Unfortunately, he did neither.
“Listen up, everyone,” Hunter said when he appeared out of the forest like a wisp of smoke. “This weekend you’re going off-campus for some field training. I want you all to grab the bag with your name and inside you’ll find everything you need to survive until tomorrow evening.” He pointed to a cluster of backpacks under a tree and gestured for everyone to move forward.
When Alex picked up the pack labelled with her name, she had to stifle a grunt—it was much heavier than she’d expected. She watched in bafflement when the much smaller Pipsqueak lifted her own bag with ease, and even the always-whining Skyla didn’t complain when she strapped hers to her back. Alex resisted the temptation to see if someone had put rocks in her pack as a joke as she heaved it across her shoulders.
“This assignment is about teamwork,” Hunter instructed the group. “You’ll need to utilise the skills you’ve already learned while being innovative enough to adapt to an unknown environment.” Hunter pointed to the tree where they’d picked up the bags. Just above head height was an arrow lodged in its bark. “This arrow is specially made to transport you to your destination. Once there, you’ll need to follow a set of instructions giving you tasks to complete before the weekend is over. After you’ve finished, you’ll find another arrow which will return you here tomorrow evening. You may arrive earlier or later depending on how well you follow the instructions, but you can be sure of one thing: the only way for you to get back here is by completing the tasks and finishing the assignment.”
This is so going to end badly, Alex thought.
“Any questions?” Hunter asked. He may have given them an opening but it was clear he didn’t think there was anything left to say.
Alex, however, had many questions—the most prominent of which was whether she could stay behind and let everyone else enjoy the ‘fun’ field trip without her. But since she already knew the answer, she didn’t waste her breath.
Her other concern involved being away from the protective wards of the academy. What if Aven discovered she was gone and decided to come after her? But she figured Hunter had to have spoken with Darrius about the trip, and the headmaster would never let her leave if he thought she would be in any danger. Besides, she was too tired to start up a conversation that was sure to arouse the curiosity of her classmates. Definitely not worth it.
“You can leave when you’re ready,” Hunter said when no one responded. “I’ll see you all tomorrow evening.”
“You’re not coming with us?” Alex blurted out. Weren’t they going to be supervised?
“Are you afraid of the dark, Alex?”
“What? No—I just—”
“Then I see no need for me to accompany you,” Hunter said, cutting her off.
She wondered how he might have responded if she’d lied and claimed she was scared of the dark, but he probably would have just given the same answer.
“Whatever,” Alex mumbled, lacking the energy to argue her point. It seemed they would, in fact, be camping unsupervised. Flipping fantastic. An image of the bloodthirsty Hyroa came to Alex’s mind and she shuddered, but then she forced herself to remember that they were rare creatures and the likelihood of running into another one was slim to none. Hopefully.
“Right, then,” Hunter said when he could see that Alex had let the matter drop. “The sooner you leave, the sooner you’ll return. I recommend you make use of the daylight. Night falls quickly where you’re going.”
Shuddering, Alex dutifully followed her classmates and stepped up to touch the Bubbler-infused arrow. With a whirl of colourful motion she was whisked away from the Ezera Forest only to land shakily in her new environment.
Someone reached out to help steady her and she turned to send them a grateful smile.
“You good?” Kaiden asked.
“Yeah, thanks,” she said, and he removed his hand from her arm.
“Come check this out, Alex!” Jordan called.
She glanced towards her friend and gasped at the sight in front of her. “Wow,” she whispered, peering out over what seemed to be the entire world.
They’d landed high up in the middle of a cluster of mountains, with three-hundred-and-sixty-degree views all around. Way off in the distance, the land smoothed out until all traces of the woodsy scenery transformed into a never-ending yellow sparseness.
Blink waved a piece of paper around, breaking Alex’s wandering gaze. “Do you guys want the good news or the bad news?”
“Good news,” Declan said, speaking for everyone.
