Page 21 of The King’s Man #5

T he morning is overcast, the air tense with anticipation. Crowds of spectators line the cobbled streets, cheering the teams as they head to the main square, stopping only when it’s our turn to pass. “No pressure or anything,” Olyn murmurs, “but I put my entire month’s wages on us.”

Megaera murmurs, “I did the same on the prins’ behalf.”

The prins taps a fist to his mouth and clears his throat, glancing pointedly at Megaera.

“How... frivolous,” I murmur, with a small, thankful quirk of my lips.

When we round a corner, we come to a sharp halt, narrowly avoid colliding with Team Orange Cloaks. We shift into single file and stiffly share the road, their leader directly across from me.

“Still time,” he mutters. “Back out.”

“Of our bet? I’d rather not.”

“Of the contest! ”

He huffs and quickens his team’s stride, overtaking us to enter the square.

Crowds cheer upon their arrival, and heckle at ours, and then become a deafening roar as the favourites make their way.

The royal team—all solemn faces and exquisite silver glowing with infused magic.

They glide into the square like ethereal beings. A mesmerising sight indeed.

In total, twelve teams, of mostly four or five members, line up in the square and face the luminarium, bathed in its light.

Darker clouds stretch over the sky in contrast, and the seat at the top of the entrance stairs seems to glow.

I can’t stave off a shiver. Megaera and Olyn inch closer either side.

With a rumbling groan, the ornate doors open and out of the luminarium marches a guard of redcloaks followed by the regent.

All in the square bow, and he keeps us prostrated until he is seated, a lavishly dressed figure illuminated on a gilded throne. “Rise.”

He waves to the contest orchestrators—including Skriniaris Evander—arrayed at the bottom of the stairs, and one comes forward to commence the first trial.

A dozen stations have been set up in the square, each with five sick people standing on pedestals. We have five minutes to diagnose, and one to gather what we need to treat our patients from a shared stall of apothecary resources.

We hit our first hurdle here: stoves, teapots, cups, but no alchemy pots. No vials. We take the teapots to brew our potions and enough cups to store them .

When we arrive back at our station with our arms full of amenities and life-saving plants, we wait for the bell to ring before we start. The first six teams to raise their flag will move on to the second trial.

“At least there were needles,” Olyn murmurs, dabbing a line of sweat at her brow.

“This trial is to assess if we have mastered curing through the acupoints,” I murmur to her.

“All these patients need accurate needling to heal.” That’s why there were needles in the stalls.

Even vitalians will use them, although their needles will be wrapped in healing spells and won’t require the use of force and fingers.

“Acupoints,” Olyn murmurs with a determined gleam in her eye.

I glance between her and Megaera. “I’ll provide the scriptions. You’ll work on those. And after the needles have been dipped in them, I’ll tell Olyn the order of the acupoints, and she’ll deliver the cure.”

Megaera inclines her head and glances at our five patients. “Are you confident you understood their ailments?”

I caught the trick pulse in the last patient. This was not the difficult part; the difficult part is to get the precise scription, to simmer the potions to the perfect consistency and temperature, to needle them into the body at exactly the right points. Difficult is to do this under time pressure.

Sound vibrates around the square as the bells chime, and the teams leap into action.

I race to the first patient, check how long her skin takes to turn from white to pink after a pinch, calculate how long she can stand on one foot, check once more the glaze in her eyes.

I note down the scription to best suit her body and pass it to Megaera, who heeded my instructions to already start heating, chopping, grinding.

She brews the potion in the teapot, and I inspect the second patient more closely.

When I have the right scription for him, I pass it to Megaera and hurry to Olyn. The first needles are dipped into the teacup holding a Megaera’s pink potion, and I quietly list the seven acupoints in order. Olyn nods emphatically and breezily administers the cure-tipped needles.

Back and forth, from patient to scription to acupoints.

There’s no time for rest, but as I race through the trial, I catch glimpses of flashing light and the sparkles from spells.

I can hear the hollers of the crowd when a patient has dismounted their pedestal.

From this, I can roughly gauge that we’re neither the fastest team, nor the slowest. We can make it into the next trial, as long as nothing goes wrong.

Three patients treated. Four.

One to go. One last, somewhat trickier, case.

Two team flags have been raised—

There’s a third . . .

