"Kill him!" — "Rip his head off!" — "Extinguish him!"

Hundreds of furious cries reverberated through the arena, mingling together into one meaning: for Henry to die.

He wanted to be furious with Thanatos; he wanted to blame the flier and his leaving for all this so badly that it almost hurt. But no matter how desperately he dug in himself for anger, there was none. Only empty despair and loneliness.

Henry was surrounded by hundreds of creatures but never before in his entire life had he felt more alone. And it hurt . . . everything did. His physical injuries flared with pain, and the ache in his heart grew to match it.

But I can't succumb, a voice in his head reminded him. I challenged myself to survive. Survivors did not succumb. Henry bit his lip until it drowned out all of his other pains. He was not dead, so he hadn't lost yet.

Henry forced his gaze up from the floor and his eyes found a group of gnawers who had assembled a little offside; they whispered with each other and occasionally pointed at him. Were they deciding his fate?

"Hey!" yelled Henry, but nobody paid him any mind. But to his relief, their sight and the way they spoke about him behind his back, as though they had any right to decide his fate, evoked anger—enough anger to overshadow his pain.

He gritted his teeth and forced his misty brain to think. Telling himself to survive was one thing, but the thought alone would not save him. He needed a plan. Anything that actually stood a chance at accomplishing this.

"I did not kill him!" he finally screamed the one thing that he had going for himself—the truth. "This is a misunderstanding. I did not kill Gorger; the fool killed himself!" And he nearly killed me, Henry almost added. But he thought it would be unwise to say this to what appeared to be a flock of his loyal followers.

"You are being rash!" he screamed and his voice cracked. Henry coughed and heaved but he could not stop speaking. He had to get this across somehow. That it was a misunderstanding. That they had no ground upon which to kill him.

"I—"

"Quiet!"

Henry winced and cried when one of the rats who still held him slapped the tip of his tail across his cheek. He twined and twisted, battling the fresh burning of the lash. His vision fragmented and his mouth fell shut.

This was not a trial; he managed to think somewhere at the back of his head. They did not actually care about the truth. All they wanted was a scapegoat, someone to blame for Gorger's death. And Henry was the only one they had.

He was . . . not getting out of this alive.

Every fiber of his wailed in protest at the realization that he had failed his challenge and that there was nothing he could do to still win. Not of his own accord. He was . . . what had he done wrong?

Tears rose in his eyes and he blinked them away angrily. He had not done anything wrong. He had battled here as he had been forced to, and he had won. It wasn't his fault that someone had recognized him.

He had wanted to make the world fight him for every ounce of life in his body. He had wanted to fight until he was physically unable to. But . . . had he any fight left? He was being restrained so that he could barely move. He was . . . alone, against a hundred gnawers. He could not fight.

Their screams assaulted him. They drove into his ears and eyes like nails and suddenly Henry felt like he was drowning. Not in water but in hatred. Their hatred wormed its way into him through every orifice and slowly filled him up from within. He could barely breathe.

Why was he . . . here? The question banged against his mind. Why had he failed? Because he had . . . battled here. No, that hadn't been his fault. He hadn't chosen to battle here. He had been imprisoned and forced. Imprisoned . . . His eyes flung open. He was here because he had been imprisoned . . . because he and Thanatos had argued carelessly. Because he had been careless.

Shame crashed into him, stealing away his last bit of will to breathe. He didn't want to die, but he had condemned himself to death with his own carelessness . . . for the second time now. He was not a survivor; Henry gritted his teeth desperately and fought the rising tears with all his might. He was a goner. Hadn't he honestly been since the fall? Or even sooner?

Thanatos had been right; he had been a fool. For thinking he was somehow stronger, better than any other outcast. He could not be stronger or better than anyone. He could only be Henry.

"No, no, no," a voice cut into his swarming thoughts. "I have a better idea."

Henry's head jerked up to spot the bearer of the rasping voice; it was closer than any of the others.

