Amelia squirmed in her seat. Despite the well-padded benches of the colosseum’s lower viewing levels, she couldn’t help but feel bothered and fidget, what with how the two women on either side of her were talking in hushed tones like they were old chums.

“You worked as a waitress? I considered something along that line, but I just knew I’d end up hurting the first person to grab me.”

“I know, right? That’s why I used to split my tips with the owner’s third son who tended the bar. If anyone ever got handsy, one word and he’d kick them out without asking why.”

“Fabulous. And I suppose the money you gave him eventually ended back in your pocket?”

“Where else would it go?”

They began laughing over her head. Amelia couldn’t hold it in any longer.

“I’m warning you now,” she said, while making sure her father had yet to return from wherever he’d gone after arriving with his own ‘date’, “I might be fine with you cozying up with my dad, but pregnancies resulting from dalliances with dragons are know to last an extremely long time.”

Martel, on Amelia’s right, and Grace, on her left, exchanged a look before squeezing in closer to begin mollycoddling Amelia in soft, soothing tones.

“Don’t worry,” Grace said, fanning Amelia with her pamphlet to alleviate the warm summer heat. “I half expected this might happen. I’m sure Havoc didn’t mean anything bad by arriving separately with Martel… Odds are, whoever gave him the tickets gave him a handful. He probably figured he might as well use them.”

“That’s right,” Martel added, “Men tend to hyperfocus. I’m sure Havoc will want to do nothing but spend time with you once your family’s affair with the Rutherford’s is resolved.”

“Says the woman who bedded my father the first day they met,” Amelia mumbled, slightly perturbed by how easily Martel had guessed she held a desire to spend time with her father.

Martel tried to hide her smile with her pamphlet, “Dear, what happened with your father… What you saw, it’s not what you’re thinking. And I would be willing to let you hit me to prove it.”

Offended Martel would try to hoodwink her even now, Amelia took her up on the offer with a poke sent towards the older woman’s stomach.

Martel flexed.

This hurt Amelia’s finger.

Maybe Martel suited her father more than expected, Amelia thought as she nursed her humiliated digit. Before the comfort of Grace’s hand took hers and placed it into the folds of the princess’s dress, which, felt exactly like a cold compress.

“I’m not naïve. I saw how undressed you were,” Amelia said with a shiver.

“That’s okay. I know how it looks,” Martel replied, in the voice a mother might use to explain something obvious to a child, “But the only reason I followed your father home is because I hurt my foot when stepping onto the coach after leaving the café. Everything else was outside my control.”

Slightly less sure of herself, Amelia listened to the small voice in her head offering a reminder that relying on memory alone was how misunderstandings usually started, “I… All I know is you left with him and I found you... doing stuff…” she said, before reluctantly giving Martel a chance to explain.

“Well, your father noticed my injury — though I can’t really even call it that, it was more of a scrape than an ‘injury’, his words not mine — and despite my insistence I could walk it off, he told our chauffeur to bring us to your townhouse. Where he carried me into the kitchen like a princess.”

The corner of Amelia’s eyes twitched. She could only hope Martel would get to the point.

“Then he left, ordered the guards to give us some privacy, came back with his coat off, and— goodness I can’t believe I’m saying this out loud — he told me to strip.”

“What?!” Amelia shouted, leaping from her seat in shock. Mortified to learn of her father’s brazen crassness. Which seemed just unbelievable enough to make sense.

She knew better than anyone how straight forward Havoc could be. If you built a wall blocking his favorite path, he would walk into it face first and come out the other side as if it didn’t exist! The first time the man had met her mother, according to Ophelia’s own words, he had burst into her carriage, complimented her in front of her ladies in waiting while covered in blood, and gone on to have a fist fight with the Duke of Winchester who had a mind to teach a rowdy youngster a lesson.

Havoc might not be a playboy like her grandfather claimed, but he most certainly could still be a scoundrel!

“I’m… I’m sorry, for leaping to conclusions,” Amelia said quietly, not knowing what else to do.

Grace tugged on Amelia’s dress, urging she sit. Before the nobles idling nearby could pick up on how there might be drama afoot and begin tilting their ears.

“You’re just too cute,” Martel said, bringing in Amelia to murmur, as if sharing a secret, “The look he gave me when popping the question was all business, I promise.”

Martel showed off her foot, “See? Completely fixed.”

“B-but he made you get naked,” Amelia said, upset, knowing her father could have easily healed Martel without needing to remove her clothes.

Grace leaned in to seed discord, “Martel might not have started it, but that doesn’t mean she didn’t encourage it.”

Amelia’s eyes opened wide. Martel let go before the cat she was holding could realise it had been tricked and start scratching. There was a faint ‘caught-in-the-act’ blush on the older woman who found a sudden interest in reading her schedule.

“You can’t put me alone in the same room with a specimen like the Baron of Strightsworth and expect me not to give him a go when I’m told to undress.” Martel said, matter of fact.

“Then I was right all along!” Amelia shouted, dumbfounded by how easily Grace and Martel could run circles around her. They were practically bullying her with their teasing and all she could consider was how her policy of accepting things as fact first, rather than after asking questions… Might not be the greatest thing ever?

“Look, for what it’s worth I’m sorry for scaring you,” Martel said, lowering her schedule to reveal a calm but penitent face. “If it happens again, I’ll make sure to properly lock the door first.”

“I wasn’t scared, I was scarred,” Amelia grumbled. Choosing to ignore the second part of what Martel had said in fear of providing more return ammunition.

It was then the roar of the crowd suddenly swelled all around them. As a gate in the arena began to grind open, allowing three silhouettes; two men and a woman, to step out into the open. A trio of gladiators who waved for a crowd that began cheering their names.

