Frances, like her mother Edana, always kept her war gear on or near their person at all times. So it took only a few minutes for her to put on her gambeson, helmet, estoc, and belt with pouches.

Ayax on the other hand looked paralyzed as she put on a spare helmet and heavy quilted jacket. She did have the equipment, thanks to her other father, Alexander, who was a professional mercenary. Yet, the orc and his husband, Don, were clearly nervous and double-checking that her protective equipment was tightly fastened.

They weren’t the only ones seeming worried. Eleanor was limping toward Frances, a look of concern plastered across her face.

“Frances, what exactly are you trying to get out of this duel?”

Only glancing at her grandmother, Frances focused on checking how much power her ring had. “Um, this duel is not really about me. It’s to help Ayax.”

Eleanor frowned, but Edana slid in beside her, smiling reassuringly. “If you think it’s the right thing to do, Frances, then I’ll support you.”

The elderly matriarch opened her mouth as if to speak, but instead, sighed in resignation. “Alright. But make sure you’re wearing these.” She handed Frances a ring inset with several small sapphires. “Standard issue “final point” rings for the Winter Tournament. If your body takes a hit that ought to knock you out or kill you, they will activate and surround you with a shield. However, if your ring activates, the duel will end and you will be considered the loser.”

Edana frowned as Frances put the ring on. “They didn’t have these before.”

“No. It’s why it has gotten so hard to win the Winter Tournament now. Before we all held back, now there is no need.” Eleanor walked off to give Ayax her ring, leaving Edana with Frances.

“Care to fill me in on your plan, Frances?” Edana asked, curious. Frances nodded and whispered into her mother’s ear, explaining to her what she noticed and what she intended to do. Edana nodded sagely. “I think it’s a risky plan, but not unnecessarily so. Be careful, though, don’t treat this lightly like Ophelia did.”

“I won’t.” Frances took a deep breath and walked into the Windwhistler’s duelling area. Apparently all the family compounds in Erlenberg had one. Meanwhile, the rest of the family retreated a safe distance behind reinforced panels of glass.

Ayax was holding a staff instead of her wand. She had a white-knuckle grip on the weapon and her tail swished nervously side to side.

“Ayax, if you don’t want to do this, we can stop,” Frances said gently.

Ayax swallowed, and shook her head. “No. I… I want to do this.” She raised her staff with both four-fingered hands and took a stance. “I’m ready.”

Nodding, Frances signalled the referee, in this case, her half-goblin half-human cousin Nobbo, who raised his wand.

“On my mark. One, two, three, mark!”

Frances knew Ayax was nervous. So she expected her cousin to either attack quickly, or wait for an opening. She raised a shield with her a short phrase of notes, before beginning to charge a fireball.

Except, Ayax advanced, staff raised but not charging at Frances. She was singing, her voice deeper and raspier, but the notes were well-sung. Her staff as a result was glowing, building up to some kind of spell.

Frances released her fireball. She did so a little early, but it was that or getting hit by some unknown spell. Fire engulfed Ayax.

And the troll flew out of it, surrounded by a glowing blue shield. Frances’s eyes widened and she stepped back. The shield was fading already, having been powered by a glowing card that Ayax was already discarding. However, it had bought enough time for the troll to close the distance and swing her glowing staff into Frances’s shield.

Her shield and right hand rang like a gong being hit. Frances found herself forced back. Instinctively she fell into communion with Ivy’s Sting and tried to grab and throw Ayax away.

Only, Ayax was stepping back, whirling her staff defensively. She whipped out another card and cried out a Word of Power to activate it. A blast of blue magic shot toward Frances, who tore a tile from the floor of the duelling area to block it. Ayax twirled her staff and a wall of earth rose in front of her, obscuring herself from Frances’s view.

Frances smiled because she knew she was right. She’d noticed it when she was talking to Ayax about combat magic. She’d glimpsed the pouches that her cousin wore on her belt. There’d been a deck of cards like the one Ophelia had, and a flask, similar to the one that Frances herself carried. It was a flask carrying water and whatever herbal drink a song mage preferred to use. Frances had put these facts together, with what she’d noticed of Ayax’s reaction to when Frances had been asked to join the Winter Tournament by her cousins.

