RONIN

CAPE AGULHAS / THE TIDE SCHOOL

Ronin runs the Tide School at Cape Agulhas, where the two oceans meet and the wind never stops. She teaches the Tide Blade, an ancient art handed down for eight hundred years at the southernmost tip of Africa. Her certificate hangs over the door. Students come from all along the coast.

The certificate is real: The Way of the Blade, by Post, twelve lessons of twenty, the last eight held up at the post office over unpaid fees. The Tide Blade is not. She made it up the week the lessons stopped coming: the scrolls, the eight hundred years, the founder (a swordfish, also called Ronin). The King has the receipts, and her first draft of the scrolls.

She's entered Snoek'em for her page, before her students find out their ancient art is younger than they are. She has started on a ninth century of history, just in case.

THE PRIZE The King Prawn keeps a book on every fish on the coast. Every year he hosts Snoek'em and puts Die Boek up as the prize. He has never lost. Every invitation comes with the fighter's own page enclosed, so they know what's at stake.