The elevator lurched into motion.
“Dead by a Death cultivator, huh?” I muttered.
“The Contrails’ Shogun is demanding the blood of three very promising probationary Dragons I just recently recruited. It’s you and your friends or the Contrails, Mr. Hake. I’m sure you’ll choose correctly.” The fist squeezing my Spirit sea tightened down for a second.
“Let me guess, I won’t get my Spirit back unless I agree to do it?”
Biggerstaff shot me a condescending smile. “Here I was beginning to wonder whether you could follow insinuations. What is your objection to this, Mr. Hake? Do you think the Heavenly Contrails are noble? That they have hearts of gold? Do you even understand why they’re here? Not just on Van Diemann, but at the top of the Contrails’ organization? These men didn’t get to the top by making distinctions between who they let live and who they killed. They certainly didn’t do it by following some sort of moral code.”
I scowled down at the glass wall right in front of my nose. There was a difference between not killing someone for their sake and not killing someone for your own sake, but I couldn’t find the words to explain that. Even if I did, I knew Biggerstaff wouldn’t care.
The elevator came to a stop, and the bruisers led us out. It was eerily silent in the market court. No movement, no talking. The fountain sounded like somebody had turned up its volume from Babbling to Screaming. The smell of burning food lingered in the air.
A space moth—the first one I’d seen inside the Heartchamber—stood guard at the arena doors. He stepped back and held them open so we could pass.
The air inside the arena felt alive, like it was a living, breathing organism I had to shove my way through. I’d never seen the Heartchamber’s arena so full. Probationary Dragons and staff packed the stands. There wasn’t any of the usual jeering and laughing or booing. Everyone just sat and waited, the expressions ranging from outright contempt to blank poker faces.
The stairs, the top level behind the boxes, and the perimeter of the arena floor were guarded by Contrails—bird people, space moths, beetles, levitating squids, and a whole host of other alien stuff that could fly. Even a couple humans with steampunk-looking jetpacks. There were easily ten times as many Contrails in the arena as had been in the whole broadcasting location, and they were all armed to the teeth with guns, swords, and Spirit attacks ready and waiting.
As Biggerstaff’s bruisers led us to the stairs, the Contrails on the risers moved aside just enough to let us pass. Adrenaline pumped through my body, racing my internal alchemy and making my breaths harsh and hot.
Down at the center of the arena floor, surrounded by a small entourage of Contrails, stood a demon-looking dude in one of those tailored suits all the high-ranking Big Five jerks seemed to prefer. His skin was dark blue, and black horns curled up from his forehead and around his slicked-back hair. Big leathery wings with jagged black spikes sticking out of the joints were folded behind his shoulders and hung down just past his knees.
I’d seen him at the Wilderness Territorial in the skybox with the rest of the Shoguns. This was the leader of the Heavenly Contrails.
Shockingly high-ranked, Biggerstaff had said. Couldn’t get much higher on Van Diemann than Shogun.
The fist around my Spirit sea eased a touch.
“Cloak your Spirit, Mr. Hake,” the catfish murmured over his shoulder.
When I just stared at him, he said, “My suppression acts similarly to the cloaking, hiding the Spirit it’s on. Not even someone in the Ketsu stage can tell the difference. Given that I’m a known Antimatter affinity and your friends’ Spirits are suppressed around you, assumptions will be made, and valuable seconds when someone could put a stop to someone like you will be wasted.”
I clenched my jaw and squeezed Hungry Ghost tighter between my numb, shackled hands. Basically he was telling me to cloak up and start killing.
Next to me, Rali’s mouth was set in a hard line, and the lace in his eyes shifted between thin and thick. Warcry was somewhere behind me. I could hear the air whistling through his nose.
There had to be some other way out of this, but I couldn’t see it. No matter how advanced Rali and Warcry were, the three of us weren’t enough to take on this army of Contrails alone, and I doubted we’d get any help from the Dragons packing the stands.
As we came to the bottom of the stairs, I exhaled, reaching for Last Light, Last Breath, but it slipped through my fingers. My heart was pounding too hard. I couldn’t find that empty nothingness.
Biggerstaff led the way to the center of the arena floor. A sort of wave went through the boxes, Dragons leaning forward or edging to the front of their seats. Nobody wanted to miss whatever was going to happen next, especially not if it was going to be bloody.
The Contrails’ Shogun tapped one hoofed foot on the dirt and crossed his arms like this was taking way too long.
Biggerstaff stopped a good twenty feet from him and bowed.
“Revered Shogun Araddon, the treaty-breakers have been found and captured. Please accept their heads as a peace offering between the Eight-Legged Dragons and the Heavenly Contrails.”
Someone kicked the back of my right knee, and my leg folded. Yoki’s huge hands swallowed my shoulders and shoved down until I was kneeling in the dirt. Rali dropped to his knees beside me. Sounded like there was a scuffle with Warcry, but a few seconds later, he was on his stomach
