Chapter 17 #2
Their job as judges scoring the novices throughout the exams was mostly to clean up the last few spots for those who didn’t steal a wristband or fail in the previous trials, and provide valuable insight and data for the Academy to add to the students’ profiles for their use throughout the rest of their schooling.
They were halfway through the first trial. A pack of chimeras had been released and the novices’ goal was simply not to be burned, but they couldn’t leave the rune circle each individual had been given.
Nikias was jotting down the clever way one of their novices was distracting the chimeras instead of solely relying on a shield when a rumbling sound crept through the air even amidst the chaotic roar of the novices, chimeras, and crowd cheering.
Nikias immediately stopped writing and rose from his seat. Aimilia looked up from the notes she was furiously scratching. “Nikias?”
There was a crack in the ground of the stadium floor. It was growing, spreading.
“Halt! Stop the trial!” Nikias’ call was too late. As the second his voice ripped through the air, the ground collapsed and everything started shaking.
An earthquake.
Screaming overtook the air as the controlled chaos of the trial devolved into utter madness.
Nikias grabbed the railing as the novices and the chimeras disappeared.
The dirt and rocks swallowed them to whatever depth lay below.
Their balcony box was shaking, making it nearly impossible to see or think, but Nikias could make out cracks appearing in the foundations of the stadium around them.
“Aimilia, get inside—in the doorframe! These boxes are going to come down!” He looked over his shoulder in the hopes maybe she’d already realized and was bracing herself in the safest place.
Instead she was holding onto the wall, looking out at the rubble of the stadium floor. Chunks of the stadium separated, falling as well. Her wide eyes and parted lips vanished to be replaced by cold, hard iron.
Even knowing what she was about to do, since it was what he was about to do, he didn’t have a hope of stopping her.
She took a stumbling, running start and was barely vaulting over the railing within seconds.
Nikias cursed in his head as he followed her over the railing and into the air. She caught herself on a vitae platform, sloping it and sliding down it, fire burning in her eyes.
Nikias cast a vitae rope instead, looping it around a lower box’s railing, letting himself fall until it snapped tight.
The sharp jerk in his arm was going to be sore later, but it got him close enough to the mess of rubble that he could let go without risking breaking his neck or leg.
He landed on a large stable piece a few seconds before Aimilia reached what was left of the ground as well.
Commander Livus and two of his other commanders from the Academy stood on the other side of the mess, arms up as they tried to hold up shields that were keeping the rest of the stadium rubble from falling down any farther.
“Your Highness, it appears a series of tunnels were dug below, crossing over top of each other and their collapse is what caused the ground above to give way.”
Nikias could hear the children’s screaming below even through the rubble on top of them.
“Where are the chimera handlers?” Aimilia called out, looking around at the entrances into the stadium’s interior.
“They ran off, evacuating with everyone else.”
Out of the corner of his eye Nikias could see the other judges escaping their own boxes or coming out from their side of the stadium interior.
Nikias waved them over. “Our first priority is stabilizing the stadium! All of you get shields up. The last thing we need is more of the walls or the balcony boxes coming down and making this worse!”
The royal box was empty, and Nikias was currently neutral to that fact. With his father’s health so poor, the best thing for them all was just to get him out of there and to safety, especially given this could be nothing but a direct attack on him and their nation.
It also meant Nikias was able to do as he saw fit.
“Once we have the stadium stabilized and skilled academics putting up temporary fixes, we can start clearing the rubble.” As the commanders started casting, pinpointing the weakest spots when the shaking began to slow, Nikias pointed toward a commander closest to the exit.
“You, go round up ten academics and get as many of the Academy teachers as you can before returning! And the chimera handlers if you see them!”
The man immediately took off, and Nikias directed his attention back to the whole stadium. The stands were mostly empty at this point, the Runai in them having gone over the back, using their vitae to escape without clogging up the traditional entrance and exits. That was good—
“Nikias! We don’t have time to wait for all of them to arrive.” Aimilia gestured to what was a slim, narrow opening in the rubble going straight down. “I see an opening I can fit through. These children are trapped in collapsing tunnels with a hoard of panicked chimeras. Someone has to go in now!”
“Absolutely not!” Nikias took a few steps, but then the world started shaking again, and he was forced to crouch and grab onto the large piece of rubble beside him to steady himself in the aftershock.
“If you go down in there, you could bring it all back down on top of you and get all of you killed!”
“And if we wait, they could suffocate from the rubble already crushing them or they could be trapped and the chimeras could tear them to pieces.”
Chimeras that could tear her to pieces too. Rubble that could come down and crush her. Anything could happen to her down there, and Nikias wouldn’t be able to protect her.
“Then I’ll go!”
Better him than her. He couldn’t repeat his past mistakes. He’d barely survived losing Faustina; he would not survive losing Aimilia.
“You won’t fit!” Aimilia shook her head, gesturing to his broad shoulders. “And if you’re afraid me going in will destabilize it, then trying to make an opening you can fit through certainly will.”
He hated she was right. He hated that he had no choice here.
Not one he could live with anyway.
If anything happened to her, he would never forgive himself.
And if he didn’t let her go, she would never forgive him.
If Hypatia had Seen this, she was probably howling like a hyena.
“You’re right. But I’m going to be right here, and if anything goes wrong, I’m coming in after you.”
Aimilia started casting a vitae rope. “Then I’ll make sure nothing goes wrong.”
He reached her spot and looked down into the Abyss-black hole, stomach churning.
She finished her rune, vitae wrapping around her like a harness, the extra, complicated and draining step done of ensuring the vitae wouldn’t burn through the fabric of her clothes or any skin.
She tossed the end to him and he took it as she set the rune, stabilizing it so it would last without her having to keep her hands involved, freeing them for other things.
The commanders around them wouldn’t be able to do the same with their shields without risking them breaking and constantly having to recast given the sheer force trying to push down and break the shield.
As commanders, they weren’t trained in the finer, more precise art of using runes and vitae to repair structures, so all they could do was try to hold it up and together long enough for those who could to arrive.
Nikias took the rope, quickly casting a rune at his feet, grounding him as Aimilia backed up to the edge of the hole.
His heart leapt into his throat as she stepped back. His grip tightened on the rope as she closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
Aimilia dropped into the darkness, the rough rocks scraping her shoulders as she went. Nikias felt the jolt of her weight pulling on the rope trying to make him stumble forward, but his runes kept him grounded.
“Lower!” Aimilia called out, and the vitae wrapped around her was the only reason he could still make out her face in the darkness. Reluctantly, he did so each time she called out the instruction until finally he couldn’t see her, just the thin tendril of vitae connecting them.
Then, finally, the heavy pull of her whole weight suspended in the air gave way, and faintly he heard her call out, “I made it!”
“Be careful!”
“I will. Any children I find will come your way, so be ready to help them climb out!”
The words were on the tip of his tongue. If something happened to her, should she know?
No. It wasn’t the right time. She still hated him. They were surrounded by commanders. She needed to focus on protecting herself and finding the children, not be distracted.
So instead of what was threatening to break out of his chest, he said, “I’ll be ready.”
Nothing would happen to her.
He would have the chance to tell her. One day, she would know just how much he loved her.