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Panic settles alongside adrenaline as I drum my fingers on my pant legs.
Gretta is missing.
Cristen is missing.
The two people I would likely fight tooth and nail for — gone.
“Sera Evercore,” Talis calls.
Sera steps forward. She knotted her hair, every strand slicked back to reveal her sharply defiant bone structure. Her and her sister share a nod of encouragement, before she walks toward the curtain and disappears, her sword in her grasp and her knuckles white against the hilt.
“Harmony Evercore,” Talis’s voice booms through the pit.
There’s a polite smatter of applause for each name, but for Harmony, the Royalists erupt into a chant of approval.
“Seems they’ve chosen a Queen,” I mumble.
Harmony tightens her ponytail. “They don’t get to choose. We do.” She looks at me then, pulling free her sword in one hand and planting a dagger in the other. “That’s the beauty of this. A choice, when we so often never have one.”
“Then choose to not die, alright?” I ask. I swallow and clear my throat.
Harmony’s eyes narrow with beautiful ferocity. “See you on the other side, Vyner.”
She charges forward with a battle cry and collides with the heavy curtain. It sucks her in, a faint echo of her roar bouncing around the pit.
I inhale, exhale, steady myself. My finger twitches at my side, and my eyes fall to the blood-stained ground beneath my boots.
“Zora Vyner,” Talis announces.
There’s no applause among the Royalists, but their silence is monumental. All that tension, all thatwilldriving toward me and hoping I’ll die – I drink it in. The Underground always knew not to underestimate me. It’s time the Royalists learn that lesson, too.
“Fuck it,” I grumble and unsheathe my sword. I stroll forward. The magic of the curtain swarms around my body, plucking at every thread in my being. It shifts through my past, present, and future, settling only when it finds the essence within me that desires and fears.
There’s a lust there for Cristen, strong enough to almost outweigh all else, but as much as I want him, there’s a desire rooted far deeper in my soul.
A desire to have a family. To steal back what was taken from me when I was far too young. A desire to be loved the way a brother might love me — a brother who exists but who has been forever lost to me. I think of Gretta, of her love and compassion, the kind a true sister would give. She may not be my brother or my blood, but she’s been there for me when it counted most. She’s family, and right now —she’s missing.
The magic flares as my fear does, and it’s then I realize my desire and my fear are one and the same.I can’t lose the only family I’ve ever had.Take me to her, I beg the magic.
It vibrates around me, coils into the center of my core. It burns and burns, writhes against my wishes, and tries to implement its own.
Let me save her, even if it’s the last thing I do,I demand.
Despite the nagging ache in my heart that doesn’t belong to Gretta, the ache only ever belonging to Cristen, the magic ignores it.
Instead, for once, the curtains listen to me, Gretta’s name whispering through my soul as I’m whisked from the arena.
Chapter Sixteen
Darknesssweepsacrossmyvision as the arena swirls away. I catch myself against a wall draped in a lavish tapestry. The ground beneath my boots stabilizes, and the blood of battle is replaced by smooth black marble. Every hair on the back of my neck raises.
I stand in The Beast’s living room.
A glance out the window confirms I’m in his townhouse, and I grip the hilt of my blade tighter. His home must connect to the Underground’s network of magical tunnels somehow.
My eyes dart about the room. It’s empty — at least I believe it is until I take a step around the plush sofa.
On the floor, curled in a fetal position, tied up and gagged is Gretta. Her clothes beneath the restraints are torn apart, the skin beneath marked with large gashes of dried blood. Her skin is pale —too pale— and her face is calm —too calm.
