“Do you know how arrogant all this sounds?”I shoot back.
He gives me a sardonic smile.“That's what I do isn't it?Arrogance.A refusal to see the world as anything but a cruel joke.There was a time when you liked that about me.”
“What I liked was that underneath it all, there was someone who cared about the people around him.”
“About you,” Alaric says.He waves a hand in the direction of the village.“Not about all this.”
He turns and heads for the door.
“Where are you going?”I ask him.
“If I stay here, we're just going to keep fighting,” he says.That hurts more because it's true.We've fallen into the habit of fighting with one another, and it's always about the same few things.Alaric feels trapped here in the village, doesn't want to settle down the way I do.And I feel guilty for holding him here.
It means I don't stop him when he walks out of the door.I know where he's going, anyway.He’ll head out into the fields to practice with a sword for a while, then make his way over to the local tavern to sit in a corner and brood.
I sit at the kitchen table trying to hold my emotions in check, but I can't.They roll over me like the tide, making tears come to my eyes.It hurts so much when we fight like this, and it's happening more and more.I can feel myself and Alaric drifting apart from one another, when I thought I was so deeply in love with him that nothing could drive a wedge between us.
Nothing but the simple realities of being with him.Alaric is… he's astonishing in so many ways.He's handsome and clever, kind and vulnerable under a hard outer shell that doesn't let the world in.I’ve seen him crouched in front of a crowd of children, conjuring images in the air to entertain them.He's also dangerous and sharp edged.He's someone it was easy to fall in love with when we were both trapped in an impossible situation.Now that we’re just trying to live our lives, he feels like a caged beast, pacing and trying to find a way beyond the bars.
I watch him through the eyes of my shadow cat, which slinks through the growing darkness with ease.It feels almost the way I imagine Alaric does: it's there because it's loyal to me, but it's still a deadly predator, held back by its connection to me, wanting to be so much more.
I watch Alaric training for a while, but he doesn't go out to the tavern the way I expect him to.Instead, he goes out to sit not far from our home, on the beach, staring up into the stars as if wondering how he might get to them.I know that's what he wants: to be free to wander, to go where he wishes.Am I the thing stopping him now, rather than the Colosseum?
I head out to join him, determined to make this up to him, hoping that we can make things better even as a knot of fear sits in my stomach.I'm worried that we can't make this better because we want very different things.I approach him in the darkness.He's sitting there with a sword across his knees and I take several deep breaths.
I know there's a danger in the conversation we're about to have, because it might be the one that finally drives us apart for good.Or it might patch things together again, hold us to one another until the next time we have this argument.I'm not sure which would be worse.
I'm almost grateful when we are interrupted by someone running up to us: a young man wearing a white tunic and golden sandals, a messenger’s bag across his shoulder.He has a glowing stone at his belt to light the way, and he's moving a little quicker than most people would be able to, suggesting a magical gift put to use to speed his way.
He runs up to us, looking us over as if trying to decide if we're who he's looking for.He frowns and then nods to himself.I'm surprised that recognition takes him so long.There was a time when everyone in Aetheria knew my face and Alaric’s, when our fame in the colosseum meant we couldn’t go anywhere without being recognized, on the rare occasions we were permitted to leave the fortress prison of Ironhold.As gladiators, we were meant to stay in there between the games, unless called from the fortress by our patrons.
“You’re Lyra and Alaric?”the messenger said.“I had to ask in the tavern to find out where you live.”
“That's us,” I say, stepping forward.“Do you have a message for us?”
The young man nods, taking a scroll from his bag.There was a time when a scroll like this would have been sealed with the symbol of the empire: a sword plunging through a burst of magic.Now it's sealed with the symbol of concentric magical bursts that has become the symbol of the Aetherian Republic.
“I have a message for you from First Senator Rowan.Your presence is required in the capital at once.”
,
CHAPTER THREE: LYRA
My heart beats faster at the news as I take the scroll from the messenger.Alaric moves next to me, looking concerned.
“What is it?”he asks.“What's so important that Rowan would send a messenger all this way?”
I'm wondering the same thing, because we're not exactly close to the capital.When I was first captured and taken to Aetheria, we travelled for days before we reached it.
“Let me read,” I say.
Alaric uses his control over illusions to conjure a small, ghostly light that means I can see the words written on the parchment as I unroll it.He's reading over my shoulder, his features drawn into a frown.
Lyra, Alaric,
I'm sending this to you because I have no choice.I had thought I could respect your desire to retire into the world, but Aetheria needs you.Things have been hard in the capital for the past couple of years.We've been fighting back elements who want to restore the empire, while trying to ensure that there's enough food and work for everyone.The different factions of the city fight all the time, and the situation is complicated by people with magic using it against us.Not just within the city; now that they aren't brought here, magic users cause trouble on our borders.Our forces hold in the face of unrest, but we don’t have the power the empire once had, physical or magical.
There are those who are suggesting that we reopen the games, both to feed the magic of the city and because of the effect it will have on Aetheria’s economy.There are plots everywhere.I've survived three assassination attempts in the past year.I find myself pulled in every direction.I no longer know who I can trust, or who my friends are.
