“Geoxus asked you to escort the victor of the match back to her people?” Madoc scratched his chin, feeling the rough stubble beneath his fingertips.
“Better than her own god, that’s for certain.” The nearest guard laughed nervously. “You won’t see Geoxus burn up his own fighter, I know that much.”
Ignitushad killed her opponent? Madoc met Ash’s gaze again, and now that oily slickness of her pain was pressing through his pores, weighing heavy in his blood. She blinked rapidly, but it didn’t stop the tears. They rolled down her cheeks, carving new tracks in the dust on her skin.
Ash twisted, breaking free. She lunged toward the arena. In a flash, the centurion had snatched a stone from the ground with geoeia and was swinging it toward the back of her head.
“Stop.” Madoc’s voice echoed in the tunnel. Outside, the shouts of the crowds, already demanding the next match, dropped away.
The centurion lowered the stone.
“Leave her.” Lightning raced through Madoc’s limbs. “I’ll make sure she gets back to her people.”
The soldiers both lowered their spears.
“She’s calm now,” said the closest one. “He’ll take it from here.”
Madoc could hardly believe the change that had fallen over them.
“You should go now,” he said.
The second centurion nodded. “We need to leave.”
They departed without another word.
A strange curiosity had him frowning after them. Talking to those guards had felt easy, more so than it should have. They were centurions, and even if he was a gladiator, he should have been more cautious. But they’d listened to him as though he was the captain of the legion.
He had bigger concerns. He was within striking distance of a Kulan gladiator. An enemy of Deimos. A woman he’d bested less than a day before.
Maybe sending the centurions away hadn’t been such a great idea after all.
But she didn’t attack. Instead, she slumped against the wall, blowing out a shaky breath.
“Are you all right?”
Her chin lifted, dark eyes a sickle of gold and brown in the dimlight that came through the front entrance. Madoc deliberately relaxed his arms and hands, hoping she didn’t see too much, and focused elsewhere. Her wild spirals of black hair that had broken free from their binding. The thin cloth wrap around her chest that she wore beneath her armor. The slope of her waist, and the small indentation of her navel.
His gaze shot back to her face, and he swallowed dryly.
“I’m sure your people are waiting at the eastern exit. There’s a tunnel that runs beneath the stands. It should take you there.”
He motioned to the corridor near the arena exit, a cave with a low, arched ceiling. Phosphorescent stones flickered around the bend, bringing a sharp, guilt-coated relief. There were no flames to draw from here. If there were, those guards would be dead. Maybe he would be too.
She pushed off the wall and took an unsteady step toward him, her sandaled feet crunching over the gravel. Her eyes remained on his.
He tried to read her intent, but all he could feel was her wary curiosity, a heavy mantle over his shoulders, and the bitterness of her pain in the back of his jaw.
Her chin lowered slightly—an invitation? She couldn’t have meant for him to go with her.
Unless she planned to kill him and cut out her competition. Or maybe she didn’t trust that it was safe. She thought it was an ambush of some kind—that he’d orchestrated the centurions to leave so that she could disappear without witnesses.
He stepped into the hallway, telling himself he was doing what any respectable Deiman citizen would do. It was better thanacknowledging the small spark of curiosity that lit inside him.
She hesitated. “I don’t know what you’re trying to do, Deiman. But it would be unwise for you to corner me alone. I told you before, you won’t beat me again.”
“I know,” he said, giving a small and, he hoped, encouraging smile. “I just want to help you get back to your people.”
“Why?”
