A fevered hush rippled through the arena. Hundreds of red eyes bore down from the tiered levels, anticipating the spectacle of suffering.
Breath rasping in her ears, Serenna clenched her teeth, resisting the urge to cower. The weight of those stares pressed against her, suffocating as the heat itself. Sweat slicked every bare inch of her, the stone at her back radiating the sun’s accumulated wrath.
Shame soured her gut, but nakedness was the least of her concerns. The flayers would slaughter them, clothed or not.
The female druid lifted her palm slowly, a glint of light lancing through the infernal brightness. She aimed theStarshard directly at the prince. The gem hummed, the noise barely audible at first—a whisper, a breath drawn before a scream.
Serenna’s heart bolted as the sound swelled to a screech, each beat a hammerblow counting down to the inevitable strike. The keening whine grew sharper, vibrating in her skull.
She flinched as it discharged, a thunderouscrackcleaving the air and rattling through the pit.
Time fractured as darkness erupted from the crystal, shadows streaking toward Vesryn faster than an arrow.
The impact was immediate. Brutal.
Serenna gasped as the rending struck Vesryn’s thigh with the force of a cleaver, butchering muscle and biting bone. His body convulsed, head snapping back against the pillar with a sickening thud.
Swaying in his chains, the prince grimaced as awareness burned through his agony. His breath hitched, a broken sound escaping.
“Vesryn…” His name slipped from her lips. Heart sinking, Serenna swallowed the rest. Waking him would just be another cruelty—dragging him from the mercy of oblivion only to suffer again.
Dark blood poured from the gash, a crimson torrent spilling down his leg and soaking into the sand. The metallic tang became an unholy incense that stirred the flayers into a frenzy. Teeth chittering, their snub noses twitched with a sickening eagerness, legs scurrying faster toward the detected feast.
The creatures advanced in chilling unison, jagged limbs skittering across the sand in eerie synchronicity. Like a swarm of living blades pressing in for the kill, the deadly formation converged on the prince.
Serenna trembled as she counted them. Ten. Ten shelled beasts closing the distance with terrifying inevitability, theirpath unwavering. A dark thought slithered into her mind. How long would it take for the flayers to strip his legs to the bones?
Terror burst through her as the horde reached him. She couldn’t look away. A nauseating rip followed—the first strip of skin peeled from his foot.
Vesryn jerked, emitting a grunt as his eyes fluttered open. Disoriented, he blinked, weakly tugging against the chains.
Serenna choked on a sob, bile rising in her throat. Tears burned behind her eyes, but there was nothing left to cry. Her body was as parched as the sands beneath her, yet her heart ached enough to weep a flood.
The prince’s face contorted, teeth gritted as the flayers butchered the lower half of his legs, blood splattering across the sand in spurting arcs. They scrambled over each other, struggling to reach up to his knees.
There was nothing to shield him, no armor to deflect the scores of teeth raking trenches into his flesh, tearing him open piece by piece. His body bucked, a feeble attempt at kicking them away.
Dread pooled in Serenna’s gut, heavy as molten lead. Agony would spool out endlessly, death an excruciating unraveling rather than a swift mercy.
And then the flayers would come for her, slowly bleed her out. She’d drown in her screams, their needling teeth an agonizing end.
She barely registered the stomping and howling cheers that rose in the arena—only Vesryn’s gasps and curses, the clatter of his chains as he strained against this inescapable slaughter.
The prince’s eyes locked onto hers—wild with despair, brimming with the merciless certainty of what was to come.
Serenna’s breath caught as she met his gaze—his hopelessness a mirror of her own.
Lykor’s snarl lashed through the air beside her. He threw his weight against his chains. The links rattled as the shackles tore deeper gashes in his wrists, fresh blood spilling.
“We came for aid!” he bellowed at the druid leader. “To find the dragons—tofightthe elves! But you…” His eyes burned into the female, unspent wrath simmering as if sheer fury could incinerate her where she stood. “You’re no better than the Aelfyn!”
But Serenna saw it—the fracture in Lykor’s expression, splintering through his rage. Something broke as his eyes flicked to Jassyn, who was beginning to stir awake beside him. Lykor’s fury faltered, face darkening as the truth settled in. He couldn’t stop this, couldn’t deny that they would be devoured alive.
Like he’d said—they were already dead.
The female druid remained unmoved, wreathed in an air of detached finality. The outcome had already been decided, their torment nothing more than a necessary formality.
Her smooth voice rang out over the pit. “We are the remnant, awaiting the New Dawn. And we guard these realms against those who stand with the Aelfyn’s descendants.” Wings shuddering behind her, she lifted a claw, an accusing talon cutting across at the prince. “Like him.” She spat the words with loathing, yet pride curled through them too, a fanatical self-righteousness.