Wearing armor to protect but their vitals, and with only a tower shield, a trident, and Stanton’s sword between them, their status as slaves for the colosseum was marked by the heavy collars they wore. A brutish device in Amelia’s opinion. Hardwired to blow should the wearer ever step beyond their play-pen. In the Historian’s novel, Stanton had shed thankful tears when Grace removed his.

Surprisingly, the Stanton of today appeared to revel in the cruel mechanism. Going so far as to drag his sword against his collar, sending a wave of sparks that followed his blade in an arc to drive the crowd wild. As if showing the world, he could care less it was there.

“Wait…” Amelia heard Grace ponder, against the volume around them, “Why isn’t Stanton wearing the fancy armor his sponsor gave him?”

Amelia bit her tongue. Grace was right, and their pamphlets had promised Stanton a one-on-one fight.

“Maybe it’s a change in the programming?” Amelia answered, finding a reason to touch Grace’s arm as she pointed out the glaring error in the princess’s schedule. “What do you think Martel?” she added, upon spotting how the older women appeared to have fallen into serious thought.

Martel’s face relaxed, as if not wanting to cause worry. “I’m just thinking about a few things I’ve noticed. See how the largest number of guards are over there?” she said, pointing to a colosseum gate which stood out from the others due to how much larger it was. “If I had to guess… We might be starting things off with a venatio, instead of a brawl. How comfortable are you with seeing blood exactly?”

The distant enraged howl of a beast punctuated Martel’s words, leaving Amelia quite impressed, but also, worried. Since Grace had mentioned her father wanted to see Stanton fight before bringing him on.

“I should be fine,” Amelia said, as the gladiators, who once lived for the crowd, now readied themselves to face the largest of the colosseum’s dark iron gates, which began violently shaking as something very heavy, and very angry bashed itself against it.

A trumpet blared. The gate slowly dragged itself open, and the gladiators gripped the handles of their weapons as an immense paw stepped out from the void, announcing the arrival of a sleekly formed monster that seemed to drag the very darkness of the colosseum’s underbelly behind it, like a shroud made from the darkest of ink.

The creeping cloud of night surrounding the creature drifted to fill the arena as it plodded in a circle around its opponents. Wolf like in structure, its resemblance to any sort of canine stopped there. Its fur reminded Amelia of woven iron, while its eyes remained hidden; beneath a natural shielding of plated bone that grew most prominently round its face like a helmet, though there were portions of spine and leg that were clad just as well.

Carefully, the monster studied its surroundings. Which collectively erupted in pitch as the crowd realised the colosseum had brought in an unexpected treat for their enjoyment.

Amelia, watching the creature warily pull its pitch-black shroud around itself as if it detested the noise, wondered how on earth anyone would dare get close enough to unlock the beast. Since much like the gladiators, it too had a collar round its neck, chained in addition by a length of steel links that would go taught should the monster move too far from the gate.

“I’ve never seen, or heard of such a creature,” Martel said, her voice filled with interest, “Have you, Amelia?”

“Not from any book I’ve ever read,” Amelia answered, finding that no, she didn’t have a clue either.

“A hound. It’s just a hound,” came a deep voice, which slowly made its way down the steps towards where Amelia, Grace, and Martel were seated.

Wanting to greet her father, Amelia’s jaw went slack upon seeing how positively silly he looked holding an enormous quantity of foodstuff. Stacked high enough to block his face from view, Martel graciously began to help Havoc unload his gift of fried chicken, skewered kabobs, and sandwiches before urging he sit next to her on the stairs.

Receiving a paper bag of her own, filled to the brim with popcorn that had been drizzled in liquid caramel, Amelia finished forgiving her father for having been so easily seduced by Martel.

“What’s that you were saying about a hound?” Grace asked, as she munched on a corn-dog.

Amelia nodded when Havoc looked over. She too wanted to know what sort of creature this was.

“This hound,” Havoc said, while devouring a rotisserie chicken like it were an apple, “Is a wretched thing hailing from the lands of our Westerly neighbors. After a chance encounter, I had it shipped to the capital for entertainment… But I will spare no tears for its life. Not when it took me almost an hour to wrestle it to exhaustion without accidentally killing the thing.”

“And you sure it doesn’t have an… actual name?” Grace asked.

Leaning back, Havoc relaxed himself upon the rock-hard cement stairs. “Not sure it has one. Wouldn’t surprise me if it doesn’t. I think the thing is obsessed with never being seen. See how its fur bristles? It hates the fact it’s been forced out in the open.” Havoc laughed, settling on a sadistic smile. “Would you believe it mistook our encampment as a foreign delicacy?” he asked Martel, who hung onto his every word, “The thing snuck into one of the tents. Nearly killed a good page before I managed to wrest its jaw loose…”

Amelia swore her father’s ears twitched an instant before the sound of trumpets picked up once more. “It’s starting,” Havoc said, licking his lips clean before he winked at his daughter, “Let’s see if your pick is any better than mine.”

“My pick against yours?” asked Amelia, wanting clarification.

“Our third.” Havoc answered. “Mine… Has already proven themselves… But I’m curious to see how yours will compare.”

Having never considered her selection of Stanton a contest, Amelia felt a surge of excitement course through her to both learn her father had already found their third fighter, and at the idea of a competition by proxy.

A pointless competition Amelia found herself wanting to win.

“Come on Stanton!” Amelia yelled, cupping her hands to better encourage the suitor from The Historian’s Novel, who faced the ear-splitting roar the hound unleashed before the gate behind it fell shut with a crash. Severing the chains which had kept it from moving.