Chapter 12
Twelve
Maze of Death
My muscles burned with every step, my lungs aching as my boots slogged through knee-deep snow. I’d lost count of how many laps we had run.
Orin had been waiting for us when we returned from the woods, pacing the corridor outside our room like a storm about to break.
He’d lectured us about our stupidity with barely leashed anger.
I’d had enough time to hide my axe in my cloak and shove it under my bed before he forced us to the training yards.
Eventually, the other initiates had joined us.
But that was no break. We launched straight into hand-to-hand combat, which surprisingly, I was good at.
Bohdi had been running us through striking forms with swords while Orin stood silently. He kept his arms folded against his chest, watching us with an unreadable expression.
Bohdi raised his sword in a series of manoeuvres that we mimicked. Sword drills were worse today, but I gritted my teeth and endured it. At least no one was dragging me to a dungeon to slice my skin open. Small mercies.
“Lyra and Riven,” Orin snapped from the sideline. I startled, nearly losing my grip on my sword.
“Spar,” was all he said. Bohdi shot him an odd expression before sighing and stepping back.
I tried to meet Orin’s eyes, hoping for a hint of reassurance, but he didn’t look at me. Just like this morning, he gave me nothing but cold indifference.
I’ve pushed him too far.
Riven twirled his blade in a graceful arc around his body before settling into a loose attack stance, a grin tugging at his lips. He was infuriatingly casual, as though he knew exactly how this would end.
I had never held a sword against another person before, but I knew what it felt like to drive steel through flesh.
A smile ghosted my lips at the only fond memory I had of him. Perhaps I was more dangerous than I’d given myself credit for. Ever since I’d touched that axe, something else coiled beneath my skin. Restless and alive. I struck first, a clumsy jab that Riven deflected with ease. Effortlessly.
But he didn’t counter. He just watched me, grey eyes bright with some unreadable glimmer. I gritted my teeth and swung again, putting all my desperation behind the blow. Metal met metal in a scraping clash that rattled all the way up my arms.
I tried to steady my breathing and swung again, a wide arc meant to drive him back.
He blocked it with a flick of his wrist, the movement so casual it felt like mockery.
“Come on, Princess,” he said encouragingly.
I lunged once more, aiming low. He stepped aside, turning just enough that my blade met nothing but air. I grunted with frustration.
He swept his sword down towards my shoulder, slow enough that I could scramble to parry. When the blades met, a sharp pain laced through my wrist, the weapon almost slipping from my grip from the force.
“Block with two hands, Lyra!” Bohdi yelled from the sideline.
The cut Riven had accidentally given me throbbed as I gripped the pommel, taking Bohdi’s advice. I kept blocking.
He didn’t relent. Another strike, then another, each one harder, each one precise and almost lazy, as though he were testing how many blows it would take to wear me down.
Gritting my teeth, I lifted my sword to block a high cut. Too slow.
His blade smacked against mine with a jarring crack. The force wrenched the sword from my grasp, sending it skidding across the snow.
“Give up, Princess?” His grin widened, splitting the cut in his lip.
“Never,” I said, lunging for my discarded sword in the snow. I gripped it, rolling onto my back in time to block Riven’s sword. I kicked my leg out, connecting with his thigh, and he stumbled.
Seeing an opening, I dropped my sword and threw myself at him, pulling Orin’s dagger from my belt. His eyes widened as he crashed into the snow, his body underneath mine. My legs straddled his hips.
His pulse beat against the blade I pressed to his throat, steady and sure, and I hated how it drew my gaze to his mouth. The heat flooding through me felt nothing like victory. His eyes flicked to my mouth, before those storm-cloud eyes crashed into mine.
“Give up?” I asked breathlessly, though I wasn’t entirely sure if it was from the fight.
His hips bucked up, throwing me off balance. In a swirl of movement, I was suddenly on my back in the snow, my hands pinned over my head. Riven’s body pressed against me, pinning me against the ground.
“Never,” he said, his breath mingling with mine. He gave me a grin before pushing off me, standing and extending a hand towards me. My fingers clasped his, and he helped me stand.
Orin avoided looking at me, lips pressed into a hard line.
“Back into formation,” he grunted. His coldness hit harder than the wind.
I’d thought his anger last night was punishment enough, but this was worse.
