Leave her, Vincent’s voice commanded.

And with that came the echo of Raihn’s, from the first night of the Kejari: They’re dead, little human. And if you go after them, so are you.

True. And true.

And yet, I found myself turning back, crouching before the child. She scrambled away from me, terrified.

“Come with me,” I said. “I won’t hurt you.”

She didn’t move, save for terrified shaking. She was stuck, I realized—she had been pressed to the wall when the stone shifted last, leaving her ankle wedged between two slabs of black marble.

How did one interact with a child this young? What was she, four, eight? I’d never even seen a human child up close like this.

“We need to go now,” I pressed.

No time. The floor began to quiver. I grabbed the girl’s tiny body as tightly as I could and pulled.

She let out a cry of pain. Resistance, then release, as I wrenched her leg free. I tucked her against me with a silent apology, and then I wondered exactly how insane I was as I ran.

A mistake. A mistake on so many levels, Oraya. You can’t fight like this. Can’t evade like this. You’re slower. You smell twice as human. You lose a sword arm. Leave her. She’s dead anyway.

I bolted through three more doors, already open, corpses of humans or contestants mangled over their slabs. I passed several more humans cowering against the walls, donned in white. I couldn’t bring myself to look at them.

The poppies grew denser, each step sluggish through the foliage. The scent was overwhelming. Carvings plastered the walls now, huge eyes that spanned from floor to ceiling, suns and stars spiraling in their depths—the symbol of Alarus, because death always watched.

Another door stood ahead, this one closed. The light had grown bright and feverish, dancing over us at the same pace as my quickening heartbeat. The girl grabbed fistfuls of my hair as she clung to me, trembling. She leaned forward, her head blocking one critical sliver of my peripheral vision.

The Bloodborn man lunged for me before I had the chance to move.

I dropped the child, cringing as I tried to push her out of the way in time for me to whirl to meet the attack. He knocked me to the ground, teeth bared. He got the first shot in, a bone-steel rapier right to my already-injured thigh, which left me jerking in pain. I leapt back to my feet with everything I had, throwing myself against him to regain control—but I only made it a few inches into my attempted blow before he grabbed my wrist and sank his teeth into it.

I ripped it away, my own blood spattering over my face. Too slow. The hesitation cost me. My back cracked against stone as my opponent caught me and pushed me to the wall. He was small for a vampire, only a few inches taller than me, and I looked right into his stare as he encroached—red-rimmed pupils dilated, glistening with hunger and glee.

Time stopped. I tried to grip my blade with my injured hand. Couldn’t move fast enough—

The Bloodborn lurched backwards.

I sucked in a sudden gulp of air. Raihn yanked my attacker off me, nearly splitting him in two with a devastating follow-up strike from his Nightsteel sword. In return, the Bloodborn leapt on Raihn like a dying animal in their final throes. Wounds along his arms shivered, the red mist of blood magic surrounding them. Raihn was hurt. The Bloodborn would be able to manipulate his blood, too.

Raihn got in two more hits, but the Bloodborn retaliated with enough force to send him careening against the stone. Still, Raihn gripped his opponent’s arms tight, not letting him pull away—and leaving his back wide open, exposed to me.

Raihn’s gaze met mine over his attacker’s shoulder—now.

I thrust my blade hard into the Bloodborn’s back, sinking to the hilt. Even from behind, I knew how to pierce a heart.

The man slumped.

Raihn let the body fall as I struggled to free my weapon. He looked me up and down. “So you do know how to be helpful,” he said, already turning to the door. “Let’s go. I saw flames up ahead. Probably Mische. I think we’re close to—where the hell are you going?”

I wasn’t listening. The child had made it halfway across the poppy field. Her leg was clearly broken, more obvious than ever now as she struggled to run away from me. I grabbed her, muttering a hurried apology, and ran back to Raihn, who stared at me.

“And what is that?” He said it like I’d just presented him with a fluffy pink dog.

The ground rumbled. We didn’t have time for this. “Go!” I didn’t stop moving long enough to answer. Raihn dropped the Bloodborn’s corpse on the slab, and we flew through the corridors.

Raihn had to be right that we were near the end of the maze. The next two doors were open, held there by the corpses of a human and Rishan, respectively. Telltale bloodstains adorned the walls—delicate sprays of red, too fine to be from wounds. Evidence of blood magic.

We encountered only two other contestants, and between the child and my injuries, I needed to rely on Raihn’s defense far more than I liked. At least he cut them down easily, just two more corpses left in the halls as we progressed.

“Raihn,” I hissed as we rounded another corner, pointing to the left with my bloody blade—to a gate marked with lit Nightfire torches. This one was bigger than the others, double doors of ornate metal, one of Alarus’s eyes peering from each.

The end? It could be. It had to be.

A single slab sat before us. Raihn and I looked at each other. Then looked at the child, who wept softly, barely conscious.

He’d move for me. I knew it. Me, or the child.

The minute he did, my arm swung.

My blade hit the solid leather-clad muscle of his shoulder. His jaw snapped shut, trembling. He glared at me.

“What,” he hissed, between clenched teeth, “the fuck was that for? I was going for that.”

He pointed his sword to a lifeless body at the far end of the hall, then muttered a string of curses and yanked my blade from his armor.

Oh.

I adjusted my hold around the child and mumbled something that somewhat resembled an apology, and Raihn told me to go fuck myself. I considered telling him how lucky he was that that blade had no poison left and decided he probably wouldn’t appreciate it.

He hoisted the corpse over his shoulder and was on his way back when the wave of pain hit me—acidic, all consuming, like I was being boiled from the inside out.

I had only a moment to recognize what was happening before Angelika hit me.

I barely managed to stave her off, my single free arm trembling with the strength it took to block her. Red suffused my vision. Each breath burned. The cuts over Angelika’s arms quivered as the mist thickened.

She smiled. “I told you I’d kill you in the ring.”

The child’s body went rigid with pain as she cringed against me. Could a human child survive this?

I heard Raihn’s approaching footsteps running for us. He had gone all the way down the hall. Seconds and he would be here. The smart thing would be to wait for him. I could withstand it—but the girl probably couldn’t.

So I left myself unguarded for one critical moment as I evaded.

The strike to my side was crippling.

I fell. I barely had enough awareness to push the child away from my falling weight before I hit the ground.

Angelika’s clawed hand was at my throat immediately. Squeezed. I found the gates, tall and glimmering with the promise of safety as everything else blurred. I reached for my magic, and it sputtered uselessly out of reach. Always gone when I needed it most.

I groped at my side. One touch to the dagger she had embedded there made me seize with agony. But it’s amazing what a body could endure to survive.

I yanked the blade out of my flesh and thrust it into Angelika’s.