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Chapter 13: Champion's Reprieve

Janice was in her element. She had her trusty sword, polished except for the blood that coated it. In front of her was her enemy, an elephant that stood up on two legs. It's large orbs of eyes stared down at her angrily. It shifted its massive club from hand to hand as if that would throw her off. It's body was covered in multitudes of cuts, but it's thick skin protected it well.

The fight had been going on for nearly half an hour at this point and the crowd was beginning to bore. They had come to see Molamse's mighty champion finally be beaten down by the mighty Carrack of Corzicar. Janice had no idea where or what Corzicar was, but they'd need to send something that relied on more than brute strength to beat her.

Janice had been hit a few times. Just glancing blows, but glancing blows had left her with two broken ribs and a bad series of bruises across his waist and chest. She had toyed with the beast, but now she needed to deliver the kill that the crowd needed.

The crowd was a mix of the rich and the poor. The coliseum of Molamse was open to all the citizens for a pittance fee. This was where the rungs of the social ladder melted away. Fine clothing stood next to rags and all shouted, cursed and spat down with blood induced fervor. They were insatiable. A blur of different colors and species. Scales, fur, feathers and other strange skins all surrounded Janice as if they were a zoo built around her instead of her being the spectacle.

Carrack raised his arms up and let out a mighty below with his trunk. His jewelry, a mix of hoops and studs across his body and two sharpened tusks rattled as her charged Janice, intending on either spearing her with his tusks or just running her over.

Janice, in her leather jerkin and metal shin guards and elbow pads that gave her the most agility, smiled. Just because she had allowed the last charge to almost work, didn't mean this one would be successful.

Carrack didn't see what happened. One second the little human was there, a price that the Molamse pit masters had spent a fortune to buy, then it wasn't there as if plucked from existence. The elephant barely had enough room to stop without smashing into the wall of the opposite side of the arena. He stood up and turned slowly to look for his target, but the arena was empty.

“Did I step on her?" Carrack was a brute and not smart. He leaned down to check the bottoms of his feet and when he did, the crowd gasped. They didn't gasp because there was a flattened human under his trunks of a foot. They gasped because Janice was standing atop his back with her sword raised high.

Carrack didn't even react to the gasp. It hadn't really registered in his brain. Better for Janice.

The woman plunged her blade down fast and hard right into the nap of Carrack's neck. It went all the way down to the hilt and the elephant was dead before it could do anything, not even make a noise.

Carrack, dead and limp, toppled forward and Janice rode him all the way down.

A great plume of dust rose up and the crowd was silent until they saw Janice step out with her sword raised high. They exploded into cheer at their champion. Never defeated and always a crowd pleaser, they threw coins down at her. She didn't bother to grab any, the cleaners would get them and they would go to the Molamse put masters, her masters.

“A fantastic display," Belus of the boars said as Janice stepped out of her simple armor. She pulled her fingers through her hair, straightening out the knots that had formed. She had stabbed the barber who had tried to take her long curls from her and so she got to keep them.

“Why are you still around?" Janice asked and stowed her sword on a rack nearby. The armory was just inside from the arena and was where all participants armed up before going to fight and die. “I don't belong to you anymore." She didn't even look at him as she then went about cleaning the blood from her gear. Elephants had a lot of blood.

“Because you are still my favorite catch," Belus chuckled and toyed with a rack of helmets, spinning it slowly with his thick fingers. “And I bet on you every time."

“Everyone does." Janice grabbed a wet cloth from a bucket filled with dilute ammonia. It burned her nose getting close to it. She then slowly wiped her armor off. “Can't be making too much off of me now."

Belus made a noise. Janice would have called it an oink, but Janice dare not say that. She was property, even though she was very expensive property, Belus wouldn't have suffered much for killing her. If he could kill her. She could probably defender herself, but others could kill her, so she kept her mouth shut and the giggle in her head.

“Most day's betting on you only gives me scraps, but today..." Belus hefted a coin pouch from his hip. “Today the masses were against you, but Belus of the Boar will always bet for Janice of Earth."

“I'm flattered," Janice set the jerkin aside and began to wash her elbow pads. They were no more than bent pieces of metal with leather straps, but even that had been useful in the pit. “It's good to know that I have fans."

Belus stowed his coin purse away and grunted as he moved to the door where a guard waited to open it on the other side. He gave the door one slap with his callused wrist and the door opened. He turned to face Janice. “Keep winning and making me rich, girl. It's the only way to stay alive." He laughed out loud, a very moist noise that rolled from his pudgy belly to his flat, wet, pink nose.

Janice sat there for a long moment after Belus had left. Then she cried.

What kind of life was this? Forced to fight for her life for the entertainment of a bunch of cruel people. She had killed. Sure, it had been to save herself, but it felt like murder. The other gladiators had been slaves just like her. Very few had actually enjoyed this. Even Carrack had that small moment of hesitation at the start of the fight. Who had he been before all of this? Could have been a loving father that was captured when away from home. Impossible to tell, but it was a possibility. She had been a daughter with a friend and a dream for a future. Now she had no friends and no future.

Janice threw the bloody rag off to the side. She could just start killing them. While she hated killing in the arena, she felt no qualms about killing the slavers. She remembered how the fat pig had laughed when he told her that he had killed Jason. How he loved it. She would kill him first. Next time she saw him which was slightly regretfully because he only came to visit after matches. She'd have to fight in the arena one more time. Kill another innocent one more time.

Janice twisted and then gasped. She had forgotten about her broken ribs. She'd go to the healer first.

