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they seemed to swallow the arms of the little fighters.
    So far no one seemed to notice him, their attention focused on the children performing dazzling feats of gymnastics and martial arts.
    After the first few hours of the ceremony, Urus's legs cramped. He stretched and shifted but nothing seemed to help. He couldn't decide which annoyed him more, the pain in his legs or the boredom. Finally his elephant moved. It was time for the part of the drama where the prisoners of war were paraded in front of the citizenry as trophies of glorious victories from far-off lands, showcasing the strength of Kest's armies.  
    There was only one prisoner this year.
    As the mock battlefield shifted, the groups headed off to the side while the solo performers made their way into the center ring. The elephant dragged Urus in a full circuit around the arena, assuring that every citizen of Kest got a good look at the boy who wasn't good enough to be a warrior—to be a true Kestian.
    The solo performances were so much fun to watch, Urus almost forgot that he was watching from the ass-end of an elephant. A few of the most skilled graduates each got to give a demonstration in their specialty, some performing feats of archery, others showing off their speed or strength. Goodwyn, the most gifted warrior in the class, performed last.
    As a pair of children from the earlier performances carried an ornate box between them to Goodwyn, the vibrations of the crowd's cheers and stomps went silent. Goodwyn opened the lid and withdrew its contents with the reverence one might show for a holy artifact. To the warrior caste, the weapon inside was as close as an object could get to holy. It was a suzur , a twenty-foot length of barbed metal chain, at one end a heavy spiked mace and at the other a long, curved blade. Goodwyn gripped the leather-wrapped wooden handle in the center of the weapon and let the chains unravel.
    Most people just called the weapon "the stumper" in honor of the missing limbs that invariably resulted from the weapon's use, even by the most skilled soldiers. Suzurs were as renowned for killing their wielders as they were their enemies. Goodwyn was the only graduate brave—or foolish—enough to wield the weapon, let alone specialize in it.
    He started by hurling the mace end of the chain to shatter pottery targets filled with bright, multicolored sand, each resting on wooden posts at different heights. The audience rose to their feet, clapping and clanking mugs in salute after Goodwyn broke three targets with one swing.
    Urus had seen Goodwyn practicing this routine and knew what was coming next. The audience was in for a spectacle. All of the children who had performed earlier formed a line, each carrying a heavy burlap bag. Goodwyn nodded to the first child, who stepped forward and threw the bag as high in the air as he could.
    This was the first day of his life as one of the culled, and Urus was getting a taste of what it felt like to have everyone in Kest ignore him while they stared in awe at the spectacle of his friend's skill.  
    Goodwyn wrenched his right hand and the chain lashed out at the bag. The blade at the tip sliced through and spilled colored confetti into the air, which swirled high above the spectators in the cool afternoon wind.
    One line of children separated into two small groups. Then more lines appeared, then more, of graduates and even some of the battlemasters and other adults, who finally formed a circle of queues around Goodwyn like rays shooting from the sun.
    Each line passed bags from supply carts inward to the circle around Goodwyn and his whirling blade and smashing mace. Bag after bag flew into the air and Goodwyn cut through them all, even with a half dozen bags in the air at once.  
    He spun and rolled and turned his slashing blade into a dancer's prop, no one able to escape the lethal beauty of his skill. He threw the blade into the air and the bags seemed to fall toward his weapon, as if landing on