Page 47 of The Kraken Games

The spotlight panned onto her, and she blinked as she stepped over to the journalist holding up the mic.

“It was a hard fight. I am not sure that I deserved to win this. But somehow, I have.

And I want to thank…” She reeled off names, hardly knowing what she was saying.

Answered questions, laughed, pushed back her sticky hair. “Now I really need to go clean up properly.”

As she walked away from the crowd chanting her name, Luna knew that Kai had gifted her far more than the prize money, far more than this golden cup.

He’d gifted her the chance to meet with his people.

“What the fuck just happened?” Shen stormed into the change room where Kai was showering.

Turning off the taps, Kai stood dripping. No point in lying, they’d have the footage.

“Why in the gods name did you let her win?” Shen’s bright blue eyes bulged.

Kai grabbed a towel and buried his face in it. Said nothing.

“You had the upper hand, and then you literally fucking handed it to her on a plate. It’s there in fucking technicolor for all the adjudicators to see.”

When Kai dared to peer over the towel, Shen was pacing, incandescent turquoise with rage. “I have to defend your sorry ass with the elders, what the fuck do I tell them?”

Kai stepped out of the shower and rubbed the water off his limbs and tentacles, slowly and meticulously. Everything needed to be properly washed after a bout in the mud like that.

“Just tell them I had my reasons.”

“Well great—just fucking great.” Shen’s tentacles flew into the air with exasperation. “Perhaps you would do your coach the fucking honor of explaining what they were?”

Kai sighed. Grabbed his tracksuit pants, retracting his tentacles into his torso. Gods, they were sore. But soon he’d have to appear in public, and he couldn’t be showing his bruised kraken form to the world.

Was he regretting the decision to let her win, he asked himself? No, a resounding no.

As he’d held her limp and helpless in his tentacles, he’d felt so much love for her it was like an arrow hitting both his hearts. He was trying to tell himself it was the heat of the moment, the adrenalin. He didn’t know her… how could he feel that strongly?

Okay, being rational now (almost fucking impossible though that was), all the emotional stuff aside, the truth was, he didbelieveher story. Behind all that anger, the sense of sadness in her was like a bottomless sea.

And if he believed her, then… he had to accept that kraken had beenmurderinghumansafterthe treaty was signed.

These were questions that needed answering for him too.

And down in the dungeon as he’d breathed into her mouth, giving from his own lungs to hers, crazy at it might seem,this… here, with Luna, call it fate, call it divine intervention, call itwhatever the fuck you liked; it had felt like his destiny and hers were intertwined.

But while Shen bristled and paced nearby, Kai still had no comprehensible reason to give him. Not one he was prepared to share, at least. The best he could do was shrug.

Shen scowled at him. “I respect you boy. Always have. But what you let happen down there was emotion getting the better of reason. Now, fucking give me something to tell your grandfather, because gods, I was one of the strongest voices to support you taking part this year.”

Kai threw the towel over his shoulder. “Just tell Razad that the best contestant won.”

With a growled chain of expletives, Shen stomped out.

CHAPTER 15

Luna sank into the bathtub and surveyed her bruises.

That one was when he…

This one…

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