My heart heavy, I turn to find Kato and Selena asleep in their chairs. They don’t need me, so I stay next to Griffin, side by side.
He loops his free arm over my shoulders, and I lean in to him, my aches and pains announcing themselves again with exhausting insistence. Fatigue rolls over me like a heavy fog, gradually obliterating my surroundings until I finally close my eyes.
I breathe in. Slowly. Cautiously. We did it. We won the Agon Games. We’ll be invited to Castle Tarva. I didn’t let Jocasta get hurt, not seriously at least. Carver and Kato are definitely the worse for wear, but we all lived.
Something lurches in my chest as I remember Cassandra and her eagerness to help, her belief in Griffin and me. She’s gone, buried along with the other casualties of these bloody and brutal Games.
I open my eyes and don’t try to find sleep again. I made choices. Now I have to live with them.
CHAPTER 34
WE’RE“INVITED”TOCASTLETARVA NOT A HANDFUL OFhours later by a contingent of armed guards.
Tradition obliges the Tarvan royals to see us. Tradition also usually leaves the combatants nearly a week to recover before arriving at the castle in full battle regalia amid glory and fanfare. Being herded on foot and weaponless through the silent, predawn streets of Kitros and Tarva City and then being left to bake in the autumn sun without food or water in a secured courtyard wasn’t part of the plan.
My head throbs behind my eyes. There isn’t a pocket of shade now that the sun is high overhead and beating straight down. Not permitted to come, Selena is waiting for us back at the arena. Both she and Kato slept during the hours before the royal guards pounded on our door, which means Kato’s arm is only partially healed. Carver can barely keep himself upright, and my injuries never got tended at all.
This isn’t how we expected to face the Tarvan royals. They aren’t stupid—unfortunately. Galen Tarva might not be known as the brightest bolt in the lightning storm, but he got this right. Galen and his sneaky sister Acantha watched us fight. So did Galen’s two sons and his other sisters, Appoline, Bellanca, and Lystra. Now the whole family has “danger!” flashing through their brains on repeat.
I’m almost surprised they’re going through with this meeting at all, if they think they have to do it not even a day after our hard-won victory and after leaving us to starve and wilt in the sun. Not only that, but the royal guards led us straight through the blackened neighborhood in northern Kitros that Galen destroyed after becoming Alpha. No one’s touched the rubble or vermin-picked bones since the day of the massacre, and I felt the sight of so much senseless death and destruction like the hard kick in the gut it was meant to be.
Galen’s nearly inexplicable, vicious attack on his own people was either a one-time phenomenon he hasn’t been able to repeat, or he keeps his magic on a very tight leash. Most people agree it’s the former. That day, though, he didn’t stop shaking the earth until every man, woman, and child he could see or hear was dead and silenced. All in return for a few shouted protests. Maybe a raised fist.
He murdered his father only to rule just like him—with a greedy heart and iron fists. People like Galen don’t deserve to live, let alone rule. Griffin is right. Griffin is always right.
I’ll have to tell him one of these days.
A scrape of keys and the tumble of a heavy lock drive home that we’re being treated like prisoners instead of celebrated guests. The gate swings open, and I lick my parched lips.
Softly, and only to me, Griffin says, “Trust in the Gods, Cat. This is it, the beginning of the end.”
Nodding, I try to swallow, but there’s only dust in my mouth as the guards surround us.
They lead us through a series of gardens before we enter the castle itself and then make our way to a lavish throne room. I should focus on Alpha and Delta Tarva, but Ianthe is all I can see. She’s seated on a small, cushioned chair on the far side of Lystra, Galen’s youngest sister. Ianthe’s eyes are wide, her anxious gaze glued to my heavily painted face. Her fingers curl around the arms of her chair, making her look ready to spring up at any moment and fly off the dais.
What is she thinking? Why is she here? Has she betrayed me?
Everyone already knows to spare Ianthe unless she attacks. We’ll spare anyone who doesn’t attack.
My fingers itch for knives I don’t have. Despite the change in circumstance, not one of us suggested aborting our plan. We worked too hard to get here. But without weapons, we don’t really even have a plan, and as my eyes finally land on Galen Tarva, I have to wonder what in the name of Olympus we think we’re doing here. The idea of strolling into Castle Tarva and taking over the realm was dangerous to begin with. Now, it seems positively fatal—something no sane person should even consider.
There must be a sane person around here somewhere.
I glance at my teammates. No furtive looks. No subtly shaking heads. Nothing. Not a sane person among us, I guess.
I return my focus to Alpha Tarva. He’s tall and thick, but not with muscle. His lips appear to be shaped in a permanent sneer. Cold, hard eyes betray nothing of his thoughts, but he must be on edge. Why else would we be here so soon? And why else would he have ordered his guards to march us straight through his deadly work from a decade and a half ago and then to cage us in that courtyard for hours?
“Congratulations,Elpis.” Galen’s obvious scorn turns the name into an insult. “Your unexpected victory will no doubt inspire verse and song.”
Well, I certainly hope so.
Instinct takes over—the instinct to antagonize and defy anyone on a throne. “That’s preferable to laments and dirges, which is the usual result of flattening a peaceful neighborhood. How many killed? Over four thousand? I’m sure those kids didn’t want to grow up anyway.”
Galen gapes blankly at me for a moment before his stunned expression ices back over, freezing into cold condescension. “You dare much.”
I shrug. “You’d be surprised at what I dare.” Which includes blatant bluffing because, right now, I have very little to back up my bravado.
Alpha Tarva’s eyes narrow into slits. “Bow before me, or I’ll have all your heads on spikes.”
