I scowl at her and her mouth twitches. “Yes, I gave him the same look. You’d have to be an idiot to go after Titus. But Albion said Titus will target us if he can. He likes hurting women. So we have to hope one of the others takes him out.”
Yes, he’d enjoyed killing Leira. My chest wrenches, and I force myself to focus.
“Leon?” Maeva asks, casting a wary look toward the others.
Lowering my voice to a whisper, I fill her in on what he said.
Baldric turns from the other side of the room. He can’t have heard us, but he licks his lips in a lewd gesture. “I can’t wait to watch you choke on your own blood, voidborn,” he calls.
My vision speckles and I get to my feet, attempting to ignore the roar of the crowd above us.
But it’s not just the roar of the crowd. The thundering sound above our heads is …
“Water,” Placus says, his eyes wide and terrified.
It begins trickling through a crack in the stone ceiling, and my palms turn slick. If the ceiling collapses under the weight of that water, we’re all dead.
I’m saved from imagining my watery demise when the enforcer steps into the room. “It’s time,” he says.
The sound is louder in the corridor, and even Hester looks nervous as she elbows her way to the front of the line.
Instead of the usual arena entrance, or one of the elevators, we’re led up a set of stairs, to the first level of the stands. The crowd screams, sigilmarked and vampires and mundanes all roaring, faces tight with excitement.
When Brenin steps aside, I see why.
A galley waits for us at the entrance to the arena, floating in the water. It’s a wooden, flat-bottomed representation of a Sarlithian warship, painted in the emperor’s colors; the railing is gilded, the sails a dark purple.
Three banks of oars. Six of us will need to row while the others steer and fight.
On the other side of the arena, another galley floats, painted in Torvellen colors.
Naval games.
Dread burrows into my gut and stays there. Queen Freya of Torvellen is one of the emperor’s most hated enemies. Even I’ve heard of the battle we’re supposed to replicate. It resulted in the emperor taking a large swath of Torvellen territory, but not before they killed enough of his army to humiliate him.
The world grinds to a halt. We’re not fighting each other. Instead, we’re going to be forced to work together.
“In,” the enforcer orders, his eyes lit with excitement.
There’s no time to process this new information. No time to strategize.
We file into the boat. A pile of crossbows are waiting for us on the deck, and I swipe one, slinging a quiver of bolts over my shoulder.
Most residents of the Thorn can’t swim. Swimming is a privilege for those with time on their hands and access to clean water. And yet, it was the emperor’s own Primus who taught me not to fear water, insisting I learn how to kick and stroke and breathe. He was the one who led me to a swimming hole every day each summer, stoking my competitive instinct with races and games.
The irony isn’t lost on me.
Someone shoves me from behind and I slide onto the nearest bench, storing my crossbow at my feet and wrapping my hands around one of the oars. Maeva slips in behind me, a crossbow in her own hand.
A fine sheen of sweat coats my body as the boat rocks unsteadily. If we overturn the galley before the emperor’s entertainment begins, he’ll probably kill all of us.
The boat sways some more and everyone hastens to their seats. The scent of salt fills my nostrils, the water continuing to rise with our boat, and I peer over the side of the railing.
The arena floor is gone. Where there should be stone beneath sand, there is now nothing but darkness.
The amount of power this must have taken is unimaginable.
Hester stands at the stern, her eyes narrowed as she grasps one of the rudders. I hope she knows how to steer, because it’s not just the other boat we will need to worry about. Numerous platforms dot the once-empty arena, most of them holding weapons for anyone stupid enough to leave the relative safety of the boat.
