Then, she began to play. Her fingers moved across the strings in a blur, creating a beautiful, haunting tune that entranced me where I stood. Wisps of sparkly yellow magic floated out from her hands and danced around the strings. I felt the music calming every cell of my body, and all I wanted was to relax and listen.
When she sang, her voice was clear and perfect, like an angel.
Octavia looked momentarily entranced, too. But she blinked and got ahold of herself, raising her hands and focusing on the fountain ahead.
A second later, spouts of water burst forth from the fountain, dancing to the melody. It reminded me of clips from movies I’d seen of the Bellagio fountains in Las Vegas. Octavia’s hands moved like she was conducting a symphony, and the water followed her commands, dancing in time with the music.
As the song continued, I looked over to Julian. Much to my surprise, his eyes found mine, too. I instantly became aware of every little thing going on in my body—my skin prickling, my breaths deepening, and my heart racing. As crazy as it sounded, I could have sworn his soul was synced with mine.
As the song ended, the water flew up so high that it misted down upon my face.
I pulled my eyes away from Julian’s, embarrassed about staring at him for so long. Luckily, everyone seemed too mesmerized by the music to have noticed.
Antonia plucked the final note, and silence descended upon the crowd. I felt like I’d been floating in a dream while listening, and had just now been returned to reality.
The crowd clapped, and I clapped, too, along with all the other chosen champions. I peeked at Julian, but he was focused on Octavia, as if that strange connection between us hadn’t happened at all.
But while Julian was no longer looking at me, someone else was. Felix—the one with movie star looks who had been chosen by Venus. His gaze was intense, like he was trying to figure me out. But when my eyes met his, he just gave me a charming smile before turning his focus back to Octavia and Antonia.
I pushed away the uneasy feeling I had from being scrutinized by him, also turning my attention back to the two chosen champions still standing next to Bacchus.
Their performances were just as Bryan had told me they’d be. Impressive, but not dangerous. Because now wasn’t the time to show how useful our magic could be in a fight. Then we’d look like a threat, and that would make us an early target in the Games.
These performances required a delicate balance to appear not threatening but still in control.
“Thank you, ladies,” Bacchus said, his strong voice silencing the cheering crowd. Unlike faeries, the rule about owing a favor by saying thank you didn’t apply to gods. “Now, return to your chariots. You’ll watch the others demonstrate their magic, as they just watched you. And then, once all eleven of you are done showing us what you can do, you’ll enter Vesta’s Villa and will start getting to know each other.”
The last line he spoke had a sinister undertone to it. Because I—and everyone else in the crowd—knew what he meant by “getting to know each other.”
It would be time for us to start sizing each other up and forming alliances.
34
Selena
One by one, the chosen champions stepped up next to Bacchus and demonstrated his or her magic.
Molly, the chosen champion of Diana, held out her arms and looked to the sky. Hawks flew down to perch on her arms. So many came down that she was covered in them, from her head all the way to her feet. But suddenly, she was gone, and all the hawks but one flew off, forming the symbol of antlers in the air as they disappeared into the horizon.
Antlers were Diana’s symbol. The goddess of animals and the hunt. Her chosen champions could communicate telepathically with animals, as Molly had just demonstrated.
The remaining hawk landed on the ground and shimmered, leaving Molly standing in its place.
Diana’s chosen champion could also shift into any animal he or she had ever touched since receiving her magic.
Felix walked up to the first row of the crowd and drove three fae women to such pleasure that they passed out, just from his touch. He looked ridiculously arrogant and full of himself the entire time, as would be expected from the chosen champion of Venus.
Julian pulled three longswords out of thin air and had Bacchus light them aflame. Then he juggled them, throwing them higher than the roof of the villa.
My heart raced, afraid that one of the swords would come down the wrong way and kill him in an instant.
But Julian was chosen by Mars, the god of war. So of course the swords didn’t fall. He even added a fourth sword into the mix, and then a fifth, until he was juggling five flaming swords with no difficulty at all.
The crowd held a collective breath, as if worried he might make a mistake at any moment.
He didn’t.
Once done, he shoved the tips of all five swords into the ground at his feet. The flames snuffed out and the swords disappeared, steel gray magic exploding up like smoke into the sky.
The crowd burst into applause, hooting and hollering for Julian like crazy.
Cassia, the chosen champion of Ceres, made the buds along the vines surrounding the villa burst into full bloom. Vesta’s Villa had been impressive before, but thanks to Cassia, it was a colorful bouquet of beauty.
Ceres was the goddess of agriculture and fertility, and her chosen champions had power over the element of earth, as Cassia had just demonstrated.
The crowd clapped for her, although not nearly as loudly as they had for Julian.
Eventually, all ten of the others had taken their turns and shown off their magic. It was all lighthearted and fun, like we were auditioning for a circus instead of entering a game where we’d connive against each other and fight to the death.
