Chapter 102

Eric

I tightened the cloth wraps around my fists, feeling the familiar ache in my knuckles as I stared across the sandy expanse at Darius. With Adrian and Heather gone, it was just the two of us left.

Darius grinned at me, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “Quite a show you and your girl put on back there,” he said, loud enough for just us to hear over the roaring crowd.

I allowed myself a slight smirk, although my stomach still twisted painfully when I thought about how close I had just come to losing Rowena forever—all thanks to Adrian and some demented scheme to assassinate the Northern princess.

“My girl?” I said, feigning ignorance.

Darius smirked at me. “Oh, come on; everyone has suspected that she’s not actually a Griffith for months. And we both know what you two were doing the other day in her office.”

The tips of my ears turned pink, but I couldn’t help but shake my head and laugh. Of course everyone had known. I hadn’t exactly put in the greatest effort to hide it since I found out that she was my mate.

But then, my opponent’s expression turned serious. “Listen, Eric... After what you did, saving the Princess like that? I’ll let you win. This title should be yours.”

I shook my head firmly. “No way. I want to win fair and square.”

Darius opened his mouth to protest, but I cut him off with a hard look. “I mean it. Don’t pull any punches, understand? Give me everything you’ve got.”

The warrior held my stare for a long moment before finally giving a resolute nod. “Alright, if you insist. May the best warrior win, then.”

“May the best warrior win,” I echoed.

The bell rang then, the announcer’s voice shouting over the din. “Warriors! To your positions for the first round!”

Squaring my shoulders, I backed up several paces until I was the required distance from Darius. We faced each other, hands raised in fighting stances as we waited tensely for the signal to begin.

The deafening roar of the crowd swelled around us. I could pick out individual voices cheering for me—warriors I had trained with for months, students I had mentored. And there, rising above it all…

“You’ve got this, Eric! Finish him!”

Rowena. My heart swelled at the sound of her voice. I caught a glimpse of her curly hair off to the side, her expression focusing. She wore her pristine white combat manager’s uniform today, although there was a tiny splatter of my blood on her shoulder from when I had taken that arrow for her—and I would have taken a thousand more.

With her by my side as my mate and my combat manager, there was no way I could lose this fight.

The bell clanged three times, signaling the start of the first round. Darius and I sprang into motion, circling each other as we traded jabs and feints. The crowd continued to roar, but the noise turned into a dull hum in the background. It was just us here, our bare feet in the sand and the breath in our lungs.

Suddenly, Darius lunged at me, his fists a blur as he rained down a combination of hooks and uppercuts. I backpedaled, deflecting each strike while searching for an opening in his defenses.

There—he overextended on his right hook! Seizing my chance, I launched a powerful counterstrike, aiming a thrust kick straight at his ribs.

However, Darius saw it coming at the last instant. He twisted away, avoiding the blow while whipping around with a vicious roundhouse kick aimed straight at my head.

Gritting my teeth, I managed to get my arms up just in time to block the strike. His foot slammed into my forearms with a bone-jarring force. I grunted against the strain, sweat rolling down my back as I felt the torn muscles in my shoulder screaming.

With a mighty shove, I broke free and we sprang apart again, circling one another once more.

All too soon, after a series of combination moves and bruises, the bell rang out to signal the end of the first round with Darius as the victor. Sucking in ragged breaths, I pivoted and strode back over to where Rowena stood with water and a towel.

“You’re dropping your guard too low after your combinations,” she said without preamble. “Darius is going to start looking for body shots if you keep doing that.”

I grunted, grimacing as I rotated my throbbing shoulder. “Yeah, no kidding. This would be a lot easier if Adrian’s arrow hadn’t hit me.”

Rowena’s jaw tightened at his name. Wordlessly, she began gently probing at the bandaged wound on my shoulder.

“Tell me if this hurts,” she murmured.

I hissed involuntarily as a jolt of pain lanced through my arm. “Yep, that’ll do it.”

