Laying with Axil and then sleeping next to him all night felt like something out of a dream. I’d imagined it so many times in my teenage years and even after. He was far more tender than I fantasized but also passionate. I tried to slip out of the bed quietly and leave, but he growled and it made me smile.
“Don’t you dare bed me and then leave without breakfast,” he scolded.
I laughed for falling into my usual ways with men. I had only bedded two others but it was casual and there was no breakfast involved.
“Well, you better hurry, I have a fight to win,” I told him.
He crawled across the bed and yanked my hand, forcing me to fall on top of him laughing.
Reaching out, he traced my hairline, looking into my eyes with a tenderness I never remembered being there at fifteen. Perhaps that came in his two years of imprisonment. It was like he was grateful for the smallest things.
“You’re damn straight you do.”
That caused me to grin. “So … you think I’ll win?” I couldn’t help the smile that pulled at my cheeks.
“I’ve seen you fight, Zara. Even when we were kids you were the strongest woman I’d ever met. You’re a survivor. I have no doubt you are the toughest amongst the wolven and will be my queen.”
I wanted to be happy about his compliment but instead bile rose in my throat. My mind was infiltrated of an image of sweet Eliza lying dead at my feet. I knew that my physical strength was unmatched against her … but I had an emotional weakness where that girl was concerned. My packmate. My sister. I could never hurt a hair on her head.
“I need to get training,” I said suddenly.
He must have noticed the shift in my mood and released me, nodding.
A servant came by with breakfast and we ate quickly and then I kissed him goodbye. I needed to get in the right headspace for this fight and being around Axil was not going to do that. I didn’t want to spend too much time with my prize before I’d won it and lose my edge.
“WE’VE GOT THIS,” I told Eliza and she nodded, though she looked like she might be sick.
The crowd had amassed again for our doubles fight. Two more girls had made it in from the outskirts just before the cut-off time: everyone else was assumed dead. Now whoever won this fight between Ivanna, Charlize and us, would fight the girls who’d just made it back. They were dehydrated and injured so it wasn’t much of a competition.
Axil sat on his throne, high above the fighting ring, as I looked my brother in the eyes. I trusted him to get me through this and he always had sage advice, so I prepared myself to absorb whatever he was going to say now.
“You smell like him,” my brother said and looked up at the king.
I stiffened at his words, blushing and then kicking myself for not bathing after bedding Axil.
That was not what I’d expected Cyrus to say.
Leaning into me, my brother whispered, “Use that. Get in Ivanna’s head that you’ve already won the king.”
Then he pulled back and I swallowed hard, giving him a curt nod. Mind games. His specialty. Instead of taunting her about sleeping with her coach, I was going to flaunt who I was bedding. What could go wrong?
Eliza’s coach reached out and placed a hand on both Eliza’s and my shoulders, bringing us closer together. “Use your pack link and the fact that Eliza is the biggest wolf here.”
We both nodded: it had always been our strategy to use Eliza’s large-sized wolf. Her size was a great asset.
I turned to Eliza. “Do you drink mead?”
She frowned, looking confused. “Not really. I’m more of a glass of wine girl … when appropriate of course.”
I grinned. She was adorable and so proper. “Tonight, after we win, we get so drunk we forget our names,” I told her.
Her coach clicked his tongue in disapproval at my words.
That caused a smile to rise on Eliza’s lips and I watched as her anxiety fled. “Deal.”
We were ready.
I stepped into the ring, taking the sword that the advisor offered. I would not be stupid this time and decline a weapon. Not against Ivanna. He offered one to the opposing team and Ivanna picked it up. It looked like we had a similar strategy. We would stay human and protect our partner while they shifted to wolf form.
The bell hadn’t rung yet, but I hefted the weight of the blade in my hands, not daring to look at Axil for fear of losing my concentration. I wouldn’t allow my mind to waver, I had to be ruthless and unforgiving until these two women were either dead at my feet or on their knees crying forfeit.
The advisor raised his hand to quiet the crowd. “This fight must start human, only one partner can use the weapon and only one partner can shift into wolf form. This includes partial shifting.” He looked at Ivanna and me.
We both nodded and Ivanna stepped closer to me, her nostrils flaring as she seemed to take in my scent. Her gaze flicked to Axil and then back to me and she growled.
I fake yawned. “I’m so tired. Last night was pretty wild.” I chose that moment to look at Axil and wink and then the bell rang.
