by G. Bailey
I move to stand next to Peyton, eyes wide. He’s struggling to keep control of the goat, whose shiny blue collar - the one with little hearts on it - is jangling in his frantic attempts to get away and explore. Why on earth Mum picked that collar for him, I’ll never know - he’s not a dog, he’s a friggin’ goat, for fuck’s sake… but I digress. There are more important things to worry about right now.
“You brought Michael to see the higher gods?” I hiss, eyes flashing as I turn to my brother. “You do realise most of the gods here probably have no idea talking animals still exist anymore, right? He is meant to be a secret!” It’s true; enchanting an animal into sentience rarely ever works, and much of the magic that gives animals like Michael his abilities has been lost for years. I could easily see some greedy fecker in the stands deciding that they want a talking goat for their house… and I have no doubt that Xur would be all too happy to hand him over.
“It was mum’s idea,” Peyton whispers back. “She thought his abilities might come in handy. Or that we could use him as a bargaining chip, if worse came to worst…” Seeing my horrified expression, he holds up his other hand. “Look, I hated the idea too, but we were desperate. We had no idea if you were ever going to get out of that prison. We-” He starts to say something else, but at that moment Michael decides to make a break for it, bucking free of my brother’s grip and charging away off to the left. Peyton lunges for him and tries to grab him, but he loses his grip on the collar, and I’m left to watch in horror as Michael runs straight into the middle of the arena.
“Michael!” Mum shouts, turning away from Dad just in time to see the disaster unfolding. “Stop! What are you doing?!” But it’s too late; the crowd erupts into feverish cheers and I realise with a sinking feeling that the higher gods have arrived.
If they’ve noticed that Michael is running loose, they don’t give any indication, instead walking to their seats with an inhuman grace, their movements all in sync with one another as they smoothly sit down. They look amazing: dressed in snow white outfits that contrast sharply with their rotten personalities. Priceless adornments accessorise them: silver belts, rings, and cuffs reflect the light all around us, giving them an almost otherworldly supernatural air. They look amazing, and radiate fear-inducing power… but they would be radiant even if they weren’t gods, I reckon.
My hand flies to my mouth then as Michael comes to a stop right in front of them and does the biggest shite ever, right in plan view of the higher gods. A silence falls over the crowd, and I see the higher gods exchange a distasteful glance.
Feckin’ hell, I think, pinching the bridge of my nose, this goat is going to get us all killed. I thought it would be my mouth that would do that, not a goat’s arse.
“B-as-tards...”
Michael’s one word echoes around the now-hushed stadium like cannonfire, and I’m pretty sure there isn’t a soul in the crowd who didn’t hear his declaration. A talking goat who’s also rude as feck. If I’m the frickin’ princess in this messed up story, I deserve a better pet animal.
“Your pet talks as well as shits a lot?” Seth asks Peyton, holding his nose as he looks away. The look of offended indignation on his face is enough to make Peyton burst out laughing, followed by Storm and Killian, who look for a moment like a bunch of schoolboys on the playground. I’m glad they’re having fun; I find myself nearly gagging at the smell as two guards hurry out onto the field, carrying black bags to pick the poo up. Michael, seemingly not done with this farce, makes an attempt to eat one of their shiny gold helmets, and I don’t think I’ve ever been this embarrassed in my entire life.
Storm is still in hysterics with Peyton and Killian, and I see that Hugo has joined in, too. Dad, Damien, and Mads, meanwhile, are trying not to laugh, but I can see the barely-hidden smiles on their faces. Mum looks utterly horrified - as she should be. Michael is her pet, not mine, and I will never understand her reasoning for bringing him here in the first place.
I become aware that the audience has started laughing, too; clearly Michael’s court jester act has paid off. At least he’s winning us the affection of the crowd, because he sure as hell isn’t doing us any favours in the arena. I can see the higher gods growing restless at the audience’s reaction, and feel a smidge of satisfaction; they probably weren’t expecting this kind of a display when they came down here this morning.
“He isn’t my pet. He is mum’s!” I tell Seth, whose expression has gone sour.
