Keth trembled and looked at Lindon in shock, but he didn’t stagger backwards as Lindon had hoped. He hadn’t taken a single step.
Panic shook Lindon even more than the Empty Palm shook Keth. His Empty Palm had been perfect…but if Keth didn’t lose his footing, it wouldn’t matter. Lindon would have to take a blow from an Iron Striker who knew that he’d been tricked. If Wei Mon Keth caved in Lindon’s rib cage with a fist, he would face no more than a fine.
“What have you—” Keth began, but Lindon followed up with a second attack driven by all the raw-nerved terrified desperation in his soul. This one wasn’t guided by any technique or sacred art; it was nothing more than an ordinary punch to the gut. Every observer in the crowd would know how useless it was. He would have a better chance punching an iron plate than an Iron practitioner.
Pain echoed up Lindon’s knuckles and reached his shoulder as though he really had punched a metal plate, but Keth’s breath whooshed out of his lungs. He clutched his stomach and took two steps backward, his legs shaking as he tried to stop himself from going to his knees.
Except for Kelsa and Lindon, every single other person present drew in a sharp gasp. It sounded like a ghost passing over the crowd.
Before anyone could speak, Lindon bowed to his still-staggering opponent.
“This one thanks you for your instruction,” he rushed out. “You are the victor.”
Then he scurried back to his family.
He didn’t need to win, after all. He only needed to save face. And while he may have been able to endure an attack from an Iron sacred artist who adhered to the honorable rules of a duel, he would never survive a blow from an enraged Iron with blood in his heart.
“Stand where you are, Unsouled!” Keth roared, and the shout was driven with all the force of his madra and fury. He straightened, which meant he’d recovered his spirit from the disruption of the Empty Palm. During Lindon’s tests with Kelsa, it only took her four or five breaths to recover, so it wasn’t surprising that someone at the Iron stage would be even faster.
Power gathered around Keth’s fist until it was visible, warping the air in a haze that reminded Lindon of the attack Teris had used to fell the ancestral tree. “I owe you a strike.”
His imagination provided him with an image of his body cracking in half as easily as that tree had, his bones snapping like dry branches. He was relying on someone to intervene on his behalf. His life was in the hands of the crowd, and for a long second, they were all silent. Even his father, Jaran, stared at him in confusion, still too shocked by the events of the duel to do anything to help.
To Lindon’s relief, the First Elder stepped between him and the Mon family head, his long eyebrows and wispy beard flowing in the morning wind. “Wei Shi Lindon has surrendered. The duel is over, and you are the victor. Congratulations.”
Lindon let out a heavy breath, and the sudden rush of relief stole his strength. He half-expected to collapse onto the stone at that instant.
Even the First Elder’s harshest critic could not have found a trace of mockery in his words, but Keth turned to him in a fury. “He cheated! He violated the terms of the duel by striking twice, in a deliberate attempt to humiliate me!”
“For which he deserved to lose,” the elder reminded him. “As he admitted his loss.”
Keth drew up in absolute rage, swelling to seemingly twice his size. “He conspired to ruin my dignity as an Iron!”
Jaran’s laughter was high and scornful as he hobbled his way forward, leaning on his cane. He’d finally overcome his confusion to side with his son…or at least against an old rival. “Whatever trick a mouse uses, it cannot defeat a lion. If Lindon decided to charge you with a spear, what is that to you? His strength should never have been able to harm you, no matter how he cheated. A true warrior of the Iron stage would not be shaken by a child’s punch.”
Lindon winced and pushed back further into the crowd. He had more or less expected Keth’s reaction, but he hadn’t anticipated his father making everything worse.
His sister caught him by the shoulder as he tried to sneak by. “Well done,” she whispered. She moved in front of him, ready to defend him at need.
The madra around Keth’s fist condensed into spinning balls of purple-edged white fire. Foxfire was only an illusion of flame; it produced no actual heat, but if it touched flesh, it would burn with the agony of real fire.
“I see how the Shi family addresses members of the same clan,” Keth shouted, trying to drum up support from the audience. “With shame and dishonor! Grant me a contest against Shi Jaran, the one responsible for the Unsouled, or I will find my own satisfaction here.”
The First Elder raised a hand. “Keth, Jaran, I have seen enough. Return to your families. This duel has concluded, and the Mon family is victorious.”
A few laughs from the surrounding gallery. No one present believed that the Mon family had won, least of all Mon Keth. By afternoon, there would be a new Mon family myth: the Unsouled who had struck down an Iron.
Lindon couldn’t deny his pride at the thought.
When the First Elder turned his head, thinking the matter settled, Keth flowed forward. He must have used some movement technique, because one step brought him before Jaran, his fist cocked back to deliver a blow that shone purple with foxfire. Lindon’s father raised his hands to defend, but even Lindon could tell he’d been caught off guard. His cane fell to the ground as he lifted both hands, his scarred face tightening into a grimace.
The scene flickered.
Jaran and the First Elder had switched places, and now Mon’s flame-wreathed fist was crashing down on the elder, not the head of the Shi family. Jaran’s hands were still raised to defend himself from nothing. For an instant, Lindon’s mind refused to accept what he was seeing. Had the First Elder switched places with his father in that breath?
In a move that seemed slow and clear—but must have taken half a second at most—the elder held up two fingers. He placed them to the side of Keth’s wrist, gently guiding the strike down and to the side. Foxfire swished through the air as illusory purple-white fireballs struck the stone, dealing absolutely no damage whatsoever.
Jaran lowered his hands, stunned.
The First Elder continued his movement, moving his two fingers to Mon Keth’s shoulder and pushing down. He didn’t appear to exert any effort, but the much bigger man collapsed to his knees, his hands behind his back. The elder flicked his sleeve, and intricate stone manacles appeared around his wrists.
Keth shouted, trying to force his way to his feet, but the First Elder had already placed a hand on the man’s hair. A ripple of force disturbed the air as it passed through Mon Keth’s body, flattening his clothes and sending a pulse of dirt blasting out.
His knees slammed back into the ground, and he resisted no further.
“Wei Mon Keth will be in isolation training for the next month,” the First Elder mentioned. “No doubt he wishes to meditate and learn from today’s events. During this time, the Mon family will be responsible for him. You are all dismissed.”
Lindon froze, replaying the scene in his mind.
The First Elder was a Forger on the Path of the White Fox. He couldn’t switch bodies, he could only Forge deceptions: copies of reality made of dreams and light with no real substance. White Fox illusions had no structure and could not resist the weakest attack; they relied entirely on crafting a perfect appearance. Forgers had to craft their pictures detail by detail. Even the First Elder could never have created an illusion so layered, so complex, as the scene Lindon had just witnessed.