Chapter 23 #2
No one gave me a second glance now. All attention was on the arena below.
We squeezed through to the barrier just as two figures entered the arena from opposite ends.
Tyler bounced on his feet, his silver buzzcut gleaming under the harsh overhead lights above the fighting ring. He’d stripped off his jacket and wore only a black undershirt and fitted black trousers. His feet were bare.
The woman across from him wore a ruby red high-necked blouse and black trousers. Her feet were also bare.
“Why aren’t they wearing shoes?”
“You’ll see,” Benedict said, his eyes alight with excitement. “Thrope fights are all fur and fang. Vicious, of course, but Haematophage fights are brutal and terrifying because each party looks human, and yet…they’re not.”
Dori interjected. “What Benedict is—not so eloquently—trying to say is that Haematophage have a beast too; it just looks a lot like us.”
“Two minutes,” the voice on the intercoms bellowed. “Start the timer, hit the bell.”
The bell rang, and Tyler threw back his head and roared.
His eyes bled to black, and his mouth stretched wide, fangs lengthening as more teeth sprouted from his gums. Across from him, the female sith screamed, arching her back as her face morphed, jaw dropping and elongating.
Her fingers grew long and tapered, tipped with black talons.
Dark blue scales erupted across her shoulders, snaking down her arms, and the whites of her eyes turned red to match her blouse.
Their feet changed, growing long and wide. They used those mutated feet to launch into the air a moment later, pouncing at each other.
They clashed with bloodthirsty snarls, clawing and tearing at each other like rabid beasts. A mist of blood rose to surround them, swirling as if alive. It momentarily obscured our view, hiding them from sight. All we heard were the awful sounds of tearing flesh and the gurgle of a wet scream.
A few seconds later, Corrine shot out of the mist, hitting the mesh with a clang that shook the arena before dropping to the ground like a stone.
She lay on her back, eyes glassy and unseeing, skin as white as a sheet, cheeks sunken, lips pulled back from her teeth. She looked…dead.
Tyler landed on the ground a few feet away, taking half the mist with him. But it no longer hid him; it hovered over him like a red cloud. The other half drifted over to Corrine, pulsing erratically like an unsteady heartbeat.
Was she dead? She certainly looked dead. Not a twitch or a blink. No rise and fall of her chest. “Is she dead?”
“Fel, no,” Dori said. “Sith are hardier than that.”
“Not as hardy as dhampir,” Clary said. “Dhampir are near impossible to kill—that’s why the vampire houses keep producing them. Wait for it…”
Corrine’s hand twitched, her arm rising as if reaching for the mist. It whooshed toward her, but Tyler struck first. He grabbed her by the throat, yanking her away and slamming her into the mesh.
The crack and snap of bone filled the sudden silence.
Corrine let out a high-pitched squeal, her body morphing back into its perfect, beautiful human form.
Her skin began to glow silver, ethereal and breathtaking.
My insides twisted with longing, and I gripped the rail harder, leaning over it, desperate to get to her.
“Careful!” Benedict’s hand shot to my waist. “Don’t look directly at her.”
Tyler growled, shaking his head as the tension bled from his body.
“You don’t want to hurt me,” Corrine crooned, her voice like honey—warm, rich, and sweet. “Let me go.” There was no tone of command in her words, only compulsion. It beat against my senses, the pin-drop silence confirming everyone else felt it too.
“Release me, Tyler,” she crooned. “You want to let me go.”
Tyler’s shoulders heaved as he fought the compulsion. For a moment, I thought she had him—that he was going to back down. But then he slammed her against the mesh once more.
“Fuck you, Corrine!” He sank his teeth into her throat, ravaging and growling as her gurgling scream filled the room.
What the fuck? He was killing her!
The bell rang shrilly, ending the match.
Tyler dropped Corrine like a bag of trash and walked away, his body morphing back to his human form.
Corrine lay in an unmoving heap, her throat a masticated maw, eyes glassy and unseeing.
“He killed her…” I turned to Benedict. “He fucking killed her.”
