Page 52 of The Ballad of a Bard

“What about in the Pits?”

“I didn’t have much time for such things like beauty and vanity, West.” She rolled her eyes at him. “Not between hiding my secret identity and keeping my shifts with Roland.”

“Pity.”

It tumbled out of his mouth before he even thought about it.

“Pity?” Her chin angled upwards in curiosity. “Why?”

He shrugged, “Because you’re beyond gorgeous. Even without the bit of Saint power flowing through you, you’re quite beautiful.”

She was.

In truth, she was one of the most stunning things he’d laid his eyes on, including the heartbreaking beauty of Muse and the serendipitous siren that was Dream. But Crimson- there was bubbling youth, eternal laughter, fierce determination, sparkling will and a fighter beneath it all. There was the joy that coated her skin like a fine layer of snow, the light that refused to dim, even if sorrow claimed her, and the way she smi-

West cut his train of thinking off before it could damage him. He silently cursed at himself for even allowing that tendril of thought, for even going there. Any sign of it, any slight plungeintothatmindset, and it could be over for him in an instant.

Her entire face turned vermillion and she coughed, covering the majority in it. He almost laughed at how it matched her hair.

“Has no one ever told you anything remotely similar, Heartstrings?” West braced his weight on his elbows, folding his fingers together and resting his head on the platform.

“Only Altivar.”

His glee dispersed almost instantly like the night without a single star to be found for miles. “That doesn’t count. The Prince can find beauty in everything. I wouldn’t be surprised if he enjoyed a piece ofdirtfor the possibility that there could be gold within it.”

“Then no. No one’s ever told me anything like that before.” Crimson fell back into her chair, sucking her cheeks in with apoppingsound. “Not that I really need anything like that. I’m not a strutting peacock who needs affirmations regarding my looks. It’s not something that’s massively important to me.”

“What is?” He picked at the side of the map, starting to roll it up. He’d pawed over it three times and still couldn’t make himself be interested in it. “Other than your brother, of course.”

Her mouth opened and closed, as if that was precisely what she was going to respond with. He took a smidge of delight in the fact that he knew her so well already. Crimson contemplated heavily, leaving a blistering minute of pure silence.

“I guess fighting was.”

“You enjoyed that?” Shock filtered through him. “Killing people for the sake of glory, of money?”

“No.” She bit out in his direction. “Neverkilling. I hated when the rules changed. I hated it when Grimm took over and made it so that no one could compete unless they were the only ones to walk out of the ring alive. It was barbaric and brutal and savage.My frienddiedbecause of Grimm and his foul additions. I will never forgive him for that, for wantingmorebloodshed, greed and vanity in a world that already suffers from far too much of it.”

He felt the puff of relief settle over him as she denied the horrible reality that has been her past. There was a part of him that didn’t understand why humans killed each other.

For money, for glory, for sport.

For anything.

“It waswar.” West uttered quietly.

“Yes.” Crimson said. “As was he.”

“So what part about the Blades of Blood did you enjoy then? If not the killing.” He admired the fire that sprung to life when she defended herself, her hard decisions in the hard life she’d been stuck with. Not many would allow anyone to push them on it, to delve further into their reasonings, let alone a Saint.

“It didn’t matter who I was. It didn’t matter where I came from. All that mattered in that moment, was what I was capable of. Of the talents that came from me, because of me. In a matter of a few seconds, minutes, I could change my entire life with a few swipes of a knife.” She opened up to him, shoving the map off to the side. “I didn’t have to worry about eating that day, about bringing the necessary means home for Cobalt. I was there, in that ring, and I was anyone and no one all at once. I could be whatever I chose, whomever I chose to be.”

She inhaled sharply and went on.

“They didn’t know that I was a twenty-six year old girl, who’d been left by both of her parents, who had to grow up when I wasn’t ready. I wasn’t someone with a massive weight on my shoulders.”

Because she had to take it all.

There was no one to help her.

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