Chapter Eight
‘ONE, TWO, THREE,’ the referee roared, hand slamming the ground.
The body didn’t move, and Leo threw his fists to the sky in celebration.
Warrior didn’t begin to cover what he was.
Elara had watched the last three fights enraptured.
Each fighter that had entered had been knocked out cold by the general.
He was near unrecognizable. He was bare-chested, sweat shining on him, blood flecked across his smooth brown skin and soaked into his hand wrappings, though none of it was his own.
No weapons had been the rule, and Leo had left his belt racked with them with Elara before he’d stepped into the pit.
She looked agitatedly to the box where Merissa was laughing, nearly glowing, as she spoke with Madame Miramere.
The woman was not the hag that Elara had envisioned.
Instead of a wizened old woman, Madame Miramere looked young, with creamy skin like spilt milk, her eyes a cold, bright blue—intelligent and shrewd—while her mouth, painted dusky pink, seemed to know a secret that no one else did.
Her hair, mahogany brown, was striped with one streak of white, and her clothes were the fashionable garb of Castorians—a dove-grey sumptuous silk dress, high-necked, with frilled lace underskirts.
She tipped back her head and laughed at something Merissa was saying as they applauded the match delicately, while the drunks around Elara roared and shoved and cheered and spilled their drinks upon her.
She pulled a face as she brushed off yet another splash of beer staining her dress and looked anxiously at Eli.
He was looking nowhere near her, in fact appearing rather bored as he watched the commotion.
Two more rounds to go and Leo would be the winner.
They could take the snakestone home—fairly and justly.
The referee started up again. ‘Our next fighter entering the pit is a captain in his own right. Introducing the honourable Lord Adrian “Blueheart” Mereille!’
Elara scrambled forwards, pressing herself to the fence as she looked in disbelief at the blue-haired pirate swaggering into the ring. He waved and bowed to the crowd, drinking in their cheers, as Leo raised his fists.
Adrian winked at him before launching himself at the King’s Thunderbolt.
Leo was far larger than the pirate—both in height and shape.
But Adrian seemed to tease him around the ring, bobbing and weaving as he ducked out of the way of Leo’s jabs.
The crowd ‘oohed’ and ‘aahed’ at the spectacle—finally, here was a contestant who was giving the long-standing victor a run for his money.
Elara chewed her nail in agitation. This wasn’t how the plan was supposed to go.
Gods, she couldn’t stand being a bystander as her friends put themselves in danger.
She looked at Eli, but the god didn’t spare her a glance, intrigue on his face as he watched the fight.
Merissa was still charming Madame Miramere, hand over hers as they whispered conspiratorially.
And no one seemed to care that Leo might be about to lose or be hurt.
She turned back to the spectacle and saw Leo look—a millisecond, it must have been—up to the box, to Merissa. And Adrian struck.
The punch knocked Leo in his gut, and he doubled over. Elara swore as she gripped the fence holding her there and the crowd surged around her. More fucking ale spilled down her back and she had to fight back a shadow that wanted to lash out at the culprit.
‘Get up,’ she whispered, watching as Leo remained doubled over. ‘Come on, get up.’
A spark of lightning fizzled out of Leo before extinguishing, and it was then that Elara knew something was terribly wrong.
Leo remained bent over, though Adrian had barely touched him.
Elara knew combat. She’d trained with two of the most formidable warriors in Celestia.
And that kind of punch couldn’t have caused that much pain.
He began to cough, now clutching at his throat as Adrian sidled around the ring, shaking his arms out.
‘Something’s wrong!’ Elara shouted. But the crowd continued to jeer. She looked around desperately to Eli, but he was too deep in conversation with the other women in the box.
Leo was on his knees now, face turning purple as he coughed again, but the crowd only roared. ‘Fuck this,’ Elara growled, shoving a path through the crowd. Shadows were already gathering between her hands and, with a swirl of them, she blanketed the entire pit in darkness.
There were shrieks and screams at the sudden absence of light, and Elara raced through the chaos towards the fighting ground. She deftly skipped down stairs cut into the rock towards the burly referee—conveniently silent in this match—who was trying blindly to find his way to the exit.
Her vision blackened yet again, and, when it cleared, the referee was tumbling into the crowd.
Elara sidestepped him, ignoring the gasps and shouts as he landed among the spectators.
