Ascendants of Ancients Sovereign (Worlds of the Crystal Moon, Book 1) (59 page)

“You know I don’t read the schedule. It gives me anxiety. I...” Sam hesitated. This was the first series of moments in which he realized he was expected to go into the arena to take a life. His first two fights had ended in death only because his foes were trying to do more than subdue him. In this fight, he was going to kill or be killed. He would have to release his rage from the beginning.

The bell of the arena sounded, jarring Sam from his thoughts. He only had a couple of moments to find his position. He headed out with Kael in hand.

The crowd erupted as Sam entered. From the stands, George marveled at how well-known Sam had already become in such a short span of Peaks. They chanted his name as if he was some sort of hero.
Not too shabby, Sambo. Sylvester would be proud.

The fighter moved into position and held his hands high to absorb the energy of the screaming mob. When Sam saw his enemy walk through the arena doors, he was shocked to see the beast. It had a bull’s head, a massive, human torso, and powerful, cow-like legs that ended with sharp hooves. He knew the beast from books he had read as a kid. It was called a Minotaur.

Sam stared at the horns on either side of the beast-man’s head as it bellowed like an angered bull. The creature’s muscles tightened as it threw its arms outward, level with the floor of the arena.

From the intense feeling of the crowd and his opponent’s dark stare, Sam knew he would die if he was not ferocious. He called upon his inner demon, now screaming to be freed. And before he could even open its cage, the demon broke free of its prison and rushed to the forefront of his mind. His demeanor changed as the hate poured out of him, and his heart turned to ice as he walked in to engage his enemy.

The arena headmaster lifted his hands into the air and shouted, motioning for Sam to stop. “As champion, Terrogon is allowed to roll the dice!”

The crowd chanted for the bowl. The Minotaur bellowed in Sam’s direction and snorted as he moved to stand over a podium. A circular dais had been placed on the arena floor below the headmaster’s box. The beast reached inside the large, wooden bowl and grabbed seven dice made from bones of past champions. After shaking them in his massive hand, the dice rattled around the bowl.

Four of the seven dice was all it took to indicate that Terrogon had his choice of battle. The Minotaur lifted both his shield and blade into the air. Once sure the headmaster understood his intent, he tossed them to the ground to signify combat without weaponry. It was now illegal under the laws of Southern Grayham to use an object to attain victory.

Lifting Kael in front of his mouth, Sam whispered, “I’m screwed.”

Sam was not surprised when Kael did not respond. The pulsating of the blade would have enlightened the crowd as to the power the weapon possessed. Sam held his head high as he walked to the area of the arena where Shalee, Helga, and BJ sat. He tossed Kael up to BJ and then discarded his shield, tossing it to the sand.

Shalee called to him, “Sam, you cannot fight this thing! You need to concede! Dying won’t accomplish anything!”

BJ would have spoken, but Sam motioned for his trainer to hold his tongue. After a moment of deep thought while staring at the stone wall surrounding the yellow sand of the arena, Sam found Shalee’s eyes. “We have nothing to go home to. This world is all we’ve got. If I don’t fight for these people, who will? You know the task we’re facing. To quit because of fear only prolongs the death we’ll suffer. I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t fight for the survival of these people. I have to be the best I can be. Would you have me do less?”

George studied Shalee’s face from the other side of the arena. Though he could not hear the conversation, he could see the look of anxiety on her face. He was surprised by his level of concern. Oddly, he wanted to help, but he had no idea what he could do. He lifted his hands in front of his face and crossed his fingers. “Fight like a mad man, Sam. Kick this thing’s ass,” he whispered.

Sam nodded at BJ, then at Helga. After one last reassuring look to give Shalee a sense of confidence, he turned to face his opponent. He pushed his neck side to side, cracking the bones and then began his approach.

Terrogon gnashed his teeth and flexed his muscles to intimidate, but Sam was no longer there. His inner demon, centuries upon centuries older than Sam, now ruled the fighter’s body. The order was given and Sam charged.

The Minotaur met Sam’s advance with a rush of his own. The two collided. The force nearly knocked both combatants unconscious. The beast-man was the first to recover. He lifted Sam above his head, threw him across the arena and watched as the human landed with a thud. Terrogon turned to the crowd and lifted his arms skyward to bask in the glory of the moment.

Sam struggled to push himself up. He appreciated Shalee’s magic. Without it, he would have been knocked out. Trying to match the beast’s power, despite his godly gift of strength, was a flawed plan. Compared to Terrogon, he was a featherweight fighting a heavyweight.

Sam shook out the cobwebs as the bull-man turned from the crowd. Again, the beast charged. Sam crouched and waited until the last possible moment. Just before Terrogon made contact, Sam rolled backward, secured a horn in each hand and used his legs to catapult the Minotaur. The bull-man collided with a single pillar that sat at the center of the arena and cracked its foundation.

Sam jumped to his feet and followed. As the beast’s massive muzzle lifted from the sand, Sam grabbed the hoop that dangled from its nostrils and ripped.

The bull-man’s flesh clung to the pin that secured the hoop as it tore free. The Minotaur reacted to the pain and kicked. Its right hoof collided against Sam’s ribs and, despite Shalee’s magic, a gash opened. Though no bones were broken, the collision was so severe that the hoop, and the flesh attached to it, fell to the arena floor and separated from one another as Sam flew backward and landed in a fetal position.

The Minotaur rose and bellowed as he reclaimed his bloody flesh and then ate it to demonstrate his superiority.

