Sia and Timi scrambled blindly, each step they took punctuated by a glance in a seemingly random direction.

The brazen relishment Sia had taken in being placed before the audience was nowhere to be seen, replaced by much the same jittery paranoia that wracked his teammate. Whether from not being able to see the crowds under which he’d basked, or simply the fear of an attack that could come from any direction, Gem wasn’t sure.

Of course, both of them did far better than Tenzo of team Fate. The boy’s trailing showl and body wrappings made a ghostly sight of him, and considering how tightly they seemed to cling to his frame they did an extraordinary job of obscuring the tiny, unconscious movements that might give so much away of what a man was thinking.

In the forest, however, they proved a thousand handholds for the grasping claws of branches to snag.

His pace was rendered sluggish by the constant tugging of his clothes, and it seemed the only advantage his attire bought him was some measure of protection from the thousands of needle-like twigs that may otherwise have scraped at his skin.

The sight brought a grin to Gem’s lips, and she turned her eyes to the remaining contestant.

Gem knew full well how the image of the task was being conveyed. The stage in which it took place had been constructed inside an isolated pocket of space, formed with the Itamis sphere, then placed within the confines of the stadium. Using this method, the forest could be contained within a structure of smaller outer dimensions than it.

Of course, witnessing a mathematical impossibility was no less disorienting for it. When Gem looked at the forest, she saw a great mass of trees extending outwards for over a mile. When she looked at the stadium, she saw rows of seats built along a great circular skeleton less than half that size.

And yet when she focused on the edge of the audience’s area, where the outermost parts of the forest met the innermost parts of the stadium, the illusion shattered. Her mind became unable to dismiss the work of architectural madness as an optical illusion, and she was forced to take in the sight of a mile fitting inside a thousand paces.

Understanding logically how it had been achieved made no difference in the wrongness of the sight, and she quickly pulled her straying gaze away from the disconcerting point of irrationality.

The forest seemed to warp, bringing the section her eyes started to focus on closer to her even as the vegetation between her and the object of her attention disappeared once more into transparency. With her perception being aided by the very stage, it took Gem only a few moments to locate Amelia.

Where the stage had eroded the other contestant’s confidence, it had clearly redoubled Amelia’s. The girl moved like a tiger, stalking through the trees swiftly enough that she was just shy of a jog, yet making barely a sound in doing so.

She stepped over roots as they sought to hook her feet and trip her, pressed her weight to hair-thin twigs only to continue onwards without filling the air with their shrill snapping.

Her every move reminded Gem of a seasoned stalker, and though the girlish grin remained affixed on her face, those bottomless eyes seemed to scrutinise her surroundings with more clarity than any of those she was competing with.

No, not competing with. To call it that gave the other contestants too much credit. Amelia was hunting them, and Gem waited with shallow, hesitant breath for her to encounter her prey.

The thoughts of hunters and prey brought Gem’s mind back to the actual premise of the task, and she took her focus back from the black-eyed girl.

Gem scanned the forest for it, using the stage’s perception-based alterations to their fullest, and yet the unknown creature seemed content to remain beyond even her sights. Frustrated, she turned to her teammates and took the problem to them.

She needn’t have bothered, it soon made itself known.

The forest seemed to warp and flicker to bring it to the forefront of Gem’s vision, compelled by the theatrics of the Sieve no doubt. Nine feet high and half as wide at the shoulder, the orc looked to weigh ten dozen stone. Gem suspected half that mass was muscle, the other bone.

Its skin was a dark grey, pulled tight across the bulging vascularity beneath and marked by criss crossing veins and shifting ligaments. It bore no small number of scars across its torso, arms and neck, barely visible on the colouration of its flesh, yet speaking nonetheless of a long history of violence and battle.

Glinting red eyes shone, framed by sockets so pronounced as to resemble the reinforced arches of a fortress more than the features of a living thing. And if its skull was a fort, then its mouth was agape with jagged, calcic spires.

Its ferocious maw was such a sight that Gem barely noticed what was embedded in the creature’s forehead. Even then, she required a second look to be certain- disbelieving that even the capricious, vacillating organisers would be so cruel.

There could be no doubt, though. Half as long as a finger, every bit as wide, smooth and polished green with the striped texture of inwardly cracked glass.

Clearly, the orc would make an exemplary guardian for the crystal. As would any creature that had the prize affixed to its own head.