I barely had time to look back at Ivanna and she was advancing on me with a battle cry. I did something insane then, something to put myself at risk but make sure we won this. Cranking my arm back, I chucked the sword right at Ivanna’s partner Charlize as she attempted to change into her wolf form. The blade left my fingers and sank into the girl’s chest, knocking her backwards onto the ground.
She instantly bled out, sword sticking out of her chest. A death blow.
We were halfway there.
The assembled wolves went wild at my bold move.
There was no time to celebrate. I was unarmed now, Eliza was mid-shift behind me, and Ivanna was full of rage intent on driving that steel into my neck. I barely ducked out of the way as the blade whooshed over my head. I dove into Ivanna’s abdomen, taking her to the ground and praying she would drop the sword in the process.
She didn’t. We crashed onto the hard dirt and then she took the butt of the weapon and smashed it into my back repeatedly. Agony exploded across my back as I fought to pin her arms down but she was like a wild beast, thrashing down on me from all angles.
Hurry up, Eliza!
Rearing my head back, I slammed my forehead into Ivanna’s and she cried out in pain as the crowd roared their approval. Suddenly Ivanna’s hips thrust upward so hard that I was thrown off her and onto my side.
I hit the solid ground and then Ivanna tried to pull the sword up between us. Reaching out, I grabbed a handful of fine dirt and threw it right in her face. She coughed and sputtered and then I scrambled to get up to my feet.
Eliza ran to my side in her giant wolf form and I nearly sighed in relief.
Ivanna stood before us, holding her sword aloft and blinking her eyes rapidly to clear the dirt.
Eliza gave me a warning yip but I had already seen Ivanna making her move and turned in that direction.
She was headed right for me with the sword held out, and I knew I’d have to get a little injured so that Eliza could finish her. I’d worked through hundreds of battle scenarios over the years with my brother. We’d run drills since I was a young pup. I was made for this. But this scenario, being stuck in human form with someone coming at you with a blade when you were unarmed, was the worst.
Control where your opponent hurts you. My brother’s advice came back to me as if floating on a memory cloud.
This was going to hurt but I had no choice. Reaching out with my hands, I grasped the blade with my fingers and squeezed as hard as possible to stop the weapon from goring my stomach. The crowd gasped, and even Axil’s voice was among them. Red-hot pain flared to life between my fingers and I couldn’t help the wail of agony that ripped from my throat. My wolf wanted freedom but I had to suppress her as per the fight rules. My natural instinct was to let go of the blade and end the misery, but I forced myself to hold onto it in an effort to keep my guts in my stomach.
I held Ivanna’s murderous gaze as she screamed in my face, pushing the hilt of the blade with all her might. When Eliza’s shadow passed over Ivanna, her face went slack and I looked away as Eliza took Ivanna’s head into her giant jaws and ripped it from her body.
Her skull hit the ground with a thud and Ivanna’s body stayed standing for a moment, which horrified me.
I dropped the blade, my bloody hands shaking as her legs finally crumpled and her body fell to the floor.
The way of our people was something that had gone on for centuries, it was raw, animalistic and instinctual but that didn’t mean I wasn’t traumatized by it.
I looked at Eliza, the blood staining her mouth, and read the horror in her expression. We’d survived but we would never be the same after this.
All the mead in the realm wouldn’t wipe that memory from our minds but I was sure as Hades going to try. The crowd was chanting our names, and then Cyrus was there with clean linens on my hands while Eliza shifted to human form. I flinched as he patched me up, pressing down flaps of skin over my palms that had been cut. Then I moved my gaze to Axil. There was pride in his eyes but it was mixed with something else.
Fear.
What was he scared of? Our next fight would be hard with me injured but I heard the girls were near dead so it wasn’t going to be that difficult.
Axil cleared his throat to make an announcement and the wolves quieted.
“The third team that made it back from the dead lands and was supposed to fight the winners has fled to Cinder Mountain, forfeiting—”
Boos filled the space and a shock ran through me.
“They are now outcasts and will be torn apart if they ever return. That makes Eliza and Zara our final two champions.”
I knew now why he looked fearful.
Nausea roiled through me as I came to the realization that my next fight would be against her. My pack sister.
No.
She seemed to realize it at the same moment.
“I won’t,” she said quietly beside me and my brother stiffened.
I nodded. “I won’t either. Don’t think of it. For now, we celebrate.”
She dipped her chin, but the sickness in my stomach didn’t leave me.
The mead started to flow then, the packs from all over began to pour it down my throat since I couldn’t use my bandaged hands.
Every hour on the hour Eliza and I were hoisted into the air and carried around the tented field while everyone chanted, “Champions.”
