Page 169 of Unrivaled
I ignored the looks sent our way.“Did he sober up okay?”I asked to settle people’s interest.Pretending Luca had enjoyed a late night with Audrey’s knappchs and some paid company had been the simplest option while we got him to a fit state to hasten him out of the city.But Luca hadn’t been drunk.
Hehadbeen out of his head, though.Never had I seen a grown man cry like that.The way he’d rocked, snot streaming down his face, arms around his chest, barely even noticing the blisters on his nose and around his mouth from the death he’d narrowly avoided…
Wild horses, it had been a big morning.
“Sleeping it off,” Callum told me.“Got someone with him to make sure he gets plenty of water when he wakes.”
“You’re too kind, Cal.”
“I’m glad you scraped him off the cobblestones,” Callum said, clapping me on the shoulder.“Your form looks good, friend.Damned good.Didn’t get these muscles by turning yourself into a packhorse, I see.”
“Comes with the job.”
What did Luca think came with his?
Would he step down, now?
Might Kadan be forced into his place?
I blew out a long breath.Kadan and Audrey made a lot more sense than Luca and Audrey.But my friend would never take up the crown.
I had no idea how Luca had believed so deeply he was harming Audrey irreparably by not marrying her after fucking her.But he’d come around.Apparently even the thickest skulls had some give.
Callum slapped me on the back again as my name was called.I settled the helm back on my head and climbed up onto the field, focused on my task.
Break, assess, avoid, block and feint, assess, avoid.Strike.
I threw the shield over my back in an easy move I hadn’t even noticed I’d picked up until I reflected back on last year.
She wasn’t coming down almost to the field itself to keep my neck whole.This year, nothing was at stake.I didn’t care if I won, lost, or drew.Not with the reek of Luca’s burning flesh in my head and my lady like a beacon in the stands.
I slipped back into the shade in the dugouts, knowing I’d have a few moments between rounds.A knight from west of the Aza Ranges was standing near the water talking to a Ltonan.The Ltonan saw me coming and said to his companion, “You think your king would have her?She’ll be old once he can use his cock.”
The knight’s neck went a mottled red, as if he thought I’d have him shitting his own teeth for suggesting Audrey might be drawing royal attention.
We all knew she would be.She hadn’t directly addressed it, but there was no question she wastryingto make them see her, and not just as the duchess-in-waiting, but as a force of her own.
They didn’t knowwhy.
“Less than ten years,” the knight mumbled.“She isn’t so old.”
She wasn’t.I drank the water, though it threatened to choke me.If the king’s men came for her, if they tried to wed her to the child-king…
That’d be the smartest thing they could do.Marry her into power, and let her run with it.
They wouldn’t, though.They’d harness her to a broken-down cart and make her drag it.They’d whip her for speed, and they’d overload the cart, and they’d toss her to the dogs once she faltered.
“You’re up,” someone said, with the air of one who’d repeated themselves a few times.
I’d lost my helm.A hand offered it to me.No one was smiling, now, especially not the knight sweating before me.
Damned if I was letting her get roped into being a packhorse for the locways.
They roared when I came out.It wasn’t for me, though.It was for her.
“Chay the champion!”someone bellowed.
I set my teeth.I’d be her champion ’til my heart no longer beat, but they didn’t know what that meant.Not protector, but mentor.Not bulwark, but ally.
