Chapter 19 #2
Something pulls loose in my chest, like a thread threatening to unravel everything I’m holding together.
He turns and walks away, leaving me alone with my reflection and the lingering scent of him mixing with paint fumes and glitter.
Those are quite possibly the last two words he’ll ever say to me.
I stand on this small rock platform, water lapping at my ankles, and I cannot believe what they’ve built.
The arena floor has been transformed into a massive lagoon.
Millions of gallons of water stretch out before me, more fresh water than most settlements see in a year.
The waste of it makes my stomach turn—people die of thirst in the wastelands while Victora floods an entire stadium for entertainment.
My rock platform is maybe eight feet across, rough granite that cuts into my bare soles.
Impossibly, it feels like real stone, not some fake construction.
Across the vast sea of water, Elijah stands on his own platform, a distant figure.
Though even at this distance, the shimmer of his ridiculous costume catches the light.
Between us rises the centerpiece—an artificial island, maybe thirty yards in diameter, built up from sand and crowned with a towering circular cliff.
The rock formation looks ancient, like something carved by centuries of waves, but the perfect symmetry gives away its artificial nature.
At the top of the cliff sits an enormous pink clam shell, closed.
The water is crystal clear. The sound echoes strangely in the vast space, little waves slapping against my platform, against Elijah’s, against the central island. Every splash bounces off the arena walls and comes back magnified.
How did they even build this? The basin that sits on the pit, the pump systems to fill and drain it, the artificial currents I can see moving the surface… The resources, the manpower, the sheer fucking audacity of it all.
My breathing sounds loud in my ears, competing with the gentle lap of water and the roar of the crowd above. The costume restricts my movement just enough to remind me how exposed I am. No armor, barely any coverage, and I’m supposed to swim and fight and kill in this horrendous getup.
I force myself to calculate distances. About five hundred yards to Elijah. Two hundred and fifty to the central island. The water looks deep. I’m an outstanding swimmer, but in this setting, with whatever weapons they’re about to introduce—
The commentator’s voice booms across the water, distorted by the acoustics.
“Ladies and gentlemen! Our gorgeous mermen have ten seconds to prepare for battle! Let’s get ready for Poseidon’s Wrath!”
Ten seconds.
The water sparkles, deceptively beautiful as it reflects the arena lights in dancing patterns across my painted skin.
The crowd’s roar builds to a crescendo.
Five seconds.
I bend my knees, hands poised at my sides. I’ve dived from high cliffs back home, but never into an arena built for death.
My muscles coil. Ready.
The horn blares across the stadium as smoke erupts from the island’s peak. Golden sparkles fountain into the air like fireworks. The massive clam shell creaks open with mechanical precision, its pink interior gleaming under the lights.
There, nestled in the center like a giant pearl, sits the Deathball.
I dive.
The water hits me like a slap of ice. Fresh water, but wrong—too clean. My eyes snap open instinctively, and fire shoots through them. Chemicals. They’ve laced this water with something that burns.
I slam my eyes shut and swim.
Hard strokes. Powerful kicks. The ridiculous costume drags against the water, but at least they didn’t give me an actual merman’s tail. Small mercies.
I push my lungs to their limit. The cold seeps into my bones, making every movement sluggish. But I push harder, faster. Elijah is somewhere in this chemical soup, and whoever reaches that island first controls the game.
The water presses against my eardrums. My painted skin feels slick, the glitter probably washing off in streams behind me. I kick harder, fighting the costume’s resistance, fighting the cold that wants to steal my strength.
My fingers scrape sand.
The beach.
I don’t give myself a second to recover from the grueling swim. My legs shake as I throw myself toward the cliff face, water streaming from my hair, my lungs screaming for air.
Rocky outcropping. Subtle handholds carved by whoever designed this nightmare.
What luck. Atrea is nothing but cliffs and rocks. I’ve scaled far worse than this.
Marco’s voice echoes in my memory—his story about saving Lucas from a cliff face. From Atrea’s cliff face.
Focus. Focus. Focus.
I grab the first handhold and pull myself up. The wet rock cuts into my palms, but I climb. One grip, then another. My muscles remember this rhythm from childhood, from racing my friends up the sea cliffs while Esme cheered from below.
The crowd’s roar fades as I climb higher. Nothing exists except the next handhold, the next foothold, the burning in my arms and legs.
Up. Up. Up.
