# Chapter 15: The Cage of Four
The metallic screech of the starting horn echoed through the vast, iron-and-stone chamber of the Gauntlet. Across the arena, a team of three moved as one, their polished steel catching the dim light from the mage-lamps bolted to the high ceiling. They were a unit, a well-oiled machine, and they immediately began advancing, their leader—a woman with a short-hafted axe and a scarred face—locking eyes with Soren. "Now, Vale! Hit them!" Jex's voice was a frantic screech from Soren's left. But Soren ignored him. He planted his feet, his weight centered, his gaze fixed on the approaching trio. He would fight his fight. The opposing team leader barked an order, and the skirmisher broke off, sprinting not toward Soren, but directly toward Finn, who was frozen in place like a startled deer. Jex cursed and veered away, not to help the boy, but toward a side passage where a disabled automaton lay, its metal chassis glinting with salvageable parts. He was already looting. The leader and her heavy companion bore down on Soren. He parried the leader's first axe-blow with his sword, the jolt traveling up his weak arm and making him grit his teeth. The heavy fighter's hammer crashed into his shield, driving him back a step. They were perfectly coordinated, one pressuring his defense while the other looked for an opening. He was alone. He was outmatched. A feint from the axe-woman, a brutal hammer strike to his sword, and the weapon flew from his grasp, skittering across the stone floor. He stumbled back, his shield arm numb. The leader stepped in, her axe raised, her eyes cold and final. There was no escape.
Time seemed to slow, the roar of the distant crowd fading into a dull hum. The air grew thick and heavy, tasting of ozone and hot metal. Soren could see the individual threads on the leader's leather tunic, the grim satisfaction in her eyes, the way her muscles coiled for the final, fatal swing. His own breath caught in his throat, a ragged, useless sound. His left arm, the one corrupted by his Gift, hung limp at his side, a dead weight pulsing with a low, agonizing throb. He had failed. His family's contract, the memory of his father's sacrifice, the desperate hope that had driven him into this cage—it all evaporated in the face of this simple, brutal truth. He was going to die here, alone, a failure in the dust and the dark.
The axe-woman's lips peeled back from her teeth in a triumphant snarl. The heavy fighter beside her chuckled, a low, gravelly sound that vibrated through the stone floor. This was it. The end. Soren's eyes flickered past his executioner, searching the shadows, the towering metal scaffolding, the distant, glowing eyes of dormant automatons. He saw Jex prying a copper coil from the machine's chest, his back turned. He saw Finn cowering behind a low wall, the skirmisher toying with him, batting away his clumsy, desperate parries with a short, stinging blade. They were lost, too. But his concern was not for them. It was for the hollow ache that would remain in his mother's heart, the hard life his brother would face in the labor pits. His death would not save them. It would only damn them further.
A flicker of movement in the periphery. Something detached from the shadows high above, a darker shape against the gloom of the ceiling's iron ribs. It fell not with the crash of a body, but with the silent, deadly grace of a diving hawk. Soren's mind, already accepting the finality of the blow, struggled to process the anomaly. The axe began its descent, a silver arc aimed for his neck.
Then, a blur of black and grey.
It struck the axe-woman not with force, but with impossible speed. A figure landed in a crouch between Soren and his killer, one hand snapping up to catch the descending axe-haft a mere inch from Soren's throat. The sound of the impact was a sharp *crack*, the force of the blow absorbed and redirected. The leader's eyes widened in shock, her triumphant snarl dissolving into a gasp of disbelief.
Soren stared. It was a woman, clad in close-fitting, dark grey leathers that seemed to drink the light. A black cloth mask covered the lower half of her face, but he knew those eyes. The sharp, intelligent glint, the fierce, focused fire. Nyra.
She wasn't supposed to be here. Her name wasn't on the roster. This was a sanctioned Trial, a locked-down event. Her presence was an impossibility, a ghost in the machine.
"Get up," she commanded, her voice muffled by the mask but sharp as broken glass. She twisted her wrist, a fluid, powerful motion that wrenched the axe from the leader's stunned grip. With the same movement, she swept the woman's legs out from under her, sending her crashing to the stone floor.
The heavy fighter roared and charged, his hammer raised to crush this sudden interloper. Nyra didn't face him. Instead, she kicked the fallen axe, sending it spinning across the floor toward Soren. "Fight, Vale!" she yelled, springing away from the hammer's downward arc. The weapon smashed into the stone where she had been, sending chips flying.
