Nameless (Nameless #1)(14)
“Today Samson Longshanks fights a Nameless to earn his shield. Let all who hear my voice bear witness.”
The Ram weren’t people of many words. They preferred to communicate with their weapons, or in the Gate Master’s case, their hands. The young Ram stood at one side of the roped-off platform while the Nameless challenger studied him from another. Judging from the subtle slant of his eyes and his straight, black hair, the Nameless looked more Raven than Kodiak.
Zo stood tall, but dropped her head as swords were drawn. The Gate Master placed a finger under her chin and gently lifted her gaze. His hot breath burned against her frozen cheek. “You will watch this.”
The men on the platform circled each other with arms extended. The Nameless did his best to maintain a careful distance from the young Ram. Zo’s heart beat faster, her stomach churned as she fought a rising panic. She’d rather be in the ring than watch it happen.
The Ram’s dreadlocks flew with life as he charged. Zo tried to look past the fight, beyond the high mountains in the distance. She tried not to hear the wail of pain as the Ram took his first slice at the Nameless man’s stomach. Or see the spray of blood as the Ram dragged his blade along his opponent’s throat. Most of all, she tried not to see the Nameless man’s final moments. The moments that separated him from life and death, when his eyes softened and his face relaxed into peaceful acceptance. When steam began to rise off his weeping entrails.
The crowd cheered. Zo vomited.
“You stupid girl!” said the Gate Master, wiping his hand on his shirt.
Zo hunched over and hugged her stomach. She couldn’t breathe.
“You disgust me.” The Gate Master shoved her from behind. She didn’t catch herself before crashing to the ground. “Get back to work!”
Zo rolled away before his boot met her side. She scrambled to her shaking feet and ran. The cobblestone road swayed. Her headscarf hung crooked. Half of her dark hair escaped and whipped her face. She stumbled down a narrow gap between two stone buildings and vomited again. With her arms wrapped around her shoulders, she melted down the side of the building and fought back sobs. She pressed her cheek to the cold stone.
Light flakes of spring snow fell through the ever-present haze.
Zo hadn’t cared enough to cry about anything for a long, long time, but seeing that man killed before her eyes brought back too many hard memories. Memories too close to a life she had known. A life she used to care about.
Footsteps crunched on the gravel behind her. “Are you okay?” The voice sounded vaguely familiar. Zo wiped the bile from her chin and carefully turned around to see Joshua’s mentor, Gryphon.
He looked the same as he had that morning. Tired from too many nights sleeping in a chair in the Medica. His long nose was slightly too wide, but his fierce jaw seemed to have been chiseled by a master stonecutter. Under the dark hood of his brows, the depth of his golden brown eyes drew her in. He stood with his arms hanging loosely.
“Are you hurt?” he asked. He took two steps closer.
Zo inched backward.
He stopped with hands extended, showing his palms as if she were an injured lamb he didn’t want to scare. “I’m not going to hurt you.” His head tilted like a curious child, but the sword on his belt was nothing close to a child’s play toy. She kept her distance.
“I’m sorry for—” His mouth hung open like there was more he wanted to say. He ruffled the dark hair on the back of his head. “Thank you for helping Joshua. You saved his life.”
Zo didn’t trust her voice. A “you’re welcome” should have come easily, but for some reason she could not tell this man, this killer, “you’re welcome.” The idea of being “welcome” was the last thing she wanted any Ram man to feel around her.
When she didn’t speak, he slowly turned and jogged away, likely off to lull some other Nameless into a false sense of security.
Chapter 8
Zo and Tess sat together twenty yards off the road on the bank of a stream. Tess used her small hands to help Zo apply mud to her face. She took her time, making swirls and shapes that she said reminded her of cloud formations.
Even with her nose scrunched up in concentration, and her tongue poking out the corner of her mouth, Tess looked like a little angel. Innocent and untainted by the evils of life. Unless Zo could help her escape the Gate, Tess would one day have to wear this mud costume. If she lived that long.
She bore the “pretty” curse too.
Unlike Zo, some of the Nameless women didn’t mind the hungry eyes of the guards. Some even welcomed them. Life for slaves inside the Gate could be easy if you were pretty. Better food. Better clothes. Better beds, once they left you there. That’s exactly why mud had become Zo’s best friend.
As a Wolf, Zo had to be especially careful to go unnoticed. The resentment between her clan and the Ram went deeper than blood or even food. It was an age-old feud between two powerful brothers that had fermented over hundreds of years. Though Zo couldn’t remember the details of the dispute—something to do with inheritance and land—she did understand the raids. The nights when Ram soldiers burned fields and killed Wolves who were outside the protection of the Valley of Wolves.
Every Wolf grew up on stories of Ram violence and evil raiding. Even before they could talk, they understood that the chilling sound of a Ram horn meant death and devastation. Boys became men at a young age, forced to join their fathers in defending the pack, then to take on the impossible role of protecting the family when their own fathers fell to the spear. Girls learned to hold their heads high with dry eyes, knowing that one day the mighty Ram would fall, just like a great moose falls to a pack of dogs.