Chapter Nineteen
RIVEN
The Moirai have gotten very creative with the trials this year.
At least, the route to get to them has been creative.
We’re waist-deep now, wading through warm lagoon water in the caves in the middle of the island.
Light shines down in spots from the holes in the cavernous ceiling above, giving me brief glances of the space and people around me.
Poppy wades beside me, water slicking her linen shirt to her skin.
Beneath the open-buttoned blouse, her tanned skin is covered in a dark green swimsuit that brings out the little forest-colored flecks in her eyes.
Her hair is wet on the ends, hanging in a long sheet down her back.
It's amazing what magic can do; only last week, her hair was short—much too short for as long as it is now.
A quiet curse slips from her lips when she steps on a rock beneath the surface. I know it hurts. I’ve done it myself at least three times. My eyes snag on her lips, watching them mutter curses and wannabe hexes at the rock.
She’s feeling spicy today, I see.
A rogue chuckle escapes my lips, snapping her attention to me.
“Stop looking at me like that,” she orders. Yes, definitely feeling spicy.
“Tell the Moirai to stop choosing challenges that make you wet.” I’m trying to get back into the schtick. The Riven, whom she has loved for years, is always armed with quippy sex jokes and swagger, but it’s not hitting the same.
She splashes me, and I laugh, but I know my grin doesn’t reach my eyes. My shadows tuck in around me, a thing they do when I’m…off. Like they sense my indecision as danger.
I step closer, crowding her space. My shadows like Poppy, maybe they will relax some being around her. It wouldn’t be the first time I eased them into her, hoping their vibrating nerves would ease.
Her breath stutters when one wraps up her leg, squeezing her thigh. “I’m sorry,” I say, regret lacing my tone because this definitely isn’t going to help whatever weirdness is happening. “They have a mind of their own sometimes.”
“It’s okay,” she says softly before retreating a step, “I know.” Her hands reach down, grasping the edge of the shadowed hand that’s formed on her thigh.
“This is fake,” she coos to my shadows, petting it as she unwinds it from her leg.
“And no one’s around right now to try to fool.
” She pulls away, letting my shadow’s grip dissolve like sand in an hourglass until it’s firmly tucked to me again.
What is up with her? She’s never minded when my shadows touched her before. Granted, they’ve never touched her bare upper thigh, but…they didn’t mean anything by it.
I watch her body tilt, bending gracefully around the corner, and I follow suit.
“Oh, wow,” she whispers, halting after she steps up out of the water onto damp stone. I keep my composure, but I’ll admit, the scene before us is worth her shock and awe.
The cave opens wide enough to send her praising gasp echoing into the abyss.
Stone rises in curved tiers, forming a natural amphitheater.
Phosphorescent moss veins the walls, casting a low, wavering light that conceals every face in half-shadow.
The ceiling arches high above us, jagged with stalactites that drip steadily into the dark, the sound echoing like a clock counting down.
The pit at the center is enormous. It’s sunken and ringed in damp stone, wide enough to host a dozen jousting matches at once, though the way the sand has been raked smooth makes it clear this isn’t meant for sport.
It’s meant for judgment. For performance.
I inhale deeply. The air smells like the sea and old magic.
Contestants murmur, shifting uneasily on the stone benches, excitement dulled by nerves.
No one quite knows how this trial will unfold, and the Moirai are down in front of the entrance to the arena with that look about them.
They wait, hands clasped and poised in front of them as they stand quiet and expectant, the way predators wait once the trap is already sprung.
I roll my shoulders, loosening muscles out of habit. Performance nerves. That’s all this is. I’ve danced, fought, flirted, and lied my way through worse rooms than this.
Still…
I feel it.
Pressure coils tight behind my ribs. Not fear. No. It’s responsibility. The kind that sits heavy once you realize someone else might pay the price if you misstep.
Poppy watches a half-step away from me, close enough that I can feel the warmth of her arm, far enough that it feels intentional. She’s quieter than usual. Pulled inward. No muttered commentary, no dry asides under her breath. Her hands are folded tightly in front of her, knuckles pale.
Anxiety, I decide.