She jumped the last steps into the pit where she could see Adrian looking towards the blanketed crowd in confusion, Leo still on his knees, suffering.
She realized then, as she made out Leo more plainly, exactly what Adrian was doing. Leo coughed, and water dribbled from his mouth as he now lay on the floor.
‘Godsdamned Neptunan,’ she hissed. Adrian could clearly manipulate the element of water and was using that very gift to drown Leo from the inside out.
Adrian still hadn’t noticed her there, peering instead at the shadows that coated the pit, and Elara stretched her neck.
She flicked her gaze to Eli, who she could see through the darkness, a Star in the night—looking at her with pure fury.
Mortals might have been merely fodder to him, but lying on the ground was Enzo’s brother. Her friend.
Walk out of here before someone realizes who you are, he hissed into her mind.
As though she would let a loved one die for an object.
She gave him a dry smile as she elegantly raised a hand and spun shadows from it.
A noose flew at Adrian, wrapping around his throat as he yelped. She tugged viciously, and the pirate fell on his arse before skidding back through the bloodied dust at her behest.
‘What in the bleeding Deadlands is going on?!’ someone shouted near her.
‘The darkness has spread!’ others screamed.
Adrian clawed at the noose, gasping for air as she yanked him to a standstill, letting his back crash into her chest. She wrapped the shadow noose around her fist, pulling tighter.
‘Let him go,’ she ordered into his ear.
He turned then, eyes widening as he beheld her.
‘You.’
Elara’s eyes narrowed. She was wearing a different face. But she had no time to ponder his recognition, instead lacing another rope around his neck and squeezing as the crowd lost their minds. ‘Let. Him. Go.’
Adrian’s eyes bulged, but finally he clenched his fist, and Leo was released. Leo coughed and spluttered, taking deep, shuddering breaths.
‘You’re a dirty starsdamned pirate,’ she spat at Adrian, letting him go so he also collapsed to his knees and sucked air back into his lungs.
‘And you,’ he rasped. ‘You have ten thousand midans on your head.’
Elara stilled, turning slowly. ‘What did you just say?’
‘You heard me,’ the pirate seethed.
‘El,’ Leo rasped, panting heavily.
‘Go,’ she ordered him, looking nervously at the crowd. ‘Get the snakestone.’
‘I’m not leaving you.’
‘Go. That is an order from your queen.’
Leo hauled himself up, and Adrian lunged at him. ‘The snakestone is mine,’ he shouted.
But Elara was ready. Her arm flung out, lacing more shadows around Adrian, thick coils that wound around and around him until he fell to the ground.
‘Get Merissa and the snakestone and leave,’ she implored her general as she saw the shadows begin to thin.
Leo cast her one last helpless look before sprinting towards the exit.
She turned then to where Adrian remained bound.
‘How in the skies do you know who I am?’
Adrian laughed drily, though the sound was quickly swallowed by the crowd growing ever more agitated. Elara could see them pushing and shoving each other as though to try to get out of the darkness. ‘You think I’d forget your face?’
Elara blinked. ‘But I’m glamoured—’
Adrian grinned, despite his circumstances; a smile which she was sure worked on other women, but not on her. He nodded. ‘Yes, just like you were in the boat?’
‘You saw through that?’
‘I did, Cass.’
‘Why are you here?’ she snapped, tired of his teasing tone and vexed by the crowd. Her head was beginning to spin, though whether from the exertion of her magick or something else she couldn’t say. She didn’t know how much more time she could buy Leo.
‘For the snakestone, of course.’
‘And what do you need a snakestone for?’
He snorted. ‘I could ask you the same thing.’
Before Elara could respond, a figure finally broke free from the crowd.
Elara froze, still above Adrian, as a woman staggered through.
She blinked at the sight before her: Adrian bound in shadows, clouds of darkness warping and pulsing behind Elara.
She raised a shaking finger, face ashen, eyes wide.
‘St-starkiller,’ she wailed. ‘It’s the Starkiller!’
Elara swore. The screams and shouts grew and grew as more people fought past the wall of darkness, some trampling others as they began rushing towards the pit.
‘Kill her!’ someone screamed.
‘For Lady Gem!’
‘The ten thousand midans are mine!’ came an exalted shout.
Elara spun. ‘Well, Adrian, it was lovely to see you again, but I’d better dash.’
