Rivonae broke the silence between the king and Ceilsea with a snort. It was good to know their conversation wasn’t interesting enough for him to eavesdrop. Vonae didn’t need to know of their ruminations on their patron-client relationships. 

“Your highness, if you don’t mind, my brother promised that he would explain all this chaos to me.” she said, placing her hand on Rivonae’s knee affectionately. Her touch jerked him out of his trance.

“Oh no, of course not. I would appreciate his perspective. I know he trained extensively for dueling and solo deployment,” his majesty said with a wave of his hand. Vonae had been on several missions on royal orders. 

“As you wish,” Vonae replied nodding to the king and then gave Ceilsea a sideward glance, whispering, “both of you.” He leaned over and put his arm around his sister. “What shall we start with? Stances, tactics, techniques, weapon styles, spells, footwork…”

“Why don’t you start with telling me when the noble’s champions join? I know there are a few more days of the open tournament, but how many of these warriors progress to the next stage?” she asked. She knew Shae didn’t have to beat everyone, but she wanted to know how many rounds they had to win to compete against the nobles’ chosen fighters. 

“His majesty can correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe there were around four hundred warriors that entered, and there are fourteen nobles’ champions advancing automatically. So around eighteen open contestants will move on to face the champions in reserve. That means there are two more rounds, two more days after today,” Vonae said. “The rounds get shorter as they disqualify people, if you are asking when it will be over today.”

“After those two days, they aren’t going straight to fighting the champions, right? There are a few days of respite in-between?” Ceilsea recalled something she had overheard earlier.

“That’s correct,” the king said.

Ceilsea sighed. Since different people would be leaving and arriving after the open tournament and the start of the finals, they had three days without fighting while the festival continued. It would give the organizers time to reconfigure the arenas and amphitheater as well as give the open contestants time to rest. Giving the open tournament contestants a few days would put everyone on a more equal footing.

“Many people are saying that we’ve given them too much downtime, and that we should simply charge through the competition, treating the warriors like animals,” his majesty added.  He knew more of the logistics of the event than Vonae. 

“For your benefit, sister, I’ll explain. There is a contingent of people who believe the tournament should mirror the conditions of actual battle, where you can’t rest and you react to situations as they are presented. However, because his majesty has decided to be more humane, fighters are given ample time to rest and recuperate. This limits the number of mistakes and injuries that come from exhaustion and stress,” Vonae told her. 

“Isn’t one of the grounds for expulsion from the tournament seriously injuring your opponent?” she asked, thinking she had heard someone talking about that.

“That rule was mainly implemented to prevent wizards from going crazy with their magics, but it also prevents the practice weapons from being used inappropriately in the highly emotional situation of competition. If you can’t control yourself, you have no place being a warrior in the first place,” his majesty explained. Clearly more thought had gone into this tournament than Ceilsea realized. She knew that some of these choices would be criticized by commoners and nobles alike.

Vonae nodded. “Notice how the wizards must limit the magics they use to make this work. Wizards have the biggest advantage in one-on-one fighting. Wayzards can be a huge threat if they have someone to back them up, but it’s hard for them to compete alone. Everyone knows a wizard is going to win. That’s what is going to stop your friend Shae. There is no way they can win without magic.”

“But they can stop magic,” Ceilsea argued. 

“Which is a purely defensive maneuver. You must attack to win, and magic is a weapon. In a single fight there are workarounds, but in general when the difference is magic and no magic, the one with magic is going to take the lead,” Vonae told her. Ceilsea didn’t agree. Shae understood magic better than the people wielding it. They could fight back in ways that others couldn’t. That gave them an advantage.

“What about the individual fights? What do you have to do and think to beat someone else? Is it completely determined by skill?” she wondered, turning to watch the fighting for the first time since she sat down.

She didn’t know anyone in the current circuit, but she focused on a wizard and a wayzard fighting closest to them. The wayzard had a sword and a small shield, she’d heard Vonae refer to as a buckler. They also had a harmonica suspended around their neck. The wizard had a single-handed sword. Other than that, they looked equally matched. They were the same build, neither was overly muscular or tall. They were average, and both looked like they were from the more northern parts of the empire. Besides the magic, neither seemed to have an obvious advantage over the other.

“If it were easy to determine superior skill, circuits with a three-win system wouldn’t be necessary. There is an advantage to being practiced and skilled, but there is an aspect of timing, strategy, and luck. The exact same pair up will end differently every time, with each opponent winning some times. That means anyone could win, but generally the more skilled fighter will win more often,” Vonae pointed at the pair she had started watching. “See how they are watching each other before acting, circling each other? They are looking for openings or weaknesses in their opponent’s defense. That visual processing doesn’t stop even when they are in the middle of an engagement. It is a constant mental and physical juggle of defense and offense until someone gets the upper hand.”

“He is very much complicating and romanticizing the process of two people hitting each other with sharp sticks,” his majesty said with a smile. 

Ceilsea grinned. The king knew her sense of humor. She shot back, “And yet somehow he wants me to be invested in all this absurdity.”

Vonae ignored them, grabbed Ceilsea’s arm and pointed back to the fight below.

“Watch,” he told her.

The wizard had started casting a spell. Vines began to writhe and wriggle from the ground, but the wayzard played a familiar tune, dispelling the plants. Then the wayzard lunged, blocking the wizard's downward slash with the buckler and banged their opponent’s wrist with the wooden sword. It looked like it would hurt, but the wizard did not flinch. The wizard pivoted the sword around the buckler. The wayzard retreated, barely batting the blade off course with their weapon. Immediately the wayzard approached again using their sword and buckler together to funnel the wizard sword into the crevasse where the blade met the edge of the shield. With the blade on the buckler’s edge, the wayzard disengaged the sword and slashed at the wizard’s neck and chest.