Anyone in our shoes would feel it here. Anyone would worry about slipping up, about being found out. About losing.
But the thought curdles in my gut as it settles.
Because this whole ridiculous idea was mine.
Fake it.
Perform.
Sell it to the crowd.
Win the trials and walk away after the Festival, unchanged and free from curses.
At the time, it felt harmless. A gag like many others I’d played in my time.
I know how to win an audience. I know how to make people believe what they want to see.
But watching her now, shoulders tight, eyes fixed on the arena like she’s bracing for impact, something uncomfortable tugs in my chest.
I have nothing to lose, but what if the act costs her something real? What if the game I dragged her into makes the thing she wants most slip further out of reach?
Love.
The word lands harder than I expect.
Poppy wants love. And she deserves it too.
I glance at her again, trying to read her expression, trying to decide if that distance is nerves…or regret. And for the first time since this all began, I wonder if pretending might be the riskiest thing I’ve ever asked her to do.
What was I thinking?
Sweat slicks my palms. No wonder she’s been distant and moody. As always, she’s the smarter of the two of us and has realized just how stupid this whole thing is. And it’s too late to back out now.
“Matches.” The Moirai’s trio of combined voices echoes more ominously in the wake of my realization.
“Be seated,” the Maiden says, her voice soft and ethereal.
“It’s time you learn of trial two,” the Mother adds, her voice stern but nothing like the demanding rasp of the Crone’s.
The scrape of shoes on sand-covered stone scruffs through the air, halting to pin-dropping silence as soon as we’re all seated in the risers above the arena and the Crone begins to speak.
“After nearly two weeks, you should be well-bonded now. Time to test it.” A snap and pyrotechnics dance through the air.
Dramatic. “Couples will be placed in a magically generated environment of our choosing. Illusions are cast using a Septhis Stone.” I wince.
The unit I was in during the Ogre War used a Septhis Stone to practice battle simulations—the ancient relic has the power to make anything feel real.
It can tap into a participant’s inner self and draw on their fear and natural instincts to challenge them to their core.
Not the best option when your subconscious mind is hiding the fact that your lovey-dovey relationship with your match is fake.
“You will get scored on teamwork more than outcomes,” the Mother explains. “Each couple will face challenges in their labyrinth, and unlike previous years, when we all watched your choices be acted out on a simulation screen, this year, you will actually be in the simulation.”
The arena flashes, transforming into a lifelike illusion of a rain forest, complete with a prowling jaguar patrolling the edge. Two figures walk along the edge hand-in-hand, a fake couple the Moirai are using to show us what it will look like.
“The labyrinth adjusts difficulty based on the participants’ emotional bonds and choices,” the maiden continues, voice light despite the gravity of her words.
“It will feel very real, but have no fear, because any injuries you sustain in the simulation will heal as soon as you’re out.
” I wince, touching the place where my arm was lobbed off in a Septhis Stone simulation during the war.
It had been a fake injury, but it had felt so real.
“You will not roll before you make choices; instead, we will see the score of Fate on this screen after every crucial choice you make.” A simulated die rolls on the projection crystal, landing on a ten before a jaguar lunges at the fake contestants in the arena.
“The simulation will end once you have discovered and completed the challenge we set before you. Winners will receive an advantage in the next trial.” The Crone’s smile almost looks wicked. Like she enjoys making our lives difficult. “And Riven and Poppy will start us off.”
Before the eyes of the crowd fall on us, a smirk is on my face, shoulders confidently rolled back. Poppy smiles, but it doesn’t light her hazel eyes the way a true smile would. It’s fake. Like our match. A pang tugs at my stomach.
I press my lips to the shell of her ear. “You’re the most capable woman I know,” I whisper. “This trial fears you, not the other way around.”
She nods and then walks down the stone steps of the arena with a confidence that warriors would envy until we come to a stop on the stage below.
“To start, you have to press palms, foreheads, and chests together to unlock Fate’s challenge,” the Maiden instructs, her hands raising up to mirror the action. “And remember, these trials should show you far more about one another than they show those of us watching.”
