Chapter Thirty
“And the three houses shall be thus: One of Avus, to represent the freedom of Sanctuary. One of Lynx, to represent the fierceness of the Verdunn. And One of Viper, to represent the danger of straying from the Path.”
When I opened my bedroom door the morning after Dante’s birthday party, Bria waited on the other side. Her long hair pulled back in her standard sleek braid, her hands folded delicately in front of her, a placid smile on her face. I sighed and turned away but left the door open between us.
“If he’s sent you to make peace with me—”
“You’ve forgotten your Trial is today?” Bria asked, raising a brow.
I straightened and faced her again. “Nearly being killed has affected my memory, apparently.”
I made my bed, despite how many times everyone in the family had informed me that the servants would do it. I still wasn’t used to being waited on.
“Besides, I assumed after our discovery last night that Dante would wish to push the eighth Trial back until we’ve mastered our newest blessing.”
“It seems you’ve convinced him that it can be called upon as needed,” Bria replied serenely, unruffled by my agitation. “But if you would prefer for me to tell Cosmo that you’re not in the proper mindset to—”
“No,” I snapped. Opening a drawer, I rummaged for the Trial uniform Myrine had commissioned for us.
“Adrian, you only get one chance at each Trial,” Bria reminded me gently. “If you’re too angry or if you and Dante aren’t in the right condition to be true partners in this—”
“I’m fine.” I pulled off my t-shirt, and Bria turned away, ever the pious acolyte.
“I will inform the family.” She exited my room, shutting the door behind her.
I dressed quickly, then paused to examine my reflection.
I hardly recognized the woman staring back at me.
Thin, malnourished limbs had turned muscled and toned.
Bloated, starving stomach had flattened and smoothed.
My hands were rough and calloused from weight training.
My legs were lean from swimming. My hair was longer, softer from the soaps of the First Ring.
At least my amber eyes were the same. Still, my outfit was made of the finest material available in Sanctuary, and the ring on my finger glistened in the morning light.
I twisted it back and forth, itching to remove it.
Maybe Warren was right. Maybe I had become one of them.
At least I could convince myself I was. Until one of them tried to kill me and the rest of them flew to her defense.
I clenched my fists at my sides, trying to fight off the glaring question of whether they would have come to my defense if it had been me who’d tried to kill Olympia instead.
But Dahlia’s punishment seemed to tell me the answer already.
Are you coming?
I pushed Dante out of my mind and headed for the door.
The whole family waited in the foyer. Dante was speaking to his mother and grandfather in hushed tones near the door.
They all looked up at me when I appeared.
Bria hovered at the bottom of the stairs, offering a warm smile.
She wished me luck as always. She wouldn’t come with us to the tunnels. She never did.
The little kids of her class were gathered behind her.
They stared in open mouthed awe as I passed.
I’d gotten used to that, the way they looked at me, the way everyone looked at me.
As if I were some sort of marvel, some god walking among them.
Little did they know, I was just an average poor girl way out of her element and just as surprised as the rest of them by my success.
“Are you ready?” Dante asked when I approached.
I nodded, and the servants opened the doors.
Dante and I walked side by side through the gates of House Viper and toward the stairs.
It seemed as though the entire First Ring was out to watch our descent.
They lined the street, gaping in a dignified manner as we passed.
The Second Ring was much of the same, though slightly less dignified.
My family’s home boasted handmade banners, and my mother and brothers waved, smiling, from the gate.
I nodded to them as I passed but glanced quickly away, still feeling guilty for having refused to tell them of my engagement in person.
The Third Ring was much livelier than the first two.
People cheered for us, screaming our names and wishing us well while waving banners and flags they’d made from various scraps of cloth.
Harrison and his bandmates were the loudest, decked out head to toe in some bastardized tone of House Viper green, so vibrant it nearly hurt my eyes.
I smiled broadly at them and nodded back to Sophie who’d nodded serenely at me from under Graham’s arm.
Children sat atop their fathers’ shoulders for a better view, women craned their necks from their porches, men laughed and clapped, hooting as we passed.
