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25

A GILDED DAGGER

CEDRIC

Magic rippled around Cedric. The dark of the void exploded in a dazzling display of starlight and color as he and Elyria fell. It was like falling through worlds.

And then he was surrounded by stacked stone and closed walls. Torchlight glinted off his armor, neatly stacked in a corner. Their weapons were still propped against the wall.

They were back.

In front of them, the door to the main chamber, the one that had conveniently disappeared when they’d entered the room, sat open.

For a moment, Cedric and Elyria stood there, as if neither of them could quite believe that it was over. That they’d survived another trial. That they were one step closer to the crown.

Cedric opened his mouth. He closed it. He knew he should say something. He wanted to say something.

He just didn’t have a single fucking clue what to say.

Not as his pulse was still a staccato beat in his veins, a stuttering reminder of everything he’d just been forced to witness—and all that happened after.

Should he be thanking her? The thought gnawed at him, bitter and relentless. He was supposed to be the strong one, the one blazing through these trials on his own merit. He’d trained for this. He was meant for this.

Yet, here he was, all too aware that if it weren’t for Elyria, he might still be trapped in that nightmare.

This didn’t feel like a victory. It felt like he’d cheated, like he’d been carried to safety while the others faced their demons alone.

If Elyria shared his concerns, she certainly didn’t show it. She was already in motion, her hand slipping from Cedric’s as she scooped up her weapons and strode confidently toward the door.

He flexed his fingers against the absence of her.

Pushing what happened during the trial to the back of his mind, Cedric forced his feet to move. He couldn’t name the emotions rolling through him as he strapped his gauntlets to his waist alongside his sword and dagger after donning his armor once more. Armor that felt somehow both heavier and lighter than it did before.

His eyes widened as he took in the scene in the Sanctum. The gilded table that spanned nearly the entire length of the room. The sumptuous display of roasted meats, ripe fruits, goblets brimming with wine and tankards full of ale. His fellow champions settled in large velvet dining chairs along both sides.

Flickering candles cast a golden glow over the tablescape, but the atmosphere was far from celebratory. Kit, Zephyr, and Thraigg had commandeered a corner at the near end of the table. Gael and Cyren sat across from them, exchanging stilted words. Tenebris Nox was by their lonesome, unsurprisingly, a few seats down.

Cedric found Belien and Leona at the other end of the table, scowls of disappointment evident on their faces as they muttered to one another under their breath .

The champions sat mostly in silence, poking at the food on their plates or taking long, deep drags from their cups. All except for Thraigg, who seemed entirely delighted as he tore into a dripping drumstick with gusto.

Elyria stood at Kit’s side. It had taken Cedric a few minutes to get his armor back on, so he hadn’t witnessed their reunion. But from the soft expressions on both their faces and the way their little fingers remained affectionately hooked together, it wasn’t hard to guess what they were both feeling. Relief, joy, perhaps the lingering hint of fear. It radiated from them both, like neither of them fully believed the other was there. That they’d both made it through.

Cedric’s chest tightened as he watched Elyria murmur something to Kit, too low for him to hear. Kit nodded vigorously before wiping at the inner corner of her eye.

Cedric looked away, suddenly feeling like he was intruding.

“There he is!” boomed Thraigg, his words garbled in his full mouth as he waved Cedric over.

“Here I am,” Cedric replied, exhaustion carrying him into an empty seat beside the dwarf.

“Took the two of ye damn well long enough. We’ve been waiting for ages. ” Balancing the drumstick between his teeth, Thraigg stretched across the table and grabbed a flagon of ale. Swaying slightly, he attempted to fill Cedric’s empty tankard for him.

“Here, let me.” Cedric reached for the flagon just as Thraigg jolted from a whole-body hiccup, sloshing ale over Cedric’s outstretched hands.

