I kneel too. I reach out with slender hands to touch Enzo’s cheeks. Enzo lifts his head weakly to look at me, and suddenly, I can no longer hold back. I pull Enzo toward me, then touch my lips gently to his.
A second. No more than that.
The kiss ends. Enzo searches my gaze. Somehow, he sees straight through the illusion.
“Adelina?” he whispers.
And that is all it takes to undo me. Raffaele’s face disintegrates into my own, revealing silver and scars. My shoulders hunch in abrupt exhaustion. It feels like all the energy in my body has been sucked away, leaving nothing but the strange, otherworldly threads that now bind me to my prince. I’m exposed before the entire arena, and I don’t care at all.
“It’s me,” I whisper back.
They waged war for decades, never realizing that they were fighting for the same cause.
—Campaigns of East and West Tamoura, 1152–1180, by Scholar Tennan
Adelina Amouteru
The Beldish queen reacts first. She has never met me before, but somehow, she knows who I am.
“White Wolf,” she says. She tries to get up, but she’s still too weak from using so much of her power. She spits out a curse, then glances at the young man standing beside her. Her brother.
“Tristan!” she shouts.
The boy turns to me. I can sense the dark energy building in him, something far more terrifying than anything I have ever felt within me. My darkness is a blanket that shrouds the patches of light in my heart. But this boy—his darkness is his heart. There is no light anywhere.
His eyes turn black. He bares his teeth and rushes at me.
The speed at which he moves is dizzying. One moment he stood a dozen feet away—the next, he has reached me and holds a flashing blade over his head. I’m going to die. No one will be able to rescue me in time. I glance at Enzo, but Enzo has hunched over on the ground, barely conscious.
Tristan slashes at me. The blade cuts deep into my shoulder. I shriek—pain blossoms in me and I stagger back. My illusions ache to lash back. But I am so weak, drained from my disguise as Raffaele, that all I can do is throw a thin black veil at him. It vanishes into smoke.
“Enzo!” I reach for him. He stays crumpled in a heap on the platform.
Tristan reaches me. His hands close around my neck. I fall backward and hit my head hard on the platform. Stars burst across my vision. He’s choking me, pushing down hard with blind, blank rage.
The only thing that saves my life is Maeve. As I struggle, Maeve’s voice reaches my ears. “Do not kill her!” she shouts. There is a frantic note in her words, and in a flash, I realize why.
If they kill me, Enzo’s only link to the living world, then Enzo will return to the Underworld.
Tristan stops immediately at Maeve’s call. Instead, he whirls, his attention shifting to where Enzo lies. The sudden realization that my life isn’t in danger hits me. My advantage. As Tristan turns to pick up Enzo, I stagger to my feet, clutching my bleeding shoulder, and flee off the stone path.
I’m only halfway when a blast of wind hits me hard, then lifts me high into the sky. I struggle in vain. The Windwalker’s work. The world around me spins—I think I see flashes of dark robes among the arena’s seats, the Daggers moving against me and heading down to where Enzo and Maeve are. Where are my Roses? My mouth opens in a scream as the wind suddenly cuts off, sending me plummeting down toward the arena’s rows.
A new current of wind stops me several feet from the stone seats. It flings me to one side, leaving me to tumble along the stairs. I stop there, breathing hard. As my vision clears, I see a Dagger approaching me, her curls tied back high on her head, her face hidden behind a silver mask that sends a ribbon of fear slicing through me. The only part of her face I can see are her eyes, flashing in fury at me. Lucent.
“You,” she snarls. “What have you done with Raffaele?”
I can’t think. Visions flash before me—I’m not sure if they are real or if they are illusions. Memories of Enzo kissing me in the rain shift into an image of him with his black eyes, staring through me as if searching for his soul. I tremble like a leaf in the wind. He recognized me through my illusion. How did I give myself away? How did he know?
Another figure hops nimbly down by my side. He puts a protective arm out in front of me. It’s Magiano.
He flashes his savage smile at Lucent. “Sorry for that rough landing,” he says, tilting his head close to me. “But I have a prince to steal for you.” Then he braces himself and hits Lucent with a blast of wind.
Lucent’s eyes open in surprise, but she manages to catch herself in time. She leaps backward, then rides a current of her own wind to the bottom of the steps. She prepares to attack us—but Violetta stands up from where she’s crouching nearby. My sister narrows her eyes.
Lucent gasps. She steadies herself, then blinks in confusion. She tries to pull together a curtain of wind, but nothing happens. Fear sparks in her, and I reach hungrily for those threads. They shimmer in a halo around her.
Magiano laughs a little. A dagger gleams in his hand. “Why so surprised?” he taunts. He lifts a hand down toward the arena, where Enzo is still kneeling on the platform, and calls the wind to pick him up. Then he lunges at Lucent with the blade drawn.
I scramble to my feet. Just standing up feels like an overwhelming task. My head spins, and cold sweat covers my forehead. Below, Enzo lifts onto the wind, and I feel the bond between us move with him. It pulls at the insides of my stomach, making me simultaneously nauseated and excited. What does our new connection do?
Lucent pulls two short swords from her belt. She crosses them as Magiano hits her, and the clash rings out over the storm.