The sun was still just rising when we reached the ruins. My tongue was still coated in bile from all the puking I’d done the night before.
Toothpaste hadn’t made a dent.
My stomach churned as I made my way beside Vladimir to our seats. The participants were already waiting. The mountain was gone and disqualified. Four remained.
Silas, the one who looked like the personification of black oil: slippery and poisonous. I felt his stare the moment I entered. If not for Vladimir, I would have been pinned in place by its intensity alone.
Then there were the two who had ended in a tie the day before. They were seated farther apart now, wounds healed, blood washed away. As if yesterday’s carnage had never happened.
It was hard to stomach the miracle of spontaneous healing that these creatures possessed. A fight like that back home would have left both of them six feet under or vegetables for life.
Somehow, here they sat, whole and healed as if they hadn’t almost ripped each other to ribbons hours ago.
Sylvanna’s eyes met mine. The color of jewels, yet cutting as glass. Her lips twisted into the shadow of a sneer.
I looked away and took my seat beside Vladimir, hands trembling against the cold stone.
The burly man in a guard uniform stood where he had yesterday, his gaze not wavering from the candidates.
To my surprise, his focus wasn’t on the three who had engaged in combat the day before.
It was on the quiet one.
In my world, he would have been the height and build of a top athlete, someone impressive, strong. But here, he was dwarfed by the others. It didn’t help that he looked younger than the rest, almost boyish, with white hair that wasn’t the platinum blonde of Vladimir’s kind. It was colorless. Like frost. Like something vital had been drained away and never returned.
He sat with perfect stillness, hands folded in his lap, eyes fixed on some point in the middle distance.
He looked so... small.
Vladimir rose, and the arena fell silent.
"The final combat matches," he announced, voice carrying across the ruins. "Silas Vane will face Sylvanna Korvin."
A pause. My chest tightened.
"Konstantin Orlov will face Dmitri Kozlov."
I looked at Dmitri was still perfectly still, expression unchanged and then at Konstantin. The man was massive, shoulders like boulders, hands that could crush bone. And worse than his size was the look in his eyes. Cold. Arrogant. The kind of anger that didn’t need a reason, just a target.
He reminded me of Ajax.
My brother. The one who’d gambled away every cent we had and then come home looking for something to hit. Preferably something that could bleed and cry and beg him to stop.
I’d been that something more than once.
Konstantin had that same look. That same coiled violence, just waiting for an excuse.
And Dmitri was quiet, unremarkable and was about to give him one.
"Silas. Sylvanna. Step forward."
They rose and entered the arena. No circling this time. No hesitation.
Silas shifted immediately.
His wolf was wrong. Not massive like the mountain’s had been, but lean and shadowed, with fur so black it seemed to absorb light. His eyes were empty, pale and sightless, like something that hunted in the dark and didn’t need to see.
Sylvanna shifted a heartbeat later. The same fawn-colored wolf from yesterday, smaller, faster, already moving before her transformation completed.
She didn’t wait for him to attack. She lunged.
Silas tried to step through the shadows, the same trick he’d used on the mountain but Sylvanna was ready for it. She twisted mid-leap, claws raking across his flank as he reappeared.
He snarled, shadows coiling around his legs like smoke, but she was already gone. Another strike. Then another.
She’d learned from yesterday. Learned from watching him. No hesitation. No fear of his shadows.
Silas tried to drain her energy the way he had with the mountain, black frost spreading from his paws but she never stayed still long enough. Every time he planted his feet, she was somewhere else, claws tearing, teeth snapping, relentless.
He was powerful. Dangerous.
And speed, I was learning, could be just as deadly as strength.
Silas stumbled. His shadows flickered. He was weakening. The cost of using the magic twice in two days was showing. His movements slowed. His strikes grew desperate.
Sylvanna circled him like a shark scenting blood.
Then she struck, jaws closing around his throat. She was not trying to kill him. Just holding. A promise of what she could do if he didn’t yield.
"Yield," Vladimir’s voice cut through the tension.
For a long moment, Silas didn’t move. Then, slowly, he shifted back to human form, forcing Sylvanna to release him or risk injuring him further.
He stood, naked and bleeding, one hand pressed to his throat.
"I yield," he said quietly.
Sylvanna shifted back as well, breathing hard but triumphant. Blood streaked her torso; his blood, not hers.
"Winner: Sylvanna Korvin," Vladimir announced. "Silas Vane, you are dismissed from the trials."
Silas didn’t argue. Didn’t protest. Just inclined his head once, respectfull and walked toward the exit, his dark eyes unreadable.
Vladimir’s gaze shifted to the final two candidates.
"Konstantin Orlov. Dmitri Kozlov."
Konstantin rose slowly, a predator’s grin spreading across his face.
Dmitri stood as well. Still calm. Still quiet.
Still impossibly, terrifyingly small compared to the man he was about to face.
They stepped into the blood-stained arena.
And I realized I was gripping the stone seat so hard my knuckles had gone white.
"It doesn’t matter what dark arts you use," Konstantin sneered. "You’re better off withdrawing." He took his position, muscles coiling. "I’m not holding back." He crouched, preparing to shift.
Just stood there in the center of the arena, hands at his sides, perfectly still.
Move, I wanted to scream. Run. Shift. Do SOMETHING.
Konstantin’s laugh was ugly. "What, no last words? No begging?" His body began to change, bones cracking, fur rippling beneath skin. "Good. I prefer my prey quiet—"
Then Dmitri pressed something on his chest.
I didn’t see what at first, just a flash of silver but then I heard it.
Metal on metal. It precise and mechanical.
Konstantin froze mid-shift, confusion flickering across his half-transformed face.
The device on Dmitri’s chest. It was small, no bigger than a fist and it began to unfold.
Pieces of silver and steel slid out like clockwork, expanding, locking into place with sharp, satisfying snaps. They wrapped around his torso, his shoulders, his arms, moving with liquid precision. Not armor. Not exactly.
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And then, impossibly, it kept building.
Metal limbs extended from his back and sides, curving down to the ground. A sleek, angular head took shape above his own. A tail that was segmented, flexible and unfurled behind him like a whip.
Within seconds, Dmitri wasn’t standing there anymore.
Metal and something that gave him light from within.
For the first time, I felt Vladimir lean in. He was as intrigued as everyone else.
The construct was smaller than a fully-shifted Lycan, closer to the size of a large dog but it was beautiful in the way a blade was beautiful. All sharp edges and flowing lines, silver catching the morning light like moonlight on water. Every joint moved with fluid grace, every piece fitting together so perfectly it looked alive.
The arena went dead silent.
Even Vladimir leaned forward slightly, eyes narrowed.
Konstantin finished his shift with a snarl, now a massive grey wolf, easily three times the size of the mechanical construct. He bared his teeth.
Sylvanna commented, scoffing, "That’s not a wolf. That’s a toy. A tin toy."