4. Cross

Iwant to rage.

I want to yell that they’re wrong, that I’m not Blackguard, I’m nobody. I want to pull my blade and gut the next creature who dares to lay a hand on me. I resist all of it.

Denial and hatred crackle under my skin as I stare at the drop of vibrant blue frozen by the door.

My tripwire.

Curiosity snags me. I release the reins of my power, allowing light and faces to watch as I raise my head high, same as I’ve done time and time again in the face of death. I take deliberate steps, ignoring the slander and curses percolating around me.

Fight, argue, scream—that’s what they crave. A coward they can exploit and humiliate. They wish to revel in my fear, watch me stumble and break. Suffer. They crave a grand spectacle, and I refuse to deliver it. Steadfastly, I ascend the short stairs into the domed chain-link fighting cage, leaving my expression calm and hands loose.

The door rattles shut after me, heavy locks clicking into place at the sweep of the showrunner’s pointer.

As far as traps go—unveiling us to a horde teeming with enemies, separating me from my only ally, and confining me behind bars—it’s clever.

Lev juts his chin at me defiantly through the fence, dark eyes lit with fury. Four burly males restrain him. “Make it a challenge,” he taunts, voice laced with poison. “Lead left and don’t lag on the backswing, and—”

—don’t show weakness.“I got it.”

The showrunner, wily, grinning, coos with a hint of amusement about a noticeable lack of confidence emanating from the king’s killers.

If that’s what he wants to think, I let him. Underestimation leads to under-preparedness.

It’s December and the Annihilator—somebody’s mom didn’t love them—stalks back and forth on the cracked cement, wearing nothing but shorts and taped knuckles. With fire red sideburns and a tattoo of a Chimera prowling up his throat, he presents an, I assume, intimidating presence. When he speaks, sharpened fangs snag his lips like a deformed saber tooth, and judging from how jacked he is, I’d guess he’s either a Demigod or he’s ingested enough steroids to never have kids.

Not even the Gods are bored enough to name their offspring the Annihilator.

“What color do you bleed, Blackguard?” he spits, rough voice leaking menace. He thumps chunky hands against his chest.

Definitely drugs. “Black. And it burns hotter than acid.” Fuckwad.

I curl my hands into loose fists, wishing I wasn’t in fucking jeans and wet boots.

Shouts flood the rafters of the Ballasts, equal parts cheerful and deadly when the Annihilator jigs a warmup, swinging windmill arms and jabbing out his legs like we’ve got ten minutes to fill before pay-per-view starts.

I roll my head left, right, popping bones and stretching muscle, disregarding Lev’s advice to lead weakside when pain bursts across my chin. A sharp sting that radiates through my teeth.

Overhead, Fuchsia laughs. Claps. Doesn’t care that the bell hasn’t rung. He decides the rules, and tonight, they’re whatever decimates a Blackguard. “The Annihilator is hungry!”

Blood builds and forms in a pucker beneath my lip until the severe taste of iron coats my mouth. The bell stays silent, and the Annihilator lunges, swinging out wildly with a wide fist. I dodge, stepping swiftly from his reach, resetting my footing, rolling my eyes, and just as I’ve decided our fight will be short—blue.

Bright ocean blue and a coat of dreamy sunset pink.

She’s right up against the fence, delicate fingers curled tightly into the gaps of gray metal. Her voice is easy to catch through the nasty, body breaking yells, through the Sabertooth’s guttural cries and screech of chains. “You’re doing great!”

An uppercut targets me, and I shift at the last minute, spinning to hook my heel on the back of the Annihilator’s thigh. He shouts, banging into the cage.

Leni gives me a thumbs up. Two.

What the fuck?

The Annihilator charges feral and snarling like he’s personally responsible for the creation of D.A.R.E and I can’t stop looking at her.

You’ll save her.

I duck a sloppy fist, shove the druggie to the floor, never taking my eyes off her.

Who would mistake me for a hero? No one.

Absolutely no one, my curse confirms.

I sidestep a tackle and over a chorus of boos ask her, “What’s your great plan when I get out of this ring?”

“Only winner’s leave,” she returns, tone lacking any animosity. “Are you going to hit him? He’s hit you.”

Once, and he cheated. I bow dramatically for her, arms spreading wide. “Apologies for dragging out my death.”

“Given the roster—” She winces as I throw my forearm up to block a harsh combination, the force of the impact reverberating through my bones. “Given the roster, I hoped for this to be brief. I thought ...” She pauses, voice strained, gaze tracking the predatory movements of my opponent. “I thought it’d be easy for you. No one would get hurt.”