"We let him share the fate of our king," it said. "We let him fall."

The words speared Henry and a clump of nausea formed at the pit of his stomach. His eyes found the speaker—an awfully familiar cream-colored gnawer who crept closer steadily with an evil grin. It was he who had pointed Henry out to Splintleg before. The comparably small shape with his clumped, light fur and his eyes, which were cold and dead, and filled with every ounce of hatred for him that existed in the room.

"What a fabulous idea, Cleaver," one of the gnawers holding Henry said, and everyone who had assembled around Henry in a loose circle cheered.

The cream-colored rat . . . Cleaver stepped even closer and his sickening grin widened. "Oh, look at him! I think he likes the idea! You do, don't you?" His tail lashed across Henry's cheek, but he didn't allow himself to cry out this time.

Henry would have loved to kick Cleaver in the gut or spit in his face, but he could not muster up enough strength. He had no strength left. He could barely hold his gaze.

The two dozen gnawers near him were all howling with laughter. They tightened their ring around him, snarling and mocking him like the bloodthirsty animals they were. Cleaver was center stage; he circled Henry like a predator taunting his prey. Despite his small size, Henry discerned that he must be a ferocious fighter. His fur was torn by numerous, vicious-looking scars, and he clearly had the respect of the others. He spearheaded not only their witch hunt of Henry; he was the ring leader in general.

"What's the matter, little human, lost your tongue? Or did your flier take it with him when he abandoned you so quickly and without hesitation?"

More laughter.

Henry did not give Cleaver the satisfaction to show how much of a nerve his words had struck. He didn't want it to hurt. But it did anyway.

Somehow, the pain must have crept into his expression because Cleaver wheezed with laughter. "Doesn't it feel good to be betrayed?" More laughter. "Is it not poetic justice?" He rose to his hind legs and even at full height, he was not any taller than Henry. "I heard that he is here because he plotted behind the backs of his fellow humans, that he presumed himself worthy of conspiring with Gorger! And that when his plan failed, he made certain that our glorious king found his death!"

The circle of rats howled with protest. For a moment, Henry considered speaking up again and telling them the truth, but he had already established that they did not care about the truth.

"So, is it not poetic?" Cleaver mocked. "You are a traitor to the humans, and now you have been betrayed by the one individual who has found enough pity in himself to still be in your company."

Henry did not reply. Even if he wanted, he had no words to respond. Thanatos' leaving had not been a betrayal, but it felt like one anyway. It was just as Cleaver had said . . . poetic. Ares had let him fall and Thanatos had abandoned him here. And now he could not even force himself to fight for his life anymore because there was nothing he could have done.

It was over.

"Let him fall! Let him fall!" The chants dug into his ears. Henry could not block them out. He made out other cries as well: "Death to the kingslayer!" — "Avenge the king!"

The arena had once more turned into a seething kettle of bloodlust, but now the blood they lusted after was his.

"Let's go! Let's find somewhere for him to fall!" ordered Cleaver, and the gnawers holding Henry instantly moved. They followed Cleaver out of the arena; he confidently led the way and, from what Henry could see, maybe a dozen gnawers who had previously assembled around him in the arena followed on his heel. And so did their chanting.

"Kingslayer!" one screeched directly into Henry's ear. He recoiled at the whiff of hot, stinking breath that accompanied it.

"Die! Die! Die!" A deeper, husky voice assaulted him from the other side. The same word, over and over. Henry gagged from the fumes they spewed his way, attempting to keep his writhing stomach at bay.

He shut his eyes tightly, struggling to block it all out: the noise, the odor, and the pain. Henry wanted to curl into a ball somewhere in a quiet, dark corner. Somewhere he didn't have to perceive them. Could be at peace.

The rats were dragging him along so that his knees scraped the stone floor; the scattered gravel was grating holes into his pants, but he could barely feel it.

"Here is a nice hole to dump our kingslayer into!" Cleaver's voice rang over the chants of the others and Henry's eyes finally flew open, but what lay ahead made him want to squeeze them shut again.

