“I knew you were a cold one, Crow,” said a voice behind her. “But I never knew just how much ice flowed in your veins until now.”
Mia stared at the Godsgrave skyline as Furian joined her by the rails. The Unfallen’s long black hair blew in the sea breeze, bronzed skin glistening with a faint sheen of sweat. His chest was pitted and scarred, the flesh still scabbed, but with the three weeks he’d rested aboard ship, he was almost hale. Despite the three suns burning above, Mia’s shadow trembled as he leaned closer. Glancing to their feet, she saw Furian’s did the same.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
Furian looked out at the City of Bridges and Bones, dark eyes narrowed against the light. “I’m told you’re to wield the blade in the execution bout.”
“Domina needs the purse.”
“O, I know it,” Furian nodded. “And I know it is Domina’s right to designate their executioner. I just didn’t think you’d be willing to put Sidonius and the others in the dirt.”
“We’re the only two gladiatii Domina has left standing, Furian. Your wounds are barely healed enough to risk you in the magni. Unless Domina wants the execution purse to go to another collegium, who is she going to field? Should she stick a sword in Magistrae’s hand and ask her to do the deed?”
Furian smiled. “Now, that would be a sight.”
“Aye,” Mia sighed. “It would at that.”
Furian’s smile died slow on his lips, his voice dropping to a murmur.
“Why did you do it?” he asked. “I’ve been meaning to ask.”
Mia glanced at him sidelong, lips pursed. “Do what?”
“You know what I mean,” he growled. “Bladesinger and the others thought of you as a friend. Yet Domina tells me that as soon as you got wind of their plan, you brought it straight to her. And not only did you foil their escape, but you fashioned a way they’d be captured alive, so they might be brought before the mob for justice.”
“If they’d just been killed in their escape, Domina wouldn’t have recouped a single coin for their loss,” Mia said. “Leonides would have shut down the collegium. We wouldn’t be here. But now, between the Whitekeep purse and the execution bou—”
“Aye, aye, I know all that,” Furian growled, his temper fraying. “What I don’t understand is why you didn’t help them.”
“Because I’m not a fucking hero, Furian. They want help, they can help themselves.”
Mia turned to walk away, but the Unfallen grabbed her arm, teeth bared.
“Who the ’byss are you?” he demanded. “No nameless slip from Little Liis, that much is sure. I look in your eyes and I see intent. I see design. Ever since you set foot in our collegium, I’ve felt your hand at work. Like some shadow puppeteer ever pulling the strings, and we, the marionettes.”
Mia snatched her arm free with a snarl. “Don’t touch me.”
“You’ve no loyalty to Leona,” Furian growled. “I know it now. Even in our match at Whitekeep, risking your life to save Bladesinger, all of it was to further your own ends. You’ve betrayed those who called you sister. Murdered and lied and stole, all to stand here on the sands of the magni when you could just slip between the shadows and claim freedom anytime you choose. So why in the Everseeing’s name are you here?”
Mia stared into those bitter, chocolate eyes, the darkness trembling at her feet. She’d once thought she and Furian were as much alike as truelight and truedark. But she saw that was a lie now. Saw the similarities between them, as deep as blood and bone. Both prisoners of their past. Both obsessed beyond reason with winning the magni, Furian for the sake of redemption, and Mia for revenge.
Mia clenched her jaw, shook her head. Tempted to speak. To look into his eyes and see if he’d grant her some measure of understanding. He of all people should. But this was pointless and she knew it. Furian sought absolution for his sins from the hands of a god. Mia sought to strike down the hands of that same god for their own sins. For one of them to stand the victor, the other would have to fall. And neither would be willing to step aside so that the other might win. This was no storybook. There was no love between them. No fellowship. Only rivalry.
And there was only one way it would end.
“Get your rest, Furian,” Mia said.
She turned her eyes back to that blinding skyline.
“You’re going to need it come weeksend.”
*
Drip.
Silver at her throat.
Drip.
Stone at her feet.
Drip.
Iron in her heart.
Mia sat in the dark beneath the arena, simply listening. Salt water fell from the ceiling above, splashing on the cell floor. All the years. All the miles.
On the morrow, one way or another, it would all end.
They’d been brought ashore yesterturn, once the administratii had sent approval for the execution bout. The calendar was packed—there had already been five full turns of games, and hundreds of prisoners had already been murdered by the state. The editorii were hard-pressed to find room for another execution bout in the morrow’s festivities, but an entire gladiatii stable turning rotten could set a vile example for other collegia. And so, the Falcons of Remus were to be delivered to justice in a five-minute window after the final equillai race. Their lives snuffed out as folk waited for food, or dashed off to the lavatory before the main event.
And after midmeal, after their murders, the magni would begin.
Drip.
Drip.
Mia had sat alone in her cell and listened to the festivities, the roar of the colossal crowd shaking the very stone at her feet. Champions of each collegium were afforded a little privacy—her walls were stone, her bed was clean, two small arkemical globes shedding a warm, constant light. A small hatch in her heavy oaken door let in a whisper of fresh air, the smell of the kitchens, of blood, of oil and iron. She wondered what kind of conditions Sidonius and the others were being kept in. How much more they’d be forced to suffer before they walked onto the sand for the final time. Mister Kindly sat in her shadow, watching her with his not-eyes. Whispering that soon, one way or another, all this would be over.
She made no reply.