‘Don’t let Grandmother see me,’ I tell the boy in a loud whisper. Then I take in what he himself is wearing. ‘Oh, are you a serf?’ I ask, fingering the collar of his white tunic.
‘Only when it suits me,’ he replies, his voice deep and velvety. ‘And you don’t have to worry about being seen, not where I’m taking you.’
I frown, unable to untangle what it is about this boythat doesn’t quite sit right through the heady haze of drugs, but I’m soon distracted by the sight of my toenails, which Spinner insisted on painting bright blue.
After a time we come to a door which leads into a small circular room, empty but for a chair sat in front of a porthole cut into the far wall. On the other side of the glass lies an arena. Fear takes over and I turn rigid.
The boy shifts my weight so that he’s holding me with one arm, using the other to brush a strand of hair from my face with a gloved hand. I relax a little at his touch, breathing in the scent of fresh mint leaves and something earthy and sweet, like pine.
He lowers me carefully into the chair, then kneels down beside me. ‘If anyone comes looking for you, it’d be best not to mention this,’ he says. ‘I don’t want anybody knowing I’m here yet, you see.’
I nod slowly. ‘All right. Your secret’s safe with me.’
The boy smiles. ‘Oh, that I never doubted.’
Then he’s gone.
I sit gazing out at the arena. This time there’s no miniature mountains or pools or lakes. Nor does it resemble the void Spinner had described. This arena is made entirely from stone, with a curved floor and high walls lined with flaming torches. The Crowned Council are seated on golden thrones atop a platform just metres above it. So thereisan audience. Only they’re invisible to the Heirs, just as this porthole must be too. Hal is with them, perched stiffly next to his father. On the emperor’s other side is King Balen, his expression bored, his fingers drumming a silent tune on the arm of his throne.
Suddenly a small figure emerges from the tunnel below. Flame-red hair, knee-high red leather boots. Elaith swivels her head from side to side, staring straight through the Council, who she can’t see peering down at her. She takes a step forward, just as Flint and Cole appear behind her.
Elaith whips round, her face flooding with confusion. ‘What do you two not understand about waiting your turn?’
I want to pound on the glass, to scream at her that it’s not them, that it’s not real. But it’s no use. She can’t hear me. So I just sit and watch as her best friends tear her to shreds with their cruel words, pushing and shoving her until she is weeping on the ground.
Then Flint is gone and it’s just Cole, kneeling down beside her, stroking her hair, murmuring kind, comforting words. Elaith raises her head, and the way she’s looking at him confirms what I’ve long suspected.
Suddenly, Cole begins to transform, morphing into a creature so terrifying that I almost fall out of my chair.
Where mine was dark and reptilian, Elaith’s beast is pale and disturbingly human. It resembles what I imagine a long-dead body to look like, blanched and bloodless. Her scream echoes around the arena. Then she’s up, she’s running.
But that’s just it – there’s nowhere to run to.
The beast moves after her with disjointed, staggering steps.
Fire, Elaith, I think desperately.Use your fire.
It’s like she hears me. As she runs she raises a hand and a torch extinguishes, the ball of flame shooting into her palm. She splits the fire in two and throws it with all her might at the creature pursuing her. It shrieks as the flamesmake contact, licking up its sallow, almost translucent skin, melting part of it away to reveal the bone underneath.
The beast begins spewing out different voices. A male voice, her father’s perhaps, telling her what a disappointment she is to him. Flint again, taunting her. And Cole. Her face twists with pain and humiliation as he tells her that he doesn’t love her, that he never will, that she is a fool for ever imagining that he would.
I’m beginning to wish I had just taken the sedative.
Elaith is sobbing as the voices descend like a flock of birds, pecking and clawing at her as she tries desperately to concentrate.
Eventually, just when I think she’s about to give up, she blasts the beast with enough fire that any remaining skin hanging off its frame melts away, leaving nothing but a grotesque, charred skeleton, the bones clattering to the ground.
Two physicians dart into the arena and begin examining Elaith’s hands. She must have been so focused on burning the beast that she ended up burning herself in the process. They lead her back into the tunnel and out of sight.
It’s not long before the next trial begins. I watch as Cole is encircled by a host of fair-haired, hazel-eyed Etheri that I take to be his family pressing in on him from all sides, spitting on him, spouting hateful words. Then his beast is there, a monstrous wolf-like creature with a long, flicking purple tongue. But try as he might, Cole can’t seem to best it, and when the horns to signal the end of the trial are eventually blown he stalks out of the arena, roughly shaking off the physicians who run in to tend to his angry-looking burns.
I’m not prepared for when Flint emerges from the tunnel, even less so as I watch myself appear beside him, my voice cold and hateful and laced with derision as I tell Flint that our mother loved me best and he knew it, that he was a coward for not remaining at her side while she died.
I am followed by his friends, Grandmother, Father, Aunt Yvainne, Spinner, even Sheen. Then comes his beast, a gigantic snake with glistening golden fangs, large enough to crush a carriage. It’s only when I take in its red scales and beady, brown-gold eyes that I realize. It’s not just a snake – it’s a cobra. A Harglade cobra, the emblem of our House.
Flint starts to run, bolting along at a slight angle from where the walls slant upward like a giant bowl. One by one, every flaming torch in the arena is extinguished, reduced to wisps of smoke as Flint passes by. Sure enough, in his outstretched hands he holds a ball of fire, which grows steadily larger with each flame he gathers.
The beast slithers after him, voices dripping like venom from its mouth.
