Asunder: A Gathering of Chaos by Cameron Hopkin (children's ebooks free online .txt) 📕

The giant swung blindly, but his opponent was never there by the time his blade arrived. And then Gamarron was on him, scrambling up his side, using a bent knee as a foothold, swarming up over his back, and finally balancing on his shoulders, one leg hooked around the huge man’s thick neck. The old savage took a firm hold of the pulsing purple strength symbiote swelling from one grotesque shoulder and savagely ripped it free, holding his prize aloft. Khraam’s knees buckled and he gave a piteous scream. Renna winced. Removing a juicer pod that way was very painful.

Pushing free of his wavering opponent, who seemed suddenly a little deflated in size, Gamarron walked calmly around to Khraam’s front, coming face to face with him. The gladiator was dazed. His hand still full of the symbiote pod, the warrior monk hit the big man across the face. The kneeling giant’s head snapped to the side, but Gamarron hit him again, and again. The blows were brutal, and soon the smeared purple of the symbiote was mixed with welling blood from a broken nose and cuts over the eyebrows. Khraam was reeling. The savage king put one finger high in the air, and then slowly lowered it to the center of his opponent’s chest. Using just that one finger, he pushed, and the massive fighter crashed to the ground on his back, his sword dangling forgotten in one hand. It was over.

Breathing easy for the first time in an eternity, Renna came back to herself. Hang on. This wasn’t the plan. The crowd was calling for the kill.

Gamarron looked up at the crowd, his lips peeled back, his beard streaked with blood. Now this is what people think a savage looks like, thought Renna. She hardly recognized the strong, wise man she had seen in weeks past. With a cruel, triumphant smile, the fur-clad victor strode across the sands and picked up his oversized war hammer. The shouts from the crowd redoubled. Hometown hero or not, Khraam had fallen, and the grunters wanted to see his blood. The savage came back to his fallen foe, hammer in hand, looking to the crowd. Idiot, you were supposed to lose this one! That was all of our money! What have you done? Now that she no longer feared for his life, she wanted to kill him. He shook his hammer in the air, reveling in the adulation of the masses, and she shook her head in disgust.

Then Khraam reared up from the sands and drove his sword right through Gamarron’s chest.

The crowd went hushed. “No!” Renna screamed. Blood dribbled from his suddenly-slack lips, and he crumpled to the sands. Pandemonium broke loose. Men grabbed and shoved each other, screaming their shock and anger – or their surprise and joy. More than one fistfight broke out in her part of the stands. I have to get out of here. Did I just sacrifice my future for a bag of gems?

She pushed her way through the throngs of shouting, charged-up plebeians, heading for the exit. Down on the arena floor, Khraam had hoisted himself to his knees, but seemed too hurt or exhausted to take note of his screaming admirers. He dropped his sword and clutched at his shoulder where the symbiote had been. Arena servants were bearing Gamarron’s corpse off the field while others churned the sand where his blood had spilled. There was less red than she would have imagined for a wound like that. I have to get his body.

That had been the plan: win big until the odds were stacked in his favor, and then go down once she’d bet a huge sum against him. He hadn’t approved at first, but given that the entire enterprise he was engaged in to snare the chaos wielder was morally suspect, he seemed to be objecting more out of habit than anything else. He’d assured her that he could lose convincingly without being harmed, but she’d known they were doomed as soon as that hideous giant had stepped onto the arena floor. What a disaster. Might as well see this part through, though. No point in leaving my winnings behind on top of everything else.

More fights were breaking out behind her as she left the stadium proper and descended into its stone bowels. A circular hallway ringed the base of the stadium, buried beneath the tiered benches on which everyone sat, and it held offices, waiting pens for the gladiators, and most importantly, the strongbox. No one else had made their way clear of the melee in the stands just yet, so only uniformed employees moved in the hallway. One spry little lad ran past her toward the office, quite likely a runner sent to inform his masters of the outcome of the match.

She could still hear the muted roar of the crowd through the stones, but down here everything was quiet, bustling efficiency. Normally that would have pleased her, but now it felt like poison was writhing in her guts. She’d seen plenty of men die before – she’d helped a few through the process herself – but the sight of that stone sword piercing Gamarron right under the center of ribs… it haunted her.

She shook her head and stepped up to the strongbox counter. It was gated with stoneoak bars, with only a narrow opening at counter height that allowed money to pass from one side to the other. Two massive guardsmen flanked the booth. Before she had seen Khraam, she might have found them intimidating. Now she couldn’t even be bothered to try to take them down a notch or two. She felt numb.

“Receipt, please,” chirped the woman behind the bars. She was a no-nonsense sort in her middle years with a frizz of tightly curled hair sticking out in all directions. Renna handed over the chit that the bookie had given her back when this seemed like a good idea. The tight-faced woman sucked in air through her