“Yes,” she whispered back. She lifted a weak hand and pressed it to my heart. “It’s yours now. Thank you . . .”
Her face relaxed into a peaceful smile. And then she was gone.
The crowd was shocked into silence at the sudden demise of their favorite whipping post. But they shook themselves free of that spell as I clambered to my feet, painted in the Fury’s blood. The arena echoed with demands for my blood too.
I reached for my swords, still buried in Uathach’s chest—they slid free with far less effort than I thought it would take—and I staggered in the direction of the Ludus Achillea bench. Catcalls and insults rained down as I tore the suffocating helmet from my head with one hand, dropping it in the sand behind me. I was almost back at the dugout when the two attendants with their grotesque jackal masks and their corpse hooks strode past me to drag the body from the arena. At the sight of them, I thought my heart would burst into flame. I turned and ran back to where the Fury lay sprawled, still and small.
“No!” I shoved aside the jackal-man. “You will not touch her!”
The crowd grew suddenly still again.
“She deserves a better honor than your kind,” I snarled. “Get away!”
The attendants backed off, looking to the games master for direction. I slammed my still-bloody blades into the sheaths hanging on my hips and bent down. As gently as I could, I slid my arms under her lifeless legs and shoulders. Even though she was smaller than me, I’d expected her to be heavy and hard to lift because of her powerful strength. But emptied of all her fire and fight, the Fury’s body was almost feather-light.
I cradled her to my chest and walked across the sand toward the yawning maw of the archway that led to the infirmary—and the arena morgue. Enraged as I was, it took me a moment to notice that the angry silence of the mob had melted into a swelling wave of applause and shouts of approval.
“Victrix!” they cried. “Victory!”
Just like that, I had gone from villain to hero at the whim of the mob.
They knew nothing. I knew what I really was.
I was an instrument of the Morrigan’s will.
Once I’d laid the body out on a low stone bench in the dark vault of the morgue, I knelt beside her on the dirt floor. I vomited until there was nothing left, but still my body rebelled against me—against the thing I’d suddenly become—dry-heaving until it felt as though my ribs would crack.
“It’s not as if she gave you a choice,” Elka said quietly from behind me. I hadn’t even heard her come in, but she was sitting on a stool beside the door. “You’ll forget this in time.”
“And what of you?” I leaned back against the cold stone bench support, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. “What about the man you killed that first day, on the stage in the Forum? Do you still think of him?”
“Think?” She shook her head. “No. I don’t have to think of him. His shade visits me almost nightly in my sleep. We’re so familiar with each other now, he’s almost a friend.”
She said it half as a joke, but I could see the distant horror of the act in her gaze. After a moment, she shook herself from her reverie and stood. Then she held out a hand, helping me to my feet.
“If Uathach was so desperate to escape her life as a slave,” I said, “if she saw that much more freedom even in death, then why didn’t she just let one of her opponents kill her in any one of her bouts before me? Why fight so hard? Why even fight at all?”
I looked at Elka, searching her pale eyes for answers I didn’t have. Then I remembered what Sorcha had said to me earlier about the danger of those who had nothing to lose, and I realized she’d been almost right. The woman who’d called herself Uathach, whom everyone else had labeled the Fury, did have one last thing to lose: her honor.
By beating her—ending her—in a good, fair fight, I’d let her keep it. She had died by the sword, and that was the way she’d wanted it. To lose myself in mourning Uathach’s death would be to dishonor how she had lived her life. But to live my life the way she had—in restless fury, always seeking freedom over the next horizon—would be to cage myself inside a fate that was not of my own making.
Why even fight at all?
I thought back to the night of my oath swearing. I had come a long way since uttering those words in the darkness. I hadn’t really understood them at the time—not fully. And I had not thought to find my kindred spirits—my tribe—so far away from home, but I had. Elka, Ajani, Sorcha. Even Nyx. I had found friendships . . . rivalries . . .
Family.
Family I wanted to keep safe the way Sorcha had wanted to keep her gladiators safe, by transforming the Ludus Achillea into a safe haven . . . in the days before she’d had to abandon that dream for my sake. That was why I would fight. That was why I would win. I was Victrix. Victory. At least, I would be. I said a silent prayer for the Fury and thanked her for giving me the fight that would send me hurtling toward my destiny.