“According to the Ghost-Master’s map here, it looks like we’re in the Durungan Ranges,” Blink told them.
Alex wasn’t sure how that was good news. She didn’t know much about the mountain range that spanned the width of Medora, but she guessed it would make for a challenging weekend expedition.
“What’s the bad news?” Declan asked.
Blink sent him a lopsided smile. “Bro, we’re in the Durungan Ranges. That’s, like, so hard-core.”
“But you said that was the good news,” Alex spoke up, confused. “How is that both good and bad news? And what are we supposed to do here?”
“Well, Alexerina,” Blink said, and Alex shot him a warning look at the nickname, “if I’m reading this ultra-military-style map right, it looks like we have to traverse the Ranges. I don’t know about you guys, but I’m hungry just thinking about it. Who else agrees that we should break for a snack?”
“Give that to me,” Pipsqueak demanded, snatching the paper from him and striding over to the rest of the group.
Alex looked over the smaller girl’s shoulder at the basic map Hunter had drawn for them.
“We can’t walk that far by tomorrow night!” Alex exclaimed.
“I’m sure we don’t have to walk the entire way,” Jordan said, looking at her in a way that silently reminded her of Medora’s advanced technology.
“I know that. But still…” Alex trailed off, not sure how to recover from her outburst. Fortunately, everyone else was too busy perusing the map to notice.
“This is obviously Hunter’s first instruction for us,” Tom said. “I say we take an inventory of what supplies we have in our packs and start walking until we find our next clue.”
It was a good suggestion so they sat around in a circle and unloaded their bags to inspect the contents. It turned out that their items were almost identical. Each pack held a waterproof sleeping bag, a bottle of water, an assortment of energy bars and dehydrated foods, an emergency medical kit, a compass, a box of matches and a hunting knife.
Each pack also had one item that was unique to its owner. Kaiden’s was a bow with a single arrow; Declan’s was a self-inflating raft; Tom’s bag contained a banjo-like stringed instrument; Pipsqueak was pleased to discover a fluffy pillow amongst her possessions; Skyla was equally pleased with the hand-held mirror and makeup collection she’d been given; Blink looked overjoyed with the extra food rations in his pack; Jordan pulled a long, sturdy-looking rope out of his bag; and Alex… well, there was a reason her bag felt so weighty. At the very bottom of her pack, she found a large and extremely heavy book titled, A Collection of Children’s Stories.
“Seriously?” she said, heaving the tome from her bag to show the others. They sniggered at the look on her face. “Oh, come on! Don’t tell me I have to lug this thing over these mountains? Pip, do you want to swap?”
Pipsqueak snorted. “Keep dreaming, Alex. That’s what I’ll be doing on my lovely, soft pillow later tonight.”
“Rub it in, why don’t you?” Alex grumbled, staring daggers at the book in her hands. Of all the things for Hunter to give her, why a children’s storybook? And a huge one at that?
“We should get moving,” said Tom. “I’ll take the lead with Kaiden and Declan, since we’ve been in the class for the longest. And until we figure out what’s going on and where we’re headed, all of us should keep an eye on our surroundings.”
Alex didn’t mi
nd deferring to them, but someone else did have a problem with it.
“You forgot about me,” Skyla said. “I’ve been in this class for as long as Kaiden and Declan. How could you forget about me?”
Her eyes actually began to fill with tears, and Tom backtracked quickly to avoid the impending waterworks.
“Of course I didn’t forget about you, Skyla,” he said hurriedly. “In fact, I trust your ability so much that I think you should bring up the rear. They say that the most experienced person should always be at the back to make sure no one falls behind.”
Skyla scrunched up her face, thinking hard about his explanation, and then smiled brightly. “You’re right. I am the most experienced person—and the most important. I should definitely be at the back. Don’t worry, everyone, I’ll keep you safe.”
“What a nutcase,” Jordan mumbled, loud enough for only Alex to hear.
