The desert sun burned like judgment.
The seventh arena—the Circle of Blades—was smaller than the rest, its walls closer, its sands darker, mixed with crushed lava rocks. The air shimmered with heat and danger, every sound sharp enough to draw blood.
Leonotis could barely hear the herald's voice over the drumbeat in his ears.
"Next challenger! Grom Stonehand!"
The crowd roared. They loved her already—this blunt, strange "dwarf" who carried a stone axe big enough to cleave a horse.
Low stepped into the ring, shoulders squared beneath her ragged cloak. The false beard hid her mouth, but her eyes, cold and golden, betrayed the stillness of a predator about to strike.
Across from her stood something that wasn't quite human.
The desert assassin.
She moved like shadow beneath black silks that shifted with every breath of wind. Only her eyes showed—two cold, amber orbs that watched Low with a reptilian patience. Rows of tiny darts gleamed across her chest, each one tipped with something oily and green.
Adebayo clicked his tongue. "He'd better end it fast. Poison fighters don't play."
Lia swallowed. "S-she can handle it."
His own voice betrayed him—too soft, too unsure. He tugged his hood lower.
Then he tensed.
A warm presence settled beside him. Too close.
Amara.
She sat gracefully, hands folded, eyes on the ring—but her nearness made Lia's pulse jump violently. His palms went damp. He forced himself not to look at her.
Lia stared even harder at the sand.
Across the arena, the assassin entered the ring.
Black silk. Silent steps. Amber eyes that glowed like desert jackals. She moved with the quiet of a blade sliding between ribs.
Lia's stomach knotted.
This woman was death.
"This is bad," he whispered. "Grom's too heavy. He won't land anything."
Amara didn't look at him, but her voice was soft. "Then he must not try."
"Huh?"
"Some storms," she murmured, "break themselves."
Adebayo grunted. "Wise talk. Let's hope the dwarf knows it too."
Jabara dropped her hand.
"Begin!"
The assassin vanished.
Lia flinched. Adebayo leaned forward. Amara didn't move at all.
One moment she stood still—then she wasn't there. The sand where she had been puffed up in a ring as she reappeared ten paces to Low's right, moving so fast her silks seemed to ripple through the air like smoke.
Low turned just in time to catch the whisper of motion. Her axe came down in a brutal arc—
Whhhhssshhh
—but hit nothing.
The assassin was already behind her.
Another swing—miss.
A third—miss again.
Adebayo hissed. "He's too slow. That woman is reading him like a drumline."
The crowd gasped at the fluidity of it all. The assassin danced between Low's attacks as though she were reading her mind, her movements hypnotic and precise.
Then came the darts.
Tch-tch-tch!
A dozen tiny impacts peppered Low's shoulders and arms. Each sting brought a slow-burning heat that burrowed beneath the skin, turning her blood to fire.
Leonotis clenched his hood. "Low…"
Low gritted her teeth. Her vision wavered.
Poison.
Of course it was poison.
The assassin's reputation preceded her—the Serpent of the Shifting Dunes, trained to kill without leaving a sound.
The crowd murmured, half in awe, half in disgust.
"She's done for already," one merchant whispered.
"No one survives her venom."
"The dwarf won't last ten breaths."
Amara's lashes lowered. "He endures."
The assassin kept circling, spiraling, weaving her kill-net around Low.
"He's finished," Adebayo muttered. "Even giants fall to venom."
"No," Lia whispered, leaning forward. "He doesn't fall."
He didn't realize he'd spoken with such conviction until Amara turned—not fully, just enough to notice him.
His heart nearly stopped.
He looked away quickly.
He wasn't wrong.
Because the assassin didn't know who she was fighting.
Low's pulse thundered, the bear inside her roaring against the venom that sought to choke it. Her cursed blood was thick and stubborn. The werebear would not die easily.
She stumbled once, twice, her limbs feeling like stone. The crowd took it for weakness. The assassin took it for victory.
Low's eyes, though never left her target.
The assassin circled, always at the edge of vision, always just beyond the reach of Low's axe. She moved in spirals, her silks whispering like shifting sand.
