I spot Talyra diving beneath a fallen log as a gloamwyrm passes, its tail whipping just inches from her hiding place. Lira and Nyx have backed against a luminescent tree, wielding broken branches as makeshift weapons.
“These prelims aren’t a competition,” I whisper. They don’t even try to be. They’re a simple execution.
Zeriel's face is carved from marble, but I see a muscle jump in his jaw. “At least they cut the fanfare.”
A change in strategy, perhaps due to the severity of the green-clad fae’s perceived crimes. And the crowd is lapping up every second of it.
What did they do? Did they broadcast their magic louder than any other?
The wyrms don't charge—they don't need to. They stalk with patience, each step calculated. When they strike, it's with devastating speed: a snap of jaws, a lash of tail. A green-clad man screams as claws tear through his chest, the sound cutting off abruptly as his body crumples.
I can't look away, even as bile rises in my throat. My eyes frantically search for my friends, relief flooding through me when I spot Vex sliding between two trees, narrowly avoiding a burst of flame.
Then it finally happens.
A woman in green, cornered between a wyrm and a roaring vent, throws up her hands in desperation. The air around her shimmers, then solidifies into a shield of translucent blue. Magic, raw and instinctive, surging past the iron's suppression in one desperate burst.
The crowd inhales as one, leaning forward.
I barely see the movement—just a flash from a hidden alcove in the wall. The woman's body jerks, an iron-tipped bolt protruding suddenly from her throat. Her shield shatters like glass as she falls.
The nearest wyrm descends on the body, jaws clamping down with a sickening crunch.
“No,” I breathe, but my voice is drowned out by the vents’ roar.
Flames drive the survivors into new configurations. Panic breeds panic. Another prisoner breaks, his hands thrust toward the sky as wind whips around him, a cyclone of desperate power.
Another bolt. Another body collapses into the mud. Another gift—rare, fragile, beautiful—snuffed out like it was nothing.
The crowd roars, louder with every death, bloodlust feeding on itself. They aren’t just spectators, they’re part of it, their hunger pushing the slaughter onward.Magic leads to destruction.That’s the lesson carved into us, drilled for generations. And here it is, performed as truth.
I force my eyes back to the chaos below, searching frantically. A flash of gray—Dren. The scar over his ruined eye makes him unmistakable. He’s limping badly, dragging one leg as he staggers toward the trunk of a tree, desperate for cover. My chest clenches.
Then another movement. Nyx, darting behind a boulder, Vex clutched at her side. Both alive, barely. Talyra and four others have somehow clawed their way into the branches above, higher ground giving them a moment’s reprieve.
But—Lira.
My pulse spikes. I scan again, frantic, the crowd’s roar in my ears. Where is she?
My heart hammers against my ribs. I lean further over the railing, eyes straining.
Finally, I spot her, separated from the others, backing slowly away from a wyrm that's fixed those terrible mirror-eyes on her. She holds a jagged branch like a spear, but her arms tremble with the effort of just staying upright.
She won't make it. I already know. Not unless I do something.
The wyrm lunges at her, jaws snapping. She dodges, barely,but the motion sends her sprawling. I rally all the concentration I possess to attempt to access the drake’s mind, when the creature rears back for another strike?—
And then something unexpected happens. The earth beneath Lira's hands ripples, then splits. A tangle of roots erupts from the soil, wrapping around the wyrm's foreleg. Her gift, surging past the iron's suppression in one desperate burst.
My breath catches. “No, Lira, don’t?—”
Too late. She’s revealed her true nature. And there’s nothing even Selen can do—or is willing to do—to help her now.
The hidden bowman’s bolt flies true, punching through her shoulder with enough force to spin her around. She falls, blood blooming across her gray uniform.
I'm on my feet before I realize it, a scream building in my chest. Zeriel rises with me, his arm like a band of steel across my waist, holding me back.
“Let me go,” I snarl, struggling against his grip. “I can help her?—”
