“I swore to myself I wouldn’t let his evil reach them. If tonight is my last fight. If he wins—I can accept that, I can—but don’t make me a liar, Riven. Please.”
“You beg for them,” he says. “They make you weak.”
I shake my head. “I’ve never felt stronger.” His amber face blurs, but he’s looking at me now. “If I die, I’ll do it protecting the people I love. Let me have that.”
My eyes burn with unshed tears, but I refuse to look away.He’s welcome to my truth. I’ve survived this long wearing my feelings on my back, and if I go out tonight, I won’t waste a second regretting the emotions my father hated me for.
I’m S’lach’s daughter, but we aren’t the same.
Riven’s face glitches wildly. “He thinks you’re disloyal,” he scoffs. “Of all his wrongs, that’s the worst. Your loyalty?—”
“—is hard earned,” I say. “By each of them.”
“I’ll free them,” he says. “Although knowing what you’ll face in the arena, I can’t fathom why it matters to you.”
“You don’t understand love,” I say gently. “Even if my heart stops beating tonight, it will always belong to them. As long as they live, part of me will too.”After all, it’s breaking as we speak.The sharp pain in my chest is as unmistakable as it is relentless.
My head drops, and I wrap my arms around myself.
Luca once told me some burdens were too heavy to carry alone. He was right. But there’s no one here to help me shoulder this one. I have no choice but to hoist it onto my back—like I did as a girl—and keep moving forward. One step after another, I’ll walk this godsdamn road right off a cliff if I have to. No regrets.
Riven grips my chin. I blink.When did he get so close?His touch is warm, warmer than it has any right to be. My breath catches as he stares at me. “Keep your head high, darling. Give no one the power to erase you, and they never can.”
“Will he be here tonight?” I ask. I’m not sure if it’s morbid curiosity, or a pathetic attempt to postpone the inevitable.
Riven shakes his head. “Not to my knowledge.”
I sigh. “Good. I don’t want his face to be the last one I see.”
“Whose would you like?” Riven asks. His voice is more urgent than I’ve ever heard it. “I’ll show you any face you want, just say the word.”
Blinking, I study the waxy living mask that coats his features and force a smile. “Yours isn’t so bad, Riven.”
He drops my chin as if I burned him and retreats.
The door slams, and then I’m alone.
The crack in my heart grows, and I do my best to wall off the pain. Undefeated in the cage and the arena. Maybe I have one more win left in me, but if I don’t, at least the others will get to go home.
The arena ground is the same odd mix of spongy sand, dirt, and cracking ice.
Sunlight shines on the arena and the stands, but it’s fading. I shiver, and it has nothing to do with the current temperature. The time of day is another opponent. If I don’t win fast, the cold will decide the winner of the fight.
Is that why Riven decided to do this now? So I would freeze to death and there would be no way for me to win?
The crowd is thinner than usual, but they’re hungry. For spilled blood, for my death—I don’t care what they want. This is my life at stake. If I got my way, the situation would be reversed, and they would find themselves down in the sand.
I take my place in the center of the arena, roll my shoulders back, and plant my feet wide.
I’m not supposed to win this fight, but I’ve never been good at meeting expectations. I’ll fight until my last breath, and there’s nothing my father or Riven can do about that.
Riven makes the announcements.
I barely listen.
He waves his arms toward the weapons.
I trudge to the rock arsenal and select the longsword. I wrap my fingers around the hilt, the grip familiar against my palm.
