39. Drusilla
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
DRUSILLA
D ru nearly smiles from watching the crowd in the arena rage against the legatus as the arena floor closes again beneath the platform.
The sun beats down on them, and Dru squints, her eyes adjusting after having been in the near darkness for so long. Cato blinks his eyes rapidly beside her.
“Stellae,” she mutters, watching the other, unhindered competitors approach them. None of them rush into the arena, gazes wary as they take their time, likely to ensure no traps have been set for them. Unlike Cato and Dru, they have no idea why they were spared this fate.
Marcus, who leads the group carrying a shield and spear, catches Dru’s eye first, then slides to Cato, determination and ferocity sharpening his icy-blue stare.
Dru glances down at the spears and shields she noticed before on the platform. At least they gave us weapons . Not that they have any way to reach them at the moment.
Beside her, Cato has backed himself up against the pillar, both hands flush to the stone and squinting his eyes in concentration .
He turns his face toward her and murmurs, “I’m going to use a burst of humming magic to break us free of the stone.”
She barely nods. “If ever there were a time to use your magic, it would be now.”
“Precisely.”
When Dru glances over to the other competitors, she finds Marcus’s attention back on her.
Blind resolve pinches his brow: he’s going to try to save them first, leaving himself vulnerable.
She tries to communicate through her eyes not to do something so rash, but, even if he could understand her, he wouldn’t listen.
Once all the competitors have huddled inside the arena, Phaedran soldiers file in from both entrances, placing themselves at even intervals along the walls. Half a dozen stand guard at the only two exits. No escape, for any of us.
There’s a chance no one in this arena will be alive at the end.
“Let the competition begin,” Ambitus signals, followed by a single drum beat.
At the sound, the other competitors sprint straight for Dru, Cato, and all those chained to the stone. A few take advantage of the close proximity to their competition, barely slowing down to stick them in the side or the leg with their spears.
“Now would be a great time to do something,” Dru tells Cato as they close in on them, bloodlust in their eyes, spears aimed at their hearts.
Her chain shudders, but the metal doesn’t budge.
“I have to be delicate,” Cato explains. “If I do too much and destroy the entire stone, the Imperium will find out that the Durevolians have magic.”
Dru huffs. “If you don’t free us, you’ll be dead. So, choose wisely.”
Another rumble vibrates through her chain until, with a crack, the metal links break apart. Dru’s hands fall to her side, the irons hitting the ground behind her.
Once the other competitors chained to the pillar recognize they’ve been freed, they lunge for the spears and shields in front of them. A few, however, are met with the long end of the others’ spears before they get the chance.
Once Marcus reaches them, he places himself between her and Cato, holding up his shield and aiming his spear as Dru leaps for her own weaponry—right as the competitors clash with them.
She barely gets her shield up in time to block the first thrust, her arm vibrating from the impact. Marcus stabs forward with his spear, gutting the competitor, and slamming his shield into the face of another.
Shuffling forward, Dru moves away from the stone pillar, not wanting to get pinned down there.
The cries of the dying echo around her as another competitor swings for her head.
She blocks the swipe easily with her shield while jabbing her spear into the fleshy part of woman’s calf.
She screams and drops to ground, allowing Dru to stab her in the chest as she steps over her body.
Another Phaedran lunges for her thigh with the point of their spear; she blocks it down with her shield, anticipating his next thrust. He pulls his arm back—when something hits him from behind and he stills. The tip of another spear pierces though his chest armor, coated with blood.
The man crumples to the ground, and Dru looks up to find a Durevolian wrenching their spear out of his back. She crouches down and readies herself for their attack, but they don’t spare her a glance. Instead, they move on to the Phaedran attacking Cato beside her, spearing them between the ribs.
This man isn’t the only one: all of the Durevolian competitors appear to only be attacking Phaedrans.
“What’s happening?” Cato asks no one in particular.
A tentative smile attempts to pull at the sides of Marcus’s lips when she glances at him. “Looks like the Imperium finally crossed a line with the Durevolians when they chained up the king of Anziano.”
Dru stops to consider what that might mean, when the sound of someone approaching them from behind draws her attention.
