Prince Skylar

There is something pecking my shoulder.

Slowly, I open my eyes, turning my head to the right. A pair of beady, large gold eyes framed by a head of tawny brown and red feathers behind an umber copper beak was peering down at me.

“Hi, Bassa.” I reach up, stroking the feathered head with the back of my hand. Bassa shrieked, spreading her large gold red-brown wings, her downy white belly puffing up in delight.

I groaned, sitting up in the four-poster canopy bed, the white silk sheets clinging to every curve of my legs and lower body. My body ached, from a combination of training, the dance, and sleeping for only four hours last night. Every muscle in my thighs and calves throbbed, a dull pulsing that set my chest on fire, sending my heart pounding.

Bassa perched on my right shoulder, her curved black talons digging into my flesh and skin through my nightshirt. The red-tailed hawk let out a soft caw, using my shoulder as a launch pad to throw herself into the bedroom air. I laugh, my laughter ringing throughout the room, watching the hawk circle around the ceiling, a dark blur against the whites and beiges of the chamber.

Swinging my legs over one side of the bed, I stand up, swaying slightly from the stiffness in my joints.

“Ow.” I wince, reaching down to massage my hips. The nightshirt was more of a loose shift, going down to my knees. I didn’t bother to wear pants under it. Instead, my bare legs sprouted from the shirt’s helm like tree limbs, my bare feet and exposed calves left to the mercy of the cold wind sweeping through the open window.

Bassa swooped down, brushing her left wingtip against my hair.

“What is it?” She dips down, circling once around the dark oak armoire sitting against the wall of the circular chamber. Bassa landed on top of it, folding one wing against her side in a rustle of feathers, and tucked her beak under the other, resting on top of the elegant scrollwork on the amoire’s roof. I signed, padding over on cold toes and numb heels across the stone tile floor.

“You trying to tell me something, girl?” I extend one of my arms up to Bassa, ignoring the tight stretching feeling in my shoulder blades. Bassa opened her beak, bending her head down to graze my fingers with her open mouth.

“Not helpful, but okay.” I bend down, attracted by the corner of brown canvas that stuck out from beneath the tall dresser.

“Hmm.” I tug on the canvas, popping it free from the armoire’s belly.

It was a folded package, about as big as one of the atlases in the library, with something long and metallic-feeling coming out of both sides. It felt like there was something cloth in it; the package was slightly wrinkled around the edges, and when I rested my hand on it, it sagged a little. I’d heard tales of people finding things like this in their rooms and opening it, only for the object inside to be a bomb.

A type of Loric sabotage, really.

Well, blast that.

Picking up the canvas package, my knuckles grazing the freezing tile floor under the brown thing, I brought it back over to my bed, setting it down. Bassa came over, landing on top of it, her wings half spread. She caws again, her gold beak parted, showing the pink slug of her tongue creeping down the darker pinks of the inside of her throat.

“I know, girl, could be anything.” I give her a chin scratch, opening the drawer on my nightstand and pulling out the pouch of pellet treats. Pouring several of the grainy, dry scat shaped pellets into my palm, I offered them to Bassa. The hawk leaned forward, cocking her head to the left at the sudden appearance of the food. I set the pellets on the blanket, retracting my hand just in time for Bassa to lunge at them, her beak going up and down in short gold flashes. Chuckling, I reach around her, pulling on the wrapping paper around the package until it comes undone, everything that was in it clattering to the ground.

Bassa shrieked, flapping her wings wildly.

“Oh, for the gods’ sake.” I fall onto my knees, pulling out a folded hard blue cloth, a long red soft one, and a tight brown vest. There was a sword too, tucked in drapes of oil cloth with a wire wrapped hilt and a red leather scabbard that hid the blade. I curl my fingers around the hilt, the copper wire digging into my palm, the hilt fitting into my hand like a second skin. It took me all of three seconds to realize that this sword had been made for me.

The scabbard was three and a half feet long, made of dark red leather covering a slim wooden slide. Gold veins ran their way around the tip of the sheath, running from the gold tip cover like water streaking across broken stone. I stand, pulling the sword out of its sheath, holding it up so I could see it.

The blade was beautiful, all three point five feet of it. It was double edged, a raised fuller running from crossguard to tip. A single emerald was set in the straight crossguard as well as one at each end and a bigger one in the pommel.

