The god made a disgusted sound, and I lifted my head higher, shouting to the rafters. “All I ever wanted was to be free! To live my own life without having someone’s boot on my neck!” My eyes went back to Nik, who was shaking on the ground in front of me. “That’s something you clearly know nothing about, so get out of my head, and get out of his. Nik’s paid his dues to you tenfold, so I’m taking him back. He’s not yours to step on anymore!”
I dropped down to clutch Nik to my chest, and the bloody god sighed. Your life to waste, little girl, he said disappointedly. Then his voice grew hard.
Kill her.
The moment he gave the order, the storm magic that had been building above my head dropped like a stone. My whole body clenched as it landed, but it didn’t actually land on me. It crashed into Nik, making him go still as a statue. I was looking down to see what had happened to him when a hand clamped down on my shoulder.
Just in time. I didn’t know how long my father had been standing behind me, but I’d never complain about his hovering again. His quick reflexes were the only thing that saved me as Nik’s metal fist slashed up through the air exactly where my head had just been. But even though I’d dodged death by a hair, all I felt was defeat, because when Nik rolled back to his feet, his eyes were emptier than ever.
Kill her, the Gameskeeper commanded again, his voice booming with the fury of the crowd yelling from the stands for the fight to continue. Our arena welcomes all comers. If the girl wants to stand on her own so badly, she’s free to try. She is your opponent now. Kill her and be victorious.
Mad Dog bared his teeth in anticipation, and I shrank back against my dad, my brain wheeling as I tried to figure out what I was going to do, how I was going to fix this. I’d thought I could get through to him because he was Nik and I was me and we’d always been able to work together, but there was no way anyone could resist the weaponized bloodlust of so many people. The Gameskeeper’s magic was so thick around him I could actually see it shimmering in the air like heat. I was wondering how the hell I was going to get Nik out of that without burning myself to a cinder when I noticed his chest was covered with blood.
I didn’t know how. My dad hadn’t even touched him. Then I saw that the blood was coming from his neck, and I understood.
It was the curse. The black spellwork of the Sword of Damocles was digging into Nik’s throat like a ring of knives, but Nik wasn’t budging. He was fighting back, resisting the order to fight me with everything he had, and the curse was cutting off his head because of it.
“No!”
I leaped forward, grabbing the torrent of magic with both hands. The power burned me just like I’d known it would, but I was too desperate to feel the pain. Not that it did me any good. When I grabbed the power to yank it off Nik, Kauffman’s spellwork jerked it right back into place, just like always. And it was that, not the pain, that made me stumble. I’d failed. I couldn’t move it, couldn’t save him. Nik was going to die. He was going to—
“Opal!”
My father’s voice knocked me out of my panic, and I looked up to see him looming over me.
“Stick to the plan!” he yelled.
What plan? If he meant the DFZ’s plot to crack the Gameskeeper’s spellwork engine, that ship was way sunk. Without the DFZ inside me, I couldn’t get the magic I needed to overload Kauffman’s circle, nor could I survive the inevitable backlash that would come after. But just as I was opening my mouth to say it was hopeless, my father held out his hand.
“Use me,” he said. When I started to argue, he cut me off. “I know you can do it. You’re a talented mage. You brought me back from the dead, you can save him too. Just try.”
I didn’t know if he’d skipped the part about how there was nothing to lose since we were all going to die anyway in a rare display of tact or if he simply thought it was too obvious to mention, but I was grateful either way. I knew it sounded pathetic, but hearing my critical father say he believed in me made me desperate to prove him right. I’m not sure if it was panic-fueled insanity or plain old wishful thinking, but right then it didn’t matter that his plan was nuts. Any chance was better than zero, and if I was going down today, then dammit, I’d die as my father had taught me: with my teeth in my enemy’s throat.
With that, I turned and thrust my hand into the pillar of magic surrounding Nik. I grabbed hold of my father at the same time, clutching hard not just to his arm, but to the connection that ran between us, the silver thread I’d seen in the Gameskeeper’s office.
I could almost see it, the silver line shining like a sunbeam through the bloody haze of the arena master’s magic. More importantly, I could feel it. I’d sent
