“How many rounds?”
“This will be number three.”
“Who's winning?” Alf asked him.
The Were leaned forward, looking interested for the first time. “Pack Leader Nikolas wasn't doing so well during the last round. He looked very ill. Pack Leader Kain was giving him his money's worth but Pack Leader Nikolas pulled through. He was doing better this round: he broke Pack Leader Kain's collarbone but then he seems to have gotten even worse than he was in the second round. I don't think it will go on much longer.”
Jaz's hand stiffened and Alf tightened his grip around it.
“It's been a long fight. It has to end sometime,” Alf muttered.
The Were nodded. “Well, go in, before you miss it.”
He let them pass and followed behind them as Alf led Jaz down several flights of metal stairs until they reached an underground maze with many passageways that led to unknown destinations on both sides. The echoes of the roaring crowd reverberated through every tunnel. Jaz's heart began beating faster. Alf's grip remained firm and his thumb traced over her hand soothingly.
They reached a large hallway, where the noise was thunderous and frightening. She glanced up, fearing the ceiling would fall down on them any second. There were three wide, metal stairways. They led to the crowd's seats above them.
Jaz wondered what was going through Nik's head right now. Was he terrified? Was he really sick? Did he know what was happening to him?
“Go on up. They'll start in a few minutes.”
“Can't we go see Pack Leader Nikolas now?” Jaz asked the Were, trying to hide the desperation in her voice.
“'Fraid not. Only those who he assigned to accompany him in the arena can see him. Until the end.”
The end, said a hollow voice in Jaz's soul.
Alf touched the small of her back and guided her up the steps. The Were came up behind them, slamming his fist against the metal door a few times. Miraculously, the Were on the other end heard it over the din. The door opened with a groan and then the booming, ear-popping noise molested Jaz's ears and brain. She was incapacitated, stunned and unable to move, only until Alf's gentle hand pushed her into the arena.
When she looked up, all she could see was a rowdy crowd supported high in something resembling a metal version of a Roman arena, circling a lowered floor in the middle. She scanned around the enormous room in awe and fear.
At the sounds of pained grunts from two men, she looked down towards the middle of the arena. She zoomed in on the half naked bodies and the sweaty, bloody torsos of two opponents fighting violently inside a disturbing metal cage in the shape of a dome; one with dark shoulder-length hair, damp and clinging to his drenched neck and face; the other, his back facing her, standing taller than his opponent and leaner, with a shaven head that was bleeding in several places. She nearly fainted when he turned to reveal his face.
Alf caught her before she fell back down the metal stairs. The guard shut the door just then and she was trapped inside the death pit. She gagged and Alf took her hand, somehow finding a seat as she followed blindly through the haze of people and the stench of sweat and blood. He propped her down in a seat and handed her a bottle of water.
After a minute of slow sipping she became more herself again and tried to remember what she needed to do. “We have to warn him.”
“Even if he knows already, it won't help him. There's no cure for hemlock poisoning.”
Jaz reeled in her seat as she locked eyes on him. “Hemlock?”
Alf's blue gaze pierced through her. “It's the only poison I know of that is dangerous to us. That has any affect on us.”
“What about snake venom?”
Alf shook his head. “It hurts. We feel it for a few minutes, then it disappears.” Jaz raised her brows in bewilderment. Alf added, “Hemlock is our Achilles heel. Our kryptonite. There's no poison I've heard of that can kill us apart from that.”
“But what if they don't want him dead? Just weakened?”
“Hemlock is still the better option. You don't need too much of it and it doesn't have a strong taste when masked by food. It has a mousy smell but wouldn't be noticed in food unless you were looking for it.”
Jaz winced every time she heard Nik's grunts of pain through the roars and cries of the people around her.
“I'm gonna go and talk to the judges,” Alf said, scanning across the arena.
“I thought when we got here, we'd rush in here and scream for the fight to stop,” she said as he got up.
“If you want to be killed before you'd have time to explain, then sure.”
She fidgeted in her seat, tucking her chin to her chest.