I also avoided the others. They discussed Joust strategies around the campfire, so I ate alone by my bedroll, reminding myself that affection was contrary to my survival—and theirs. Even so, affection crept upon me like a spider, spinning debts of loyalty I couldn’t afford.

I would cower in my bed as their voices, buoyed with hope, drifted across the clearing. I was just so cowered on the night William entertained the group with the story of how he became Champion. Each detail, spoken in his broken English, sent shocks of longing through my body.

He had a wife when he was young—my mother. And they’d had a baby—me. Despite the birthing laws, they found a way to know the child and were careful to keep their knowledge a secret. One day, when their baby girl was an infant, his wife snuck from the field to the village nursery. The Overseer caught her and kicked her. As fate would have it, she—my mother!—had fallen and cut her neck on a rock, bleeding to death in minutes. Enraged, William seized the Overseer’s weapon and killed him with it.

“The Overseers longed to kill me for taking that life,” he said. “Murder shined in their eyes. But, I was a strong worker. I brought in three times my quota. To kill me was to lose the crop. Their greed could not stand it.”

“So, what happened?” Voltaire asked.

“They did not kill me. No, they said, ‘William, you will be in the Guard.’ I got a new quota—to beat the workers each day. I became the sword of the Overseer. I became a beast. And I hated that beast like the Devil. All of Cobane hated that beast. In my first Joust as Champion, they wanted me to die. My death would end their misery.”

“They don’t hate you now,” Voltaire said. “You’re revered.”

“What you speak is true. At last, their hatred became love. Near and far, people knew the name Crane the Conqueror. They cheered me and my love for them was strong. I could not beat them. I lost my stomach for it.”

“What about the Overseer and his men?” Voltaire asked.

“The Overseers fear the people together. They would not do me harm. The people together are the strongest sword of all.”

He went on to describe how he spent the next years of his life as a bounty hunter. With workers—not just in Cobane, but everywhere—on his side, he became virtually autonomous. He traveled between Houses, hunting outlaws, and delivering them at his discretion. He was welcomed everywhere. He used his fame to build a secret network of men that he trained as soldiers, teaching them all he learned in the Guard.

“A White-Face murdered my sister,” Pidge said, his voice petulant. “They kill without caution.”