The Changeling Chronicles Books 1-3 by Emma L. Adams

Author:Emma L. Adams
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Emma Adams

13

The crowd roared.

Another bloodthirsty bout had just come to an end, and the evidence was strewn all over the arena. Several security guards carried the limp form of Sabre—imaginative name there—past the screaming front row of rowdy spectators. The victor, a horrifying mass of tentacles who’d spit slime all over the arena and nearly drowned its opponent, transformed back into the innocuous form of an eight-year-old girl.

I wasn’t entirely sure the last ten minutes hadn’t been a hallucination. Supposedly, ‘Lilac’ was a chimera faerie who could transform into whatever animal she felt like. So she’d picked a poisonous land-dwelling octopus and left the crew a hell of a mess to clean up.

One of the hobgoblin’s faerie guards moved in, waving a hand, and the slime disappeared. Thank god for that. Fighting on an ice rink would be preferable to fighting knee deep in slime. I’d been put up against a Summer half-faerie known as Raptor. I’d watched Jurassic Park as a kid and was pretty sure I knew what to expect.

The hobgoblin called the match, and I stood up at the same time as Lilac skipped past.

“Might see you in the next round,” she whispered to me as she passed. Creepy.

Raptor was a raven-haired male half-faerie who wore both armour and a bird-shaped mask. The armour would make it hard to land a hit on him. I’d need to use magic first.

I faced him across the arena, already tugging my magic into place. It seemed restless tonight, keeping up an ever-burning glow that would have drawn attention had it not been for all the other magic pouring off the crowd. They’d worked up into a frenzy, and as this was the last match of the night, the noise climbed to a fever pitch. Drunk on glamour and faerie cocktails passed amongst the crowd, they screeched and shouted after me, expecting a good show.

Raptor’s face was entirely hidden by the mask so I couldn’t see his expression. I studied the armour instead. It covered his body from shoulders to knees, leaving his arms exposed. I could work with that.

His hands flexed, and long claws sprouted from his fingers. Bird’s claws. Oh, shit.

He launched himself at me, and I spun around, ducking his outstretched hands. Since he hadn’t used magic, I risked dimming my shield down and turned it into offensive mode instead. Streams of blue energy rippled from my palms, forcing Raptor to dodge to the side. I’d practised earlier—a lot—but the last time my magic had been this unruly was in Faerie.

Hope that’s a good sign.

Raptor spun around, claws outstretched, and ran at me again with the speed and agility of a faerie warrior. With magic humming through my veins and manifesting in swirls of blue energy around my palms, my own instincts were equally sharp. I fired a blast of energy at him which knocked into one of his clawed hands, sending him sideways. Raptor made a snarling noise, and wings sprouted from his back.

Crap.

Even with magic enhancing my speed, I couldn’t jump high enough to catch an opponent when he was in the air.

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