My fear was so crippling I could do nothing but watch, utterly frozen, as Skaris inched farther into the storage room.
“Drop the weapons,” she repeated.
“Move, now! I mean it!”
Still, Skaris pushed closer, hands held out placatingly. “Drop them. It will be all right, friend. You have my word.”
Melanthius’s gaze shifted to mine, and I saw the guilt pressing behind his eyes as he let the sack of weapons fall to the floor in a heavy, defeated clatter.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “Forgive me.”
It happened so fast. One moment, he was standing before us; the next, his blade was slashing open Skaris’s thigh. A furious howl of pain ripped from her throat as she fell to the ground. I dropped to my knees beside her, placing my hands over the wound as hot blood throbbed between my fingers.
“What did you do?” I screamed at Melanthius.
He blinked, the sword quivering in his hands.
“This isyourfault,” he cried. “I didn’t want this. I tried to make you understand. I didn’t—”
“You need to help me stop the bleeding.”
Melanthius shook his head, the strained whites of his eyes glinting in the light, shot through with veins of red.
“Melanthius!” I shouted, but he was already shoving past us, the weapons sack slung over his shoulder as he sprinted toward the banquet hall.
I called his name again, a ravaged, desperate cry, but it was no use. He was already gone.
Skaris gripped my arm. “You must stop him.”
“I can’t leave you like this.”
“This? This is nothing. A scratch.” Her laugh was frayed, sweat dripping down her temples. “You must go.”
“Skaris—”
“You cannot let him arm them.”
“But your leg—”
She grabbed my face. “Telemachus will die, Melantho.”
A sickening clarity shot through me.
“I’ll come back,” I promised as I rose. “Just stay hidden, all right?”
“You waste time! Go,now!”
Turning away from my bleeding friend, I willed my guilt to fuel me as I broke into a sprint. I darted across the courtyard, careening down the passageway where my brother had just disappeared. My sandals clattered frantically against stone as I pushed myselffaster,faster, my muscles screaming in protest, each breath a blade in my lungs.
Then I heard them. The screams.
The bloodshed had begun.
***
I glimpsed Melanthius just ahead.
He was faster than me, but the sack of weapons had slowed his pace considerably. More cries lifted, the echo of violence ringing through the passageway, ricocheting off the walls in a hideous cacophony of screams. Somewhere, distantly in my mind, I heard Penelope’svoice—Do not step asingle footinside that hall.
