CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
It’s one thing to say I’m going to enter the Grand Tournament, quite another to make it happen.
“I’ll reach out to my connections within the colosseum,” Marcus assures me, as he gets ready to leave for the senate. “I should still have enough influence to get them to add you to the list of fighters.”
He looks stately and controlled as he stands there in his toga, but I think I can detect a hint of nervousness in him. It mirrors my own.
“Are you sure you want me to stay behind while you go?” I ask him. “I don’t like the idea of you being alone out there if Olivia is sending assassins.”
“Planning to be my bodyguard?” Marcus says, with a faint smile. He shakes his head. “I’ll be fine. I can find new guards, and I suspect all the training I’ve been doing will help me to protect myself. Besides, Alaric says he’s going to have a couple of people watching me.”
That catches me by surprise. Alaric and the resistance have little love for Marcus, but now they’re sending people to protect him?
“Why would he do that?” I ask.
Marcus spreads his hands. “Perhaps he’s realized we’re on the same side, at least for now.
Perhaps he realizes the best chance for his resistance to achieve their aims is if I haven’t been murdered.
” He shrugs. “Or maybe they’ve decided it’s a good idea to watch and make sure I’m not working against them. ”
I suspect it’s some combination of all those things. Alaric might not want Marcus dead right now, but he also won’t trust him completely. But I do feel a little better knowing Marcus is going to have some protection watching him.
“I could still come with you,” I say.
Marcus shakes his head. “You have training to do. If you’re going to do this, you need to be ready. Alaric is going to be here in a few minutes.”
It’s strange to see the two of them cooperating like this.
I know it’s only because I’m at the heart of both of their efforts.
I’m the one thing that can bring them together.
I’m both happy I’m able to do it and worried about what might happen if I’m not here to stop them fighting against one another.
If I fall in the Grand Tournament, will Marcus and the resistance go back to being at odds?
Will all their efforts to stop Selene fall apart?
It's not an idle worry. I’ve fought in the colosseum plenty of times.
I’ve come close to dying, and I’ve killed to survive.
I know exactly how dangerous it can be, even for skilled fighters.
There’s always an element of luck in any fight.
I’ve seen fighters who should have been better than their opponents cut down by lucky blows, fighters who should have been killed find ways to survive despite the odds.
No matter how much I train, there’s always a chance I could die.
It's a sobering thought, but not one that makes me pull back from the path I've chosen.
I'm convinced that facing Selene in the colosseum is the way to stop her.
She's carefully thought through all her plans beyond the arena, but within it, there is no other plan than to fight and hope she's stronger.
She can't outmaneuver me politically there, can't use her followers to fight her battles for her.
In the colosseum, it will just be Selene and me.
Assuming Marcus can get me into the Grand Tournament.
“While I’m there, I’m going to try to pick up any information I can on your potential opponents,” Marcus says. “The more we know, the better you’ll be able to prepare for everything they have to throw at you.”
He still sounds nervous, and I know why.
I’m proposing going into the Grand Tournament still wearing the dampener around my wrist. I don’t have the power to remove it and even if I did, that would be a breach of the terms the senate set for my release into Marcus’ custody.
Olivia, or another of Selene’s followers, might be able to see me executed just for that mistake.
Leaving it on means I’ll have to fight without my magic, or at most, with only a faint trickle of it. If Alaric really can find someone who’ll tamper with the dampener discretely, it will give me some of what I once had, but not all. I’ll need to be ready.
That’s why, as Marcus leaves, I go to the training area he’s had built in the grounds of his villa.
I start by lifting heavy stones, carrying them around the training area to try to build up my strength.
I run lightly between logs set into the ground to build up my speed and agility.
Slowly, I’m recovering the physical capabilities I once had as a gladiator, but which have been worn down by my time as a prisoner.
I feel as though I’m as fast and strong now as I ever was, but I still need to work to hone my skills if I’m going to be able to compete against the gladiators Selene chooses to send against me.
