The Arena Read Online Free Page A

longer. I grabbed my staff, thinking of tapping into that energy, when an idea slammed to the forefront of my mind. If it worked, we would live; if it didn’t, we would die. But at least we would do so together.
    The Demons surrounded us on all sides and were now becoming more aggressive in throwing themselves against my shield. Each attempt they made weakened me. The dark energy had stopped shooting into the night sky, leaving us in silence except for the brief sizzle as a Demon rebounded off of my shield. Most of the Demons had run off into the night, spreading out in every direction, but more than fifty still encircled us.
    With my staff in hand, I focused all its energy into myself and, with one last push, I thrust all of the energy outward with as much force as I could. The result was more spectacular than I would have believed. Every Demon within twenty-five feet of us disintegrated. The top of the earth was scorched black in a perfect circle around us, and not a single Demon was left standing.
    I removed my coat and used it to cover Sarah’s naked human form. Once she was covered, I kissed her gently on the lips. “I love you,” I whispered as I pulled away from her lips, as tears of joy fell from my face. We were alive, and we would be able to keep fighting. There was so much work to be done. Before unconsciousness could grab me, I felt Sarah stir in my lap. I could have sworn I heard her say, “I love you, too,” before I passed out.

2
Stillman, Present Day
    I hung up the phone , thoughts reeling from what the Council had just told me. The man leading the rebellion had a son. How had they found out? How could they have possibly confirmed it? I remembered the decision the Council made like it was yesterday. Had thirty years really slipped by since the Council decided to put down the Ascendancy’s rebellion? What could they have possibly found out that led to the decision to kill one of our own? Was it the constant fear of losing their station in life? The Council of the Gifted had renounced the teachings of the Ascendancy as hearsay. They dismissed its leaders as false prophets, branding them as traitors to the Council and declaring that anyone supporting them would be considered an outlaw.
    The founding families had no choice but to follow the Council’s decree. In an effort not to look weak, the families put their own sanctions in place and gladly sought out and handed over members of the Ascendancy. Adam did what he could to protect them, but too many families didn’t believe the Council would actually go to such lengths. When the Council found out that despite their sanction that the Ascendancy and its rebellion still had the support of the masses, it drove them to action. The Council voted to set an unheard-of precedent. For the first time in our kind’s history, the Council declared war against some of our own.
    The Council sent out a message to Adam and told him that they were willing to stop any and all hostilities against them if he and the ruling members of the rebellion would agree to a meeting. The Council agreed to celebrate Ada’s latest victory against the Demons and to welcome the Ascendancy back into the fold. Instead, the rebellion leaders left that meeting in chains.
    Adam had not brought all of the rebellion’s leaders to the meeting as the Council had asked him to do. Fearing that the meeting would be a trap, he left John in charge of the Ascendancy. He publically rallied our people against the Council, and in the end, they were forced to release the rebellion’s leaders. The Council let years pass by and took no further action, but they had not forgotten the humiliation that they had suffered at the hands of the young upstart. Twelve years to the day of their bitter defeat, they sent a team to America in secret to kill the man who had humbled them. Now eighteen years later, we had discovered that that man had a son.
    I was still trying to wrap my head around how this would affect me.