The announcement came three days later, and Kaldrath practically shook with it.
Heralds rode through every district before noon, trumpets blaring, unrolling proclamations at every major square to crowds that gathered faster than I'd seen the city move for anything else in my time there. I happened to be crossing the market district when the nearest herald reached his post, and I stopped along with everyone else to listen.
"By decree of His Majesty King Aldous the Third," the herald announced, voice pitched to carry over the growing crowd, "in celebration of the fiftieth year of peaceful reign, and in recognition of the extraordinary talents scattered across every corner of this kingdom and its allied territories — the Tournament of Kings shall be held, one month hence, within the Grand Coliseum of Kaldrath! Champions from every kingdom, every guild, every house are invited to compete for glory, for royal favor, and for a prize purse the likes of which this continent has not seen in a generation!"
The crowd's reaction was immediate and enormous — cheering, excited chatter, more than a few people already placing informal bets on favored competitors before the herald had even finished his second reading of the proclamation.
I found Kael Drenmoor, of all people, nearly bouncing on his heels with excitement when I ran into him near the Guild hall an hour later.
"You have to enter," he said, without preamble, before I'd even finished processing the full announcement myself. "After what you did to me in that exhibition match, you'd place easily. Probably win the whole thing, honestly, and I say that as someone who does not enjoy admitting it."
I turned the idea over carefully, and the longer I considered it, the more it settled into place as something closer to opportunity than risk. A continent-wide tournament would draw exactly the kind of high-profile talent, noble attention, and political maneuvering that might surface information about the Grey Sovereign's movements faster than months more of careful library research ever could. It would also, I suspected, draw exactly the kind of watchful attention Malakar had already been paying me — and possibly, if I was fortunate, whatever was directing him.
There was risk in that, obviously. A public tournament meant a public stage, and a public stage meant far less room to hide exactly how far my abilities actually extended if circumstances forced my hand. But Selene, when I raised the idea with her that evening, was unexpectedly enthusiastic.
"Every noble house, every kingdom's champion, half the continent's scholars and diplomats, all gathered in one place for weeks," she said, already flipping through a mental checklist I could practically see forming behind her eyes. "If there's any current gossip, any recent 'unexplainable' military report, any surviving fragment of Court of Heaven lore scattered across noble libraries I haven't had access to, this tournament is exactly where all of it will surface. You'd be a fool not to enter, Lukas, and not just for the fighting."
"I'd have to hold back considerably," I said. "Enough to stay in character as a talented but mortal swordsman, all the way through what sounds like a fairly serious competitive bracket. That's going to get harder the further I advance."
"Then don't advance carelessly," Selene said. "Fight smart, not overwhelming. You've already proven with Kael that you know how to win without revealing the full scope of what you're capable of. Trust that instinct."
I thought about Aria's advice before I left Valoria — don't assume you already know everything the world could throw at you — and found, somewhat to my own surprise, that the idea of stepping into a genuine, structured competition, against opponents I didn't already know the full measure of, held a strange, honest appeal that had nothing to do with strategy or information-gathering at all.
A trillion years of training had made victory, in almost every conceivable form, a foregone conclusion long before any fight actually started. The Tournament of Kings, whatever else it turned out to be, offered something I hadn't realized until that exact moment I'd been quietly missing this entire time: the small, human thrill of a contest whose outcome, for once, I'd have to actually work — carefully, cleverly, believably — to control.
"Alright," I said, mostly to myself, feeling something settle into place. "Let's enter a tournament."