The next day of the trial, the crowd erupted with applause as Daryn and Lyra were called onto the stage for their trial. It seemed the pair had gathered quite a number of fans since the trials began. The judges took their places, and the priests activated the hex. With a loud bang, the stage shifted, assimilating the form of the challenge of the day. The arena narrowed into a ring of low stone and dim torchlight, a stage set for choices rather than blows.
Clearly, this arena's designer had a taste for theatre. The arena did not merely test skill; it staged temptation. Where the maze had tested touch, and the bridge had tested timing, the Betrayal Theatre would be testing the small, corrosive decisions that could be made in a single breath.
The Betrayal Theatre was a ring within the hex where the rules of combat blurred into the rules of conscience. Actors moved through the smoke like currents. Actors—trained, convincing, and dangerous—moved among the smoke and rune-light, offering bargains in voices that sounded like salvation.
Merchants with too-bright smiles, soldiers with hollow eyes, a priest whose stole was immaculate and whose voice had been practiced until it sounded like mercy. None of them carried steel. They carried offers while the arena recorded every choice: a ledger of decisions that could be read by priests and gods alike.
Lyra and Daryn entered with the reliquary still warm in their pack and the rune-slates folded beneath Lyra's robe. The air tasted of old incense and dust; the crowd's murmur sharpened into a single, expectant thread. The theatre's enchantments recorded more than movement: every token touched, every bargain considered, every hesitation was logged into the arena's ledger. Compromise here did not vanish with applause. It became a debt that could be called in later, in the form of rune cascades and traps that punished moral shortcuts with blood.
Actors would offer bribes, false intelligence, or promises of safety in exchange for abandoning a rule—leaving what is yours exposed, handing over a sigil, or sacrificing a partner's position for personal gain. Any team that accepted a hostage-like bargain would not only lose the immediate advantage; the arena would record the choice and later trigger lethal rune cascades keyed to that ledger entry to delay progress. Turning a moral compromise into a physical hazard. This designer wanted to know not only whether champions could win, but wanted to know what champions would trade for speed: honour, memory, a comrade's safety. The actors moved like a current through the arena, offering alternatives: safety for a price, knowledge for a favour, a shortcut for a betrayal. Each offer came with a small, visible token—an amulet, a sealed note, a promise.
Before the Trial, Lyra and Daryn had written a small set of rules and signed them with the kind of dry, practical solemnity that suited a priestess and a moonborn. Rule One: Lyra's explicit veto on hostage-like choices overrode aggression. Rule Two: Any bribe required a two-signal acceptance—vocal assent plus a negative heel-tap—to be valid. These rules were not romantic; they were insurance. They were also a test of whether two people could bind themselves to a future they might not yet understand. It was a small, bureaucratic safeguard, but it was the kind of thing Lyra trusted: rules that could be recorded and defended later.
He found them near a low wall of rune-stone, where the arena's light pooled like oil. The faux-priest approached with the right mixture of humility and entitlement, his stole immaculate, his eyes the practiced gray of someone who had learned to read need, his hands empty but for a small, sealed satchel he produced with a flourish. The satchel's seal glowed faintly—an arena token that would register acceptance if touched. He bowed with the right mixture before he spoke;
"You carry something dangerous," he said, voice honeyed and practiced. "A reliquary. The gods will hunger for it. I can take it to safety. Leave it with me and your partner will be spared the next test."