“Should I explain the concept of cage fighting to you?” I ask, spitting a swell of blood and ducking a kick before rocking back on my heels as the Annihilator’s momentum throws him to the floor like a sack of flour. “Would you like to tag in and find out?”

“You’re one of the Blackguard,” she hiss-screams, as if that explains everything. All it does is rile the creatures watching, their cheers growing louder, pressing her tighter into the metal, her grip turns white.

My boots are leaving slush marks across the concrete, and Team Roids falters mid combination. Is he really their best fighter? Lev could kill him with a sneeze. My focus is on Leni. “Hey, next time, why don’t you yell it next time for the nosebleeds?”

“Why don’t you end this so we can get out of here?”

“My sincerest apologies,” I deadpan. “Does the Great Plan have a time limit?”

“Yes in fact, it does.” I bet she’s tapping her little silver boot like a rabbit late to tea.

I smile. It’s nice. Chatting. Even with a bright red target painted on my back. A target she painted on my back. She worked with the Chire children to lure both Lev and me here. For what reason, other than to enter me in the ring,?

No. She couldn’t have, that’d mean she’d have remembered my name.

“You will pay!” The Annihilator roars, his face purple with frustration. He’s swinging out like a cat dunked in water, all skill abandoned. I twist from Leni as attack after attack steals my focus, annoying the ever-loving shit out of me.

I almost end it, fed up. Until I notice the dazed frosted blue gaze chasing me around the ring. By the time I return to her, her pupils are overtaking the blue.

“You’re light on your feet.”

I could hear her if I was deaf in heavy gunfire, as if I’ve trained myself to her frequency, but I shrug, nonchalant, pretending she doesn’t sound impressed. Admiring. My veins heat. The first bead of sweat trickled down my forehead. “Hate to disappoint.”

“The opposite.” Her nose scrapes the fencing. “It’s just …” The Annihilator’s angry shout cuts her off, demanding a fight, blood, bones, a fiver for a cab ride home—I’m not listening. Leni’s eyelashes are the color of frostbite. “I didn’t expect you to be graceful. It’s—”

I’m on my toes for her to finish. My heart pounding in my chest, my cheeks, my fingertips.

A foot slams onto her fingers, rattles the fence. Leni cries out.

My limbs lock.

A bolt of anger consumes me as fast and vicious as a bomb’s wick, drowning out everything else. The seedy lights, the smell of sweat, Lev’s impatient stare. I only hear her plea to get off while the Annihilator demands I stop fooling around.

Something poisonous and white hot rolls through my blood, coiling and lashing. It’s been so long, I almost fail to recognize it, scarcely think to acknowledge it. But it grows until I can’t feel anything else, sharp and dirty and tempting.

Possession.

Before he can blink, I throw my elbow across his jaw, chase the impact with my white knuckled fist, and slam my boot into the curve of his knee. Only then, when he’s piled on the ground, blinking rapidly, sucking down air, do I begin.

Knocking him forward, pounding his face into the dusty concrete, I grind my boot into his hand. It’s a sickening crunch, the bones cracking and splintering, flattening beneath me. I push harder, teeth clenching.

Payback. A cruel smile spreads across my face.

Every muscle in my body is taut, pulsating with fury. I flip him over so he can see me smiling. The sound of the Annihilator’s skull hitting the concrete echoes, a sharp crack that silences the Ballasts. Whispers permeate up into the rafters, a blend of murmured shock and disbelief.

“Get up.” I tell him, harsh voice slicing through the air, directed not just at the Annihilator but the wall of stone-faced spectators who frothed for my demise.

I clap, slow and mocking as I circle the cage, a hyena on the hunt. “Get the fuck up! You wanted to fight? Get. Up.”

Lev’s vibrating, smiling with all his teeth.

Revenge seizes control as I stalk toward my opponent—a grown male trembling on hands and knees, spittle dripping down his chin, genuine terror in his eyes.

Horrified thoughts smear across his bruised face, mirroring the crowds. What’s happening? Where is this coming from? I want the other guy back.

Tough shit.

I’m out for blood. Each movement deliberate and precise as my fist launches into his face and shatters his nose. Energy crackles around me, tendrils of black skating around my arms like smoking snakes.

I yank his face into my knee just to watch him crumple onto the ground, groaning and rolling.

“How about the other hand?” I’ve given up on him. Now I’m talking to her.

To the woman who seems to have taken up permanent residence in my thoughts.

