My arm was grabbed and I was pulled unceremoniously from the sands. The Mete was over. We were being taken back to our cell.
“Citizens,” Lord Calchas attempted to address the crowd once more. I couldn’t make out what he was saying but, given the howls of outrage swirling over my head, it appeared the crowd was unhappy, and hungry for more. I was struggling to keep my feet as I was dragged across the arena to the howling of the masses at being denied immediate satisfaction.
I would not be accused today. I stumbled. More than anything I just wanted it to be over.
We were pulled and pushed, the sounds muffled as we presumably hit the tunnels under the amphitheatre until we were back in the holding cell from which we had been taken. We were released, footsteps sounded, and then the door slammed shut. I snatched the mask from my face as quickly as I could get it off. I couldn’t bear to be stifled under it a moment longer.
Chapter Two
They were going to kill Devyn. I saw again the specks of blood on the sand from his last visit to the arena. His blood would spill there once more. We had been so close. And now… I couldn’t think about it. I felt stunned by the noise and events in the arena.
What had happened? Why had the Mete been halted? Did it matter? We had been given a reprieve. One more night.
It took a moment for my vision to adjust after having been in complete darkness for so long, but the light in the cell was dim enough. I pulled in a breath of air as I was grabbed from behind and spun around, the black skirt of my accused’s uniform swirling. Devyn’s hands framed my face, his dark eyes scanning me for bodily injuries before holding my eyes with his as he did the same for internal damage. Satisfied, he lifted his head and turned to our fellow cellmate.
“Well, aren’t you going to say something?” Marcus finally burst out, clearly unnerved by the lack of reaction.
“What do you expect me to say?” Devyn asked coolly, under no doubt as to which corner Marcus expected an attack from.
“I don’t know. Aren’t you going to say getting off so lightly proves that I was in collusion with the authorities the entire time?” Marcus’s point had merit, especially given how suspicious Devyn was already.
Devyn raised an eyebrow. “Were you?”
“No. I don’t know how they were waiting for us. I was careful, but it was all arranged so quickly. I don’t know.” Marcus ran his hands through his hair.
“I may not remember the twenty lashes I took out there, but I’ve been beaten before. Have you?” Devyn asked. “Believe me, fifty lashes isn’t exactly getting off lightly.”
“Why didn’t they hold my trial?” I asked quietly. “What happened out there at the end? I couldn’t see.”
“It looked like Governor Actaeon made Calchas call a halt,” Devyn explained.
“After what happened with me…” Marcus trailed off.
An extraordinary Mete, Calchas had said. That it had been. Some of our most fundamental traditions had been overturned. Anonymity had been thrown out, both the government and the Code undermined by the clemency granted by the citizenry despite Marcus’s conviction of the Empire’s most vilified crime. An accused found guilty of using magic wasn’t just burned at the stake, they were stripped of their citizenship; they were considered less than nothing.
The council would be incensed at the mercy shown by the mob towards Marcus. If Actaeon had objected to continuing, then it was to make sure my trial didn’t repeat the leniency shown to Marcus.
“I failed,” Devyn said, directing his soft words to me. My chest felt tight. He was blaming himself for this.
“No,” I protested. “No. This is not your fault. You are not the reason we are here. They are. We shouldn’t be here. At all. We don’t belong in the city. We’re not even citizens. We were born free. We were born with magic. They don’t…”
I couldn’t find the words to express that where we found ourselves was no fault of our own. They might as well condemn us for breathing. Our abilities were innate, the magic running through our veins the reason they had stolen me to begin with. We had been so close… We had been outside the wall with the smugglers’ door closed behind us, the freedom of the night lying before us with its canopy of trees and the open sky above.
“Screw them.” I lifted his head and held his dark eyes with my own. “I don’t care. I would rather not live at all than live the lie I thought was happiness. I… We nearly made it.”
Devyn pulled his head out of my hands, his fist clenched as he punched the stone wall. I could feel his frustration, his deep despair, pulse through the connection we shared.
He looked back at me over his hunched shoulder. “I’m sorry, Cass.”
I smiled at him, opening the connection as wide as I could and allowing my feelings to pour through. I loved him. Fiercely. I was angry, but not at him. I was mad at the world, at the Britons who had failed to keep me safe as an infant, at the city that had stolen me. But not at Devyn. If my twenty-two years had meant anything, it was the gift of the precious hours I spent with him and the evening we were together, knowing what it felt to truly live. In his arms.
“Screw them,” I repeated. I had lived.
Devyn grinned back. He always held back, always tried to maintain a distance between us. Now that we had nothing left to lose, now that
