Chapter 13 #2
Everyone knew an imprisoned witch was a dead witch. She was here for the show. Perhaps she could best me in whatever tomorrow would bring. She would then join the hunt and tell them everything she knew of Vitoria.
And still she would die in the end. It wasn’t until I had crossed the room that I finally broke and turned to face her. The earth witch had suffered in the trial. Dirt still clung to her hair, and her hands shook with exhaustion.
“How noble of you to volunteer to save the world from the Phoenix.” Katarina’s voice was conversational, loud enough for Wickett to hear, casual enough to sound like friendly concern. “If only we’d known just how close she was to us. Some... closer than others.”
My throat tightened, and for a moment I couldn’t swallow the wine I’d been drinking.
The glass trembled in my grip before I managed to set it down.
There was a threat of exposure laced in Kat’s casual words, not of my nature, of course, but in the fact that Tor and I were like family.
And I was here to block every path to her.
“Makes you wonder what might have been done differently,” Katarina continued, her hand resting briefly on my shoulder in what looked like a show of comfort but felt like a brand. “If we’d known who we could really trust.”
She straightened up, her voice brightening to the level of normal dinner conversation. “Well, I should get back to my table before they serve the next course then lock me away. Good luck tomorrow, Syneca. I have a feeling we’ll all get exactly what we deserve.”
I stared at my plate. She knew I wasn’t a noble volunteer. She knew Vitoria was like a sister to me. And she knew Calder and I would do anything to sabotage the hunt. She was only waiting for the right moment—as soon as she stood to gain the most, she’d spill all she knew to save herself.
“Old friend of yours?” Wickett asked, sending my heart straight into my stomach.
The words came out steadily, though my throat felt like it was closing. “Something like that. We have history.”
“Seems like a complicated history.”
I reached for my wine again, doing everything I could to mask the fear of her implied threat.
“Is there any other kind?”
He made a noncommittal sound, but I could still feel the weight of his attention on my skin. Across the room, Katarina had settled at her table, wearing a satisfied smile that made my stomach twist into knots.
She had me trapped as surely as any magical binding, and we both knew it. The Oracle’s Guardian stood perched next to her with the kind of casual authority only those born to power could truly understand.
He’d traded his dragon form again, now appearing as the man Eda Mire had been questioning us about, dragon mark on his neck and all.
Though power still radiated from him like heat from a fire.
His silver and black hair was a tousled mess, but when it caught the light, I could see the hints of purple hue, just enough to give away the color of the beast within him.
He moved between tables without fanfare, each step deliberate and unassuming. When he reached the contestants’ section of the hall, he didn’t try to command attention at all. He simply waited—with all the stillness of a dragon—until our conversation died naturally.
Patient. Inevitable, even.
His voice was pitched low, but it carried to every corner of the hall all the same.
Not through magic or projection, just the quiet confidence of someone who never needed to raise his voice to be heard.
“The second trial begins at dawn. Teams will navigate a maze built specifically for this hunt. You’ll be tested on more than just raw ability. ”
Another fucking maze. The Magistrate had absolutely no imagination.
From the head table, Tiberius’s fingers drummed once against his goblet, perhaps a tiny tell that suggested he wasn’t entirely pleased with how his carefully orchestrated event was being reshaped.
But he said nothing. Even Tiberius Veyne knew better than to interrupt a Guardian at work.
The Guardian pulled a crystal from his robes.
There was no flourish, no theater; he was merely retrieving a tool for a job.
“Three artifacts wait within the maze. Which you choose will determine your role in what is to come.” He paused to look at Wickett and me.
“Because you won today’s challenge, your team will get a head start. ”
He extended the crystal pulled from his robes toward me. “Before we begin, I’ll need witch magic to reveal the artifacts you are all aiming for.”
The attention of the entire hall settled on me. I reached for the crystal, letting my fingers trail through the condensation on my wine goblet. “Manifestus,” I whispered.
Water answered my call like it always had.
Three objects materialized in shimmering light within the outstretched crystal.
A crown of gold with black thorns that moved with a slow, hypnotic malice.
A chalice that filled and emptied itself in endless sequence.
The third was a blade whose form cast no shadow, the space beneath it remaining bright.
“You must choose only one,” the Guardian said, pocketing the crystal with the same understated efficiency he’d shown throughout. “But choose carefully.”
