The Keeper's Flame (A Pandoran Novel, #2)

by Barbara Kloss

  Did everyone know?

  Every time I thought of what had happened, I felt sick, and I had plenty of bruises on my body and face to remind me.

  As my dad had promised, Sonya had come to tend to my wounds. However, the king had been so furious by my “willful disobedience” and “abhorrent subterfuge,” that he’d insisted the healings be minimal so that “the consequences of her actions will be felt acutely.” Sonya had done all she could, but I was still left with splotches on my body and an ankle that ached incessantly. At least I could walk on it.

  Every so often, I would catch Danton looking at me, but he’d always glance away, brow wrinkled. He probably knew, too, and was disgusted with me like I was disgusted with myself.

  “Veranna,” Master Durus rumbled as he stormed through the door. His huge dark frame filled the doorway.

  Vera swiftly stood and walked past Master Durus, and Mastur Durus glared at me before closing the door after them.

  “Was that you I kissed, or Stefan?” Danton whispered.

  I turned to look at him.

  His expression was guarded and withdrawn. So the way he was acting had nothing to do with…

  “It was me,” I said in a whisper.

  He held my gaze a moment longer, then stared at the space before him, wringing his hands.

  I thought, perhaps, he was done talking to me for the rest of my life, when he said, “Stefan was in the bathroom, wasn’t he?”

  I hesitated. “Yes.”

  Danton’s blue eyes moved to mine, his lips tight. “With Alexander.”

  It wasn’t a question.

  He knew, and he’d quickly realized the reason I’d kissed him. To hide the truth of what had happened that night.

  My cheeks flared as I turned away, feeling Danton’s gaze on me, feeling his anger flourish inside.

  “I must admit, princess,” he continued, slightly piqued, “I’m a little…surprised you did that.”

  “I’m a little surprised I did, too,” I whispered, staring at the ground.

  The crowd outside roared, and Danton’s disappointment was acute.

  “Well,” he said, “let us hope your magical ability is a surprise, as well.”

  I felt a sharp stab of guilt. I knew better.

  Master Durus entered the tent again. “Danton,” he rumbled.

  Danton stood. “Good luck, princess,” he muttered, and then followed Master Durus out the door.

  I exhaled, slowly.

  The crowd eventually cheered and hollered again, yet somehow I had the feeling they wouldn’t be doing that for me.

  It wasn’t long before Master Durus opened the door.

  Before he said a word, I stood, fighting back the pain from my ankle. I followed Master Durus down a long, dark tunnel that slowly rose to the arena floor. He was quiet, his dark eyes fixed on the light up ahead while I focused on walking, step by aching step, hoping whatever the challenge was wouldn’t require running.

  When we reached the end of the tunnel, Master Durus stopped and turned to me. His eyes were dark and powerful. “You’re a princess, are you not?”

  “Yes…?”

  He leaned forward. “Then stop acting like one.” He stepped aside, motioning for me to pass.

  Loquacious and edifying as always.

  His expression didn’t invite further inquiries, so with a deep breath, I walked with him into the arena. And just like I’d expected, the arena was quiet.

  Thousands stood in the stands, towering above amidst banners and flags waving in a blur of color. But the banners didn’t wave for me. They waved because they had no choice, because the wind demanded they move, but the wind couldn’t move the people and the people just stood there and stared.

  Silent.

  I swallowed as the wind whistled through the arena, making it sound empty.

  Another man dressed in crimson walked toward us—Headmaster Ambrose. He slipped through an opening in the stone wall that separated me from the crowd, a wall that ran along the perimeter of the arena’s field, crowned with little stone statues. The headmaster’s cloak whipped about his waif-like frame, and in his hands was something long and narrow and black.

  When he reached us, he stopped. Master Durus tilted his head in deference.

  I waited and so did the crowd.

  “You will need this.” The headmaster held the object before me.

