Chapter 8 #2
Clank. The arena filled with the sounds of hydraulics, breaking me away from Warwick. A dozen massive metal cages rose from the ground we were standing on. Trapdoors strategically placed around the pit were nearly undetectable to the eye.
“What the hell?” I muttered, climbing to my feet.
Instantly roars, snarls, and howls echoed from inside the barred cages, animals frantically pacing back and forth.
Holy. Fucking. Shit.
Istvan had taken another note from the Roman games.
Dozens of wild animals filled the cages, bursting with rage and fear, ready to kill.
“They haven’t been fed in a while.” Istvan grabbed two drinks from a table set out for him and his party. “This should be exciting. Anyone want to take bets?”
Olena giggled with delight as Istvan handed her a glass of Pálinka.
Caden still didn’t move, watching every move between his father, new stepmother, and us.
For one second, his gaze found mine like he needed me.
A flare of the connection burrowed into our DNA, an instinct to seek each other out.
For one second, I could feel my old friend there.
A roar from a lion snapped my attention back to the cages. Multiple tigers, boars, lions, and bears occupied the pens.
Istvan realized we wouldn’t battle each other and changed the battlefield to one we couldn’t protest by bringing in an opponent we had no choice but to fight.
The animals didn’t need to strip away the layers and find their primal instincts to survive. We did.
Kill or be killed.
The crowd of soldiers cheered as the metal doors unlocked with a clank, freeing the hungry, wild beasts.
My spine went ramrod straight, fear flushing through me, oxygen barely skimming my lungs. Warwick struggled to his feet next to me, stronger than he had been when he first came in, but still frail. We both observed the dozens of predators prowling out of their cages.
We were wounded, drained, and defenseless. Easy prey.
My attention went to my friends, all of them instinctively clumping together.
Safety in numbers. It was true in some cases, building a wall of defense together, but there were times it made you more vulnerable, easy for them to circle and attack.
Istvan once demonstrated this to Caden and me through a game of billiards.
Grouped together, you could hit a lot at once, but once they were divided, you had to go after each singularly.
Right now, the beasts had their kills all in one lump.
Warwick rumbled next to me, and without a word or look, I could sense he understood the same thing. We were the only two still alive who had fought in the Games, who understood the strategy of survival.
The art of war.
“Split up in pairs,” I bellowed, my arms waving. “Find anything you can to use as a weapon or shield.”
No one hesitated at my order. They accepted my strategy, darting in different directions, already confusing the animals, who cranked their heads in different ways, trying to pick out the weakest link.
I assessed everything in the stadium which could be used as a weapon. Roars thundered the massive room, echoing the heartbeat thumping painfully against my ribs. The tigers reacted first, swiping their claws at the closest victims.
“There.” Warwick huffed through his swollen mouth, pointing, his legs already moving for a torch on the outside of a gate. It was something we had once used to fight against each other in Halálház Games.
In Věrh?za, we stood together.
“Get up on a cage,” he yelled back at me, yanking the torch from its holder.
Right as I turned, my brain registered something leaping for me, a large orange and black mass, before the weight crashed into me, the claws sinking into my skin. The tiger and I hit the ground, the weight crushing me.
People always assume lions were stronger, when in actuality tigers were. With their condensed muscle mass and agility, they were a far more aggressive and faster breed.
My mind blocked the excruciating pain shredding through me, adrenaline and terror taking over as teeth snapped for my face, claws digging into my flesh.
“Brexley!” I could feel Warwick’s voice bellow within me, his fear and rage pushing out all his own agony and thrusting his energy into me.
A cry broke from my mouth, my fist cracking into the tiger’s throat, then its eye. The beast bellowed as Warwick singed its body with the flame from the torch.
Roaring, it bucked back in defense, retreating off me. Warwick’s palm fisted my collar, yanking me up. “Come on!”
Feeling wobbly, I got to my feet with no time to reflect on wounds or broken bones. I was alive, and that was the baseline to keep moving.
“Get up there!” He shoved me up on top of a cage before climbing up beside me.
Blood soaked my uniform from the cat’s nails, turning the gray into a muddy brown, my limbs shivering with adrenaline, pain, and fear.
The arena was a sea of movement, filled with screams and roars, chilling me to the bone. My attention swept over the pit.
Scorpion, Hanna, and Maddox had climbed onto a cage across from ours, their backs together, fighting off beasts from all sides. Kek and Lukas were on one farther away, while Killian, Sloane, and Rosie scaled one next to us.
Birdie, Wesley, Ash, and Kitty grabbed other torches and fought near the fire pits. Birdie and Wesley were amazing fighters and worked together well, but Ash and Kitty surprised me. Enthralled me with their movements as if it were a performance.
Whatever issues they had disappeared when they had to work together.
Their unity was ingrained in their very beings.
They knew each other so well; it was as though you were watching one person.
They moved and fought like a dance; a rhythm so deeply-rooted they didn’t have to think.