“For Fate’s sake,” Poppy curses, coaxing a snort from me. A few years ago, that would have been the worst curse she could have thought of. Before she stopped revering Fate’s soulmate-finding power. I feel my cocky grin slip.
Poppy turns to face me, nestling into me. I feel the soft press of her chest against mine, and when I dip to press my forehead to hers, I feel her eyes burning a path over my face.
“Careful, sweetheart. If you look at me like that, I may forget this is fake,” I whisper, my own skin cringing at the sickeningly sweet sound of it. Do I always sound so…cheesy? I wrap my arms around her, embracing her in an honest act of connection I know she needs.
She snorts, a little laugh loosening the tension I feel in her back. “I’m not looking at you like anything.” Defensive, her face scrunches with confusion.
Since when did she start looking at me like that? With…disdain? “Are you okay?”
Our hands connect, and sigils glow around us.
“Forget it. We need to focus.” Her eyes aren’t on me anymore. They’re closed. Like she’s bracing herself.
“Poppy-” is all I get to say before the light blinks out and the illusion begins.
A flash of darkness, and then the world has shifted. Gone is the arena and the watching couples, and replacing it is a world I’ve never seen before. I know it’s a simulation, but it’s so real that it’d be easy to forget if I were in here long enough.
We’re in a tunnel now, cave walls leaking with moisture and smelling of mildew. Poppy’s hand finds mine in the darkness, and I squeeze it once. I’ve got you.
She squeezes back, not afraid, but with steady pressure. I know.
Our steps echo down the tunnel, the still quiet somehow more eerie than monsters jumping out at every turn.
“Is anything going to…happen?” Poppy asks.
“I’m not sure.” These trials are meant to challenge us.
To teach us about our partner and ourselves.
I suppose that being lost in underground tunnels would be unsettling for many people.
It would give them a number of things to overcome: panic, resourcing, or navigating in the darkness, just to name a few.
These are all things that would unsettle even the steadiest person. But not me. There has to be more.
The tunnels widen, magically pulling apart until we’re left in a large alcove of a cave.
The walls still seep with moisture, and light is scarce, but it seems we are no longer alone.
My shadows cling to the wall, whispering in their mother tongue that a creature lurks behind the jutted-out cave walls.
My shadows huddle around it to the north, and I step in front of Poppy, shielding her from a potential attack.
She wouldn’t know how to defeat it, not unless the beast is made of pastry and covered in icing.
The only great physical feat I’ve seen her accomplish is putting down far too many desserts than her small body should be able to fit.
A sixth sense I picked up in battle awakens. One that answers the call of violence without hesitation. Turning off all reason and shirking my carefree persona to stir the killer within.
The creature leaps at Poppy, and I hear her shriek only once before I’m baring my teeth and ordering my shadows to restrain it.
A better partner would have remembered that this is all fake.
Would have remembered that working together would best serve our purpose and that the illusion responds to our reactions.
Some contestants would have let their partners handle themselves.
I cannot.
My instincts overwhelm the illusion magic, rattling it so much that my shadows squelch out the beast they tangle around until it’s nothing but pixie dust in the wind.
“Where is it?” I growl, turning slowly, my hand on Poppy’s hip behind me to keep her near.
My power spikes, shadows caressing Poppy as I search for the next attack.
“Riven, I’m fine,” Poppy says, her words muffled. Sounding almost underwater behind the protection of my shadows. The simulation glitches, the ancient magic that lies dormant in my veins too much for the weak simulation the witches put together.
My voice drops to a gravel-dark order, “Stay behind me.”
My shoulders are angled at the flickering opening in the cave wall, the only place an attack could come from. I widen my stance, slightly elongated canines still bared.
I can feel the pulse of my magic behind my eyes, making them glow and allowing me to see through the darkness. My power giving me a predator’s edge that Poppy has never seen before. That I haven’t felt since I was at war.
Another beast attacks, running with all four paws on the ground, saliva dripping from its feline maw. My power flares again, dark and lethal, and disintegrates the illusion once more. I roll my shoulders back and steady my breathing.
Whatever sunshine I normally wear has disappeared entirely.