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KAIO
Gwen was gone, taken somewhere I could not follow, and I was left alone.
No, not alone.
Raveen Morte’s descendant had found his way into the quarry, and he was very busy sending red-hot fireballs in my general direction.
I had thought it might be a magick user at the pool—given Gwen’s description of the incident—but I’d dismissed the idea as ludicrous, assuming that at worst, Bloodworm might have brought a Danickan fae into the Gladiator Games. I didn’t fear their magick, as it relied on their own planet’s power. It weakened the longer they were away from home. Hardly a challenge.
But for the people of Orenda, my people, the power we wielded emanated from our own bodies.
And it could be strengthened by the use of sigils—like the ones under the snow here.
I cursed internally, dodging another fireball and peering around the cage, hoping to see Zyair Morte. But he had ducked behind what looked to be a solid wall of ice.
One I would have sworn hadn’t been there moments ago.
My grandfather’s words echoed in my head.
The Incendiaries use dishonorable tactics, tricking your eyes and mind. Do not trust what you see when they attack.
Could the ice wall be an optical illusion?
“Zyair Morte,” I called out in my most regal tone. “I am not your enemy!”
For a moment, the incessant fireballs stopped slamming into the ice and snow around me, long enough to hope that perhaps the Incendiary took my words into his hearts.
Then a peal of laughter echoed through the ice quarry.
“Not my enemy? Don’t be foolish, King Kaio.” His tone turned even more mocking when he used my title. “My people live and die in anguish, generations imprisoned for the ‘crimes’ of their forebears. For nothing more than using the magick that is our birthright by nature.” He paused, then continued angrily, “And the instant you face danger, you have the unmitigated gall to use that power yourself—to save a human.” I could hear the sneer in his voice on the final word.
A flash of guilt shot through me. Oh, by all the gods above. He’s right.
Worse than that, I knew he was strong in the ways of the olde magick. If reports from the prison were true, he and his kind—his family, I reminded myself—had spent decades refining their magic, impeded only by the occasional interference of the guards, whose anti-magick activities were funded by my own royal treasury.
Clearly, those guards hadn’t been paid enough to stop the olde ways from being passed down in Vanguard Prison.
I tried to reason with Zyair one more time, but my hearts weren’t in it—not really. “We can walk out of here together.”
It was the wrong thing to say. Zyair roared out his anger, and a lighting flash of blue-hot fire, fueled by rage, shot toward me.
I barely managed to dive away from it in time to keep it from frying me to a crisp.
Just like I destroyed Trumble.
I was going to die here at the hands of a male descended from—trained by—the single most evil villain in all of Orendan history.
I couldn’t even convince myself that such a death wasn’t just—not after killing Trumble with magick. I should perish, here and now.
Without ever seeing Gwen again. Never touching her, pressing myself to her. Not even being able to say farewell.
To tell her I love her.
No. That cannot be allowed to happen.
That thought spurred me to action.
I couldn’t defeat Zyair in a one-on-one battle. Deep in my hearts, I knew that.
