The captain laughed. “Pleading with the king? Pathetic. Am I so frightening, Firefilth? It’s as I thought. You were lucky against Gravnach. His heart failed while fighting and it had nothing to do with you.”
“I don’t want to kill you,” I said, shaking off my confusion, turning my back on the king’s balcony.
“Fortunately, I have no such qualms.” His blade flashed toward me. I threw mine up to block but miscalculated the arc of his, which tore into my upper arm. I hissed in pain and stumbled back.
The captain’s teeth flashed in a satisfied smile. “You’re worthless with a sword. You hold it like you’re carving a roast.”
Before I could take a breath, he feinted right and slashed left, the sword cutting into leather straps and the skin at my side. I clapped a hand over the warm blood that wet my skin.
“You make it so easy, Fireblood,” the captain said. With a lightning slash, he cut a lock of my hair. The strands scattered in the breeze like poplar fluff. The crowd laughed and cheered at the captain’s display of precision.
With a cry of frustration, I threw my blade to the ground and sent a spiral of fire at his leggings. He screamed and swore as he batted at the fabric.
He aimed a stab at my heart. I leaped free. I kept him at a distance with a series of sizzling arrows that landed at his feet.
The crowd picked up its chant. “Die, Fireblood, die!”
The captain circled me, murder in his eyes. It was the same look, lazy, but with a hint of satisfaction, that he’d worn just before he killed my mother.
A blur came from behind him. I had all but forgotten about Clay until I saw his shackled wrists come down on the back of the captain’s head, sending him to his knees.
“That’s for my village, you scum,” Clay said, spitting at the captain.
“Clay, no!” I moved to push him away, but the captain reacted with blinding speed. Still on his knees, he twisted his sword behind him, running it through Clay’s belly before I could even draw a breath. Clay’s wide eyes met mine as he fell to the ground.
I screamed, feeling the pain in my gut as if it were my own. Darkness stirred in my heart, rearing up and filling my limbs. My mind sharpened. My attacks became faster and smoother.
I used tail of the dragon, this time aimed at the captain’s chest. It cracked him like a whip and heated his metal breastplate. I followed that with another hit, and another. A series of fire arrows, a hot, twisting wind that picked up dust from the arena floor and whipped it into his eyes. I used every attack I knew and improvised some more, one after the other and then over again. He fell back, reeling. I put out a hand and sent boiling heat at his sword.
He cried out and dropped the weapon.
Now was my chance. I could finish him off and be done. My mother’s killer would be dead and I would finally be free of him.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of two people leaning over the edge of the railing: the captain’s wife, her face pinched and strained, her hair covered in a kerchief, and their wide-eyed daughter, her long braid falling over her shoulder.
I paused. His daughter would be just like me, plunged into grief, her only thoughts of vengeance. She would hate all Firebloods forever. There was no end to the cycle of revenge.
“Pretend to die,” I said, turning back to the captain. “I’ll throw a blast at you. Let it knock you down and stay down. They won’t find out you’re alive until it’s too late. I won’t kill you.”
While I’d hesitated, he had recovered, picking up his sword and holding it with grim purpose. “You must be mad, Firefilth. I will kill you.”
“You have no gift of frost. You must know you have no chance. Look.” I gestured to the stands, still circling, keeping my distance. “Your daughter is here. I don’t want to kill you in front of her.” I swallowed and whispered words I never thought I would say. “That won’t bring my mother back.”
A calculating light entered his eyes. “I don’t need frost. Frost didn’t help your precious monks when we raided their abbey and put swords in their bellies.”
My skin went cold. The world tipped beneath my feet. “I don’t believe you.”
“Because you don’t want to. And here’s something else you won’t like, Firefilth. I heard you talking with the village brat. He was telling the truth. He didn’t send for us. You did.”
“Now I know you’re a liar.”
“We had a temporary camp on Mount Vex, just northwest of your dung heap of a village. You liked to go into the woods and build a fire, didn’t you? To practice your little tricks.”
“You couldn’t have seen.”
“Two of my people saw you in the woods putting your hands in the fire, but you weren’t burned.”
He lunged toward me and I leaped backward, scrambling to regain my balance.
“The villagers didn’t even know I was a Fireblood, you bastard.”