“So the wayzard won? I thought you said that didn’t happen,” Ceilsea asked, watching the two fighters talk to one another for a minute before returning to their starting positions, “Does that mean they’re a bad wizard?”

“Not necessarily. Did you see the wayzard’s strategy? They got rid of the casting hand first to make the fight more even. Then they created an opening to set up the killing blow,” Vonae explained. “Otherwise, the wizard would have kept casting while the wayzard was attacking, making it harder for them to close and strike the killing blow. It doesn’t mean the wizard is bad, just unprepared or unlucky.”

“The wizard could still cast though. Their hand is fine,” Ceilsea pointed out.

“The rules state that they must treat solid strikes to limbs as if the weapons had blades and had created a real injury. That’s why sometimes they’ll fall to the ground for no reason,” Vonae said. “If an officiant notices either fighter ignoring the strikes, and they refuse to correct it after verbal warnings, the round goes to their opponent. These rules ensure the fights have a more realistic flow.”

“That’s confusing. How are you supposed to know what’s going on unless you’ve watched the whole thing?” 

“You don’t or you can guess.” He said with a shrug.

“If the wayzard’s plan works, why doesn’t everyone do that?” Ceilsea continued, even though she could see that the wizard and wayzard were doing something completely different now.

“Most wizards know to keep their casting hand close. You can train to cast quicker and retract cleaner, but if your opponent’s trained as well it’s just a battle of who is faster and more accurate. Sometimes you can be an inch off and your fingers get hit,” Vonae told her, flexing his own hand. Ceilsea winced, knowing what it felt to have your fingers crushed with a hammer.  She knew this must be even worse because her father always stressed how important hand dexterity was to wizards. Vonae, Miennere, and even Yippinee, wore gloves when training to prevent injury. In sparring, only some wore thin gloves that wouldn’t get in the way of their strumming. 

“I see. Skill and technique only get you so far,” Ceilsea said watching the wizard win with a flourishing spell of ice. 

“The circuits should level it out so only the most skilled will advance. You certainly need to have endurance and focus to keep this up,” Vonae said with some reverence. He respected the contestants who could survive, whether with skill or guts.

Ceilsea’s eyes wandered as their example pair left the arena. Despite Vonae’s blanket statement, the wayzard in that pair had advanced. The next circuit was entering. She saw familiar curls and a xylophone. Shae entered the farthest arena. Ceilsea grabbed Vonae’s arm excitedly.

“Look, it’s them! Can you explain their fights to me? Please!” she begged. That was what this whole ruse had been about. 

“I can try to tell you how they are doing. Not every spar is as cut and dry as that last one,” Vonae gently pushed her off his arm.

Their section of the box went silent. His majesty was also focused on Shae and their opponent, a large warrior who seemed to only have rudimentary magics and a large sword. Ceilsea tried to focus, but it really was just a flurry of weapons. The first, Shae won. The second, the warrior won. The third, Shae won again. Finally, Shae took their third victory and rotated opponents. Even from this far, Ceilsea noted the muscles in Shae’s neck and arms, and how striking their silhouette was when they extended their sword. She filed the observation for when she began carving them later. 

After a few spars with the next opponent, Vonae made a disapproving click with his tongue. He crossed his arms and muttered, “They just don’t get it.”

“What? What don’t they get?” Ceilsea asked, ignoring the fights completely to try and read his face.

“They are too clunky with their sword strikes. You’d think since they're musical, they’d have more finesse. They appear graceful with their footwork and dispelling, but some people think strength comes from swinging the sword harder, instead of powering with your whole body. No one wins a sword fight by bashing their opponent with it. You win by slicing and stabbing with the pointy end!” Vonae growled mimicking a sword movement with his hand. The king laughed. 

“But they are still winning,” Ceilsea pointed out as Shae won their third spar with the second opponent. 

“They have a good eye for maneuvering and finding openings. Again, good footwork, but they stall and wait for their chance instead of being proactive. Someone like Jala, or even Miennere, will have them wait right into a trap, or use their overcommitted strikes to push them off balance. Let them bowl themselves over and then stab them,” Vonae said, still annoyed.

“Do you think they could improve?” Ceilsea asked.

“Of course. I don’t know how much experience they have, but it doesn’t seem like much. Some people fight for years and find limits to their talent, but Shae doesn’t seem to be at that point. Do they have formal training?” Vonae asked her.

Ceilsea shrugged. “I don’t know. I would hope so.”

“There are plenty in the tournament that don’t or picked up skills in other ways,” his majesty pointed out. 

“Do you think you could train them to be better?” Ceilsea asked her brother. He had trained Miennere after all. She was doing well as far as Ceilsea could tell.

“Are you asking me to?” Vonae turned to her for the first time since he had started explaining the fights.

“Would you?” She should do something to help Shae if they were going to win. Rivonae was the best swordsman she knew.

He looked at her with a furrowed brow. He thought for a moment. “I can’t promise that I’d be able to make a difference for the tournament results. It would only be a couple of hours, but if they want my help, I have no reason to say no.”

Ceilsea grinned. “I don’t think Shae has a reason to say no either.”

“It depends on their pride. If they think they are good, you could insult them by butting in, buttercup,” Vonae told her, turning back to the fights. 

Shaelis had lost two of three fights against the third opponent. 

“It’s my friendship, not yours,” she told him, picking at his hair until he swatted her away. She could survive Shae getting upset at her. That had already happened a few times in the short time they’d known each other. 

In the end, Shaelis managed to advance, though they weren’t at the top of their circuit.