“Wow.” A shortsword and what else? Setting the naked sword and its scabbard on the bed behind me, I unraveled the blue cloth. It was a jacket, navy blue and made of tanned leather, a high wide collar that would go to my jaw. It was a jacket like the ones pirates wore in stories, an overcoat with gold embroidery and brass buttons.

The red thing’s a scarf, long and thick, made of wool. Both ends are knotted in half foot braids, little wooden beads crowning each one. And tied to the scarf, is a folded piece of parchment with my name scribbled in laced handwriting on it.

Handwriting I recognize.

Fumbling with the brown string tying the paper to the scarf, I undo it, the parchment coming undone in my lap. On it, written in words that slated with a certain urgency, was a letter that sent blood spinning in my head:

My Prince,

I hope things and events are going well for you. The scarf and jacket is a gift from me, the sword and vest a gift from a friend. I hope they serve you well.

If you’re curious about the sword’s name, it is the Loric term for fire. I hope you remember enough of those lessons I taught you to know the word for it.

I can’t say much, meaning that I write this letter near a single candle in the cellar of a dear friend of mine while Randor’s soldiers turn their house inside out; my time is short.

You must find a way out of Argona.

Your father, the King, will stop at nothing to either bring you completely into his plans, or kill you. He wants total annihilation of the Lore. You must warn them.

I won’t ask you to betray blood. I can’t, not after what the two of us have done. But hear me out, I beg of you.

The ink was still shiny, gleaming in the light from the open window, meaning that this letter had been made only hours ago.

There is a sally port near the southern gate. Go through it, then down the Widowbeak lane to the cottage ruins on the hill there. I won’t tell you everything; the risks of someone intercepting this letter are too high.

From there, go into the jungle, following the compass rose east. Don’t stop until you find a Lore village in a clearing with a pavilion made of dragon bone. Whether it’s been destroyed or not, I know not. Simply know that the Monarch there will help you, should you simply ask him for sanctuary and show him this scarf.

Time is running out. Randor is searching for allies.

Don’t let your emotions rule you.

I am sorry that you couldn’t find what you were seeking for in me. It pains me to see you searching for love in a time when your future is . . . uncertain. Here me when I say this, you don’t have to limit yourself to your own race in the search for a partner. Love comes in all shapes and forms. However, put it as being the main goal away from your head. Focus on the present, on the war your father started, and look for a mate secondary.

You must succeed. Thousands are counting on you, whether they know it or not. Things have been set in motion that can’t be stopped.

Be careful, be smart, and stay sharp.

Your faithful advisor,

Captain Tejon

The blade is strong, as long as I breath, learn from pain or death shall take you.

I blink, curious as to the three dark splotches that marked the parchment. They hadn’t been there when I’d started reading Tejon’s letter. My eyes felt dry, the corners parched of liquid. Reaching up with one finger, a single tear ran down my cheek, flowing over my fingernail, continuing its path down my face to my chin.

Names held power, I remembered that, but not the word for fire in Loric. The only word I knew was Shur’tyr, Bugplant. It was the only word a lot of people knew. Only a few knew more, and those people were the Lore.

The very same people my father wants dead.

I sigh, rubbing my head.

Politics were complicated, a tangled web of lies and half-truths that ensnared any who became involved with them.

Tejon had stated that I would soon be forced to make a choice. Choices were good. They invoked change, and people couldn’t live without change. Sure, most change was terrible and heartbreaking, but change made us make choices, and most of those choices were good and beneficial.

Some in the short run, some in the long run.

Padding over to the armoire, I opened it, taking a pair of less formal breeches and a simple non-embroidered tunic out. Slipping them on, I took out the knee high leather hunting boots I had, pulling them up to my lower thighs and buckling the straps, fitting them to the curves of my calves and shins.

Going back over to the bed, I put on the vest that had been in the present, giving it a good sniff. It smelled of iron and leather, marking that it had chain mail sewn into it. Slipping it over my head, it sat tight against my chest, pinching ribs.

Means it’s doing its job.

Tejon had told me when I’d complained about the tightness of a pair of greaves. If it was loose, then it didn’t protect the body part or body parts it was supposed to.

I put the jacket on next, looping the scarf around my neck. Then I attached the sword scabbard to my belt, the straps of leather looping around my hips sagging to the left a little from the weight of the sheathed sword.

