“How did you do it, Marcus?” Auctor Ralvese spoke, but Marcus barely listened. The two were standing on the unshaded part of the balcony of the Speaker’s Box. “Last night they rioted over her, this morning they despised her, and now you’ve gotten the whole crowd to love her again!

  It’s really quite brilliant, what you’ve done here: the beautiful and innocent orphan transformed from a peace-loving monk, into the blood-thirsty vorago champion we see before our eyes!”

  “You needed something, Ralvese?” Marcus asked.

  “Oh, yes. Your father said we could resume the program as we normally would once she was dead by the end of the first round.”

  “Yes?” Marcus tried to listen to Ralvese without getting angry.

  “Well…she’s not dead,” said Ralvese. “So, what do we do? Normally, Remus would have spent the rest of the morning shooting everything that moved.”

  “Are you really asking me this?” Marcus was about to tell Ralvese that he needed to find a way to end the tournament when an unmistakable earthquake shook the vorago stadium and the castle. “What the devil was that?” He peered over the balcony handrail to the people who were still celebrating in the stands.

  “It felt like a ground quake.” Ralvese said as the shaking subsided.

  Marcus looked to the castle spire where his father resided. He saw flashes from the windows around the top of his tower’s rook beneath its rounded red rooftop.

  Marcus grabbed Ralvese’s shoulders and physically moved him so that he could climb the steps and jog into the vorago corridor. Marcus didn’t care for his father, but he didn’t want him to get assassinated on his own for whatever reason.

  That would mean that Marcus was next, so he continued through the passage beneath the vorago to the corridor leading to the castle. He watched his back constantly.

  A trio of guards were hurrying through the passage to the castle. Marcus joined them. “To the Chancellor’s tower! I saw activity.”

  “Are you okay, prince?” The guards formed around him.

  “Yes, but we need to make sure my father isn’t in trouble.”

  “What was that shaking?” another guard asked.

  “We’re going to find out. Be ready for a fight.” Marcus reached for his hip and realized that he hadn’t thought to bring his sword from the box. He had been too focused on getting to Susi. His heart dove at the out of place thought of her.

  The four men entered the castle, hurried up the stairs, and marched across the St. Alton Bridge to the east tower. They followed corridors and climbed stairways through the building with practiced memory, eventually entering the chancellor’s tower to ascend the spiral steps to his sanctum.

  Marcus and his men reached the top of the stairwell, only to find Chancellor Marks standing across from a tall man with long, curly red hair in a fine red jacket who he knew to be Senator Selatravis. He stood next to a young woman with similar red hair who was clearly his sibling.

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  She wore sleek, black leather armor beneath her expensive pink cloak. The girl had a pair of daggers drawn, but she put them away at the sight of Marcus and the guards.

  “Is everything all right, father?” Marcus asked.

  “Yes,” said Damius Marks, his eyes never leaving Selatravis’s. “The senator and his sister were just leaving.”

  “That’s Seladia the outlaw,” one of the guards pointed at her. “She’s wanted for dozens of crimes.”

  “Let the senator and his sister leave.” Marks drawled. He went over to his dusty ledger in the corner, withdrew a piece of parchment, and quickly scrawled a letter of exemption, stamped it, and turned to two siblings.

  “They have full clearance to leave the city as swiftly as possible. I believe you two have a boat to catch.” Chancellor Marks folded the parchment and gave it to Selatravis.

  Seladia and Selatravis exchanged an uncomfortable look. Selatravis sighed. “Thank you, Chancellor.”

  “This isn’t over.” Seladia said, glaring at him.

  “Oh, silly girl: if I wanted it to be over you’d both be ash in the wind right now.” Marks scoffed and turned to the orb that sat blankly upon its perch within its stone circular apparatus.

  Seladia opened her mouth to retort, but Selatravis hissed at her. He waved to get her attention off of Marks, shook his head, and then motioned for her to follow him. The two descended the stairwell and disappeared from sight.

  “What on Aallandranon was that?” Marcus asked.

  “Your father taking care of necessary, but unfortunate business.” Marks closed the orb’s housing with the slide of the external panel connected to the apparatus. “You came, thinking I was in trouble. I appreciate the sentiment, Marcus, but I’m a big boy and I can handle myself.”

  “I saw activity, and there was an earthquake. It’s my duty to make sure you’re safe.” Marcus said.

  “Yes, an earthquake,” said Marks. “We’ll let everyone believe that’s what it was. Come, Marcus. We need to make sure that dullard, Ralvese, has a good show to put on for the next round of the vorago.”

  The group was about to make for the stairs when they heard hurried footfalls upon the steps. Thayer, Damius Marks’s apprentice, appeared at the top of the stairs. “I sensed trouble.” He panted.

  “A few inconveniences, but nothing I can’t handle. Honestly, I didn’t expect everyone to come running on my behalf.” Chancellor Marks spoke.

  “The whole castle shook.” Thayer said.

  “Yes, it was just a minor quake” said Marks. “But I’m glad you’re here, Thayer. I have a task that calls for your particular expertise. I’ll meet you back in the stadium later, Marcus.” Chancellor Marks waved Marcus away.

  Marcus glanced at the stony expressions of the guards around him, shrugged, and dismissed them. They descended the stairs and left the chancellor’s tower.

  Marcus parted from the guards and exited a side entrance to the streets to see if he could find Susi’s clothes with Sived. He knew the soldiers guarding her would be of no help.

  He returned to the clothier’s shop. Sived had already placed her clothes neatly folded and stacked on the counter for them to retrieve when they returned.

  “She is a special person, that girl.” Sived said. “She had to leave in such a hurry, but I knew she would need these again.”

  “Yes,” said Marcus as he took Susi’s clothes. Just seeing them and knowing they were hers sent his heart nose diving for the second time since he last saw her. “‘A special person’ doesn’t begin to describe such a unique individual as Susi.”

  Sived reached over the counter and grabbed Marcus’s arm before he could leave. Marcus looked at his hand, then met Sived’s gray-blue eyes. “Don’t let them kill her, Marcus.”

  “I’ll do everything in my power, but she’s already in. I can’t stop a falling rock that’s already in motion.”

  “Unless it’s worth dying to stop.” Sived released Marcus’s arm.

  Marcus dropped his eyes to the floor, narrowing his brows. He glanced up to meet Sived’s eyes one more time, nodded, and left the clothier’s shop to enter the city streets.