BOOM.
He flung the door open. “Hide in here!”
As soon as he set me on my feet and slammed the door closed, darkness fell over me like a blanket. Wait…it was an actual blanket.
I sat up in a bed—mybed. I was tightly tucked into the sheets and my quilt weighed on my legs. Green wallpaper patterned with willow leaves surrounded me. He had shoved me into an exact replica of my bedroom.
With a grunt, I shoved the heavy blankets off my legs and headed for the door. I had to slay the monster.
I wrapped my hand around the iron handle only to find the door was locked. I rolled my eyes and pinched the air to retrieve my magic silver needle. I stuck the tip of the needle into the keyhole and wiggled the lock open.
The door creaked open and I stepped into darkness. My needle had disappeared. The faint sound of cheering echoed behind me.
I turned around, finding an archway lit up with sunlight at the end of a long hallway. Derrick stood in the shadow of the arch, twirling the hilt of a narrow dueling sword in his hand. He looked no older than eighteen and he wore a streamlined version of his black school uniform with a Hyton Blue band around his right arm.
I peered outside the archway—we were in the Hyton arena. A rainbow of colors of the noble Houses lined the upper boxes. Screaming peasants filled the lower rows.
The memory was the Heaston Spring Exhibition.
A loud voice boomed amongst the sand-filled arena floor. “Announcing first in his class, Grigory Orion Thornebow!”
Most jeered and hissed. The cluster of grey-backed nobles cheered and waved the banners of the Thornebow silver fox as Grigory stepped into the sun at the opposite end of the arena. He beamed in the noon light, effortlessly stepping away from the refuse thrown at him, and entered the white inner circle in the center of the sand.
I spotted Anders Hyton wearing the gleaming Lycaster crown. He sat in his throne beneath his Hyton Blue canopy with, not Freya, but my mother at his side.
Anders’s brows were furrowed as he watched Grigory deftly swish his sword.
The Alastar trials might have ended, but the implication of the match went far beyond a schoolboy competition. The grandson of the treasonous Baron was facing off against the sole heir to Lycaster in the exact location where most of the heirs had fought and died for their title.
All the eyes of Lycaster were on Derrick. He couldnotlose the first of the endless trials if he was going to prove himself worthy of the name Alastar.
Especially not to a Thornebow.
“Announcing the sole heir to the House of Hyton…”
The cheering swelled.
“…andthe Dukedom of Lycaster…”
Derrick let out a breath and his brow hardened.
“Lord Alastar Derrick Pervale Hyton!”
He stepped into the sun and the crowd went wild. I followed his footprints in the sand to get a closer look.
As soon as he entered the white inner circle, Derrick and Grigory crossed swords and waited for the duel to begin. Fromacross the arena, Anders leaned on the golden armrests of his throne. Mother held her hand over her heart.
The boys so focused their chests barely rose with their breath, but then Grigory’s voice was low enough to slip beneath the roar of the crowd. “I wonder what that sweet twin sister of yours will think when I beat your ass.”
Derrick bared his teeth and sliced his sword.Clink.Grigory blocked him.
The crowd erupted with screams of delight—their heir had struck first.
The swords flashed in the sunlight as they dueled. Derrick moved with the genteel of a sportsman and had the advantage of height, but Grigory had a ferocious edge, fighting with the tenacity of someone with everything to lose. He was a desperate boy with his family’s honor on the line, a jaded noble son seeking revenge…
…or, some could whisper, a man with the spirit of the Conqueror.
Grigory pushed Derrick to the edge of the white line, nearly throwing him off balance to win the duel.
