Circle of Shadows (Circle of Shadows, #1)(57)

Where was Daemon? Why wasn’t his presence in her head?

Instinctively, Sora reached out toward her gemina connection. She hit a wall.

Huh? Why was it closed? On her side?

And then she remembered. Prince Gin had asked her to close her mental ramparts.

Everything was fine. He wouldn’t lead her astray.

He loves his warriors. He loves his people. He loves his kingdom.

She smiled. Just thinking of the Dragon Prince filled Sora’s head with a warm cloud of contentment, like walking into a bakery and breathing in the aromas of cranberry tarts and hazelnut cookies coming out of the oven and pots of chrysanthemum tea on the counter.

What was I thinking about before that? She shook her head but couldn’t remember.

Probably wasn’t important.

Beetle was sitting in front of her, though, looking at her with his head cocked sideways. “You still there?”

“Huh?”

“Your eyes got all dreamy for a minute.”

“I’m . . . fine. More than fine.” The pastry warmth still floated through her head. Maybe the cookie sandwich Beetle was eating had something to do with it too.

“So you were about to tell me why you were in layman’s clothes in Kaede City?” he said.

“Oh, right,” Sora said. “I was trying to spy on your army. But that was before I heard Prince Gin speak. Now I understand how naive I was. I’m thrilled to join the ryuu.”

Beetle grinned more broadly before he took a big bite of his cookies. “Yesh,” he said with his mouth full. “We’re really lucky to get to use this magic and fight for the prince.”

Two warriors—a man and a woman—stepped into the scrimmage ring.

“Oooh, this one’s gonna be good,” Beetle said. He was so intensely focused, he forgot to finish chewing.

Sora leaned forward too.

“Ready?” the ryuu serving as judge called out. “Three-two-one, scrimmage!”

The man began to circle.

The woman simply sat cross-legged in the middle of the ring.

What in Luna’s name?

A moment later, a rumbling came from the cargo hold below. Oranges rolled up the ladders, in neat but hurried lines. They rushed to the scrimmage ring and piled atop themselves to form an enormous citrus gorilla. The gorilla towered over the ryuu, its broad orange chest heaving, as if it were really alive. Then it bent down and opened its hand. The woman stepped onto its palm, and it lifted her twenty feet up into the sky.

The entire spell took a span of ten seconds.

Sora gawked. Who would have thought a bunch of oranges could be so imposing? It was phenomenal. A gushy sense of pride bloomed inside of her, just by virtue of being part of the ryuu.

The crowd broke out into hollers and applause. Beetle cheered with his mouth full, flinging his arms up, cookie crumbs tossed into the air like sloppy, sweet confetti.

“Are there limits to what we can do?” Sora asked Beetle over the noise.

He shrugged. “Sort of. Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. But I think it’s like anything else. Some people are really good at math, and others stop at algebra. Same with magic.”

Fascinating. Sora grinned so hard, she knew she must look a little stupid, but she couldn’t help it. Everything about being a ryuu was new and intriguing. There’d been this whole other world, right beneath the taigas’ noses, and they’d never known. But now Sora would get to be a part of it.

“It seems like all ryuu are geniuses with magic,” she said.

“Nah,” Beetle said. “Smart, maybe, but not geniuses. Except Prince Gin. And Virtuoso. That’s why she got her name. While most of the ryuu took a while to learn what they could really do with the magic, she was a natural from the start.”

The other warrior in the ring looked up at the gorilla. He nodded, as if acknowledging its grandeur. Then he puckered his lips and whistled. A keening, high-pitched noise sliced through the air. Sora and everyone around her smashed their hands over their ears.

Seemingly out of nowhere, hordes of bats filled the sky, blotting out the moon for a moment.

“Fruit bats,” Sora said as she realized what they were.

The man raised his hand, ready to give the signal for his bats to descend on the orange gorilla. To devour it.

“Halt!”

Someone whispered, “Virtuoso!” and the warning floated through the air like a winter ghost. Every ryuu on deck froze, afraid to move. If there was anything soft left inside of Hana, she didn’t show it to the other warriors.

Hana strode to the center of the scrimmage ring and smacked the man upside the head. “Menagerie, you will not have your bats eat all our oranges. Think before you act. We need those.”

He set his jaw, angry that she’d stopped him before his grand finale. But then he said, “You’re right, Virtuoso,” and whistled to call off his bats.

“I declare this scrimmage a draw,” Hana said. The ryuu who was supposed to be judge didn’t try to protest.

The gorilla crumbled, oranges cascading gently downward and bringing with them the woman on her platform. She landed quietly on deck as the last of the oranges rolled away, back down the ladders and, presumably, into their drums.

Hana paced the ring, examining every ryuu who stood around it.

“Personally,” she said, “I think these duels encourage idleness and speculation.” She glared at a place in the crowd where money was changing hands. The truing up of bets ceased immediately. “But His Highness sanctions them, believing them to be good practice for you. So then, let us make this a worthwhile exercise.”