They came for me before I had even finished eating breakfast.
Two guards walked me straight to the center of the arena, the same one where the whole school gathered for important events, and hundreds of eyes locked onto me the second I stepped through the gate. My legs still ached from yesterday, my arm still throbbed under the bandage I had hidden so carefully. Every part of me felt like it needed another day, at least, before anyone asked it to do anything hard again. None of that seemed to matter to anyone but me, and I had learned a long time ago that wanting rest and getting it were two very different things.
"There she is." A whisper moved through the crowd like wind through dry grass. "The shadow girl." "Did you hear what she did in the ritual?" "She's dangerous." The words follow