They just were. And through all the chaos and fear, the tiny little moment gave me hope.
That no matter what, they were family, along with Warwick.
And they would fight and die next to each other without question.
“We need more weapons.” Killian’s voice yanked me back. Puffing himself up, he struck his boot and swung at the lion trying to jump up on the cage with them. Rosie kicked at it as well. “We can’t sustain this.”
We couldn’t. They would wear us down and leap the moment our walls started to deteriorate.
Once again, my gaze shot around the space, trying to find anything we could use; otherwise, this was a lost cause.
Even the gladiators got shields and swords.
My attention darted up to the points board.
This time, I noticed several HDF and Hungarian flags sticking out from the top of it. They were on wood poles.
It would take a nimble person to get up there, but we had to at least try. I turned to the only person I knew here who could scale things like a monkey.
“Birdie!” I screamed at her, pointing up at the flags.
Her head went from me to the potential weapons high up.
She didn’t bother responding, her tiny figure beelining in that direction, probably quickly mapping out her course as she went.
Hopping up on a cage, she leaped to the wall surrounding us, using the frame of the gate to pull herself up onto the ledge where the stands started.
There were hollers from the crowd—some seemed to be cheering her on, while others hissed, trying to grab for her, and push her back into the pit.
Birdie dodged and weaved past them, climbing higher up the stands.
Springing, her tiny frame flew like a bird, jumping onto the points board, clamping onto it with everything she had while she scooted and slinked up the side, reaching the top.
“Damn.” I heard Warwick breathe out next to me in reverence.
Birdie ascended to the top, yanking out the flags. They waved in the air as if she had just won the quest, then she tossed them to us.
Wesley darted over, grabbing the first one and passing the rest to any group who had no weapon at all. Killian, Scorpion, and Kek each got one, while Warwick, Kitty, and Ash had the torches.
It still wasn’t enough. We needed a plan, or we would not survive.
Birdie started to descend, but this time the crowd was ready, knowing the only route she had accessible to her. Running along the ledge of the seating area, soldiers rushed for her, one pulling out a knife. My mouth opened, primed to scream at her.
“Birdie!” A male voice stole my cry of warning. Birdie jerked to the sound, the movement shifting her slightly out of the trajectory of the weapon.
A grunt came from her mouth as the blade grazed her hip, her body falling from the ledge.
“No!” I cried out, her form hitting the dirt with a thud. Wesley zipped to her, getting her to her feet and back toward the fire. Her features seized in pain, and she was limping, but otherwise, she seemed okay.
Her gaze lifted to the stands, to the one who called her name, who warned her.
Caden stood at the rail, his hands gripping the bar, his jaw locked down, eyes on her, but his face held no emotion as if he had never opened his mouth. Istvan stared at his son, his cheek twitching with fury, shock, and embarrassment. Caden had warned her. He helped a fae.
My thoughts were quickly dashed as a bear vaulted for Ash and Kitty with a roar. Its claws sliced across Kitty’s shoulder, flinging her to the ground, ramming straight into Ash, almost throwing him into the firepit.
“Noooo!” Warwick belted. His instinct to protect them already had him jumping off the cage, running like a madman toward any foe wanting to hurt his family. He darted right up to the beast, thrusting out his arm, burning the back of the bear with the flames of the torch.
It reared up, veering around, its paw swinging around in defense. Its mouth opened in a feral snarl, showing off long, pointed teeth. Standing on its hind legs, the bear eclipsed Warwick, stretching over fourteen feet tall.
When the wall came down and flooded Earth with magic, it altered the wild animals’ DNA. They were bigger, deadlier, and more prehistoric-looking than the ones I saw in pictures of zoos from the time before Earth and the Otherworld meshed.
“Warwick!” My throat shredded in my horror.
The bear came down on him with all its weight, slamming Warwick to the ground, nails digging into his chest. Before I could move, Maddox leaped from his position on top of a cage near them, flinging himself onto the back of the bear.
His arms wrapped around its neck, digging one of his hands into its eye.
The bear’s pained roar shuddered throughout the entire place, vibrating the ground. In a blink, it shook Maddox off, casting him to the dirt with a thud, stealing the air from his lungs.
“Maddox!” Scorpion shouted. The animal’s massive paw slashed across Maddox’s body, the claws gutting him, dumping blood and his insides out onto the dirt. Warwick punched at the bear, trying to stop him as Maddox screamed, his back arching and thrashing while the bear ripped him apart.
The bear reared back on Warwick, its talons slashing for The Wolf.
My mouth opened in horror; tears and grief plunged through my lungs. “Nooooooooooo!” The cry erupted deep from me, burning and sizzling through my soul and up my spine. Time seemed to stop and speed up all at the same time. My universe crashed at my feet.
Fury. Grief. Hate.
My broken pieces forged in wrath, assembled with rage.
I warned the world if it took him from me . . .
I’d burn it to the ground.