Elias nodded. Again. “Okay. Yeah, that sounds good.” He shook his hands out by his sides, his body humming with pent-up anxiety. “Tonight. Before midnight. Petros’s villa is in the Olantin District in South Gate. You can’t miss it—it’s the only big, rich house there. I—” He started to turn back to the carriage. “Thank you,” he whispered over his shoulder before sprinting away.
“The Kulans tried to pass a threat from me to Madoc!” Elias shouted as he rejoined the servants. “They’re so scared of him, they can’t even threaten him themselves!”
The servants broke out in a chorus of laughter.
Ash gave a brittle smile, but it froze on her face.
“Champions—the carriage is ready now,” one of the guards called.
Tor took her arm and led her to it. “Who was Petros talking to?” he whispered.
The carriage rocked as Ash pulled herself up. She looked down at Tor, her insides shifting with the carriage.
“Who do you think he was talking to?” was all she could say in response.
Tor swallowed, hard, and gave a curt nod.
Geoxus. Petros may have been the one making the moves, but Geoxus was giving the orders. Which meant it was all connected: Madoc, his anathreia; the target painted on Kula by Geoxus, Aera, and Biotus; even Stavos using the poisoned blade on Char. Had Geoxus told him to do that in order to get rid of Ignitus’s strongest gladiator and Geoxus’s biggest threat?
The only pieces that still didn’t connect were why Petros had captured Stavos, why he was dead, and what had happened to the other missing gladiators.
Ash sat next to Spark and let the healer check on a cut Brand had slashed across her thigh. Her mind was far away, poking at the lingering uncertainties.
Part of her felt like these final questions, and the waiting answers, would be worse than all the other revelations. Like the dark green-gray hue the sea would take before a punishing typhoon.
So Ash sat up straighter, watching Crixion roll past, and thought about how tonight, she would help Madoc get his sister back.
The moment Ash and Tor returned to the palace, servants swept them away to get ready for the dinner Ignitus had requested. He wanted to strategize about the final battles, they said.
Ash found it hard to care about the war when so many other dangers stalked around it.
As night fell, guards led them to Ignitus’s personal chamber. They reached an entryway with flames whipping in braziers on either side of two towering white doors, making the area smell of earthy burned pine.
“Wait here,” one guard said, and slipped inside. The other took up a stance before the doors.
Tor idly stepped away from him, his arms folded over his beige tunic. Ash followed, the two taking a slow stroll across the wide, empty marble floor. Her hands shook, built-up energy begging for release, and she fought to keep from breaking into a run just for some way to expel the unbearable emotions reeling inside her.
“We need to excuse ourselves from this dinner at the first opportunity,” Tor whispered. “It’ll take about thirty minutes to get to Petros’s villa.”
“How will we evade the guards?” Ash eyed the one by the door. “How—”
She stopped and planted her hands over her mouth.
Tor swung on her, eyes twisted. “What? What’s wrong?”
“I forgot to tell you and Elias that Petros knows I heard him. Oh no.” She dug her hands into her loose curls. “He knows, so he’ll be expecting me to do something like this. And if it was Geoxus who was talking to him, then Geoxus likely was spying on us in the preparation chamber, even though we tried to get him to show himself. He knows we talked with Madoc—”
Tor touched her shoulder. “Calm, Ash. You were right to take risks. You were right to push for a better future. What Madoc is changes everything.” He exhaled, face slack, and bent close to her, his voice a brush of whisper. “You have shouldered so much since Char died. Most of that is my fault, for being so shortsighted. I’m telling you I see it now, the possibility for a future, and we can’t let that possibility escape. We’ll take this opportunity—we’ll free an innocent girl and find out what Petros and Geoxus are planning against Kula. And we’ll use that to take down Ignitus.”
“What if Kula still gets hurt?” Ash breathed. She fiddled with the hem of the tunic she had changed into, a weave of treated Kulan