The stands let out a cheer as Lila entered the arena. From the balcony, the stadium had looked considerable. From the floor, it looked massive.
She scanned the crowd—there were so many people, so many eyes on her. As a thief in the night, Lila Bard knew that staying out of the light was the surest way to stay alive, but she couldn’t help it, she relished this kind of trick. Standing right in front of a mark while you pocketed their coins. Smiling while you stole. Looking them in the eye and daring them to see past the ruse. Because the best tricks were the ones pulled off not while the mark’s back was turned, but while they were watching.
And Lila wanted to be seen.
Then she saw the Veskan.
Sar entered the arena, crossing the wide space in a matter of strides before coming to a stop in the center. Standing still, she looked like she’d grown straight out of the stone floor, a towering oak of a woman. Lila had never thought of herself as short, but next to the Veskan, she felt like a twig.
The bigger they are, thought Lila, the harder they fall. Hopefully.
At least the armor plates were sized to fit, giving Lila a bigger target. Sar’s mask was made of wood and metal twined together into some kind of beast, with horns and a snout and slitted eyes through which Sar’s own blue ones shone through. In her hand hung an orb full of earth.
Lila’s teeth clenched.
Earth was the hardest element—almost any blow would break a plate—but it was also given in the smallest quantity. Air was everywhere, which meant fire was, too, if you could wrangle it into shape.
Sar bowed, her shadow looming over Lila.
The Veskan’s flag rippled overhead, a cloudless blue marked by a single yellow X. Between Sar’s letter and Lila’s knives, the crowd was a sea of crossed lines. Most were silver on black, but Lila thought that probably had less to do with rumors of Stasion Elsor’s skill, and more to do with the fact he was Arnesian. The locals would always take the majority. Right now, their loyalty was by default. But Lila could earn it. She imagined an entire stadium of black and silver flags.
Don’t get ahead of yourself.
The arena floor was dotted with obstacles, boulders and columns and low walls all made from the same dark stone as the floor, so that the competitors and their elements stood out against the charcoal backdrop.
The trumpets trailed off, and Lila’s gaze rose to the royal balcony, but the prince wasn’t there. Only a young man wearing a green cape and a crown of polished wood and threaded silver—one of the Veskan royals—and Master Tieren. Lila winked and, even though the Aven Essen probably couldn’t see, his bright eyes still seemed to narrow in disapproval.
A tense quiet fell over the crowd, and Lila twisted back to see a man in white and gold robes on the judge’s platform that cantilevered over the arena. His hand was up, and for a second she wondered if he was summoning magic, until she realized he was only summoning silence.
Sar held out her sphere, the earth rising and rattling inside with nervous energy.
Lila swallowed and lifted her own, the oil disturbingly still by comparison.
Tyger Tyger, burning bright …
Her fingers tightened on the orb, and the surface of the oil burst into flame. The effect was impressive, but it wouldn’t last, not with so little air in the sphere. She didn’t wait—the instant the man in white began to lower his hand, Lila smashed the orb against the ground, sending up a burst of air-starved flame. The force of it jolted Lila and surprised the audience, who seemed to think it was all in the spirit of spectacle.
Sar crushed her own orb between her hands, and just like that, the match was underway.
*
“Focus,” scolded Alucard.
“I am focusing,” said Lila, holding her hands on either side of the
“You’re not. Remember, magic is like the ocean.”
“Yeah, yeah,” grumbled Lila, “waves.”
“When waves go the same way,” he lectured, ignoring her commentary, “they build. When they collide, they cancel.”
“Right, so I want to build the wave—”
“No,” said Alucard. “Just let the power pass through you.”
Esa brushed against her. The Spire rocked slightly with the sea. Her arms ached from holding them aloft, a bead of oil in each palm. It was her first lesson, and she was already failing.
“You’re not trying.”
“Go to hell.”
“Don’t fight it. Don’t force it. Be an open door.”
“What happened to waves?” muttered Lila.
Alucard ignored her. “All elements are inherently connected,” he rambled on while she struggled to summon fire. “There’s no hard line between one and the next. Instead, they exist on a spectrum, bleeding into one another. It’s about finding which part of that spectrum pulls at you the strongest. Fire bleeds into air, which bleeds into water, which bleeds into earth, which bleeds into metal, which bleeds into bone.”
“And magic?”