story about Adelson and Merrimer, but I don’t want to get her all twisted up with worry when she’s stuck at Neptune, unable to do anything to help. I’ll tell her as soon as it’s all over. Hopefully. Assuming I make it out in one piece.
She called to wish me luck earlier this morning, and that cheered me up. Now I’ve got to focus on just winning this damn thing.
Next semester better be a fucking cakewalk, that’s all I’m saying, I think to myself as we reach the quad. If there’s some freaky dragon riding competition or whatever, I am out. No way, no how.
Out in the stands, the guys and Kendal are in position, and Roman is watching out for any suspicious activity in case the third man reveals himself. I can’t see exactly where they all are, but I know they’re there. I need to stay focused on my own fight and trust that they’ll take care of the mages long enough for me to get through.
A realization strikes me, and I grin to myself. There’s a hell of a difference between now and when I first set foot on this campus, telling myself not to trust anyone I met here farther than I could throw them. Somewhere along the way, I came to honestly trust these men, and to care about them. The thought doesn’t scare me quite as much as it used to.
“Contestants!” Dean Hardwick intones, his voice amplified. Once he has our attention, he goes over the rules and explains that there will be an award ceremony immediately following the competition, after we take a few minutes for contestants to clean themselves up and for the judges to deliberate.
Well, at least I won’t have to wait long to find out how badly I did.
If I lose, I remind myself. I have no intention of doing that.
Before Hardwick has even finished his speech, walls burst out of the ground around us, cutting me off from the rest of the contestants—cutting us all off from each other, isolating us, entrapping us in a maze.
My heart slams in my chest, and for a moment, I wonder if this is really part of the competition. Or have Merrimer and Adelson decided to stop beating around the bush and attack the school outright?
“As this round is a culmination of the previous competitions,” Hardwick continues, his steady voice amplified magically, “you will have to escape from this maze just as you escaped from your rooms, using ingenuity and magic, while confronting or avoiding any illusory opponents, overcoming obstacles, and using your magic to locate the golden coin.”
An image of the coin appears high above our heads, enlarged so we can see it.
Great. I lost that challenge spectacularly, and now I have to somehow succeed in it while doing everything else too.
“Whoever locates the coin first will be the winner.”
The image of the coin vanishes.
“On your marks, get set—begin!”
I have no idea what my fellow contestants are doing, and I don’t care. This time, I’m going to be ready.
The way I got out of the escape room last time was using my brain. I just have to do the same this time. If the judges are at all logical, then the coin won’t be anywhere random—it’ll be in the center of this maze. And, if I’ve learned anything from playing video games with Cam and Asher, it’s that the more opponents you come across, the closer to the treasure you are. I also remember reading somewhere, I think in a weird history book, that if you want to get somewhere in a maze, just keep selecting the left-hand option.
So, I have a plan. Keep going left, and if I keep running into illusions of dragons, I’ll know I’m headed in the right direction. Aim for the center of the maze.
My first problem, though, is to get out of where I’m currently trapped. When the walls came down, they surrounded me on all sides; a puzzle, just like the escape room. Fair enough.
As I begin to move toward the left-hand wall, the ground opens up beneath me into a gaping pit—and then it vanishes as quickly as it appeared, leaving the ground smooth and even again.
I stumble back quickly, but grin as I right myself. Kendal and the guys are doing what they promised and keeping those two mages distracted. They must’ve stopped whatever extra spell that was.
After a little bit of poking around—though much faster than in my first escape room—I solve