Chapter Twenty Six
My nerves build moment by moment as I make my way down to the arena in the morning. This is to be the last day of the Champions Trials, and in some ways it is to be the simplest. Today we will fight the way we would normally fight in the games. No tricks, no strange environments or dangerous animals. Just two gladiators on the sands with our powers and our strength.
The crowds are more subdued after yesterday's trial with the thunder hooves. Fewer people are cheering my name, and the more I think about it, the more I suspect that's a part of Ravenna's plan, along with the rest of it.
I can feel the way the pieces are fitting into place for her. I can see the point of all this for her now and what she hopes to gain. I just hope I'm going to be able to stop her, because if I can't I'm going to die today.
I look over to Alaric, marching down to the games. His eyes meet mine. He isn't playing to the crowd today. He looks worried, not for himself, because nothing could pierce his self-belief when it comes to his abilities in a fight, but for me. I want to reassure him that I will be fine, but I cannot do that here and in any case I'm not sure it's the truth. Ravenna has laid her trap well, and my only chance of coming out of it alive is to walk into it first.
I walked down to the arena with the others, moving through the slums of the city and the noble parts. The colosseum awaits us ahead, and we go inside, moving straight through to the sections beneath to await the call to fight.
I sit there with my spear across my knees, waiting, trying to calm my racing heart. How long I sit there I don't know. Outside, I can hear the emperor welcoming the crowds. All too soon, a trainer comes for me accompanied by guards.
“It's time,” the trainer says. “Move.”
I go with them, heading to the iron gates and then stepping beyond them. Ravenna is already out there on the sand, waiting for me.
“These are to be your first two gladiators to fight,” the emperor says. “Lady Ravenna and the mistress of beasts, Lyra. Gladiators, are you ready?”
"I would speak first, my emperor," Ravenna says, loud enough that she's heard by the crowd.
I know this is a part of it, a part of what she's been building up to. I must survive this part as much as what comes next.
“Very well,” the emperor says.
“The gladiator Lyra has been interfering in these games,” Ravenna says, the shape of her plan finally revealed. “We all know that someone has, and look at the things she has done. She has cheated the crowd of the blood it wishes in the maze. She has sought outside help within the fire ring. She has conspired with one of her lovers in the fight in the temple, neither of them truly fighting one another. Somehow she managed to persuade people to give her the challenge of the thunder hooves in the fourth trial, and there again she cheated the crowd of the true spectacle of all of us fighting for our lives.”
Around me, the crowd is booing, starting to believe her. I realize that's part of the point of her plan. She wants to make me into a villain so that she looks like a hero for killing me. That, or she will demand my execution rather than having to fight me.
“And how do you believe I've influenced the trials?” I ask.
“Probably you got your patron to speak into the right ears,” Ravenna snaps back. “I'm sure you have her to the point where she will do anything you ask.”
She continues the insinuations of the rumors about me and Lady Elara. Those rumors have kept us safe, because they have hidden the fact that she is teaching me the skills of a beast whisperer, but now, they increase the danger.
“My emperor,” Ravenna says. “I call on you to declare Lyra a heretic, suborning the holy nature of these games. I call on you to have her executed, here on the sands, to appease the gods and the crowd!”
The crowd roars and boos, their fury obvious. In this moment, if I do not speak, I will be condemned.
“My emperor, may I speak against these charges?”
The emperor nods. “But speak well, Lyra, because the accusations are serious, and they fit with what we've seen.”
“Deliberately so,” I say. I point at Ravenna. “I am not the one who has been manipulating these games; she is. She has been using her powers of the mind to manipulate the matchups. You will find evidence of her and her friends making money from betting on the lineups of the fights. I believe that she has manipulated this whole set of trials to cause me pain, to make me look guilty, but also to give herself the easiest route through the trials that she can.”
A murmur runs through the crowd at my counter-accusation.
“Lies!” Ravenna says. “Are you suggesting that even I am powerful enough to manipulate all of the organizers of the games?”
That has been the argument that people have made to me throughout these trials in the face of my suspicions. They all know the limits of Ravenna's power, or they think they do.
“Not alone,” I say. I look at her. “You shouldn't have had Vesper help me in the maze, Ravenna. You shouldn't have sent him to get close to me. But I guess you had to in order to make the fourth trial work.” I turn my attention to the emperor, trying to ignore the pain I feel at that betrayal. Because it is a betrayal and a big one. Vesper made me believe that he was my friend, that he was there to help me. Instead, he was only out to help himself. I have been told again and again that it is the way of things in the colosseum, but that doesn’t make it hurt less. "The gladiator Vesper also has the magic of the mind, but his focus is on boosting the powers of others. Here's the reason that even with a dampener around my wrist, I was able to control a herd of thunder hooves. Imagine what he could do for Ravenna's power when she is not restricted in the same way. With his help, she could control Lord Darius. She could do it without the arch magistrate sensing anything."
“Lies!” Ravenna says. “Nothing but lies!”
“The logic is sound, Tiberius,” a woman’s voice says. There are few people who would call him that, and I know the voice in any case. Lady Selene Ravenscroft, the arch magistrate, steps to the front of her box. She is younger than her white hair suggests, only in her thirties, shorter than I am, with a slender figure encased in white robes, but she is one of the most powerful magic users in the whole empire. I have seen her blast a wraith into nothingness with barely any effort.
