The silver coin in Victor's pocket felt heavier than the brick tucked into his belt.
It wasn't physical weight. The coin was light, a thin disc of stamped metal that had probably passed through a thousand hands. The weight came from what it represented.
In the Warrens, a copper piece was a meal. A silver piece was a murder motive.
Victor kept his hand in his pocket, fingers curled tight around the cold metal. He moved through the crowd of the Market Square, his eyes scanning the perimeter. Head on a swivel, his old coach, Mickey, used to bark. The punch that knocks you out is the one you don't see.
His body was screaming. The adrenaline from the rat fight had burned off, leaving behind a hollow ache in his marrow. His hip the one he'd bruised falling at the fountain had stiffened into a rusted hinge. Every step sent a jolt of dull pain up his spine.
He needed food. Real food. Not garbage. Not half-eaten ribs.
He stopped at a stall smelling of yeast and woodsmoke. A large man with forearms like tree trunks was pulling trays of round, dark loaves from a clay oven. The heat coming off the oven hit Victor's face, triggering a memory so sharp it almost buckled his knees.
Sunday morning. His mother's kitchen. The smell of biscuits. Before the fame. Before the entourage. Before he stopped calling.
Victor pushed the memory down. Distraction was dangerous.
"How much?" Victor asked. His voice was still Elian's thin and reedy but he forced the tone to drop, to carry weight.
The baker didn't look up. He was scraping ash off a loaf. "Two coppers for the day-olds. Five for the fresh. Move along, rat. I don't give handouts."
Victor didn't move. He pulled his hand from his pocket and slapped the silver coin onto the wooden counter.
The sound was sharp. A metallic clack that cut through the ambient noise of the market.
The baker stopped scraping. He looked at the coin. Then he looked at Victor. His eyes narrowed, shifting from the silver to Victor's ragged tunic, then to his bruised face.
"Stole it?" the baker grunted.
"Earned it," Victor said.
"Don't care." The baker snatched the coin. He bit it, his eyes never leaving Victor's face. "It's real."
"Two fresh loaves," Victor said. "And change. In copper."
The baker hesitated. In this part of the city, a boy like this with a silver coin was usually running from someone. But commerce was commerce. The baker grunted again, reached under the counter, and tossed two steaming loaves onto the wood. He counted out ninety coppers, dropping them in a disorganized pile.
Victor didn't reach for them immediately. He waited.
"A bag," Victor said.
The baker scowled but threw a rough burlap sack on the pile.
Victor moved with deliberate slowness. He put the bread in the sack. Then he scooped up the coppers, counting them by feel as they slid into his palm. He didn't look down. He kept his eyes on the baker.
Don't look like a victim. Look like a problem.
He turned and walked away. He felt the baker's eyes boring into his back, but he didn't speed up.
He found a secluded spot between a tannery and a collapsed warehouse. The smell of curing leather was acrid, like ammonia and rot, but it kept people away.
Victor sat on an overturned crate. He opened the sack.
He tore a chunk off the loaf. Steam rose from the soft, dark interior. He put it in his mouth.
It was the best thing he had ever tasted.
It wasn't a Michelin-star meal in Vegas. It was coarse, dense rye, slightly bitter. But it was warm. He chewed slowly, letting the saliva break down the starch. His stomach cramped initially, shocked by the sudden intake, then relaxed.
He ate half of one loaf. He wanted to eat it all, to stuff himself until the hunger stopped clawing at his insides, but he stopped.
Discipline, he told himself. If I eat too much too fast, I'll vomit. Waste of calories. Waste of money.
He tied the sack shut. He had ninety coppers. A fortune.
He checked the position of the sun. The shadows were shortening. It was getting close to noon.
Master Oren. The East Gate.
Victor stood up. His legs felt a little steadier. The carbohydrates were hitting his bloodstream, a sluggish trickle of fuel into a dry engine.
"Alright," he whispered to the empty alley. "Let's go to work."
The city of Harborwatch was a layered beast.
The Warrens were the guts messy, dark, stinking. As Victor moved east, the architecture began to change. The shacks of scrap wood and mud gave way to timber-framed houses with actual foundations. The mud streets turned to cobblestone.
