Mikros Leonidas's Arc

Chapter 2 of 11

The dead manticore still cooled in the dust when Mikros left the registration table. He wanted to reach the fighters' camp and study his rivals before the games. But he felt eyes on his back. He turned. The red-haired woman from the wall followed him, her tool satchel banging her hip. She held a strange brass device and pointed it at him like she was measuring his height. Mikros walked faster. The woman hurried to keep up. She was tall, and her boots slid on the loose sand. She fumbled with the device, watching him instead of her feet. Mikros ducked behind a supply cart to lose her. It did not work. She rounded the cart, caught her toe on a tent stake, and went down hard. Tools spilled everywhere. Gears rolled. A wrench clanged off a shield. The whole camp turned to look. A few fighters laughed. She had landed face-first in the dust. Mikros stopped. He should have kept walking. But she was small next to the big men laughing at her, and he knew that laugh well. He walked back and offered his small hand. She rose. Her nose was red and scraped, blood beading at one nostril. Her goggles hung crooked over bright red hair. She grinned anyway, even with the dust on her teeth. "You climb like a spider," she said. "I watched you drop on that beast. Nobody your size should hit that hard." "You've been chasing me," Mikros said. "Why?" She wiped her nose and held out a hand smeared with grease. "Cassandra Forge. I build things. I build things for people who win." She glanced at the laughing fighters and lowered her voice. "They see a jester. I saw a champion. I want to make you gear no one else has." Mikros studied her. Her tools were real, worn from use. Her eyes did not mock him. "I don't need help," he said. "I killed the manticore alone." "With a spear you found in the dirt," Cassandra said. "Imagine what you do with a spear I forge to fit your hands." She picked up a fallen gear and turned it in her fingers. "The other champions have smiths and sponsors. You have a clown nose and pride. In these games, pride gets you killed." That landed. Mikros had trained twelve years and owned nothing but his skill. The big men had money behind them. He had none. "Show me your workshop," he said. "Then I decide." Cassandra's grin widened. She gathered her tools fast, stuffing them back in the satchel. "This way," she said, and led him from the arena grounds. Mikros followed. He had wanted a place in the games, and he had it. Now he had something new: an ally he did not fully trust, and a reason to leave the arena for the first time. Whatever she built for him would decide how he faced the men who wanted him dead.