The Tourney Begins

The day had finally arrived, the street that were once filled with bitter feeling had been renewed into a sound of pure joy as flags lined the street, and new stalls opened with different foods from the countryside. It seemed as if the city had forgotten completely what had happened in the war and put it aside for this grand occasion. It was to be a festival lasting till the end of the tourney and a small ceremony for those picked to join the Royal Guard. Me, Mak, Ash and Phyora all approached the muster hall for the tourney, passing by various stalls filled with rice bread, lemon cakes and mint leaf perfumes. We gazed around us at our competitors and for once I felt as if I could take them all on myself. These weren't warriors that had faced battle before, they were people who had just been recruited into the school and now were trying their luck at becoming a Royal Guard.

The trumpets sounded and next to the arena entrance a large poster was nailed onto the notice board, it showed the bracket for the tourney up until the finals along with a group stage to even out the numbers. As we approached to see what the groups were the trumpets blared and all of us were ushered out into the middle of the arena. All fighters were now being displayed to the people as they began to cheer louder than the trumpets. The arena had been made up of multiple stands with one having a high reaching spot in its middle for the Royal Family seating. Most of the spectators had crowded themselves into pens and leant against the fences trying to climb over each other to see who was standing in the middle.

As each of the contestants names were called out the crowd would erupt with a cheer and begin clapping, a continuous sound shaking the earth beneath them whenever a name was called. Then my name was called,

"STAVN FORSBERG!" the crowd cheered and with me getting into it I stepped from my line and raised my fist, not out of ego but I wanted to have fun with this. As I did this the crowd cheered louder for me and I went back into line, with Mak being next who did the same but this time he drew his sword raising it high. The crowd absolutely loved this and both me and Mak laughed at each other for what we had done. Next was Ash who stepped out and simply bowed to the crowd, then Phyora who planted her sword in the dirt as her name was called and bowed like Ash. Then a herald stood above the crowd ready to announce the days matches.

"The first matches will be from Group A, so can all fighters from A remain!" he screamed at the top of his lungs whilst everyone. The four fighters from Group A remained, the tourney scheme was eight groups of four contestants that would be placed into a bracket to decide the winner in an eventual final. I was in Group D, whilst Mak was in B, Phyora was in Group H and Ash was in Group F. The groups would be tackled day by day so we had to wait till tomorrow for one of us to fight. The groups worked in a round robin type format, each fighter would fight everyone in their group and those with the most wins would pass on to the bracket.

Due to none of us fighting we made a choice to experience the festival in full force on the first day as to not miss too much due to our fights throughout the tourney. So we all began to leave the arena as the Royal Family finally arrived, each one well dressed in vivid reds and purples, the women in silk dresses as if they were attending a wedding.

"Late as usual for royals." Mak muttered as we watched them walk past, all of us moving towards the stalls to get some food and drink.

"What do you expect, they're above us no?" replied Ash who cackled a little after saying it, "After all they would never fight for anyone other than themselves if it came down to it." She quickly added stopping at a sweet stall, buying a bag of candied sugars.

"It's not like we need to care for them anyways." Phyora mentioned as she quickly run on to a stall selling a fermented fruit mead, that smelt of different honeyed berries.

I remained silent as I looked around the stalls looking for something that caught my eye, I slowly approached a bread stall and bought a small piece of date bread and re-joined the group.

"Supposedly the youngest of the Royals is our age. Think it was eighteen or something along those lines." Mak said spindling off towards a drinks merchant to buy some fine wine.

He quickly came back with the bottle in hand as we made our way to a seating area.

"So, how is everyone feeling about their groups?" I asked as we began to sit at a table in the seating area, placing our bought items on the table.

"I'm fine." Ash replied sharply with Phyora nodding and saying the same.

"We're all fine Stavn, but your group... well lets say you might get fucked up." Mak said a smile breaking on his face which then quickly turned to laughter between all of them.

"How come?" I replied quickly a little bit nervous.

"Those in your group are all veterans of tourneys, far more experienced than you are." Phyora replied as she stopped laughing for a split second.

I let out a small sigh as I came to terms with my position, before quickly scoffing down the date bread I had bought. Everyone seemed far more cheery than usual, and it rubbed off on me quite quickly. We all briefly chatted about the fighters in our groups whilst we ate and drank until night fell, when all the people at the arena exited after the matches had been done, the two fighters from Group A had been decided a man called Yoir Tholkt and another called Darius Rowen would be sent to the bracket. Reportedly Yoir dismantled everyone in the group and won his fights quite easily, whilst Darius did the same to the other two but not Yoir.

As the sun went past the horizon we all decided to go get some rest for tomorrow, to watch Mak fight, and hopefully watch Mak win.

"Good night." I said walking away from Ash and Mak as I headed to our room with Phyora. Both of us felt exhausted from the day of walking around different stalls so we both passed out on our different bunks.