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I'm standing in the middle of an actual dueling arena. Stone floor. Enchanted barriers humming around the edges. Three hundred students packed into the stands, whispering like I'm about to explode.
Maybe I am.
Rena's up there somewhere, probably taking bets on how fast I die. Cassandra's in the instructor section, arms crossed, face carved from ice. She signed me into this thing yesterday. Didn't ask. Didn't explain. Just shoved the parchment across her desk and said, "You'll compete. You'll win. Or you'll prove me wrong."
I should've run.
My opponent walks out from the opposite archway. She's tall, blonde, probably seventeen. Her robes are pristine. Her wand's already in her hand. She looks at me like I'm a stain on her morning.
"Alex Morris," the announcer calls. His voice echoes off the stone. "Facing Elara Thornwick, second-year dueling champion."
Oh good. A champion. That's just great.
Elara raises her wand. The crowd goes quiet.
I don't have a wand. I don't have a spell. I've got my ER instincts and about six hours of sleep in the last three days.
The bell rings.
Elara moves first. Her wand slashes through the air and a bolt of white light screams toward me. I throw myself sideways, hit the stone hard, roll. The spell cracks into the barrier behind me and the whole arena shudders.
Holy shit.
She's not playing.
I scramble to my feet. She's already casting again. This time it's three bolts, staggered, cutting off my angles. I duck under the first, dodge the second. The third clips my shoulder and pain explodes down my arm like someone stuck a live wire in my muscle.
I bite down on a scream.
The crowd's eating it up. I can hear them cheering. Someone yells, "She can't even block!"
They're right. I can't.
Elara's circling now, wand raised, confident. She thinks this is over. Maybe it is. I back up toward the edge of the barrier, trying to buy time, trying to think.
Then I feel it.
That cold weight in my chest. The thing that woke up two nights ago when Cassandra was dying in front of me. It stirs. Uncoils.
No. Not now.
Elara casts again. A bigger spell this time, something that hums like a chainsaw. It comes at me in a spiral of silver light and I know if it hits me I'm done.
The cold thing in my chest surges.
I don't cast. I don't move. I just reach out with something that isn't my hand and the spell stops. Mid-air. Three feet from my face.
The arena goes silent.
Elara's eyes go wide. Her wand drops an inch.
I don't know what I'm doing. The spell's just hanging there, frozen, buzzing like a trapped wasp. I can feel it. Cold. Heavy. Wrong.
Then it snaps back.
Elara doesn't have time to scream. The spell slams into her chest and she goes down hard, hits the stone, skids. She doesn't get up.
Oh god.
I run. Don't think. Just move. I'm on my knees next to her before the referees even react. Her eyes are half-open. She's not breathing.
No no no.
"Get back," someone shouts. I ignore them.
I rip open her robe. Find her sternum. Start compressions. Thirty beats. Hard and fast. Her ribs flex under my palms. Come on.
"She's using dark magic—"
"Stop her—"
I don't stop. I tilt her head back, check her airway, give two breaths. Her chest rises. Good. Back to compressions.
"Alex, step away from the student." Cassandra's voice. Cold. Sharp.
I don't look up. "She's in V-fib. Shut up."
Thirty more. Two breaths. I'm counting in my head, same rhythm I've used a hundred times in the ER. Her color's bad. Lips going blue. Come on, kid.
Then she gasps.
Her eyes snap open. She coughs, rolls onto her side, retches. I sit back on my heels, hands shaking.
She's alive.
The arena's dead quiet.
I look up. Every single person is staring at me. Not at Elara. At me.
Cassandra's at the barrier edge now. Her face is unreadable.
One of the referees steps forward. Older guy, silver beard, robes covered in medals. "The match goes to Alex Morris. By... incapacitation."
The crowd doesn't cheer. They just whisper. It spreads like fire through dry grass.
"She stopped the spell."
"Did you see her eyes?"
"That's not normal magic."
Elara's being helped up by two medics. She's shaking. She looks at me once, and I see it in her face. Not anger. Fear.
I saved her. And she's terrified of me.
Great.
I get to my feet. My shoulder's still screaming where her spell clipped me. The cold thing in my chest has settled again, coiled up tight, waiting.
Cassandra's already gone from the instructor section. I don't see where.
Rena appears at the arena gate as I walk off. She looks pale. "That was..."
"Fucked up," I finish.
"Yeah." She hands me a water bottle. I drain half of it. "You didn't tell me you could do that."
"I can't."
"Alex, you literally stopped a kinetic hex in mid-air and sent it back. That's not beginner magic. That's not any magic I've ever seen."
I don't have an answer. I don't know what it was. All I know is every time I use it, I feel less like me and more like something else.
We're halfway back to the dorm when someone calls my name.
"Alex."
I turn.
Vivienne.
She's standing in the corridor, sunlight from the high windows catching her hair. She's wearing her senior robes, deep green, perfectly tailored. She looks worried.
"Are you all right?" she asks.
I shrug. "Still breathing."
"That's not what I meant." She steps closer. Her voice drops. "What you did in there. That wasn't standard dueling magic."
"I noticed."
"You need help." She glances at Rena, then back to me. "I can teach you. Control. Theory. Enough to survive the next match."
"Why?"
She blinks. "Why?"
"Yeah. Why do you care?"
She's quiet for a moment. Then she smiles. It's soft. Almost sad. "Because you shouldn't have to go through this alone."
Something in my chest twists. Not the cold thing. Something else. Warmer. More dangerous.
"Okay," I hear myself say. "When?"
"Tonight. Library, third floor, west wing. After curfew."
Rena raises an eyebrow but doesn't say anything.
Vivienne starts to leave, then pauses. She looks back at me, and her expression shifts. Harder. Serious.
"Alex," she says quietly. "Don't trust Cassandra."
My stomach drops. "What?"
But she's already walking away, her footsteps echoing down the corridor.
Rena whistles low. "Well. That's not ominous."
I stare after Vivienne until she turns the corner and disappears.
Don't trust Cassandra.
Cassandra, who forced me into this tournament. Cassandra, who looked at me like I was a bomb waiting to go off. Cassandra, whose heartbeat I felt under my hands two nights ago, fragile and human and terrified.
What the hell is going on in this place?
And why do I get the feeling that winning is the worst thing I could've done?