* * *
Jahrra was almost shot five more times as she crept back through the city, searching for any sign of Eydeth’s team. Curse them, where are they?! Dread pooled in her stomach and sweat trickled down her back once again as she imagined that perhaps this had been their plan all along; to make her think they were plotting only to sneak into her camp while she went out looking for them. Jahrra was just about to turn back when an arrow whizzed by her head, a flash of yellow catching her attention as it disappeared into a pile of hay.
Mission accomplished! she thought as she sent a violet arrow towards one of Eydeth’s teammates before turning and running directly back towards camp.
She was winded by the time she reached the top of their hill. She took a few moments to catch her breath before shouting, “Gieaun, Scede! Where are you guys?! Eydeth shot at me and I think he saw me come this way!”
She waited a few moments but was met with nothing but silence. She released a few curses then called out again, trudging back and forth between the redwoods, “Rhudedth, Pahrdh? Kihna? Where are you guys, you were supposed to stay and guard the flag!”
Jahrra turned to face the street below, one hand placed on her hip, the other letting her crossbow hang loosely at her side, as she donned a bewildered look. “Maybe they just left to scout the boundaries,” she mused in a not-so-quiet voice.
In the next moment something hard smacked Jahrra on the side of the face, causing her head to whip to the side and her vision to become clouded with stars. What the . . . ?
She quickly held her hand up to her temple and pulled it away to see if she was bleeding, but the moisture on her fingers wasn’t red, it was yellow.
Hot anger welled up in her stomach as she snapped her head upwards. She scanned the bottom of the hill and was nearly hit again with another bolt. This one managed to graze her hair.
“What are you getting at Eydeth!?” she shouted angrily. “Head shots don’t count you idiot!”
She moved herself more securely behind the redwood, willing the pounding in her head and the ache in her temple to go away. Her eye was watering and she was livid, but she had to control her temper or Eydeth would get what he wanted.
He casually stepped out from behind the building he was using as cover. Unfortunately, it would still be hard to get a clean shot at him.
He held his crossbow loosely, another yellow-tipped arrow resting and ready to be fired.
“There’s something nasty on your face and I was trying to kill it,” he sniffed.
A torrent of chuckles answered him, all of them coming from the edges of Jahrra’s territory.
She seethed in anger. There would most definitely be a bruise on her face tomorrow. No Jahrra, she thought as she ran the plan through her mind once more, just have patience. Just get him and his cronies to move in a little closer . . .
“Where are your worthless friends?” Eydeth asked. “I heard you calling out for them, but you got no answer. That was pretty stupid. Now do I not only know the location of your base camp, but I know that you have no backup either.”
Despite his assurance that she was alone, Eydeth stepped carefully up the hillside, his head swiveling in every direction as he checked for an ambush.
Jahrra held her breath when he tried to peer into the redwood trees’ branches, but when his gaze returned to her, she let it out slowly. He hadn’t seen them . . .
“They didn’t leave me here!” she answered haughtily, hoping that her irritation would lead his thoughts in another direction.
“Oh really? Then why were you so angry just a second ago when no one answered? Ha!”
Eydeth relaxed a fraction and Jahrra took advantage of his claim.
“No! They’re hiding just a few feet away, waiting to attack you!”
Sometimes it was good to go with the truth, and this time it paid off. Eydeth threw his head back and laughed, lowering his weapon. “How could they be hiding? You can’t blend in with a wooded hillside when you’re wearing white with bright colors splattered all over it! We would have seen them by now!”
He turned his head and whistled. “You guys can come out, she’s here by herself.”
He turned back to face her, his eyes gleaming with malice as his sister and four of their friends stepped out from behind the buildings and climbed down from further up the hill.
“You’re dead Nesnan,” Eydeth breathed as he lifted his crossbow and took aim once again. His teammates followed suit.
“Oh, I don’t think so . . .” Jahrra muttered under her breath. “NOW!” she shouted as she quickly threaded her crossbow through her arm and threw herself into a back handspring.