  It was a cattle prod, a very long, very sharp cattle prod. One end had been made into a circle with a dragon’s head inside, the symbol of Valdon, and the other end tapered into a very sharp point.

  The headmaster turned from me and faced the crowd with outstretched arms. When he spoke, his voice sounded unnaturally loud. “Our final contestant, Princess Daria Regius.”

  Only a couple of people high in the stands cheered.

  The headmaster turned back to me. “You are to retrieve the flag at the top of the pole.”

  Pole?

  I glanced past him. At the opposite end of the field was a giant statue of a terrifying dragon, and in its sharp claws was a very long and very thin rod. At the top of this rod was a tiny green flag, whipping distantly in the air. It had to be higher than the tall towers in the arena. How would I ever climb up there…and with a bad ankle?

  “Good luck, princess,” the headmaster said, and he and Master Durus walked back behind the wall, taking a seat in the stands beside a group cloaked in red.

  This was it?

  Climb a pole and get the flag?

  I thought the games were supposed to be dangerous. Was I missing something?

  The air rumbled.

  Not too far from where I stood, a patch of earth shifted. It slipped beneath the ground like a sliding door, leaving a square hole in its wake.

  A big and black form rose through the opening, slow and steady, until its entire body came in view.

  It was a vox.

  It jerked and tugged against the chains clamped around its legs—his legs—beating his wings at the air. He struggled to rise, his wings battered and frayed, bruised and bloodied in places. Fighting against pain, the agony, rising higher and higher. He passed the height of a nearby tower when the chains rattled and jerked taut.

  His wings beat frantically, his hooves futilely kicking at the air, each kick filling the sky with a ferocious clatter, and with a final surge of strength, he jerked forward. The chains yanked back, hard, and the vox let out a keening wail as it fluttered to the ground, weak and defeated.

  The earth around his feet was dark in places with something deep and red: blood, from the vox that had been chained there before him.

  That was why the vox had been locked in the cage, down at the marketplace. The people had planned to use them for the games.

  They had planned for each of us to break the vox, one by one. They had planned for me to break one. Break one so that he was mine, so that I could command him to do anything I wanted him to do.

  They had planned for me to break something that had already been broken inside.

  Like they’d broken Fleck. Like they’d broken me.

  They’d never expected me to climb that pole.

  The crowd stopped cheering and watched. Waiting.

  Was this it, then? Was the vox—this weak, feeble, and trembling creature—to be my dangerous foe?

  Wind whipped through the arena, lonely and…sad. The vox’s head was bent and his wings sagged, covered in dirt that was sticking to splotches of blood. Stripped of his power and majesty…and pride.

  He whimpered a small and miserable sound, and I thought of Fleck. My chest squeezed.

  The ground rumbled again, this time near the dragon statue holding the pole. Two more dark shapes appeared, one on either side of the statue, but these weren’t vox.

  These were hideous forms, brought from the shadows of a world I did not know. Their forms were black and skeletal, reptilian and vile, the embodiment of horror. Long whip-like tails slashed at the air as their lips curled back, bloodied teeth bared.
/>   Of course it wouldn’t be that easy.

  One of them raked at the ground with long black talons, and let out a low guttural sound that vibrated the air.

  I had to fight against those, without magic.

  The crowd went mad, while the vox near me wailed in fright and agony.

  I didn’t have time to feel fear because one of the abominations charged. Its snarl filled the arena as it bolted straight for me, kicking up clumps of earth as its talons dug at the ground. I tossed the iron prod aside and pulled my daggers free.

  The monster was getting close fast, its sinewy muscles flexing as its yellow, snake-like eyes fixed on me.

  With a fierce growl, it lunged through the air, slashing at me. I jumped to the side and rolled on the ground. I shoved myself back to my feet, but its tail came fast and strong, ramming into my side, right into my bruises. With a cry, I flew through the air a few long yards before colliding with the ground, hard.

  The crowd gasped.

