that is for you to decide.”
They looked thoughtful as they ate, if not more than a little scared. Well, all but the one boy. The one who declared first that he’d be joining her. Quinn stood off to the side, dividing up the remainders for who would carry what, watching him out of the corner of her eye.
He looked just like the other children.
He didn’t act like them though. Something about him was . . . different.
Familiar even.
Quinn wasn’t sure what to think about that.
The sound of a boom coming from the docks made them jump. The children, all but the one little boy, stared ahead with fear on their faces and terror in their hearts.
“What was that?” Trissa asked.
“The beginning,” Quinn said, smiling to herself. “And the end. Now hurry up and eat, we need to be gone within the next hour.”
Chapter 11
Black Desert
“Without hitting our lowest point, we might never reach our highest.”
— Mariska “Risk” Darkova, beast tamer, Mazzulah’s heir
Mazzulah said she would make her powerful.
She said that she would be a god among men.
That no one would ever harm her again.
But as the raksasa before her beat her bloody and blue—Risk couldn’t help thinking that she’d been a fool.
Mazzulah lied.
“Precious heir,” the beast cooed. His long black talons raked the front of her shirt. Risk’s head thudded back, hitting the dense black sand beneath her. Particles drifted in the air, making her choke.
“Pretty heir,” he continued, trailing one bloodied talon down the side of her cheek. Risk closed her eyes and turned her face. Tears welled, and she tried, but failed, to stop them from running down her cheeks.
“Pathetic heir,” he snapped. She felt the clawed fist coming for her face. With her eyes screwed shut, she prepared herself for her own end.
Except . . . the fist never made contact.
She opened her eyes.
His black horns curled away from his forehead. Sweat ran from the thick locks of dark hair, down his forehead, dripping onto her prone form. Blue streaks smeared across his chest, but it wasn’t his blood. It was hers.
He’d won the fight by all means.
Just like every raksasa that came before him.
And yet . . . he sat there, hovered above her, his open hand clenching around empty air as he restrained himself from what surely would be the death blow.
“Rise, Dartan,” the god commanded. A dark sun covered the battle grounds in violet light. Risk squinted against the shifting sands as the raksasa stood and stepped away from her.
Stands made of obsidian stone, marble chunks, and purple quartz surrounded the black desert. They were not tall, not compared to the colosseum in Vusut where she and Quinn had been gladiators for a time. But they were packed to the brim, nonetheless.
Men and women and raksasa all cheered and jested. It wasn’t them that Risk watched. Her time in the dark realm had taught her that they were inconsequential when the dark god spoke, as he did then.
Slowly, Risk sat up.
“Mariska Darkova, heir of mine . . .” Mazzulah began. Her arms shook as she tried to stand, but she was unable. “You are a disappointment.”
Risk stopped trying and simply stared.
She knew it in her heart. She’d felt those golden eyes on her with each failure. She wasn’t sure what the dark god wanted or how to achieve it. Risk was only half-raksasa. While she had the ability to survive in this terrible land without food or water, she was not as strong as Mazzulah’s children. She was not as fast. She could summon claws, but what good did claws do when theirs were stronger? She could summon wings, but these beasts had wings themselves. Ones that flew higher and further and faster than her own.
Risk lacked in every way, and yet Mazzulah continued to put her in these death matches, letting her be beaten to a pulp.
Risk’s hands curled into fists. Her own baby talons piercing her skin. The pain did not bring her clarity, though. The blood flowing from her veins did not slow her rapidly beating pulse.
She’d known that she was the weaker Darkova all her life.
She’d known that she wasn’t cut out like Quinn.
She’d known that she was a disappointment, and yet she couldn’t escape it.
She came here to right the wrong she committed. To save her sister from the fate she had condemned her to. And in doing so, she locked herself in a prison of her own making.
Tears burned in her eyes. The granules of sand stung as