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She sheathed her sword with a clang. “I’m not a queen anymore.”
The men exchanged a look that Elma couldn’t parse. “As you say,” said the bearded one.
They left her alone then, bustling about nearby, cleaning weapons, and chattering amiably. Elma was glad they hadn’t put her in a cell, another show of respect that she had not foreseen. Food was brought to her after a time, and while it was only dried fruit and cured meat, she was grateful for it. She hadn’t been able to stomach breakfast, but she was hungry, and it would be so pointlessly sad, she thought, to die on an empty stomach.
As she chewed, she couldn’t stop her thoughts from wandering to the other champions who might be waiting for battle. The arena belly was massive. Whoever her first opponent was, he would likely be entering from the other side. They would not interact before the battle, nor would she see who it was. Better that, she thought, than playing out the fight in her head beforehand. Anticipation would only make her sicker than she was already.
When the horn sounded to signal the start of the Games, Elma’s gut twisted. She suddenly regretted all the dried meat she’d eaten.
“Here we go,” said the bearded man, holding out his arm to guide her way.
Elma strode toward the stairs that would lead her up, and up, and into the arena. Her limbs felt infinitely heavy, her heart a vibrating rhythm in her chest.
“Wait,” cried the man with the patchy beard, running up to her. He held out his hand. “You forgot your rock.”
She smiled. “Keep it safe for me, will you?”
But he shook his head. “Take it. It’s a protection stone.”
“That’s superstition,” the bearded man called from where he stood on the stairs.
The younger man rolled his eyes and said in a conspiratorial whisper, “You and I both know it’s not. Most of thesoldiers carry them. Didn’t know queens subscribed to the beliefs of the masses, but, well…” he shrugged, glancing away. “We had hoped you’d be different.”
Elma closed her eyes tightly, took a shaking breath, and opened them again. “I have nowhere to put it.”
The man grinned. “Give me two seconds. There should be a pocket in your armor lining.”
In a moment, he had untied her chest armor just enough to allow her to slide a hand in. She patted her velvet doublet, and sure enough, there was a pocket sewn into the side. Wordlessly, she took the stone and tucked it inside, standing tall while the young man tightened her armor once more.
“Good luck out there,” he said, giving her a jovial pat on the arm as if this weren’t the prelude to her execution. “Remember…”
“Three coppers,” Elma said. “I know.”
Elma stepped into the arena in the wake of another deep, vibrating horn blast. The crowd roared. It was impossible to tell if they were cheering or jeering, but Elma supposed it didn’t matter. A faint glimmer of warmth held fast in her, the kindness shown by the arena men and Winifred.
She may be disgraced, a traitor queen. But there were some who still believed in her. Godwin would win the game, but not wholly. Hope for a happy Rothen still lingered if someone rose up against him.
It was too late for Elma, but she would do what she could to die with something resembling honor.
From the other end of the arena, Elma’s opponent emerged from a tall dark archway. It was not, as she had quietly dreaded, Rune. Instead, it was a brute of a man, not one of the arena’s champions, but some criminal whose life they’d decided to toss away that day.
He moved with slow precision, sizing up his opponent no doubt, just as Elma was sizing up hers. The man was tall and muscled, but he would likely strike and block slowly. If she could get past the reach of his arms, a lethal blow would be easy enough.
As she and her opponent sidled toward one another across the arena, she glanced up to where she knew her uncle was sitting. She imagined the smug look on his face as he watched his sick game play out exactly how he’d wanted it to. If only she could devise some way for him to come down to the arena.
Her opponent’s attack came unexpectedly. Instead of moving slowly forward until they met at the center of the arena, when Elma was close enough to see the whites of his eyes, he let out a horrific bellow and charged. He moved like a loose boulder beginning its descent down a mountainside.
Elma could see exactly how he was going to swing his great-ax. The way he held his body as he charged gave him away neatly. And so, when he was close enough to bludgeon her skull in two, Elma nimbly dropped to her knees, skidding sideways while the much larger man stumbled past, his weapon hitting nothing but air.
It was only a matter of leaping to her feet, darting up behind him, and burying her sword in his spine.
He fell with a loud thud, his ax clattering to the snow beside him, half-hidden in fresh powder. The horn sounded to mark the end of the battle. The crowd nearly drowned it out. Were they cheering?
But Elma had no time to wonder. The horn signaled both the end of the first battle and the beginning of the second. Her next opponent was already on the field, rushing toward her like a phantom. Heart hammering, Elma wrenched hersword free, blood gushing onto the snow in its wake. She backed up, knees bent, and studied the figure that drew toward her.
They were slight and, unlike the last opponent, frighteningly quick on their feet. A pair of daggers was clenched in their hands, a black mask half-hiding their face. The rest of their body was encased in black leather. A moment later, Elma saw that this was a woman, one of the arena’s resident champions. She hadn’t seen this champion fight in years and had forgotten her name.
But names didn’t matter in the Death Games.
