Rook paused, hands on his knees, face to the ground, wheezing. They hadn’t been fighting that long. He couldn’t be tired yet.
Had he been poisoned, like Char?
“Rook,” Ash whispered, her lungs hollow. “What happened to you?”
At their pause, the crowd’s cheering became one collectiveBOO.
Rook swiped his hand across his nose. “Four days. He let me carry on for four days.”
“What are you talking about? What’s wrong?”
He sobbed once, still bent double. “I wasn’t there. Because I washere. With him. Great Ignitus, we have to call him. GreatfuckingIgnitus!”
He bolted upright to shout the last words at Ignitus.
The noise of the crowd silenced.
No one—no one—spoke badly of the gods, least of all directly to them.
“You need to stop,” Ash tried, panic welling. “Please—attack me, and I’ll fall. You’ll win. Ignitus will be pleased with you—”
Rook whirled toward Ignitus’s viewing box. Ash chased after him, coming around the firepit—and there, hands on the railing, Ignitus fumed down at Rook.
Ash grabbed Rook’s shoulder. “What are you doing? Remember Wolfsbane—”
He spun on her, slapping her hand away, and pointed his other fist at her, the one holding the scroll. The crowd whooped, urging them to bloodshed.
Blue fire flickered on Ignitus’s arms, the tips of his hair.
Rook’s lower lip trembled. Ash went motionless, her hands splayed between them.
“Lynx is dead,” Rook whispered. “He died the morning after we left Igna.”
Ash sucked in a breath.
“My son has been dead for four days, and Ignitus claims he just got the news.” Rook opened his fist and let the scroll drop to the sand.“But he waited to give me the letter until this morning because all he cares about, all he’severcared about, is war.”
A howl bubbled in Ash’s throat. She fought it down,willedit down, because Ignitus watched and already Rook had gone too far and she needed to be the one to save them both.
“Rook,” she begged, “I’m so sorry. I loved Lynx too. I’m so—” She swallowed. “Fight me. One more round, we’ll fake a win, and we can walk out of here.” She lowered her voice. “You’ll get your revenge. I swear, Rook. Please.”
Sweat, tears, and dust from the arena made a paste on Rook’s face, thick streaks of brown across his dark skin. He didn’t look angry. He looked... tired.
“I should’ve gotten Lynx out years ago,” Rook said. “Char should’ve taken you too. We all should have run instead of playing his sick games. You deserve better than this life. Lynx deserved better. And I can’t—” He coughed, sniffing back tears. “I’m sorry, Ash.”
He took off—sprinting away from her, toward Ignitus.
Agony seared hotter than any flame, gouged deeper than any wound. Ash flung herself after him. “No! Stop, please—”
Momentum carried Rook as he leaped into the air and grabbed the wall of the viewing box, kicking the rough edge of the stone to propel himself onto the railing.
The crowd had gone silent again. Shocked, awed, intrigued.
In the viewing box, Ignitus watched Rook come at him, his anger dimmed to disgust. His attendants cowered behind him; his guards held flames in their hands but didn’t attack, held in place by Ignitus’s two lifted fingers.
Rook balanced on the railing, readied his knife, and hurled himself at Ignitus.
The blade sank into the god’s neck.