The people changed, too.
In the Warrens, everyone looked at the ground. Here, in the Craftsman District, people walked with purpose. They carried tools. They wore leather aprons and sturdy boots. They looked at Victor with open disgust, stepping aside as if he were carrying a plague.
Victor ignored them. He was focused on the mechanics of walking.
Heel strike. Roll to the ball of the foot. Push off. Engage the glutes.
Elian's body had a terrible gait. He hunched his shoulders, collapsing his chest and restricting his lung capacity. His stride was short and shuffling.
Victor forced the shoulders back. It hurt. The muscles between his shoulder blades were atrophied, burning with the effort of holding his posture. But he held it.
posture is presence. Posture is power.
He passed a smithy. A man was hammering a glowing bar of iron. Clang. Clang. Clang.
Victor slowed down. He watched.
The smith wasn't huge, but his swing was effortless. He breathed in on the upswing, out on the impact. A faint red glow Fire Qi pulsed around his hands with every strike. The metal seemed to yield like clay.
Victor felt a pang of envy. Not for the magic, but for the efficiency. The smith was getting maximum result for minimum effort.
Qi is a force multiplier, Victor thought. I don't have the multiplier. I just have the force.
And right now, he didn't even have that.
He kept moving. The East Gate loomed ahead.
It was a massive archway of grey stone, flanked by two towers. Guards in chainmail stood bored at the entrance, leaning on spears. The gate led out of the city proper and toward the rising slopes of the hills that eventually became the Spire Mountains, hundreds of kilometers to the north.
Crowds of laborers were gathered near the gate. Carts were being loaded. It was a logistics hub.
Victor scanned the crowd. He looked for the grey robe. The wooden staff.
There.
Master Oren was sitting on a stone bollard near a watering trough. He looked like a beggar, ignoring the bustle around him. His eyes were closed. He was tapping his staff against the cobblestones in a slow, rhythmic beat. Tap. Tap. Tap.
Victor approached. He stopped three feet away.
"I'm here," Victor said.
Oren didn't open his eyes. "You're early."
"Better than late."
Oren opened one eye. It was a milky blue, sharp as a hawk's. He looked Victor up and down, noting the sack of bread, the cleaner face, the straighter spine.
"You ate," Oren said. It wasn't a question.
"Yes."
"Good. You'll need it."
Oren stood up. He moved with that strange fluidity Victor had noticed before like his joints were oiled. He pointed his staff toward a stack of wooden crates near a waiting wagon.
"That's the job," Oren said.
Victor looked.
There were twelve crates. They were rough-hewn wood, bound with iron straps. They looked heavy.
"What's in them?" Victor asked.
"Iron ore. From the northern trade. High quality." Oren leaned on his staff. "The wagon driver is a drunk. He dropped them here and refused to take them up the hill. My dojo is up there."
He pointed with the staff.
Victor followed the line. The road from the East Gate wound up a steep hill, lined with trees. Near the top, maybe two kilometers away, a wooden structure perched on a cliff edge.
"You want me to carry them?" Victor asked.
"I want them at the dojo before the sun hits the western wall," Oren said. "You have four hours."
Victor looked at the crates. He walked over to the nearest one. He squatted down, keeping his back straight deadlift form and gripped the handles.
He tested the weight.
It didn't budge.
It was at least fifty kilograms. Maybe sixty.
In his old life, Victor could have curled this crate with one arm. He used to warm up with sixty kilograms.
Now, he strained. His thin arms shook. The tendons in his neck popped. He managed to lift one corner an inch off the ground before his grip failed. The crate slammed back down. Thud.
Victor stood up, breathing hard. His hands were stinging.
"Too heavy," Victor said.
Oren smirked. "I told you. You're made of twigs. Go home, boy. Enjoy your bread."
The old man turned to walk away.
Victor felt a flash of heat. It wasn't the shame of weakness. It was the anger of being dismissed.
"I didn't say I couldn't do it," Victor called out. "I said it was too heavy to carry."
Oren stopped. He didn't turn around, but he tilted his head.
Victor looked at the crates. Then he looked at the hill. Then he looked at the environment.