Rowena quickly checked the tightness of the wrapping. “Here, let me adjust this. Keeping it more secure will help restrict your movement so you’re not overcompensating as much.”

I stayed still as she began tucking and smoothing the bandage, my eyes wandering her face as she worked.

In that moment, I remembered how she used to tend to my cuts and scrapes when we were kids roughhousing after training, how sloppily she used to slap the band-aids over them even though she tried her hardest. She may have always had that combat manager streak in her, but she had become more efficient and knowledgeable over the years.

Although, she still stuck her tongue out just a little bit when she worked. I never told her because it was too cute for her to stop.

“There,” Rowena finally said, tying it off. “I know it’s not perfect, but hopefully that’ll help for now. Now get back out there and win, dammit.”

“Yes, Your Highness,” I replied with a mock bow, my arms stretched out to my sides. Rowena rolled her eyes and swatted at me.

With that, the bell clanged again for the next round, and I marched back out to meet Darius. This time, I forced myself to keep my guard higher and tighter to protect my body.

The fight raged on much like the first, both of us battered by now but refusing to give up. Darius was relentless, but so was I. Every time one of us gained an advantage, the other would counter and slip away before a decisive blow could land.

Finally, soaked in sweat, the second round ended with my victory this time. I helped Darius to his feet, our chests heaving, as the bell rang out again.

“Water break! Prepare for the final round!”

I staggered back to Rowena, gulping down her offered canteen while she checked my bandages again.

“You’re doing amazing,” she said intensely, “but Darius is learning your fighting style and he’s starting to match you move for move. You need to catch him off guard somehow if you’re going to win the third round.”

I frowned, thinking hard as I sucked down more water. Catch Darius off guard… a plan began forming. Something unorthodox that he would never see coming.

Offering Rowena a grin, I pulled her close until our foreheads touched. “I think I’ve got just the thing, Ro,” I murmured, “but you’ve gotta trust me, alright?”

She nodded and pressed her hands into my chest, pushing me back with a newfound redness in her cheeks. “You know I trust you. Do whatever you have to win.”

I shot her a wink. “Don’t take your eyes off me, then.”

With another clang of the bell, I made my way back out to meet Darius. He stood waiting, sweat-soaked and tired but with fire in his eyes.

The bell rang again. Darius and I charged, trading another flurry strikes and counterstrikes. He landed a kick combo to my ribs—but I kept pressing, driving him back toward the center of the fighting pit.

Before I knew it, our limbs had locked together in a stalemate, both of us straining until… I suddenly dropped into a crouch, over-committing to a low defensive stance. Just as I anticipated, Darius reacted by rearing back to hammer down an overhead strike to my exposed head.

In that split second, I exploded upwards, using every ounce of my momentum to launch a devastating uppercut that slammed squarely into Darius’s solar plexus.

He froze, all the air driven from his lungs. Throwing my whole body into it, I spun and landed a final brutal heel kick to his abdomen. Darius’s eyes went wide before he flew back against the sand, coughing and sputtering.

“I yield!” he choked out, slapping his hand on the sand. “Yield, yield!”

The arena seemed to erupt in complete pandemonium around us as I stood over my fallen opponent. Darius blinked up at me dazedly before slumping fully onto his back, his chest heaving for air.

A massive roar shook the entire arena as the crowd lost their minds. Warriors, students, spectators—all were on their feet, screaming and cheering my name over and over.

“Eric! Eric! Eric!”

Grinning, I held my hand out to my opponent. He paused for a moment, still gasping for breath, before he took it and let me haul him to his feet. We slapped each other on the backs good-naturedly.

“You’re one hell of a fighter,” Darius breathed, a choked laugh escaping his lips before he nodded toward Rowena. “Go on. Go to your girl.”

Turning, I saw Rowena standing there—jumping on her toes, her face split from ear to ear with the widest smile I had ever seen. I didn’t see anyone else in that moment; I didn’t see the announcer bringing me my trophy, nor did I see my parents running out onto the sand.

I only saw her.

Striding toward her, I threw my arm around her waist and pulled me close.

“Kiss me.”