Page 66 of The Cost of Blood and Bonds

“Allowing more to enter this year,” he says, voice commanding.

Finn’s shoulders tense beside me.

“There will be more chances for those of common blood to rise.”

More. The word catches and won’t let go. More competitors in the trials, in the year I go through the arch into the Weeping Woods.

“There will be more competitors and more glory to be earned,” he continues.

I draw in a breath, and it feels thin, like I didn’t get enough of it.

“I’m accepting volunteers. Those brave enough to take the chance.”

Brave, not desperate or expendable, brave. People step forward, and I watch them move toward the stage like they’re being offered something worth wanting.

“He’s expanding the trials,” Grier says behind us, his voice low and tight in a way that only people who know him would recognize as fury.

I spent my whole life looking for proof that he gave a damn. This is my answer. He’s expanding the trials my year. My hands tighten on the reins until my knuckles ache. Beside me, Finn’s jaw ticks, and his hands fiddle with the reins.

Grier rides closer to him. “You’re still the best fighter in this realm,” he says quietly. “This doesn’t change that.”

But we all know the odds just did.

My father is taking oaths now; people are kneeling in front of him and swearing themselves into a death sentence. Two figures near the back catch my eye. A boy and a girl, so young, neither could be older than twenty. Siblings from the look of them, with the same sharp cheekbones carved from hunger. They hold hands as they step forward, and the girl keeps her chin raised high, but her hands are shaking. The boy looks at her, and I recognize that look. The one that says I’ll die before I let anything happen to you. They kneel together, and my father takes their oaths without even looking at their faces.

I look away and find Hayes, whose eyes are already locked on me. I see the same fury I’m swallowing down, burning. My father is still talking, still smiling, still playing benevolent king. As if staying in power is worth the chance I won’t come back.

We move away, back toward the castle. Gemma is up ahead and hasn’t said anything, but I can feel cold anger radiating off her. She slows deliberately, dropping back until she’s alongside me.

“He just made the trials more lethal,” she says under her breath.

“Yeah.”

“Did you know he—” She stops and swallows. “You and Finn⁠—”

“We’ll make it out,” I say, needing her to believe it even if I don’t.

She looks at me, and I see it, fear written plainly across her face, stripped of everything else. She just realized what I’ve known for longer than I would like to admit. My father will let me die if it serves him.

Cold settles into my chest. If this is what he does to his own blood, I can’t afford to let him see what she is to me. I realize with a bone-deep certainty that the distance I’ve been holding isn’t nearly enough.

Chapter 22

Hayesland

“This year’s trials unsettled them.” Father’s voice carries as we step inside his private study. The room is cold despite the fire. “Too few survived, and it gave the people something to fixate on. Unrest is building.”

He sits as he gestures his hand dismissively, like grief is a stain that didn’t lift properly.

“It needed correction.”

“So you expanded the trials?” I say.

“Yes. It has worked to quell the unrest.”

How simply he weighs them and how easily he lets them fall.

“You made the course harder.”