Just as the omnicat pounced, Ceres felt as if a ball of fire ignited in her chest, and suddenly she felt a ball of energy shoot out of her hand.
Mid-air, the beast suddenly went limp.
It crashed to the ground, skidding to a halt on top of her legs. Half-expecting the animal to come to life again and finish her off, Ceres held her breath as she watched it lie there.
But the creature didn’t move.
Baffled, Ceres glanced at her palm. Not having seen what transpired, the crowd probably thought the beast died because she had stabbed him with her sword earlier. But she knew better. Some mysterious force had left her hand and had killed the beast in an instant. What force was it? Never had anything like this occurred before, and she didn’t quite know what to make of it.
Who was she to have this power?
Afraid, she let her hand fall to the earth.
She lifted hesitant eyes, and saw the stadium had gone silent.
And she could not help but wonder. Had they seen it, too?
CHAPTER TWO
For a second that seemed to stretch on and on, Ceres felt every eye upon her as she sat there, numb with pain and disbelief. More so than the repercussions to come, she feared the supernatural power that lurked within her, that had killed the omnicat. More than all the people surrounding her, she feared to face herself – a self she no longer knew.
Suddenly, the crowd, stunned into silence, roared. It took her a moment to realize that they were cheering for her.
A voice cut through the roars.
“Ceres!” Sartes yelled, beside her. “Are you hurt?”
She turned toward her brother, still lying there on the Stade floor, too, and opened her mouth. But not a single word came out. Her breath was spent and she felt dazed. Had he seen what had really happened? She didn’t know about the others, but at this distance, it would be a near miracle if he hadn’t.
Ceres heard footsteps, and suddenly two strong hands pulled her to a standing position.
“Get out now!” Brennius growled, shoving her toward the open gate to her left.
The puncture wounds in her back ached, but she forced herself back to reality and grabbed Sartes and pulled him to a standing position. Together, they darted toward the exit, trying to escape the cheers of the crowd.
They soon arrived in the dark, stuffy, tunnel, and as they did, Ceres saw dozens of combatlords inside, awaiting their turn for a few moments of glory in the arena. Some sat on benches in deep meditation, others were tensing their muscles, pumping their arms as they paced back and forth, and yet others were preparing their weapons for the imminent bloodbath. All of them, having just witnessed the fight, looked up and stared at her, curiosity in their eyes.
Ceres hurried down underground corridors lined with torches giving the gray bricks a warm glow, passing all manner of weapons leaning against the walls. She tried to ignore the pain in her back, but it was difficult to do so when with every step, the rough material in her dress chafed against the open wounds. The omnicat’s claws had felt like daggers going in, but it almost seemed worse now as each gash throbbed.
“Your back is bleeding,” Sartes said, a tremor in his voice.
“I’ll be fine. We need to find Nesos and Rexus. How is your arm?”
“It hurts.”
When they reached the exit, the door swung open, and two Empire soldiers stood there.
“Sartes!”
Before she could react a soldier seized her brother, and another grabbed her. It was no use resisting. The other soldier swung her over his shoulder as if she were a sack of grain, and carried her away. Fearing she had been arrested, she beat him on the back, to no avail.
Once they were just outside the Stade, he threw her onto the ground, and Sartes landed beside her. A few onlookers formed a half-circle around her, gawking, as if hungry for her blood to be spilt.
“Enter the Stade again,” the soldier snarled, “and you will be hanged.”
The soldiers, to her surprise, turned without another word and vanished back into the crowd.
“Ceres!” a deep voice yelled over the hum of the crowd.
Ceres looked up with relief to see Nesos and Rexus heading toward them. When Rexus threw his arms around her, she gasped. He pulled back, his eyes filled with concern.
“I’ll be okay,” she said.
As the throngs poured out of the Stade, Ceres and the others blended in and hurried off back into the streets, not wanting any more encounters. Walking toward Fountain Square, Ceres replayed in her mind all that had happened, still reeling. She noticed her brothers’ sideways glances, and wondered what they were thinking. Had they witnessed her powers? Likely not. The omnicat had been too close. Yet at the same time they glanced at her with a new sense of respect. She wanted more than anything to tell them what had happened. Yet she knew she could not. She was not even sure herself.
There was so much unsaid between them, yet now, amidst this thick crowd, was not the time to say it. They needed to get home, and safe, first.
The streets became far less crowded the further away they traveled from the Stade. Walking next to her, Rexus took one of her hands and interlaced fingers with her.
“I’m proud of you,” he said. “You saved your brother’s life. I’m not sure how many sisters would do that.”
He smiled, his eyes filled with compassion.
“Those wounds look deep,” he remarked, glancing at her back.
“I’ll be fine,” she muttered.
It was a lie. She wasn’t at all certain she would be fine, or that she could even make it back home. She felt quite dizzy from the blood loss, and it didn’t help that her stomach rumbled, or that the sun was harassing her back, causing her to sweat bullets.
Finally, they reached Fountain Square. As soon as they walked by the booths, a merchant trailed after them, offering a large basket of food for half price.
Sartes grinned from ear to ear – which she thought was rather strange – and then he held up a copper coin with his healthy arm.
“I think I owe you some food,” he said.
Ceres gasped in shock. “Where did you get that?”
“That rich girl in the golden carriage tossed out two coins, not one, but everyone was so focused on the fight between the men that they didn’t even notice,” Sartes replied, his smile still very much intact.
Ceres grew angry and prepared to confiscate the coin from Sartes and throw it. That was blood money, after all. They didn’t need anything from rich people.
As she reached to grab it, suddenly, an old woman appeared and blocked her path.
“You!” she said, pointing at Ceres, her voice so loud Ceres felt as if it vibrated straight through her.
The woman’s complexion was smooth, yet seemingly transparent, and her perfectly arched lips were tinted green. Acorns and mosses adorned her long, thick, black hair, and her brown eyes matched her long brown dress. She was beautiful to behold, Ceres thought, so much so that she became mesmerized for a moment.
Ceres blinked back, stunned, certain she had never met this woman before.
“How do you know my name?”
Her eyes locked with the woman’s as she took a few steps toward her, and Ceres noticed the woman smelled heavily of myrrh.
“Vein of the stars,” she said, her voice eerie.
When the woman lifted her arm in a graceful gesture, Ceres saw that a triquetra was branded on the inside of her wrist. A witch. Based on the scent of the gods, perhaps a fortune-telling one.
The woman took Ceres’s rose gold hair in her hand and smelled it.
“You are no stranger to the sword,” she said. “You are no stranger to the throne. Your destiny is very great, indeed. Mighty will the change be.”
The woman suddenly turned and hurried away, disappearing behind her booth, and Ceres stood there, numb. She felt the woman’s words penetrate her very soul. She felt that they had been more than an observation; they were a prophecy. Mighty. Change. Throne. Destiny. These were words she had never associated with herself before.