Her words, her unexpected appearance, jolted Soren from his stupor. Adrenaline, hot and sharp, flooded his veins, overriding the pain and despair. He scrambled for the axe, his fingers closing around the familiar, worn leather of the grip. It was heavier than his sword, clumsier, but it was a weapon. It was a chance.
He surged to his feet just as Nyra engaged the heavy fighter. She was a whirlwind of motion, a phantom of dodges and feints. She didn't have the strength to match him, but she didn't need it. She used his momentum against him, ducking under a swing, redirecting his charge with a precise shove to his shoulder, her movements economical and devastatingly effective. She wasn't just fighting; she was dismantling him, piece by piece.
The skirmisher who had been harassing Finn abandoned his sport, seeing his leader down and his companion in trouble. He sprinted toward Nyra's back, a dagger in each hand. Soren saw the threat. He saw the opening. He could run. He could leave her to this impossible fight and save himself.
But her intervention had changed the equation. She had breached the cage for him. The debt was instant and absolute. He would not abandon her.
He moved. The weak arm screamed in protest as he hefted the axe, but he ignored it, channeling all his pain, all his frustration, all his desperate will to survive into a single, guttural roar. He charged the skirmisher. The man heard him coming and twisted around, daggers raised to parry. But Soren wasn't aiming for a clean fight. He was aiming to end it. He swung the axe in a wide, clumsy arc, a move any trained fighter would sneer at. The skirmisher easily dodged inside the swing, expecting to find Soren's exposed ribs.
Instead, he found Soren's forehead.
Soren threw his entire weight into a headbutt, a brutal, unrefined crack of bone on bone. The skirmisher's head snapped back with a sickening crunch, his eyes rolling up in his head. He dropped his daggers and collapsed in a heap.
The heavy fighter, seeing both his companions neutralized, bellowed in fury and abandoned Nyra, turning his full attention to Soren. He was big, slow, and now, he was enraged. He charged, hammer held high for a crushing overhand blow.
Nyra was there. She swept the man's legs out from under him. He stumbled, his swing going wild. Soren didn't hesitate. He swung the axe, not at the man's head or chest, but at the knee of his leading leg. The blade bit deep, sinking through leather and flesh with a wet, gristly sound. The fighter screamed, a high-pitched sound of agony and shock, and went down, his leg buckling at an unnatural angle.
Silence descended upon their small corner of the arena, broken only by the heavy fighter's pained moans and the ragged sound of Soren's own breathing. The three opponents were down. Defeated. By him. By her.
He stood over the fallen heavy fighter, the axe dripping blood onto the stone, his chest heaving. The pain in his arm was a raging fire, his vision swimming with black spots. He looked at Nyra. She had retrieved the leader's axe and stood in a ready stance, her masked face turned toward him. The distant crowd's roar began to filter back in, a confused, questioning thunder. They had seen a ghost appear, a match turned on its head.
"Who are you?" Soren rasped, the words tearing at his throat.
She didn't answer. Instead, she tilted her head, listening to something he couldn't hear. A new sound was joining the noise of the crowd—the sharp, authoritative blasts of whistles. Inquisitors. The arena's security had been breached, and they were coming.
"We have to go," she said, her voice urgent. She sheathed the axe at her hip and moved toward the nearest wall, a sheer thirty-foot face of riveted iron plates.
"Go where?" Soren asked, his mind still reeling. "The Trial isn't over."
"It is for us," she countered. She reached into a pouch at her belt and pulled out a small, dark metal object. She pressed it against the wall. There was a faint hiss, and a section of the iron plate dissolved into a shimmering, liquid-like doorway, revealing a dark, narrow passage beyond. An escape route. A pre-planned breach.
She looked back at him, her eyes intense. "Are you coming?"
Soren glanced across the arena. Jex and Finn were now standing over the bodies of their defeated opponents, not helping, but looting. Jex was already prying a jeweled bracer from the axe-woman's arm. Finn just stood by, watching, his face pale and vacant. They had won. Or rather, Soren and Nyra had won, and they would reap the rewards. The bitter irony was a foul taste in his mouth.
He turned back to Nyra. The shimmering portal was already beginning to flicker and shrink. The whistles were getting closer. He had a choice. Stay here, claim a tainted victory he didn't earn, and face the Synod's interrogation. Or follow the ghost who had saved his life into the darkness, owing her a debt he couldn't begin to comprehend.
He thought of his family. He thought of the disappointment in her eyes earlier. He thought of the impossible, exhilarating fight they had just shared.
He took a step toward the portal.