Because I have no doubt that, ultimately, she’ll control the brackets.
Already, her people are the ones picking who’ll compete, scouring the world for suitable entrants to the games.
Those fighting in the Grand Tournament will probably be powerful magic users, and I’ll need to fight with speed and skill to overcome that.
“You’re working hard already, I see,” Alaric says as he arrives. I turn towards him, and the biggest shock is that, today, he’s wearing his own face, without illusions to cover it.
“Alaric, what if one of the servants sees you?” I ask.
Alaric shifts his features slightly, to someone who looks similar to him.
“Then when they get close, they’ll realize it wasn’t me after all.
But most of them probably don’t even care at this point.
The lines have been drawn, and they know what side Marcus is on.
I’m sick of having to hide myself from you, of not being who I really am around you. ”
He moves over to me, and I assume he’s going to pick up weapons, ready to start training, but instead, Alaric puts his arms around me, holding me close.
“I was so frightened for you when you were a prisoner,” Alaric says. “I cursed myself for not being able to get you out of there, then cursed Marcus and Rowan for the way they got you out. I wish they’d taken me instead of you, back in the prison.”
“I don’t,” I tell him. “They would have killed you, Alaric. At least with me, Selene wanted to keep me in case I proved useful for her plans.”
“Are you sure all of this isn’t a part of one of her plans?” Alaric asks, stepping back and holding me at arms’ length.
That’s always a worry, with Selene. So many times, she’s proven herself to be one step ahead of everyone around her, with plans that take the natural reactions of her opponents and weave them into her schemes to her advantage.
When she came back to Aetheria, she knew she would be arrested, but that the law let her demand to fight in the games.
She knew the different factions of the city could be manipulated to give her more power and influence.
She was able to trick Alaric and me into a doomed raid on the prison beneath the city.
But there’s also a danger in thinking like that.
“We can’t assume everything is part of one of her plans,” I say.
“If we do, we paralyze ourselves, unable to do anything in case Selene’s predicted it.
She’s clever, yes, and she’s powerful, but she isn’t omniscient.
If she could see everything that was happening in the city, you and every other member of the resistance would have been arrested long ago. ”
“I guess you’re right,” Alaric says. “But I’m still worried about all the ways this might turn out. What if she finds some way to have you killed in the preparation rooms of the colosseum? What if she rigs one of the fights so your equipment breaks?”
“I don’t think she’ll do that with me,” I say, although I can’t be certain.
“Why not?”
“Because everyone knows I’m her greatest enemy,” I explain. “If I have some kind of ‘accident’ everyone will think Selene is afraid of me. It will hurt her reputation, rather than protecting her from me. And… there’s something Domitian said, in the time I was imprisoned with him.”
“You’re taking advice from him now?” Alaric says, his eyebrows rising in surprise.
“He knew Selene,” I point out. “He told me that for her, it isn’t just about winning. It’s about the spectacle of it. About as many people as possible seeing that she’s the victor. Selene won’t want someone else to kill me quietly. She’ll want to beat me.”
“And what if she can?” Alaric asks. There’s real fear in his voice now. “Even with your full power, you were barely able to keep up with her in the fight in Ironhold. With just a fraction of it, against an Archon? How are you meant to survive?”
I take up my practice trident and net.
“By training hard. Selene has learned to fight, but this has always been a game to her. I intend to become an opponent she can’t hope to defeat. With your help.”
Alaric sighs, not looking convinced, but he goes to the rack of training weapons, picking up a curved wooden blade. His features shimmer with illusion, and now it’s as if Selene herself is standing before me in the practice circle.
“Then we’d best stop wasting time,” Alaric says. “Every moment from now on is dedicated to make sure that you come out of the Grand Tournament alive.”
I nod, but it isn’t just about me. I don’t just need to win to keep myself alive. I need to win because, if I don’t, Selene Ravenscroft will have a clear path to making herself empress.