Page 7 of Blood King, Part I (Crowns #4)

The chains of the side gates rattled. Time was running out. Bash advanced with a lethal combination of strikes, and on an upswing, his opponent stumbled back, losing his balance, and hit the ground.

“Finish him!” Cyrus roared as he raced toward them, fearing Bash would falter.

Don’t falter.

Finish him!

But Bash paused, just like Cyrus feared he would. The hesitation of killing a man on the ground.

And that hesitation cost him.

Bash’s opponent flung a handful of sand in his face, blinding him, then sprang to his feet with a fatal thrust toward the gut.

But Cyrus barreled into the man, careening him sideways.

He could have ended him there, taking his head with a backhanded swing, but he pulled back.

Bash needed this kill. Instead, Cyrus dropped and raked his blade along the man’s side, slowing him.

The side gates rose.

They were out of time.

“Get to the center!” Cyrus bellowed.

Bash clawed at his face, still struggling to see, as a giant striped cat lunged from the darkness of its keep. Cyrus jerked Bash sideways, just in time, and pulled him toward the center of the arena as the beast sprang again, but this time onto Bash’s unfortunate opponent.

Cyrus swore. That kill was lost.

He shoved Bash, who was finally managing to regain his sight, toward the center, where Jaem fought another man. Cyrus slid in and overtook the match, redirecting Jaem to join Everan. But Cyrus didn’t keep the opponent for himself. Instead, he fell back for Bash to try again.

Bash’s eyes were tearing and red, but they focused on his target.

A scream rang out, and Cyrus glanced over his shoulder to see another man from the Aramine team—Kord’s opponent—snagged and being dragged to his death by the black lion.

Cyrus hadn’t even realized the second beast’s gate had been opened.

At least they were outside the perimeter.

They needed to finish quickly, though. When the third gate opened, the perimeters would overlap, and there would be no safety.

“Time!” he bellowed.

His team raced to finish. Everan set up Jaem to take a kill, and Jaem did so beautifully. Two remaining.

Bash attacked, a second effort at his own kill, weaving through another set of skilled moves—moves Cyrus had taught him.

But this was a silver-tier opponent, and Bash still suffered from troubled vision.

Tears trailed his dusted face as he blinked rapidly to clear his bloodshot eyes.

It would be a challenge for him to win against this opponent at his best, and he certainly wasn’t at his best. He needed help.

Cyrus saw an opportunity and lunged forward, drawing the man’s focus with an elbow to the face. As the Aramine fighter blocked it, Cyrus dropped his opposite arm and ripped his blade across the man’s thigh, slicing to the bone.

The man didn’t scream, perhaps he didn’t even feel the lightning cut of Cyrus’s sword, but his leg wouldn’t hold him, and he stumbled forward.

Bash’s blade finally found home as he sank it into the man’s chest. The Aramine fighter collapsed to the ground. Cyrus growled in triumph and turned to scan the rest of the arena. But his joy was cut short as he saw Haddick on his knees—having been run through by his opponent’s sword.

“No!” he roared, and then charged toward him. Kord beat him there and, with two swings of his sword, cut down the Aramine fighter, claiming the last kill for the team win and stopping the fight. The chains of the cats tightened, and they were dragged back into the darkness of their dens.

The crowd cheered. Of course they fucking cheered.

Cyrus reached Haddick and dropped down beside him. Blood poured from his lower stomach. “You’ll be all right, brother,” he assured him. Cyrus quickly assessed his men. Everan, Bash, Kord, Jaem. While bloody, they were all uninjured.

Haddick struggled to speak.

“Save your strength,” Cyrus said as he looped an arm underneath him.

A sword through the stomach would have been fatal for a fighter in any other fighting house, but not House Pyro.

Not with Teron. Cyrus breathed an air of thanks that it hadn’t been to the chest—they had time to get him back to the villa.

“Let’s get you to Teron. You’ll be fine. ”

Everan moved to Haddick’s other side, and Kord and Jaem took his feet. Together they lifted and carried their friend from the arena.

“Six!” Cyrus bellowed out as they stepped through the gate.

“Six!” the gate guard called.

They made their way down the long tunneled hall from the arena, carrying Haddick.

The tightness of his body lessened as they went.

He was losing consciousness. Perhaps that was better than suffering through the pain.

Cyrus was grateful the villa wasn’t far.

With luck, Teron would heal him quickly, and when Haddick woke again, it would be as if this had never happened.

They wove through the corridors, doing their best to keep from jostling their friend, but as they passed a side hall, a woman’s voice called out.

It was the faintest of calls.

“Lucien.”

Cyrus stopped abruptly. Prickles rose up along the back of his spine.

Kord grunted as they all staggered to a stop. “What the f—”

“Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

But Cyrus just stared down into the darkness of the side hall. His hearing sharpened.

That name…

Everan said something to him, but he didn’t catch it.

That name…

Maybe he’d imagined it. No. He’d worked hard to forget that name, to strip it from every piece of himself, from every dark corner of his mind—to erase it as though it had never existed.

“Lucien,” came the voice again, jarring him just as much as the first time.

“That. Did you hear it?”

Everan gave an ever-so-slight shake of his head.

Then the voice came again, quieter now, but somehow more powerful. The whisper of a sinister siren.

“Lucien. ”

His breaths came faster. No one knew that name. Not Everan, not Kord, not Kieve. No one. Yet someone did.

And she was calling to him.

“Take him,” Cyrus said to Bash.

“But what are you—”

“Take him.”

Bash quickly moved to take his place carrying Haddick. Cyrus nodded for the small group to keep on. “Go. Get Haddick to Teron. I’ll follow.”

“Wait—what are you going to do?” Everan asked.

“Just go.”

Everan glanced down the dark hallway, then back at him. “Cyrus,” he said warily.

“Go on. I’ll see you back at the villa.”

Reluctantly, they moved off again down the hall toward the exit and the cart that would take them to the villa and to Teron. Cyrus watched them go. Waiting. His heart pounding.

When they disappeared, he turned back toward the hall.

Back toward the voice.