Page 154 of A Tribute of Fire

This was ridiculous. I didn’t have enough time to respond to my overactive imagination. But I sheathed my knives and went down the stairs. The dread in my gut increased with each step.

It reached a frenzied pitch when I realized that Io wasn’t at her post.

My heart thudded low and hard as I went through the doorway and saw Io on the ground. An absolute giant of a man was kneeling on top of her, his meaty hands wrapped around her throat, squeezing the life from her.

For a second I was so shocked that I didn’t react.

Then I threw one of my knives at him, but my aim was poor and it bounced off his breastplate. He turned to glare at me, a murderous gleam in his eyes.

“Leave her alone!” I said, hurriedly trying to calculate my next move. Io’s face was turning purple. In the time it would take me to reach them, he could easily snap her neck. I had to get him away from her and to chase after me.

“Where’s the Locrian?” he asked.

Only a tiny part of me registered panic at the notion that he was looking specifically for me. The rest of me was hysterical over Io’s eyes rolling back into her head before her eyelids drifted shut.

He was going to kill her.

“I’m the Locrian,” I taunted him. “Come and get me.”

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

My remaining throwing knife wouldn’t be enough to keep this man at bay. Not only did I need to get him away from my sister but I had to find a longer weapon. Something that would keep him at arm’s reach. I had one upstairs.

Thankfully he released Io, who was unmoving.

I didn’t know if she was alive or not.

He pulled out a giant broadsword from his back. My heart twisted in my chest as I realized that it would cut the staff I’d left at the door of Theano’s office into kindling. Maybe she had a weapon of some kind in that room.

It would be the only way I could hope to survive this.

I cursed myself for leaving my xiphos back in my bedroom. I turned and ran for the stairs and heard the man following behind me. I raced up, ducking as he swung out at me with his weapon. I heard his broadsword smash into the stone wall. I ran down the hallway, grabbed the staff, and tried the door handle.

Some part of me had secretly hoped that I’d miraculously managed to undo the lock earlier. How many times was this going to happen to me? Chased by killers, locked out from safety.

With a desperate yell I rammed my body against the door with all my might, and to my complete shock, it gave way. There was still a fireburning in the fireplace, giving me enough light to quickly search the room.

There was no weapon. It was only a workspace.

I turned with my staff in front of me, but without a sound, the man wrenched it out of my hands and knocked me down with his fist. I heard his broadsword drop to the ground while he climbed on top of me, straddling my hips. Everything was happening so quickly that before I knew it, he was on top of me, had pulled a knife from his belt, and was aiming it down at my throat.

I reached up and grabbed at his wrists and shoved with all my strength against him. I didn’t know which one of us was more surprised that I was able to hold him off—him or me.

It shouldn’t have been possible. The man was built of pure muscle. He should have been able to obliterate me within moments.

He growled and kept on pushing his knife at me. I couldn’t shove him off or get myself free. I was stuck, my heart beating so fast it felt like it was going to burst out of my chest. I grit my teeth together, my entire body aching from trying to save my life.

I somehow managed to direct his blade to my left, slowly moving the pointed tip of the dagger away from the base of my neck and over toward my shoulder.

My strength began to falter and his weapon moved ever closer to my body. Moment by moment, inch by inch. I was shaking from the strain of trying to keep him from stabbing me.

The knife hovered just above me and I could feel the cold edge of it against my heated skin.

No, no, no.

This couldn’t be it. Things couldn’t end this way.

Please help me.

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