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Mal lowered his sword slightly, watching the blood stain my sapphire tunic with a victorious smile. “You see, Tauriel? The outcome was decided before we ever stepped through the portal to Earth. You were a weapon forged for our entertainment. Nothing more. Just Collateral.”

I wiped a streak of sweat and sea salt from my eyes, my green gaze locking onto the exposed skin of his throat just above his armor collar.

He thinks he’s won, I thought, my heart thumping wildly against my cracked ribs. He thinks I am weak because I am bleeding.

“You talk too much, Mal,” I rasped, spitting a mouthful of copper-tasting blood onto the black sand.

I shifted my stance. I didn’t raise the spear into a high block. I dropped low, setting my right foot back, bringing the double-edged head of Vaelthrys level with his chest.

Just one drop. Just slice his skin.

I lunged forward with everything I had left.

It wasn’t a standard thrust—it was a reckless, lightning-fast feint taught to me by Caspian in the courtyard. I drove the butt of the spear toward his knees, forcing Mal to drop his broadsword to block the low blow.

The moment his blade made contact with the lower shaft, I pulled back, twisted my wrists, and spun the seven-foot spear over my shoulders in a blinding, circular arc. The head of Vaelthrys swept upward, the razor-sharp crescent blade flying straight toward the exposed right side of Mal’s neck.

It was a fraction of an inch from his skin. A fraction of an inch from drawing the single drop of blood needed to lock his death sentence.

Mal’s eyes widened in sudden shock—the first flicker of true surprise to cross his face since the duel began.

With unnatural Fae speed, Mal jerked his head backward.

The blade missed his throat by less than a millimeter, slicing through a single lock of his dark hair, sending the strands fluttering down onto the sand.

Mal stumbled back two steps, his hand flying to his neck, his fingers coming away dry. No blood.

His shock vanished instantly, replaced by a cold, murderous fury that darkened his eyes.

“A clever trick,” Mal growled, his voice dropping an octave into a guttural register. “You almost had it, didn’t you? You thought that relic would save you.”

He took three heavy, aggressive strides forward, his broadsword raised high. He didn’t offer any more taunts. He unleashed a ruthless, relentless barrage of bone-crushing strikes that drove me clear across the arena.

My arms went entirely numb. The skin on my palms tore completely open, slicking the dark shaft of Vaelthrys with my own blood. My mended ribs screamed in agony, my vision swimming with dark spots as the concussion from the armory returned with a vengeance.

I was losing ground fast. Backing up, step by agonizing step, until the heels of my boots hit the hard, cold stone of the inner perimeter wall.

I was cornered.

Behind me was the ward of the arena.

Mal stepped into range, a cold finality settling over his face as he raised his broadsword over his head with both hands, gathering his strength for the executioner’s strike that would cleave me in two.

“It ends now, Princess,” Mal whispered.

Time seemed to slow to a crawl inside the dead air of the dome.

I looked at the broadsword raised above his head. I looked at the crowd screaming for my death.

I had no magic. I had no dragon. I had no strength left to block another blow.

Just a drop, my mind whispered, a cold, unshakeable fire igniting in the deepest core of my soul. Just one slice.

If I couldn’t reach him with my feet planted on the sand... I would bring the spear to him.

I didn’t try to raise Vaelthrys into a defensive block.

Instead, I dropped into a deep, low hunting stance. I planted my left heel against the wards behind me, using it as a launching pad. I wrapped both of my blood-slicked hands around the center of the shaft, pulling the butt of the spear back past my hip like a javelin.