I do see, the DFZ whispered, her voice stricken. But despite their intelligence, they’re not human. That means they’re not my citizens, and manticores are not one of the magical species protected by the Peacemaker’s Edict.
Forget the Peacemaker! I thought back frantically. What about you? This is your city, isn’t it?
The spirit didn’t answer. A few seconds later, I forgot all about her when the handler teams unhooked the choke collars from the manticores and ran back to the gates. Both creatures were so terrified, they didn’t even give chase. When the handlers were safe and the gates were closed again, a horn sounded, presumably to signal the start of the fight. I say “presumably” because neither manticore budged from their terrified crouch against the arena’s curved wall. At this rate, it didn’t look like there was going to be a fight at all. I was wondering how the crowd was going to take that when something shifted in the magic.
If I hadn’t been so paranoid about it already, I never would have noticed. The twitch was tiny, barely more than a jerk, but the moment it happened, everything about the manticores changed. Their terrified expressions vanished, and their postures switched from cowering to aggression. Even their muscles looked bigger under their rust-colored fur as they leaped at each other, claws and tail barbs extended for the kill while the arena roared.
Things went south fast after that. I had no idea what had caused the shift, but the manticores now seemed determined to rip each other to pieces. The fight rapidly got so gruesome I had to disconnect my camera feed to avoid being sick. I’m not normally squeamish, but it was a lot of blood. Unnecessary, pointless, cruel blood that made me happier than ever I’d talked Nik out of selling our baby cockatrices to this horrible place. The only good thing I could say about the fight was that at least it didn’t last long. Both manticores looked dead by the end, but I guessed there must have been a winner, because the horn sounded again, and an announcer came on to tell people to go to the windows to collect their money.
“Barbaric,” my father said as the people who’d bet on the winning manticore hurried down to the bookie area to receive their payouts. “Manticores are incredible scholars with photographic memories. I once met one who’d worked in the long-lost Library of Alexandria. They are ancient and wise, and not many are left. What a waste.”
I was angry, too, but not about the waste. I was furious that this had been allowed to happen. What was the point of living in a “free” city if a stronger person could just come and take your freedom away? But while that thought was dangerously close to blasphemy, my god didn’t answer. Meanwhile, the show went on.
After that first bloodbath, I was braced for the worst, but the next fight turned out to be a vehicle battle between two tricked-out cement trucks, one of which had been equipped with a flame thrower. If I hadn’t been so upset, I would have eaten it up. Truck battles were exactly the sort of cheesy, over-the-top fun I’d come to love after a childhood of nothing but tasteful, educational entertainment. But I was upset. I was also still distracted by the magic, which definitely seemed to be growing stronger just as the DFZ and my father had said. After the trucks, the next fight on the program was listed as a ten-on-ten brawl between two teams of surgically augmented women in bikinis, so I felt safe closing my eyes and letting the magic flow through my hands to try and get a better feel for its nature.
By the time all the ladies had lost their tops and were rolling in the dirt pulling each other’s hair, I’d determined that, whatever this magic was, it was not part of the DFZ. The city’s magic felt like city: all wet cement and car horns and chaos. But while this power was definitely still frenetic, everything else was different. Where the DFZ’s magic was soft and soupy, this power was sharp, stiff, and hot to the touch. I also noticed that, in addition to flowing in a circle, the power here rose and fell with the crowd. Specifically, it seemed to spike whenever people were calling for blood.
That last detail was particularly noticeable during the bikini fight. Though it had been rising all night, the circling magic actually slacked while the women were fighting. It couldn’t be the lack of violence or blood because there was plenty of both, but unlike with the manticores or even the trucks, no one in the audience was screaming for the women to kill each other. While they were definitely giving it their all down there, their battle was ultimately just an excuse to rip each other’s clothes off. No one was actually in danger of dying, and the crowd was more amused and titillated than frenzied. All of that changed, though, when the next fight was announced.
People must have been looking forward to this one. They yelled so loudly when the announcer came on, I couldn’t actually hear what he said. That turned out not to matter, though, because before he could finish speaking, the whole arena began to chant.
“Bum fight! Bum fight! Bum fight!”
“What’s a ‘bum fight’?” I asked the German tourist next to me, completely forgetting that I wasn’t supposed to speak English.
“It’s the best,” he told me excitedly, his flushed face lit up in a huge grin. “They get a hundred bums in the arena and send them at each other! Last one standing gets ten thousand dollars. It’s hilarious!”
I didn’t believe my ears. I mean, I knew