“No, he didn’t,” Benedict said. “Look.”
The mist sank into Corrine’s skin, covering her completely. The wound in her neck began to knit, and life flickered in her eyes. She sucked in a ragged breath, then another, as the mist finally dissipated, leaving her healed and whole.
She sat up slowly, fixing Tyler with a murderous glare. “You’re a bastard, Damascus!”
He spat blood. Her blood. Then wiped his mouth. “And you’re a cunt. What of it?”
“You can’t have them.”
“You lost, so they belong to me. Have them delivered at sunset tomorrow.” He strode to the exit but paused, looking up at me. His razor-sharp smile—so much like his brother’s—made my soul quake. You’re next, he mouthed. Then he ducked through the door and was gone.
“Next match,” the arena master announced, “Tamina Vayne and Anamaya Onyx.”
* * *
Voices and faces blurred as I descended into the arena.
Students and seafolk parted, clearing a path for me.
Jay and Brek stood on the opposite side of the cage, flanked by a couple of other bulky guys.
More Thropes, no doubt. And standing on the other side of the arena was my opposition, the Phage of the hour, Tamina.
She’d dressed in tight red trousers and a red silk bodice. An ensemble that brought out the murder in her eyes and left nothing to the imagination.
She carried no weapons aside from her cherry-red nails, which were sharpened to points.
Maybe I was about to get clawed.
I could handle that.
But she was sith like Corrine. Could she use her glow and words to control me?
Would she make me inflict damage on myself?
I needed to be prepared to look away from her aura and resist. Drayven’s warning came to mind about her ability to get into someone’s head.
Could she do that even if I wasn’t looking at her?
My skin prickled in awareness, everyone was watching me.
If I failed, if I fell under Tamina’s control, then my defeat and shame would be on full display.
Had I taken on more than I could handle?
Ruspin sat behind the mesh, collar biting into his throat, warm brown eyes filled with shadows. Fresh welts decorated his flank. It was a message for me, and a panacea to my doubts. If I fell, I fucking fell, but like Tarrifel would I walk away without trying to save him.
Tamina followed my gaze and smiled. “You like it? I made a pretty pattern,” she singsonged. “I plan to make more once we’re done here. If you’re still conscious, you’re welcome to watch.”
This bitch was going down. It’d been a while since my last fist fight—I was itching to break a nose, maybe dislocate a jaw. I flexed my fingers, registering the slight stiffness in my right hand. Fuck it, busting it again would be worth it to smash her nose in.
“Three minutes,” the arena master said. “Let’s bring the pain.”
The crowd roared. Tamina raised her arms, urging them to cheer louder.
I looked up at the Unwoven. Clary gave me a thumbs up, Benedict dropped me a nod of encouragement, and Dori shouted, “Fuck her up, Onyx!”
“Boo!” the crowd yelled.
“Onyx bitch!” Someone shouted.
Great, Tamina went around beating her pet Thrope, yet I’m the villain? Twisted.
The crowd to the left of our cage parted, and Arnav stepped through. He crossed his arms, surveying the arena before locking his sharp emerald gaze on me. A small group of females surrounded him, preening even though he didn’t spare them a glance.
Boy, did I feel special.
The bell rang, shrill and damning. Before I could act, pressure coiled around my shoulder, and an invisible force yanked hard at my arm.
My shoulder dislocated with a sharp pop.
“Fuck!” I clutched at my arm now dangling useless at my side, and Tamina grinned from ear to ear, her eyes alight with triumph.
“Is that all you’ve got?” I popped it back in, and her smug smile died. “My turn.”
I closed the distance, fist connecting with her face, producing a satisfying crunch and gorgeous blood spray. She staggered back with a grunt, both hands covering her nose. I punched her in the head before she could recover.
She hit the ground, her shoulders shaking. Wait, was she…laughing?
Fuck, she was.
Her shoulders quaked with mirth, her laughter rising, annoyingly melodious as it echoed around us. She wiped at her bloody face and looked up at me with a perfectly healed nose.