“Michael, you get back here this instant!” Mum shouts, but Michael is completely ignoring her. He’s staring down the higher gods as if they couldn’t smite him where he stands if they felt like it.
“Would you like me to make a portal for your goat friend, Mrs. Kismet?” Killian asks Mum through his laughter-induced tears.
Mum, who looks like - well, about how you would expect for someone whose pet just shat in the middle of a life-or-death trial - gives him a grim nod. She hurries to Michael’s side, taking hold of his collar and speaking to him in a low, dangerous voice. Killian wastes no time conjuring up a gold portal, and I watch as Mum successfully pushes Michael in, telling him off the whole time.
It’s only after the portal disappears that the spectators calm down, and an unsettling silence falls over the crowd once more as we wait for the higher gods to speak. Xur seems to revel in the attention, savouring it for a long moment before finally standing up off his leather seat. He walks slowly forward, his voice echoing throughout the natural amphitheatre as he speaks.
“Unless there are any more… antics your lovely family would like to share with us,” he says, his voice dripping with sarcasm as he says the word “family”, “are you ready for the first game, Karma?” He doesn’t sound one bit amused by Michael’s display. I’m pretty sure the guy has a stick stuck so firmly up his arse that he couldn’t laugh if he tried.
I close my eyes for a brief moment, steeling myself. This is where shite gets real, Karma, I tell myself. Don’t mess up.
After taking one more glance back at everyone I love, I stride slowly forward and clear my throat. Both my amusement and my family’s have disappeared in an instant as we face what’s going to happen next.
“Yes,” I reply, crossing my arms and glaring defiantly up at Xur.
“Excellent,” Xur says, nodding slowly. “But it wouldn’t be fair to you to have to play this game alone,” he continues, his eyes on me as he watches for a reaction. It feels like my heart stops in my chest as I take in the meaning of his words. “Therefore,” he continues, “we will be summoning an ally for you - out of the goodness of our own hearts, and as a gesture of good faith. Madison Grey,” he shouts, his eyes drifting over to my best friend, “you are called to stand alongside Karma in her first trial.”
I see Madison go pale, and I have to fight the panic that wells up inside me. “No!” I shout, moving to step in front of her. She’s a little distance behind me, but I can’t help wanting to obscure her from Xur’s view even so. “She didn’t agree to play! It was only me!”
“If you wish to end the game and leave—”
“No!” Mads says, walking to my side after pushing away from Peyton. She holds my hand, squeezing tightly. “We will play. Together.” I look at my best friend, knowing the game has just changed. I can’t let her die in this.
“The aim of the game is to start at one side and get to the middle. In the middle, there is a gold circle ring. You both touch it simultaneously, and you both win,” Xur explains, his voice echoing so loudly it hurts my ears. “As a gift to my new found niece, if the human is alive at the end of the game, she counts as winning one more game. Win this, and you are three away from getting the prize you want.”
“Then what are we waiting for, uncle?” I sarcastically say, crossing my arms, and he almost smiles at me as he sits down and claps his hands. Fireworks blast into the sky, all of them red and looking like fire as they fall down around us in sparkling dust. I hold my best friend’s hand as we walk to the entrance, and
I know I will not let either of us fall in this game.
We have to win.
11
I stare down the entrance to the maze, my back rigid and my hands clenched into fists at my sides. I’m trying not to let the cheers of the crowd distract me, but I’m acutely aware of the fact that their eyes are all on me and Madison as I take a tentative step forward. The hedges are thick and high, shot through with thorny branches, and even from here, it’s impossible to see what is in there. Mads follows my lead and comes to a stop at my side, and wordlessly she slips her hand into mine. I squeeze it in an attempt to comfort her, but I can feel her trembling with fear. I don’t blame her one bit for being scared; I’m nearly petrified with fear myself. I’ve gone from only being responsible for protecting myself to making sure that she stays safe, and I don’t trust my ability to do that. What if I can’t keep her alive against whatever is in there?