Inches before him, the ground disappeared into nothingness. The hole was so deep that the faint light of the brazier one of the gnawers had brought with them, likely so that Henry would see his fate before meeting it, didn't reach the ground.

Henry's heart pounded violently against his ribcage and he broke with a cold sweat. He gagged, unable to calm his breaths this time. It was the image of all his recent nightmares. He was always falling into an abyss like this. And this time, he could not fight the new phobia. It had him by the neck and strangled him, driving tears into his eyes.

Only the most despised, the loneliest, and those truly unwanted by all died like this. He did not want to die like this. Make them kill me in any way, he begged in his head. Just not like this. Please, not like this.

"Like the view?" Cleaver said into Henry's ear. "Oh no, what's with that face? Don't be sad!" Every gnawer howled with laughter. "Be honest, are we not doing you a favor by killing you?"

Approving roars.

"What do you still have to live for, anyway?"

More screams.

"Cast out by the humans, abandoned by the flier. What have you left?"

Nothing, Henry thought. The rat was right. That was the worst part.

"Once, you were a prince, I hear. What are you now?"

Nothing. He was good for nothing. Henry had to use all his will so as not to cry. That was the one thing he would not give them. It was all that he could still do—retain a final ounce of his dignity. They could humiliate him and steal everything else, but they would not see him cry.

"Well, what is he now?" Cleaver addressed the crowd.

"A kingslayer!" one said.

"Dead meat!" another.

"A prince of traitors!" it sounded from behind and Cleaver's ears perked up.

"A prince of traitors," he repeated with a dry laugh. "Oh yes, I like that. A Prince of Traitors—a Prince of Rats!"

Henry didn't know what was worse, the title itself or the fact that it was uttered by someone who was himself a gnawer—a rat. Was it not a contradiction? Should it not be a compliment from their mouths?

But it didn't sound like a compliment. It was a slander, and coming from the rats themselves, it sounded even worse than if it had come from anyone else.

"Kill him!" they screamed. "Kill the Prince of Rats!"

Henry's head pounded with the roars. He teetered at the edge of the cliff, kicking down a few loose pebbles. He shut his eyes, attempting to force himself to accept his fate. To die with dignity. A single tear ran down his cheek and he angrily blinked the rest away. Dignity—he could not cry. He would not.

Without warning, the gnawers released Henry and he fell to his knees, directly in front of the impending abyss; his hands clutched the edge. Then a sudden, heavy blow knocked him in the back and down.

"Die!" yelled Cleaver behind him . . . and Henry would die. Because then he fell.

Every fiber of his screamed for help, but his mouth didn't open. He had told himself he wouldn't give them the satisfaction of hearing him cry and he would stick with that.

There it was—the familiar breeze on his face and in his hair. Only then did he fully process that this time there would be no good-willed flier pitiful enough to save him. Not this time. This time, he would die. Here. Now. Like . . . this.

Raw panic speared his chest, lumped his throat, and clogged his mind. He could not see the ground but it couldn't be far. Henry curled into a ball, wrapping his arms around himself, and wished for the impact to come sooner rather than later. Oh, if only it would come at last.

He did not count the seconds or watch, but he would later discern that the ground had been only seconds away . . . when claws dug into the sword on his back and then he was tossed in the air. He flew . . . up, and then he landed with his face pressed into . . . black fur.

"Dammit, Henry," hissed Thanatos. "I leave you for less than an hour and already you are falling to your death again?"

"Death—" cried Henry. He wrapped his arms around the flier's neck so tight that he wondered if he was making it hard for him to breathe. And then he began to sob.

The gnawers were no longer here; they couldn't see him cry anymore, so he cried, and he did not feel any shame for it this time. He was a shaking, sobbing, useless weight on the flier's back—the flier who was not his bond but hadn't abandoned him. Had come back for him and proven that he was not yet so alone that he had to fear dying in this manner.