My hand slaps against the flat surface at the top. I haul myself over the edge and—
No sign of Elijah.
I’m alone with the open clam shell and the Deathball gleaming in its center.
I could cry.
But I don’t. I run.
The Deathball sits there like a trapped star. So close that the arena lights dance across its metallic spikes.
Three steps. That’s all it takes.
I reach out, my fingers stretching toward the prize that will give me control of this nightmare. The crowd’s noise fades to nothing. There’s only the ball, only the moment of victory within my grasp.
So, so close—
SLAM!
The clam snaps shut with a sound like breaking bones. The edge whistles past my fingers, missing them by a breath. One heartbeat slower and I’d be staring at bloody stumps.
I jerk backward, stumbling on the slick surface.
What the hell?
The crowd explodes. Not a roar of excitement, but something different. Laughter. They’re laughing at me. Pointing and howling like I’m some silly fool who just walked into a wall.
Heat floods my face. The painted glitter suddenly feels like a mask of humiliation.
“Ladies and gentlemen!” The commentator’s voice booms, dripping with theatrical delight. “It appears our pretty bird was a touch too slow to reach the nest! Don’t worry, folks—our mermen will have another chance to claim their prize soon enough!”
Timed intervals. Of course. The architects wouldn’t make it that simple. Every few minutes, the shell must open for a brief window, then snap shut again. Another way to stretch the spectacle, to milk every drop of entertainment from our blood.
I clench my fists, rage burning through the embarrassment. But there’s nothing I can do. If I want to live, I have to dance on their string like a puppet.
A grunt of effort distracts me from my wallowing.
Elijah finally hauls himself over the cliff edge, his chest heaving like a bellows. Water clings to his body, to his ridiculous costume. His face is flushed, his movements shaky with exhaustion.
But he’s here.
Our eyes meet across the small plateau. Twenty feet of slick rock between us. The closed clam shell sits at the center like a monument to our shared frustration.
Neither of us speaks.
We charge.
The impact drives the breath from my lungs. We slam together in the middle of the platform, hands grappling for purchase, feet sliding on the wet stone. This isn’t the clean combat Atrea taught me—this is desperation. Savage. Brutal.
Elijah is stronger than I anticipated. His hands lock around my biceps, trying to lift me, to throw me toward the edge. I twist, driving my shoulder into his ribs, and we stumble backward together.
The cliff edge yawns behind us both.
This is the game now. Not speed or skill, but simply who goes over first. Who lies face down on the sand below while the other claims the prize. A dangerous gamble—if one of us dies on impact, the other has to play again next week.
But it’s the only game left to play.
I hook my foot behind Elijah’s ankle and shove. He staggers but doesn’t fall, his hand shooting out to grab my wrist. I cling to him. We’re locked together now, swaying on the precipice like dancers.
“Let go,” he gasps.
His grip tightens. Mine tightens in response. We’re both balanced on the knife’s edge, one move from—
His foot slips.
Time fractures.
His weight pulls us both over the edge. I feel the moment when solid ground disappears, when gravity claims us both. The crowd’s roar rushes up to meet us as we tumble through space.
We twist in the air like fighting cats. His elbow crashes into my ribs. My knee finds his stomach. But momentum has its own logic, and physics doesn’t care about our messy struggle.
I hit the sand first.
Elijah lands on top of me with the force of a falling boulder. My spine compresses. My lungs collapse. Every bit of air gets driven from my body in one violent exhalation.
Stars explode across my eyelids. I can’t breathe. Can’t move. Fuck. I’m dead.
The sand beneath me feels like broken glass. Each grain cuts into my back through the wet costume. Elijah’s weight presses down on my chest, and I can’t draw a breath. Can’t move.
Then, abruptly, he’s off me.
He grabs my ankle and starts dragging me toward the water.
I try to resist, but my body won’t cooperate. My ribs scream. The impact rattled something loose inside me, and every movement sends fresh waves of agony through my torso.
“Stop,” I try to wheeze, but no sound comes out.
He’s stronger than me right now. I used everything I had on that climb, and then the fall knocked the fight right out of me. My body’s dragged along uselessly as he hauls me toward the lagoon’s edge.
The water laps against my legs. My shoulders. My neck.
“I’m sorry,” Elijah pants, large brown eyes meeting mine for a moment. I believe him, I do. “I’ll make it painless.”
He turns me over, my attempts to shove him off useless. His hands find my head. Push down.