Mantle of the Gods

“Atlas, it’s time to go.”

I woke up staring face to face with a white-haired, red-eyed snow-white-skinned young woman. There were a lot of people who would find the combination very frightening, but I found her presence to be comforting. Ether Klix was our Tank, though the only defensive gear that she had at the moment was a pair of leather gloves.

“Morning Ether." I brushed dirt off of my face as I sat up. It took me a minute to remember what was going on, then I realized that I’d fallen asleep. I looked around for the brown-haired green-skinned Healer of our team. "Justia! You let me fall asleep?!?”

Justia Publian, the blue-eyed woman arguing with Edward Rene, our blonde-haired, green-eyed snow white-skinned Hitter, put her hands on her hips and glared at me. "I didn’t ‘let’ you do anything. You passed out while packing the fruit.”

I looked around and spied my blue jumpsuit within arm’s reach. The arms and feet had been tied off, creating a makeshift bag that had been filled with various types of fruit.

We were on our third straight day of being locked on the first floor of the dungeon under the All-Temple’s Cathedral. Our teacher, Trent Vowler, had locked us in as a training method to teach us about survival. The only supplies that we had brought with us, besides the clothes on our backs, had been an ax, a sword, a knife, and a pair of leather gloves.

Edward had broken the blade of the sword on our first day. I patted myself down. I’d had both the sword and the knife, but neither was on me.

Not that I had much on. I was only wearing a pair of shorts since my jumpsuit had been used as a makeshift bag. We had eaten almost all of our food on the first day, so when we found a tree with lots of different types of fruit on it, I was the one to make a sacrifice so we could transport the food.

The jumpsuits didn’t provide much defense, so I wasn’t too worried about getting hurt. The only thing that we’d run into so far was a knee-high, thorn-covered, plant-based, skeletal-looking monster that our teacher had labeled a Bramble Skeleton. The thorns could hurt like walking through a rose bush, but overall, they weren’t life-threatening. Given the low threat level, this should have just been an uncomfortable exercise to teach us how unprepared we were for the dungeon.

Except our teacher’s old team had found us and kidnapped one of our members. If we wanted her back alive, we had just four days to gain over eighty experience and beat the first-floor boss. If we didn’t, then they were threatening to throw Rix into the boss room to fight it by herself.

I tried not to think about what torture she would have to endure. She had almost killed two of the older students, so I knew they weren’t going to be kind to her. But she had volunteered to trade places with Aelin.

I looked over at the blonde woman. She wasn’t her usually bubbly self, instead, brown-skinned Buffer looked like she was on a mission, running around the clearing that had been made into a camp, packing up the last few things.

I looked at the white-haired beauty beside me. "How long was I out?”

“Barely an hour.” She pointed at my jumpsuit. "I finished packing the fruit so you could sleep.”

“Where’s…?” I looked around. The sling bag that I had been carrying our crystals in was on Aelin’s back. There were more than fifty crystals in there, which would be enough to buy a new skill or spell once we got out of the Dungeon. Not that we would have a chance to spend them before we had to fight the floor boss.

“I’ve got the sword.” Ether handed me the broken blade. She pointed at our blonde Buffer. "Aelin has the knife.” She looked confused. "Did the other team give it to you?”

“Ha!” I couldn’t stop the short sarcastic burst from leaving my lips. "No, that was Rix’s. I don’t know where she got it.”

“Mister Volwer said that hers got destroyed when we came into the dungeon the first time.” She shrugged. "Maybe he gave her one that she could bring in as a replacement?”

I had trouble seeing our teacher as being that benevolent. “She probably bought it from him before everyone else woke up.”

The red-eyed woman leaned against me. I knew we needed to get moving, but I was still tired and so very sore that her touch helped me forget about how wrong things were at the moment.

“Is she going to be okay?”

I took a deep breath and slid my right hand to the side of her face so I could look into her eyes. "Rix is tough, she’ll find a way to survive.”

I felt a tear slide down her cheek and hit my hand. I wiped it away with my thumb and found myself caressing her cheek after it was gone. She closed her eyes and leaned against my hand. I leaned in and kissed her gently.

Her eyes shot open in surprise, but she didn’t pull away. I held the kiss for a little while longer, then looked at our audience. I realized that Justia was the only one who knew that the two of us were, actually, I didn’t know what we were. But Justia was the only one who had caught us together.

Ether was blushing and moved so that I was between her and the others.

Justia shoved a pile of stakes at Edward. He curled his arms around them reflexively to keep from dropping the armful.

“I’m guessing Justia told everyone what we’re up against.” I was mainly looking at Edward since Ether was the other one whom I hadn’t told about the Yellow team and she was behind me.

He nodded, still too dumbfounded to speak. I found I liked him better when he didn’t talk.

“Let’s grab what we can carry.” I pointed towards what I was considering the south. " We’ve got a long grind ahead of us and we’re already behind.”

Edward started grumbling as he began walking. Aelin ran ahead while Justia walked over to the two of us. "Are you going to be able to carry that?”

I grabbed my jumpsuit and flipped it onto my back. My back and knees protested under the weight, but we were already leaving almost a third of the fruit we’d picked behind. I knew Ether probably offered to carry some of it, but we needed to move fast and she was going to have enough trouble keeping up with us without being overburdened.

“I’ve got it.” I headed out after Edward. It had taken Aelin and myself almost six hours to make it to the camp, but that had been from the door of the boss room and at night. All we had to do was get a little way past the bridge. I could last that long.