Low tracked her by sound, by instinct. Her hearing, sharpened by her bloodline, picked up the faint hiss of cloth, the crunch of sand beneath bare feet.
Every turn of the assassin's path narrowed the circle between them.
Low's breath came slow and steady.
Her body screamed for rest, her veins pulsed with poison, but her mind was calculating. Measuring distance. Weight. Rhythm.
She shifted her stance slightly—one step heavier, slower.
She let her axe drag.
She pretended to weaken.
Adebayo exhaled through his teeth. "Oh. He's playing dead."
The assassin smiled beneath her veil. The huntress had found her prey.
A flick of the wrist sent another volley of darts hissing through the air—
Tch-tch-tch-tch!
Low didn't flinch. The barbs struck her neck, her collarbone, her chest.
To the crowd, she looked finished—her body sagging, her knees softening under the weight of exhaustion.
The assassin tilted her head. The job was done. All that remained was the killing blow.
She moved.
A blur of black silk and flashing daggers.
The air shimmered as she lunged for Low's throat, twin blades crossing like a serpent's fangs.
But this time—
Low wasn't there.
The bear moved.
Her hand shot up with inhuman speed, fingers closing like iron around the assassin's wrist. The blade froze mid-strike, less than an inch from her neck.
The assassin's eyes widened.
Then the sound came.
A low, deep growl—something primal, ancient, wrong. It wasn't the sound of a human throat.
The growl became a roar.
Adebayo's brow lifted.
Amara's fingers tightened slightly. "That's… not human."
With a single twist, Low turned the assassin's momentum against her.
WHAM!
She slammed the smaller woman into the dirt so hard that the ground cracked. The shockwave rattled the walls.
The audience went dead silent.
Dust drifted through the sunlight. The assassin's blades clattered from her hands.
Low held her there, pinned with one massive hand pressing into her chest. Her breath came ragged, her body trembling from venom and fury alike.
"You should've brought a bigger snake," she growled through the false beard.
The assassin struggled, then went still. Her eyes rolled back.
Out cold.
Silence.
Then, like a storm breaking—
The crowd erupted.
"STONEHAND!!"
"THE DWARF!!"
"BROKE HER IN HALF!"
The cheers rose in a wave, shaking the amphitheater.
Leonotis jumped to his feet with everyone else, cheering so loudly he forgot to be shy. "YES! THAT'S WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT!"
Adebayo laughed. "I must apologise to the dwarf for doubting him."
Amara didn't cheer, but she watched with a faint, unreadable smile. "Strength revealed at the right moment is its own miracle."
Leonotis's cheeks burned. He finally remembered he was supposed to be quiet and reserved and quickly ducked under his hood again.
Low had won. Poisoned, exhausted, outmatched—but she had won.
Even Jabara's expression softened at the display. She lifted one hand, and the wind carried her voice over the crowd.
"The victor—Grom Stonehand!"
The griots took up the chant, their drums booming in rhythm with the crowd's heartbeat.
"Stonehand, the unbroken! Stonehand, the storm that endures!"
Low rose slowly, her breath harsh. Sweat and blood mixed beneath her armor, her head pounding from the venom still clawing at her veins. She gripped the haft of her axe to steady herself.
Her opponent lay unmoving, the black silks torn, the bandolier shattered.
She wanted to say something clever, something cutting—but all she managed was a grunt before turning away.
An attendant hurried forward, offering her the bronze victory token.
She took it, wiped the sweat from her brow, and tucked it into her belt.
No bows. No grand gestures. Just a nod, and she left the ring.
Adebayo stood, stretching. "Come on, Lia. Let's make sure he doesn't fall on his face."
Lia nodded quickly—heart still racing, partly from the fight, partly from Amara still sitting there, close enough to touch.
As he turned to leave, Amara spoke behind him.
"You care for him deeply," she said.
Lia froze.
Adebayo smirked.
Lia's voice came out tiny. "H-he's… a friend."
"A valuable one," Amara said quietly. "Hold him close. Those who walk with storms rarely remain unchanged."
Leonotis swallowed hard and hurried away, nearly tripping over his own cloak.
Adebayo chuckled. "Smooth."
"Shut up," Lia muttered, cheeks burning.
Leonotis hurried toward the healers' tent.
