Targun watched from the shadows of the opulent throne room that would one day be his to rule. It was his birthright, there was no denying that. The enchanted seat swirling with the orbs of his own mines made it both powerful and a marvel to behold. High-backed, a combination of topaz, lilac, magenta, copper, bronze, teal, violet and many more that blended together into a refined polished marble. A range of gift-abilities and more curtesy of the Sulphite mines. His own powers handled by Aradian's. It was almost too much to bear. But it wouldn't matter. The king could use all the Gift-Abilities in the world, but Sulphites were immune to them. He knew exactly what was going on here, exactly who these fake rulers were. But it didn't matter the tournament like Aradia would be open to all. A mistake, like Erya's politics.

In the end the Kings plan would be for nothing. The type of kingdom he had dedicated his life to create would fall, but Targun would make sure the shield didn't go down with it.

"You're drawing attention to yourself Targun," the high priest had snuck up on him.

He stiffened, Shakur was his mentor, the highest of the Sulphites, a man who demanded better than your best.

Targun managed to school his features. "Sorry High priest," he managed, "it isn't easy to see the King play these kinds of games especially with what's at stake. I mean just so they can —

"Targun," Shakur warned, his eyes slits in the dimness, "never mention that, if the king finds out his spell didn't work on us it will all be for nothing, he will realise I've been plotting from the moment he mentioned this pathetic plan. And the less he knows of you the better, just stay silent and keep close. When the time is right, we'll reveal what we know and the king," he sneered at Erya speaking to his meek attempts at avoiding the curse, "despite all his well thought out plans and softness regarding his responsibilities will have no choice but to follow through with it."

"I'll win the tournament," he hissed, "I'll —

"The tournament doesn't matter..." the high priest trailed off, Targun froze, when Shakur snapped into thoughtful silence it didn't bode well for those in close proximity.

"Targun," he eventually whispered, leaning in so his breath heated his ear and laying his long hands on his shoulders, "do you wish to please the king, to draw attention and show him who you are. Do you want him to notice you?"

"No!" He lied immediately; he knew it wasn't true like he knew exactly what was going on around him. Deep down he had always wanted the king to see him, to know...

"I sense you're being dishonest boy," Shakur squeezed his shoulder, pressing his fingers deep into the sensitive tissue. Targun grimaced but showed no pain.

"I serve the gods of Sulfa,' he managed to get out, "I only want them to see how much better we are than the rest of these..." he couldn't conjure the words, so he spat.

The high priest released him. "Forgive me for failing to believe you boy," there was an undercurrent of fury in Shakur's tone that made him wish he was anywhere else. "I feel like you need to face your god's punishment, so you see what happens if you stray from the path."

Targun stiffened, but he nodded quickly. Stupid, how idiotic had he been to have nostalgic thoughts about an Aradian. What was wrong with him?

"Yes, high priest, "he agreed, it was foolish to permit the torture his gods would have him face, but he deserved it.

Like the gods knew Aradia and its people deserved what was coming when Shakur and he ended this reign and his began...

***

Merran

"So, a tournament?" Siva said tapping the side of his fist against hers in greeting.

Merran glanced at the backs of the other leaders as they left the throne room. The king had dismissed them. Inviting them to explore the city while final preparations were put in place. The rulers she trailed behind were legendary, the stories were myth, each one of them had tales written and songs sung about them. She couldn't imagine going up against any of them, yet alone Siva, the strong, towering presence at her side.

"What do you make of it?" She asked.

"Well, the king has no children," Siva pondered thoughtfully, "so, it stands to reason that he would need to pass his powers onto someone to maintain the shields when he passed."

The curse, Merran thought, was like a song she couldn't quite remember, it blurred into two different tunes, or alternative lyrics one she could sing, but the other she could only hum. As if she had conjured her own words to the melody.

"Aradia, land surrounded by sea,

living in harmony.

Protected by an invisible shield,

that only the king can wield.

If no child this curse to bear,

a champion must be selected to be his heir."

"I don't like the sound of this tournament," she admitted, "any idea what it is?"

Siva's caramel eyes lingered on her.

"What?" She couldn't help but succumb.

He didn't take his eyes off her. "It's just — well —um..."

Merran had never seen the leader of the Dharisyian tribe stumble for words, and especially in her presence. Compared to the pedigree of the leaders in this tournament she was plainer than her looks. Where they all had distinctive features and tales that flitted along the warm north coastal breeze, she was the leader of a fishing town, which until now had never done anything other than made her proud. But now... in the face of a tournament where she would have to face them, hunters of monsters, wielders of gift-stones, healers, the incredible strength of Khumo and gathers of the iron wood weapons and tricky not to mention dangerous hunt for the golden fern, Merran, for the first time in her life felt truly out of her depth.