“Arcane Sovereign!” Megaera curses and, catching her error, adds a few Skeldar gods to her expletive as I rush to her shattered teapot—and the potion puddling into the ground. “It couldn’t withstand the heat. ”

With a backdrop of hand-pointing and laughter, Olyn crouches beside me and the sharp shards of teapot.

Carefully, I lift a curved shard that still carries a little fluid and set on the table. One by one, I dip three needle ends into it, and set my lips in a flat line. “It didn’t boil enough to coagulate.”

“What does that mean?”

“If it doesn’t hit the exact centre of his acupoints, it’ll poison him.”

“You mean . . .”

“The patient will be paralysed.”

Olyn sucks in her breath. Two more flags are raised around the square. Only one more team can pass. If it’s not ours, Quin...

I pinch the needles and twirl towards our last patient. The neighbouring team are a burst of vibrant light as they quickly finish stacking their last spell.

“What are you doing?” Olyn says, hurrying to my side.

“I can’t ask you to bear this responsibility.” My stomach is diving out of my feet as I stand before the last pedestal. This is a life I will ruin along with the king’s if I don’t...

“You’re an exceptional healer.” Olyn strikes my acupoints, freezing me in place, and plucks the needles carefully from my fingers. “But I’m still better with needles.”

She doesn’t hesitate. There’s no time to hesitate—the team beside us are driving their magicked needles towards their patient’s lower stomach.

Olyn flings the three needles into our patient —

Megaera gasps—as do I, internally.

Such perfect accuracy.

Even our patient is stunned a full second before he raises our team’s flag and leaps off the pedestal.

Bells chime around the square announcing the end of the first trial.

Olyn jabs to free my movements and I growl at her and grab her into a fierce hug.

Even Megaera is laughing joyously. The crowds swarm past us to surround the other teams, lifting them onto their shoulders to parade them.

Even the teams who didn’t make the second trial bow with respect to the other five.

Ours, they all ignore. Stormblades surround us, blocking us from a few violent attempts to put us ‘in our place’. Only Captain Kjartan, the prins, and Skriniaris Evander give us nods.

“Must’ve cheated,” most murmur, while the more generous shrug. “Luck.”

Skriniaris Evander calls for order and when the square is quiet, he and the other orchestrators officially announce the six passing teams. The regent looks over each, with a stiff smile at ours, and rises.

“Prins Lief,” he calls with feigned diplomacy, “you’ll be happy we’ve considered non-magic limitations.”

Captain Kjartan surges forward to retort, but is held back by the prins’ warning look.

I smother the instinct to defend and fold back between Megaera and Olyn.

I don’t listen to the rest of the exchange, nor do I pay much attention as the regent and his men leave, or when Team Orange laughingly point out to us how easy that round was.

“The next will be harder, and I hear the third has been designed by the regent himself!”

My hand squeezes my clasp once more, and the pulse I feel is all that matters.

One trial down . . .

When the prins and stormblades have gone, Bastion emerges from the shadows. “Had my heart in my throat back there. You scraped sixth only by a second!”

Olyn pulls out her personal set of needles—withheld along with my medicinal bag until after the trial—and turns a tiny tip in his direction. “What you’re saying is I need more practice.”

Bastion admits he’s an insensitive fool and with a gulp begs her to point it elsewhere.

On a chuckle, we head for dinner—to an upstairs table, where vespertines make sure we’re served like any other customer. Bastion hooks his leather-clad forearm on my shoulder, and I skip right past his waggling brows to the patrons seating themselves at the table across from ours.

The royal team, their silver cloaks no longer glowing. Mikros and Makarios, joined at the hip, are teasing one another while Florentius solemnly guides Akilah to a seat beside him. He catches my eye and raises his drink with a polite sip—a quiet congratulations for our team.

I find myself moving to their table.

Mikros and Makarios stop bickering and look towards me with surprise and caution. “Where’s your fourth team member?” I ask.

Florentius answers, “Resting.”

I settle myself at their table and pour myself wine from their jug. I raise it in a toast, my gaze straying to Akilah and mentally calculating any change since we parted. There’s a small scar beside her ear—vitalian magic should erase it. Why is it there? “Your team is the talk of the town,” I say.

Florentius raises a brow. “I beg to differ.”

“Your team is all the agreeable talk in town.”

A small frown. “Why are you engaging with us?”