She spins on her heel, her braid flicking over her shoulder, to find a competitor’s spear pointed straight at her chest. Keeping her shield raised, she lunges forward with her spear around the side of it, skewering the man in the stomach before he can reach her.
He drops to his knees, blood dribbling from his mouth.
She kicks out at his chest and he collapses to the ground.
A short screech nearby pulls her to the left.
What must be the smallest competitor in the entire blood trials—and the woman who nipped at Cato’s heels in the horse race—charges her.
She’s too close for Dru to shift her shield over in time, and the sharp point of her spear slices through the top of Dru’s hand, forcing her to drop it as she ducks.
Dru hisses but doesn’t have time to nurse her wound.
The Phaedran woman comes at Dru again with a ferocity she’s never encountered, thrusting and stabbing forward without relenting.
Dru thwarts her every attempt, while knowing she can’t tire herself out like this.
Blocking another thrust down into the ground, Dru kneels down, grabs a fistful of dirt, and tosses it into the woman’s eyes.
Dru’s spear piercing her throat cuts off her virulent scream.
Without giving Dru a moment to catch her breath, someone else barrels toward her out of the corner of eye.
Grabbing her shield off the ground, she rolls toward them, lands on her knee, and thrusts the point of her spear upward.
Their eyes widen in surprise as blood gushes from the wound directly below their chest. With a short yell, she yanks the sword from their flesh and they fall to the ground.
“Better get up—it’s not over yet,” a familiar voice says behind her.
She turns on her heel to find Marcus standing above her, offering his hand. She gets to her feet with his help.
“When is it ever over?” She glances around, finding more than half of the competitors dead or bleeding out on the arena floor. Many of them wearing red arm bands.
She’s about to question his judgment, when she watches a Durevolian throw his spear at one of the Phaedran soldiers on the outskirts.
It meets its mark in the fleshy part of his leg and she gasps.
Blood gushes from the wound as he falls to his knees and then collapses to the ground. Crimson soaks the dirt beneath him.
The crowd goes silent. Until a few rise up from their seats, their voices starting to cheer louder and louder, until the cheers become one tangible phrase:
“Morte all’Imperium! Morte all’Imperium!”
Dru searches the crowd of mostly Durevolian spectators, standing and pumping their fists into the air in tandem with their mantra.
“Death to the Imperium,” she whispers.
One of the few Phaedran left leaps out from behind the stone pillar, aiming for Marcus. He brings up his shield, going toe to toe with them.
Dru moves to help, when she notices a spear flying straight for her—she gets her shield up just in time. The impact forces her to stumble back as the point of it splinters the shield’s thick wood and digs into the surface of her armor, but doesn’t penetrate it.
Facing her attacker, she recognizes him as the man she beat in the first trial. Fury blazes in his dark eyes as he stalks toward her, yanking another spear from a lifeless body on the ground.
Tossing her useless shield to the side, she breaks her spear in half against her knee and grips both ends, taking a run at him once again.
Having given him no room to throw his next spear, she presses her advantage.
With his spear aimed directly at her heart, she crosses the separate pieces of her own and thrusts upward.
She bends her neck backward as far as it’ll go to avoid his sharp spearhead and slides on her knees as his weapon changes direction, lifting his arms and leaving his midsection vulnerable.
Breaking off, she dives forward before he can recover, thrusting the metal tip of her spear into the space between his ribs where the armor isn’t tied tight enough.
Crimson spurts from the wound, spraying her breastplate. He staggers, dropping his weapon, but doesn’t fall. Breathing hard, Dru climbs to her feet and kicks out, making contact with his stomach and forcing him to the ground. Where he stays, unmoving.
Marcus comes up beside her. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she says breathlessly, gesturing at her last opponent. “Don’t worry about me; worry about Cato.”
He touches her wrist. “I’ll always worry about you.”
She almost smiles before picking up the dead man’s fallen spear.
Looking around her, more bodies litter the ground. The Durevolians have now started fighting the Phaedran soldiers on the edges of the arena, wounded and outnumbered. The spectators cheer louder and stronger—a sea of rebels demanding blood.
Only a few soldiers fall before three drum beats sound, and Legatus Ambitus stands to quiet the crowd.