Around us, dozens of whispered conversations started up all at once as people recalculated their odds.
“Well,” Lucette said quietly, “that was illuminating.”
Wickett studied the space where the artifacts had appeared, his expression clinical. “The crown leads. The blade kills. The chalice...” He paused. “The chalice is something else entirely.”
The binding around my wrist pulsed, reminding me that whatever we chose, we’d face it together. Three paths. Three destinies. Three ways for tomorrow to end.
Dawn couldn’t come fast enough, and yet, I dreaded its arrival all the same. I felt Wickett’s attention shift. He was already determining which of us would prove useful and which would become liabilities. The hunter’s mind worked like a machine designed for efficient, merciless killing.
Wickett planted his hands on the table. “Pass the wine.”
I reached for the bottle. Heat gathered in my chest, begging for release, demanding I burn away the magical chains that bound me to him.
I couldn’t, of course. Instead, I bit down on my tongue until I tasted iron and passed him the fucking wine.
“Good witch,” he said. The condescension in his voice made me want to drown him.
Across the table, Lucette said quietly, “I have nothing to hide here. The crown. That’s what my team will claim if it’s still there.”
“Why?” Pip asked, her voice smaller than usual as she cocked her head to the side, the charms she’d woven into her hair clinking together.
Lucette smiled, though it wasn’t kind. “Process of elimination. The chalice keeps filling itself with unknown liquid, and that blade looks hungry. I’ll take my chances with thorns.”
The binding tightened again, yanking my hand closer to Wickett’s.
Exposing the mark he’d seared into my palm with that damn coin.
No one else seemed to struggle as much as I was.
As our wrists were forced together, he leaned in just close enough that his breath warmed my ear.
“Fighting it only makes it worse, witch. You’re mine until one of us dies. ”
“Last I checked, leashes work both ways.”
He completely ignored my barb, straightening before whispering, “We’re taking the crown.”
I turned to stare at him. “Why?”
“Because I don’t like giving my enemies their first choice. Bad precedent.”
Heavy footsteps approached our table. I knew that gait.
That familiar presence. Calder appeared beside us, his dark coat still damp from whatever duties had kept him occupied during dinner.
His eyes found mine immediately, scanning the binding marks on my wrist, the way I sat too close to Wickett, and probably also the exhaustion I was trying to hide.
When his gaze dropped to my hands resting on the table, his entire body went rigid. The Hunter’s Promise was barely visible on my palm, but Calder never missed tiny details. His jaw worked as if he were biting back words that would get us all killed.
“Syn.” My name came out rough, loaded with everything he couldn’t say in present company. Are you hurt? Are you safe? What did they do to you?
“I’m fine,” I said quietly, though we both knew it was a lie.
His attention shifted to the Ripper, and the temperature around our table dropped. “Hunter.”
“Heartless One.” Wickett’s response was equally cold, but there was calculation in his eyes as he studied Calder’s protective stance.
Calder’s hand moved to rest on the back of my chair, a gesture that looked casual but positioned him between me and any potential threat. “Pip Willowbend,” he said, though his eyes never left Wickett’s face, “the Magistrate requests your presence.”
Pip’s wings fluttered nervously. “Now?”
“Now.”
As Pip gathered her belongings, Calder leaned down just enough to speak near my ear. “Really okay?”
“Really,” I whispered back.
The binding yanked me closer to Wickett, as if it were responding to Calder’s proximity. As if that fucker had some kind of pull over the magic that held us together. Pain flared through the marks on my skin, and I couldn’t quite suppress the small sound that escaped my throat.
Calder’s eyes went murderous. He’d already lost one of his roommates to this madness. He wasn’t about to lose another. His hand dropped to his blade hilt, the movement so smooth it was almost invisible. But Wickett noticed.
Of course he did.
“Careful,” Wickett said. “Wouldn’t want anyone to get hurt over a simple magical mishap.”
Calder didn’t step back. “Come on then, little one. Best not to keep the Magistrate waiting.”
As they moved toward the exit, Calder’s gaze found mine one last time. The look in his dark eyes was pure anguish, the expression of someone forced to leave family in enemy hands.
Tomorrow, we’d enter the maze. Tomorrow, I’d be alone with Wickett in another place designed to kill us. And Calder would have to watch it happen, helpless to do more than pray I survived.