Physics, he thought. If you can't generate force, you manipulate it.
He scanned the area. He saw a discarded length of rope near the trough. He saw two round logs being used as seats by some off-duty porters.
"Hey," Victor said to the porters. He held up his hand, flashing a copper coin. "Rent those logs for an hour?"
The porters laughed. "For a copper? Take 'em."
Victor rolled the logs over to the crates. He laid them parallel on the ground, creating a track.
He looked at the crates again. He couldn't lift them. But he could flip them.
He jammed his shoulder against the crate, finding the center of gravity. He didn't push with his arms. He drove with his legs, meager as they were.
Grunt.
The crate tipped. It landed on the logs.
Victor tied the rope around the crate. He didn't loop it over his shoulder that would compress his spine. He tied it around his waist, lowering his center of gravity.
He stepped forward. The rope went taut.
He leaned. He didn't try to walk yet. He just leaned forward, letting his body weight all forty-two kilograms of it act as a counterweight.
The crate groaned. Friction fought him. Then, the logs rolled.
The crate moved.
Victor took a step. Then another. When the crate rolled off the back log, he stopped, untied himself, ran back, grabbed the free log, and moved it to the front.
Leapfrog.
It was slow. It was agonizingly tedious. But it moved the unmovable object.
He looked at Oren.
The old man was watching him. The smirk was gone.
"One at a time?" Oren asked. "It's a two-kilometer walk. You'll never finish in four hours doing twelve trips."
"I'm not taking them up one by one," Victor said, wiping sweat from his forehead. "I'm moving them to the incline."
"And then?"
"And then I'm going to make gravity work for me."
Victor spent the next hour sweating. He moved all twelve crates to the base of the hill, where the cobblestones smoothed out and the incline began.
His hands were raw. Splinters from the logs had dug into his palms. His breath came in ragged gasps.
He had three hours left.
He stood at the bottom of the hill. The road was fairly straight for the first five hundred meters, then curved.
"If I push them," Victor muttered to himself, "they slide back. If I pull them, I lose traction."
He needed a sled.
He didn't have a sled.
He looked at the crates. Iron straps. Wood.
He looked at the road. Stone.
Friction coefficient.
He opened his sack of bread. He took out the second loaf.
"What are you doing?" Oren asked. He had been following Victor, sitting on rocks, watching like a vulture.
Victor ignored him. He tore the bread into chunks. He walked to the nearest public fountain a trough for horses and soaked the bread until it was a soggy mush.
He came back to the crates. He tipped one up and smeared the wet, doughy paste along the bottom wooden runners.
"That's good eating," Oren said, his voice flat.
"It's grease," Victor rasped. "Poor man's grease."
Victor lined up three crates. He lashed them together with the rope.
He got behind the stack. He placed his hands on the wood. He dug his heels into the cracks between the cobblestones.
Drive.
The wet bread paste slicked the wood. The stone was smooth. The friction reduced just enough.
The crates slid.
It wasn't easy. It was brutal. Victor had to keep his legs churning, his body at a forty-five-degree angle. His calves burned. His lungs felt like they were filled with broken glass.
One step. Two steps. Don't look at the top. Look at your feet.
He pushed.
Fifty meters. His quads were trembling.
One hundred meters. The bread paste was wearing off. The friction increased.
Victor stopped. He breathed, hands on his knees. The world was spinning. Black spots danced in his vision.
This is round ten, the ghost of the Champion whispered. Your eye is swollen shut. Your nose is broken. The other guy is bigger. What do you do?
You find a way.
Victor saw a patch of loose gravel on the side of the road.
He grabbed handfuls of it. He threw it under the runners.
Ball bearings.
He pushed again. The wood ground over the stones, rolling instead of sliding. It was louder, harsher, but it moved.
Two hours passed.
Victor was a wreck. His tunic was soaked through with sweat. His hands were bleeding freely now, the rope and the wood having rubbed the skin raw. He had fallen twice, scraping his knees.
But he was three-quarters of the way up.
Oren hadn't said a word. He just walked alongside, tapping his staff.
The final stretch was the steepest. The road curved sharply up to the cliff edge.
Victor's legs gave out.
