The Empress's smile had faltered immediately like a light from a flick of a switch.
Her lips parted from disbelief, her pale face subtly turning an even more impossibly paler shade.
The massive red door, with the semi-circle top, was left ajar enough to fit a small carriage through the gap.
Behind the massive open red door, the sound of shuffling armour was audible.
The cloaked boy looked past Lady Alexis's shoulder, noticing guards through the gap, the guards twitching forward at the sight of his hand over her wrist.
They had stilled already before the boy had even noticed them, Lady Alexis's free hand already held behind her to signal the guards to a stop.
Once again, the crowds of spectators turned deadly silent, the peoples' gaze fixed to the interaction held between the two in the pit.
The silence was cold, the air thinning as if the noise was the only thing that had kept it alive.
Then the Empress's expression did a complicated thing, like a puzzle cube, it seemed to magically click into place.
Her subtly parted lips, never revealing a hint of teeth, began to purse before immediately shifting into a deceptively warm smile.
The ends of her overly red lips never quite reaching her eyes.
"I think I misheard you; I thought I heard you say-" The Empress was immediately cut off, rudely, by a disinterested voice.
"I wish to vacate my title of champion." The cloaked boy repeated himself in the same monotanous bore.
There was another long silence from not just the Empress, but the crowd too.
Up, up far into the heights of the coliseum, Sol sat rigidly.
Her weight curled inward, held up by her fist, seeming to suddenly jitter.
"What?"
Sol thought to herself, her eyes widening another time, shocked at this next thing that had once again taken her aback.
"He wants to give up his title...Even though he just won?" Sol questioned to herself, pausing to comprehend the thought.
"Why? Why would anyone fight all this way to become a champion? Only to rescind their status immediately? What was the point of being here then?" Sol questioned to herself in a rapid fire of fiery-tinged thought.
Suddenly Sol felt a heat begin to pool in her stomach, the bubbling kind that only brewed when agitated.
This heat swirled inside her, whirling from the depths of her being as it gnawed at her with increased intensity.
The curious thing about this lava-like emotion, the engulfing need to understand what she did not understand, was Sol couldn't tell where exactly this emotion persisted inside her.
Sol was currently in the body of a shade; this realisation struck her as she suddenly wondered where these emotions came from.
Sol was technically in a construct made from, not flesh, but shadow.
How was it possible for her to even perceive emotion?
Was she feeling these emotions from her main body still within the sun?
Was the piece of her consciousness, that she placed inside of the shade, responsible for these emotions?
Then, as she peeled back the layer of thought, she wondered "Why do I care about any of this?"
Her faintly blazed irises, like ghostly rings of flame, narrowed onto the Empress's expression where she stood down in the pit.
She watched how the Empress had gone through a similar process of agitation, in a fraction of a second.
The Empress's expression shifted to a deathly still, her lips closing as her brows furrowed with a vile look, something wicked and angry stirring underneath the surface of her deathly pale skin.
"I see." Lady Alexis finally breathed in an unnaturally calm tone.
Then just as quickly, the corners of her lips creased to diverge away from each other, blending into a theatrically warm smile.
The red tint of her lips acted as the only colour to her face, apart from her eyes, her green gaze glinting radiantly over the cloaked boy.
Then the Empress's expression did a dangerous thing.
Her smile curved into too wide of a grin, her red lips too tight at the edges.
"A shame. I saw a…Potential…In you." She breathed in a sweetness as floral as substandard perfume.
"In that case." She paused, her voice rippling through the air as she let the words drag.
"I'd be happy to escort you back to your dressing room." She insisted with the same deceptive smile, her red lips gleaming at the cloaked boy.
Her green eyes continued exploring the shadow under the boy's hood, scanning again to find another peep of those dark eyes.
"Theres no need." The cloaked boy answered in an expressionless tone.
At once the audience collectively gasped.
The sound so very audible, like a sharp gust of wind, that it made the Empress's ears perk up.
Even Sol growled an inaudible breath from the tops of the coliseum "What?! Is this combatant mentally stunted?"
Although no one could hear it from the rows further down, let alone the pit.
The Empress, herself, offering her company.
Only to be refused.
To deny such a rare privilege, could only been seen as rude behaviour to the people in the audience.
To Sol, she thought in the same manner, feeling that a commoner should always treat someone of status with respect.
After all, if this boy had done the same to her, she would've saw it fit to throw him into the depths of the sun
"Who does this cocky bastard think he is?" She swore internally, forgetting her royal image whilst in thought.
Yet the cloaked boy did not see it as a privilege, rather a disadvantage.
In his gut, he felt a bundle of needles gently pricking him.
