With each calm breath and steady beat of my heart, I feel for the flower’s grip on me and purge it, metabolizing the poison as if it were part of me all along. In a way it is, as all living things in the Vale are.
Slowly, the light within me begins to beam again. My heart beats faster, not with fear, but with strength. With a final sweep of my mind’s inner warrior, I neutralize the last remnants of the poison. My magic sparks into light, shining with the radiance of the sun.
I blink open my eyes, gasping. Carefully, I flick a white flame onto my fingers.Back in business.But now that I have my magic, what can I do to help Dayton while I’m trapped?
My gaze flits around the room until it lands on the Orb of Ancestors.
An artefact of the Above. One that holds all the memories of those who fought in the arena.
Summoning a golden briar, I weave it across the ground and wrap it around the orb. Carefully, my briar snakes back to me with the treasure.
Maybe there’s nothing I can do, but there’s somethingtheycan do.
All the warriors of Summer.
CHAPTER 81
Dayton
There’s something sobering about losing half your weight in blood.
Sobering and fucking sticky.
Here lies the fool, coughing on his own blood. Who let his realm fall to a tyrant because his mind was too muddled to save it.
The blurred image of the Bronze Knight swims before me. Damn, I knew I’d lose to this bastard, but I thought at least I’d put on a show.
Have to hand it to the crowd, though. I guess in their own way, they’re rooting for me. There’s none of the applause that would normally arise when a kill is about to be made.
Horror cuts through me at the thought of what my death will mean for Delphia. Of the pain and burden she will feel in only moments—
“Wait!” A clear voice rings out across the arena, and I see the blurry shape of a girl in white running across the sand. “Wait, please!”
Wrenley. I can’t even form words as she throws her slight body over mine.
“He’s mymate!” Tears stream down her face as she looks up at the Bronze Knight. “Let me say goodbye!”
“Be quick,” the Bronze Knight rumbles, “before I end the Summer Prince for good.”
“Dayton.” Wrenley takes my head in her hands.
“H-how did you …”
“I snuck past the guards. I couldn’t watch this.”
“Did …” I cough, blood splattering on my chest.
“Did what, Dayton?”
“Did Rosie come back?”
Wrenley’s face turns to pity.
Just from her expression, I know the answer to my own question. “She didn’t return, then.”
“Dayton—”
We don’t have much time;Idon’t have much time. “Wrenley, you need to get out of here. You need to find my sister and tell her she can’t return to—”
