Sloan’s lazy eye wandered Rhino’s way, and she grumbled something.
“Good luck, and dive safely!” X said as he walked down the platform. “I’ll see you all soon.”
Miles barked once, tail thumping.
In the open launch bay, the divers looked stoically out—no waving or departing words. Even Sofia kept her arms at her sides, but her eyes were on Rhino.
His heart thumped as the launch-bay doors closed. He had always longed to be with Sofia, and now that he finally could, they were once again pulled apart by the realities of war.
“You ready for this?” X asked.
“Always ready for a fight,” Rhino replied. “But I’m afraid this won’t be much of one.”
“That’s what I’m counting on.”
X set off with Miles running ahead.
“Move it, lug,” Sloan said, elbowing Rhino in the biceps. She cracked a sly grin that made him wonder whether she was flirting with him. The gruff woman would have made a good Cazador like Wendig.
“Ton, Victor, with me,” Sloan said, gesturing for them to follow. They ran to catch up, eager to protect their king.
Hundreds of Cazadores stood in the stands around the recessed stadium while more streamed in through the heavily guarded access door. They wore their best clothing and jewelry to watch once again the spilling of blood on sacred ground.
Unlike the other Cazadores, Rhino hated the Sky Arena. Even when he was a younger man, the cheers and bloodlust had felt unnatural. Fighting the monsters in the wastes was one thing, but he had never enjoyed taking another human life.
As a child living underground, he had learned to value life as a precious gift. But living on the islands had taught him that life here was anything but precious. Here, they glorified death. He would perform his duty tonight, but he would not enjoy it.
He closed in with the other soldiers to form a phalanx around the king. Here, with so many Cazadores who had lost loved ones, X had security threats aplenty.
Families stopped to look, some baring their sharpened teeth in a show of respect. A man bent down next to his four-year-old daughter and pointed at X, whispering something to her that made her smile.
Rhino scanned for threats and moved into the elevated booth from which el Pulpo had watched the battles during his reign. Sergeant Wynn was already there.
“Area is secure, King Xavier,” said the brawny soldier, pulling back a drape to the booth. Today, there were no slaves serving wine, broiled chicken, or skewered shrimp. Just two boys and a woman Rhino didn’t recognize, but judging by their fair skin and their clothing, they were sky people.
X spoke to them quietly and gestured toward Rhino. “General, this is Mallory and her sons, Rhett and Keith.”
Rhino didn’t need to ask who they were. Both boys and their mother had swollen eyes from crying.
“Tonight, they will watch you kill the man who killed their father,” X said.
Rhino walked into the booth and stopped in front of the kids. The oldest couldn’t be much past puberty, the youngest nine or ten. Skinny boys with long, wild hair.
“I will avenge your father,” Rhino said.
A second horn silenced the crowd in the recessed stadium. Everyone stood and looked down at Jackal, the announcer, with his spiked hair and thick, curled mustache. He wore his trademark faded blue pants and bloodred shirt. In one hand, he carried a megaphone; in the other, a handgun.
Rhino couldn’t stand the guy, but the crowd roared as he strutted to the center of the stadium. He brought the megaphone to his mouth. “¡Buenas tardes, señoras y señores!” he yelled. “¿Están listos para ver un poco de sangre?”
The stadium erupted in clacking teeth and excited screams.
Jackal pumped the megaphone into the air and brought a hand to his ear. “I can’t hear you!”
The audience yelled louder as Jackal raised both arms higher and higher.
But not everyone in the arena shared the exuberance. Mallory stared blankly downward, and her boys watched the spectacle with the same hatred in their eyes that Rhino saw in the gazes of some Cazadores who looked up at the booth and their new king. It was a look he had seen on the deck of the training ship Elysium when X first went there to meet the youngster warriors.
“Since you all have been starved of blood, Colonel Moreto has decided to quench your thirst,” Jackal said. “Tonight, Warthog comes out of retirement to deal with two thieves we caught stealing fish.”
Rhino looked across the arena at another booth reserved for nobility. Inside stood Councilman Tomás Mata with several other wealthy merchants. They huddled in the shade of an awning, drinking wine and smoking cigarettes.
In the next booth was Carmela, with her parrot on her shoulder. She waved to the crowd and then gestured down to a gate.
“Here comes Warthog!” Jackal yelled.
Rhino hadn’t seen the warrior fight for almost two years. The sixty-year-old former soldier, who had fought under the leadership of el Pulpo, had gone into retirement after a long and impressive career in the army and as a gladiator.
The last Rhino heard, he was living on a fishing boat.
Warthog ducked under the gate and strode out wearing a helmet topped with the spiked crest of a bone beast—the same monster that had killed Whale and Fuego in the wastes before Wendig finally brought it down. Only a handful of the nightmarish things had ever been killed.
Warthog wore the trophy and carried the spear that had killed it in the wastes twenty years ago. It was also the reason for his nickname—the bone beast had clawed off half his nose in the battle, leaving him with a porcine snout.
Hollers and clicking teeth greeted the warrior. Jackal scampered away and climbed a ladder to the stands while two gaunt, half-naked Cazadores were shoved out onto the dirt. Though the men had some military training, they were still fishermen, and a far cry from skilled warriors.
The thinner and older of the two turned and tried to run back into the gate before it closed. A Cazador standing guard kicked him to the dirt. Laughter rang out from the stands.
The man brushed his long gray hair from his face and looked around, disoriented. He got up and stumbled over to pick up a sword that a warrior had tossed down. The other prisoner picked up a second rusty blade.
Jackal fired his handgun into the sky to kick off the fight.
Rhino had a feeling this was going to be fast.
The only way the two men stood a chance would be if they worked together, and that didn’t happen. They split up, and Warthog decided to pick one of them off right away.
He threw his spear at the older fisherman, impaling him through the chest and pinning him like a bug to the wooden wall of the arena. It happened so fast, the crowd didn’t immediately react. He squirmed for several seconds before going limp.
Then came the shouts.
Warthog threw his arms up in the air, feeding off the excitement.
The second thief, seeing his only opportunity to dispatch Warthog while his spear was stuck in the wall, ran at him. He swung his dull blade, but the veteran gladiator ducked it easily.
The edge hit the bony skull crest with a loud crack.
The man staggered past Warthog, his balance off. He swung the blade backward, but Warthog was already on his feet and backing away. The swipe missed his arm by a good two feet, and the prisoner wobbled again.
Warthog used the opportunity to move forward and punch the man in the back, knocking him to the ground. But the scrappy fisherman managed to hold on to the sword and swiped again, nearly slicing Warthog’s boot.
The gladiator again backed away, letting the man get to his feet with the sword. He crouched in a defensive position and motioned for Warthog to advance. Perhaps he was more than a fisherman after all.