***

Astra stared as the beast took off into the forest, trunk-like legs swaying under it like the pendulums on a great clock, carrying it yards with every stride.

It didn’t look like a fast creature, and yet the agility with which it bulled through the undergrowth seemed more than the simple product of long legs and strong muscles. There was something unnatural to it, like its strength was not fit even for a body so bloated and jagged with muscle as its own.

She gasped upon realising the cause of the effect. The stage had been wreathed in magic, altered to slow down the events that came to pass within so that those watching, most of whom were unable to use magic, would not find their eyes insufficient to clearly observe.

But one magic-user might be far faster than another, and so whichever rate it was slowed by would either leave some seeming unusually sluggish, or others unusually fast. The orc, it seemed, was the latter.

That its speed was in such advance of several mystics struck fear into her.

Though the focusing functions of the stage had taken some moments for her to get used to, Astra was able to make full use of them now- and she added haste to her practice as she scoured the battleground for the contestants.

Sia was the first she found, yet it was Timi who was unknowingly occupying the orc’s path.

Scrawny shrub-branches were crushed flat, roots split apart rather than catch the charging beast’s feet, and Astra wasn’t even remotely surprised when the girl looked up with eyes as wide as a sheep before a wolf’s.

Hurriedly, she turned away from the noise and began to scramble through the forestry- stumbling and half-falling every other stride on the thick, grabbing plant life underfoot.

It seemed she couldn’t resist the urge to glance over her shoulder, yet she couldn’t possibly have actually seen the monster’s approach. Not from a hundred paces in front, obscured by the foliage it had yet to ravage.

Sia had evidently heard the great rumbling of the orc’s charge, as when Astra glanced back at him he’d turned and begun a hastened jog. His sense of positional judgement must have been impressive, as his course looked to intersect with the creature’s just twenty feet from Timi.

For a few moments there was nothing but the snapping of wood and the rustling of leaves as all three of them ran, and then the orc came into Timi’s sight.

The creature’s mouth, already split by great fangs and tusks, gaped ever wider, the girl’s pallor seemed to deepen at the very sight of it as she stared transfixed, and Sia exploded through a mass of leaves and twigs in-between and to the right of them.

Right hand outstretched, eyes bulging as if amazed at his own stupidity, Sia unleashed a crackling arc of lightning onto the creature. The blue energy struck solidly in the shoulder, dancing across the creature’s skin and scorching wherever the forks fell.

Wisps of vapour rose from each point of contact, twisting through the air by the agitated currents produced by the electrical discharge. Whether it was steam from the atmosphere or smoke from flesh, Astra couldn’t tell.

After two heartbeats, the snaking lightning dissipated. Pale, jagged lines were visible where they’d touched the orc’s shoulder, yet the creature’s hide proved more than a match for the magic and Astra could see no blood escaping. The monster rounded on Sia, crimson eyes aflame with murder.

It was Timi who likely saved the boy, charging into the monster as it took a step towards her teammate and forcing it off-balance. She almost looked comical, slamming into a creature a dozen times her weight, only to bounce off its chest. Her endeavour achieved what it set out to, though, and the orc was pushed back a half-step.

Another mass of lightning, arcs crackling around and over one another like writhing snakes. This time the attack met the orc’s face, and the creature roared its pain as an arm shot up- its meaty forearm a shield for delicate eyes.

This time it didn’t wait for the attack to stop before charging.

The space between the orc and Sia seemed to vanish in the span of two strides, a metallic sheen spread across his body like flowing mercury, defensive magic if Astra had ever seen it. The orc barely seemed to notice the ability. A fist, grey as cold lead, crunched into Sia’s face- snapping his head back and casting him to the ground with such violent force as to send his body sinking inches into the dirt at his back.

Blood fountained from the contestant’s face, pouring from his nose- crushed flat and ruined- like hot magma from an erupting volcano. The magic was banished from his flesh as he lay still.

Timi was on her feet again as the orc raised its foot, yet she was far too slow to reach it in less time than the beast’s heel did Sia. The boy’s face contorted in wide-eyed pain as he was driven down by the ribs, and the creature’s knife-rowed maw seemed to split in sick amusement at the sight of him.

Her foot wiped the savage grin from it, sinking deep into the muscle of its back. The orc spun, thrashing out with its fist to retaliate, but Timi had already darted back and the blow fell far short of landing.