  Clutching my stomach, I scrambled to my feet while struggling to breathe. The beast’s tail beat the air behind it, back and forth, as it crouched low, its yellow eyes fixed on me, its prey.

  I felt its hate, its malice and unrestrained madness. There was nothing innately good inside, no inkling of hope or mercy. It knew only wild barbarism.

  I wiped the sweat from my forehead with the back of my hand as it reared its head and lunged again. I jumped, and its jaws snapped over the space I’d stood seconds ago. When I landed, I whirled my daggers around and sliced a slit through one of its nostrils.

  It gnashed its teeth and screamed, a shrieking, glass-shattering sound, and I saw a shadow grow in my periphery.

  I barely missed the talons of the other one.

  It swiped, grazing my cheek. A burning sensation spread over my cheek as I moved back, tasting the blood as it dripped into my mouth. I clenched my daggers tight as both beasts crouched low and lethal. One licked its snout with a long, black reptilian tongue.

  Then both sprang.

  I dropped to the ground, rolling away as fast as I could. They collided into each other with a crunch and fell to the ground, scrambling back to their clawed feet.

  This wasn’t working.

  “Look out!” shouted a voice from the stands, and I spun.

  One of the tails slashed down upon me, and I leapt aside; the tail landed on the ground, hard. Like a whip, it rose again to strike, the barbs on the end long and sharp and angled down as the tail came toward me.

  I jumped to the side and rolled, as the tail came down on me again…and again.

  The next time the tail came, I rolled on my back and scissored my knives. Something warm and viscous splattered over me, and one of the beasts screamed in pain.

  I wiped my face; my hands were covered in black. The end of a tail lay on the ground, oozing thick black blood into the dirt.

  The crowd cheered, but the beast was furious. It snapped at the other one, feral and enraged, and stormed me.

  I sprinted this way and dodged that, forcing down the burning in my ankle. The beast’s jaws snapped behind me so closely it brushed against my hair. I was running straight at the wall with nowhere to go.

  There was the prod, lying on the ground beside the wall right where I had left it.

  I set my jaw and focused. I could do it, and I would. I had to, or I would die here.

  I sprinted harder.

  A crowd was huddled there, right before a refreshment stand serving fire and ice, but the bartender was frozen, watching me running at them.

  I reached the wall.

  In one fluid motion, I snatched the prod and used the wall to launch, flipping backward and landing right behind the creature.

  The creature rammed headfirst into the wall. The people in line gasped and jumped back, dodging the creature’s tail; the creature stumbled back a few feet, shaking its reptilian head. But when it turned, I was waiting for it.

  It came down on me and I used its weight to shove the sharp end of the prod into its chest. The end pointed out the other side, through its back. Its body went slack, and it fell.

  Right on top of me.

  The crowd cheered, and I struggled to push the massive beast off my body. With a groan, I shoved it away and crawled onto my feet.

  One down, one to…

  The other was poised, bearing down upon the vox.

  No.

  Air whipped through the arena, and time slowed. The beast struck forward, inch by slow inch, as though I were watching everything in slow motion. The vox’s wings rose in the air, slow and steady, and its mouth opened but no sound reached my ears.

  With a sharp twist, I flung my dagger. It split through the air like a silver bullet and sunk into the beast’s skull with a sickening crunch.

  Time returned to normal, and the beast slumped to the ground in a heap.

  The crowd erupted around me.

  Sweat ran into my eyes as my heart beat furiously in my chest. I wiped my hands on my pants, trying to catch my breath.

  The crowd started chanting, “Get the flag! Get the flag!”

  I wasn’t done. I had to retrieve the flag at the end of the pole, and I was supposed to use the vox to do it.

  Anger bubbled inside of me. I would not give them what they wanted. Not in their way.

  I set my jaw and walked back to the beast—the one I’d killed with the prod. With a sharp tug, I jerked it free. The rod was covered in thick black blood.

  The crowd cheered, and my anger surged.

