Free Rebel Elements (Seals of the Duelists) by Jasmine Giacomo

Kiwani as a Blessed Ward of the Empire, a sign of great personal favor to her family. Now that she was just another duelist, all efforts to smooth her way into a successful political career were wasted.
    Without the political influence she craved, she could not become a beloved heroine of the people, like those who populated the stories her father had told her as a child. She knew he had been trying to inspire her, and it had worked, if perhaps too well. Nothing was more important than succeeding at her goal to serve the empire in a fashion glorious enough to place her name in the history books.
    Duelists were glorified bodyguards. Yes, perhaps one in a thousand children possessed the rare gift of elemental manipulation, but all duelists did the day long was beat each other bloody for pay. The empire’s justice system was completely random! Half the time, the claimant in the wrong actually won the dispute. Where is the fairness in that?
    “Lady Kiwani, are you attempting to lose me?” Azhni asked. Kiwani had become used to Azhni’s rarely-used voice, roughened as it was from scarring due to a childhood disease.
    Belatedly, Kiwani noticed that her annoyance with the imperial justice system had caused her to speed up. Sighing, she slowed, not wanting to slip on the frosted walkway. If she was going to injure herself, however, best to do it when Azhni was within calling distance.
    Azhni always required a lengthy explanation to Kiwani’s new acquaintances. She’d given the speech a dozen times in the last score of days and was tired of it. Kiwani’s mother was unable to bear any more children, so she was an only child. As such, her parents were, to put it mildly, overprotective. Azhni had been engaged by her parents, ever since Kiwani could remember, as nanny, bodyguard, and chanter—since her damaged voice prevented her from training in the rare and powerful magic of song.
    How her father, even with his vast resources, could afford the continual services of a chanter for fifteen years was beyond Kiwani. She’d asked him several times over the last couple of years to let the woman go, but he’d always refused. Once, she even suggested to Azhni that her father could not afford the chanter, hinting that Azhni might be exaggerating the need for her services. Azhni’s response was that, after so long, Kiwani’s father couldn’t afford not to employ her.
    Kiwani had to admit that Azhni’s constant presence did come in handy at times. Once, she had fallen from a horse at the family’s ancestral estate on Wisnuk Bay and broken her leg and her wrist. Azhni had healed both limbs within moments by pulling her blood crystal from the pouch that never left her belt and chanting until the crystal resonated with magic.
    Unfortunately, due to her parents’ paranoia about her continued health, the blood drop inside Azhni’s crystal was taken directly from Kiwani, and Azhni had told her it wouldn’t work on any of her friends if they got injured. Making an injured friend wait in pain while Azhni crafted a new crystal on the spot had made for a few awkward moments through the years.
    The Hall of Seals loomed ahead, all red paint and sint-fingers. Kiwani and Azhni descended the covered stairs and followed the stone path to the hall’s rear entrance. A pox on Anneke for coming to look for me. Why did she bother? She already has classes anyway; she started months ago! Now I have to go in, and I’ll look foolish for being so late . She sighed, adjusted her expression, and tugged open the heavy door.

Mud and Maggots
     

    “What’s he doing with a plant? That’s a strange looking flower,” a boy whispered behind Bayan.
    “Marikit was a Pinamuyoc,” a girl muttered, “and even she called Balangs mucklings.”
    Bayan bristled, but Calder put a hand on his arm and shook his head. Up on the dais, the headmaster had just finished introducing the six elemental magic instructors, two of whom Bayan had already seen: Wekshi, the