of echoes."

"Echoes?" Archie asked. "What's that?"

"That's the memory of pain still bouncing around inside of you. Chances are you'll just have some minor echoes. But sometimes the hurt is just as bad as when you first received it. It subsides over time, but I've seen some bad cases in my years."

Archie couldn't take a full breath. When he pictured fighting, he pictured trophies and parades, arms raised in celebration. Reality was far more grotesque than glamorous. "What determines how bad the echoes are?"

"How bad the pain is, for starters. But there's no guarantee that more pain means more echoes. Melo got an arm burned to a nub a month ago and he never had a single echo. Meanwhile, Pepper Ivy hit Gristle with a pepper spray several months ago that still has him squinting at least once a week. I'm not sure why some are more persistent than others."

"I hope ours aren't bad," Sorrel said.

Pomegranate shuffled across the dirt floor to examine each of their arms. "Well, it took. Better be off before Peach comes to get you."

Archie and Sorrel nodded at each other and left, Sorrel saying thanks to Pomegranate on his way out.

They found their way through the tunnels without trouble. They just had to follow Peach's voice, which sounded out with renewed urgency.

"He burned up everything but the boulders! Okay, get those trees up. And…let's do patches of tall grass. I want twenty to thirty percent coverage. Enough for strategy, not too much to obscure vision. Move! Go!"

Archie entered the lounge as Barley and Yarrow entered from the other side, their fight having just ended. Yarrow walked with his chin high. Barley shriveled into a ball as two Veratores whisked him away to another room. Neither had a scratch on them—the Competitive Spirit had made sure of that—but Barley's anguish was still plain to see. Archie tried to rush over to comfort his friend, but Peach cut him off.

"Good, you're here. We're going to need to rebuild a lot of the decorative assets for the main event, so we need your fight to last a little longer. Ten minutes or more should do. Can you do that?"

"I—"

"Good. Now get up there! And don't forget to wave!"

Next chapter will be updated first on this website. Come back and continue reading tomorrow, everyone!

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.