He collapsed. His knees hit the stone. He didn't have the strength to catch himself. His face slammed into the dirt.
He lay there. The smell of dust and iron filled his nose.
Stay down, a voice in his head said. It sounded like Elian. It hurts. Just stay down.
Victor closed his eyes. It would be so easy. Just sleep.
Then he felt it.
The vibration.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
Oren's staff.
"Disappointing," Oren said quietly. "Smart. Resourceful. But the engine is too small. The chassis is broken."
Victor's fingers curled into the dirt.
The chassis is broken.
"Shut up," Victor whispered.
"What?"
Victor pushed himself up. His arms shook so violently his teeth rattled.
"I said," Victor gritted out, forcing his torso upright, "shut up."
He grabbed the rope. He didn't have the strength to push anymore.
He turned around. He sat on the ground, back to the hill, facing the crates. He braced his feet against the bottom crate.
He grabbed the rope tied to the top crate.
He pulled with his back, while pushing with his legs. A rowing motion.
Leverage. Isolate the lats. drive the heels.
The crates moved six inches.
Victor reset. He pulled again. Six inches.
He crab-walked backward up the hill, dragging the load inch by inch.
He didn't look at Oren. He stared at the crates. He stared at the iron straps. He focused his entire universe on that metal.
He entered the flow state. The pain didn't vanish, but it moved away, becoming a distant signal rather than an immediate alarm.
He rowed. He dragged. He gasped.
The sun touched the western wall. The sky turned a bruised purple.
Victor's hand slipped. He grabbed the rope again, his blood making it slick.
One last pull.
The ground leveled out.
He had reached the top.
Victor let go of the rope. He rolled onto his back. He stared up at the sky. The two moons were visible now Luna Major pale and calm, Luna Minor red and angry.
He couldn't feel his legs. He wasn't sure if he was breathing or just vibrating.
A shadow fell over him.
Oren stood there. The old man looked at the crates. Then he looked at the trail of drag marks, sweat, and blood coming up the hill.
"You ruined the bread," Oren said.
Victor let out a sound that was half-laugh, half-wheeze. "Bread is cheap."
"You're bleeding on my driveway."
"Charge me."
Oren fell silent. He looked at the boy. Really looked at him.
He saw the malnourished frame. He saw the "Leaker" aura the faint mist of Qi dissipating constantly from the boy's skin. A biological dead end. A waste of life.
But he also saw the eyes.
They weren't the eyes of a child. They were the eyes of a man who had walked through hell and decided he liked the heat.
Oren reached into his robe. He pulled out a pouch. He tossed it onto Victor's chest.
It hit with a heavy clink.
"Ten silver," Oren said. "The rate for a team of mules. Since you did the work of a mule, you get the pay."
Victor didn't touch the pouch. He just lay there, trying to convince his heart to slow down.
"I don't want to be a mule," Victor rasped.
"No," Oren said. He turned and walked toward the wooden building a dojo that looked like it had weathered a thousand storms. "Mules have more sense than to kill themselves for a stranger."
Oren stopped at the door.
"Come back tomorrow at dawn," the old man said without looking back. "If you can stand."
"And if I can't?" Victor asked.
"Then crawl."
Oren slammed the door.
Victor lay alone on the cliff edge. The wind from the ocean whipped over the wall, freezing the sweat on his skin.
He reached up with a trembling hand and grabbed the pouch of silver. He squeezed it.
Pain shot up his arm. His muscles were screaming. Tomorrow, he wouldn't be able to move. He knew that. The lactic acid buildup alone would cripple him.
Victor smiled. His lip split, tasting of copper.
"Round Three," he whispered to the moons.
He closed his eyes, just for a moment, listening to the sound of his own heart. It was beating too fast, fluttering like a trapped bird against his ribs.
But it was beating.
I'm alive.
He shoved the money into his tunic and began the long, agonizing process of standing up. He had to get back to the Warrens. He had to find a safe place to sleep. He had to defend his ten silver from every predator in the city.
But first, he just had to stand.
Victor Vance rolled to his knees. He planted one foot. Then the other.
He rose.
He swayed, corrected, and took the first step down the hill.