“No, the parking garage is outside the wall and underground.”
Ember laughed. “Wait, are you serious?”
“Yep. The walls ate our ride and everything.”
“This place keeps throwing punches left and right.”
Cheyenne smiled and nodded toward the crowd gathering around one section of the open ground. “Come on. I gotta see what they’re pulling out next. There’s nothing here.”
“Okay. I’m gonna call it.” Ember floated along beside her friend, unable to keep her smile from widening at the sight of so many O’gúleesh dancing and whooping in the open space, clinking tankards together and jostling each other in excitement. Somewhere behind them, the drummers had come down from the rooftops and now approached. “They’re gonna build a giant bonfire and burn everything that makes them think of the Crown.”
“Right. That would pretty much be the entire city, and it’s made of metal.”
Ember shrugged. “Fine. Debunked. Do you have a better guess?”
“Nope.”
The drumming grew louder and closer behind them, but Cheyenne couldn’t see the magicals approaching through the crowd, which had doubled in size in the last two minutes. She did, however, get an open view of Maleshi standing on a large square of metal that was much lighter and cleaner-looking than the ground around it.
The general spread her arms and lifted her chin. “We’re here to take back what has always been ours!”
A cheer rose from the crowd, magicals roaring and cramming closer together to get a better look.
“Come on.” Cheyenne grabbed Ember’s wrist and practically pulled her through the crowd. It surprised her to find a path opening up in front of her when the O’gúleesh saw the drow girl in the black trenchcoat, followed by the fae girl hovering an inch off the ground. Do they know who I am already? Not the halfling part. That would make this a whole different kind of crowd.
They stopped at the edge of the crowd gathered around the fifteen-foot-square metal square on which General Hi’et stood. Maleshi’s silver eyes flashed in the muted gray light when she met Cheyenne’s gaze. Her lips parted in a feral grin, and she stepped off the brighter square. “Blood and glory, brothers. Rip this fell-damn thing apart!”
Two ogres stepped through the crowd from different directions, each carrying what looked like a pickaxe over their hulking shoulders. Cheyenne squinted at the tools-turned-weapons. “What are they supposed to do with those?”
A troll woman with thick bands of tattoos racing up both bare arms nodded at Cheyenne and leaned toward her. “They’re breaking the seal.”
Ember snorted. “How nice.”
“On what?” Cheyenne asked.
“Come on. We’re done pretending we’ve forgotten. For now, at least. It’s in our blood.”
“Right.” And if I keep asking, someone’s gonna notice I’m not from around here.
The ogres grunted and swung the deadly-looking pickaxes at the square of metal. The weapons hit the ground with a grating shriek and a burst of sparks. Maleshi shot a bolt of silver lightning at the metal square, and in five seconds flat, the entire panel blew away like ash on the wind to reveal a ten-foot pit in the middle of so much nothing.
A crazed, emboldened roar exploded from the crowd. Magicals jumped up and down, shoved each other forward, snarled and hissed, with the occasional word of O’gúleesh thrown in for good measure. Cheyenne removed the activator from her pocket and stuck it as covertly as she could behind her ear. After the sharp pinch of syncing tech subsided, she flicked her finger beside her thigh and managed to turn down the noise before she got a migraine.
They opened a giant pit outside the city, and there’s hardly any tech out here.
Lines of code scrolled across her vision here and there, difficult to see through so many bodies and spread out far more than she’d seen with the activator feeding her information in Hangivol.
Maleshi howled and drew a thin, glinting silver dagger from a sheath at her hip before thrusting it over her head. “We let that bitch pin us down for far too long, but we know the old ways. The Crown wouldn’t last two seconds in here, but I know every one of you bastards can hold their own in the ring that binds us all!” Grinning, she grabbed the blade with her other hand and sliced a deep cut into her palm, hissing at the pain. Then she raised her clenched fist over the ten-foot drop and let her blood patter onto the sand below for everyone to see.
The crowd erupted in wild, animalistic grunts, hisses, roars, and bellows. Cheyenne stared at Maleshi’s blood, sinking into the white sand at the bottom of the square hole. I thought we were done with sacrifices. And it sounds like a damn zoo out here.
She recognized Jara’ak’s bellowing laughter and stepped past two other jeering magicals to get to him. “What is this?”
Jara’ak brought his heavy hand down on her shoulder and gave her a quick shake in his excitement. His hand disappeared again before she had a chance to warn him about losing it. “The true heart of Ambar’ogúl, Cheyenne. The O’gúl fighting pits are officially open again, eh?”
“The fighting pits.”
“By the blood of Op’paro, I’ve been counting the days.” The orc slammed a huge fist into his opposite palm and chuckled darkly, glaring across the open pit at anyone who met his gaze and sucking in the drool pooling around his tusks.
“Jesus.” Cheyenne stepped back toward Ember and shook her head. “Fighting pits.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. Apparently, they’re a real hit.”
Ember grinned. “Awesome.”
“All right, bloodletters, listen up!” With her dagger sheathed again, Maleshi ignored her bleeding hand and shrugged out of her military jacket before tossing it into the magicals gathered behind her. A troll man caught it, shook it in the air, then balled it up and dropped it at his feet. “We’re celebrating a