The boy was smart, experienced even for his young age, he quickly concluded that this offer would only serve as suppression toward him.
He would not allow the Empress, and her guards following closely behind her, to monitor him.
Yet this distrust was not apparent in the boy's tone, nor his straightened expression well hidden under his hood.
The gasp from the audience however, whilst involuntary, made the disrespect palpable now like a thin blanket laid over the whole coliseum.
The Empress's sharp grin somehow widened impossibly further.
Her eye lids converged softly, the image of harmless innocence, yet her left eye ever so slightly twitched.
The Empress, unbeknownst to the audience, was not hurt by the reasons the audience would naturally have presumed.
Internally, the Empress was seething.
She hid her intentions well behind the facade of her beautiful expression, as was the boy if Lady Alexis could see his mask of a straight face under his hood.
The Empress was not offended by the refusal of her company, rather that her reputation was thrown to the wind so audaciously in front of the audience.
Though this only nagged at her more, like a craving for a certain taste of something, the mysteriousness of this character was intoxicating to Lady Alexis.
"He doesn't show his face, he doesn't care to be champion, nor does my presence affect him." She wondered to herself; with the same way a chef considers the taste of food.
Something brewed deep within the dark swells of the Empress's dungeon-like conscience.
This unfathomable essence, already having existing for some time, now seemed to intensify into a narrow beam of focus onto the calm cloaked character before her.
Her secretly ominous intentions finally caught up with the present moment, her jaw parting to slip a joyful giggle out past her red lips.
Her flat palm rose to her lips to gently stifle the rest of her laugh, the perfect image of innocent, her radiantly joyful aura making the thin blanket of tension dissolve into nothingness.
The audience relaxed into this aura, continuing to spectate the conversation.
Though it was exactly this audience that prevented Lady Alexis from acting, how she truly desired.
The people of Nioavoleir who would've been considered monsters by the humans above ground, if the humans knew of them, were all still a good people.
In this sense, if their leader were to punish a combatant for exercising their right to withdraw from the tournament, this would anger the people.
The Empress had a reputation to uphold, that was how she had stayed in power for so long.
Thus, this single seemingly human combatant was not worth risking her position for…yet.
"As you wish." The Empress conceded as she forced the words between her lips, her voice as smooth as polished mahogany.
"Though if you must go, at least be as kind as to give a lady your name." She requested in a purposefully slow voice, her tone just a drop too kind.
The cloaked boy remained as still as ever, though he sighed deeply within his heart.
This question, whilst so achingly simple, was anything but innocent.
The Empress had intended to find the cloaked boy's identity, using the pretence of kindness to wrap her intentions in sinister strands of velvet disguise.
The boy recognised this, perceiving the snake in the grass, he was wary as he thought quickly to himself.
"Sparrow." He uttered delicately, providing his stage name instead of his full name.
This way, Sparrow still politely accepted her request without giving into her real plans, he could avoid giving his identity away this way.
The Empress could not press any further, it would appear rude and suspicious to the people to continue prodding anymore, Thus using this loop hole was a safe option.
The Empress swallowed a sour thought, knowing full well she had failed to trap the boy as she forced a mockingly pleasant smile.
"Well everyone, lets give one last cheer to your champion of only tonight...Sparrow!" She announced into the disc shaped item, forcing herself to discard any unpleasant thoughts, her voice theatrically exuberant.
The crowd burst into a blaring cry immediately, to celebrate Sparrow's win.
A burst of coloured bits, each bit small and thin, rained over the coliseum once again.
The pit was engulfed in coloured pieces, like thick snow.
The precipitation of different bits filled the sky with drops of colour, obscuring the pit entirely.
When the downpour of bits finally subsided, the clearing revealed two things missing.
Sparrow, the cloaked warrior.
The red crystal sword, the one that Bonecrusher had used.
"Thank you, everyone, for being here to witness this match!" Lady Alexis spoke into the magical disc, still standing in the pit, projecting her voice around the coliseum.
Whilst the Empress continued garnering the admiration of the people, Sol sat barley still.
Her entire body was curled up, her frame vibrating with tension.
Somehow, her day off had actually gone incredibly wrong.
Her mind was full of unanswered questions, and before she realised it, Sol had found herself descending flights of stairs down the coliseum toward the hallway she had come from.
Sol climbed down in hasty steps, soon approaching the inside corner, past the bottom row of the seats.
She turned, walking toward the walk way leading into the hallway she entered from.
Whilst she walked, she noticed the Empress from the corner of her eye.
The Empress suddenly paused mid way through a sentence, talking about the honour of sharing witness to the match with such a wonderful nation of people.
