Seduction (Curse of the Gods #3)

“That’s what we need the carriages for,” Emmy insisted. “Several of the top sols are injured, and I’ve been directed to organise their transport to Dvadel, as the Blesswood healers are overrun. Please don’t make us wait any longer, or the repercussions will not just land on us.”

He nodded, jerking his eyes away from the arena. “Of course, Miss. Wait right here, I’ll prepare the carriages. Will two be enough? I only have one spare driver—”

“These two women have been asked to drive,” she quickly intercepted, nudging my mother to stand behind me. Luckily, the dweller hadn’t paid much attention to her, yet. “The dweller committee felt it best that our representatives travel with them, as the families of the sols will need to be notified of their healing progress in a … diplomatic manner. You know how these sol families take failure in battle …” She let that trail off suggestively, while the dweller nodded a few more times.

“Of course.” He hurried back into the stables and we both turned in complete synchronisation to face my mother.

Her expression didn’t change, but her eyes moved quickly from me to Emmy, and back.

“Who sent you here?” Emmy asked.

“Staviti,” she replied. “Our great and humble Creator. The Father of our Realm. The Benevolent. The Wise—”

“We get it,” I muttered. “Why did he send you here?”

“He said: Donald, I would like you to stand in the arena when they call your name. Try not to fall over.”

“That’s all?” Emmy pressed, apparently frustrated.

“He said I was not to injure the Sacred One,” my mother added.

“Which sacred one?” I puffed out a breath. “There are so many.”

“You, Sacred One.”

“Oh. Cool. Why can nobody hurt me?”

“He would like to meet with you. He does not like when people bleed on his rugs. He was very clear that creating rugs was a chore he liked to avoid, so if I could prevent people from bleeding on the rugs—”

I placed my hand over her mouth to stem the tirade of unhelpful explanations. “He clearly hasn’t told her anything important. I can take her with us. Are you going to come, or stay?”

“You know I need to stay.” The expression on Emmy’s face was sad, but her shoulders were squared, determined. “The dwellers need a leader—someone steady that they can trust, someone who can help to rally them. I won’t leave them in this mess. Especially with Evie still injured. Once you and the Abcurses leave, the sols are going to try and take back control of the academy. They’re going to send the dwellers so far into the ground that we’ll forget what sunlight looks like. I need to stay and help.”

Evie. I had forgotten about her. I shouldn’t have forgotten about her considering I was part of the reason she got burned. Cyrus was most of the reason, but it was still my Chaos, and I needed to accept my role. There was no time to ask more about her, though. Not right now. “I should stay and h—”

“You need to leave,” Emmy insisted, lowering her voice as the dweller began to lead one of the carts out. “The longer you stay, the more everyone here will suffer the fate of Staviti’s punishments for you. You need to get as far away from all of these innocent people as you can.”

Her words would have probably filled me with pain and guilt, if I hadn’t already shut myself off to everything. I continued with my very practical, analytical train of thought. “You’re right, and I think I know a place. Will you watch mu—Donald? I need to get the guys out of the arena so we can leave. Before things get even worse.”

“I’ll watch her.” Emmy pried my fingers from our mother’s arm, and opened her mouth to speak, but the dweller was now directly behind us, fiddling with the bullsen reins. She waited a click, until he returned to the stable, and then quickly rushed out: “She’ll be safe with me. I promise. Go!”

I wasn’t going to wait for any more encouragement; I spun and ran back toward the arena entrance, searching along the ground for where I might have dropped my broken spear. I didn’t see it anywhere, of course, but it didn’t matter. I could maybe use Chaos. Probably. Hopefully.

“Found her!” a familiar voice shouted out, and I noticed Aros standing right beneath the arena gate, two stolen spears gripped in his hands and blood smeared up his arms.

“Gods.” I lurched to a stop before him, reaching for one of his arms. “Is this yours?”

“No.” His eyes were heavy on my face, trying to dig into me, to measure how I was feeling. “Sorry, Willa. We had to hurt some of them.”

I turned to the arena, where the others were still fighting, though Siret was now breaking free from the centre of the death-circle, swiping servers out of his way. The bodies were piled up all around them. And … they were still fighting.

“Where the hell are they all coming from?” I asked, flinching as Siret kicked another server out of his way.

“Don’t know,” Aros grunted, shifting one of his spears to a holder at his back.

I could see Rome in the center of the mass, trying to knock people away from him without doing any serious damage—and mostly failing. I could see Coen, too, causing people to crumble around him, their screams of pain echoing over to me.

“Where’s Yael?” I shouted, as Siret drew closer, kicking away another server.

“Went to find you. Figured we’d need to send Persuasion to convince your ass to stop being a hero.”

“Ah. Well, I have returned. Just in time to rescue you.”

Aros snorted, using his second spear to tap me on the shoulder. “We could have been done with this fight half a rotation ago—figured you wouldn’t want us killing too many of them, though.”

“Thanks, Three.” I wanted to pull him into my arms and wrap around him, but I had to fight the urge off. I was forcing all of my emotions away. I needed to.

“Found her!” The shout came from behind me, but I didn’t have time to spin around before two arms locked around me, drawing me tightly against a broad chest. “There’s a dweller-Emmy outside the arena with Willa’s mother and a couple carriages. Apparently, Willa is trying to rescue us.”

“That’s what she said,” Siret confirmed, before turning and running halfway back to the death-circle. I could hear his shout still, from where I stood. “Hey Pain! Strength! Willa would like to rescue us now!”

“Now?” Rome bellowed back. “Can it wait a bit? We have a bet going!”

“What a bunch of shweeds,” I muttered, before summoning an internal reprimand to project into all of their heads.

We need to get the hell out of Blesswood before Staviti tears the place to the ground in his attempt to punish us.

“She has a point!” Coen yelled across the arena. “Be there in a click! I’ve almost beaten his body count!”

“Ye-ah,” I drawled sarcastically, rolling my eyes toward Aros. “They’re trying really hard not to hurt anyone, aren’t they?”

“Let’s um … go and see the carriages?” Siret reached forward and grabbed a hold of my shirt, attempting to pull me out of Yael’s arms.

It didn’t work; Yael only tightened them around me, lifting me up off the ground.