What the fuck? How was I going to hurt her if she healed this fast? I shook off the doubt. I could do this. I’d hit harder, faster, not give her time to recover.
I threw another punch, but an invisible force grabbed my fist.
Tamina rose slowly, wiping her sleeve across her mouth to catch the last of the blood. “I let you have those two blows for free, Onyx. But now, it’s time for you to kneel.”
Pressure gripped my leg above the knee.
Crunch.
I buckled, hitting the ground, my palms scraping the stone floor.
Shit, she’d taken out my knee. I fake screamed a beat too late, mind whirring as to how I was going to kick her ass if I couldn’t use my leg.
Tamina leaned down, her eyes glittering with realization. “You don’t feel it, do you?” Shit. “That’s your curse. No pain.” She threw back her head and laughed. “Oh, this is perfect. I see now. I see why you agreed to this. How long has it been?”
“Fuck you.”
“Do you miss it? Did you ever have it? Do you want to know what it feels like? Pain isn’t just housed in our bodies, sweetie…
” She tapped her temple with a cherry-red nail.
“It’s also housed in our minds. Let me show you.
” Her eyes narrowed as she focused on me and a band of pressure circled my head, blurring my vision.
“This is what a dislocated arm feels like.”
Fire burst across my shoulder, sinking claws into my skin so suddenly that my scream was nothing but a strangled gasp. “And your knee.” Needles sank into my knee and my ears buzzed. “A broken wrist.”
Ice-cold spread across my wrist before blazing with a fire that had my ears ringing and the edges of my vision darkening.
This time, the scream that tore free from my throat was all too real.
Shrill and awful. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t see.
I was blinded by agony and crippled by pain.
Pain hit in sharp, unforgiving waves—shoulder, knee, wrist—before finally sinking its claws into my abdomen.
I curled in on myself, body trembling, eyes rolling, and that’s when I saw him…Drayven.
He crouched by the mesh, eyes on me, watching my pain with unblinking focus. Jay and Brek flanked him, along with the others.
The Thropes…
Agony tore through me in fresh waves, raw sobs clawing up my throat. But I kept my gaze locked with his, watching him through hot tears. He’d come for me. To bear witness to my pain, like they’d done for Ruspin.
Like they did in solidarity for all Thropes. But tonight… Tonight, they were here for me.
There was strength in that. Strength and beauty, just as there was in the pain, because for the first time in a long time, I wasn’t numb.
I was a fountain of sensation. Rippling with it.
Fire and ice, needles and blades, stabbing, burning, and pricking.
I screamed again and again, venting until my cries morphed into laughter—because this wasn’t real.
This was temporary. This was her doing. And praise the Trinity—it was glorious, because pain was part of living.
And I finally felt alive.
I hauled myself to my feet, limping to favor my busted knee, riding the echo of pain she had given me,
“No…” Tamina said. “What is wrong with you?”
I laughed through tears, past the tightness in my throat. “You can’t break me. I’m already broken, bitch.”
The bell rang, and Tamina’s hold on me snapped. Her eyes rounded in shock. “No…” She shook her head. “You can’t… This can’t be happening.”
“But it is!” Drayven shouted over the clamoring crowd. “Ana won.”
The silence was loud as everyone absorbed this truth.
Tamina looked across at Ruspin, then back to me. “You can’t have him! I won’t let him go!”
A sudden heat tore a path across my chest.
Drayven bellowed, grabbing the mesh and shaking it, his horrified gaze on my torso.
I looked down at the bubbling crimson stain seeping through my top. What… The edges of the world went gray. A scream pierced the air. Metal clanged, and the world swayed and tipped.
I hit the ground on my side, trembling as shock overtook me.
“No!” Drayven’s shadow fell over me, snarls and growls erupting behind him.
Another scream echoed, but all I saw was him—warm moss-green eyes, hot breath against my cheek, my neck. Warm… My chest was warm, even though the world was darkening.
“I’ve got you,” Drayven said. “Out of the way!”
I was floating. It was…nice.
“Stay awake, Ana. Stay—”
Darkness swallowed me.