“Bassa, come.” I spread one arm, offering my hawk a perch. Bassa cawed, preening her white feathered chest. “I take that as a no.” I leave the room, closing the heavy oak door behind me on oiled hinges, preventing it from squealing.

I groan, pressing my back to the door, splaying my fingers on either side of me over the smooth surface of the wood, leaning my head back, closing my eyes.

The weight of Tejon’s words crashed over me, sending a hurricane of anger and raw vengeance swirling in my gut.

My sword’s name meant fire in Loric.

Tejon was hiding in someone’s cellar.

My father might kill me.

I might have to go on the ran.

And life sucked.

Propelling myself off the wall, I hurry down the hallway to the dusty whitewash and cobblestone spiral stair, taking them two at a time. Dashing down the stairs, my view went sideways, one of my feet catching on a loose slab of stone, pain flaring up my toe,sending me teetering forward.

Stolen story; please report.

And falling right into my father.

“Prince Skylar.” My father plants his hands on my shoulders, keeping me from face-planting on his boots.

“Sire, I apologize.” I can’t keep the whimper out of my voice, my lips quivering with each word.

“I didn’t raise you to be a bootlicker, Skylar. Get up.” My father’s grip slides to my wrists, yanking me to my feet.

“No, Father.” I say.

“Good. I need you to do something for me.”

“Which would be?” I tug back on my arms, trying in apparent vain to slip out of his grasp.

King Randor of Argona stood giant, towering almost seven feet, with muscular shoulders and an obvious gut kept trapped beneath a tight royal purple tunic and fur lined jerkin. He had a full beard of thick gleaming red wire that covered his entire jaw and the skin around his lips. Randor’s head was balding, the wave of copper hair thinning and running down to his hard jaw. His eyes were narrow and sharp, darkened pits of mournful blue. Nose a hard, jagged blade, lips full and puckered, bright cherry red.

“So much like your mother, Skylar.” He hisses, leaning forward until his face was inches from mine, fingernails digging trenches in my forearms.

“What would you have me do, Father?” I whisper.

“Go to the Lore village east known as the Barrow. You’ll know which one it is by the dragon pavilion in it.” Randor releases my arms, taking a step back. “Do not fail me, boy. Come home with a Lore’s head and news of victory, or don’t come at all.” He turns on his heel, shiny black military boots climbing the steep slopes of his calves to his knees clicking on the hard gray stone floor. The sound follows his retreat until I can’t hear his footsteps anymore. I exhale, freeing the breath I was holding pinned in my diaphragm.

Wrapping my fingers around the banister, I steady myself, sharp splinters of anguish creeping up my arms from my wrists.

Oh gods, Randor’s grip hurt.

It’s been years since he’d last grabbed me like that.

Five years ago, when my mother died of the plague when I had just turned ten.

I could still see the rage in his eyes, the fear of losing another. Even though the Lore had had nothing to do with her death, Father still blamed them. He blamed them for everything.

The drought last year.

The failed assassination attempt on me three months ago.

I shake my head, massaging the bruised area. I needed to get to the stables, from there I could worry about it.

And worry about how my father would react when he learned I might disobey him.

Scholars had drilled into my brain the events of the war with the Lore. The rest of Arkeya had to still choose a side. Askätori and the Nara in the east along with the Terrians on the coast seemed promising. The Shapeless had declared themselves neutral, the arrogant peacekeepers they were. The Dwrfish and Iybrids were unknown, their views as clouded as a fog bank, completely hidden. But what did I care of interracial treaties. The Lore were losing, their numbers plummeting from the millions to the early thousands in the span of three decades.

I knew I had reached the barn and royal stables when I smelled the straw. The stable smells wafted up, bringing the scents of straw, manure, and wet huge furry bodies into my nose. Not very pleasant smells, but bearable. It brought back memories of one of the nobles’ daughters coming down here with me years ago, saying that she’d teach me how to ride. Even now, I couldn’t suppress giggles at the thought of her going down three steps, moaning, and fainting, falling into a pile of horse scat, her lily pink and indigo dresses and skirts turning a moist brown.

“Wha’ you laughing at, youngling?” I jump, whirling around to see the stablemaster standing behind me one step up, a long bending piece of straw poking out of the corners of his wide wet lips. An oversized hat sat on his head, hiding a greasy mop of gray curls. A buttoned shirt barely hid the beer belly he had, jester’s striped leggings hugging his legs close, and pointed Eastern boots riddled with holes.