Behind them, the drums shook the desert sky, and the obsidian sand drank the last of the assassin's blood—
a silent reminder that the Circle of Blades had no mercy for the slow or the weak.
And today, Low had proven she was neither.
Back in the arena, Jabara watched as Grom left the ring with a look that wasn't quite approval.
She leaned toward one of her fellow seers.
"That one… his àṣẹ sleeps like a mountain. If it wakes—"
"—it will crush more than his enemies," the other finished grimly.
The wind stirred their robes as they fell silent.
In the arena below, attendants dragged the unconscious assassin away, the black sand swallowing the marks of their fight.
Leonotis saw Low walking through the hallway.
"That was amazing!" he said as she approached the competitors' gate.
"Mm."
"I mean, you threw her like a thunder god! And she was—she was invisible, practically!"
Low rolled her neck, grimacing. "I told you not to doubt me."
"I didn't doubt you," Leonotis said, though he absolutely had. "You just looked like you were—uh—dying."
Low's eyes flicked toward him. "I was."
He blinked. "What?"
"The poison," she said, waving one hand dismissively. "Nasty stuff. Didn't like the taste."
Leonotis gawked. "You—what—how are you even standing?"
"Because I'm not normal, remember?" she said, voice low, almost tired now. "Don't forget that."
He hesitated, then smiled. "You're really something else, you know that?"
"I know."
The crowd was still buzzing, the aftershocks of Low's victory rolling through the stands. Down below, attendants scraped cracked sand back into place.
King Rega sat forward on his throne-like seat, fingers drumming the armrest. His eyes never left the arena floor.
"That wasn't dwarf strength," he said quietly. "Not even the mountain clans hit that hard."
Kenya, arms folded, kept her voice low. "His power spiked unnaturally. No ordinary warrior shrugs off venom like that."
Zuri leaned slightly toward them, mask tilted. "Maybe he's just trained harder than others. Sometimes strength looks strange."
Rega scoffed. "He moved like something waking up inside him. A beast, not a fighter."
Kenya nodded once. "If he's hiding power, we should take note."
Zuri added gently, "He spared the assassin's life."
Rega gave her a sideways look. "Mercy… or control. Both can be dangerous."
Zuri opened her mouth to reply, but Kenya tapped her fingers to let it rest.
Rega leaned back, eyes narrowing as the sand finished being raked smooth.
"Watch him," he murmured. "Quietly. I want to know what he really is before the next match begins."
The drums shifted rhythm again.
Another fight was about to start.
But Rega's thoughts were still on the "dwarf."
Later, in the healers' tent, the air was thick with the scent of herbs and burnt incense. Low sat on a stone bench as a masked medic examined her arm.
"You've neutralized most of it yourself," the medic murmured, impressed. "Your blood burns hotter than the poison."
Low didn't answer. Her mind was far away—back in the ring, in the moment she'd nearly blacked out.
For a brief second, she'd felt her skin ripple, her muscles shift. The bear inside her had stirred, hungry for release. If she hadn't ended it when she did…
Her hand tightened around the bench.
That couldn't happen. Not here.
Not where kings and seers watched.
Not when Leonotis still needed her.
Outside, the drums continued, announcing the next match. The crowd's energy rose again, feeding the desert heat until it seemed the entire arena might catch fire.
Leonotis stood at the edge of the tent flap, watching the arena sands being raked clean for the next battle.
He turned to her. "You okay?"
"Define okay."
"You're not gonna pass out, right?"
She snorted. "I'll live."
"Good," he said, then hesitated. "You were incredible, Low. I mean it."
She looked at him, expression unreadable beneath the shadow of her beard. "You sound surprised."
"No, I just—" He paused, rubbing the back of his neck. "You didn't even use àṣẹ. That was pure grit."
"Sometimes that's enough," she said quietly.
Leonotis nodded, though part of him wondered if she was wrong—if someday, it wouldn't be enough.
Because as the drums changed rhythm and the crowd chanted for the next fight, he couldn't shake the image of the assassin's dart glinting in the sun, or the way the sand had cracked under Low's roar.
He had seen the beast beneath her skin—just a glimpse—but it haunted him all the same.