Her good hand still clutches the fence, revealing an unexpected resilience, but her frosty eyes have tinged red and her lips are pressed. Angry.

In an instant, I’ve got the Annihilator by his wrist, and one by one, his fingers snap. It’s not a harrowing sound, it’s soothing, oddly satisfying, like the gentle click of a clip signaling empty.

He screams.

I’m louder. “What else?”

I’m a pile-up on the highway, stares fixating on me, disgusted and terrified and thankful they’re on the outside looking in. Wicked satisfaction fills me. “His neck?” I ask her, breathless with anticipation and twisted pleasure, already going for the kill.

“Wait!” Leni calls and fool that I am, I look. I devour. Blue. “Please,” she says. “Don’t—”

Pain becomes me. Engulfs my being and sears violently. Wraps around me like a vise, merciless and unrelenting.

Ramming, bone snapping pain seizes fervent and constant. The tattooed bands on my wrists tighten with brutal force, cutting into my skin, while the one on my throat threatens to crush me.

My right foot gives way beneath me, and I go down on one knee, wheezing, struggling for air. My muscles spasm involuntarily, desperately attempting to fight the torment. Blinding white flashes and engulfing black spots mar my vision, and I can’t inhale.

The curse has come. My punishment for failing to protect the King, for failing to avenge him swiftly and with zero reservations: pain.

Pain, pain, pain. It lances up me, around me, lashes like electric whips specifically designed to agonize.

The first time I ever felt it, it struck like lightning. It happened minutes after Kadmos took his last breath. Thick dark bands burning around our necks. At first, we thought the band was a mark of failure, nothing more, a symbol of the Blackguard and it’s disgrace.

It wasn’t.

Together, we’d vowed to find the king’s killer, purpose the only clear way through the darkness. But our progress was infinitesimal. Creatures despised us. Queen Vinia banished us, and Calydon, our expert in arms, the kindest of the lot of us, the most tenderhearted, was slain by the Queensguard in a display of power.

Our anger became sorrow. A fallen brother. A dead king. No hope. We abandoned our search.

And the curse returned. It’s simple: if we stop trying to avenge the king, we get punished. Tortured. Dominated and beaten.

Ten years after Kadmos died, a second band appeared on our wrists in the same heartless black, and the interval between torment shortened. Another ten years and our other wrists blackened. We couldn’t go a month without our noses in the grindstone or blacking out from the excruciating pain.

Thirty years have passed. Tattoos ensnare our throats, our wrists, one ankle each, and the grace period for vengeance has shrunk to mere days, a week at best.

I’ve been distracted all week.

Fixated on magnificent blue.

“I’m in Tallinn,” I croak to the cold, unforgiving ground, convulsing, throbbing. “I’m searching,” I beg, pleading to dark, fetid magic that doesn’t give a shit, desperate to gain favor from the merciless forces at play. “I’m gathering leads, I’m—”

Obsessed, my curse dings, with her. It almost sounds like Kadmos, his dark bellow of frustration. Is she more important than your king?

My head collides with the hard ground, and I curl into the agony, as if welcoming it will prevent it from tearing me apart. Foolish. Red-hot spikes rip through me from the inside out.

Is she worth all this?

Soft, pink lips parted in shock, Leni stares at me as she slips bruised fingertips through the cage, held just short of reaching me. “Get up,” she pleads, eyes flooded with panic. “He’s angry. He’s coming.” The light has vanished from her voice. “You need to get up now.” She pounds on the chain-link, shoving her arm through the gap, stretching and straining to touch me. The tip of her finger grazes my forearm, and I instinctively recoil, fearing the curse will kill her too.

My ears pop, and a broken groan escapes me. No air for a minute now. My ankle is broken, shattered at best. Two racing pulses throb in my wrists. It feels like I’ve gone through the windshield of one car and smashed through the windshield of another.

I can hardly focus, my thoughts keep racing, wild and panicked.

The blackout is coming. Hungry to steal the blue from me, lock it away. I fight, coughing, choking. I can’t catch my breath, lungs closed up. The room spins fast as a bullet, and I pound a hand against the floor. The air’s oppressively hot and suffocating. My vision swims.

A panicked cry pierces through my blur of hell, jolting me back to reality like a splash of icy water on my face. “Cross,” the voice pleads, filled with remorse. “I’m sorry.”

She ... remembers?

She repeats those words over and over, her expression etched with sheer horror, her outstretched hand unable to reach me, but refusing to retreat. “Cross. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Cross.”