The girl's hair was whipped by the wind dragging in the wake of the great fist, and even as she continued to distance herself from the orc, it closed the gap almost without effort. The last glimpse of her face Astra got was a look of abject terror, then it disappeared under leaves and shrubs as she was bowled over with a single swing of the orc’s trunk-like arm.

Straightening, the orc stared down at her, then turned its feral gaze onto Sia. Neither contestant moved, and after a second of staring the creature took off once more- carving a fathom-wide path through branches and vines with its own unstoppable form.

And that was all there was to it. Two contestants, both having faced challenges similar to Astra herself to get as far as they did. Both lying broken and still in mere moments. She felt a growing sickness in the pit of her stomach as she watched the monster move.

There seemed a strong direction to the creature’s charge, and Astra found herself thinking back to Alabaster referring to it as a predator. Was it tracking the other contestants? Eager for an answer, she began scanning the forest for those that remained.

Her eyes moved as quickly as she could make them, but they found Amelia only when the orc did.

The black-eyed girl’s reaction was to Timi’s as night was to day. Rather than freeze up at the sight of the creature charging towards her, she was spurred into motion without the slightest hesitation.

If the other contestants had been the baseline for movement speed, Amelia clearly surpassed them by far. Even with the image slowed down for the benefit of the audience, Astra struggled to keep track of the girl’s attacks.

Her fists flew like musketballs, smacking against the body of the orc once, twice, a dozen times and then even more. Her blows clearly lacked the strength of the beast, and the difference in mass between them was undeniable, but she threw them with such a rapid pace that even the hardy creature forced to soak them was forced back.

Each thunderous strike sent ripples across the sturdy musculature as Amelia made herself a blacksmith, and the orc’s torso her steel. She could reach no higher than the midpoint of its stomach, but the girl didn’t allow such a thing to stop her.

The orc swung an arm, she ducked under it and responded with a kick to the side. It barely moved from even a strike so heavy as that, yet many more soon came to join it elsewhere. The beast’s arms moved to cover its body from the onslaught, yet as soon as one section of flesh was denied to her, Amelia would merely move on to attack another.

In only seconds, she had become the predator. The orc her prey.

Apparently tiring of being on the defensive, the orc lashed out with a sudden fury. Amelia twisted aside, and Astra stared as the very space between them seemed to join her in the motion- folding as though pulled about a loom. The orc’s attack missed, and earned it a kick to the jaw.

Amelia followed the creature as it stumbled away, reeling from the surprise attack, and the next moment she was back to raining blows upon it. Astra found herself awed by the way the girl fought, embittered and consoled simultaneously.

With an opponent who fought like this, how could she possibly be shamed for losing? And yet with an opponent who fought like this, how could there be any doubt as to the totality of her defeat?

The orc’s torso heaved, and its arm came back around like a hammer. Amelia sidestepped, the air warping to exaggerate the distance bought by her movement, but she was a hair too slow. Knuckles like hammer-heads grazed against her ribs, dragging her off-balance and forcing her to right herself.

By the time she’d regained her footing in the tangled undergrowth, another fist had darted out to meet with her stomach.

The crunch of bone against abdomen made the power difference just as evident as it had before, yet there was something sickening about seeing the advantage rest with the stronger combatant. Amelia was half-flipped by the strike, her head and heels exchanging altitudes as her body hurled limply backwards.

A tree served to catch her, and proved an inferior cushion as she bounced from the barked surface in a spray of chipped wood and torn creepers. She came to a stop some three yards from the base, lying there and struggling to move for only an instant before the orc charged to continue their battle.

Stunned though she was, Amelia clearly wasn’t entirely shaken by the impact. As the orc came close, she lashed out with both feet. The left missed, the right connected and delivered a kinetic jolt that would surely have snapped a man’s leg like the devastated twigs beneath her.

The orc barely seemed to notice the assault.

Before Amelia could even begin to make another move, fingers as thick as rolling pins closed around her ankle, and she was hoisted into the air as though her body weighed no more than a bundle of straw.

For a moment, time seemed to slow. Amelia was suspended in the air, her hair trailing out behind her as if she were underwater. And then she struck a root face-first. It was a large one, impossible large, a span across and embedded so deeply as to tether a ship.

All the same, it proved a poor obstacle for Amelia. The growth split under the force of the impact, and with no loss in momentum that Astra could see the girl continued to meet with the ground once more.

