This started when I fell into the Spiral Garden, a body made of sparks, and now it ends at the Bowl of Bones. I’ll leave as a corpse.
Arena attendants, all dull-eyed Silvers, descend on us like a flock of pigeons. They pull me behind a curtain, preparing me for what’s to come with brisk movements and hard hands. I barely feel them, pushing and pulling, shoving me into a cheaper version of a training suit. This is meant to be an insult, making me wear something so simple to die in, but I prefer the scratch of fabric to the whisper of silk. I think dimly of my maids. They painted me every day; they knew I had something to hide. And they died for it. No one paints me now or even bothers to brush away the dirt from a night spent in a cell. More pageantry. Once, I wore silk and jewels and pretty smiles, but that doesn’t fit Maven’s lie. A Red girl in rags is easier for them to understand, and to kill.
When they pull me back out again, I can see they’ve done the same for Cal. There will be no medals, no armor for him. But he has his flame-maker bracelet again. The fire burns still, smoldering in the broken soldier. He has resigned himself to die, but not before taking someone with him.
We hold each other’s gaze, simply because there’s nowhere else to look.
“What are we walking into?” Cal finally says, tearing his eyes away from mine to face Arven.
The old man, white as paper, looks back on his former students without a flicker of remorse. What did they promise him, for his help? But I can already see. The badge over his heart, the crown made of jet, diamond, and ruby, was Cal’s once. I don’t doubt he was given much more.
“You were a prince and a general. In his wisdom, the merciful king has decided you are to at least die with glory.” He smiles as he speaks, showing sharp little teeth. Rat’s teeth. “A good death, the kind a traitor doesn’t deserve.
“As for the Red girl, the trickster.” He turns his fearsome gaze on me, focusing harder. The stifling weight of his power threatens to drag me down. “She will have no weapons at all and die like the devil she is.”
I open my mouth to protest, but Arven leers over me, his breath reeking of poison. “King’s orders.”
No weapons. I feel like screaming. No lightning. Arven won’t let me go, even to die. Maven’s words echo sharply in my head. Now you are nothing. I’ll die as nothing. They don’t need to hide my blood if they can claim my powers were faked somehow.
Down in the cells, I was almost eager to step out onto the sand, to send my sparks into the sky and my blood into the earth. Now I shake and shiver, wanting to run away, but my wretched pride, the only thing I have left, won’t even allow that.
Cal takes my hand. He quivers like I do, afraid to die. At least he’ll have a chance to fight.
“I’ll protect you as long as I can,” he whispers. I almost don’t hear him over the tramp of feet and the pathetic beat of my heart.
“I don’t deserve it,” I mutter back, but I squeeze his hand in thanks all the same. I betrayed him, I ruined his life, and this is how he repays me.
The next room is the last. It’s a sloping passage, leading up a gentle incline to a steel gate. Sunlight dances through, bleeding down to us along with all the noise of a full arena. The walls distort the sounds, transforming cheers and shouts into the howls of a nightmare. I suppose that’s not far from the truth.
As we enter, I see we’re not the only ones waiting to die.
“Lucas!”
A guard holds his arm, but Lucas still manages to glance over his shoulder. His face is full of bruises and he looks paler than before, like he hasn’t seen the sun in days. It’s probably true.
“Mare.” Just the way he says my name makes me cringe. He’s another one I’ve betrayed, using him like I used Cal, Julian, the colonel, like I tried to use Maven. “I was wondering when I’d see you again.”
“I’m so sorry.” I go to my grave apologizing, and it still won’t be enough. “They told me you were with your family, that you were safe, or else—”
“Or else what?” he asks slowly. “I’m nothing to you. Just something to be used and cast aside.”
The accusation cuts like a knife. “I’m sorry, but it had to be done.”
“The queen made me remember.” Made. There’s pain in his voice. “Don’t apologize, because you don’t mean it.”
I want to embrace him, to show this was not what I wanted. “I do; I swear, Lucas.”
“His Majesty, Maven of House Calore and House Merandus, the King of Norta, Flame of the North.” The cry rings out in the arena, echoing down to us through the gate. The accompanying cheers make me cringe, and Lucas flinches. His end is near.
“Would you do it again?” The words sting sharply. “Would you risk me for your terrorist friends again?” I would. I don’t say it out loud, but Lucas sees my answer in my eyes. “I kept your secret.”
It’s worse than any insult he could throw at me. The knowledge that he protected me, even though I didn’t deserve it, gnaws at my core.
“But now I know you’re not different, not anymore,” he continues, almost spitting. “You’re the same as all the rest. Heartless, selfish, cold—just like us. They taught you well.”
Then he turns, facing the gate again. He wants no more words from me. I want to go to him, to try and explain, but a guard holds me back. There’s nothing more for me to do but stand tall and wait for our doom.
“My citizens.” Maven’s voice filters through the gate with the daylight. He sounds like his father, like Cal, but there’s something sharper in his voice. He’s only seventeen and already a monster. “My people, my children.”
Cal scoffs next to me. But out in the arena, a dead, haunting silence settles. He has them in the palm of his hand.
“Some would call this a cruelty,” Maven continues. I don’t doubt he memorized a stirring speech, probably written by his witch of a mother. “My father’s body is barely cold, his blood still stains the floor, and I have been forced to take his place, to begin my reign in such a violent shadow. We have not executed our own for ten years, and it pains me to begin that awful tradition again. But for my father, for my crown, for you, I must. I am young, but I am not weak. Such crimes, such evil will be punished.”
Up above us, high in the arena, jeers ring out, cheering for death.
“Lucas of House Samos, for crimes against the crown, for collusion with the terrorist organization known as the Scarlet Guard, I declare you guilty. I sentence you to die. Submit to execution.”
And then Lucas is walking up the incline, to his own death. He doesn’t spare a glance for me. Not that I deserve one. He’s dying, not just because of what we made him do but for what I am. Like the others, he knew there was something strange about me. And like the others, he will die. When he disappears through the far gate, I have to turn away and stare at the wall. The gunshots are hard to ignore. The crowd roars, pleased by the violent display.
Lucas was only the beginning, the opening act. We are the show.
“Walk,” Arven says, prodding us on. He follows as we begin the slow climb.
I cannot let go of Cal’s hand, in case I stumble. Every muscle in him tenses, ready for the fight of his life. I reach out for my lightning in one last attempt, but nothing comes. There’s not even a tremor left in me. Arven—and Maven—have taken it away.
Through the gate, I watch Lucas’s body be dragged away, leaving a streak of silverblood across the sand. A wave of sickness passes over me, and I have to bite my lip.
With a great groan, the steel gate shudders and rises up. The sunlight blinds me for a second, freezing me to the spot, but Cal pulls me forward into the arena.