‘I’ll say.’ Therin shook his head. ‘I found something.’
‘Us, too!’ Titus said. ‘Annev thinks we can get to the ramp without fighting Fyn and the others!’ Therin had been smiling before, but after Titus described what Annev and he had discovered he was grinning from ear to ear.
‘Fyn’s in for a big surprise then.’ He pointed at the scaffolding floor twenty feet above his head. ‘You see that crack running down the middle? That’s the line separating the two halves of the platform. The left side has linchpins to keep it from dropping down. It was built to collapse from the inside – just like Annev guessed.’
Annev nodded, unsurprised. ‘Ancient Denithal probably created that black muck at the bottom of the arena, but Master Murlach’s done everything else here. He’s always been fond of traps. He built the scissor-field. And the tumbler. And the twiddle-snap.’ He shook his head. ‘They should have named him Master of Traps.’
‘So what do we do?’ Titus asked, looking up at the platform above their heads.
Therin laughed. ‘We pull the pins! While Fyn and his mates are standing on them.’
‘But … we don’t need to fight them?’
‘If we leave them behind, they’ll just come after us. Leave no enemies behind, Titus.’
Annev nodded, seeing the wisdom of Therin’s suggestion; if they could cripple Fyn or Kenton – literally or figuratively – then they should, and Annev wouldn’t feel guilty in the slightest.
‘Therin’s right. Titus, watch for the moving platform. Therin, we’ll pull the pins on his signal. After that we’ll have to get out of here fast and climb the northern exterior wall.’
Titus nodded, keeping any dissenting thoughts to himself, and Annev and Therin began to scale the interior scaffolding. They climbed in silence, slowing as they neared the top. Through the cracks above his head, Annev could see a boy keeping lookout on each side of the tower. A fifth boy stood in the centre of the platform, and the sixth was just off-centre, closer to the northern face of the tower. This last boy was pacing back and forth, the planks beneath his feet creaking with each step.
‘Where are they?’ Jasper whined, directly overhead.
The avatar who had been pacing stopped. ‘I don’t know.’
Annev smiled. That was Fyn.
‘There’s nowhere else to go,’ Fyn said. ‘They’ll have to climb out.’
‘We can’t wait here all day.’
‘We can if we have to. Look around. Do you see any other way to the scissor-field?’
A long pause. ‘No.’
‘So no one can get there without going through us first,’ Fyn said. ‘Annev and his twits can wait as long as they want. The next group of students to reach the tower will throw them off anyway. We can sit back and watch. Got it?’
‘Um … yes. But how are we supposed to get there?’ Jasper persisted.
Fyn walked over to Jasper, placing himself between the avatar and the southern lookout. Annev looked over at Therin, who excitedly held up three fingers. Three out of six on the hinged part of the platform was pretty good. It would even the odds at least, and maybe the boy straddling the divide would fall, too. They could cripple Fyn and half his group in one blow.
‘If you really want to go over there,’ Fyn said, his hushed voice just a few feet from Annev’s head, ‘you could always walk …’
He shoved Jasper over the edge of the tower.
Annev’s breath caught as he heard the avatar smack into the gooey arena floor. He struggled to keep silent as, above him, Fyn muttered ‘so annoying’, and began pacing again. There was some shuffling on the planks overhead, as whoever had been standing in the centre of the tower moved to fill Jasper’s vacancy.
Annev shook his head, disgusted. It was one thing to throw a competitor off the tower, but pushing a friend off? His stomach revolted at the thought … though he remembered feeling differently after his discussion with Tosan.
Annev reached up and grasped the pin next to his head, resolved. He looked at Therin, who did the same.
‘Titus,’ Annev whispered, his voice barely audible. He looked down and saw the boy had just poked his head out of the opening in the eastern wall. ‘Titus!’ Annev whispered more urgently. The smaller boy pulled himself back in and looked up at Annev.
‘It’s coming!’ he whispered back, a little too loudly.
Annev swore as he heard more feet shuffling above his head. With barely a nod to Therin, Annev hauled hard on the linchpin supporting the southern side of the platform. Therin did the same, and the two-foot-long pieces of metal slid from the rafter above their heads. The hinged platform shrieked as half the ceiling swung downward and two boys dropped through the opening, plummeting twenty feet to the floor below. As the avatars fell, Annev caught a flash of Fyn leaping to the northern side, narrowly evading the trap.
Quick as a cat, Annev climbed down the interior tower wall and dodged past the two bodies lying at his feet: Kellor was unconscious at the bottom of the heap, his leg either dislocated or broken; Janson lay atop him, groaning and in no hurry to get up.
‘I’m going to kill you, Ainnevog!’ Fyn shouted from the opening above their heads, searching for a way down.
‘Why does he only use my full name when he’s threatening me?’ Annev asked as he and Therin swung themselves out of the tower and began climbing.
‘Why does he give you all the credit? I dropped half that platform.’
Annev lifted his chin towards the top of the tower. ‘You’re welcome to tell him that.’
They’d pulled themselves up to Titus when a string of curses rained down from above. Annev looked up and saw Fyn, snarling and glaring at them, still looking for a way to reach them. A moment later Brinden and Kenton appeared at Fyn’s side.
‘Climb up here, you bastards, and I’ll kick your skulls in!’
Therin laughed as he adjusted his grip on the wooden planks. ‘He makes that sound inviting, doesn’t he?’
‘He still thinks we have to climb up,’ Titus said, and nodded in Annev’s direction. ‘But our ride is here.’
Annev watched as the moving ramp came within two feet of the side of the tower, almost level with them. As it continued to rise it also began to extend, the nearer end reaching for the tower as the far end stretched towards the scissor-field, almost forty feet away.
‘Be quick,’ Titus said as he prepared to jump. ‘It collapses in on itself a few seconds after it reaches the top of the tower.’
‘And we’ll have Fyn right behind us,’ Annev said, not relishing the thought.
‘There’s an incentive to run faster!’ Therin leapt onto the ramp and sprinted off.
Annev rolled his eyes, adjusted his grip and prepared to jump. The end of the platform had reached their height and was only a foot away.
‘Brinden! Get down there and stop them!’ Fyn yelled.