It is a suppression. Her words are so quiet I barely hear her. But there they are, hanging in the air.

Mayor Elland tucks a strand of silver-gray hair behind her ear and leans toward me. “You thought the war ended when you lost Mara. But this, Talin, can be our chance to truly end the war. This can be the real end. And I know you want to see the fall of the Karensa Federation. Don’t you?”

I meet her eyes, hardly able to believe what I’m hearing. I am just one of many.

These are the many. I am sitting with leaders of the rebellion.

She gives me a grim nod. “Interested, eh? Good. Now let’s get you caught up.”

15

RED

The evening is split by the echoes of horns blasting around the city, each of them harmonious with the next. The chorus resounds eagerly from every tower in the city as people flood into the streets, celebrating in anticipation of tomorrow’s game.

I remember the sound of these horns. I’d sport bracelets on my arms and run alongside my father as we headed out to the festival grounds. Once, the festival had coincided with the conquering of the western nation of Larc.

What a little fool. How could I have enjoyed myself so much back then?

Tonight, Jeran and I try to keep a low profile in our Karenese wardrobe as we join the crowds teeming around the city. We sport yellow stripes tied around our wrists. Like the rest of the crowd, we know little about what will happen in the arena tomorrow—only that it will involve captive Strikers from Mara, and that they will each be sporting a different color so that the audience can distinguish easily between them. Already, I can overhear conversations around me from those taking bets on which colors will survive and which will perish, gambling on the lives of people none of them have even seen.

Beside me, I can sense Jeran’s tension. Maybe Adena will be wearing the yellow bracelet. Maybe Aramin.

Maybe Talin will be the one ripping those bracelets from their wrists after taking their lives.

Clusters of soldiers stand at attention along the thoroughfare. I glance at them whenever I can, listening for snatches of conversations, bored chatter, clues. But the few that talk are only barking out orders, herding people in the right direction. As always, I search for the symbols on their sleeves, keeping track of the patrols I see.

Strange. There are fewer patrols here than there should be.

Up ahead, rising up in the center of the Solstice Circle, is Cardinia’s arena, decked out entirely tonight in colorful banners.

We avoid the arena and end up walking along the path linking the surrounding festival grounds to the road leading to the lab complex. The guards cluster thickly around here. Immediately I know what it means; Ghosts must have been transported along this route earlier in the morning, ushered into the arena’s holding rooms in anticipation of tomorrow’s events.