Page 175

He circled Bekn slowly. His shoulders felt tight, his hands flexing at his sides while pale static jumped from fingertip to fingertip. His gaze never left Bekn.

Bekn pushed himself upright, chains dragging, chest heaving. “What? You need your prince to tell you where to bite?”

Ryneth struck low and fast, catching Bekn across the ribs with enough force to send him skidding sideways through the sand. Bekn hit hard, rolled, came up choking on dust.

The crowd screamed—not for him, but for more.

Ryneth heard it. So did Bekn.

And for the first time, something changed in his face.

Just the smallest break in the smile.

He spat sand and laughed again, but it was forced. “I’m not afraid to die.”

Ryneth kept coming.

Bekn backed up another step. Then another. “You hear me?” he shouted, louder now, like he needed the whole arena to hear it. “I’ve got nothing left. Nothing. You think this scares me?”

Ryneth tilted his head. His teeth ached harder. His hands twitched once at his sides. The static around him flared bright enough to light the sand blue under his boots.

He barely felt human now. Just rage and power and the whole arena waiting for him to use it.

Bekn saw it. His grin slipped.

The crowd saw it too, and they got louder. Crueler. Thousands of voices crashing together in a single brutal demand.

Kill him. Kill him. Kill him.

Bekn looked up into the stands. For the first time, the grin was gone. His eyes moved over the rows of faces, over the mouths shouting, over the hands raised high in the air.

They weren’t cheering for him. They were chanting for an ending.

“Wait,” Bekn snapped, too fast now. “Wait. Light, no, don’t⁠—”

Ryneth lunged. He hit him hard enough to drive him flat onto his back.

Sand burst up around them. Chains snapped tight. Bekn twisted under him with a strangled sound, heels digging trenches into the arena floor as he tried to wrench free.

Ryneth barely felt the impact. He caught Bekn by the throat with one hand and slammed him back into the sand. Static exploded out of him on contact.

The sound that tore out of Bekn wasn’t human.

Blue-white light burst over his body in violent waves, racing across the purple prison fabric and jumping from chain to chain, bright enough to burn spots into Ryneth’s vision. Bekn arched under him so hard his spine nearly bowed off the ground. His mouth opened in a scream that vanished into the crackling surge.

The crowd became one long, deafening roar.

Ryneth couldn’t hear it. Couldn’t hear anything except the power.

It tore through him in hot pulses, savage and endless, pouring out through his palm and up into his clenched jaw and aching teeth. His whole body locked around it. The smell hit next. Burned fabric. Burned skin. Burned hair.

Bekn thrashed once. Then again, weaker.

Ryneth pressed harder. The chains shook against the sand, and Bekn’s body convulsed under him in broken, violent spasms. His scream cut off. Started again. Cut off.

Ryneth saw his face.

The blood. The sweat. The panic finally there. The mouth opening on words that never made it out.