By the fourth pint of mead, Eliza and I were cackling in laughter at any small thing. Axil had even come to join the party which had assembled at the bonfire in front of my tent. It was hard to get drunk as a shifter: we burned it off too quickly, but I was well and truly buzzed right now.
“You throwing the dirt in her eyes was so cool!” a little wolven girl told me. “I’m using that move one day when I’m chosen as champion.”
I smiled at her. “We’ll make sure you have a good coach.” I tried not to slur and the little girl nodded.
Her mother gave me a knowing smile and told the child it was time for bed.
By the time two more hours had passed, it was late and most everyone else had gone to sleep. Eliza, Cyrus, Axil and I were stomping around the fire in a circle, singing songs of old while shaking our half-drunk pints of mead. Everything felt numb and good and the blood-soaked gauze on my hands was a distant memory. A few wolven from my pack were playing songs on the drums when Axil asked me to dance.
Eliza knew that my heart belonged to him and so I knew she wouldn’t mind if we danced. Though relationships with the king were forbidden, surely a dance wouldn’t prove anything to anyone.
I threw my arms around his neck, careful of my healing hands as he gripped my waist and we swayed to the music. With the mead flowing through my system, I had no filter left to cover my words.
“I never stopped loving you,” I whispered into his ear as he gripped me tightly. “Even when I hated you, I loved you.”
There had been an Axil-sized hole in my heart that was never going to be healed by anyone except him.
His lips brushed against my ear. “I’ve loved you from that first day at camp, Zara,” he said and my stomach fluttered. “And that’s why you have to kill Eliza tomorrow.”
My body went rigid and I pulled back with wide eyes. I shook my head vigorously and Axil leaned his forehead against mine. “Only the last wolf standing can be my wife, Zara,” he said and the mead suddenly flushed from my system. Sobriety, mixed with horror, rushed through me.
Could I kill her? To be with the love of my life?
I glanced across the fire to see Eliza laughing and with my older brother. She was so carefree, her smile so genuine and her laugh full of such innocence. She wasn’t made for this competition and yet somehow, she had fought her way to the top.
A sister for a husband?
I dropped my hands from around Axil’s neck and took a step back. “I’m beat. I need some sleep,” I told him.
Concern flashed across his face and he nodded. “Do you want to come to my—”
I shook my head. “I’ll sleep with my pack. Last night,” I said.
Tomorrow I would be dead, or his wife.
He nodded, swallowing hard, and Eliza’s laughter died down as she looked over at me. “Going to bed?”
I bobbed my head. “I’m exhausted,” I lied. I probably wouldn’t sleep a wink. Killing someone I had grown so close to wasn’t something I was sure I was capable of.
She frowned.
The tension of our reality hung in the air like a tangible thing. Axil took two steps towards Eliza. “Come see me first thing in the morning, Eliza. I’ll break your temporary pack bond and take you back into Death Mountain pack.”
Temporary? That hurt and yet I knew it had to be done. I couldn’t fight a packmate to the death. It was insane.
Her face was completely void of any emotion and she just nodded.
The drums had stopped and my brother seemed to pick up on the awkwardness of this whole thing. “Well, we should get to bed. Goodnight, everyone,” he said to all those who still lingered at the bonfire and then walked over to me, physically pushing me inside our tent.
I looked up at my big brother with tears swimming in my eyes and was surprised to see that he too looked emotional.
“Cyrus, I can’t,” I whimpered.
He released a shaky breath. “You have to, Zara.”
I didn’t sign up for this, to kill someone I cared about!
I tore across the tent and then slipped into my hammock, covering my face with the fur blanket so that I could hide from the world.
It wasn’t fair and I couldn’t do it. I heard the hissing of the fire as my brother put it out with a bucket of water and then my packmates whispered as they bid each other goodnight. They all slipped into their hammocks as I lay awake, the buzz of the mead fully worn off thanks to my rapid healing. My hands barely hurt anymore, already mending, and my mind was a complete mess. I was plagued with memories of Axil and our love story. Who meets their mate at fifteen years old? But then my mind would bring up memories of Eliza. How she’d done nothing but protect me and watch my back since I got here. She needed me.
Like Axil had said, I was nothing if not loyal. But who should I be loyal to? My love for Axil? Or for Eliza? I tossed and turned for hours, long after Cyrus and the others fell into a deep slumber and started snoring.
I just lay there, my mind spiraling as I stared out of the open flap of the tent and looked up at the moon.
Maker, help me. I prayed for the first time in a long time. This was too much to bear.