"I've never seen someone as brave as you," Siva managed.

Merran opened her mouth and then closed it. She was sure Siva, the calm, humble and sometimes headstrong powerful leader of the Dhariysian tribe was blushing. Although his complexion made it impossible to be certain.

"Well," Merran elbowed him in the ribs, "when you start running away from a fish someone has to step in and save the day." She knew that wasn't what he was referring to. That he was speaking of another moment, a moment she had cast to the back of her mind, but a moment where she had stood up and found the courage to face down...

Siva's rich laugh took the thought from her mind. The crescendo almost dancing out of his mouth in a rhythm as perfect as him. It didn't stop, it grew until it hummed off the walls and through her bones. And as they stepped out through an arched brick alcove and overlooked the Terraced city, she decided that she could live with leader of Temis, fishing town; Merran the brave...

Temis had always felt like a massive city until she had come to Aradia for the first time. In comparison her land was nothing more than a town, built on stilts atop the turquoise waters that she was so fond of. However, this City was something to behold, especially from the top tier. A vertical shaft of rock ran straight out of the ocean and almost fifty feet into the air until it levelled out into the first platform, and that went back until another wall that rose straight up until another platform, and so on until eventually the city resembled a giant's stairway to the sea. Each terrace was completely different, the landscape, the climate, the structures; either a part of the natures influence or that of the king and his enchantments.

"So, what do you want to do?"

She looked at Siva, the setting sun made his caramel eyes almost sparkle as they rested on her instead of the view.

"Let's go talk to the others," she managed picking out the figures silhouetted against the sky.

"I want to gauge what they think of this tournament," she said noting his confusion.

"Merran the brave," he sang underneath his breath.

She rolled her eyes and ignored him setting off for the five legendary leaders, in truth she didn't want to know what they thought the tournament would contain, or if they would participate. She just wanted to meet them, as someone who grew bored in spending mere minutes alone, she craved company, associations, stories, and who better than the clandestine-like tales of the leaders of Aradia's coastal cities. Besides, she prided herself on getting along with anyone, although, that wasn't when she planned on going up against them in an unknown tournament for incredible Gift-abilities. Still, it was worth the try. These were the people whose cities she traded so fairly and freely with, there was nothing to lose.

Not yet...

"All the leaders together at last," Khumo opened his arms in a welcoming gesture, "it's a thrill to see everyone who aids Tark so much, your supplies are invaluable."

The others nodded, but apart from Khumo everyone else was hidden behind a poker face, and the very warm air was fraught with icy tension. The tournament was already winding its tethers between them and pulling them apart. Even before they'd got to know each other. She briefly wondered what the King had been thinking when he planned this, or if he had at all. Competing with each other would not do the losers any good when they went back to their respective cities. Would they hold grudges? Halt trade because of an alteration? Or start a war... all based on the outcome of a competition. It seemed somewhat silly to disturb the balance that held everything together, then again, from what she'd heard about the leaders, they were wise and mature. Maybe, they could handle loss, but humiliation... if it came to that, if they were beaten in front of the king himself, could they let it go?

Could she...

She gritted her teeth, she would have to, for Temis and for Aradia. And she would also have to create a dynamic within the group, if they enjoyed each other's company and realised just how much each of them did for their cities and Aradia, hopefully the tournament would come down to the best earning the crown, and not the islands going to war because of it.

Merran was normally good at easing the atmosphere, but it didn't help when Kaijan shook Siva's hand in greeting with such a grip that Merran almost kicked him. However, Siva simply smiled, while his hand was crushed. It was something she adored in him, the unrelenting calmness, and unwavering stance of being who he was, that he had nothing to prove. He was Siva and Siva was what you saw, and what you got.

"I don't know about you guys," she broke the silence, "but until the tournament starts why don't we just be ourselves, as if we'd met right now with a whole city to explore and an entire lifetime of memories to share?"

Heads swivelled towards her; silence rung in her ears stretching until...

"It would be silly to waste the time we have on some pissing contested," Tia stated winking at Kaijan, who had the decency to look ashamed, "I think the Lady of the warm Western seas is right, let's explore this place and maybe she can tell us the tale of her tussle with the Forcian offspring."

Merran was just warming to the name Lady of the seas when the rug had been pulled from under her, the memory of that fight, the scars that came with it, the damage...

