Page 2 of A Tribute of Fire

Someone from my regiment offered me their hand to help me up and I accepted, brushing dust from my tunic.

Demaratus’s face finally came into sight and I breathed deeply to fortify myself. I was very tall for a woman, but he was a head taller than me. He was nearly as old as my father but moved like a much younger man. He radiated anger and frustration. Even the patch over his missing right eye seemed angry with me.

“You are not as strong as them,” he yelled. “Hide! Evade! Run! You don’t try to fight your way clear.” He gestured toward his soldiers, who had all been sworn to secrecy. “They have more training and they are stronger than you. You will not win in hand-to-hand combat. You must stay out of arm’s reach! Once they get their hands on you, it’s over.”

“I know,” I said again as my breathing returned to normal. I looked at my shoulder, which had already started to turn a darker color.

The bruises were getting harder and harder to explain.

Then Demaratus was directly in front of me, grabbing me by my breastplate the way he would any of his other soldiers and pulling me up to his face. His breath reeked of alcohol, as it normally did.

“No quarter will be given! You will not be taken alive. If they catch you, corner you, you will die!” He roared the words so loudly I wondered if everyone in the palace could hear him.

The former Daemonian general spent his time either not speaking at all or yelling at the top of his lungs. During our training, there had been no middle ground.

I didn’t even know if he knew my name. He only ever called me “stupid girl.”

“What happens if you get within reach of those Ilionian men?” he demanded.

“They will kill me.” I understood this better than everyone else here, as I was the one it would soon happen to.

I had been training with Demaratus for the last year in preparation for the selection that would take place in two days’ time. The Seven Sisters constellation had appeared in the sky a week ago, letting us know that the time had arrived.

And the main thing that I had learned in practicing hand-to-hand combat was that no matter how many techniques I learned, no matter how agile or nimble I might be, if more than one soldier could get their hands on me, I was finished. Demaratus was right—they were stronger than I was.

My only hope was to keep my distance. I wouldn’t be able to fight my way out. Getting cornered would mean certain death.

And you got cornered in a place that you’re familiar with,that worried voice inside me pointed out.

When this happened for real, I would be in a city I’d never stepped foot in before.

I stumbled a bit as he finally released me. Seeing that Demaratus had finished lecturing me, the other soldiers dispersed. I’d wondered more than once what the general had threatened them with to get themnot only to help me train, but to keep silent about our activities. Because they were the biggest bunch of gossips I’d ever met. If I wanted to know what was happening in the palace, I only had to ask one of them.

“At least when I go to Ilion, I won’t have this much armor weighing me down,” I said as I undid the buckles at my shoulders, letting the breastplate drop.

Demaratus watched as it hit the ground. Before he could yell I reached over and picked it up. I could already hear him in my head.Stupid girl! A warrior’s armor deserves respect!

But to my surprise he spoke in a rational tone, one I normally only heard when I visited him in the evenings after he’d become completely drunk. “There used to be a racing event called the hoplitodromos. It was a footrace run with full armor on.”

“Was the point to torture the athletes?”

He ignored my jest while I undid the bracers on my wrists. “Centuries ago, there was a battle between the Sasanians and Daemonians. The Sasanian archers expected to pick the Daemonians off easily, given the superiority of their arrows. What they did not expect was a phalanx line of soldiers rushing them in full armor, plowing into their front defense. Training with armor made the Daemonians able to run long distances in it, unlike our enemies.”

“I’m not going to battle with the Sasanians,” I said, bending to remove my leg plates.

He grimaced, as if annoyed. “You race with armor now so that when it matters, you will be accustomed to a heavier load and you will be faster when you run without it. And it strengthens you to train with it on. A warrior who sweats more in training bleeds less in war.”

I had certainly sweat enough to ensure that I wouldn’t bleed at all when the time came. I gathered my armor, holding it against my chest. “One of those arrows almost hit me.”

“You have to learn to be unafraid of being shot at, and there’s only one way to do that.”

“By shooting at me.”

He grunted, and if he were the sort of man who ever smiled, I was sure he would have.

“At least no one threw an axe at me this time,” I said.

“I didn’t want to risk injuring you. Not so close to the end.”

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