“I need a horse.” I say, moving back to let him pass me, one hand resting on the pommel of my sword.

“Aright. Anything ales yer might need?” He crosses the straw cover floor, padding over to a massive deep brown stallion.

“Provisions and directions, if you have them.” I follow him, stepping around a mammoth black cat curled up sound asleep amid the brown and yellow flooring, half a mouse tangled up in its right paw.

“Aye.” The horse is already tacked, a saddle, bridal, and saddle bags decorating the creature’s back, head, and hips. The man passes a packed satchel into my hands, grunting as he does, the insides of his rough hands grazing the nails and tops of mine.

“Thank you.” I put the satchel in the saddle bag closest to me, strapping it shut, hard leather and cloth pushing up against my hands.

“Don’t hear words like those in these parts. There’s enough chow for a week, hope you have a place to restock. The horse can outrun most Shur’tyr, though only on flat ground. Nice sword, and here,” he hands me a sheathed dagger, one that’s as long as my forearm, both hilt and blade combined.

“Thank you.” I say again, sliding the dagger into my boot.

“Stay alive out there, Little Lark, don’t do anything too crazy. Sure would hate to lose the only heir in a time like this.” He hands me the reins for the horse.

“Does he have a name?” I swing up onto the creature, putting my feet into the stirrups.

“Aye. Most folk don’t know what it means, but his name is Utyir.” He says, running one hand down the horse’s mane.

“What does it mean?” The horse starts moving, heading for the stable doors.

“Meanin’s changed over the past few centuries, but it’s Loric, know it to me bones. Good luck, now. Hyyah!” He slaps the horse’s haunches, sending it galloping through the huge double wood doors, out onto the paved stone and lead road of Argona.

The wind whipped at my hair, pulling it down in my eyes, only to rip it back out. Beneath my legs, the horse, Utyir, heaved and strained, his muscles shifting and pulling, tightening and stretching.

I decided to ignore Tejon’s advice about Widowbeak and the cottage. I’d go to the village Tejon had told me to, then to the Barrow, the one Randor had.

Head east, follow the compass rose til you reach a village in a clearing.

Maybe, just maybe, I could escape the destiny laid out for me. Maybe the Lore would help me.

Or maybe they wouldn’t.

Who knew, but what I did know, all the way to my bones, was that I trusted Tejon, and would until the day I died.

“Hello?” My voice echoes, strangely empty in the tunnel of ferns I had somehow managed to get myself into.

“Hello!” I shout it again. Nothing happens, only the tall green spires of plants shaking slightly from some hidden wind on either side of me. I sigh, running one hand over my eyes. It’d been a day since I’d left Argona, a day since I’d been in the untamed jungles of Arkeya, fending off small pack hunters and a few panthers.

“Oh course I had to pick the most deserted part of the jungle to scream my lungs out.” I haven’t denied it though, that screaming all day had helped me vent out my emotions. All the pain and rejection from Tejon had been bottled up in my chest, weighing me down, and bellowing at the sky and the trees had uncorked the bottle and upended it, pouring out all the emotion and anger on the floor.

It helped, in a way, to picture that.

Utyir twitched, standing up straighter, muscles hardening beneath me.

“What is it, boy?” I lean forward, patting the side of the horse’s neck, feeling the beast of burden’s powerful heartbeat. Utyir huffed in response, flaring his nostrils. Then I heard it, someone yelling and the ground thundering. I twisted around just in time to see the biggest centipede I’d ever seen come charging down the center between the two walls of ferns.

I had had a gut feeling that these walls weren’t natural, that someone or something had put them here. And I was right.

The centipede came barreling down, roaring and bellowing, spittle and blood flying out of its tooth-lined mouth, bearing down on-

What the hell?

There was a person running in front of the centipede, waving their arms at me.

“I can’t hear you!” I gesture grandly to my left ear, doing whatever I could to control the horse with my right hand. The person gets closer, more details of their appearance coming to light.

The person was a girl, and the girl was Lore.

Her skin was daffodil yellow, hair long , braided, and canary yellow with an orange tint. Short light brown horns wrapped in leather, a long tail streaming behind her like a banner on a windy day.

Both the girl and the centipede get closer, until I cam hear the girl yelling at me, her chest heaving, rising and falling rapidly.

