I have two wins so far. Two more rounds to go. One more win, and I’m off the hook next semester.
“Jade and Evie,” Kieran says after announcing all the other pairings. “Fury Loop. You’re last.”
Of course we are.
The matches before ours blur together. Nina takes down Elizabeth in the Siphon Sphere with ruthless efficiency. Vera destroys Felix in the Smoke Spire. Sam barely pulls off a win against Rebecca in the Void Pit.
Finally, Kieran calls our names again.
“Jade. Evie. You’re up.”
We climb the carved steps with Kieran leading the way, the rest of our classmates trailing behind us.
Sixty feet across, the Fury Loop’s burnt red stone is scarred with cracks from decades of people losing control. The moment Evie and I step inside, the air becomes thicker and charged, pressing against my skin like it’s testing me.
Across from me, Evie’s hands are clenched into fists at her sides, a wild look in her eyes that I’ve never seen before.
“First to yield or stay down for five seconds loses,” Kieran calls from the sidelines. “Begin.”
For a moment, neither of us moves.
Then Evie throws a fireball.
It’s stronger than I expected—faster and more precise. I barely dodge in time, rolling to the side as heat scorches past my shoulder.
I throw a fireball back, weak and poorly aimed. Evie deflects it with a small heat shield she calls around her hand and advances, her movements sharp and aggressive.
“Fight back,” she snarls. “Stop holding back andfight me.”
She hurls another fireball, and I dodge, but not fast enough. The edge of her flames catches my arm, and all I can feel is the weight of every lie I’ve told her, every time I watched her hope for news about Oliver, and every moment I pretended to be her friend while hiding that I helped turn her brother to ash.
For one terrifying second, silver crackles along my fingertips.
I look at Helen’s orbs immediately. They’re still circling, still recording. Did they catch it? Did she see?
Helen’s expression is stone.
Evie’s fist connects with my jaw.
I stumble backward, stars exploding across my vision. She’s on me before I can recover, fire blazing around her hands, her face twisted with rage.
“Oliver trusted you,” she growls, the words hitting harder than any punch. “He asked you to the ball. He wanted to be with you. Now he’s gone, and you’ve been acting like you don’t even care.”
She throws another fireball, and this one hits me square in the chest.
I go down hard, the breath knocked out of me, pain radiating through my ribs. But before I can get up, heat slams into me from all sides, a translucent dome forming around me.
A heat shield. Evie’s specialty.
The air turns scorching, pressing in from every direction like I’m trapped inside an oven. Sweat pours down my face, my lungs burning with each breath. I can’t see through the shimmeringwaves of heat, can’t find Evie, can’t do anything but try not to pass out.
I throw my own fire, trying to push back against the heat, but Evie’s shield is strong.
“Evie,” I choke out, but she either can’t hear me, or she doesn’t want to.
Through the wavering heat, her face flickers into view. Tear tracks cut through the soot on her cheeks. Her mouth is open, her chin shaking, and she’s not even looking at me anymore.
The heat intensifies. Black spots dance at the edges of my vision. Her shield is cooking me, suffocating me, boiling the moisture from my skin and stealing the air from my lungs.