The emperor stands there, looking to each of us. He nods to Selene. “Find the truth of this.”
Selene gives a brief bow, then steps from the edge of her box, floating down to the ground as if it is nothing. She lands between me and Ravenna, moving towards Ravenna.
“I will look into your mind and find the truth,” she declares.
“I am a free noble of the empire,” Ravenna snaps. “You have no right to do such a thing.”
“I have been instructed to do so by the emperor,” Selene retorts. “That gives me every right I need.”
"Well, I will not let you into my mind," Ravenna says, and that is no idle declaration. She is powerful in her way, and while she couldn't take on the arch magistrate in a straight fight, she may be able to keep Selene out of her thoughts.
Selene produces something from within her robes. I recognize it as a dampener, similar to the one I'm wearing. She moves forward, and Ravenna looks as though she might try to stop her from placing it on her wrist, but then seems to realize the foolishness of that. As powerful as we all are in Ironhold, there are those within the empire with more power, and it possesses an army, filled with people who all have their own minor talents. If she strikes at Selene, she might not be declaring her guilt, but she will be guilty of attacking a noble woman.
It means she must let Selene strap the dampener around her wrist. The archmagistrate seems to concentrate for a few seconds. I can see Ravenna's eyes clouding over.
“Tell us the truth,” Selene says. “Did you conspire with the psychomancer Vesper to suborn the trials.”
I can see the tension in Ravenna's body as she tries to fight, but she doesn't have the power now to hold back the arch magistrate.
“Yes,” she says. “I did it.”
A gasp goes out around the crowd.
“And what were you seeking to achieve?” Selene asks, in a stern tone.
“Money, power, fame,” Ravenna says. “If I built Lyra up into a villain, I could guarantee myself an easy ride through these trials, with her as my final opponent. By making everyone hate her, I could make myself into a hero when I killed her. Even the emperor would be grateful.”
“And now I am not grateful,” Emperor Tiberius says, in a tone that promises violence. “Guards, seize the gladiator Vesper and take him to the dungeons to be executed at my leisure.”
I feel a wave of sadness at that. I know I would not be alive right now if it were not for him. He helped me so much in the games. But he also did that purely because it suited Ravenna’s interests. His betrayal is too painful to ignore right now.
“Seize Ravenna,” the emperor continues. “She can be executed now on the sands. As she pointed out, that is the fate of those who suborn the games.”
Ravenna looks horrified as she sees her plan unraveling, and she understands the consequences of it.
“No!” She says. “I am a noble woman. A free gladiator! You cannot-”
“I am the emperor!” Emperor Tiberius roars. “I may do as I wish!”
Ravenna's fear fills her face. She is looking round as if she might run, but I'm not sure where she will run. Even if she somehow makes it out of the colosseum, she will be faced with an empire that is hostile to her, and in which she will be hunted down.
I stand there for several seconds. I know that all I need to do now is step back and let the guards take her. She will be punished for what she has done. She will die for it, probably in a horrific fashion.
I don't know what it is that makes me speak up. Maybe it is the potential horror of her fate. Maybe it's the sense that things shouldn't end like this. Or maybe it's the memory of Naia, manipulated by her and ultimately left to die.
“My emperor!” I call out.
“What is it?” Emperor Tiberius says. He sounds as though he’s expecting me to plead for mercy for the condemned gladiators. The annoyance in his tone makes it clear that would do no good, even if I tried it.
"Ravenna did all this so that she could face me in combat at the end. She thought she would have an advantage because she would have her full powers while I would wear a dampener. Now she wears one too. Rather than execute her, why not let her have this fight that she has longed for?"
The emperor looks as though he might rebuke me, but then he looks thoughtful. “Is this some plan to try to be merciful with her, Lyra?”
I look to him, then to her, then back again. “Not with her. Not after everything she has done.”
When I look at Ravenna, I feel only a steely determination to finish this.
“Very well,” the emperor says. “It will be as you suggest. Selene, move clear of the sands. Leave the dampener around Ravenna’s wrist.”
Ravenna is clawing at that dampener, as if she might be able to remove it. She should know that it's impossible for her to do so. Only someone else can take it from her. Eventually she seems to realize that and determination settles over her face as well.
"All right," she says. "Powers or no powers, I can still beat you. You shouldn't have suggested this, Lyra, because all that's going to happen now, is that I'm going to kill you and I'm going to get to survive. You could have seen me dead just by walking away."
“And I'm sure that's what you would have done,” I say. “Always trying to twist the situation, always trying to get the biggest advantage. But I'm not you.”
“No, you aren't,” Ravenna says. “You're a fool. You could have been my friend, Lyra. We could have done great things together.”
“People like you don't have friends,” I snap back. “You just have people you use.”
“Enough talking,” the emperor commands as the arch magistrate clears the sands. “It is time for this to end.”
I stand opposite Ravenna, lifting my spear, testing the weight of my weighted chain. She has her spiked chain in her hands, her curved knife held ready.
“Gladiators, begin!”