Ayax was very enthusiastic about combat magic and by the looks of it, she was quite good. In fact, she was strong enough to send that wall of earth she’d made ploughing toward her.

Frances decided to dodge it, only, as she side-stepped, something hit her shield, hard. Gasping, she found herself spinning around, knocked almost to the edge of the duelling area. Her ring now glowed hot as more of her power flowed out of it.

Regaining her balance, Frances saw that Ayax leaping off of the Earth wall she’d sent at her. She’d hung on to the wall, and at the last possible moment, hit Frances with her enchanted staff.

There was no time to admire this on-the-spot ingenuity. Frances dug deep and pulled into a song and spell she’d rehearsed. Floor tiles and clods of earth ripped from the ground hammered Ayax, who was forced to play another card to create a shield.

Only stopping to take a deeper breath and to reinforce her posture, Frances continued to sing. This time small forks of lightning, just powerful enough to sting and burn, bombarded Ayax, who screamed a word of power and raised an earthen wall to take cover behind.

Frances charged her trademark lightning spell, preparing to blast the wall apart and knock her cousin out of the ring. Yet, even as she built her song to a crescendo, Frances wondered if Ayax would be able to get out of this situation.

That was when she realized she wasn’t the only one singing. She could hear Ayax’s deeper voice belting out a chorus that made the air hum with power. A second later, the troll dashed around the wall, her staff glowing with power.

Frances wasn’t finished charging her spell yet, but she realized she had to fire. If Ayax got too close, it would be too dangerous for her to cast her spell.

Thunder cracked deafening everybody’s ears. The air stung of ozone, and Frances blinked back the flash to find Ayax on her knees. The troll was grimacing, holding herself up by her staff. Somehow she must have blocked the spell.

But it was only partially. Ayax tried to struggle to her feet, but groaned and shook her head. “I yield.”

“The match is over,” said Nobbo, his voice filled with awe.

Frances sheathed Ivy’s Sting and helped Ayax up. “That was amazing!”

“I—wait what? I lost.”

Frances felt a sense of deja-vu as she helped Ayax to her family. “Yes, but you were really good. You don’t have my power, but your instincts are brilliant.”

Edana walked over and cast a healing spell on Ayax. “I agree. You’re a natural.”

That sentiment was echoed by the horde of cousins and uncles and aunts that surrounded them, most of them expressing awe and congratulations.

Ayax did smile at this, but Frances could see that her cousin didn’t seem able to meet their eyes. Before she could act, though, Eleanor pushed into the crowd and sized her niece up. “So, Ayax, are you interested in joining the Winter Tournament along with Frances? Each house can send two representatives after all.”

Ayax’s smile faded and Frances tensed, but she had no idea what she could do. This… was her cousin’s decision.

To Frances’s relief, the troll took a deep breath and nodded, much to the cheers of the Windwhistlers and Eleanor’s grateful smile.

Later that night…

As per tradition after Windwhistler family gatherings, everybody stayed over at Eleanor’s mansions. It was also practical because the adults were too drunk and the children were too tired to take a carriage home. Some of the Windwhistlers did live there regularly but some such as Edana, Eustace and Eleanor’s brother and sisters lived in different houses. Still, the mansion was so expansive that each of them had a private room.

This turned out to be a good thing, because Frances could not sleep. Aside from the guest bed being too soft for her (which was why she’d spread a set of bed linens on the floor), she was thinking about the Winter Tournament. The card magic that Ayax and Ophelia had been using had piqued her interest. She was now reading a book about it by the candlelight.

She was so engrossed in the tome that she didn’t notice the first knock on her door. She did however notice the second, much louder knock.

Closing her book, Frances walked up to the door and opened it. “Hello?”

Ayax, dressed in a black night shift, was standing at her door. Frances blinked and tried to figure out from her cousin’s expression the reason for the late night visit, but was greeted by stony silence.