Dirt, leaves and smaller plants were flung apart as she struck, rendering the forest soil no more coherent than water under a diver. A mighty huge diver, for that matter. The orc released its grip on her the moment after impact, and Amelia bounced from the ground atop a fountain of mangled dirt.

She landed a half dozen paces away, and the displaced earth fell upon her as rain. Staring at her, the orc’s beady eyes seemed to shrink in their sockets, its chest heaving as though it were struggling for breath.

With equal parts rage and revulsion, Astra realised the monster was laughing at the girl’s pain. As the feral, inhuman chuckling died down, the creature stalked towards the limp Amelia almost lazily.

Astra remembered the sight of the girl as she’d beaten her. The monstrous grin splitting her lips, the gleeful glint in her jet-like eyes. And yet she found a vacuum inside her, left by the absence of her fear.

She wasn’t scared of Amelia anymore, even the images of her loss had lost their bite. Amelia was no monster. Astra had been a fool to ever mistake her for one.

A monster was about to kill her.

As it approached the still girl, however, the monster found its meal delayed. There was a flash of movement, black streaking through the forest’s greens and browns, and a shape twisted through the foliage. The shadow was as tall as a man, seeming to convulse as it moved.

It wasn’t until Tenzo was almost upon the orc that Astra realised the darkness was the fabrics of his wreath. The twisting and rippling, the winds tearing at the trailing cloth as he moved.

The orc heard or smelled him, its angular frame whirled to meet the boy with the speed of a whetstone. Tenzo didn’t even blink in the face of the motion, simply extended an arm and flicked out his wrist.

A dark blur passed between them, and the orc cast its head back with a roar like unto cannon fire. Its fists uncurled into claws, reaching up and tearing at its own face- and Astra quickly realised why. Its eyes, nose and mouth had all been completely covered by a patch of pure darkness.

Not wasting any time, Tenzo lashed out a kick to the creature’s knee. His heel connected perfectly. Once, twice, five blows were deflected from the sturdy joint, each looking as savage and deadly as any crippling blow.

With a pained roar, the orc swung out an arm from his face. The strength of its swing turned the air heavy, its jagged fingernails turned it sharp, and Tenzo barely evaded the swipe as he stumbled away from the creature.

Fingers dug into the shadow over the orc’s face, and Astra watched as it wrenched the darkness free of itself with one hand. Burning red eyes emerged from the umbral carpet, staring unwaveringly at Tenzo as though the beast thought it could slay him with hatred in place of strength.

The shrouded boy took a step back, and the orc took one forwards. The two of them remained still, staring at one another unwaveringly as seconds dragged by- feeling like minutes. Finally, the shrouded boy burst into action. He whirled, clothes flapping madly in his wake as he turned and began to sprint.

It took only three bounds for the orc to bring him within the reach of its span-long arms. Its tusks seemed to grow as scarred lips peeled back to reveal yet more of them, the dreadful grin promising nothing a human had any place in imagining.

Claws closed around Tenzo’s head, and his lower body snapped forwards as he was dragged to a stop from the top. His hands came up to pry apart the orc’s grip, and yet Astra knew with a crushing certainty that he would not escape in time. The beast’s left fist climbed high into the air above it, then came down like a headsman’s blade.

Yet it never found its mark.

So swiftly Astra could scarcely follow it, even slowed, Amelia crashed into the orc from behind. The creature let go of Tenzo, surprise loosening its grip where force failed. Before it could get its bearings, the girl climbed up onto its shoulders.

Her legs closed around its right bicep, pinning the thick limb to its side. As the orc struggled to retaliate with its free arm, she raised one of her own as if in mirror of the creature’s attempted finishing blow on Tenzo.

It came down as an elbow, landing just a finger from the beast’s tiny eye and eliciting another wild howl of pain as the bone of her limb met that of the orc’s socket.

Claws flashed as the monster thrashed around, Amelia clung on in spite of the violence with which she was dragged one way and the other. Jagged fingernails grazed her, drawing flecks of blood from what skin they could reach, but she made no indication of even feeling the pain. The girl brought her elbow down once more, this time into the open mouth of the orc as it stared desperately up at her.

Blood shot free of the impact, and something thumb-long and painted crimson fell from the monster’s mouth as it lowered its head in a feeble attempt to avoid further strikes. Astra realised the dislodged object was a tooth- or more accurately, half of one.