“Whoopsie,” slurred the dwarf, and Cedric couldn’t help but grin at the juxtaposition of a word like that coming from someone who looked like him. He turned toward Elyria, curious to see if she’d heard the dwarf’s unexpected exclamation. For some reason, he just knew she’d find it hilarious. But she was facing the other direction, having slipped into the chair next to Kit with a goblet of wine in one hand and an entire loaf of bread in the other.

A petite green face popped into Cedric’s line of sight, cutting Elyria off from view. He couldn’t tell if the reflexive emotion that flared in his chest was one born of gratitude or irritation.

Zephyr held out a cloth napkin .

“Ah, thank you,” Cedric said. He took it and wiped the liquid from his hands. “I’m relieved to see you made it through.”

She smiled, though it didn’t quite meet her eyes. Cedric wondered what past horror she’d been forced to relive during the trial.

“I, too, am very glad to see you,” she said quietly.

“Aye. We had a grand old time fighting our demons though, didn’t we, Zeph?” Thraigg said. “I must admit, though, she made for piss poor company in there. All that pacing and wringing of her little hands. She seemed far more worried about ye than about the two of us getting through the trial.”

Cedric swore the sylvan’s cheeks turned a darker shade of green.

“I wasn’t worried ,” she insisted. “I just wasn’t sure where you’d gone, and it caught me off guard.” Her eyes darted to the doors lining the back wall. “Thought we were heading to the same place. That’s all.”

“As did I,” Cedric said, reaching for the now overfull tankard of ale in front of him. Its amber contents rippled as he took a careful sip. Then another, less careful one. And another, which was really more like a gulp.

He hadn’t realized how desperately he needed a drink until this moment.

“But I suppose all’s well that ends well,” he continued after finally setting the tankard down, nearly drained. “Even if I ended up with a far less pleasant partner than I would have liked.”

The good-natured jibe was barely more than a conspiratorial whisper in Zephyr’s ear, inaudible to anyone else. But that didn’t stop Elyria’s head from whipping to the right, her eyes narrowing on Cedric as if she’d heard every word.

Already feeling emboldened from the ale, he tipped his chin at the fae with a lopsided grin. She responded by chugging the contents of the goblet in her hand.

He turned his attention back to Thraigg. “Are we the last to arrive?”

“Aye.” The dwarf hiccupped. “Wait, no. Still waiting on that mousy li’l human bloke—the healer.”

“Alden.” Cedric scanned the remaining champions, confirming that the saint wasn’t there.

Thraigg blinked slowly before nodding, like the action took some effort. “And that other fae fellow, too. With the blinding hair. ”

“His name is Paelin.” Gael’s voice cut across the table with no hint of the colorful humor Cedric had come to expect from her.

“I’m sure he will arrive any moment,” said Cyren, tucking a lock of blue hair behind his ear. He patted Gael’s shoulder, but Cedric caught the uncertainty flickering in his eyes.

Across the table, Elyria nodded in agreement as she refilled her goblet.

“That’s what that ginger twit said ‘bout the other one,” Thraigg muttered.

Gael tensed.

Elyria shot Thraigg a warning glare.

“How long have you been waiting?” Cedric asked—an attempt to shift the dwarf’s drunken focus.

Thraigg took a long drag of his drink before shrugging. “Dunno. A while.”

Cedric was too exhausted to stop himself from rolling his eyes. “Very helpful.”

“You two did seem to take quite a while. We thought...” Zephyr trailed off.

Cedric leaned back in his chair, understanding washing over him. The nervous way Kit clung to Elyria made a lot more sense now. They’d already thought them lost.

“Well, if we managed to squeak through,” Elyria said, a sudden lightness in her voice that Cedric suspected was very much forced, “then I’m sure Paelin isn’t far behind either.” Her green eyes met Cedric’s for the briefest moment before flitting back to Gael.

For a long time, nobody spoke. Despite his efforts to dispel the tension in the room, it hung heavy in the air—a storm waiting to break. Cedric could see it in the way Gael’s restless fingers tapped against the table, in the suspicious squint of Belien’s eyes, in the perpetual sneer gracing Leona’s lips. They may have survived the Trial of Spirit, may have all faced their truths, but bonds of camaraderie were thin, sparse, primed to snap.

