Page 203 of Everything Under the Sun

“Stay back! All of you—stay back!” My fists were clenched, held out in front of me.

From the corner of my eye, I glimpsed the bloodied knife just inches from my foot; I dropped quickly and snatched it up from the floor.

“Come any closer,” I threatened Kade, “and I’ll kill you. I. Will. Kill. You.”

Kade’s nostrils flared, and he came toward me anyway.

“STOP!” a woman’s voice called out from the crowd like a whip striking flesh.

Kade stopped mid-stride; he gritted his teeth, rounded his chin, frustrated by the order but submitting to it.

I looked up to see Ravinia’s blonde hair moving down the bleacher steps and through the parting crowd like light pushing through darkness. An eerie hush fell over the gymnasium: a thousand whispers went around the room; the movement of closely-packed bodies; the hum of the balloon lights; the tap-tap-tap-tap of Ravinia’s boots as she made her way across the arena floor.

I stood my ground, knife gripped now in both hands, and I waited, with Atticus wounded at my feet; I could sense him moving just barely; his shallow breaths rattled in his chest; he moaned and grunted.

Ravinia stopped feet from me, just out of striking distance, and she looked me over. “You’re not as delicate as you appear,” she said.

“Stay back,” I warned, pushing the knife forward.

Ravinia smiled, and the non-threatening nature of it puzzled me.

“And what would you do,” Ravinia said, “if I didn’t? What would you do if I came at you?”

“Do what you want with me,” I said boldly, “but if you touch him, I’ll do whatever I have to, whatever I can, to kill you.”

A wave of low laughter went around the room; Ravinia raised her hand and it ceased at once.

She kept her attention on me; her smile grew more; she clasped her hands together on her backside.

“Do you really think you could kill me?”

I backed up an inch—an inch was all I had to keep from stepping on Atticus—my hands still locked out in front of me, gripping the knife I was terrified to use, but would without thinking twice, if I had to.

“One never really knows these things,” I answered with logic. “Because one person is bigger, or more experienced than another doesn’t always mean they’re stronger.”

“So, you think you’re stronger than me?” Like her smiles, nothing about Ravinia’s questions were sarcastic or mocking or threatening. “If you thought you could kill me, how exactly might you do it?”

I glanced away from Ravinia’s eyes; I swallowed nervously.

“If I told you that, you wouldn’t let me leave here—you’d kill me.”

Ravinia tilted her head to the left, and then to the right.

“I’ll take her back to my room,” Kade spoke out, and then tried to step up beside Ravinia but she shot him with a hateful glance and he backed off with a disgruntled sneer.

“What is wrong with you people?” I blurted out, looking at Ravinia for only a moment, and then my gaze followed all those standing nearby, surrounding the arena floor. “These aren’t fights—they’re executions!”—I glared into Ravinia’s eyes then because she allowed such barbarism—“You are no better, no more evolved or advanced as human beings as those out there hunting people for food! You’re uncivilized—savage!”

A mild eruption of voices rose and fell over the crowd.

Ravinia remained silent, allowing me to continue, perhaps wanting me to, but when I did not go on, Ravinia spoke instead:

“The World is a savage place,” she reasoned, raising her voice so that all could hear, but never taking her eyes off me. “But we are not a savage people. We are survivors. We are strong”—she raised both hands high into the air—“We are survivors because we are strong!”

The gymnasium erupted into cheers, and then silence fell over the room again slowly.

Ravinia’s brown eyes met my blue ones.

“Forcing others to fight,” I began, stepping toward Ravinia rather than away anymore, “forcing the weak and oppressed into slavery doesn’t make you strong—it makes you pathetic. It proves your mind weak. And what good are strong hands if the mind that controls them is broken?”

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