Page 84 of Once a Villain
A lone figure sprinted toward the imperial box. Joan gasped, her heart in her throat. It was Nick.
Without changing pace, Nick threw a spear at Eleanor’s chest.
Joan followed its path, hope rising. Could this be it? Could this be the moment they took back the timeline?
But Eleanor’s personal shield shot back up just in time to divert the blade. Joan gasped. The shield hadn’t manifested all at once. The diverted spear had managed to graze Eleanor’s arm, and blood streaked her pale skin.
The crowd exclaimed in mixed shock and horror; until this moment, they’d still believed Eleanor to be a hologram. But now the blood on her arm made it clear to everyone that she was here in the flesh.
And someone had managed to wound her—a supposedly all-powerful goddess.
Eleanor stumbled back, searching for the source of the attack. She fixed on Nick at the base of the box, breathing fast. He’d scared her.
Nick took his silver mask off, revealing his face, and Eleanor took another step back, visibly shaken.
Rumblings sounded across the stadium. The audience had recognized him. Even from down here, Joan could hear the words. “Nick Ward! The Gladiator!”
“You—” Eleanor sounded out of breath. “You’re supposed to be dead!”
“Iwasdead!” Nick had raised his voice, and it rang now around the stadium, unexpectedly clear. The arena must have been built with acoustics in mind. Perhaps gladiators gave speeches when they won, or when they begged for mercy. “I came back to stop you!”
He’s popular among the humans, Eleanor had told Aaron. Joanhadn’t understoodhowpopular Nick had been until this moment. He was gaining a shield of his own now.
From the battleground, people were running and limping toward him. Gladiators and criminals.Humans.Joan spotted the injured Bull among them. They clustered around Nick, protecting him.
The stadium was pin-drop silent. Joan had the feeling that if Nick said the word, all the humans in the stadium would riot—everyone in the arena, on the uppermost levels of the stands. Every worker in the building.
Eleanor seemed aware of that too, because she didn’t give the guards the order to seize him. She turned again, seeking Aaron this time.
In the Oliver stands, Aaron’s posture was the picture of confusion, and Joan saw Eleanor tilt her head; she wasn’t sure if that confusion was feigned or real.
“We seem to be at a stalemate,” Nick called to Eleanor—Joan had the feeling he was deliberately pulling her attention back from Aaron. “You need to lock down the timeline. And you can’t do it from behind that barrier.”
“Perhaps,” Eleanor said.
“I don’t think you have long to decide,” Nick added, “becausethat”—he gestured at the jagged tear in the timeline above them—“doesn’t look very stable to me.” The killings in the arena had stopped, but the tear was still visibly widening. “My bet is that it’ll keep growing until you lock the timeline.”
“We are at a stalemate, then,” Eleanor agreed. “Because I don’t think you want the world to end any more than I do.”
Nick didn’t answer. Instead, he took a step back and then ran at the wall, scaling it and the overhanging balcony of the imperial box as easily as climbing a ladder. There was a collective gasp from the crowd as he landed in front of Eleanor. It was a superhuman feat—the wall had to be fifty feet high at least. Nick really did still have his abilities.
A guard came at him, gun raised, and Nick disarmed him like a magic trick. One second the gun was in the man’s hand, and the next it was in Nick’s, and the man was on the ground.
Nick dealt with three more guards just as quickly. When he was done, it was just him and Eleanor on the balcony. He aimed the gun at Eleanor’s chest.
A dozen guards rushed up into the box behind Eleanor, stopped by Eleanor’s raised hand. They couldn’t get to Nick unless she dropped the shield.
“No scars,” Eleanor said to Nick slowly. “You’re not the Nick of this timeline.” She looked around. “Where’s my sister?”
Joan stepped closer to the window, wanting to answer her.I’m here.Fightme.
Nick answered. “She didn’t make it,” he lied. “I was the only one who arrived here.” His voice was still clear. Joan wasn’t sure if it was the acoustics of the stadium, or if he was close enough to Eleanor that her microphone was picking up his voice.
“How terribly sad,” Eleanor said. “Because she diedhereas an infant.”
Nick’s answer was a low growl of warning. “I won’t discuss her with you.”
Frustration and terror surged through Joan. Was thereanything she could do from here? Create a distraction? Get into the arena herself? She couldn’t think of anything that would help and not make things worse....