The crowd groaned its disgust.

A moment later, Terrogon retrieved his nose ring off the sand. With no place else to put it, he yanked the clasp off the pin and then pierced his ear lobe by shoving it through.

Again, the majority of the crowd moaned, but there was a number who cheered.

Angered by the fact that he had been wounded, Terrogon placed his massive hands against the pillar after he shoved the chains aside that dangled from it and pushed. At more than 15 paces tall and a pace wide, the pillar toppled in Sam’s direction.

Sam had barely recovered enough to lunge out from under the object’s path. The pillar missed crushing him by a narrow margin as he rolled to his feet. The arena floor gave way. The weight of the stone was too much to bear. Each section of the pillar fell into the darkness lit by torchlight and killed four men who were waiting below for their moment to fight.

The crowd’s energy amplified the mood as the hole opened. George sat in his seat, stunned. He could not believe how sadistic these people were. Their thirst for blood was insatiable. He thought to himself,
Damn … at least when I killed the owners of The Old Mercantile as fast as I could. How can these people be so cruel? Getting crushed is serious.

As soon as George finished his thought, he lifted his voice and shouted, “Kick his ass, Sam!”

The woman sitting to George’s right turned and grumbled. She was heavyset, probably around her 50th season and wore a billowing, yellow dress. The dress had no sleeves, and the hair under her arms stuck out. The woman had a grouchy, grandmother’s voice as she spoke through stained teeth. “You aren’t from around here, are you, boy? You should watch your mouth. Those who sit around me root for the champion. You understand me?”

Out of the corner of his eye, George watched as the Minotaur threw Sam across the arena again. As Sam landed, everyone surrounding the old lady stood, threw their arms up and cheered, but not the woman. She just sat there staring at George as if he had some sort of disease.

George put on a smile. “You’re right,” he conceded. “I’m sorry. Who am I to be sitting here insulting you like this? I’ll cheer as expected.”

The woman turned forward and growled, “That’s more like it, boy.”

George listened to the crowd moan as Sam kicked the Minotaur in his loincloth-covered nuts. As Terrogon cried out, George took the opportunity to remove the glove on his right hand. He then touched the old woman on her left arm.

Every bone, muscle, and organ from the top of her neck down turned to stone, but her skin remained unchanged. Despite most of her bodily functions being shut down in an instantaneous moment, George knew her mind was not dead yet. He watched her eyeballs roll in his direction. He stood, smiled, nodded, and then said, “It was nice to have met you. Please, don’t get up, I’ll find my own way out.” As he moved past, the woman’s eyes glossed over.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the arena, Helga had to take Precious from Shalee. Her hot-tempered student was finding it hard to watch. She desperately wanted to help, but it was against the law. The young sorceress-in-training had threatened to kill the Minotaur with her magic twice already, and Helga had stopped her on both occasions.

Since she could not use her power, Shalee resorted to the next best thing and started screaming. “Sam Goodrich, you grab him by his junk, drag his sorry butt around this arena, and then use that god given strength of yours to shove your foot right up his backside!”

BJ and Helga were amazed that someone so beautiful could sound so foul.

Shalee looked at Helga. “Can you believe the nerve of that thing? I ought ta—”

Helga put a finger against Shalee’s lips. “You’ll do nothing, Child.” The older sorceress took Shalee by the arm and sat her down. “I suggest we pray. Sam needs all the help he can get.”

Shalee rolled her eyes. “You do that. I’d rather watch the fight. Who in their right mind prays at a fight?” Shalee stood, looked across the arena and shouted, “Kick his trash, Sam!”

Sam fought to pick himself up after being thrown into the wall below the headmaster’s box. He tensed as Terrogon charged again. With its head lowered, the beast rammed Sam into the wall. Blood rolled down Sam’s chin, his internal organs taking much of the force.

The beast backed up, saw that Sam was unable to move, and scuffed his right hoof through the sand.

From his home deep beneath the Peaks of Angels on Ancients Sovereign, Lasidious was watching the fight as the images of Sam and the Minotaur appeared in the green flames that burned in his fireplace. He could see Sam’s pain and understood the situation was critical.

The Mischievous One moved to the stone table at the center of the room, grabbed the remaining pieces of the Crystal Moon and then returned to the fire. “Use this to your advantage, Sam. The moment hasn’t come for you to perish again, my brother.” Lasidious shook the pieces of the Crystal Moon.

Once again, the beast-man slammed into Sam, pinning him against the wall. Blood was dripping from Sam’s mouth as the ground beneath the arena began to shake.

The quaking was severe. The seismic activity was enough to capture the beast-man’s attention. The Minotaur turned his back to Sam. Confusion spread across Terrogon’s face as he watched the sand sift into the hole the pillar had created at the center of the arena.

Seizing the opportunity and understanding that this was his only chance for survival, Sam reached deep within and reacted. He lunged forward, grabbed the end of the Minotaur’s left horn with his left hand and used what was remaining of his god-given strength to break the horn, snapping it at its base with his right fist. The detached horn was now a weapon. Before the Minotaur could react, Sam spun around and plunged the horn deep into Terrogon’s back, piercing the Minotaur’s heart.

The crowd screamed as the bull-man fell to his knees, but Sam was not finished. He pulled the horn free with his right hand, reached over the top of the Minotaur’s shoulder with his left, and grabbed the beast’s chin. Pulling his enemy backward, Sam used the horn and drove it into Terrogon’s massive chest again and again.