“Get out of the fucking way!” She changes course, heading straight towards me.

“Who- Wha!” The centipede jumps, sailing over my head, a long streamline body broken by segmented plates of armor and long spindly legs all in shades of murky brown.

Something hard rams into my shoulder, knocking me off Utyir’s back. I hit the ground, pain flaring up my left ankle, someone’s ragged breathing against my ear, their breath hot and moist. The world spins, flashes of black and gray seeping into my vision like water escaping a leaky dam.

“You better not die, you oversized fool.” Sharp pain lights up my cheek, and I open my eyes.

The Lore girl is on top of me, her legs parted on either side of mine, knees wedged into my armpits, one hand on my chest, the other holding an inverted curved blade made of white and beige bone, the tip resting just inches from my face.

“Who are you?” I croak. The girl scoffs, leaning back, putting more of her weight on my naval.

“Someone you should fear.” She leans forward, jamming her knees farther into my armpits, pressing the tip of her blade to my throat, right under my chin. This close to her, I could smell her breath; chives and bread, and see her eyes.

They seethed with anger, deep startling pits of dark green. She had freckles along her cheekbones and nose, a small gold earring in her left ear, and dark yellow lips that curled outward in a sneer.

The sounds of something crashing around behind us made me swing my head to the right, ignoring the bone dagger taking residence on my neck.

The centipede creature lay thrashing and writhing in a huge snare-like net, its pincers and limbs and long flexible body tangled in the weaving. Standing on top of the net, their arms spread wide, was another Lore, a red one, whooping and yelling while a blue one with a black eye paced around the centipede in circles. I turn my head back to the girl on top of me.

“You never answered my question.” I say.

“I don’t care about your questions. Shut up and stay quiet.” She climbs off me, the absence of her weight making me feel light and airy. It doesn’t last long.

I’m yanked to my feet, fresh pain igniting my ankle. The girl scoffs, slipping one arm around both of mine, forcing me to lean back and bend my knees.

She’s shorter then me, the tips of her fawn brown horns level with my eyes. Her knee rams into the back of mine, and I’m sent sprawling.

“Who’s this?” A face comes into my vision, hovering on the verge of blurriness before coming to focus, revealing another Lore, a male, with blue skin and midnight blue hair, a black eyepatch with silver designs on it covering his left eye.

“Him.” The girl says.

“Ah, him.” A hand slides around my throat, rough and calloused, lifting me from the ground. I gag, clawing at the person’s wrist as their embrace tightens. Nothing happens, and I stay like that, until my sight goes black, and the world fades to darkness.

“Did you kill him?” The voice stirs me, bringing me back from whatever strange realm I’d gone to in unconsciousness.

“I don’t think so.” A second voice states.

“Humph. You can’t kill a Magi with Emhic that could kill a dragon the size of a mountain, and you killed a prince by choking him? Gods, Delto, what on earth were you thinking?” The first person snaps.

“Give it a break.” Delto snarls. Slowly, I open my eyes.

My world is upside down, everything flipped a hundred eighty degrees vertically. I swing my head upward, trying to take inventory of my body.

I’m shirtless, my muscles gleaming oily under a hidden torch. Leather straps crisscrossed my chest and belly, binding my hands and arms behind me in the small of my back. Shackles around my ankles suspending me from the ceiling, a thatched maze of angular beams and strips of dried leaves and grasses woven together. A gag made its nest in my mouth, shoved back far into my throat and tied in place with rope.

Growling, I throw back my head, arching my spine in an attempt to break free. Nothing happens, only the wraps around my midriff digging into my ribs and hips, my ankle blazing like someone had lit it on fire.

“I think he’s alive.” The first, female voice, says.

“Wow, Arck, you don’t think that someone thrashing around means they’re alive.” There’s two people in front of me, standing around a low table. There’s the blue male with the eyepatch, his hands thrown up. The second person had red skin, a blacksmith’s apron covering their narrow frame.

“Can it, brother. The Ku’yu is waiting.” The female says, crossing her arms over her chest, biceps flexing.

“I’ll shut up if you do, sister.” Footsteps, then a hand grazes my sternum, lifting me up by the straps around my belly. The face of the one eyed Lore from before fills my vision, a sneer twisting his dark blue lips in a curved, jagged line. He reaches up with his other hand, the chains binding my throbbing ankles coming undone with an audible click.