I’d thought being waited on by servants in the First Ring was the strangest experience of my life.
Finding success in the Trials had been even stranger still.
But this? There was something about the oddity of being paraded through the center of Sanctuary, following the most direct route to the eighth Trial and finding it littered with people who simply wanted a glimpse of us, their heroes.
Being someone’s hero was never something I’d anticipated. Darius had, though.
Darius would have loved this.
I turned away, jaw clenching, and kept my focus on the task ahead.
I couldn’t risk getting emotional. No matter what was happening with the people of Sanctuary, I had a task to complete, a Trial to win.
And the second Trial had taught me that getting bogged down by the past, getting lost in my own emotions, would do me no favors.
While the noise grew the closer we got to the eighth tunnel, the cheers getting louder, clearer, I ignored our fans and focused only on entrance to our next test. Dante seemed to be doing the same.
He didn’t so much as glance at the crowd gathered to herald us onward, nor did he attempt to communicate with me.
We just marched on in silence, each of us preparing for whatever awaited us in our own way.
It wasn’t until we were safely alone, in the dark and relative silence of the eighth tunnel, that I allowed myself to relax, the tension dropping out of my shoulders. I took a deep breath and stepped into the familiar metal tube.
We were dropped into what appeared to be an enormous version of the same tubes which had brought us there.
The floor was metal. The room was a circle, with walls rising up to form a metal cylinder around us.
High above us, only visible because of our enhanced eyesight, were the rings, and in the center of the room was a solitary staircase.
Eight steps up to nothing but a drop back down to the ground below on the other side.
Dante moved closer to examine it.
I cast my eyes around the space as well.
I didn’t notice anything particularly interesting about the staircase.
It seemed normal, made in the same fashion as the much larger ones which connected each ring of Sanctuary.
The walls were made entirely of one sheet of metal, it seemed, but there were slots in it. Closed now but could perhaps be opened.
“Maybe we’re supposed to move the staircase?” Dante asked. I turned back to see him bending over and shoving his weight against the staircase. It didn’t budge.
He looked up at me and raised a brow, and I rushed over to help. But even with our combined strength, it didn’t move. He sighed in frustration. I only shrugged. I wasn’t sure why it mattered. The staircase itself wasn’t high enough to bring us anywhere near the rings anyway.
“There’s got to be something in here we can use to get up there.” Dante started systematically searching the room around us.
I kept my eyes peeled for anything out of the ordinary, but there was little to investigate. There was nothing in this room but metal walls, the stairs, and those rings high above.
Until…
“What’s that?” Dante’s gasp was drowned out by a mechanical whooshing that sounded strangely like our metal tubes when they transported us to our Trials.
One of the slots I’d noticed earlier had opened and something was slithering through. It was long and thick, like a rope but alive. It raised itself up and looked at us with beady little eyes, forked tongue flicking in and out of its flat, wide mouth as it hissed.
“What is that thing?” Dante cried.
I cocked my head to the side. Something about the creature seemed familiar and, when I realized why, I nearly burst out laughing. “I think…it’s a Viper.”
His eyes grew wide, and he shook his head. “That’s impossible. They’ve been extinct for a thousand years. They don’t—”
Another whooshing noise, and another viper slithered out of the wall behind us. Emboldened by its companion, the first snake darted toward us.
Dante cried out and bolted for the stairs. I dodged the viper’s first strike, speeding to the side. But another slot opened in the wall just beside my leg, and a third viper struck out at my ankle. I shifted just in time, and the snake bit nothing but air.
When I rematerialized, I dashed to join Dante at the bottom of the staircase.
A fourth compartment in the wall opened.
“What are we supposed to do?” he asked, wide eyes darting from viper to viper as they grew in number with each whoosh and gathered at the base of the stairs.
“Why aren’t they coming closer? Is there some kind of barrier protecting the steps?
Something we can’t detect? There’s nothing in here to fight them off with.
There’s nothing for us to climb to get to the rings.
Maybe we’re supposed to combine our gifts in some way. Maybe we’re supposed to…”