Chapter 8 #3
The warmth of his smile catches me off guard. Unlike the sharp confidence of the vampire across the room or Thorian’s constant brooding intensity, there is something gentler about this man. Something open and unguarded that immediately puts me at ease.
His gaze drifts over me, curious rather than assessing.
“You don’t look like most competitors.”
I let out a quiet huff of laughter. “I imagine that is a very polite way of saying I look entirely unequipped for this.”
His mouth curves. “I was going to say unexpected.”
The answer sends an odd little flutter through me.
He glances toward my empty seat, then back to me. “So what made you enter? Most people don’t volunteer for the gods’ games unless they’ve got something worth risking everything for.”
“I thought everyone already knew,” I say.
“I heard about you,” he admits. “But only bits and pieces. Mostly gossip. You know how these things go. By now, I’ve probably heard six different reasons you volunteered.”
Despite myself, I smile. “And which one did you believe?”
“None of them.” His own smile widens. “I figured I’d rather hear it from you.”
The simple honesty of the answer loosens the knot in my chest.
“My sister was chosen as the Courted Prize,” I say quietly. “She’s all I have left, and she isn’t strong enough for what waits if someone else claims her.”
The easy humor fades from his expression.
“That’s one hell of a reason.”
“It’s enough.”
For a beat, he simply studies me, as though seeing something he hadn’t expected.
Then he offers his hand. “Fenric.”
I place my fingers in his, and another strange shiver works its way through me at the contact. At home, every greeting was a curtsy and polite distance. This constant skin-to-skin familiarity feels strangely intimate.
“Nyx,” I say. “Lady Nyx Nocturne. I’d wish you luck in the trials, but...”
“Right, only one team can win,” Fenric says.
He releases my hand, but not immediately. His fingers linger against mine for the briefest pause, his warm green eyes holding my gaze as though neither of us is quite certain why the moment feels difficult to break.
Then his mouth curves into that easy smile again. “A shame. At least I can say I hope if it isn’t me who wins, it’s you.”
I simply stand there, caught by the warmth of his expression. It is absurd, this strange pull I keep feeling toward men lately. For years, my world was small and carefully ordered. I knew every face that crossed our lands. Every voice. Every expectation placed upon me.
And now, in the span of a single evening, I’ve found myself surrounded by men who unsettle me in entirely different ways. It is equal parts unnerving and impossible to ignore.
He nods at me, and I force myself to turn away. To clench my plate with its lone roll and walk through the room of competitors, of gods, and the privileges, and make my way back to Thorian.
When I finally return to our table, Thorian watches me intently, as though a decision has crystallized in his mind. Rather than letting me sit, he rises, his hand coming to my elbow. “Look, Nyx, there’s something—”
But he’s cut off by a loud trill ringing through the room, and one of the court staff standing up with a scroll, his eyes cutting over the teams.
“It is now time,” the man says, his voice carrying unnaturally through the room, surely amplified by magic, “for the teams to come before the gods. Please proceed to the throne room.”
At the sound of his announcement, I glance instinctively toward the dais. The gods are gone.
Their absence has changed the room in strange little ways.
The stars Soryn had suspended overhead have already begun to fizzle out, their once brilliant glow dimming into scattered pinpricks before vanishing entirely.
Around the columns, Terranis’s vines stretch greedily beyond their planters, leaves unfurling wildly now that his attention no longer keeps them restrained.
Even the elegant streams of water winding through the air have gone still, no longer turning to wine as they spill into the fountains below.
It is as though the room itself has sagged without their presence.
They must already be waiting in the throne room, seated in judgment and ready to inspect the competitors one by one.
Until now, a stubborn part of me had refused to fully believe any of this was real.
Even after entering my name. Even after the days of training.
Even after standing among the other competitors tonight, watching them eat and laugh and sharpen themselves for what lies ahead, it had all felt strangely distant, as though I were moving through someone else’s life.
But as Thorian and I move with the crowd flooding toward the adjoining throne room, reality settles heavily over me.
In a matter of moments, I will stand before the gods.
They will look at me and judge whether I am worthy of competing in their brutal games.
And for the first time, I will have to prove that I am more than a frightened noblewoman chasing an impossible hope.
I will have to show them that I am a warrior worth fearing.
That I am strong enough to save my sister.
Can I do this? The thought enters my mind in a panicked rush, so I take a deep breath. How can I not do this?