The room fell silent.
“Yes, he was worried,” Tor confirmed. Ash beamed up at him. Hedidn’t return her exuberance. “But you were reckless. You can’t only focus on this vague lead.”
“Let’s make it less vague, then. We can push Stavos. Maybe Geoxus has something planned against Ignitus, like Hydra said in her message, some squabble between them. Maybe it could actuallyhurtIgnitus, whatever it is, and Stavos is part of it—he did take out Ignitus’s best gladiator illegally. He said—” She swallowed. “He saidmy god told me your mother would be an easy kill.Did Geoxus put him up to poisoning Char? Maybe—”
Someone knocked. “Ignitus’s guards,” soldiers said from the hall, “here to escort the champions back to the palace.”
Tor flinched, giving Ash a pained look. “Stop, Ash. You’re fighting Rook tomorrow. You’re so focused on bringing Ignitus down that you’re losing sight of the immediate consequences of your actions.”
Ash wilted. “I’m not losing sight of anything. What more do we have to lose?”
The guards knocked again. “Champions?”
Tor’s face flared red. Before he could respond, Rook pressed close to them.
“Ignitus seemed genuinely concerned, which means it’s possible that whoever or whatever he fears is in Deimos. We owe it to ourselves to pursue his weakness, Tor. We owe it to everyone we’re fighting for back home.” He swallowed, noticeably not saying his son’s name. “We owe it to Char too. You know we do.”
“We’ll talk to Stavos, then?” Ash’s stomach suddenly shriveled into a knot. “We’ll find out if Geoxus told him to kill my mother?”
She didn’t want to talk to Stavos.
She wanted to slice his throat.
“Geoxus is likely to have some kind of festivities after the first round fights,” Tor said to Rook. He was ignoring her. “Those events are always saturated with wine. We can wait until Ignitus is drunk and press him for information, a more solid lead.”
“We have a lead,” Ash tried again. “If Geoxus used Stavos to kill Char, he could be—”
“Stavos is a brute,” Tor snapped. “A fumbling idiot of a man. He isnothing, Ash. Do you hear me? I won’t waste any more energy talking about Char’s murderer. Stop. We’ll question Ignitus. That’s it.”
Ash agreed with him; Stavos was all the things Tor said. But he could also be the key to figuring out Ignitus’s weakness if he was involved in a larger plot.
“Champions,” one of the guards called, impatient. “To the palace.”
Spark gave an apologetic shrug and answered the door. She and Taro walked out into the group of waiting soldiers.
Ash wilted under the sorrow in Tor’s eyes, the fury that was blinding him to a potential weakness of Ignitus’s. Or was Ash’s own fury blinding her?
The only way to find out was to take the next step at whatever celebration Geoxus held after the first fights. Talk to Ignatus, yes—but they needed to talk to Stavos, too. Even if Ash had to do it herself.
“All right,” she told Tor, her head dropping.
Tor spun on his heels.
Rook steered Ash for the door.
“Thank you,” she whispered to Rook. “For defending me.”
“Don’t thank me. You’re right about pursuing a lead, but you’rewrong too. I know you feel like you lost everything with your mother. But there’s always more Ignitus can take from you.” He looked at her somberly. “Always.”
Ignitus and the Kulans had their usual wing on the twelfth floor of Geoxus’s palace. For the first time, Ash had her own room with a canopied bed, chairs and a table with a washbasin, and a balcony ringed by elegant marble statues. Tor and Rook had their own chambers farther down, on either side of Ignitus’s room, while Spark and Taro had a room in the hall just below.
Ash lay in the same bed she’d shared with Char a handful of times. With everything that had happened, she’d thought that sleep would instantly seize her. But moonlight made the air a hazy, dreamlike blue, and Ash had to shut her eyes to hold on to her composure.
Having Char had always let Ash ignore her loneliness. When her lack of friends threatened to swallow her whole, Ash had just looped her arm through her mother’s and listened to the lull of her voice until she stopped wanting so much.
There was nothing now. No one in this room with her. No one to hold on to.
Ash scrambled for memories, wet eyes squished shut.
