CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
Cheers break out around me as Alaric declares me the victor. It isn’t something he has the power to do, since he’s nothing to do with the games, but that doesn’t seem to matter to the people in the colosseum.
“Lyra! Lyra!”
They roar their support for me, those citizens on my side chanting my name over and over.
Selene's supporters look as though they can't make up their minds whether to run or riot.
I can feel the tension building again in the crowd, and I send out more waves of calming energy, determined to quell any violence in Aetheria.
I reach out through the animals of the city, watching the streets.
The fighting out there is dying down as waves of calm and peace spread, taking away the determination of every faction to kill the others.
I see people standing around, looking at their weapons as if they aren’t quite sure why they’re holding them.
I can’t stop every fight, certainly can’t control people with the precision of a psychomancer, but I’m not sure I’d want that kind of terrifying control.
I only want to take away the rage that has spread through Aetheria like a virus, forcing people to stop and think rather than simply attacking one another on sight.
Here and now, I have the power to do it.
Selene ordered magical amplification stones built into the colosseum to enhance her Grand Tournament, but now, they help me to calm people’s animal instincts throughout the city.
I keep pouring out waves of peace, while around me, the crowd continues to chant my name.
“Lyra! Lyra!”
I can still see a few more determined people attacking one another out in the streets.
Some of them are Selene’s supporters, not the crowds she’s whipped up into a frenzy with her popularity, but paid killers and mercenaries.
Some are guards, obeying what they believe to be the will of the senate.
Others are people she’s recruited from the gangs.
The resistance fights those, trying to stop them from hurting anyone.
I send them help, calling on the animals of the city to rise against the enemy.
Rats and stray dogs rush at them. Birds swoop from the sky to peck and claw.
It’s enough to break up their formations, drive them back, and send them running.
I give the resistance the advantage it needs to start to take control of Aetheria from the slums all the way to the palace.
I can finally let go of the magic I’m holding in place, relaxing and letting it flow out from me. I hope everything I’ve done in the city will be enough; I know I can do no more. I’m too exhausted and injured from my fight to do anything else.
I turn slowly, looking at the colosseum around me. The buildings Selene called into being have been mostly turned into a wash of rubble scattered across the arena floor. That’s what her dreams for the city have been reduced to, now.
Everyone is still looking down at me, the chanting fading a little as they all wait to see what I’ll do next. They aren’t looking at me like I’m just the victor in a contest, now. They’re looking at me like...
...like an empress.
I swallow as I think about the law Selene had the senate enact: that the victor of the grand tournament would rule.
It seems like too foolish and arbitrary a thing to stake such power on, but then, Selene didn’t imagine that she might lose.
And if she did, then whoever beat her would clearly possess such magical might that they deserved to rule, in her mind.
Looking around at the crowd, I’m sure everyone is aware of what my victory means. They’re waiting for me to tell them what to do, and the way life is going to be in Aetheria. I know I need to say something.
"I fought today for everyone in Aetheria," I say, lifting my spear. "I fought because it was the only way of stopping Selene Ravenscroft from simply taking power. Well, it's time for the fighting to end."
I fling my spear from myself, tossing it among the rubble that dominates the colosseum now. I walk onto one of the larger piles of it, so people can see me more easily.
“When we founded our Republic,” I say, looking around at the people in the stands. “We wanted to bring an end to the cruelty and violence of the empire. We wanted to create a version of Aetheria in which all the people of the city and its provinces could be safe and free.”
I give them a second in which to imagine that possibility.
"Instead, we got people trying to twist the Republic of Aetheria from the start," I continue, with a sweeping gesture that takes in everyone and no one, all at once.
I'm not going to pin the blame on just a few people.
I'd rather let everyone in the stands consider their own part in the way Aetheria has turned out.
"There were those who thought life would be better if they could only return to the days of the empire, and those who sought to protect the privileges they'd built up under it at the expense of the ordinary people.
Almost at once, corruption and bribery became the norm, with systems designed not for the good of the citizens but to placate the factions and interests within the city.
Everyone talked about our great Republic and how much better it was than the empire, but almost from the start, people were trying to erode everything it stood for. "
I wonder if I’ll persuade any of the people there. I wonder what it will take to show them that Aetheria can be a better place.
“Look around you at the other people in the stands,” I say.
“Selene Ravenscroft tried to tell you that only some of you were worth anything. That only those with the greatest magic count in Aetheria. It’s true that it’s a city of great magic, but that is not the source of its strength.
It's you, all of you. The people of this city are what make it into something beautiful, and this city should work for"
"No!" Selene's voice sounds behind me, and I turn to see her rising, her blade back in her hand. "No, this isn't done! This will never be done!"
She lunges for me, blade ready for a killing stroke.
I have no weapons, and I've used so much magic already that I don't have anything left to throw at her.
Our bout is over, and I wasn't expecting her to attack me so suddenly.
It means I have no way to stop the sword blow that's coming.
Selene is going to cut me down, and it won't matter that I was the one who won our bout.
Selene is going to take the throne regardless.
That’s when the ground beneath us rumbles, the rubble shaking so hard that I’m thrown from my feet. So is Selene. She falls, still struggling to get up, still trying to find a way to kill me.
A spike of stone rises from the rubble, the scattered stones reforming themselves into something sharp and deadly that grows with almost impossible speed.
It slams into Selene and she gasps as it punches through her body, lifting her into the air, high above the colosseum.
I see Rowan standing at the far side of the arena, his hand outstretched as he uses his power over stone to form the pillar of rock that impales Selene.
His face is creased in concentration. This must be right on the limits of his abilities, even with the amplification effects of the colosseum.
“It’s forbidden to attack once a bout is done,” Rowan says, striding forward while Selene twitches atop the spire of stone. She goes still, her body hanging in grim imitation of the ones that once hung over Ironhold, disobedient slave gladiators slain and displayed for all to see.
It's a shocking sight, one that stuns the crowd in the colosseum to silence as Rowan comes over to me, helping me up. He lifts my hand in victory, and now the crowd cheers as one, celebrating my win in the arena, or maybe Selene's death after all the misery she's caused.
“Thank you,” I say to Rowan, as a wave of relief spreads through me. I know, without his intervention, I’d be the one who’s dead, not Selene.”
“I couldn’t let her kill you,” Rowan says. “The city needs you too much, Lyra.”
Rowan keeps his grip on my arm as he leads me over to the throne Selene set on the floor of the arena. I know what he intends, and I’m already shaking my head as I approach it.
“No,” I say. “I don’t want to be empress. I don’t want to rule.”
“And that’s exactly why you should, at least for a time,” Rowan says. He picks up the golden crown of laurel leaves. His grip is strong enough that he holds me in place effortlessly as he sets it on my brow, before turning to the audience.
“All hail Empress Lyra of Aetheria!”