Ghada entered a large room, which already held many of the other competitors. Cecil directed them both to the buffet table, which held many meats and fruits which Ghada had never seen before. As Cecil began stacking the food on his plate, sampling as he went, Ghada took the time to look more closely at the people around her.

One man in particular looked familiar to her, and after awhile of studying his character Ghada realized it was the man who had called her a slave only that afternoon.

"If you clutch that plate any harder it's going to break,"said a voice from behind her.

Ghada looked down at her fingers and noticed her knuckles had turned white and relenquished her death grip on the porcelain. Turning around she looked into a face of a fellow knight who looked around her age and was smiling.

"Oh, forgive me, my name is Damian Corwin," he said, with a slight mock of a bow.

"I'm Emlyn," said Ghada, not knowing what to think of him.

" I noticed you in my sleeping quarters, and I'm directly across from you so if you ever feel like talking to someone I'm always there." Saying that the boy saundered off to join Cecil at the buffet table.

After a few minutes had past Ghada grew bored and lonely as no one else had introduced themselves to her. Cecil walked over still eating, and Ghada wondered how he could remain so thin from all the food he was packing in.

"See that man?" Cecil pointed to an extraordinarily elderly looking man who was biting into a chicken leg with great delicacy.

"Yes what about him?"

"He's the main judge of this whole competition he is. Mr. Wellington has been over looking these tournaments for at least thirty years and is excited about the new changes in this one."

"How many judges are there?" asked Ghada.

"Oh they'll be introducing themselves shortly," he replied gnawing on the last of his meat.

Soon enough Cecil was right and the hall was called into a silence so that Mr.Wellington could speak. Three other men rose beside him and Ghada guessed these were the other judges.

"Welcome to the 118th tournamnet of Renolph. You have all nevertheless registered for the upcoming battles and we are proud to announce there are now over one hundred competitors. A record for an amateur Knight Title, if I do say so myself. On my Right is Mr.Appleby," Mr.Wellington signalled all attention towards him and paused then continued with the introductions, " And on my left is Mr. Redolpho," Redolpho smiled cheerfully and waved at them all. " And finally Mr.Paindridge, otherwise preferred to be called 'Knox'."

Ghada gasped at the name, and reaized that the man who had called her a slave had also been the man who had entered her home seven years ago with Slade. Did that mean that Amaryllis was here?

" The rules are to be followed," carried on Mr.Wellington, " Absolutely no tolerence will be held with violence outside of the arena or deliberate attempts to hurt a member of an opposing team. Night time strolls and walks are strictly prohibited. Any substance found to enhance your performance is banned. And by no means are any bribes to be taken." With that said Mr.Wellington sat down looking tried, and left the rest up to Mr.Redolpho to explain who looked very enthusiastic.

"Right then, there will be five teams of twenty, and you will all draw out a different coloured ball tomorrow morning to see which team you will be on, you then will be expected to introduce yourselves make your strengths clear to others and start practising on the arena, and or the trianing rooms located around and inside this coliseum. Within the next few months you will learn to work as a team and once the tournament starts you will start facing off against one another. I shall let Mr.Paindridge, explain to you how the groups will work," and with that Mr.Redolpho sat next to Mr.Wellington.

"This tournament I hope you understand will be no cake-walk," started out Knox, " Many injuries will occur and perhaps a few deaths—

"Mr.Paindridge!" said Mr.Appleby clearly shocked at the opening line of his comrades speech. " There will be no deaths in this competition that we reassure you," he said to the growing restless audience.

" As I was saying," said Knox eyeing Appleby steadily which made him sit down giving full attention to Knox, " This tournament will be tiring, stressful and very long. We have promised the city eightenn days of entertainment, and the battles will occur from morning to mid-evening. Afterall battles at night time would be a bloody nuisance as no one would be able to see anything. You will start out in groups of twenty which will be arranged tomorrow as Mr.Redolpho said. From there you will be set up to fight the other groups and knights who are knocked out or unable to play in any way will be disqualified. The groups will rapidly shrink after each battle and you will then be divided into smaller groups. The numbers in these groups are yet to be decided as we don't know how many of you will carry on past the first round," Knox stared his audience down and with a final sneer sat down.

Ghada shuddered, this man seemed to enjoy violence very much and he made the tournament sound a lot more like warfare then a tournament. Cecil stood beside her clearly in awe also of what he just heard.

"Well I hope I'm on your team," he said breaking the silence between them.

"Yeah I hope so too," said Ghada.

As they left the hall and walked back to their sleeping corridors, Ghada started to worry about the whole thing. She could be exposed at any minute and being watched by thousands when the tournament began was no console to her.

As they entered the loud room, Cecil began to unpack his things.

Ghada threw herself onto her bed and looked at the bedside right to her. Still no one occupied it. Cecil apparently had noticed that too.

"That's odd, usually everyone would be here by now, especially if the teams are made up tomorrow," he said.

"He probably backed out, afterall no amateur knight would want to have to go through this," she said.

The room all of a sudden grew very quiet and all the knights were looking past her. Ghada sat up and turned around seeing a very tall and handsome knight looking down at her.He had brown hair and a tan which made it obvious he was under the sun a lot and his blue eyes looked at her with a fierceness that ran chills down her spine. Fighting the urge to blush Ghada hoped he hadn't heard the comment she had just made, but judging by the way he was looking at her he had.

" I assure you I am no amateur," he said coldly, and with that threw his stuff onto the bed on the right of hers and lied down fully attired.

"Well you're an amateur at getting places on time,"stated Ghada, not liking his tone.

The knight turned towards her propping his head up with an arm surveying her.
"I bet you won't make it past the first round. In fact I'll make sure you don't,"he lay down again facing away from her which angered Ghada even more so as she was never used to being insulted to her face then snubbed right afterwards.

Ghada picked up her sack filled with her armour and tossed it at him. It hit him successfully causing an unsuspecting grunt and for him to throw it back at her with a lot more force.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"Putting an arrogant bastard in his place," she replied.

The room grew even more silent if possible and Ghada looked at Cecil for reassurance but only met a horror-stricken face.

"You're place soon enough will be under the ground if you don't stop bothering me," growled the knight.

This would almost seem comical to Ghada if he hadn't meant seriously wanting to kill her. As the knight went on Cecil pulled her out of the room and walked down the hallway out of earshot, and the room began to get nosiy again.

"What was that?" asked a panicky Cecil.

"He was being unneccessarily arrogant."

"Yes, but you should just ignore it! Do you even know who that was?"

Ghada shook her head.

"That was Calix Lancaster, the knight most likely to win this whole competition, and he just threatened to kill you!"