I can feel my fear giving way to determination, and I look away just once to meet Xur’s cold, heartless gaze. His red eyes creep me out as a knowing smile spreads across his face, and I realise with a sinking feeling that he’s satisfied because either way, he wins this. He wants to see me suffer, and maybe the outcome doesn’t matter to him as much as punishing me for what he perceives as a crime. He always planned to have Mads go in here with me; it wasn’t enough for him to subject me to these trials - he has to put my best friend in danger, too. I guess I did kill his crazy brother… even if it was an accident. I’m never going to refer to him as my father, though. I can at least cling to that vindication.
The sound of a bell chiming drags my attention away from Xur, and I realise that someone has cast a spell. A timer has started counting down from ten, projected over the thousands of seats in the arena, and I look away only to see everyone I love standing together on the sidelines. Storm and the justice twins are standing together, their arms crossed and their faces masks of strength and determination. I have to put the same appearance on; I can’t afford to be weak right now - for Madison’s sake, if not for my own. I close my eyes for a moment, bracing myself, and open them just in time to see the counter drop to one before magically disappearing in a puff of smoke.
I exchange a look with Madison and we silently step forward. The crowds of assembled supernaturals let out a cheer so loud that it nearly hurts my ears, and I grimace as we face down the maze that looms before us.
“Okay,” I say to Mads. “Okay, we can do this. We just run and pretend this is a normal morning jog. Not that I run for fun or anything - only feckin’ crazy people do that. Anyways, this is normal, okay?” I’m well aware that I’m nervously muttering to try to keep myself calm, but Mads is too busy looking around us apprehensively to pay attention. “Mads!” I damn near shout her name to get her attention, desperate for her to stay grounded so we can get through this. After I give her hand a gentle tug, she seems to snap out of it, finally looking my way and giving me a shaky nod.
Whatever bravery she had before is completely gone now, replaced with pure and utter fear. She’s done an admirable job so far, but it makes sense that she would be fearful. At the end of the day, she’s only human, playing the game of the gods, but what she just doesn’t realise is that she has been playing this game for years without knowing it, ever since we first became friends. It’s my fault that she’s been dragged into this mess, and I hate that I don’t know if I can protect her.
My heart is pounding in my ears, and the sound of our breathing seems to nearly drown out the sounds of the crowd as we make our way slowly through the entrance to the maze. Hedges tower all around us, casting gloomy shadows in all directions with no indication of which way we should be going. As if by magic, the sounds of the crowd seem to die down as we enter the maze, although whether it’s because they’re waiting in anticipation or because the maze is enchanted, I don’t know. All I know is that an eerie silence has filled my ears, and the soft rustling of the leaves is the only sound we can hear. It’s ominous, and I almost miss the noise of the stadium.
I glance over at Mads, whose eyes are as big as dinner plates as she looks tentatively around. Both of us are wondering exactly what is going to happen here; there’s no way it can be this easy.
We start slowly forward, and I find myself moving in front of Mads so I can shield her if something decides to pop out at us. It’s like being in a haunted house, except the boogeymen who jump out are all too real, and will kill us if they get the chance. “Karma?” Mads asks, her voice quiet.
“Just keep going,” I murmur to her. “And stay close.”
Only a few moments after I say this, there’s a loud rustling sound from behind us, nearly enough to make us jump. We lurch forward just in time, before a wall of thick moss suddenly materializes out of nowhere. It blocks off the path we just took, trapping us in our current corridor, and I have no doubt that any magic I try to use to tear it down won’t work. This maze was constructed by the higher gods, and forward is now the only way out.
“What the hell…?” Mads begins, but we’re interrupted when the ground suddenly begins to shake, as if with some sort of small, localized earthquake. The force of it is almost enough to knock us both over, and I lean against the moss wall as I struggle to hold me and Mads up. “We should run,” Mads suggests frantically, and I think she might be right.
I nod to her. “Go!” I cry. “But stay with me!”
We both start running as fast as we can in the direction of the end of the corridor, but the tremors shooting through the ground make it difficult to keep our balance. Somehow, we make it to the end of the hedge hallway without falling, and as soon as we turn around the next corner, the path behind us blocks itself off the same way it did earlier. The path forks in two different directions, and I know it’s important we choose the right way to go. I glance over at Mads, hoping she’ll have some wisdom for me.