I tumble, somersaulting head over heels, slamming my jaw into the hard cedar wood floor, my groans muffled by the cloth shoved down my throat.

“Don’t break him. Humans have terrible skeletal structural integrity. It makes them so flimsy.” Arck chuckles.

“Won’t dream of it.” Delto hoists me to my feet, rolling his eye. “Don’t make me carry you, Princeling.” He drags me out of the hut, a sliver of sun hitting my face, before we go down a narrow tunnel, the ceiling low and the wooden walls closing around us. One of Delto’s hands is planted between my shoulder blades, and I’m launched forwards all a sudden, rolling to a stop in the center of a dirt circle, warm hard soil pressing up against my shoulder.

It’s an arena.

Lore of all colors and ages fill the circular stands that line the place I am, whispers and chatter lifting up like smoke. Using my shoulder, I push myself to my knees, my spine and hips aching. Padded footsteps signal someone’s behind me, and I pivot to see three people emerge from the tunnel I was thrown from.

The first person is the girl who had held the dagger to my throat. She wore a simple dark green jerkin over a brown sleeveless tunic, deep brown leggings covering her legs from ankles up. Her hair was in a tangled braid that went past her hips, almost to her knees. A braided leather belt wrapped around her hips, three pouches and her bone dagger hanging from it. Her tail flickers, curling around itself.

The second was a tall orange male wearing an open vest, his horns two spiked peaks above his head. His tail a half stump waving slowly behind him.

The third was the blue male who’d thrown me. He wore a loose gray tunic with sleeves that went to his elbow over loose black pants, a green infinity scarf nestled around his collarbones, partly covering three pendants. His eyepatch caught light, revealing a jagged silver scar running vertically through his left eye. Silence falls over the crowd, punctured with three heavy thumps.

“So this is the prince of Argona.” The voice comes from above me and to the right. I twist my head to see a male with striped black and white skin seated on a twisted chair made of tree roots, a staff crowned with a carved bird made of dark wood held in his right hand.

“Yes, Xandyr.” The orange male steps forward, striding up til he’s standing parallel with me, large calloused hands hanging at his sides.

“I see.” He leans towards me, resting one hand under his chin.

“Yes, Ku’yu. We found him when we were trapping Shur’tyr.”

“I suppose introductions are in order, after all. I am Ku’yu Xandyr, and welcome, Prince Skylar of Argona, to Ribena.”

The man besides me crouches, whispering in my ear. “I am going to remove the gag.” He hooks two fingers between my cheek and the rope, a knife flashing in his other hand. The cold steel of the blade kisses my skin, weaseling its way across my face, cord coming undone and falling around my neck. I cough the gag out, pressing my forehead to the earth as I recover, hacking and spiting out threads.

“Who are you?” I croak, my throat hoarse and chapped.

“He already told you, Weakling.” It comes from the girl. She stalks over, her bone dagger gripped in one hand.

“Then you?” I meet her eyes, daring to glare into their green depths.

“I could gut you here and now.” She takes a step closer, flipping the blade in her hand around, inverting it.

“Cerbera, peace.” The orange male rests his hand on her shoulder, stopping her from craving her knife across my skin.

“Tavarn, please don’t stop me,” she says it to the orange male, then she turns to the striped male up on the throne like chair. “I invoke the Trial of Sun and Fire for the Weakling prince.”

Gasps carry throughout the crowd, people muttering and whispering to each other.

“Cerbera.” Tavarn says in a warning tone, his lightly accented voice dropping an octave.

“I said don’t stop me. Please, Tavarn, I have to do this.” Cerbera says, retreating out of Tavarn’s reach, her movements graceful and swift, cunning like a predator’s.

“She is right, younger brother,” Xandyr stands, silence falling over the crowd in his wake. “Prince Skylar, Cerbera has challenged you to the Trial of Sun and Fire. This trial ends in one of two ways. Either you win, or you die. Do you accept her challenge?”

Thousands of thoughts race through my mind at once. Both my father and Tejon had said to find a Lore village called the Barrow. I’d found a Lore stronghold called Ribena. This Xandyr character was right. There were two ways everything-not just these trials-ended.

Either you won, or you died.

I raise my head, meeting this man’s gaze, cold resolve digging into my heart, clamping its jaws around the inside of my chest, a cage of sorts.

“I do.”