Spittle and foam mixed with the lifeforce, dripping down the orc’s chin as it redoubled its efforts to shake Amelia free. Its nails continued blindly clawing for her, and yet the girl paid none of the creature’s efforts any heed at all.

Tenzo chose that moment to strike, letting loose fists of darkness from five paces back- each one landing true and breaking against their target like waves against a rock. The sea could erode stone, eventually, but it was clear that the waters had not the required time. As the orc started towards the boy, Astra realised what precious seconds he had could be counted on a single hand.

His temple was clipped by the orc’s hand, his dodge too late to evade them completely. In the instant after the glancing blow, he might have dived back some yards- felt dirt on his back in exchange for more space.

That was what Astra would have done, yet Tenzo chose to try and right himself. His decision saw that the second blow landed directly, driving ram-like knuckles into his sternum and folding him like a sheet.

Amelia let her arm fall on the monster, crushing a malformed ear beneath her elbow. The orc barely seemed to notice the mangling of cartilage.

With a delay only so long as the time required to raise her arm anew, she hammered the orc once more with her iron arm. The bone sank deep into the muscle of its neck, and as the monster sagged she delivered another, then another.

Elbows fell like arrows upon the wretched predator, each carrying force enough to shatter the skull of most men like eggshells. Even the impossibly sturdy orc seemed to feel the impacts, and its steadfast footing grew more shaky and uneven by the moment.

Just as it seemed the orc would fall fully, the monster threw itself back and charged rear-first towards a tree.

Amelia had no time to disentangle herself from the beast before she was crushed between a span of wood and the slab-like musculature of her enemy. A great creaking filled the air, and fissures ran through the bark of the towering growth.

The girl’s eyes widened, bottomless blackness seeming to expand in her head as her mouth was left agape. A wheezing, strained cough escaped the girl’s lips, and Astra could practically see the strength banished from her arms as muscles uncoiled and visible tendons disappeared back downwards.

Her moment of weakness was no shorter than the orc needed. Wrenching its trapped arm free of Amelia’s grip, the beast grasped upwards and, perhaps by luck as much as effort, snagged her arm.

With a mighty heave it whipped her back around and brought her head slamming into the ground, plowing through soil as though she were a fence post. Amelia stopped only when her shoulders kissed the dirt, yet Astra noticed with dawning elation that, in spite of the devastating blow dealt her, the girl’s hands remained tightly closed around the orc’s wrist.

Amelia folded her legs in, pulling her head free of the ground even as she tugged the orc off-balance. Straightening up, she sent both her feet into the beast’s stomach.

The orc rose from the ground almost glacially, its enormous form lifted into the air by a foot and left to crunch back against the wounded tree behind it. Shocked, the creature remained still for precious seconds. Seconds that Amelia made full use of as she rolled onto her front, then scrambled to her feet.

Her right foot found the midpoint of the orc’s torso as it charged for her once more, yet robbed of the surprise element, it was defanged. And the momentum of the muscled predator was far greater than Amelia’s.

She shot back an entire yard, hopping to regain her footing and managing only in time to be knocked off both her feet, rather than only one. The two of them tangled once more as they went down, Amelia’s back serving to bludgeon the ground even further. This time a grey fist fell upon her before she could do anything else.

Amelia’s face had been ruined by her battle, such that Astra could tell the girl was still conscious only when she raised her arms to guard the second fall of the orc’s arms.

It seemed to do her little good, as her straightened limbs were driven backwards into her own forehead with each attack.

The orc struck her perhaps a dozen more times, then began to clamber to its feet. Amelia moved like a viper. The moment the onslaught ceased, she drew her legs to her stomach and lashed out another kick.

Pain had given her strength, or else it was merely a lucky blow, for the orc’s porcine nose was crushed under the girl’s booted heel.

Its head snapped back as a spatter of crimson beads arched over it, yet the blow forced no more movement in the orc than that. Its fist descended once more before Amelia could make use of the inches and heartbeats the strike bought her.

She gasped as knuckles sank into her stomach, and Astra felt her own guts churn in sympathy for the girl. Amelia folded as the hand was withdrawn, but the orc was ill content to let her lie. It stepped forwards, swinging a foot downwards like the pendulum of an impossibly large clock.

Amelia’s ribs caught the kick, the force delivered in such magnitude that the girl’s magically-anchored body shot through the air like a football, landing in a heap some dozen paces away.

