“Enough.”
The word broke through this time—at least for Aros, since he was the one who pulled back, ending the kiss. His hands rose to my wrists, pulling my arms down from where they had apparently climbed around his neck, and he took an unsteady step back, forcing my legs to untangle and release him. Yael had a hand on one shoulder, and Rome had a hand on the other, slowly separating him from me. I wanted to reach out and draw him back, and he seemed to read the plea all over my face because he rumbled with a growling sound that shook me to the core.
“Get it under control, Seduction.” Siret was the one who spoke, stepping directly in front of me.
Aros jerked against the hands holding him, a feral look crossing over his beautiful face. For a moment, I was truly scared that he was about to tear Siret apart, but the two gods holding him managed to wrangle him back another step. There was some part of me crying out, some part of my chest that felt like it had been ripped away. They had warned me that dwellers weren’t strong enough to withstand too much exposure to their powers, but I hadn’t realised just how right they were until that moment. I needed to sooth myself by touching one of them, and Siret was right there, his back displayed to me. I reached out without even thinking, winding my shaking arms around his neck from behind, pressing the lower half of my face against the back of his shoulder, my eyes peeking over at the others.
I was astounded at the change that came over Aros.
He watched as Siret dropped his hands to my knees, which had slipped to either side of his torso, and he stopped fighting Rome and Yael immediately. Coen was standing right beside Siret, looking ready to jump in between everyone and break up the whole fight if he needed to—but even he had stopped to look our way. The fight drained out of Aros, and his eyes stopped swirling with the bright golden colour that had started to speck his irises. They were back to normal now, and he offered me a smile that was almost … well, it looked like an apology.
“Thanks,” I croaked out, my voice dashed against Siret’s shirt—a clean shirt, I noticed. He must have changed his clothes with Trickery while I had been … busy.
The apology fled from Aros’s face, and his smile became a little wider. “Thanks?”
“For the … you know.” The most terrifying and amazing kiss ever. “Healing the cuts and stuff.”
He chuckled, and a few scattered laughs bounced around the room. They had heard my thought.
Great.
At least we’d moved on from almost killing each other to laughing at me again.
Eleven
After that, Siret used his Trickery to ensure the rest of me, outside of my cleaned wounds, was relatively mud free. And also dressed: this time in a long-sleeved black top and fitted pants. The material felt thick, but somehow still moved fluidly with me as I walked.
“You’ll be better protected in this, since you insist on staying for round two.” He still sounded pretty angry. About as angry as the rest of them looked.
“I’m not leaving you five to face the arena, or the gods, alone. No way. I need to see with my own eyes that you’re all okay. Plus, I totally have your backs if anything goes down.”
They shook their heads, though they were grinning, which was fair enough since I was actually no use to them … but leaving them felt wrong.
“And let’s not forget,” I continued as we walked back to the main stands, ready to watch the other rounds. “I can’t be away from you. I’d literally have to sit outside the stadium, or closer. So what’s the point of leaving?”
We were heading toward the ‘blood-splatter’ section again. A row I was now reluctantly claiming as ours. I really disliked this level of the arena—what with its close proximity to the beheading area—but the Abcurses kept dragging me back there anyway, so I might as well just resign myself to the fact that it was our row.
Lots of eyes were on us as we stepped along the rows, following the six of us with close inspection. Which was odd, considering sols were probably dying in the arena right at that moment. Some would think they’d be more interested in that. But no, they were lingering on the hand Rome had pressed against my lower spine, or how Yael reached out and clasped my forearm, preventing me from tripping down the stairs before I could even try to trip down the stairs.
I was lingering on those things too, mostly because my body was still all worked up from Aros’s kiss, and each touch from them sent even more energy through my body. A body which was partially numb from the gel, and partially numb from the overload of sensations rocking it. I was sure that my brain was blocking some of it out to protect me from accidental self-combustion.
As we took our seats I swallowed hard and spoke just loud enough for the five of them to hear. “I think I’m starting to understand the pact.”
Rome, who was on my left, and Yael, on my right, turned toward me in an instant. “Are you okay?” Rome demanded. “What’s wrong?”
I shook my head, stretching out my sore legs, before realising that I was only making the lingering pain from my healed cuts even worse, so I tucked them in again. “Just … Aros’s power affected me. Is affecting me. I’m not sure what long term exposure would do.”
Aros was staring out into the arena, his goldenness somewhat dimmed by the darkness of his expression. “I’m sorry, Willa. I couldn’t think of another way … your pain is …”
He trailed off and Coen picked up the rest of the sentence. “When you’re hurting, we’re hurting.”
“My pain doesn’t bother me,” Siret added, “but for some reason, yours …”
“It bothers us a lot,” Yael finished.
They were staring at me and I was both overwhelmed and confused by their words. I knew we had a connection—my sneaky soul and Rau had pretty much ensured that—but this felt like more. This felt bigger. But if I was just a regular dweller, who clearly couldn’t handle their god powers, then what was this thing between us?
“We’re confused too.” Rome was all gruff as he spoke, turning to stare out into the arena. “But there’s no more time for us to discuss this, we need to figure out how to keep Willa from the arena again.”
Now all of my attention was back on the death maze below. I stared toward a few sols, who looked to be battling a huge beast right in the centre of a sandy section. If four sols had gone into this round, there were only three of them left, darting around the monster.