Mikros Leonidas's Arc

Chapter 6 of 11

Mikros slept on the workshop floor in his new bronze skin. He woke at first light, ready. The armor gripped him warm, blue veins faint along his ribs. His red nose still glowed above his chin. He touched it once, then let his hand drop. He would not fight it today. He would fight in the arena. Cassandra knelt beside him, still awake. Grease marked her cheek. Her red hair hung loose from its band. Tools filled the vest across her chest, and she gripped a wrench she had clearly not set down all night. Since the manticore, she had believed in him when the officials only laughed. She had built armor for a fighter no one else would touch. Now she watched him rise, and her jaw was tight, as if she feared to send him out. "The plates will hold," she said. "I checked every seam twice." She reached up and pressed her palm flat to his chest. The bronze answered with a soft glow under her hand. "Just come back and let me hear you brag." Mikros looked at her. She was tall, and he was small, and still she had never once bent down to speak to him like a child. That mattered more than the armor. He grabbed her hand where it rested on his chest and squeezed it. "You built this for me," he said. "You saw a champion when they saw a clown." Heat climbed his face. His glowing nose burned brighter, and he knew it, and he laughed at himself instead of hiding. He rose on his toes and kissed her cheek. His lips left a smudge of soot behind. Cassandra froze. Then a grin broke across her face. "Careful," she said. "The whole crowd will see that nose light up." "Let them." Mikros stepped back and stood straight. "I will win with Maxx. But I will win for YOU." He turned and marched to the workshop door. Contraptions and brass pipes crowded the walls around him. He pushed the door open into the morning. The road to the arena grounds lay ahead, already loud with the noise of the crowd gathering for the games. He walked toward it proud, chest out, nose shining like a lantern. Then the crowd near the gate saw him. A ripple of laughter rolled back through the people. Fingers pointed at the glowing red bulb on the little warrior in bronze. Someone shouted for the jester to go find his tent. Mikros did not slow. But he saw now what waited. The armor would stop a spear. The nose would not stop the laughing. To win the laurel, he would have to walk into that arena and make every mocking mouth go silent with his blade. He reached the gate and stepped through.