Mez must've read her face. "How about I begin with the battle of Frost-cliffs?"

Merran managed to nod, not really noticing if anyone was paying her any attention. The images in her mind were like a virus, once they latched, it took a lot to pry them free, to scourge them.

"You, okay?" Siva hooked her arms and steered her out of the Ridian Towers and towards the Terraced enchantment.

She nodded mutely, the feel of the thing's breath, the way it had spoken through its deformities, what it had taken...

"Merran,' Siva sounded worried.

She blinked her eyes against the images. "I'm fine," she exhaled, "It's just...'

"I know," Siva muttered, and put his arm around her and pulled her in close. The act shocked her enough that she shot out of her own mind, her senses sharpening on the moment. Yes, they had known each other for years, worked together, attended each other's major events, but she had never just been a girl in a city and he, never a boy in one. They had been rulers, responsible for their people and the supplies that reached the others. Now, in this moment, for the first time since she was twelve, she let herself wander, let her mind drift down passageways she had long thought shut, only to find they were just as closed and bolted as before. A tournament pitting them against each other, how did they come back from that, from knowing you had beaten the person next to you?

Could love still to exist if he beat her and became king?

And what if the tournament was deadlier, could she...

No! None of them. She took in each of the leaders walking before her, slipping down the cobbled pathway towards the Discs. There was laughter on the air now, a sense of enjoying each other's company as the tension of what was to come was replaced by what was happening now. All of these leaders had helped one or the other, they were each the link of a chain that made Aradia what it was, that ensured it not only survived but thrived. And now together they could explore that bond, the bond of corresponding for an entire life, but never meeting. It was cruel to pit them against each other, to take a bond strengthen by years of relying on one another, and risk that in a tournament where relationships could be destroyed.

Merran glanced at the tower behind her. It was circular in shape, a lighthouse rebuilt into a palace. Residing on the highest terrace with the vast Iron tipped mountains behind it, the white tower overlooked the sea, rumour had it that it was built to monitor the ocean for any approaching Forcians.

Every night it shone, a light exploding out of the crystal roof and sweeping out and across the ocean like a giant eye watching. Covering the span of the ocean until it was almost possible to see the Forestlands beyond.

As Merran took this in, the tournament, the king, the tower, she felt an overwhelming urge to leave. So, she wouldn't get caught up in the coming conflict, but before she did, she would explain her point of view to the king. He was a reasonable leader; he would listen, and she would make him understand.

Her mother had always told her to use her words, to talk to people, but also to listen at the same time. To contribute to another by engaging in their own stories. Erya, she felt would appreciate that, it was what she thought made her capable of speaking to everyone she met, her ability to listen, to learn and to respond thoughtfully. Taking her mother's advice, she snapped out of her own mind and tuned in to the conversation at hand. stories, they carried along the breeze. "They hide below the ice," Tia paused dramatically, "you can't see them at all.'

"Why not?' Siva asked, enraptured with the story, but still arm in arm with her.

How could they expect to fight one another? Maybe, it isn't a fight, a voice whispered.

"They're pure white like the ice and the snow, blend right in," Tia answered stepping onto a large Disc, they all crowded on one of Erya's inventions, a silver platform that carried people from one terrace to the other.

"But we found a way to hunt them."

"Why would you go after them?" Arya's eyes were wide.

An expression of grief crossed Tia and her twins face.

"We were thirteen when my sister and I became rulers of Tehren."

"Tehren?" Kaijan blurted, his slanted eyes wide, "I thought you had different lands."

"We do," Mez twisted at her long braided blonde hair, "but the battle of the Frost-lands divided us, more and more of the Forcian's were bypassing the shield. I don't know if you've noticed but their numbers are increasing, the sightings of them, the rampages, and the intelligence."

Every head nodded, Merran's included. "A portion of our people decided to leave, to find another life away from the demons who hunted them, who exploded from the ice and pulled them under. But evil doesn't stop spreading, it followed them and "the White-stone massacre, is still there. A site where..." Mez bowed her head as if in prayer and Tia took over. "Hundreds were killed."

The disc descended onto the sixth level of the Terrace, a trade post of sorts was setup right in the middle, a grey platform that had men and woman clamouring around it. Even though she had seen this happen a million times it still thrilled her to see the items appear out of nowhere, and the people surge forward to grab the goods they would sell in their shops in the Ridian market that stretched and winded through the second highest terrace. Merran caught a glimpse of some red fish and dyed cloth before it was snapped up and wheeled down the cobblestoned alleys to where it would end up at little wooden stores.

