Rend Stripclaw's Arc

Chapter 4 of 7

The morning after Lorn Thade rose from his knees, Rend looked at his trophy board. It sagged. Jerseys, straps of armor, and torn shirts hung off every peg. New wins came faster now. Prowlers lined up each day to lose to him. But the board could hold no more. A stripped tunic slipped off the top and landed in the dirt. Rend picked it up and had nowhere to hang it. "You need a bigger board," Patch said. The elelion nudged the fallen tunic with his trunk. "Every match adds another trophy. Soon you'll have a hundred and no place to show them." Rend stared at the crammed pegs. An empty board had shamed him once. A full one shamed him worse, because it hid his wins under a pile of cloth. "Then it grows with me," he said. He grabbed rope and planks from the tailor's cart. Patch lifted the corner posts with his trunk. Rend lashed new planks across, wider and taller. But he built it different this time. He set the planks on sliding rails, so each fresh win could push the board out another notch. Now it would never fill. It would stretch as fast as he stripped his rivals. A heavy tread crossed the yard. The crowd went quiet and pulled back. Rend turned. Marcus Strongpaw stood at the ropes. The bear wore a new jersey, red and clean, the number nine bright on his chest. His fists were clenched. Rend had stripped him bare once and made him famous for losing. Marcus had not forgotten. "Big board," Marcus said. He looked at the sliding rails, then at the jersey Rend had taken from him, still hanging near the top. "You keep my old one up like a flag." "I keep every win," Rend said. Marcus pointed at the new empty planks. "Then leave room. I'm filling that space with your fur." A wide tiger stepped up beside the bear. Lorn Thade, no armor now, cracking his knuckles. He had lost to Rend, but the fight had woken him. He did not look beaten. He looked ready. "We live in your yard now," Lorn said. "We watch how you fight. We learn." Patch shifted closer to Rend, uneasy. The bear and the tiger had moved in, and they were studying him. Rend understood. The board he built to never fill had become a challenge. Every peg he added was a promise his rivals wanted to break. He looked at the sliding rails, then at Marcus and Lorn. "Fine," Rend said. He touched the empty planks. "Show me you can fill it." The board would grow forever. That was solved. But now the strongest prowlers on the island slept in his yard, learning his every move, waiting to strip the trophies back off his wall.