*COMPLETE* "People don't believe in us anymore. They don't believe that in the end we will do what is right. We can't let them down. We can't let Ben win."
Decisions made on top of the lonely, wind-swept cliff of Lethinor reverberate around the five...
The first person Allayria sees outside of the courtyard is Caj, perched high in a tree far off to her right. Then, in a sudden shimmer of movement, Kali shifts into view in the tree next to him. Allayria grits her teeth at the sight of the woman, but there are more pressing concerns: namely, the new wall that has sprung up between them and their final destination. She can see Ruben's hand in the twisting vines that weave the net, and she can see his mind in the riddle of space and coordination which hangs in the locked doorway—a puzzle in which the two collected items lock together to unlock the entrance into the courtyard, allowing the winning team inside.
"Ready to be thrown in the air again, Ms. Pennyfeather?"
Allayria turns to see Hiran limping out of the forest. He's looking worse for the wear: dirt, blood, and bruises cake his sides and face; his once lax and languid shoulders are now stiff and tensed.
"What happened to you?" she asks, and he flashes a slightly strained smile at her.
"I was just about to ask the same thing," he answers, gesturing to her knee.
"Nina," she supplies.
"Ah," he answers and then, motioning to the blood on the side of his face, "Rahul."
When Tara and Bora join their teammate, the Periwinkle team learns how busy a day it has been for the Green team. While both Rahul and Durai had been unsuccessful in their abduction attempts, the "lovely Nina," as Hiran calls her, his voice sharpening to an edge, had struck gold: a Halften soldier called Ila from the Scarlet team.
"We ran into one of the others, Peter, on our way down to the lake," Tara says as she hands a canteen to their other teammate, Bora. "He told us what happened, so we took a little detour."
"Did you find Ila? Is she alright?" Lei demands but Hiran winces.
"No," Bora says, his voice a low rumble. Thunderclouds lurk in his dark gaze and Allayria remembers that he too is a Halften soldier, just like Lei and Ila.
"She's alive," Hiran interjects, "but not in the best shape. Peter and Emil are bringing her this way. We went ahead to get Ruben."
"Yeah, well," Allayria mutters and they all turn back to the wall.
It's Fae, with bright splotches of fury painted across her cheeks, who brings it all around. Fae, who barges through the underbrush, her teammates trailing behind her, and takes one look at the wall, another at Hiran, and then another at Allayria.
"I have an idea," she says without any preamble, and the shadow of flint glints in her eyes. "We could either fight over that stupid puzzle, or," she points at the side of Hiran's face, then at Allayria's knee, "we could get even."
"I adore that second option," Hiran answers, and there's a bit of teeth to his smile now.
It's when Fae starts dividing them into groups that they notice the other two. The black team had stayed away as the others gathered, but Julia approaches now, marching with a splotchy, fuming look identical to her fellow Halften soldiers, while Caj lingers a stretch behind, a stray wary of strangers.
"Kali's not joining us?" Hiran asks.
The Smith-caller shakes his head, his dark gaze flickering to Fae before returning to Hiran.
"She wants to solve the puzzle."
While this sole holdout tinkers at the courtyard wall Hiran and Fae set the trap. Lei and the other Halften soldiers climb the trees, Fae scaling up alongside them, as Hiran, Allayria, Finn, and the others sink low into thickets, lurk behind trees.
"Fifteen minutes away, coming from the East," Tara says, and Allayria glances over to see her looking up at the sky. Somewhere above them is a hawk, flying high, and somewhere beside her, Finn squirms. Allayria can almost hear his thoughts—she certainly sees the envious looks he shoots the Roften girl.
Allayria sets a hand on his shoulder.
"Just concentrate on those moles, ok?" she whispers.
The arrow is the first thing the bloodied, limping Green team sees. It flies past Durai's face as he staggers back with a cry, but this is cut short by the stuttering gasp as the earth gives way underneath their feet, a thousand interlinking holes collapsing in a cloud of dust.
Five pairs of boots hit the ground as six bodies crash out from the brush. The four Halften soldiers charge Durai, or "that hulking, pea-brained moron" as Fae called him, while the seven others run for Rahul and Nina, "the slightly smarter pea-brained morons."
Under normal circumstances Allayria would think eleven against three is a little unfair, but after more than six hours of stress, exhaustion, and endangerment, there's something oddly satisfying in the way Tara's elbow cracks down on Nina's nose, the way Rahul, catching sight of little Finn, lurches back into Hiran's incoming fist.
Nobody notices much when Kali breaks through the door, sprinting in and declaring the black team the winner, despite the fact that her two partners still stand outside, one holding Nina Cuortes down and the other wrapping metal manacles around a bloodied Durai. Nobody really minds Ruben either when he sticks his grizzled, perplexed face out from around the courtyard wall. They dump the three offenders onto the ground and sit on them, hungry, sweaty, and all in a desperate need for a bath.
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A/N: Greetings from my phone—my internet appears to be out, but there's always data. Sweet, reliable, expensive data. A short chapter this week, but really one of the trickier to write. It was written and then rewritten and then rewritten and then rewritten...
Next week we settle on a team. Who are we voting for? Personally, I want the kid who freezes people with his mind. Seems like that might come in handy.