The twins continued their story and Merran noticed that where Mez twisted her blonde hair, Tia tugged at it, running her thumb over it as if to test its smoothness, the only other discernible difference was the scar that marred Tia's cheek, a slash from eye to mouth. "Then I — we found a way," she corrected. "Mez had gone to oversee the survivors at Mehren and return them to their home, on that return journey she noticed something, you could see the Forcian's if they moved, see their shadow and the slits of their vivid eyes."

"How did you get them to move?' Arya asked, her hands over her mouth muffled her question slightly. The disc drifted down, passing the next terrace, a light pine forest, with tall spindly trees, and wooden cabins. Khumo blushed the tips of the foliage as if in some silence communication.

"We were coming from one side to another, and Unbeknown to us we had trapped them between Mehren and Teren, when I saw this, I signalled Tia, and she marched towards us, closing them in. Trapped below the ice with us above we drove sharpened fishing poles into the ice and through them, and now, we hunt like that, using new iron-wood spikes crafted by Khumo's brilliance to hunt them."

"I loved making those weapons," Khumo said, "there was so much technique that went into them, the spring, the trigger, the —

"Please can someone else tell a story," Kaijan interrupted, "if Khumo starts talking about his forest we might just die of boredom, and he'll win by default."

Khumo punched Kaijan on the arm. "It's no worse than you and your caves."

"Not my caves," Kaijan argued, "the people's."

That surprised her, Kaijan was a Sulphite, even with his different hair and healthy skin colouring, Sulphites were very pedantic about their caves and the gift-stones within. The Disc was almost at the base of level four now. The armoury.

"Now that's a sight," Siva practically ogled at the enchantments carved into the cliff, one touch from the right person and it would send a wave out into the ocean that could decimate everything. There were four markings on the wall. Four steps. But it wouldn't stop the forcian's, slow them, maybe, but not stop.

"I thought Sulphites didn't really like Aradian's?' Arya blushed, her baby-faced cheeks reddening.

"We don't!" Kaijan, retaliated and then smiled at the despair on the teenage girl's face.

"Don't listen to him," Khumo weighed in with a smile that revealed perfectly white teeth, "no one else does."

"It's true," Kaijan agreed plucking his lips as if in sarcastic thought, "my mother was a Sulphite," he said, "my father an Aradian, it explains my shockingly good looks, doesn't it?"

"And the reason that nobody listens to me," he said to break the awkward silence that followed, "and I don't have any of the prejudices or beliefs Sulphites have regarding the stones, the more who wield them. The better."

Merran heard the double meaning. "What does that mean?"

He gave her a once over before responding. "The south-side of the island is not the only side dealing with an increase in Forcian appearances, the shield seems to be faltering."

Which would align with the kings wish to name a successor, Merran debated silently.

"And Sulphites are stubbornly refusing to give Aradian weapons to protect themselves because they're not Sulphite. There are rumours that they are stockpiling gems for something, but nobody has been able to get any information; they don't trust me," he answered the unasked question, "and I can't trust any of them to ask."

Catch twenty-two, Merran mused.

"But it's at a point where men disappear in those mines on a daily basis, just a scream echoing through the darkness and rumours of a watching, waiting shadow.'

Merran shivered. And it wasn't the sun that had dropped below the horizon, or the Disc that had drifted towards level three, their unintended destination. Festiva.

The Nightlife or Aradia.

"Have you ever seen what it is?" Arya asked, Merran found her curiosity invigorated, she loved questions and people showing interest and intrigue. It was something that was becoming more and more lost to the island.

For a second Merran thought Kaijan might tell a joke in an attempt to spare the teenager from what he'd seen, but when she looked closer, she saw it for what it was. He was terrified. He was afraid that telling them would make it real.

"I have," he eventually managed, the joke dying on his lips, "and if I didn't have a gemstone, I'd be dead, and so will all these people if Sulphites continue their selfish ways."

Someone tapped their foot against the disc, and it stopped hovering just above the ground. Merran was about to step off when the moon rose above the horizon and turned the world into every pencil shade imaginable. She stared out at the silver shaded sea, it pulled at her, her home, her adventure... her... there was something out there, something darker. She felt it. A thing filled with such hatred that it polluted the world, the ocean...

"You coming?' Siva asked extending a hand.

She grabbed it, and again there was that wrongness that she couldn't place. "Thanks," was all she managed happy to let the famous night life of Aradia swallow her up so she could forget all she had seen and heard today, and a long time ago...