The healer was a decrepit old deer named Niik. He was a slave, but so honored that he might as well have been free. He had free range of the entire city, though his advanced age prevented him from really going anywhere, instead he had small slave children go and get whatever he needed. It let the kids stretch their legs and if they were scolded, they just had to say they were getting something for Niik and that was the end of that.

Niik, unless he had been summoned by the pit masters to heal someone from somewhere, could be found under a small awning in a courtyard filled with herbs and medicinal remedies that made the space smell like cinnamon and pepermint. He had a small fire at the center and the sound of children playing could always be heard from nearby buildings.

Niik gave Janice a warm, but sad smile. “You have won again," he said in a voice that had surprised Janice the first time. There was life in the voice still, loud enough to carry quite a distance.

“Not unscathed," Janice said and winced as she sat down. She looked down at her side past her breast wrappings to where the two broken ribs were. She could see them slight eschew. It wasn't but would get worse if not treated quickly.

Niik leaned closely and gazed at the wound and nodded. “Impact causing a fracture. This will only take a few minutes." He raised a hand and flicked his hoof at a nearby open door.

A few moments a small lizard in tattered clothes, but with bright eyes, came running out. He stopped next to Niik, who whispered something to him and then ran off.

“Children truly are innocent," Niik waved until the boy vanished out of sight around a corner. “He'll be back soon with what I need for you, but in the meantime, sit." He waved a hand at a small leather covered stool. “I can tell you have much on your mind and it doesn't take years like mine to tell that they are dark thoughts."

Janice hesitated for a moment. She had done her best to hide what she had been thinking. Most of the time she half a rather stern and intimidating look on her face and bought she had that on now. Yet, the old deer had seen right through her mask. The thought of just leaving and hoping for the best with her ribs came to mind, but she stopped. Niik had been known as someone who could confide in secrets without telling. Not even the master could coerce him, even with threats to the children. He had nearly starved himself on a hunger strike the last time the masters wanted him to tell a secret.

Janice took the seat. It was small and creaked with the threat of breaking, but the little thing held firm. It had supported the weight of much larger creatures and for years at that. A human wasn't going to break it today.

“Talk," Niik said. It wasn't a demand, but an offer to offload her thoughts and put some of the weight on his shoulders.

“I'm going to kill them," Janice said quickly. “All the masters, starting with Belus of the Boars."

There was a moment's silence between them. Even the sound of children had paused for a moment before laughter and giggling could be heard again.

The deer sat up straighter and rubber some longer chin hairs he had with his hooved fingers. “Well, that is something." He nodded a few times. “But not the first to make that claim. Other have tried and all have failed. The masters are very powerful."

“I won't fail," Janice said and she believed it. She had gone through her life with the intention of completing every thing she set out to do. Confidence was the first part of success and while she had failed in the past, she never let it dampen her spirits.

“Maybe you won't," Niik shrugged and turned to face his fire. There he had a pot of boiling water which he took and then poured into waiting cups and with cinnamon sticks in them and herb leaves in them. There had just been two cups as if the deer had been waiting for her or someone.

“Maybe I will," Janice shot back defensively.

“Maybe," Niik said and sipped his tea.

Janice didn't like tea, but took a sip anyways. It was earthy with the hint of cinnamon from the sticks. She preferred sweeter drinks.

They sat in companionable silence for a few moments until the small lizard returned with a small linen bag. He gave it to Niik, who then gave him a piece of caramelized sugar. The lizard nibbled on the sweet with a smile and ran off again.

“Here we go." Niik undid the small string at the top of the bag and opened it up to reveal a small scroll, ink, a feather pen and some more herbs. He took them out, setting each item by itself. With a care that Janice had never seen before, Niik opened the bottle of ink and crumbled up the dried herbs and deposited them into the ink bottle while chanting in a language that Janice didn't understand.

A red smoke rose from the ink bottle and then turned green once Niik stopped mixing the herbs into it.

“If it remains red, it will kill," Niik said to Janice. “Always look for green smoke when it come to any healing spell."

Janice nodded reflexively and watched as Niik then dipped the pen into the bottle and began to write in the scroll. The letters on the scroll glowed green for a moment and then faded back to black. Small bits of the herbs could be sticking out of the ink.

The deer wrote for several minutes until every part of the scroll was covered in writing that Janice couldn't make sense of.

With the writing done, Niik carefully closed the ink bottle and tossed it into the fire where it merely sizzled. The feather pen followed shortly afterwards. He then wiped his hand across the scroll. The ink was already dry and Niik nodded again. “Good. It's done. A simple healing scroll. Easy to find materials and yet the art of scroll making is dying. Too many youngsters want to have that healing touch when anyone can make a scroll." He looked up to Janice who was patiently waiting and reached to his left and into a worn leather bag without looking. His hand came out with a small piece of paper and he handed it to Janice.

Janice took it and looked at it. It was a recipe. She didn't know what a Faraghast Root was, but she got the jist of the instructions.

“I know it by heart," Niik said. “You don't and I'm sure that it will come in handy. Everything there can be bought at a market or found in the wild."

“Thank you," Janice said. She was honored. It felt as if she had just gotten a blessing from Niik. She pocketed the paper with the intention of scribing it over to a leather roll where it would be less susceptible to being ruined in bad weather or torn if she took a bad fall.

“Now," Niik said and clapped his hand. Raise your arms for me. He grabbed the scroll. “It may be a healing spell, but this is going to hurt."