Page 17 of Ironhold, Trial Four

I ride on one of the carts for the injured for the journey back toIronhold.The crowds around us wave and cheer but the journey back is always more somber than the one outbound. Already there are faces missing from among those who set off. Arctus is dead, his body nearly hacked intwo. I won't shed many tears for him.

My friends have survived, at least. Cesca and Zara are walking back together. For Cesca, today was her first time fighting for real. She killed her opponent quickly with her needle like sword, stunning him with a jolt of lightning through it, then finishing him with a thrust. She looks different somehow tonight, both exhilarated andmore serious. Alaric isn't with the procession, which can only mean that he's with his patron, his mother. He will return to the fortress later than the rest of us. Rowan is walking by the side of the cart, looking at me with concern.

“How badly are you hurt?” he asks me. He wouldn't have seen it all of my bout. He would have been busy preparing for his own, and in any case, we don't get much of a view from down underneath the stadium. The games are for the spectators, not for us.

I shake my head. “I'm not injured, I'm just… when I fought Callus, he did something. He has magic.”

“I heard that part,” Rowan says. “I can't believe someone managed to get in without Lord Darius realizing what their talents were.”

I look over to where Callus is marching at thefront of the procession. A couple of guards are between me and him, clearly making sure he doesn't try anything else, at least until we're back in the fortress. It doesn't make me feel much safer.

“He can drain someone's life from them,” I say. “And the emperor… he believes that Callus was sent by someone to kill me, either for some personal reason oras a way of attacking the emperor through me.”

Rowan looks worried. He reaches out a hand and puts it over mine. “Any patron can attract danger for you, buthaving the emperor as yours is doubly dangerous. Anyone who wants to insult him without risking being accused of treasonwill do it through the gamesrather than out in the open.”

“That doesn't make me feel better, Rowan,” I say.

He shakes his head. “I'm sorry but it isn't meant to. I need you aware of just how dangerous this is, Lyra. Lady Tyra…”

Even saying his former mistress's namemakes him wince.

“…she was upset once with another noble whowas a patron to a gladiator in the games. She had the gladiator’s armor tampered with, so that it tangled their movementsthe next time they fought. I was standing next to her when she strode up to the noble to watch the bout together. She stood there and smiled as she watched a gladiator diejust to make a point.”

“That's horrible,” I say. I know that Rowan has many difficult memories of his time as a slave to Lady Tyra. “I wish none of this had happened to you, Rowan.”

“This isn't about me now,” he says. “I just want you to take the warning from it. If someone is targeting you like this, and you know who they’re sending after you then… you can't be alone, Lyra.”

“Is that a way of getting to spend more time with me?” I ask. It's only half a joke. The truth is thatRowan near me is more than a comforting presence at the moment. It's hard to deny how attracted I feel when I look his way. Especially when Alaric has pulled back from me. It might almost be simpler if I could put Alaric from my mind and be with Rowan. Alaric is leaving after all.

And yet I can’t. I can’t let go of him like that. I can’t pretend that what we have isn’t real.

“I'm serious, Lyra. If he has the powers you say, if he can just drain the life from you with a touch, then anytime he can catch you alone, he can kill you. Worse, no one will even be able to prove anything because it will just look as though you have died for no reason.”

Making him the perfect assassin. I assume that if I were anywhere else, Callus would not have attacked me face to face. If I had been some fine noble, he would have touched his hand to me in the street, and I would have fallen dead. It would have looked as if I'd suffered a heart attack.

How many people has he killed like that? He talked in the colosseum about all the other beasts whispers he's killed. I have heard the empty threats of the arena, and that didn’t sound like one. This is a man who has hunted many like me before. Who has killed and killed again.

“Promise me,” Rowan says. “Promise me that you won't be alone.”

“I promise,” I say, although how I'm going to manage it, I don't know. The thought of what I must do to stay alive is frightening, the kind of nagging fear that I hate the idea of having to live with.

Ironhold looms ahead of us, its granite wallsdark and grey compared to the white marble of the city, as if to remind us that we are less, undeserving of such beauty. We head inside, and Lord Darius is waiting as usual in the main practice area to address us.

“As always, we take a moment to honor those who have died today. The fallen.”

He slams his fist to his chest before raising it in salute.

“The fallen!” We copy the gesture. Each of us is meant to take a moment to think about those who have died, but I find myself thinking of how close I came to death instead.

“Today there was cheating in the games,” he says. “Remember that they are a holy thing. Remember that we train here for the glory ofAetheria. If you have other aims, if you wish to do things that are beneath the dignity of the colosseum, remember that there will be punishment for it.”

He looks my way and then at Callus. I want to point out that Ididn't have a choice about him attacking me with a power I knew nothing about, but I have done enough things to upset the master of Ironhold over the past seasonsthat I doubt it makes much difference to him. He has decided that I do not fit in with Ironhold any more than beast whisperers fit in with Aetheria.

“Now those of you who have survived, get to the practice posts. Work out what you could have done better. Work out how to avoid making the same mistakes again. Learn from your fights and become the best gladiators you can be.”

The others go to the practice posts, and I can see the indecision on Rowan’s face. He wants to be near me but at the same time, he cannot ignore the instruction. I should be going to the healers, but that would leave me alone and vulnerable. Now that Callus has tried for me in the colosseum, I doubt he will hold back outside it.

I solve the problem by getting downfrom the cart and forcing myself to go with Rowan to the practice area, taking up wooden weapons and working through the movements of my bout. Every effort of it is agony.

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