Frenzy, Part 3
(Previously: “Frenzy, Part 2”)
Amongst the next crop is a Bahar’sool, which seems unfair. Tuduk—he’s just fifteen, but very much a man by his tribe’s standards, with a short, black beard and thick, dark, bristly fur between his big red nipples. Although new to bouts in the arena, he is Bahar’sool and therefore already adept at killing, which they learn at such a young age; as he swings, his poor opponent—Odinn, older by two years but far less capable—begins to yelp and snivel like a coward. Odinn may be meaty, but the steel makes quick work of him. “You’ve cut me!” he hollers, a foolish phrase if ever one was heard in the course of a bout, and dumbly stares as blood begins to leap from out his slashed and spitted body, splashing at his bare feet. Tuduk’s final thrust is brutal: square and deep into the navel, then he twists, tugs loose, and open’s Odinn’s middle to the flank—an ugly, gaping wound. As the boy goes on his knees, feebly attempting to pack his organs back in, Tuduk drives the steel square through his throat. Even dead, Odinn’s eyes flash wide open, surprised to the end.
He may well kill me, Stiv thinks, but I’ve got to try!
“I gut you next,” Tuduk tells him plainly. Holding out his weapon, he turns the blade inwards, draws an imaginary line between his own hips, as if to illustrate the coming disembowelment.
“I’m not afraid,” Stiv says, back arched, chest jutting proudly. Though awash with blood, the muscles of his thin, strong belly stand out on display, almost as if they’re eager to defend the vulnerable vitals hidden underneath.
“I make you afraid.”
Clink-clang! Clack! Their swords meet; sweat flies. Stiv spies an opening and goes for it, but very swiftly he regrets it: feeling something cold and penetrating, he looks down to find the Bahar’sool’s blade buried in the groove that runs straight down his abdomen, below the belly button. He was stabbed before but this time, it is deeper somehow, more painful—The guts, he thinks, he’s got me through the guts... “And now I spill them out,” says Tuduk, answering the boy’s thoughts, frowning as if burdened with a heavy task. The work is swift, and Stiv is fascinated, frankly, at the ease with which his body comes apart, intestines almost leaping from his butchered midriff. Laughing with delirium, the disemboweled boy tries to catch his guts, but ultimately fails; as he dies, eyes glazing over, frantic cheering fading from his ears like the sound of a rushing yet distant river, the image of his pink bowels spilling in the sand and glistening beneath the sun is comforting, somehow—here comes the fate that he was always meant to meet.
Another pair of boys is still alive: Woltan and Ebrinn, brothers, aged fifteen and sixteen years. They vow to take the Bahar’sool brute down together. All their childhood, the two youths sparred for just this moment, training for the day that they must put their skills to use—and here it is, at last, the day they live or die beneath the tumult of the audience. Woltan, despite his youth, is larger than his brother, beefier, his meaty belly covered with a sheen of fresh sweat; Ebrinn too is very muscular, bearing the frame of a man several years older and more experienced. All his life, Ebrinn’s thought of his body as merely a tool, a means to an end, and of the battlefield as a game. Their father was a blacksmith; where he learned this grim philosophy, and how the brothers got so interested in combat, is a tale for another time. The fact is that they’ve ended up where they belong: feet bare upon the hot sand, breasts and bellies proffered, blades in hand and hearts more eager for the kill than any dozen other boys combined!
But Tuduk is a brutal warrior—he sticks his point in Woltan’s gut right off the bat and tears the flesh wide as he rips free, spilling out a loop of bowel. But Woltan soldiers on, and jabs the Bahar’sool’s thick thigh; next Ebrinn’s blade comes, sliding underneath the killer’s ribs. A look of rage burns hot on Tuduk’s face—he swings, but Woltan grabs his wrist, holds it aloft, leaving open a window for Ebrinn to finish the kill.
“I’m givin’ you yer gut-gift early,” Ebrinn tells him, grinning.
“And I bear it gladly—erghk—hrunnnghhhfff...!”
Ebrinn’s first evisceration is a messy one, but more than capable of putting Tuduk down. The brute laughs, grinning, as his guts flop out one fat, slick loop after another, steaming in the dirt and gathering a swarm of eager flies almost at once. The novice victor tries to take his head, but Tuduk’s neck is thick, and so he fails on the first try; blood spurts from the hacked throat, and the fighter’s last gasp is a choked and agonizing gurgle.
“...We have won,” says Ebrinn.
“No,” his brother tells him—“you have won.” Woltan is on his knees, paler than Ebrinn has ever seen him. He holds the butchered portion of his guts against his belly, knowing full well that his chance at being whole again is slim to none. “Now, kill me—time to claim your victory.”
“Brother... brother, no!”
“Yes—I am gut-stabbed. He has... he has spilt my innards out...”
“Then I shall spill mine with you—we will die together!”
Ebrinn kneels in front of Woltan, sticks his sweaty belly out. He rubs the smooth, hard meat below his navel, guessing at how firm it must be, and how badly it will try to keep the steel out—though ultimately, Ebrinn knows, the steel will win...
“Ebrin... Ebrin, no—!”
“Unghf...!”
Woltan watches, helpless, as his older brother disembowels himself with slow, deliberate intent. The boy is brave—he bites down on his lip so hard it bleeds, but he is almost silent, grunting only slightly as he works the blade inside himself. The glistening intestines bulge out in the blade’s wake; Woltan moans with grief and beats his breast. Ebrinn sways; blood and grease pool in the sand between his thighs, and soon the stinking pink-and-purple innards slide out like an awful birth, the very culmination of his brief but very brilliant fighting life. His chest heaves, and the heart within beats proudly for awhile... but finally it stops, the body topples backward, organs streaming out in front of it. The crowd, predictably, goes wild... but Woltan, nigh on dead himself, is racked with agony and disbelief. They carry him away; he watches from the stretcher as his brother’s corpse is dragged off, entrails strung behind it like a gory wake. As victor of these games, he will be treated to the fullest of the healers’ capabilities... but if he were a man, a real man, he would’ve died along with Ebrinn like they’d always dreamed. Young Woltan’s fate is not yet set, but he will learn soon which cruel fate awaits him—death, or life without beloved Ebrinn, battle-partner, brother to the end.