Her green eyes travelled above the pit, noticing the red haired woman walking around the rim of pit above, just before disappearing into the coliseum.
Before lady Alexis resumed speaking, she couldn't help but briefly notice the indescribable sensation of feeling like she had seen this woman somewhere before.
...
The hallways were long, the walls a sickly shade of pale green as Sol ventured further ahead.
She reached a bend in the hallway, turning the corner and progressing forward past the door of the former champion's room.
Sol reached the west end of the hall, the opposite of where she had came from, turning another corner as she heard the faint sound of voices.
In front of her, she saw a door with a sign labelled "Sparrow."
The door was left ever so slightly ajar, enough that voices slipped through the light that peeked out through the crack.
"Hehehe, so? You got it?" A voice from inside shrieked in a playful tone, followed with joyful laughter.
"Of course." A disinterested voice mumbled back, followed by the noise of rustling fabric.
"Hmm... smaller than I expected." The first voice spoke again in a theatrically exaggerated tone.
"It's obviously inside this." The unfazed voice responded.
"Oh, right." The excited voice now breathed in a quieter chunk of realisation.
"Well, we went to a great trouble to get this. It better be worth our time." The first voice breathed again in a dramatic sigh.
Sol froze almost immediately mid-step, her breath hitching as she went to eavesdrop on the conversation.
Though just before she could perfectly still herself in time, the balls of her foot smacked against the floor with just a little too much noise.
At once the room turned silent.
Sol remained eerily still, her expression shifting with unease.
She tilted back to begin shuffling away, only for the door to suddenly push all the way open.
The cloaked boy stood in the door way, his invisible eyes under his hood shifting into a dangerous narrow at Sol.
One arm already extended to keep the door open, the other tucked neatly into his cloak.
Sol could feel the burn of his gaze, even whilst hidden under the shadow of his hood.
"Who are you?" The boy demanded in a concrete tone, his voice dry of any emotion.
Sol had immediately shifted stance, forcing her shoulders to sag in relaxation as she twirled a strand of red hair around her finger.
She then discreetly manipulated the shape of her shadow, adding faint colour to her cheeks.
"I wanted to congratulate your performance." Sol lied in a purposefully soft voice.
The figure stood still, the shadow under their hood inspecting Sol with scepticism.
Sol had frozen in place within her mind, she was no fool, she could tell there was a weapon under that cloak.
Her weapon of disguise however, was much sharper than whatever rusted junk the warrior kept confined under the black fabric.
Her faintly warm skin seemed to be untouched by the lamp light, gently stretching from a oil lantern a door down from the two.
Sol could feel the weight, from the shadow under the hood, synthesizing over her.
The shadow suddenly stilled, brooding heavily.
Then the hood twitched subtly as the characters invisible face turned, the shadow following as it obscured the figures face.
The fabric, creating the shadow, weaving to meet the twists of it's wearer's head.
One turn left, down the hall.
Sol forced her eyes not to narrow on this subtle change, her expression remaining still like a perfectly intact matryoshka doll.
The hood twitched again, his head turning right slightly, toward the other end of the hall.
That was when Sol, who had the experience of living for thousands of years, finally understood.
The boy was checking to see if the coast was clear.
SHING!
Sol suddenly found herself staring at the ceiling, watching something metallic hover inches above her, where her head previously was.
Sol processed her situation quickly: she had instinctually leaned back upon sensing the boy's attack.
It was the realisation she had just beforehand, that allowed her to react just in time.
Though to think this combatant had attempted to kill her in an instant, was unheard of.
Murder is not an easy concept, for one to decide to take a life requires plenty of resolve.
Sol was muddled, why had he resorted to violence?
What part of her disguise had he somehow seen through?
No, what disguise was there even to show, she hadn't even had harmful intentions.
Sol only planned to discover how he had beat the champion, to quell her curiosity.
So why, did this warrior resort to murder in such an instant?
However before Sol could figure that out, she had other problems to concern herself with.
The shadow under the warriors hood grew unexplainably darker with the confirmation of his suspicions.
Unbeknownst to Sol, the cloaked boy had acted purely based on scepticism alone.
If this girl really was a harmless girl, her head would've been on the floor by now.
An innocent girl, with the intention of congratulating a champion, would not be fast enough to dodge a surprise attack.
The fact that this woman had evaded his attack, showed that she was not as innocent as she pretended to be.
The cloaked warrior, Sparrow, had no way of knowing Sol's intentions.
In other words Sol's life, to this boy, was insignificant.
Willing to risk her life based on absolutely no evidence.
To make such a decision so carelessly...
To treat life so indifferently...
One could only be a monster.
end of chapter 7