The holding pen had a bench and a bucket and nothing else. Chris sat on the bench because standing was not an option.
His chest ached where the Stone Face had hit him.
His shoulder ached from the roll. His knuckles were split. He looked at his hands and grinned
'damn ,i won. i can get used to that'
The door opened. Chris expected a guard. Got someone different. The man who walked in was not tall or wide or armed. He wore gray and moved quiet.
One of Maren's personal attendants.
"The Warlord will see you."
Chris got up and followed the gray man through corridors he had never seen, past doors that had no handles on the outside, up stairs that got wider as they climbed. The higher you went in this fortress, the more space you got. That was how power worked in this place. The chamber was not what he expected. He expected a throne room. Got a study. Books on shelves. A desk with papers. A window that looked out over the yard, which meant Maren could watch the fights from his desk whenever he wanted.
The Warlord sat behind the desk with his hands folded and his eyes on Chris. Up close, Maren was older than he looked from the arena floor. He studied Chris
"You made the Stone Face yield." Maren said it flat. Statement, not question.
"Yes.i surely did" Chris heard his own voice.
"With mockery. That is unusual. Most Faces fight with their power. You fight with theirs."
'Theirs?'
"You turn their identity into a weapon against them. The Stone Face was respected. You made him ridiculous. The Bolt Face was fast. You made speed useless." Maren leaned back.
"That is not Jester behavior. a jester is an idiot. you are not."
Chris said nothing. His grin held on its own.
"I am going to give you something," Maren said. "but you have to maintain your value."
He slid a key across the desk.
Chris looked at it.
"A room above the pens. Your own. You will still perform. You will still fight. But you will sleep behind a door you can close." A room. The difference between sleeping in a pen with forty other slaves and sleeping alone with a lock. That was not something small.
'I can't believe I'm going to thank him for giving me a longer chain'
Chris picked up the key. The room was at the end of a corridor on the second tier. Stone walls. A cot with a real mattress. A window too small to climb through but big enough to let in light.
He closed the door. Turned the key. Stood in the silence.
Silence. No snoring. No coughing. No whispered conversations at three in the morning. Just him and the walls and the light through the window. He sat on the mattress. It was thin but it was still a mattress. He put the key in his pocket.
He found Voss waiting outside the corridor the next morning. The commander stood with his hands behind his back, blocking the path, not moving.
"The Warlord sees potential in you." Voss said it flat, stating the obvious. "I see risk."
"In me?"
"In what you represent. A Face that feeds on laughter, that grows stronger with an audience, that cannot be serious. You are a weapon that points in every direction at once. Including back at the hand that holds it."
Chris looked at him.
"I will be watching," Voss said. "When you slip and you will I will be the one who decides whether you get back up." He stepped aside. Chris walked past. His shoulders were tight.
'Great. a fortress full of people watching me. being a showman isn't easy.'
Delk was in the yard, Fear pulsing low around him, keeping the usual perimeter of empty space. Chris walked through the Fear without flinching anymore. You got used to it. The Fear became background noise after a while.
"You got a room," Delk said.
"News travels."
"The last Face who got a room was a Blade Face named Ren. Fastest fighter Maren ever owned. Won twelve bouts. Lost the thirteenth on purpose because Maren told him to. Proved loyalty. Maren gave him a room the next day." Delk paused. "Ren is dead now. Maren sent him into a fight he could not win. Needed to make a point to a rival."
Chris absorbed this. A room was not a reward. A room meant Maren planned to use him again. 'Valuable things get maintained. Until they're not valuable anymore. Then they're just things.'
Evening. The kitchen steps. Sera was already there, sitting with her back against the wall, a piece of bread in her hand.She just looked at him.
"You look terrible."
"I feel terrible. But I also feel nothing. It is confusing." He sat beside her."
"Maren gave you a room."
"Delk told you." He did not wait for confirmation. "It is not a gift. It just means he plans to keep me."
Sera was quiet for a moment. Then: "What are you going to do?"
The question sat between them. He could not answer it honestly. He could not answer it at all.
"Survive," he said. "Same as always."
She nodded. She did not argue. though she knew he had. no plans at all.
The room was dark. The window let in moonlight, not enough to see by, just enough to make the walls gray instead of black. Chris lay on the mattress and stared at the ceiling thinking about what Delk had told him.
Morning came gray and cold through the small window. Chris got up. Put on the clothes that had been left outside his door. New clean clothes. Another sign of ownership. He put the key in his pocket and walked to the door and his hand was on the handle when the knock came.
He opened it. The gray attendant stood in the corridor.
"The Warlord requires you in the arena."
"Again?"
"A new opponent. Commander Voss selected them personally."
He stepped into the corridor and closed the door behind him.
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A/N: I hope you enjoy this novel. Support by adding to your library and giving a power stone or two. Thank you.