CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
One more day, and the tournament will begin, which means there’s something I have to do. Marcus puts his arms around me.
“I’ll see you in the arena,” he says. “Stay safe until then.”
“You too,” I reply.
I step from his estate, and there are guards waiting for me.
They form a ring around me as I head through the streets, and I'm not entirely sure if they're there to make sure I don't run off or to keep the crowds back.
There are certainly plenty of people out in the open air to watch me as I make this walk through the city to its edges, and beyond.
I walk along the long path to Ironhold for the first time in months, the fortress standing black and forbidding at the end of my journey.
It's built from granite, where most of Aetheria is constructed from white marble.
It clings to one of the hills beyond the city, its walls sheer and topped with spikes.
There are bodies on those spikes again, although I doubt they're those of gladiators who disobeyed, the way they once were.
Perhaps they're the remains of criminals killed in the arena, or simply executed quietly.
Aetheria has become a harsh place again, even without Selene formally seizing power.
The walls have been repaired since the last time I was here, when a fight between me and Selene resulted in substantial damage to the structure.
Once again, the fortress seems capable of containing even the strongest gladiators, and that will be its purpose tonight.
All those taking part in the Grand Tournament are expected to spend the night here tonight, so we can all join the formal procession into the city tomorrow.
The guards peel away from me as I reach the gates, and I walk inside, feeling as though I’m being swallowed by the maw of a great beast. There’s an open training area beyond, in front of the main buildings of the fortress.
I can see gladiators standing there, some attended by servants, others standing alone.
They all seem to be looking around at one another as if trying to size up the competition.
I see one dark-haired woman standing beside a chariot, wearing armor that seems to be composed of living plants.
She must be Lorelei. Another man is huge and bearded, with shaggy blond hair and a furious expression.
I guess this might be Jor, the mountain barbarian.
Karubus is there with his spiked armor and a mask that mimics a skull, while there’s an assortment of others standing around.
One man is receiving a massage from a trainer who looks so similar to him the two might be brothers.
A woman is sharpening a blade almost obsessively.
They all watch me as I walk into the courtyard, some with careful consideration, a few with obvious confidence.
Are any of them afraid of my reputation as a former champion of the colosseum?
Or do they see the dampener on my wrist and assume I won’t be a threat?
Some of them are whispering to one another, but they fall silent as a figure walks out from the main building of Ironhold, accompanied by trainers and guards.
Selene Ravenscroft isn't dressed like an empress today.
Instead, she's wearing patches of shimmering scale armor, a curved blade belted at her hip, and shimmering silver bracers on her wrists.
Selene's hair is bound up in an elaborate series of braids now, rather than hanging free, clearly so it won't get in the way if she has to fight.
Everything about her declares her status as a gladiator like us, but the very fact that she's walking at the head of the trainers makes it clear she's still in charge of everything here.
“Welcome,” Selene says, looking out over us all. “You are here because you are going to become part of something special, something the people of Aetheria will remember for generations to come.”
She pauses for effect, but the gladiators aren’t some crowd of ordinary citizens to cheer her every utterance. Selene keeps going.
“You’ve been chosen for the Grand Tournament of Aetheria because you are some of the strongest gladiators, not just from Aetheria and its provinces, but from all the known lands of the world,” Selene says.
“Each of you is special, proof of the power magic holds. In the morning, we will all join a grand procession down into Aetheria and to the colosseum. Tonight, though, be welcome here, in Ironhold.”
Selene sweeps her arm around like a host welcoming guests to a party.
“Some of you,” and here, her gaze rests on me, “will be familiar with its halls. Others may have heard stories about it. Once, this was a place that molded the finest warriors of Aetheria.”
“It’s a place that took slaves and worked them cruelly before throwing them into the colosseum,” I counter.
Selene smiles tightly.
“But can you deny it helped to make you into the gladiator you are today, Lyra? A gladiator who is all too keen to throw herself back into the fray.”
Selene doesn’t give me a chance to point out that I’m only fighting to try to stop her. Instead, she gestures to the doors of Ironhold’s inner structures.
“Please, enter. Food and rooms await you within. Anything you wish, you need only ask the servants here for. I ask only that you use tonight to make sure you are as prepared as you can be for the morning. We want to give the people a good show.”
Selene heads back inside and the gladiators follow her. I go with them, moving smoothly in her wake. I head in with the other gladiators to the main hall, where food has been set out for all of us.
I move to the plates of food, taking what I want and wondering what our accommodation will be like for tonight. Lorelei comes over to me, nodding.
“You’re a former champion of Aetheria’s arena?”
“I did what I had to do to survive,” I say.
“And yet tomorrow, you’ll fight for glory.”
“I’m fighting to make sure Selene doesn’t come to rule Aetheria,” I tell her.
“Whereas I fight because my queen has commanded it,” Lorelei says. “She wishes to show your people that they do not have the strength of the Arborians.”
“I hope you survive the contests,” I tell her.
She shrugs. “I will or I won’t.”
A servant comes to us with wine. Lorelei takes a goblet and I do the same, but even as I do so, she puts a hand on my wrist.
“Don’t,” she says. “I sense plants in yours that have nothing to do with grapes.”
I hesitate, guessing she can sense different plants as easily as I can sense the nature of beasts. Poison. Lorelei has detected poison. I look at the servant, a young man in a pale tunic with an increasingly desperate expression.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “It wasn’t meant to kill you.”
“What, then?” I demand.
“Just to slow you down a little, just to make sure.”
“You were going to drug me?” I say. That could be just as fatal as poisoning, slowing my reactions for the fights to come.
“It wasn’t my idea.”
“Then who?” I demand.
“I can’t say. I won’t.”
He lunges at me in the middle of saying it, with a knife in his hand.
Some instinct makes me throw myself sideways as he lunges, thrusting at me with a speed and violence that might have proved fatal if he’d taken me by surprise.
As it is, though, I manage to twist out of the way of the blow, slamming the heel of my palm into his jaw and sending him staggering back.
He rights himself, obviously intending to come forward again, even as my heart hammers with sudden fear.
A beam of violet magic burns through him as he steps forward, disintegrating a section of his chest. He staggers forward one more step, then collapses, knife falling from nerveless fingers as he dies.
Selene stands there with her hand raised, a look of such anger on her face that I know she had nothing to do with this latest assassination attempt.
“This is your hospitality?” I ask her anyway. I need to know I’m safe here.
She shakes her head. “This should not have happened.” She raises her voice.
“I will find the person behind this, and they will face justice for it in due course. Know this: all the gladiators here are honored guests. All of them. You are to see that no harm comes to them. If it does, I’ll hold every guard and trainer near them responsible. ”
I can feel the fear around me at her words, truly feel it, thanks to the fragment of my powers that lets me tap into the primal instincts of others. It seems Selene is truly angry that her followers would continue to try to protect her from me by taking me out of the contest.
It means, for almost the first time in Ironhold, I’m probably safe. At least for tonight.