Page 12 of Fae Champion

Kill me it was, then.

“Let’s go,” I said, inching away slowly in a wide arc that would take us away from Ivar as well as the sinkhole. “I’ve had enough of today already.”

The queen’s glare was on me the entire way until we finally exited the arena. As soon as we did, I pointed us away from the palace.

I wasn’t going to allow anyone to lock me in a dungeon, not even the shockingly gorgeous fae with the moonlight eyes.

I’d skirted death already once that day. I wasn’t about to tempt destiny by giving it a second easy opportunity.

4.MY BELOVED ENEMY, HER PRECIOUS PET

“Elowyn, wait,” Rush called.

Though I had no idea where my purposeful steps would lead me, I didn’t slow or turn.

“Wait,” he repeated. Then more softly, “El, please.”

Despite my intentions to flee the coliseum as rapidly as possible, I found my steps faltering. The chatter of the mob wafted from the open arena like a cloying scent, threatening to drag me back to its brutal violence.

At least the odd creatures that appeared to be horses cloaked in dragon scales were behind us. After sighing in resignation, I halted and turned to face the man I knew was directly behind me. I wasn’t sure when it had happened, but at some point I’d begun to sense his proximity, as if I were suffering from cold and he were my only source of heat.

My gaze went first to his friends. West, Ryder, andHiroshi stood far enough away that they wouldn’t easily hear what Rush said to me. I wondered why.

When I met Rush’s waiting stare, his eyes flashed for a moment—a blast of moody moonlight. They ran up and down my body before resting on my face. His forehead bunched in concern. “Are you all right?”

For several breaths I simply looked back at him. Then I laughed.

“What’s so funny?” he bristled. “Based on what I saw today, there’s nothing to laugh at.”

“Oh, trust me, I know.”

“Then why are you laughing?”

Dark as night, I chuckled again. “Because what’s my alternative?”

His forehead smoothed and he took a step toward me. If he reached out, he could touch me.

He didn’t. “You know you don’t have to pretend to be okay. You don’t need to be strong all the time.”

I snorted. “Don’t I though? Just today the queen’s tried to kill me twice already, and I have no idea what was going on when I touched the ground.”

His forehead was back to scrunching.

“I’ve been taken by force from my home,” I continued, even if I was no longer certain Nightguard qualified as such, “…shot with arrows, slapped by a major prick, threatened, and when all that didn’t work as well asHer Majestyhoped”—unlike how others spoke the queen’s official title, I made sure to fill it with all the disdain I held for the woman—“she took my friends. She’s holding them somewhere in this cursed place, andas if it weren’t enough to tell me she’ll kill them, she’s also threatened a hundred goblins just so I can live withthathanging over my head too. She’s making me fight in this ridiculous tournament just for show because she’s trying to kill me at every turn.”

I flung my hands into the air, unable to contain my mounting frustration. “She couldn’t wait for Russet to do the job. She had that slimebucket ass turd, Lennox, stab me in secret. That’s the kind of stand-up lady she is.” I grinned fakely, bitterly. “She had her lackey magic me into looking like someone else, forced me to lie or I’d sound like a squealing pig, and I still have no idea what I’m really doing here. Why couldn’t the king’ve left me alone? It’s not like he acts as if he wants me here.”

My agitation was building to a crescendo, for all the good it would do me. “And the almighty bitch wants to stick me in a dungeon? Seriously? It’s not enough for her that I’m coated in blood and probably traumatized enough to last me my entire lifetime, she has to threaten you guys now too? What, by the time she’s done is she gonna threaten to murder every one of her subjects to get me to do what she wants? Why does she even care? She could easily send me back home and be done with me.”

My chest rose and fell as if I’d run from her as fast and as far as I could—something I should probably be doing right this very moment, actually.

Rush’s eyes were wells of understanding, and I thought within their depths I saw shared my wish that things might be so verydifferent.

They held me glued in place.

“So you were Zinnia this whole time, huh?” he eventually said.

“Pretty messed up, right?”

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