Finally, Bacchus turned to me, a curious glint dancing in his dark, mischievous eyes. “Selena Pearce, chosen champion of Jupiter,” he said, nail-biting silence descending upon the crowd as his spoke my patron god’s name. “It’s only appropriate that we leave the most intriguing player of this year’s Games for last.” He grinned at me, and while I smiled politely back, I inwardly groaned at how he was bringing extra attention to me. “Come stand by me and give a demonstration of your magic!”
The crowd erupted into applause as I stepped off the chariot and walked toward Bacchus. They clapped for me louder than they’d clapped for any other chosen champion.
I’d expected as much, because Bryan and Finn had prepared me for this. As Jupiter’s first ever chosen champion, I was bound to get more attention than the other players.
Which made it extra important for me to not let my magic look threatening.
Remembering my training, I positioned my hair artfully over my shoulders and smiled wide, like I was being presented at a beauty pageant.
Bacchus grinned at me like I was a piece of raw meat about to be thrown into a ring of starving lions.
“Bacchus,” I said, bowing my head respectfully. “May I please have a bowl of fruit?”
“A bowl of fruit.” He chuckled. “What would the chosen champion of Jupiter need with a bowl of fruit?”
“Provide it for me and I’ll show you.” I kept my gaze on his, refusing to let his reaction throw me off my game.
“Very well.” He waved his hand in the air, there was a flash of light, and a giant bowl of fruit appeared beside him on a pedestal. “Show us what you can do.” His smile turned sinister, as if he didn’t think I could do much with it at all.
But being mediocre was exactly my plan.
I picked up the fruit on top—a bunch of grapes—and held it up in the air. The strappy dress I wore left my arms bare, so when I called forth my magic and felt it buzz and crackle within me, my arm holding onto the grapes glowed with the lightning that sparked through my veins.
The golden orbs flew a few feet away and recorded my every move, broadcasting my glowing arm on the screens so the entire audience could see.
I released my magic into the grapes, and t
he entire bunch of them turned to ash in my hands. I let the ash fall around me like snow, purposefully leaving bits of it in my hair and on my dress for dramatic effect.
The crowd clapped politely, as they had for some of the other chosen champions with underwhelming performances. It was just what I was going for.
But at the same time, the disappointment on their faces made my heart drop. It was similar to how my teachers at Avalon Academy had always looked at me whenever I’d tried and failed to produce magic. Like they’d expected more from me, and I’d let them down.
I hated that feeling.
Because I wanted to be more than the powerless girl who couldn’t defend herself. And now that Jupiter had gifted me with his magic, I could finally show them all that I was more than a disappointment. I could be strong. I could be powerful.
I could be everything I’d always wanted to be.
Lightning crackled stronger through my veins, bubbling to my skin and glowing brighter as it begged to be released. Anger stormed within me so intensely that I felt powerful enough to make bolts strike down from the sky. I wanted to try to do that, just to see if I could.
But I was supposed to be disintegrating fruit.
So once the claps quieted, I took a deep breath to calm down my magic and reached for the next piece of fruit in the basket—an apple. I held the apple up in the air and did the same thing with it as I had to the bunch of grapes, allowing the ashes of the fruit to collect in my hair and around my feet.
The crowd clapped again, although they sounded less enthused than they had with the grapes. I ignored the murmurs of discontent the best I could and continued using my magic to disintegrate each piece of fruit in the basket.
Finally, I reached the final and largest fruit in there. A watermelon. It was a huge watermelon—probably around the same size as a god’s head—so I had to raise it with both hands over my head.
When I looked out to the crowd again, they looked bored. A few of them even yawned and talked amongst themselves, loudly. It was like they wanted me to know that I wasn’t interesting enough to deserve their attention for less than five minutes.
The watermelon disintegrated in my hands before I realized I’d let my magic loose.
The ash drifted like snow around me, and all was silent for a few precious seconds.
“That’s it?” a large, red-winged fae man finally said from the side of the front row. “Jupiter’s champion is disintegrating fruit?”
“So disappointing,” another fae agreed.
With that, the floodgates opened, and more and more fae voiced their discontent.
“I expected more than that.”
“We wanted lightning!”
“She doesn’t stand a chance in the Games. She’ll be killed off the first week.”
“She’s useless.”
“Better off dead.”
“I thought Jupiter’s chosen champion would be special. Guess I was wrong.”
Their voices erupted around me until I couldn’t distinguish one from the other anymore. And the voices weren’t the only things spinning around me.
The golden orbs recording every moment of this public embarrassment were having a heyday. Two of them buzzed around my face to broadcast my humiliation for all of the Otherworld to see. The buzzing seeped into every crevice of my brain, until my head felt like it was going to explode.
I just wanted it to stop.
So I crossed my arms over my chest like a shield, and the lightning crackling through my veins burst out through my palms. Thick bolts of it shot through the air and struck the orbs hovering around me in a bright flash of blinding light.
A second later, there was ash on the ground below where the orbs had been.
The big screen televisions overhead went dark.
The crowd stared at me in stunned silence.
“You wanted lighting?” I muttered, mostly to myself, but also to them. “Well, there you go. You got your lightning.”
The screens lit up again, but I was no longer on the screen. Bacchus was. And the normally jovial god was so livid that his entire face was flushed bright red.