Leona’s sharp voice shattered the silence. “How long are we to be expected to continue waiting?”

“As long as it takes, Blackwood,” said Gael.

“You had no problem moving right on when the one we were waiting for was my sister,” Belien spat. “But now that it’s your little fairy friend, I suppose we should wait forever, is that right?”

Cedric’s hand tightened around his tankard.

Lethal calm blazed in Gael’s eyes. “The Crucible moved on. Is it my fault that the Arbiter declared the trial over? I would have waited as long as necessary. I expect whether Paelin will?—”

“And Alden,” Leona chimed in.

“I expect whether Paelin and Alden”—Gael’s jaw ticked—“will best the trial still has yet to be determined.”

Belien, evidently incapable of not stirring the pot, leaned forward with a smirk. “I think it’s time you face the truth, Winters. After all, that’s what the trial was all about, wasn’t it? Your buddy is dead.”

The air in the room shot up several degrees. The tangy scent of vinegar filled the air, along with the sound of...bubbling?

Cedric’s chest tingled as he looked down. Gael Winters, flamecaller, had one hand flattened on top of the table. The other was wrapped around her metal goblet...which was full of boiling wine.

“Gael,” Cyren murmured—a gentle warning.

“It’s not personal,” Leona added quickly, an attempt to sooth the escalating situation. Even she could not ignore the magic pulsing off Gael in angry waves. “Not all of us were cut out for the demands of the Trial of Spirit. Just look at how long it took Lightbreaker and Lord Church’s golden boy.”

Cedric ignored the cloud of shame hanging over his head.

He didn’t know if it was ignorance or malice that drove Belien to say what he did next, but either way it was very, very stupid.

“Yes, exactly,” Belien said haughtily. “Some of us are simply weak.”

Gael looked ready to burst into flame.

Elyria spoke before she could. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. That trial forced us to confront our deepest fears, our darkest memories. It called on things that would fell even the toughest and strongest among us. If you think someone weak after they’ve stared down their worst nightmare, even if the nightmare won in the end, you’re a greater fool than I thought.”

Hard though that may be to imagine, Cedric quoted in his mind, remembering the way she’d hurled nearly those exact words at him before the trial.

“...hard though that may be to imagine,” Elyria finished.

Cedric buried his grin in his tankard. It was rather nice when her vitriol was aimed at someone who actually deserved it.

Unfortunately, her words did not land with Belien the same way they had with Cedric. The sorcerer simply did not seem to care.

“Is that defensiveness I detect rankling the mighty Revenant?” Belien asked snidely.

“And is it for yourself...or on Sir Thorne’s behalf, I wonder?” added Leona, her eyes narrowing on Cedric.

Her suspicious gaze was like a punch in the gut. Did she know? Did she know that he’d been unable to best the Trial of Spirit on his own? That the only reason he’d made it out of there, that he wasn’t still trapped like Alden and Paelin, was because of Elyria?

He hadn’t endured. He’d been dragged out of the darkness by someone stronger, someone who had faced down her own demons and still had the strength to save him. The others won their trials; Cedric merely escaped his.

And somehow, Leona knew.

“Shut up, Blackwood,” said Kit, interrupting Cedric’s guilt-driven spiral.

“Was she talking to you, pixie?” Belien spat, his tone so vitriolic Cedric might have slapped him had he been closer.

Elyria stood, the movement so abrupt that it sent her chair scraping back several inches before toppling over. “By the fucking stars, how many times does the Arbiter have to say the word ‘unity’ before you two get it through your thick human skulls?”

Leona rolled her eyes. “You truly expect me to believe a death dealer like you is out here preaching harmony?”

“And what exactly is it that you hope to achieve by being an asshole? Other than making me want to crack said skull against this table.”

