A Feast of Dragons - By Morgan Rice Page 0,37

Before Thor could grasp what was happening, boys were crisscrossing the training ground in every direction, and he suddenly saw Malic, charging right for him, a dagger in his hand. Malic scowled, and Thor could see on his face the intent to kill, and he lunged at Thor, about to thrust the dagger into his heart.

It all happened too quickly—Thor could not react in time. He braced himself, as he knew he was about to be killed.

Suddenly Krohn appeared, leaping into the air and digging his fangs into Malic’s chest; Malic stumbled back, caught off guard, trying to get him off.

Before Thor could react, he suddenly felt himself tackled and pinned down to the ground from behind, his face planted in the soil.

Thor tried to get up, to figure out what was happening, as all around him others were hitting the ground, too. He spun around and realized there was someone on top of him. It was an exotic warrior, one he had never met, from a faraway kingdom. He was trying to pin him down.

It was then that Thor realized the sound of that horn meant that the training grounds were being opened up to wrestling. But then why had Malic attacked him with a knife? None of the others were using weapons.

Thor had never been taught how to wrestle, and he felt a searing pain in his shoulder as this warrior, a young warrior, maybe eighteen, with dark brown skin, large yellow eyes, a bald head and a scar running above his eyebrow, twisted him around and put one arm behind his back. He was stronger than Thor could ever dream, and Thor felt like his arm would snap.

He squirmed and struggled, and could not break free of this man’s grip.

“YIELD!” yelled the warrior.

But Thor did not want to yield so quickly.

Just as Thor thought his arm couldn’t bend anymore, just when he thought it was about to break, he heard a running noise, followed by a kick, and felt the warrior go flying off him.

Thor looked up, wanting to thank whoever it was—but was confused as he blinked into the sun to see that it was Malic.

Malic had freed himself from Krohn’s grasp and then had kicked the warrior hard in the back of his head with his boot while he was on the ground, then he extracted a dagger, jumped down, and as the warrior turned, he stabbed him in the heart.

The warrior let out a horrified gasp, blood pouring out from his chest, all over the dagger. Thor sat there, horrified, hardly believing what was happening. He felt terrible: it had all happened too fast for him to react. Clearly, weapons were not supposed to be used in this training session. So why had Malic killed the man?

Before Thor could process it, Malic rushed to him, thrust the bloody weapon into his palm, then took off.

Another horn sounded, and suddenly Thor was surrounded by dozens of warriors, scowling down at him. Kibotu and Kolk walked over, and the other warriors cleared a path.

“What have you done?” Kibtou shouted down. “You have murdered one of my warriors! In a training session!”

“I killed no one!” Thor protested, looking down at the bloody dagger in his hand, and throwing it down to the soil. “I did not do this!”

“Then why do you hold the weapon?” Kibotu shouted.

“Malic did it!” Thor yelled.

There was a gasp, as the others turned and looked at Malic.

He appeared, being dragged by two warriors. Thor gained his feet, as more and more warriors gathered around, and he felt them all staring at him.

“I did not kill this man!” Malic lied. “I saw Thor do it. After all, that is his dagger. He was attacked by that man.”

“Do you deny that you were attacked by that man?” Kibotu pressed Thor.

“He did attack me. We were wrestling. He was about to break my arm.”

“So you admit you stabbed him,” Kibotu said.

“No! I did not. I swear to you.”

“Then I ask again: why do you hold the weapon?”

One of the warriors stepped forward and snatched the dagger from Thor’s hand and handed it to Kibotu. Kibotu examined it, then handed it to Kolk.

Kolk held it up to the light, inspecting it. He nodded grimly.

“This is Thor’s dagger,” he confirmed.

“But I did not kill him!” Thor pleaded. “Malic planted it!”

Kibotu looked back and forth between Thor and Malic.

“One of you is lying. Only the fates will know. The murderer must be punished. On this island there is a