I didn’t know whether I wanted to scream at him or force him to look at me.
I swallowed the feeling, forcing a mask of indifference to slip over my face.
After watching the others spar and eating dried meat around the fire barrels, Commander Kragthorne marched into the training yard.
“Good luck,” Bohdi said as he walked with Orin to the viewing platform. My mouth went dry as I noticed the other Iron Guards leaving their initiates behind, and the growing crowd gathering in the viewing platform.
“Welcome to the second war game!” Commander Kragthorne announced, the crowd cheering.
My stomach sunk. Orin would have known, but he didn’t warn me.
He hadn’t so much as looked at me since his lecture this morning.
And after my fight with Riven, the frown line on his forehead hadn’t quite gone away.
If I thought he was capable of caring about anything more than his role, I’d say he was jealous.
“Today, you will fight,” Commander Kragthorne boomed.
“Each squad will be issued a single medallion. Your objective is simple: protect your own and steal from the other squads. When the game ends, the squad holding the most medallions wins. The winning squad will earn an exemption from the next game.”
Round golden medallions strung on a strip of worn leather were handed out to all fifteen squads.
Dreya held ours and it gleamed in the dull light with the number one in its centre.
The other initiates were either picking up extra weapons or making sure theirs were secured.
Orin’s dagger was still in my belt, but that wasn’t the weapon I wanted.
I wished I had the axe, but Riven had insisted on it staying hidden under my bed.
Dreya had used her Sanctum to make it invisible while Orin had lectured us last night.
“May the Gods have mercy on your souls or find joy in feasting on your blood.” Behind Commander Kragthorne, five Iron Guards walked towards us.
Their hands moved in sync with one another, causing threads of power to twirl in a delicate shimmer.
The ground shuddered beneath our boots. I stumbled backwards and Riven grabbed me under my arm to stop me from falling.
Stone exploded from the ground in front of us, cutting us off from the other squads.
The fighting pit had been transformed into a maze of jagged stone around us.
I stared at the towering walls, fear settling deep in my bones. The dull winter light vanished behind a curling mist, swallowing everything in suffocating silence. A scream pierced the fog, the clash of steel close behind it.
The mist slithered across the stone, thick enough to hide a body. My fingers found the end of my braid, twisting it until it bit into my skin. “It’s a little barbaric, isn’t it?” I said, eyeing the narrow walkway ahead. “Making us kill each other and calling it a game.”
“Says the psycho who tried to strangle me.” Hadley glared at me, as though she were trying to burn holes through me.
I smiled sweetly and looked down my nose at Hadley. The bruising around her neck had faded to an ugly yellow. Pity. It had suited her, like a collar on a dog that barked too much.
Roman quirked an eyebrow, boots crunching against the iced over stone. “Focus on the game. You may not care if you die, Lyra. But the rest of us want to live.”
“We need to move,” Dreya snapped in a hushed voice. She levelled us with a warning look before walking further into the maze. The darkness was so complete I could only glimpse the outline of Riven following her. A crack echoed through the mist, too close.
Dreya signalled for us to halt from the front of the line, her hand a swift, urgent motion.
I pressed myself against the rough stone, its jagged edges biting through my clothes as we crouched. The silence pressed in, thick and suffocating. I pulled the dagger from my belt as Dreya peered around the corner, gesturing for us to follow.
Two bodies lay on the ground, fresh blood oozing across the snow-flecked stone.
My stomach churned as I forced myself to look away while Dreya and Riven searched the dead, their hands moving with grim efficiency.
I knew the dangers of Ascension. Of standing on the front line in the war against the Fae.
I had accepted all the ways I might die when I chose this.
Welcomed them, even. But I didn’t think I could be killed in some stupid game.
“No medallion,” Dreya murmured.
“Obviously.” Riven chuckled. “The squad who killed them would have taken it.”
The others kept walking. But I hesitated, watching blood run between the grooves in the ground, a gentle caress marking the wasted lives of those the Gods had chosen.
Another scream cut through the fog. I jumped, hurrying to catch up to my squad. We had made so many sharp turns that I was beginning to feel disorientated. We came to a slight opening and the maze branched off in four directions from where we stood. The perfect place for someone to be hiding—
A large form lunged out of the shadows, slamming into Riven. He hit the ground with a grunt. An initiate loomed over him, the tip of his sword pressing against his throat so hard, a drop of blood began to ooze.
