“You sure?”
The siren sounded a warning. I wasn’t paying attention. A quiet calm settled over me. I could hear my heartbeat like a staccato rhythm in my ears. Deep inside my mind, I was screaming at myself to get the heck out of there. With well-practiced familiarity, I balled the feeling until it fit into a box and locked it away. There was no more time to overthink.
The siren sounded again. Andrei shot forward at the same time Barbara did. They crossed paths, moving at equally frightening speed towards opposing targets. There was a reason why Drake was a House Captain. Before Andrei could reach him, a chilling wind ripped through the arena. It cooled the air at least ten degrees. When it reached me, I gritted my teeth and stifled a scream. It yanked me off my feet and threw me twenty meters in the air in two seconds flat. Rather than resist it, I allowed my body to be lifted, going with the flow as much as humanly possible. My only goal was to hang on to Morning Star.
The displacement of air against my sword arm slowed the rate of acceleration. Going up wasn’t a problem. While Drake still had control of the wind, the biggest danger would be him smashing me against the barriers.
I didn’t bet on that happening before Barbara caught up to me. Almost as soon as Drake lifted me off my feet, Barbara shot up into the air after me. She was there to make sure I was out of action before I reached the ground. Or to be a witness on the off chance that Andrei disabled Drake. If that happened, all she would need to do was let me fall.
The stadium became a blur below me. I was beginning to lose confidence when my extremities no longer felt the chilling bite of wind. There was a moment of sheer weightlessness. A roar lifted up to me from the crowd. And then the freefall began. Barbara matched my descent. Her lips pulled back in a sickening grin. With the air rippling over her features, it made her face look like it was made of jelly.
Magenta light surrounded her. The tips of her wings were dusted in grey. I never knew Nephilim wings could be anything but pure white. You learned something new every day.
I was about to teach Barbara something new in return. Everybody remembered how I had gotten my demon blade. The part that always slipped their minds was that it hadn’t always been a smooth sabre. Trying not to think about the fall, I ran Morning Star’s edge against my palm. Blood coated the blade.
I pushed all of my intentions into the sword. By now it was attuned to my will. As long as I offered it blood, Morning Star would obey. The blade’s magic wasn’t tied to my own. It had been forged in the Hell dimension by dark elves and had magic of its own. My magic only contained it and bound it to me. I promised it more blood.
I reached terminal velocity just as Morning Star morphed into a Japanese kusarigama. A long-range weapon with a hooked blade attached to a metal chain. I whipped the head at Barbara.
She was too stunned to evade. The chain wound around her waist. The hooked head surged behind on its second loop to sink into her shoulder blade. Barbara let out a startled scream. I tugged and it pulled taut. It slowed my momentum. She thrashed like a bird caught in a wire. It had the opposite effect than what she wanted. The ground came speeding up towards me.
I tucked my legs and rolled as I touched down, trying to disperse the impact as much as possible. When I came to a stop, I grabbed the chain and swung it against the barrier. Barbara hit it like a kite against a power pole. Sparks of white and magenta light pummelled against each other.
I didn’t think it would be enough to keep her down. No. What got her was the vampire who shot out and landed on her back. Barbara tried to swipe at Andrei with her blade, but with her balance off kilter, she had no hope.
I winced as Andrei slammed his fist against the side of her head. Nephilim or not, a sucker punch like that would take anyone down. That was exactly where she went. She dropped like a stone onto the mat.
Andrei relieved her of her angel blade. “Look what I got.” He waved it at me.
I placed my bleeding palm over Morning Star, and it morphed back into a blade. A gong sounded. Only then did I allow myself to scan the arena for Drake.
He lay on his back, his face completely pulverized.
My mouth gaped open. “I thought you weren’t going to come down breathing,” Andrei said.
“Is he dead?”
Andrei shook his head, but he was grinning.
Oh brother.
The crowd was going insane. Charles’s cheering somehow raised above the collective sound of the crowed. The mirrors zoomed in on him and projected his image for all the supernatural community to see. He was jumping up and down making hand motions like he was throwing money in the air. For once, Luther joined in. Poor Cassie looked like she wanted to disappear into a hole.
For the first time, I allowed myself to think past the next challenge and considered the possibility of what might happen if Andrei and I were the last two standing.
53
The grin that split Max’s face when we arrived back at our seats in the front row wasn’t unexpected. When I turned and sat down, it was immediately eclipsed by the thumbs-up I got from Professor Eldridge. I turned my head to the sky to see if there were pigs flying by. Nope. She’d taught us about Japanese weapons in second semester of Weaponry and Combat. Just because I had been absolutely useless at fighting didn’t mean I wasn’t listening. It just took me
