Celes's breath left her in a rush of air. It... Celes had heard what the price of the Head Doctor's game was, she wasn't stupid. Men in wars died everyday, sometimes at her behest. But this wasn't a war, not like she was used to. And single combat...

"Can he be any more barbaric..." she murmured. Stupid. Dias was stupid for that half-second pause that she knew he should have seen coming. He wasn't some greenhorn with a blade. The Lady General did not weep, or cry out in alarm.

Men died. It was the way of the world.

But this. Yet another man she nearly called friend was gone, and that smarmy, weak bastard in the box was to blame for it. She would kill him. Slowly. Perhaps with a fruit knife, skinning him from the ankles upward. Each wrong, each death, each wound would be paid for in kind, in agonizingly slow detail.

Celes drew in a slow breath to calm her wicked thoughts before answering the girl, "A pity, that. Then there is no point in casting it again."