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Lio, Cassia, and their Trial circle sent up their most deafening applause and cheers.
Nike disappeared, then reappeared outside her cell. She gave Solia a salute to the victor. “By the Goddess, that was well fought.”
The Ashes helped the defeated Stewards up, everyone exchanging taunts, compliments, and claps on the shoulder. Aunt Lyta was right behind them, going to each of her trainees with generous praise. Cassia leapt from her seat to congratulate her sister, Knight dashing off with her, and their Trial sisters went to console Mak and Lyros about their defeat.
Lio followed and pulled his father in for an embrace. “It was good to see you spar.”
“Was it?” His father kept an arm around his shoulder. “I tried not to do it too often when you were younger. I never wanted violence to touch your life, least of all through me.”
“Is that why? I thought you were…content.”
“Oh, I am, Son. I would take a dance with your mother over a fight anytime. But I must admit, I enjoyed myself tonight.”
Nike stood back, admiring the cage of stone. “It’s rather beautiful, in its way. You should keep this one, Uncle.”
He tilted his head. “The sculptors’ circles would be scandalized if I tried to pass this off as art.”
“In that case,” Nike said, “you must certainly display it where I can see their faces.”
When Mak and Lyros joined them in front of the stone cage, Lyros enthused like an initiate at the Hippolytan Games. “Brilliant strategy! Disabling Nike was the only way your side could have won against the Stewards.”
Affection warmed Nike’s aura. “Uncle Apollon is one of the few people alive who can give me a real challenge, I admit.”
“The way he and Karege plowed through us!” Mak shook his head. “Uncle, you should fight with us more often.”
“Yes, you should,” Lio agreed.
When Solia and Cassia broke away from the Ashes, Cassia slid into Lio’s hold, while her sister came to stand by his father. There was not a drop of sweat on Solia, the air around her parched and warm. She seemed more at ease than Lio had ever seen her. She looked…calm.
They shared this plight, he realized. Peace was elusive when you carried so much magic in you. There was no feeling quite like those fleeting moments after you had poured enough power out of you to give you rest.
Cassia would face the same struggle in her future. But he and Solia would both understand.
Nike held out a hand to Solia. “Never in my existence have I enjoyed fighting against magefire until tonight.”
Solia took the offered wrist clasp. “It was a privilege, Victory Star.”
A silence fell, one that had the chance to be comfortable, but still held the possibility of pain. Lio could hear that Cassia was holding her breath.
Father slid an arm around Solia’s shoulders.
She didn’t flinch. She relaxed. “I’m looking forward to that statue, Papa.”
Cassia knew Rudhira had entered the arena when Knight ran away from her, his tail wagging. But when she turned, she saw that her hound had bypassed the Blood-Red Prince himself to drool upon a different Hesperine errant.
Kalos knelt so Knight could lick his face. “That’s a good boy.”
With his wagging tail smacking the Blood-Red Prince and Kalos rubbing his ears, Knight wore the smile of a hound who had died a hero and ascended to Sanctuary.
Rudhira gave the dog hair on his battle robes a dark look. But then his grim expression dissolved into a rueful laugh, and he began to pet Knight.
Apollon’s shoulders shook with silent laughter. Nike, on the other hand, laughed aloud and couldn’t seem to stop.
Rudhira held up his free hand. “Not a word.”
“It’s only your most humiliating surrender to the enemy of all time. I wouldn’t dream of rubbing it in.” Nike’s fanged grin promised she had every intention of doing so.
“Knight is not the enemy anymore, are you, good sir?” Kalos seemed oblivious to the liegehound slobber on his dark green travel robes.
