“Then don’t believe me,” he whispers in my ear. “But hear my warning. You are the only genuine threat to anyone in this castle other than the champions. They just don’t know it yet. Hide your lineage, Daughter of Rhaskar. Hide your powers and your potions. Hide everything about yourself from anyone save Nyxthos. Your right to be here is undeniable, and he cannot kill you or influence your chance to win without breaking an oath. Your trials will be more difficult. Your position will benearlyunwinnable in every trial, but itmustbe winnable for him to keep his oath. Just remember that Nyxthos cannot reveal you or kill you, but anyone else can. And they will. Stay secret and safe, little Priestess, anddon’t leave the road laid out before you in the dark of night.”
My body’s shaking with uncontrollable need, but I hear every word he says. They echo in my mind. Then he’s gone. I still don’t move as the last bit of shadow leaves my body desperate for his touch.
The silence is as thick as porridge until a scream erupts in the hall. I whirl around to see that a stone wall has grown to cover the door to my room, a parting gift from Azric.
I hear my door shatter and the snarl of a demon before a muttered curse. There’s more fighting, more chaos in the rooms on either side. Screams and battle cries ring out, and I hold my daggers tightly.
He saved me.I hadn’t thought anyone would be brazen enough to knock down my door or to send demons after me. I’d thought it’d be a knife in the ribs in a corridor, not all out war in the rooms. Tonight, I underestimated my competitors. Now I know they’ll do whatever it takes to win these trials.
But I’m relatively safe because Azric didn’t underestimate them at all.What about Darian?Is he safe? I know he has eighty years of dealing with these people, but if they worked together? He’s never really seemed to be the warrior that King Rhion is. He’s not a champion like Ainslee. He’s just a High Fae, so how could he fight demons or Abominations that Mages and Corpsebinders summon? How could he fight off the Chained or Burning Ones?
There’s nothing to be done about it now. Even if I wanted to, unless I were to use my Mark of Chains, I couldn’t leave this room. If Azric were telling the truth, the last thing I want is for someone to realize I used any powers.
I do the only thing I can do. I gather up my equipment, including my short bow and quiver, and sit down to wait for the first trial to begin.
Interlude 3
Alittlegirl,wholooked not much older than seven, walked up the stairs of the Crimson Tower. The iron and oak door swung open as she hummed a bawdy little ballad she’d heard in the Kingdom of Cindralith last week, and she skipped to the rhythm. Through the Great Hall and up the stairs, she moved unbothered and unseen by the Undying she passed. A little bluebird settled on the tattered linen tunic she wore and chirped in her ear.
“Who cares if the hag decides we’re interfering? Taldor gets away with it all the time.” She huffed, and a few of the Undying turned in her direction, confused where the sound came from.
The girl could have moved like the wind if she’d wished, but there’s something about walking through the front door of a place that matters. It’s rude to sneak into someone’s room unrequested. Sure, she was going to walk into a room without asking, but it was more polite to use the door like everybody else.
She skipped up the stairs without a care in the world, even though everyone knew that the world was changing. Nyxthos’s champion was dead. What a sweet girl she had been. Nyxthos, terrible old man that he was, had ruined her, but that was typical of them all.
You couldn’t look anywhere without seeing how they’d all spent the last eighty years. The girl remembered the Pact the adults had made. She’d certainly had no part of that. Not her or Taldor. The grandmammy hadn’t either, but she did little anymore. The girl liked Saelira even if she was old. She reminded the girl of her own grandmammy from so many years ago.
The girl’s golden hair bounced on her shoulders as she made it to the top floor, and the bluebird squeaked in her ear. She turned to face her second closest friend. “Well, you should know better than to sit on my shoulder when I’m skipping. Not my fault you haven’t learned that I have bouncy hair in ten thousand years.”
The bird squeaked again and turned on her shoulder, brushing the girl with its tail feathers. The girl just giggled as she pushed the door open. It led into a nearly bare room, save for the drawings of a dragon that hung on the walls like prized artwork.
“What do you think?” the girl asked as she walked to a bookshelf hiding powerful relics amidst trinkets from a boy’s childhood, one of which she’d given. A leather-bound book, a vial of tears, a golden coin, a mirror, and a white fur pouch that holds three glass beads.
The bird flew to the coin first, a question on its face, and the girl shook her head. “No way am I letting Taldor ruin anything forher. She’s nice. Did you see the way she fed those pigeons? It wasn’t just crumbs. She tore off a piece of her own bread.”
The bluebird nodded its head and chirped before flitting over to the mirror. The girl shook her head again. “No, she won’t need to know if someone lies.” She plopped onto the ground, sitting cross-legged. Her fingers twirled a golden strand of hair as she bit her lip. “No, we need something that will help her when she needs it most, but we don’t know what or when that will be. All we know is what the old lady told us.”
The bird mimicked the girl, settling down on the mirror, though it didn’t cross its legs because bird legs don’t work like that. “What about the quiet one’s gift?”
The bluebird hopped to its feet and moved to stand on the ermine pouch. As birds are wont to do at the most inopportune times, it relieved itself on the fur.
Immediately, the girl laughs with the freedom only a child can muster. “Well, that’ll do,” she said between gasping laughter. There’s very little that can compare to the joy a child can find in such a small and disgusting event. The bird bobbed its head in time with the laughter, and while there was no one to see it, no one could deny that the little bird smiled.
Then the girl stopped suddenly and stood up.
A woman with long black hair stood in the middle of the room, a look of fury on her face. “What are you doing here?” she hissed. She left bloody footprints in her wake as she approached the girl.
“Whatever I want, you old hag. Not everyone agreed to play your silly game.” She crossed her arms and smiled as she staredup at a woman even kings would tremble before. The bluebird flew toward the woman, but right before it hit her in the face, the woman raised her hand, and the bird—minus a single bright blue feather—disappeared, the feather slowly falling to the ground.
The girl moved faster than a human could imagine, and she shoved the woman’s thigh. The woman fell over, and the girl said, with pure venom in her voice, “Nobody messes with Miri. She’s mine.”
“And Azric Cyrus is mine,” the woman said as she stood up and smoothed out her twinkling black dress. “You aren’t supposed to interfere in his life. Seems only fair that if you touch mine, I get to touch yours.”
“I didn’t touch nobody. Not all of us are creepy old ladies.”
The girl didn’t back down an inch as the woman leaned forward. “Then why are you here, Veris?” The woman’s black dress slowly turned crimson as though she’d bathed in blood.
“I’m here because I’d heard yourchosen oneliked to draw dragons. Hadn’t seen them yet and wanted to make fun of ‘em. Why areyouhere? I thought you were hiding like e’erybody else, too afraid of the big bad Hunters to leave your houses. Me and Miri aren’t afraid. ‘Specially since they aren’t even here yet. My mam always told me you…”