Astra remembered the black-eyed girl’s durability, the way it had seemed to render her blows no more effective than those of a child, and yet the strength of the orc shattered the certainty she’d had in her former enemy’s unbreakableness.

The orc wasted no time in continuing its assault, apparently possessing a mind great enough to understand the danger in leaving this particular foe to recover.

It came upon her like the wind, grabbing her by the head and hoisting her upwards. At the end of its arm she hung some eleven feet from the ground, and then it released its grip and let her fall.

When gravity had dragged her a span nearer the ground, a fist was waiting for her.

She spun from the contact, careening off into the air like one of the fireworks Astra had watched at Selsis all those years ago. Her body spun over and over, head and heels chasing one another so quickly that Astra half-imagined a burning fuse trailing behind her.

Amelia didn’t explode into sparks and lights, merely fell back among the undergrowth. Astra felt something wrap around her hand, tightly enough to almost hurt. Turning, she saw it was Crow’s fingers curling around her even as he stared with terrified eyes at the brutality unfolding before them.

Her own fingers worked their way around his as the orc turned from the still form of Amelia and began lumbering back towards Tenzo.

***

Flint caught his hand as it snaked towards the stock of his musket, forcing himself to inhale and exhale slowly- feeling both lungs work within his chest as the air flowed through him. The calming effect was strong, just enough that he was able to resist replacing an orc’s eye with its volume in lead.

He’d seen plenty of orcs, enough that he was more used to their deaths than those of men. Even so, in his years at Wrath he’d encountered only a handful like the one fighting below him in the arena.

It was a Prime. Bigger, stronger, tougher. Smarter. A beast dangerous enough for entire companies to march leagues for their blood, just to avoid them getting the chance to organise their savage brethren.

However the pit the organisers had gotten one to fight for entertainment, he didn’t want to know. Whoever the pit had decided to put it against children, on the other hand, interested him greatly. It would surely help if he knew which bastard to aim for.

He spat at his feet as he saw it stalk towards the black-cloaked boy.

***

The crowd was as silent as the grave. All the lively cheering had been buried by the crushing display unfolding before them, bets for or against any contestants having been cast aside upon the realisation that death was just as likely as defeat.

Was it though? Astra stared at the crumpled form of Tenzo, sure it would disappear in a puff of light, yet finding herself proven wrong again and again with the orc’s every step.

Why won’t they transport the contestants back out? She wondered, desperately. Did they simply not care about the lives of those giving life to their games?

Her heart crawled into her throat as the creature came within a span of the fallen boy, and though every nerve in her body screamed for her to look away, she found herself unable.

A gnarled hand came down for Tenzo’s throat, meaning to either tear it open or simply snap the neck lining it. Astra’s breath caught within her, Crow’s hand tightened around hers so strongly that it may well have brought out a cry of pain in any other situation.

But then, just as the creature was about to make contact, there was movement behind it. Movement, and noise.

“HEY!” barked a vaguely-familiar voice.

The orc turned, its scarred, malformed features proving themselves human enough that Astra could recognise the surprise in them. Amelia was back on her feet, though recognising her from appearance alone would have been a challenge.

Her hair was a tangled, knotted mess, spattered with dirt and drying blood, with twigs and chipped wood clinging to it in more than one area. Her face was a ruinous mask, nose destroyed so thoroughly as to more closely resemble a puddle.

The cartilage was crushed flat and snapped, pressed down amidst a puddle of congealed ichor. Astra could see where the nostrils’ remains were by the bubbles that emerged and burst among the thick, clotting mass of mucous and gore.

Her lips looked in worse condition than the orcs, and one of the girl’s pitch-black eyes had swollen shut. Yet even bearing such injuries, she smiled.

It was a feral thing. Wide and unrestrained, like the grin of a wild dog. It revealed many teeth, chipped, shattered and dyed crimson by the battle. Yet there was not a scrap of pain or hesitancy visible on it.

Amelia took a step towards the orc, and Astra watched as veins ran across her body like so many streams breaking off from a river. Toned muscles seemed to coil and bulge, her skin tightening as they swelled beneath it. A new torrent of blood wept from her ruined nose, running down her chin, throat and chest.

Memories flooded back to Astra, telling her of a similar transformation- the one she’d been witness to right before her loss to the girl.

She had just enough time to process the light, full-body trembling that seemed to have seized the black-eyed contestant, and then Amelia pounced with all the speed and unrestrained eagerness of a rabid wolf.