“Selena Peace, chosen champion of Jupiter,” he said, my name echoing from the orbs with an impending sense of doom. “You just attacked and destroyed magical equipment created by the gods for use in the Faerie Games, and are therefore in violation of the rules of the Games.”
I gulped and turned around, facing his commanding form. He was terrifying, with his glowing green eyes, red face, and dark wild hair.
“I’m sorry,” I forced out, lowering my eyes and praying he accepted my apology. “I got angry, and… I didn’t realize what I was doing. I’m sorry.”
The words were all coming out wrong. Now it sounded like I couldn’t control my magic. Which, technically, was kind of true. But I wasn’t supposed to admit it. Especially not in front of the other players.
This was a disaster.
A glance at the other chosen champions showed that most of them were smirking, amused by my massive mistake. A handful of them looked worried, including the chosen champion of Ceres—the bright-eyed girl with green wings who’d made the villa bloom with flowers.
And then there was Julian. He gripped the reins of his horse, his eyes raging with anger. He looked like he was going to charge at Bacchus and thrust a flaming sword through his heart if the god did anything to hurt me.
I had no idea what to make of his reaction. But Julian wasn’t what I needed to be worrying about right now.
Because I couldn’t just stand there. I needed to try saying something else to save myself. Because the punishment for violating the rules of the Games…
The punishment was almost always death.
“It was a mistake.” My body shook with fear, but I raised my eyes and met Bacchus’s blazing ones. “I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. I promise.”
His expression flickered from anger to amusement. “Whether I believe you or not isn’t important.” He leaned against his chariot and toyed with his scepter, resting it across his shoulder. “Because I’m only the host of the Games. Your sentencing falls to the rule maker herself. The queen of the gods—Juno.”
35
Selena
My heart dropped at the name of Jupiter’s jealous wife.
The goddess who most likely had it out for me and wanted me dead.
But before I could worry about it any longer, a blue orb of swirling light appeared at the top of the stairs. It grew and grew, until it was big enough to hold a god. Then the light faded until it was gone completely.
In its place, a stunning, dark-haired woman in a blue and gold dress sat on a throne backed with the feathers of peacocks. One side of the dress was slit all the way up to her thigh. She wore gold cuffs on both arms that went from her wrists to her elbows, and a gleaming gold and sapphire crown on her head.
She was by far the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. But her beauty was harsh and intimidating. Like a warning to everyone to watch their backs.
Juno.
Given what had just happened, I expected her to be looking at me. But she wasn’t. Instead, she focused on Bacchus, her stone gaze cold enough to make the giant god shrink in her presence.
“Your magic shouldn’t have been able to be destroyed by a half-blood.” She held her chin high, looking down at Bacchus like he was lower than dirt. “Even a half-blood gifted with magic from a god.”
The corner of Bacchus’s mouth twitched in annoyance. “You’re right.” He gave me a lethal glare before returning his focus to Juno. “I was as shocked as everyone else when she did what she did. But my father’s magic is strong. Apparently that strength transferred to the half-blood when he chose her as his champion.”
Juno’s eyes narrowed as he spoke, as if she couldn’t stand the sound of his voice. “My husband’s magic is strong,” she said. “It amused me to watch the half-blood he chose for the Games destroy your magic so easily.”
Bacchus’s hand tightened
around his scepter at her venomous words.
I blinked, looking back and forth between the two of them as I put the pieces together. Because if I understood correctly from what they’d just said, Jupiter was both Juno’s husband and Bacchus’s father.
And judging from the way Juno looked at Bacchus with so much hatred, I guessed that not only was she not his mother, but she had it out for him big time.
Fascinating. Especially because if she was amused by my accidental stint, perhaps there was hope for me yet.
Apparently done with scolding Bacchus, Juno turned her hawkish gaze straight at me. “Selena Pearce,” she said my name with disdain. “Aren’t you a pretty little thing.”
From the way she said it, it clearly wasn’t a compliment. And now she was silent, staring at me, waiting for me to say something.
I swallowed and mustered up the courage to speak. “Your Highness.” I dipped into a low curtsy before turning my gaze up to hers again. I wasn’t sure if that was how I was supposed to address a goddess, but since her expression remained unchanged, it didn’t seem like she hated it. That was good. At least, I thought it was. “I’m sorry for breaking the orbs. I didn’t mean to do it.”
I’d technically done more than broken them. I’d disintegrated them. But it was the same thing. Kind of.
“You might not have meant to do it, but you still did it.” She tilted her head curiously. “Why?”
From the challenge in her sharp eyes, I knew not to mess this one up.
But there was no lie I could invent to explain what I’d done. And Devyn had told me that no matter what happened in the Games, I should follow my gut.
Which meant telling Juno the truth.
“Until Jupiter gifted me with his magic, I had no magic of my own.” I shifted in place, since making myself vulnerable with so many eyes on me was uncomfortable. Especially since the golden orbs were buzzing around me again, broadcasting me so all the fae could hear.
The Faerie Games (Dark World: The Faerie Games Book 1) Page 11
