Gong.
Thirty seconds. ‘What can you see?’ Annev asked.
‘There’s a lot more open space than usual.’
‘Right. They broke down the maze to build the holding-wall.’ Annev gestured. ‘They left the scissor-field up, though.’
‘That’s good. Therin can get us through it.’ Titus leaned forward. ‘The doors are behind the scissor-field, cut into the far back wall. Everything points in that direction. Looks like Fyn’s group is headed that way, too.’
Gong.
Twenty seconds. ‘Is that too obvious?’
‘Maybe … though getting there will be quite a challenge, and Ather said it was on the opposite end of the arena.’
‘Do we follow the west wall there?’
That’s what I thought,’ Therin said, popping up beside them. ‘It reaches all the way to—’
‘The wall is no good!’ Titus snapped. ‘A beam sweeps across it.’
‘So where then?’
‘I think I see—’
‘Be sure,’ Annev cautioned. ‘We’re almost out of time.’
The gong sounded yet again – ten seconds – and several boys jumped from the observation platform, disappearing from view. A number had the same thought as Therin, for they began making their way across the top of the western wall.
Titus slid from Annev’s shoulders as Therin asked: ‘Where to, Titmouse?’
‘There’s a rafter right beneath—’
Bong. Gong. Bong. Gong. Bong.
‘Go!’ Annev shouted over the din.
The remaining students began to scramble away. Some moved with purpose, while others looked wild and uncertain. Titus pushed Annev and Therin to the eastern corner of the platform and pointed to a small square of wood fifteen feet below them.
‘It’s rising!’ Titus shouted above the din. ‘A few more seconds and we can jump down!’
Glong-glong-glong-glong-glong. BONG!
Time’s up.
Ather stepped forward. The master casually cradled a quarterstaff and strolled over to the remaining mass of students huddled at the platform’s edge. He looked one of the boys in the eye – the freckle-faced avatar Alisander – and idly ran a thumb and forefinger over his moustache. Alisander smiled weakly at the master. He was still smiling when Ather pushed him off the ledge and sent him tumbling to the pitch-covered ground below.
A resounding smack! echoed across the arena as he struck, though when Annev looked down he saw Alisander had only been dazed by the fall. The ginger-haired boy shook his head, planted his hands in the muck and struggled to right himself. Instead of rising, though, his arms sank solidly into the bog. The boy fought unsuccessfully to free himself.
‘Wow,’ Titus murmured, one eye still on the rising platform.
Annev watched Ather topple two nearby boys off the ledge with a sweep of his quarterstaff and turned back.
‘We have to jump now.’
The small piece of planking was now six feet below the observation deck. Therin dropped down and the wooden platform bounced under the impact then slowly began to descend.
‘Hurry!’ Therin shouted. Ather was closer, knocking an acolyte one step away into the muck below.
Annev nudged Titus. ‘Go! Quick.’ Titus bent his knees and sprang out over the edge. He landed with a soft thud and rolled to his feet.
‘You’re taking your own sweet time,’ Ather drawled in his ear. ‘Let me help.’
Annev flung himself off the ledge. For a moment, he thought he’d escaped Ather, but the butt of the master’s staff caught him in the ribs and Annev found himself twisting in mid-air. He came down hard on his side, jarring the planking violently, and shaking the rickety elevator loose from whatever cog or crank had been raising and lowering it. The whole thing plummeted towards the muck and Annev braced himself, grabbing the platform’s edge. The other two boys dropped to their knees and did the same, all lurching as the square of wood hit the viscous muck covering the arena floor.
Annev breathed deep in the stunned silence, then felt the black ooze sucking at his fingers. He jerked his hands back from the platform’s edge and stood, heart still racing.
‘Quick, before we sink!’
‘That way!’ Titus pointed at another platform just above Therin’s head.
The three boys formed a human ladder: Titus climbed onto Annev’s shoulders and Therin clambered up both, gaining the platform and then helping Titus do the same. Annev came last. He scooted to the edge of the sinking planks, found his balance, and took a flying leap. His chest thumped into the scaffolding and he scrabbled for a handhold as Titus and Therin grabbed him, halting his descent. With some effort, the two boys pulled him over the edge, scraping off a bit of skin in the process.
‘You’re bleeding,’ Titus said, pointing at Annev’s chin.
‘Keep going,’ Annev said, rising to his feet. ‘Which way?’
Titus took their bearings. They’d been the last into the arena, and an earlier group of boys had taken the same path, moving towards the eastern wall. The scissor-field lay to the north, while Elder Tosan and Master Ather watched the competition from the south.
Annev studied the boys east of their position as they climbed, crawled and hopped through the suspended obstacle course. Far to their west, two avatars had found a route to the top of the curtain wall, and Annev cursed as they sprinted along it, their brown-robed figures fast approaching the scissor-field. His anger faded, though, when he saw a multi-pronged beam swing across the top of the wooden barrier, as Titus had warned. The obstacle swept the first boy off the partition. The second tried to jump over it and one of the prongs caught him in the chest, tumbling him off the wall and into the muck.
‘This way!’ Titus shouted.
Annev and Therin followed Titus, dashing onto a long plank just as it rose to their level and then across a series of narrow interconnecting ramps suspended above the mire.
‘I know the way to the scissor-field,’ Titus said over his shoulder, ‘but we have to hurry before the room shifts too much.’
The three acolytes ran down a long rafter then jumped onto a moving ramp that sloped up into the heart of the arena’s interconnecting beams and platforms.
‘Where are we heading?’ Annev shouted over the din of grinding gears and creaking wood.
‘The tall tower in the middle!’ Titus pointed to a tower of scaffolding nestled at the centre of the wooden web. Directly above it hung one of the glowing glass spheres that lit the arena. ‘There’s a ramp from the top that leads to the scissor-field.’
Therin squinted. ‘I don’t see it.’
‘It moved.’
Therin and Annev both slowed, glancing at one another.
‘What?’ Titus asked, as they reached the top of the ramp. ‘We just have to be at the top when it comes back.’
Therin still looked dubious, but Annev thought back to his first glance at the arena and nodded his agreement.