  With the prod in my hands, I walked, ignoring the pain in my ankle, moving steadily toward the vox. My anger boiled and fizzed with each step I took, and I finally stopped a few yards before the vox.

  I released my grip on the prod and let it fall. It clanked on the ground, its echo loud and hollow in the arena, and then I bent over and spit on it.

  The crowd went silent.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the king. His white hair blew in the wind as he stood, high up in his safe tower beside the anxious and strained faces of my father and the Del Contes. The king’s hands gripped the railing and his eyes burned with fury so hot I could feel it from here.

  But I didn’t care.

  I held my head high and kept walking past all the angry faces; even the little stone demons that decorated the top of the stone wall seemed to be glaring at me.

  At last, I reached the vox, huddled against the wall, trembling and frightened.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” I whispered.

  He didn’t move.

  I took another slow step forward, fighting back the pain in my ankle and ignoring the glares all around me. “I want to help you.”

  His ears flickered as he adjusted his wings, such tattered and torn wings. And he was hurt. The beast that had reared back for its final attack had injured one of the vox’s wings, badly. A fresh stream of blood oozed from one of the ribs, running down the edge of his wing and dripping onto the earth.

  I could feel his pain as though it were my own.

  I took another step, and the vox reeled.

  Moist white air streamed from his nose as he snorted, his hooves raking at the space between us. I was jumping back, out of the way, when one of his black wings slammed into me.

  I flew through the air and collided with the wall and fell to the ground.

  For a moment, I couldn’t move. My bones throbbed from the impact. With a groan, I rolled on my back, struggling to inhale with a metallic taste in my mouth, right as two large black hooves bore down on top of me.

  I rolled and the hooves landed beside me with a thud.

  The crowd gasped, and the vox was furious.

  Move!

  I rolled again, but one of his hooves landed on my cloak, pinning me to the ground. I wriggled and tugged, but I couldn’t shake him. The vox reared back again, and I hacked at the cloth with my dagger and rolled, just as his hooves landed again.

  The vox noticed my dagger and went berserk.

 
; His hooves came down on me again, and I moved, throwing my dagger behind me. It spun across the ground and slid to a stop.

  The vox stopped beating his wings and watched me with his large chocolate eyes.

  There was a figure in the stands, lingering in the shadows, near one of the towers. He was veiled in a cloak and as I reached out, as I tried to get a sense of him, all I could feel was cold and…death.

  The dark rider.

  He was here.

  A surge of power pummeled over me. The sky darkened and filled with a sonorous ripping sound as though the heavens were being pulled apart, but when I looked back, the dark rider was gone.

  A chorus of high-pitched shrieks suddenly filled the air. Dark shapes had begun jumping from all along the wall.

  The gargoyles.

  Something told me this wasn’t a part of the competition.

  One by one, the little stone dragons shrieked to life, glowing like burning coals, growling and snarling with malicious glee. They spread their bony wings and dove like burning darts into the stands.

  The crowd erupted in chaos as the winged demons dove into them. People dodged and scrambled, and one of the gargoyles unhinged its jaw filled with razor sharp teeth and dropped a ball of fire.

  People screamed, falling over each other, trying to clear from their paths. The blue and gold tower with Campagna written down the side suddenly erupted in flames.

  Someone yelled my name and I looked down.

  One had landed near my feet, gnashing its sharp stone teeth, and rushed toward me, leaving little black footprints behind. Like it had burnt the ground.

  In one swift moment, it lunged. I snatched the prod from the ground and swung as hard as I could. The rod jarred as though I’d hit a rock, and pain seared up my arm, into my shoulder.

  I cradled my arm; the end of the rod glowed orange, as if I’d just stuck the iron in fire.

  The dragon’s ugly head rolled across the dirt while its stone body walked around in erratic circles, flapping its wings, completely lost without its eyes. But as I watched, something sprouted beneath its head—a neck and body and legs and clawed feet—just like a head was starting to grow atop its body.