All of a sudden, the hillside was alive with arrows, their purple and yellow dyed tips marking the ground, the trees and anything else that got in the way. Jahrra managed to get to an oak tree just up the slope with only a few shots to the leg, but Eydeth and his team were faring far worse.
“Where are the arrows coming from?!” he screeched as he searched the trees once again, backing up to take refuge behind the buildings.
Jahrra managed to make it ten feet up into the tree before she stopped and pulled her crossbow off of her arm. She quickly readied an arrow and scanned the forest floor for possible targets, her grin growing wide when she noticed Ellysian retreating back up the hill. She was moving slowly, her eyes searching the redwood trees, so she didn’t see Jahrra following her progress with her own weapon.
Ellysian’s back was to Jahrra, so she took a breath, aimed for a spot between her shoulder blades and . . . lowered her aim to the middle of her back, her lower back . . . When the arrow was lined up with a spot just below Ellysian’s tailbone, Jahrra released the arrow and relished the screech that ensued as the Resai girl went scrambling up the hillside, her backside splattered with dark purple paint. Two more purple smudges decorated her back before she found cover.
Remembering that they had a flag to defend, Jahrra whipped her head around and breathed a sigh of relief when she spotted the purple banner, standing proudly between the two redwoods. She had guessed correctly; their territory was too well defended for anyone to just run in and grab the flag. It wasn’t worth the risk when six people were shooting at them from the trees.
“Retreat!” Eydeth screamed as he scrambled down the hill.
Jahrra caught one last glimpse of him before he rushed out onto the cobblestones below with his teammates. She laughed out loud when she counted the paint marks on his back. Plenty to put their team out of the running.
When they were certain that the enemy had fled their camp, the six friends climbed down from their respective hideouts: Gieaun, Kihna and Rhudedth from the redwoods and Pahrdh and Scede from the second story porches of the closest buildings.
“That was fabulous!” Pahrdh proclaimed, throwing his arms in the air and giving Gieaun and his sister a hug.
Scede looked as if he wished to extend the same gesture towards Kihna, but before he could decide, she made the decision for him.
“You did so great!” she said as she stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek. “You shot everyone at least twice!”
Jahrra hid a grin as she watched her friend turn bright red.
Before any more celebrations could take place, the distant school bell began ringing.
Jahrra brightened immediately and glanced at all her grinning friends. “The game’s over! Let’s go see if we’ve won!”
The six of them gathered their own flag and carefully removed the other three from their hiding places and ventured back towards the schoolhouse. They walked confidently through the center of town, though they kept a wary eye out for people seeking revenge. Luckily, there were enough adult volunteers around to catch anyone trying to cheat.
The look on Eydeth’s face when they finally all gathered in front of the schoolhouse was worth all the hard work Jahrra and her friends had exerted that day. When he saw them, he glared maliciously, but all Jahrra did was s
mile widely and flap out his banner as if she were taunting a bull. He crossed his arms and darted his eyes in another direction, his face turning dark red in anger.
It took Professor Tarnik and the adult volunteers a good twenty minutes to tally up all the points for each team. Jahrra patiently tolerated their examination, wondering if maybe she'd been hit more than she thought. The other teams, she had observed, looked just as messy as she and her friends did.
Finally, Tarnik had all the tallies and he was ready to proclaim a winner.
“In third place is the blue team. Although they lost their banner, they suffered the fewest wounds and were able to inflict enough on the other teams to earn a sizeable score.”
Everyone clapped politely.
“In second place, the red team. They were able to successfully capture the blue team’s banner and receive very few wounds as well.”
The applause continued.
“And in first place, the team with the most points and the winners of a day off from school . . . the purple team!”
The clapping and cheering was louder this time, even though Eydeth’s team didn’t participate.
When everyone quieted down, Tarnik continued blandly, “Although they garnered the most wounds from other teams, they also inflicted the most onto others. And,” he paused and gave Jahrra a suspicious glare, “they managed to keep their own flag and to capture three others. Congratulations.”
Jahrra didn’t think his best wishes were sincere, but she smiled anyways as she and her friends started making plans for their day off.