I’m not someone to be mourned.

I consider telling her, using my last conscious breath to wipe the sad look from her face, to steal a last pretty picture before I blackout when something hard slams into my jaw.

Metallic floods my mouth.

Hazily, I register clapping and hollering. A celebration.

All creatures, regardless of which Gods they worship, find delight and morbid fascination in witnessing the fall of a once mighty figure. Icarus, Achilles, Phaeton.

Tonight is no such spectacle.

I clench my teeth and the long tubes of fluorescent light burst into fragments, raining down sparks and shards of glass that embed into my back and neck.

Deafening screams.

In the darkness, I muster the strength to push myself up, smothering a cry as my arm fractures, solders together and fractures once more. I hear Lev’s voice, shouting through the roars for more, for blood and gore. I swallow the blood I can’t spit out and stagger to my feet.

The pain increases exponentially.

I can barely lift my arms, but I intercept the big body hurling toward me, allowing the Annihilator’s weight to bring us both crashing down. We scramble, grappling together mindless and filthy. Predators in the dark. I drive an elbow into his chest, ram my forehead against his. Draw away, hobble onto my solid leg and drop again, smashing my elbow against his nose.

Auxiliary lights rev up, blink on. Harsh white streams into the cage, creating shadows of crosses.

I can’t get up, even as the bell begrudgingly crowns me the victor. Creatures jeer and scream and spit at me. Bottles shatter against the cage, splintered glass and alcohol cut at me.

I should be accustomed to this forced agony, the relentless cycle of bone breaking and mending. Breaking again. But each time, it hits worst, harder.

I can’t get up.

Nausea churns within me, threatening to overtake my senses. I can’t—

The showrunner’s urgent shouting pierces the venom in my heart. He sneers for them to wrench the cage open, but he’s too slow. Lev, with a fraction of his strength, rips the door off its hinges. He steps over the Annihilator’s mangled body and forces me to my feet, half pushing, half carrying me out.

“Black smoke, black flames.” He’s yelling, has to over the shrieks. Wet, hot liquid spills from my ears. My neck’s wet too. “There were black flames in the throne room,” Lev snarls. “Hold on!”

Vibrant, ancient cursing. Tugging on my shoulder. My ears pop again. I can’t see.

“Focus,” Lev growls. “Shit. Listen!” He’s shaking me. “Black flames.” Slicing, instant pain slashes my cheek.

A punch.

Lev again. “He burned. Kadmos burned. They burned him.”

Secrets. He’s feeding me secrets. A lead to the king’s killer. He’s bringing me back from the surge, siphoning pain away.

Pain that would gladly kill me if I let it.

With his arm bracing my shoulders, I limp forward, stumbling to keep up. I shut my eyes to focus on draining oxygen from the air when it changes, goes from humid and foul to cold and rank. We’re outside.

A bone cracks in my hand, breaking or setting, I’m not sure. I stare at a slimy brick wall through a sheet of freezing rain. Hot metal licks my mouth.

Black smoke, black flames. I gag on air, lungs swollen.

A week thinking of Leni, and it’d nearly cost me everything.

Save her? You can’t even stay upright.

Pathetic.

“Where is she?” I mutter, pushing free of Lev’s support, only to collapse hard against the wall. It’s wet. I slide. “Where’s the girl? Leni. Where—”

Lev’s frown deepens as I struggle to stay upright. “Focus on the king before you kill yourself.” He pins my shoulder to the wall with a clenched fist. “Need me to go over it again?”

“No. I have it.” I glance at the Ballasts’ neon light. It bursts with a loud pop, momentarily lighting the entire alley before we plunge into black.

Lev swears—Russian, messy—and snaps his fingers. “Hey. Eyes on the prize.”

My throat feels dry and scratchy as I clear it. “Black flames,” I repeat, grinding my teeth against the wracking pain to take in the information, to convince my body that I haven’t lost sight of my mission, that the curse can release me, because I’m still on the Divine path of revenge.

I don’t know how long it takes, but the next time I’m lucid, Lev hums in the back of his throat. The lines of his forehead are smooth again, and his voice is no longer frantic. “Here I thought Atlas sent you to watch me.”

I wince as my thumb snaps into place and push off the wall with strength I don’t yet possess to square my shoulders. “Please. You begged Atlas to come.”

“Guess you’re not so perfect,” Lev taunts, but the undercurrent of worry sticks. “You good?”

I shrug, force a curve on my mouth. Inside, I’m screaming, where is she?