Fortunately, her muffled laughter was covered by the sound of the rest of them rising to their feet.
Tom crosschecked his compass to the map then started leading the group on their journey. After three hours of making their way down the mountain, they rested at the base for a drink and some morning tea. Barely any time passed before they were on their feet again and trekking up the next, much steeper incline. They paused for lunch when Kaiden spotted an arrow sticking out of a tree with a note that read:
Stop here for lunch.
Thanks, Hunter. Very helpful, thought Alex.
It was the middle of the afternoon by the time they reached the top of the mountain. Unlike the lush green scenery on the way up, the peak was bare of trees. It was solid, grey, craggy rock. Glancing over at the other mountains surrounding them, Alex was comforted by the fact that the one they stood on wasn’t snow-covered like most of the rest. They evidently weren’t as high as most of the Ranges around them, and she was grateful they’d only had to climb the smaller peak.
So far, anyway.
While their journey had been steep, they hadn’t had to use Jordan’s rope, much to Alex’s relief. But that relief was short lived when she saw what lay ahead of them.
Cutting directly through their path across the mountain was a crevasse gouged deep into the rock at least fifty feet wide. It was as if the mountain had been cleaved in two, since the vertical drop fell straight down to the ground way, way below them, where a rapidly churning river flowed at the very bottom.
“Looks like we’ll have to backtrack,” Pipsqueak said, squinting down at the violent water far beneath them. “Let’s just hope we can find a way to cut across the river.”
“I think we have different instructions,” Declan said, pointing to an arrow that was rooted in a boulder nearby. He retrieved the paper scrawled with Hunter’s words and looked grimly at the rest of them.
“What does it say?” Jordan asked.
Declan turned the note around so everyone could read Hunter’s instructions.
Cross with caution. It’s a long fall.
“No. Way.”
Alex wasn’t sure if the words were hers or someone else’s, but it was likely what they were all thinking.
“Ghost is like, the man,” Blink said with reverence.
“Shut up, Blink,” Pipsqueak said.
“How are we going to do this?” Tom asked the group.
Pipsqueak gaped at him. “You can’t seriously be considering crossing here?”
“That’s what we’ve been told to do,” Declan pointed out. “So, there must be a way.”
“There is,” Kaiden spoke up. “But I don’t think any of you will like it.”
ing el se.
Fourteen
They all looked at Kaiden questioningly as he unstrapped his bow and the single arrow that came with it. Alex hadn’t paid close attention to it before, but now she could see that it wasn’t like a normal arrow, and the bow was unique as well. Both of them appeared to be made of some kind of heavy, metallic substance. The arrowhead was different too, with little grooves spiking in the opposite direction to prevent it from being pulled out of a target. At the bottom end of the arrow was another surprise: instead of it finishing with the normal feathery decoration, the metal curled into a loop with a hollow centre.
Understanding dawned on Alex and she looked at Kaiden, aghast. “Please tell me you’re not thinking what I think you’re thinking?”
Despite their predicament, the corner of his mouth quirked in amusement. “That depends on what you think I’m thinking, or not thinking.”
“I think you know what I think you’re thinking—just like I think you know what I hope you’re not thinking.”
His smile widened and everyone stared at them.
“I’d like to know what you’re both thinking, because I’m sure lost,” Jordan said, subtly raising his eyebrows at Alex and flicking a speculative glance between her and Kaiden.
She felt her face heat up under his perceptive gaze, but Kaiden saved her from her discomfort when he jumped in with his explanation.
“I think we have to tie Jordan’s rope to my arrow and shoot it into the rock over on the other side of the crevasse,” he said. “Then we use it to make our way across.”
“Just like that?” Pipsqueak said, throwing her hands on her hips. “Why didn’t you say it would be so simple?”
“Hey, it’s not his fault we’re stuck in this situation,” Alex defended. Normally she liked Pipsqueak, but her attitude wasn’t helping the situation.
