More and more questions crowded into my mind. Mo . . . he had to know about this. So did Claudia. After all, they’d been friends with my mom and Seleste. So why hadn’t they ever told me about Seleste and Deah?

But I pushed all the questions and revelations aside. Just because we shared the same DNA didn’t make us family. Not really. It didn’t matter if I was related to Seleste and Deah. It didn’t have any bearing on the tournament at all. Because Deah was my opponent, the person standing between me and what I wanted, and I wasn’t about to go easy on her just because some secret had been dragged out into the light.

So I stepped forward and listened to the official go through the rules a final time, even though everyone had already heard them before. Deah looked up at the Draconi box, and so did I. Seleste was sitting there, front and center, and she gave a big, cheery wave to her daughter before her gaze moved to me. She hesitated, then waved at me as well, although not as enthusiastically.

Victor was also in the box, sitting and talking to Blake, the two of them totally ignoring Deah, even though this was her big moment. Or maybe they were so sure she was going to win that they didn’t even have to watch the match.

I looked into Deah’s eyes, feeling all of her tight, pinching hurt. She desperately wanted her father’s love and approval, and she never felt she had it, no matter what she did or how much she accomplished. Not even now, when she was in the spotlight, poised to bring such glory to the Draconis and win the Tournament of Blades for the third straight year.

It made me feel sad for her.

My mom might be dead, but she’d never ignored me the way Victor and Blake were ignoring Deah. She might still have both her parents, but in her own way, she was as alone as I was. Katia had been wrong. Deah Draconi didn’t win at everything, and she certainly didn’t have everything.

She didn’t have very much at all.

Seleste noticed that Victor and Blake were ignoring Deah, so she waved to her daughter again, a big, happy smile on her face. I sensed that some of the hurt eased in Deah’s heart, and she waved back to her mom. Then she dropped her gaze from the box and focused on her sword, swinging it around and around in her hand, gearing up for the fight.

I stared up at Seleste, and she looked at me again. Our gazes locked, letting me feel her aching desperation for me to throw the match and let Deah win. I wondered why it was so important and why she thought it was the only way that Deah and I could save each other. Even if I did throw the match, it wasn’t like Deah and I would automatically become besties. It wasn’t like we would ever be friends. Not when she was a Draconi and I was a Sinclair.

Not when her father had murdered my mother.

So I turned away from Seleste and looked over at the Sinclair box. Devon, Felix, Claudia, Angelo, Reginald, and Mo were all up there, with Oscar zip-zip-zipping around faster than ever before. All of them were looking at me, grinning, clapping, and flashing me thumbs-ups, but I focused on Devon. Our gazes locked, and his warm pride filled me from head to toe. Win or lose, friends or something more, he’d always be there to support me.

That knowledge shattered the last part of the shell around my heart, letting all the feelings I had for Devon pour in. I just stood there, with all these emotions flooding my body. Warm happiness. Rock-hard certainty. And a hot, dizzying rush that made my heart soar. But for once, they weren’t someone else’s emotions—they were mine.

Once again, Devon had stormed past all of my defenses without even trying, just by being the good guy that he truly was. Word by word, smile by smile, thoughtful thing by thoughtful thing, Devon had chipped away at the cold, brittle shell that coated my heart, the one that had encased it ever since my mom had died. I wanted to tell him that—and so much more.

But now wasn’t the time for Devon and me, so I dropped my gaze from his and focused on Deah again.

“Good luck,” she said in a soft voice. “May the best fighter win.”

“Yeah,” I said, tightening my grip on my sword. “You too.”

The official lifted his hand, then dropped it.

Deah and I both raised our weapons and charged at each other.

My sword met Deah’s, the resulting clang so loud that you could hear it throughout the stadium. This wasn’t just about two people fighting each other to win a contest; it was representative of our two Families fighting as well, and the epic clash that had been going on between the Sinclairs and Draconis for years.

Deah and I stood in the middle of the stone ring, our swords locked together, each one of us trying to throw the other off, neither one of us having any success. Neither of us had speed or strength Talents, so we were evenly matched. I’d have to fight her with my wits and skills, like I had Devon.

I didn’t have a problem with that.

Finally, we both backed off, untangling our swords and circling around and around each other. Then we both charged at each other again, whipping our swords back and forth, and back and forth, and falling into the steps we’d both danced to a thousand times before.

All the while, the crowd was going crazy, cheering, yelling, clapping, and screaming with every move Deah and I made, with every clang of our swords and every smash of our feet in the trampled grass. This was the last match of the tournament, and they wanted it to be a good one. Well, I planned to give them their money’s worth—before I beat Deah.

But the longer we fought, the brighter Deah’s blue eyes glowed, and the more her movements became exactly like . . . mine. The way she held her sword, the way she moved, even the snarl of her lips—it was all like a mirror image of myself—and I realized that she was using her mimic power.

The cold chill of her magic radiated off her body, and my own transference power stirred weakly in response. But unless she actually used her power on me in some tangible way—hit me, tripped me, whatever—then I couldn’t absorb her magic and use it against her. I couldn’t use her magic to make myself stronger. This wasn’t the first time something like this had happened, but I found it more frustrating than ever before because if I was just a little bit stronger, I could overpower her and win the match.

So the fight dragged on . . . and on . . . and on....

Since I was more or less fighting myself at this point, I couldn’t win, but neither could Deah. One minute passed, then two, then three, and we fought on, both of us starting to suck wind. With every blow we landed, the crowd gasped, thinking that this was going to be the moment when one of us cut the other and drew first blood. But I blocked her blows, and she thwarted mine, and the fight raged on.