You do not lose.I felt her hesitation as Muhannad let out a mighty roar of his own, six times the size of her and covered in so many spikes and horns that he could split her scales with a single blow. I let none of that show in my eyes as I repeated,you do not lose.
CHAPTER 10
AMEIRAH
Muhannad charged without warning, his long neck snapping at Raheema, enormous jaws already parted. He was as big as Mak, but without the composure and intelligence of my husband’s mount. This wyvern was all brute force, and he’d pinned all that lethal violence upon Raheema.
You’re smaller and faster. You can stay ahead of him,I said urgently, throwing the words down our link and hoping they translated into any sort of sense as I sat forward, hands clenched in my lap. If this went badly, I could rip off my gloves and kill the wyvern myself, but the Saber family might turn on me.
If I didn’t play along with this very dangerous game the king had thrust me into, both our lives could be forfeit. And I didn’t know what that would mean for Varidian, for Rawiya. These weren’t my only family members, and with every warning I’d been given of the king—and what I saw of his cruelty and delight now as he raised his voice and shoutedto the death—I suspectedhe would take out his rage upon anyone close to me. Would the Legion of Fyrevein suffer, too, if I acted out today?
But if I didn’t act, I could lose Raheema.
She roared a defiant scream as if she heard the words and whipped her tail around to drive it into Muhannad’s side with no effect whatsoever. Shit. I tensed, my whole body on alert.
“Calm down,” Kamaal said in a quiet, stony voice.
“My wyvern is at risk, and you tell me to calm down?” I hissed, not looking away from the square as Muhannad snapped his jaws, the clack so loud it cut through the excited rumble of the spectators. He hadn’t struck yet, and my stomach twisted. He was playing with her.
“Everyone is watching,” he breathed. “You need to stay composed.”
But I couldn’t conceal my emotions when Muhannad snapped out a leg and struck Raheema in the side, enough to shove her back but not cause real damage. The low, rumbling sound that came from him could only be called laughter, and it made mefurious.Magic boiled in my veins, death gathering at my command if only I would take off my gloves.
“It’s a game he likes to play,” Kamaal whispered, watching the display with a complete lack of interest as the mighty black wyvern tore a taloned wing through the air, so close to Raheema’s flank that I stopped breathing. “He wants you to react. Don’t.”
I only had half a thought to spare for those words, to wonder what it must have been like growing up with a father who liked to play those sorts of games. Most of my attention remained on Raheema as a rush of determination flowed down the link. She cowered back when Muhannad lashed his mighty head at her again, and the crowd roared for him to draw first blood, but I saw her flinch for the bluff it was. A frisson of razor-sharp panic kept me on edge.
Muhannad was so big, so fiercely built and covered in spikes, but Raheema acted as if they were the same size, utterly fearless. No, not fearless; I felt the icy brush of terror from her soul to mine. She knew how swiftly her life could be ended, but she acted anyway.
I would never claim another wyvern, never accept Muhannad. My warrior heart recognised Raheema’s and hers alone. We were both small and scarred and overlooked, but never weak.
When Muhannad’s chest shook with another growl-laugh at her retreat, she whipped her whole body around and slammed into the space between where huge, ink-dark wings balanced his weight on the ground. She was so small against the bulk of him that I nearly vomited. Raheema had only two nubby horns, no ridges, and yet she drove her head into his throat with enough rage that his laugh cut through with a bark of hurt.
Before he could do more than lift his wings to prepare a retaliation, Raheema danced back, using her sleek body and lighter weight to jump out of his reach.
My heart resumed beating, air flooding my lungs again, when I saw the streak of red on her light blue scales, dripping from her mouth down her chin, splattering the warm stone at her feet. An answering stain dripped from the deep grey scales of Muhannad’s throat where the protective hide was thinner, vulnerable.
Raheema had drawn first blood.
I felt the ripple go through the crowd, the bloodlust shifting to a different sort of hunger—surprise and a newfound support for the underdog. My lip curled. These people were so despicable, so vapidly eager for a show that they didn’t care who won. They had cheered for Muhannad, and now as Raheema slunk low to the ground, her silver-blue wings tucked tight to her back, they cheered for her.
“A sky blue hasn’t been seen in centuries,” I heard someone murmur a few rows behind where the royal family sat, and behind the guards who stood at attention between the riffraff and their beloved regis. “Where did this one come from?”
I’d never thought to ask. In all the weeks I’d been bonded to Raheema, I’d never wondered about her childhood, about the life she lived before she saved me in Wyfell and claimed me as her rider. I assumed she hatched in Daurith as all wyverns did and trained there for flight and battle before leaving to bond a rider. But this wasn’t the first time I’d heard whispers that a sky-blue wyvern hadn’t been glimpsed for hundreds of years. The riders who attacked the Red Star had said something similar.
“Ignore them,” Mihrunnisa breathed, clasping my fisted hand, the warmth of her a shock. My blood had turned to ice the moment I saw Raheema dragged into the square to battle a war-bred wyvern to the death. At first, I thought the princess meant the cheers, the call for more blood, but I heard it then. Two words that made my stomach drop—lightning soul.
I couldn’t ignore them, couldn’t afford to when I wasmarriedto the lightning soul. So I kept my eyes on Raheema as she and Muhannad circled each other, the larger beast now far warier than before, his teasing games gone. And I kept my ears on the crowd behind us, even as my gut clenched.
The mount of the lightning soul.
The last abomination rode a blue wyvern.
Muhannad should put this thing down.
My back stiffened, but I didn’t turn to acknowledge those accusations that could have me returning to this square for an entirely different reason: my own execution.
Raheema tracked Muhannad, her silver eyes bright, fevered. I wondered if mine looked the same when the bigger wyvern shot across the square with thundering steps so heavy and loud, I felt each one punch through my ribs and into my heart. Thebirds that had chattered in Morysen’s treetops fell silent, a hush sweeping over the city as that war wyvern honed every bit of lethal power on my mount, my friend. Raheema and I had flown together, fought together, bled together to save my home. I couldn’t just sit here while she fought for her life.