Thanatos did not interrupt; he let him cry and Henry had no words to express the gratitude he felt for the silence. The lack of questions or judgments that he was not used to from anyone.

"I already told you that I would not let you fall," the flier said after a while. "I had to get out of there or I would have risked my own life needlessly, and we already established that this is not something we would do. I apologize if it seemed as though I had no plans to come back for you."

"Don't ever do that again," Henry sobbed. "Don't . . . ever do that again." He sounded so pitiful that he barely recognized his own voice.

"You know what? Considering what you just went through, I will even disregard that this sounded very much like an order, just now."

Henry remained silent for a while, allowing his tears to dry. "You said that you would leave," he said after a while. "By the lake, you said that you—"

"I was angry," hissed Thanatos. "I am no longer angry. Although I admit that it upsets me that I have to be the one who must teach you these things. You have learned, and that is what matters."

"I'm sorry."

"Oh, by all that you regard as holy, in what kind of condition did that bit of taunting put you?" Thanatos exclaimed; he attempted to sound lighthearted but there was a good portion of unease in his voice too. "Never mind what they said. Besides, consider that this experience at least gave you a new title. Is it not so? Your Highness, oh great Prince of Rats?"

Henry snorted with laughter. In the flier's teasing tone, the term that had supposed to be a slander sounded like an actual achievement.

"Why are we flying in circles?" Henry asked moments later when he pulled himself into an upright position and realized that Thanatos did just that at the bottom of the pit, not in any apparent hurry to leave.

"Because I am waiting for you to get yourself together so much that you will ask me to fly up again and teach those gnawers a lesson."

Henry didn't answer; he drew his sword.

***

For the celebrating gnawers at the top of the cliff, the attack came out of nowhere.

Fueled by overwhelming rage and the rush of adrenaline from the fall, Henry, perched on Thanatos' back, surged up the pit and dealt a fatal blow with his first strike. Blood from the wounded gnawer specked Henry's face and he joined Thanatos' harrowing battle cry.

The space by the pit was narrower than Henry had initially realized, and for the grounded rats, it was not an ideal spot to fight. It was easy to slice gnawer after gnawer, driving each and every one he could reach over the dreaded edge.

But he was not satisfied with only his followers. Henry wanted Cleaver. The gnawer's screech still rang in his ears and every fiber of his body lusted for his demise.

One brown rat attempted to hide behind the brazier that still burned brightly. In his blind rage, Henry struck the brazier instead of the gnawer. As soon as his sword came into contact with the burning fuel, the fat- and blood-soaked blade mixed with it and . . . caught fire.

The flame was meek and blue and would likely extinguish soon, but when Henry halted in his tracks to take it in, it flooded him with an unprecedented surge of confidence. Maybe it wasn't just about surviving by himself, he thought. He would have lost his challenge today had he not found a reliable ally in Thanatos. But he had not lost, and he would not lose. He would win.

Fueled by the rush of that thought, he slashed the burning sword across the gnawer's face, driving him out of his hiding spot.

He didn't stop there, either. Flaming sword raised high above his head, he gave another howl. It ripped out of his mouth and there, perched atop Thanatos' high back, Henry suddenly felt utterly invincible. The remaining gnawers screeched and scattered. They all ogled his sword. Some fled, and some tumbled over the edge without Henry's involvement. And then, at last, he spotted the one he had been looking for—Cleaver.

Henry didn't even have to say anything; Thanatos had spotted him as well and leaped straight at the rat. He had saved himself in a corner, staring at the battered, bloodied duo of the skull-faced flier and the prince on his back with the flaming sword raised for a lethal strike.

Henry hesitated, then slid off Thanatos' back. The tip of his sword pointed at Cleaver's neck. The gnawer howled from the fire that now singed his whiskers and fur, but Henry's face was unyielding stone. "The Prince of Rats sends his regards," he said, and pierced Cleaver's throat.