20. The Alliance #2
“You actually held your own surprisingly well, considering how your head has clearly been somewhere else the entire time we’ve been inside this ring.
” Khali leads us out of the ring to join Az, Reiva and Diana while the rest of Ferrum arrives.
She looks me over and shrugs. “Perhaps with Silver’s sessions in the training hall and us skiving R&R to spar here, it’s all becoming muscle memory. ”
My stomach churns. Part of me doesn’t like keeping the full truth from her.
The other half feels like I’ve become too relaxed and let my guard down around her far too much.
And though she doesn’t seem to think I’m suddenly about to win this entire thing, clearly she’s noticed that I’m not completely incapable.
Especially being able to hold my own against her attacks when my head is nowhere near the ring or even on this island.
Khali is good, and she knows it. Which means she’s going to have me figured out sooner or later.
“Nice work,” Diana whispers as Khali breaks off to stand with Az and I step in beside my nephilim friend. “You’re getting so much faster. Week on week you look more and more like…” One of them, I finish for her. “Like you’re made for this.”
My stomach twists again, but like Khali, Diana doesn’t seem suspicious, only congratulating me on the progress I’ve made.
Does that mean I’ve pulled it off? That I don’t need to hold back anymore because they all assume I’m good because their training program and games made me so?
“Seriously. Whatever Khali is teaching you is working.”
“Thanks, Di,” I mumble. “She’s a good teacher.”
Again, not a lie.
Rather than compliment what I’d seen of her training with Reiva and Az, which would be a lie, I ask, “How did you get on? I was kind of distracted.”
“I’ll say. Khali was not going easy on you.
” She glances toward Az and Reiva, then drops her voice to barely a whisper.
“Okay, I guess. They are really trying, bless them. But I can feel Reiva’s frustration especially.
They don’t get it. They’ve been doing this sort of thing all their lives.
Violence isn’t me. The only combat I’ve done was at the academy, and well, that was more mental combat to hold onto my marbles than anything else. You know?”
“You’ll get there.” I just hope it’s before we face a game our alliance can’t save her from.
“You will,” Reiva mutters from Diana’s other side. So, he’d heard everything, and is what? Feeling bad for losing his temper trying to train her?
A few weeks ago, I’d never believe a cambion capable of such compassion, but things have changed, especially where our allies are concerned.
Every day they do or say something that has me blindsided or questioning everything.
Diana grabs my arm and tugs at it frantically.
“What?”
Her eyes bug. “Holy…”
“Fucking…” Khali breathes and I follow their eyes.
“Lucifer…” I gasp as I see what the big deal is.
Silver and Az step into the ring together and start to strip off their training tunics.
I’m suddenly thrown back to a week ago in this very yard, our instructor in the stews, those abs… the water and steam and…
Without any exchanged words or theatrics, they start to spar.
A beautiful dance of blurring wooden staffs, blocks, kicks and immaculately honed muscle.
I didn’t know that two forces colliding could be so hypnotic. The way they move…
My siblings training together is the closest I’ve ever been to it with my own eyes, but this, it’s raw and lethal in a way that makes it impossible to look away.
I thought I was better than this, that I’d learned from my mistakes with Elias in the barn, but I’m holding my breath right along with the rest of them.
It’s too hot in this yard to remember why I should be chilled to my bones at the sight.
I’ve seen cambion fight a hundred times in the weeks since I became one of their cadets. I’ve seen seraphim warriors go at it a thousand more.
But this, it’s like Asmodeus said to Satan, “Let’s team up to make this one.”
Every edge of Silver’s body is honed like a weapon, all sharp lines and barely restrained power.
The vein-like patterns twist around golden skin, standing out even when they are muted.
They coil before every attack he makes, but it’s so quick, before Az or any opponent can catch it, they are already feeling the weight of his fist or foot or whatever body part he is weaponizing.
More of the faint silver markings consume the skin between his shoulder blades, crossing his entire back, wrapping around his arms, then trailing down over his stomach, which is like the poster child for how abs can look if you work hard enough.
They don’t stop there though.
I bite my lip as I track them past those dimples on his back, and when he turns, meandering to the V at the front before they disappear into his leathers.
And I want to touch them, to trace them, to feel exactly how much power—
Az goes in for the kill, and the markings that have been dull and muted on Silver’s skin for the entire fight so far glow. It’s brief, no fire and flames follow before they are muted once more, whatever magic he has is obviously not needed to finish this fight.
“Stop drooling over our Overlord,” Reiva teases Khali.
“It’s not Silver who has her drooling,” I whisper back before I remember myself.
Khali somehow manages to tear her eyes away from Az for the first time since he entered the ring, and they land on me with accusations in their dark depths. “What do you mean by that, Scarvo?”
No point denying it now.
I roll my eyes but don’t take them off the men in the ring. “Azazel Thorne isn’t exactly hard to look at—”
A low growl sounds, and it takes me a moment to realize it’s coming from Khali.
Reiva snorts. “I think you made your point, Scarvo,” he says. “Maybe now the two of them will stop eye fucking each other and start actually fucking—”
“Reiva!” Diana blushes, but Khali’s eyes are hooded and back on the one and only Azazel Thorne, who’s just been slammed into the ash by our Overlord and twisted up like a pretzel.
“Okay, Okay, I submit,” Az eventually grits out through his teeth once he can get enough breath in his lungs to talk.
And just like that, it’s over.