“Frances, can we talk?” the troll asked.

“Uh, okay.” She let her cousin in and they both took seats across the small round table in the guest room.

As Ayax settled down, she seemed to glower at Frances, but that glower shifted into a pained look.

“Why did you want me to enter the Winter Tournament?”

“Because I thought you wanted to, and I thought it’d help you.” Frances blinked, panic filling her chest. “Was I wrong?”

“No—yes…” Ayax’s fists formed into tight balls. “You asked if I felt like I didn’t deserve or didn’t want to enter the tournament.” At Frances’s nod, Ayax spat out, “What does it matter if I feel like I don’t deserve to enter the tournament? What if I didn’t want to enter the tournament because I felt like I didn’t deserve to?”

Frances frowned. “But you do. You’re a really talented mage, Ayax.”

“So my feelings don’t matter?” Ayax demanded.

“Of course they do,” Frances replied, alarmed now.

“Then why did you make me—well, push me to enter, Frances?” The troll wiped her moist eyes. “I want to enter the tournament. I really do, but if you could tell I wasn’t completely comfortable, why push me?”

“Because your guilt is holding you back from what you want,” said Frances. She remembered how she had felt two years ago. She’d thought she deserved all the beatings, the abuse that her parents had heaped on her. It had crippled her thinking, her thoughts about herself, poisoned what she thought she wanted and what she actually desired.

“What do you know about my guilt?” the troll demanded.

Frances hesitated, but the defiant, combative glare in her cousin’s eyes demanded a response

“You feel guilty about what happened to your parents. You feel like they died because you failed, and so you feel undeserving.”

Ayax flinched and opened her mouth, only to close it. Her lips twisted, trying to form words.

“Okay, you’re not wrong about that. Is it related to the… thing you went through?”

“Yes.” Frances closed her eyes and steeled herself. “My parents abused me for years. They starved me, beat me, and taught me that I deserved all of it.” She averted her gaze. “Even when I was told I didn’t deserve it, I still felt like I couldn’t—shouldn’t be happy. I still feel guilty that I didn’t realize it earlier.”

Frances Bowes her head. “That’s the thing with traumatic events, you can’t understand why they happened to you and so to make sense of it all, you think they happened to you because you deserved it somehow.” She looked up, looking Ayax right in her black eyes. “You deserve to be happy, to have good things happen to you.

Ayax nodded, head bowed, not quite meeting Frances’s gaze. It was kind of odd for Frances to observe her cousin’s silence. It didn’t seem any one person reacted quite the same way when she disclosed her past.

“I’m sorry this happened to you. Thank you for telling me.” The troll closed her eyes. “But please, don’t do this again.”

That was new. “Do?” Frances asked.

“Make me do something I’m not sure about.” For such a stoic character, Ayax could inject a lot of emotion in her tone. “Maybe it worked for you. Maybe it helped you. Maybe this will help me, but I didn’t like being pushed into joining the Winter Tournament.”

“But you wanted to join,” Frances stammered.

Ayax conceded that point with a tilt of her head. “And I also didn’t. Maybe I am wrong, but I get to make that mistake. Okay?”

It took Frances a moment, but it all suddenly became quite clear what her cousin was saying.

“I understand. I’m sorry I pushed you.”

Ayax grunted and leaned back in her chair, looking away from Frances. “It’s alright. I did want to join. I just…” She shivered and took a deep breath. “I’ll tell you about it later.”

Frances nodded and smiled. “Okay. I am curious, though, how are you so good at this?”

Ayax snorted, a smirk spreading across her features. “How did you figure out I was good?”

Frances giggled and explained to Ayax how she’d noticed her deck of charged cards, the things she said and the look on her face when the Winter Tournament was brought up. Ayax in turn, told Frances about how her father, a retired combat mage, trained her. They kept talking on and on into the night.

Edana found the pair that morning. Frances sleeping on the floor with a blanket. Ayax on the bed. Chuckling, Edana wished she had one of those “cameras” so that she could take a picture. As it was, she had to be content with just the sight of the pair, fast asleep.