Her shadows were already spreading beneath her.
‘You know, as much as I enjoy being tied up, this isn’t quite the right setting,’ Adrian said, looking nervously to the men who were now traversing the pits’ entrance.
Elara sighed, flicking her hand and cutting his bindings as her dragun began to materialize beside her, its claws and fangs sharpening. When it was large enough, she vaulted up on it as Adrian remained slack-jawed, and the crowd began to gasp and scream.
‘Holy mother of Stars,’ Adrian said faintly.
Her dragun flew.
From her higher vantage point, she began to plan her exit. But everywhere she looked was blocked with those trying to stop her escape.
Adrian was still standing there, dumbfounded, like the useless idiot he was, as the crowd advanced. But then, to her horror, when the first few people reached him, they began clawing and tearing at him.
With no weapons save his powers, his hands twisted, trying to drown them the same way he had Leo.
But alas, there were too many. Elara paused in the air, watching, brow furrowed.
Try as he might, he could not fight them off.
The crowd’s incensed fury and excitement at seeing Elara was reaching fever pitch as they scrabbled for any pound of flesh, not caring whether it was hers or not.
Something bright and blue began to glow from Adrian’s hands, and she realized that it was water—pure water—conjured from his palms, torrents now pouring on to the ground.
‘He’s trying to fill the godsdamned pit,’ she murmured. It was maybe the first spark of intelligence she’d seen in the pirate. She waited a moment longer, the exits around her still barred.
She searched for Eli, but the box was empty.
Neither he, nor Madame Miramere nor Merissa was there.
She fought down her panic. She would find them.
She turned her attention back to the onslaught of the crowd, now beginning to swallow Adrian.
Her eyes widened as she saw someone yank his hair, another grip his calf as they tried to drag him down into the water.
It was senseless. Those most moved by violence tried to stab at Adrian with paring or hunting knives, which Adrian seemed to dodge by forcing water down their throats, though he was waning. Even city guards, their grey cloaks billowing, advanced, drawing their weapons on the pirate.
‘Help!’ Adrian shouted.
More than one person now held him down within his own beloved water, others trampling him in their frenzy to get to Elara.
The pirate cried out in pain, those mischievous blue eyes bright with fear. An innocent, who had done nothing to this crowd. At the mercy of this…this onslaught of sheep.
And something within Elara snapped.
She growled, willing her shadows into a nosedive and jumping off her dragun as it reached the floor once more.
She threw out her hands. Shadows spewed from them, wrapping and tunnelling around the advancing, gleeful mob.
She looked at them, at their one mind, their call to violence so easy when it was in the name of their gods.
How much blood had been spilled for them, for faith in gods who did nothing to save those believers.
She would save Adrian. For Sofia. For the blood her friend had spilled for a Star.
But as the shadows grew darker and more vicious, coating the crowd, her world tipped once more and everything went black.
When Elara came to, she was standing ankle-deep in the water that Adrian had been trying to fill the pit with. The world was silent. Why was it so…?
She blinked, and blinked again, before taking a shuddering, wailing breath.
Bodies. Bodies floated before her, scores upon scores of them, lapped by the dirty tide. She waded back, only to bump into another, and screamed. Their blank stares were wholly black, never-ending, and she held a trembling hand to her mouth. ‘No,’ she whispered. ‘No, no, no.’
She turned then, seeing the seats entirely emptied of those who had fled. And every member of the crowd in the pit, every guard and savage who had tried to attack Elara and Adrian…was now dead.
She turned fully in a circle, stilling when she saw one lone figure standing in the water.
‘Adrian,’ she said in a rushed breath, splashing towards him. He didn’t move, looking between her and the bodies. ‘Did you do this?’
Adrian shook his head, tanned face now ashen. He took a step towards her. ‘You did.’
She stumbled, falling into the tainted water. ‘You’re lying.’
He shook his head. ‘You…you let me live.’ His voice was calm, so calm that at first she couldn’t quite comprehend what he’d said.
She reeled backwards, looking down at her own shaking hands, at the shadows she could feel still pulsing under her skin.
‘You owe me a life debt,’ she rasped, staggering to her feet.
Adrian blinked at her, though there was not an ounce of fear in those ocean eyes. Only something as steady as the sea. It pierced her, unwavering, as she turned away and ran into the tunnels.