“When in doubt, always go right,” Mads breathlessly says as the ground begins to shake even harder. Is this earthquake going to follow us the whole time we’re in here?
Before I can respond to her, I look down and see the ground buckling. The dirt and stone under our feet is beginning to break apart, a long crack bursting through it from the force of the earthquake. Red fire burns through the crack, giving off a wave of heat that feels like it damn near singes my eyebrows. I let out a scream as the floor literally begins from under our feet, the ground collapsing in on itself. I barely manage to grab hold of Mads’ hand in mine before we fall, crunching it in a death grip, but we hurtle into the fissure and slam into some rock, knocking her hand loose. The wind is knocked out of me in a whoosh, and I struggle to get my breath back as pain radiates through my upper body. My ribs are on fire, and I realise with a sinking feeling that I probably fractured one, and my shoulder, which took the brunt of the impact, is a ball of pain. I groan, wheezing, clamping my eyes shut against the pain.
“KARMA! HELP!”
Mads’ scream shakes me out of my daze, making my eyes snap open in fear. I tell myself to get up and painfully drag myself to my feet, my body sending jolts of agony through me every time I move. We’re at the bottom of a large crevasse, the only light coming from the crack that formed with the earthquake. I’m standing on a jagged rock ledge, and my heart drops when I see Mads hanging over the edge not far from where I am. She’s struggling to hold onto the ledge, her feet dangling in space, and I scramble to get to her, my pain momentarily forgotten.
Right below her is what I can only describe as how hell must look like.
Fire and molten lava bubble out of a pit below us, sending up acrid sulfur fumes and radiating heat. There are creatures tripping over each other in a desperate attempt to escape the fire; their skin is blackened and charred, and their eyes glow like embers in a campfire. Their inhuman screams fill my ears, and for a moment I stand there paralysed.
“Karma, please! I can’t hold on!” Mads’ desperate cry is the only thing that can pull my attention away from the inferno below us, and I scramble to take hold
of her arms and pull her back up. The strain in my ribs and shoulder is nearly unbearable, and the pain is so much that I feel tears start to stream out of my eyes as I haul my best friend back onto the rocky platform. With one last, desperate lurch, we both collapse onto the jagged surface, gasping for the little air that is down here. The heat makes the air thick and sulfurous, and it feels nearly impossible to catch my breath - like working out in a sauna.
What is this place? I wonder as I stare weakly up at the crack in the maze floor. Did Xur create this nightmare just for me?
But there’s no sense in even asking the question. Of course he did.
After what feels like an eternity of gasping for breath and trying to ease the pain in my torso, I slowly sit up, wincing at the pain that shoots through my side. Mads has already gotten to her feet, and she looks a mess: her blonde hair is matted and tangled, dirtied with smoke and dust, while the knees of her pants have been ripped open. Other than a couple surface cuts and bruises, though, she doesn’t appear to be injured, and I thank the gods that I was able to stop her from falling into the fire.
She slowly approaches me, and I see that she’s trembling from fear and adrenaline as I grit my teeth and clamp a hand over my side. I let out a hiss as I struggle to get my feet underneath me again, and her eyes go wide. “Karma!” she cries, reaching out for me. “Are you okay?”
Gratefully, I take the hand she offers, and manage to crawl back to my feet. “No,” I reply. “I landed wrong. I think I broke a rib, maybe. And my shoulder…”
“Shit,” she mutters, running a hand through her hair. “What do we do?” She glances back up at the fissure with barely-disguised panic on her face. “Karma, I don’t want to die!”
“I know,” I say, taking her by the shoulders and looking into her eyes. “I don’t want to die, either. I’m going to get us out of this. I promise. Do you trust me?” She swallows, staring back at me for a long moment before nodding. Satisfied, I turn away, keeping her hand in mine as I lead her over to the steep wall. It’s dotted with cracks, ledges, and textured sections that we might be able to use as handholds if we’re lucky. Climbing seems like it’s going to be our best bet for getting out of here. I’m no athlete, and I’m sure as hell no rock climber, but it’s either this or face the fire creatures that are struggling to get out of the lava, and I know which one I would rather deal with.