Fates Defiant Excerpt

Graffiti with my name?

It wasn’t a new occurrence, but certainly the first in a while. Which meant that Octavian’s plan to bring in spectators and revenue was working.

The thought should have settled my nerves—public opinion was everything, after all—but instead something sank in my stomach as we entered the Arena gates. It might have been exhaustion, but it wouldn’t go away—not as I left the others and shut the door of my quarters, not through washing the incense smell from my skin and hair, and not as I wandered onto the lattice-enclosed balcony that adjoined my quarters.

The Arena was never quiet. There were always the sounds of fights, shouts of workers, and roars from the beasts housed in the lower levels. Add to that the rumble of carts, hiss of metal being tempered, and thumps of training, and you ended with a place that sounded like the constant hum of blood in my ears. Most of the time, I didn’t mind. It was easier to stay in the very center of the noise, creating it myself if necessary, than it was to face the gaping silence that waited when no else was present.

And reminders like this week of how alone I really was didn’t help.

Stone scraped my skin as I slipped through a gap in the lattice to stand on the narrow ledge beyond my quarters. The architects of old had constructed the Arena with multiple decorative facings, fashioned in such a way that someone determined could climb them with ease. I grabbed for a handhold and scaled to the top of the Arena, muscles burning and the risk of falling spurring me on. It wasn’t until I was sitting with my feet dangling precipitously over the edge of the roof that the urgency fell away and bone-numbing exhaustion crept in.

Graffiti with my name. I rubbed a hand through my hair, the dampness from washing it clinging to my skin the same way as the sweat from today’s fight had. No doubt there are also stories, songs, people talking about me in every forum.

“It’s working,” I told myself. The thought of the public talking about my successes would ordinarily have cheered me up. Tonight, the thought brought nothing but uncertainty. “There’s nothing to worry about. It’s working.”

Until it doesn’t, and then what?

The thought lanced through my skin faster than any monster’s claws. This evening wasn’t the first time I’d seen my name splashed across a building, and stories about me—most wildly exaggerated, others eerily close to the truth—had circulated ever since I’d gained public attention at age nineteen. I’d used my sword blade to reflect light into my opponent’s face, and the tale of a fighter who wielded the power of the sun had spread like wildfire. Over time, my name became intrinsically linked with the sun itself.

Golden. Powerful. Glorious and beautiful.

Unfailing.

“I won. This time.” The healing gashes across my arm burned as I buried my head in my hands. “What if I can’t keep this up?”

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