“There! You see?” Leona slammed her goblet down, red wine splashing across the polished wood. “See how she threatens me? Unity, my ass .”

“Can you blame her? We all have our limits,” Nox muttered—an uncharacteristic contribution .

Thraigg snorted into his tankard.

“You’re so blinded by your arrogance and bigotry, you can’t even see how you are fighting against your own interests here,” Elyria said, waving her arms animatedly. “Why would the Arbiter be constantly preaching the necessity of unity if it wasn’t, oh, I don’t know, necessary ?”

Leona raised her goblet in a mock-toast. “Well, thank the celestials we have the Revenant here. Our ever-present reminder of the consequences of not sitting down and shutting up like good little humans. Will you slaughter us the way you slaughtered our people during the war?”

Elyria stilled, a sudden calmness overtaking her features that sent a chill down Cedric’s spine. This was about to take a very bad turn.

“For fuck’s sake, that’s enough, Leona!” Cedric slammed his fist on the table. “Stop antagonizing every stars-damned champion that’s left. We’ve all been through it today. We don’t know what’s ahead. Fighting amongst ourselves won’t get any of us closer to the crown.”

“Maybe not. But if it keeps it out of their hands, it’ll still be worth it,” Leona said. “You may have gone soft as shit on these magic-hoarding cretins, but not all of us are so quick to forget our roots, Sir Thorne. ”

With a huff, she turned to face Belien, content enough with having gotten the last word to end the conversation.

Belien, as it turned out, was not.

“Fairy fucker,” he muttered, distinctly not under his breath. “All his morals tossed in the gutter for a soft piece of fae ass.”

In a flash, Cedric was on his feet. He reached for his token before he could stop himself, heat flaring in his chest. He’d teach Belien to watch his words, to think twice before acting this way again. Even if it meant breaking whatever nebulous, unspoken truce the champions had been operating under thus far. He would pay the price, if it meant Belien paid one too.

Turns out, it didn’t matter.

Because before Cedric could activate a single spark of his magic, a tendril of shadow had shot out from Elyria’s outstretched hand and wrapped around Belien’s neck.

Zephyr gasped. Leona screamed.

“What was that you said?” Elyria’s voice was a gilded dagger—beautiful and deadly. “Not sure I heard you correctly. ”

Belien clawed at the shadow with both hands, straining for breath.

Cedric’s stomach turned as he watched Elyria’s magic coil around Belien’s neck. He had heard tales of the power of the Revenant, of course. Spent night after night imagining it, dreaming of what it would be like to face it. To face her. To bleed her power from her, watch the light drain from her eyes, his parents’ deaths avenged.

Seeing her wield it now was everything and nothing like he imagined.

It was so dark. So devastating. So breathtaking.

So similar to the power he had just watched tear his mother into pieces.

“Nightwielder.” Nox’s red-black eyes were locked on Elyria. Their voice was a reverent whisper, barely audible over Leona’s screams and Belien’s labored wheezing.

Kit stared at Elyria too, her mouth agape. Like this was the first time she was truly seeing her friend.

The shadow cinched tighter. Belien’s face started turning purple.

That golden thread in Cedric’s chest propelled him forward until he stood beside Elyria. Her body shook, though whether from the strain of using this dark magic, or from restraining herself from using more of it, he didn’t know.

“Elyria,” he murmured into her ear, his voice low. “That’s enough.”

She didn’t react.

He lifted his hand. Paused. Drew it back. Then, with as gentle a touch as he could manage, he placed two fingers on the side of her chin and turned her face toward him.

Magic sparked where their skin met, sending a shock zipping through Cedric. Elyria too, from the sudden way her arm fell, her shadow dissipating into nothing.

Belien was on the ground, wheezing, gasping, crying as Leona fussed at his side. Cedric barely heard them. Not as emerald eyes bore into his, mere inches apart, his hand still on her face.

“Yes, that is enough,” came the Arbiter’s voice.

Cedric dropped his hand.

And everything stopped.