Page 44 of Echoes of Fire

But I hesitated.

The fissure taunted me—a hairline crack weeping steam near the cell’s corner. I crouched before it, Vyne’s vial burning a holein my pocket. One drop could fracture the volcanic stone. Two might collapse the entire wall.

My thumb caressed the stopper.

Run.

The survival instinct drilled into me screamed for action. Melt the bars. Slip into the steam vents. Let the acidic reek of Volcaryth’s underbelly cloak my escape.

I uncorked the vial.

The liquid fire hissed at exposure to air, its surface swirling with miniature plasma storms. I held it over the fissure, watching light dance across the stone. One trembling tilt would expose the weakness in the rock.

And possibly blow me to bits.

My hand froze.

Coward.

The word slithered through me in a nameless Drakarn’s voice, all gravel and disappointed heat. I slammed the stopper back in place.

“Fuck you,” I whispered to the phantom judgment.

But the truth coiled tighter than Vyne’s acid—escaping wouldn’t stop the challenge. It would only prove every sneering Drakarn right.

Human. Weak.

Unworthy.

I retreated, back pressed against the far wall. The dagger’s hilt bit into my side as I methodically braided my hair—tight, practical, battle-ready. Every tug of the purple strands filled me with resolve.

Survive until sunrise.

The geothermal hum beneath my shoulders carried whispers of the arena. Vyne’s casual horrors—shadow predators, flesh-melting vents—took shape in the condensation dripping down the walls. I imagined hypotheticals, calculating thermal blindspots, drafting escape vectors from half-remembered schematics of Scalvaris’ underlevels.

A rasp of claws against stone snapped my head up.

“Final meal, leech.”

A guard slid a clay bowl through the slot—lukewarm gruel swimming with unidentifiable protein chunks. My stomach revolted. I ate it anyway, trying to remember those honey fritters Rath had brought me.

Vyne’s acid vial went into my left boot. Rath’s dagger claimed a spot in the right.

The cell’s oppressive heat thickened as night deepened. Sweat glued my tunic to my skin. I counted breaths, trying to meditate.

Three hundred twelve … three hundred thirteen …

Eventually, I must have slept.

Metal shrieked.

I jolted upright as the cell door groaned open, revealing silhouettes backlit by blood-orange torchlight.

“The challenge begins when the horn bellows.” The guard’s smirk dripped venom as shackles snapped around my wrists. “Hope you die quickly.”

Somewhere beyond the labyrinth of stone, Rath would be hunting.

And I’d be the prey.

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