“Give me your medallion or I’ll slit his throat!” Riven’s attacker pressed the blade harder against him. Riven chuckled despite being in obvious danger and the steel scraped against his stubble.
I stared in disbelief as Riven’s face warped.
Morphing into the same features as the man pinning him to the ground.
His hair shortened and changed, mirroring the male that pinned him to the ground.
They looked identical. It was as if he had made himself into an exact replica.
Taking advantage of the distraction, Riven grabbed a fistful of snow and threw it into his face.
He pushed his hips up, throwing the initiate off balance.
In a tangle of limbs, somehow Riven now straddled him, spinning his knife away from his body and squeezing his throat with his other hand.
His face returned to his own as he squeezed the life out of his attacker.
The initiate struggled, legs thrashing against the ground, but Riven’s grip only tightened.
The initiate’s eyes were glassy. He stilled, arm dropping limply to the side.
Riven rose slowly, the lifeless body sprawled beneath him, its neck twisted at an unnatural angle.
“I think you just received your Sanctum!” Dreya said excitedly.
Riven grinned at her before searching the dead body. “No medallion,” he said as he came up empty handed.
“But where is the rest of his squad?” Roman crossed his arms, looking around the small clearing.
Hadley was facing a dark alleyway. She exhaled sharply, flexing her hands. The air shifted around us.
I pivoted, my hair whipping me with the sudden movement.
Two initiates were running towards us, swords raised.
Hadley threw out her arms and wind roared.
An invisible blast of air sent the initiates flying, slamming into the stone wall.
The bodies crumpled against the ground, eyes fixed and unmoving.
Hadley laughed, staring down at her hands with open delight. “I did that—”
Her words cut off mid-breath.
A dagger tore through the dark and sliced into her throat, blood spraying as the blade sunk to the hilt.
Her eyes went wide with shock, mouth opening in a soundless, wet gasp.
She staggered, hands flying to her neck as blood spilled through her fingers and splashed against the snow-dusted cobblestone.
I hadn’t realised I’d moved until I was there, catching Hadley as she crumpled forward. Her weight collapsed into me, slick and heavy, her breath gurgling against my ear.
Panic crawled up my spine as I looked past her into the darkness.
“You’re okay. It’s okay,” I whispered, feeling the weight of the lie on my tongue.
Where had it come from?
The shadows stretched deep and unmoving. Too thick to see through. But I could feel them.
“Dreya,” I whispered, my voice breaking as I tightened my grip on Hadley. She didn’t hear me. No one did. Her attention was fixed on Riven as he rifled through a fallen initiate’s pockets. “Riven—”
“Got one!” Riven yelled, his voice slicing through the eerie quiet as he yanked free a medallion and held it up with a triumphant grin.
Roman returned his smile from where he was crouched over the other body, searching for anything useful.
“Riven!” I shouted, panic tore through me as Hadley gasped violently.
Their heads snapped towards me.
Dreya’s hands flew to her mouth.
Roman grimaced, turning away as if he couldn’t bear to look.
“It came from that way,” I whispered, my gaze locked on the darkness. “They are there. I can feel it.”
The mist pressed close, swallowing the scent of blood sharp in the air.
Hadley’s fear-filled eyes stared up at me, her breath slowing as she gurgled and choked on her own blood.
“You’re free now,” I whispered as I wrapped my hand around the dagger protruding from her throat.
A sound slipped from me before I knew what I was doing. Low and soft. A melody drawn up from somewhere deep within me, vibrating through my chest and into my bones.
I pulled the blade free with a wet squelch. Blood flooded down her neck and spread across my leg. Hadley’s body shuddered once and went still. My song threaded through the rush of blood, through the roar of my pulse pounding in my ears, steady and consuming.
I did not recognise the tune, but it belonged here.
I hadn’t liked her. But she didn’t deserve to die in a game for Gods who had turned their backs on us.
Somewhere behind me, steel clashed, and more screams followed. My song died in my throat, the sound of steel clashing jarring me from the haze.
Dreya’s voice snapped me back. “Move, Lyra!”
For us, the game had only just begun.