Pipsqueak turned to glare at Alex as if the entire assignment was her fault, but before either of them could say anything more, they were interrupted.
“I don’t see why we can’t just fly across,” Skyla said loftily.
Everyone turned to look at the blond girl who was holding her mirror in front of her face and reapplying her lip gloss.
No one seemed to know how to respond to her peculiar statement, but Jordan tentatively tried to speak up without upsetting her delicate disposition.
“Um, Skyla, how exactly would we fly across?”
She snorted and snapped her makeup case closed. “We’d make wings, obviously.”
Alex fought off the irrational urge to laugh. When it appeared that no one else knew what to say, she diplomatically said, “That’s a great idea, Skyla. But since Kaiden came up with a solution first, it’s only fair that we try his way before giving any other ideas a go. If his arrow doesn’t work, then we’ll be sure to discuss your plan.”
Alex couldn’t believe she’d actually just agreed to try Kaiden’s suicidal proposal, but compared to making wings, it almost sounded like a sane strategy.
Only almost.
“I guess that’s fair,” Skyla begrudgingly agreed. “But I still think my idea is better.”
Alex chose to let the conversation end there, and she turned to find Kaiden watching her with amusement.
“What?”
He flashed her a humour-filled grin but shook his head. “Nothing.”
“How are we going to do this?” Tom asked, indicating to the arrow in Kaiden’s hand. “Obviously you shoot it over there and hope it’ll hold us, but what’s going to keep the rope on this side?”
He had a valid point. But Hunter had already provided the solution.
“We tie it to Hunter’s arrow,” Alex answered, pointing to the shaft embedded in the boulder where Declan found the note. It was made of the same metallic substance as the weapon Kaiden held—looped end and all—and Alex had no doubt that it was intended for this purpose.
“Let’s do this,” Declan said, giving Kaiden an encouraging clap on the back.
Jordan handed the rope over to Kaiden who knotted it securely around the loop at the end of the embedded arrow. After tugging against it to make sure it held, he unwound the remainder of the coiled rope and tied the other end to the arrow in his hands.
As a group, they walked to the edge of the crevasse.
“Shoot straight, Kaid,” Declan said, as Kaiden strung the bow and pulled it tight.
Pa
using for barely a second to aim, Kaiden released the arrow, and it pierced firmly into the rock wall on the other side of the fissure. It was a perfect shot, with the arrow sticking out close to the top of the crevasse—just enough for the rock to not crumble under their weight, but not too far that they wouldn’t be able to pull themselves up.
Perfect shot or not, butterflies began to trample around Alex’s stomach at the idea of crossing the ravine.
“Who wants to be the test dummy?” Declan asked, cracking his knuckles with anticipation.
No one was eager to raise a hand, and after a few tense moments, Kaiden spoke up. “I made the shot. I’ll go first.”
Alex reached out and clutched Jordan’s arm as Kaiden secured his backpack over his shoulders and stepped up to the rope.
“Here goes nothing,” he said, lowering his body over the edge.
Only when Kaiden was sure the rope would hold his weight did he begin to move, using a hand-over-hand approach to swiftly make his way across the ravine. He made it look effortless, but Alex didn’t take a proper breath until he reached the other side and drew himself up to safety.
“Are you going to let go of me now?” Jordan asked her with a knowing smirk.
She dug her fingernails in a little deeper for a vindictive moment before she released him, choosing to ignore his amused chuckle.
“Who’s next?” Declan asked.
One by one they began to make their way across the crevasse. Blink followed after Kaiden, locking his legs around the rope and pulling himself across backwards. Skyla copied his example, while Jordan adopted Kaiden’s faster—if less secure— hand-over-hand approach.
Just as Alex watched Tom pull himself to safety, she heard Pipsqueak’s sha“I don’t have very good upper body strength,” the waif-like girl said. “What if I fall?”
“You won’t fall,” Alex assured her classmate, who appeared to be very close to hyperventilating. “You’ll be fine.”