Vaelor nodded once, grimly.
“How do you know about the toxin?” she demanded.
“I spoke with Dugan,” he said. “I left a sample from the cloth I used when you got sick. He analyzed it.”
She stared at him, stunned. “Why would he betray his own partner?”
“He’s an honorable male,” Vaelor said quietly. “If he didn’t need to win for his people, he would have turned Blaine in—or let me destroy him.”
Mara ripped her pack off her shoulders and threw it onto the ground. The sound echoed across the ice. “I can’t believe how stupid I was. I thought he was my friend. But of course, it makes sense—he shoved me into the herd of ice beasts. He’s been trying to kill me from the beginning. But why? I’m not a threat to him!”
Vaelor stepped closer, reaching for her, but she pulled away, anger and betrayal burning too hot.
“I don’t think he intended to kill you,” Vaelor said, voice low. “The tent and your biosuit… those were attempts to force you to withdraw. They weren’t meant to be fatal.”
“But the toxins could have killed me,” she shot back. “And then he pushed me into the herd!”
“He grew desperate,” Vaelor said. “He escalated. I’m not making excuses for him. When I found out about the toxins, I wanted to kill him.”
She looked up sharply. His expression was deadly serious.
“You would have killed him because of me?”
“Yes.”
A simple word. A devastating truth.
She believed him.
“Not that I want you to,” she said softly, “but why didn’t you confront him?”
“I wouldn’t have been able to just confront him,” Vaelor said. “I would have attacked him. It would have ended with his death. And if I did that, I would have been disqualified. No player can attack another outside a challenge. If I was disqualified…”
“I would have been as well,” she finished for him.
The realization hit her like a wave. He had held back—for her. He had swallowed his rage, his instinct to protect, because being taken out of the games would mean losing her chance to save her father.
Emotion surged through her, overwhelming and fierce. She closed the distance between them and threw herself into his arms.
“Thank you,” she whispered against his chest. “Thank you for putting me first.”
His arms wrapped around her, strong and sure. “I will always put your needs first.”
Her heart swelled, full and aching. She knew, with absolute certainty, that she would never be the same.
Not after him.
Chapter 36
Vaelor
The wind sharpened as they approached the base of Mt. Volt, carrying with it a metallic tang that made the back of Vaelor’s neck prickle. The sky above them had shifted into a strange, reddish hue—streaks of crimson and violet bleeding across the horizon like warning signs painted by the gods. The air felt charged, heavy, as if the mountain itself were bracing for something violent.
A storm was coming.
He could scent it clearly now—ozone, ice, and the faint, electric bite of approaching lightning. It coiled in the wind like a living thing, whispering danger.
He opened his mouth to warn Mara, but she beat him to it.
