Aella guessed she should have asked Archer more questions. If she had known humans were somehow involved, she never would have gone to this party. At least she would have stuck to Maya like glue.
'...Maya!'
This guy was just a distraction! Her eyes flicked over to the real Archer, and he nodded.
Aella darted out of the kitchen into the main hall and the living room. As she scanned the crowd in the hall she suddenly realised she could see no sign of Maya. She ran down the circular staircase and started to move amongst the graduating students, her eyes darting more wildly with each passing second, noticing any brunette with any hint of teal hoping it was Maya. Then Aella began to call her name, getting ever louder, until many heads were turned in her direction. The sea of blank faces just stared back at Aella as she passed them and weaved her way through. She found Vinson instead.
"Woah, is everything okay?" he asked, as he gently grabbed Aella who slowed down unwillingly.
She had no time, but asking him quickly wouldn't hurt. "I need to find Maya. Where is she?"
"Out on the porch!" he had to shout when a bass-heavy song started playing. "Come with me!"
Vinson grabbed Aella's hand and led her out of the mass of people into the coldness of the night. He paused for a moment, swiveling his head left and right to spot Maya. There she was, with a male classmate of theirs. Evans, Aella recalled his name. He was the captain of the football team, athletic, and currently looked kind of threatening.
Maya was backed against a wall. From afar it looked like they were having a private conversation that could have led to some intimacy but…
She was rigid, statue-like, her eyes wider than a deer caught in the crosshairs. She took a step backward and her head shook side to side almost too slight to notice, part tremble and part deliberate.
"Hey, what's happening over there?" Vinson yelled, stomping over.
'Oh no, Vinson.'
Without missing a beat Aella ran past Vinson and pushed him to the side, right as a knife pierced into her left thigh. Searing fiery bursts pulsated around the wound, intensifying with each step, jarring and brutal.
Adrenaline coursing through her, she ignored the pain and continued running. She ran because if she didn't hold on to Maya, she was as good as dead.
The dagger he had thrown at them was the same as that fake Archer's. They weren't fatal to humans, but a stab to the heart with anything sharp killed just about anything.
Aella kept her eyes on the attacker, especially his hands. They moved the slightest bit, but that was enough for him to send another small dagger flying at her. She ducked into a forward roll and right as she landed on her feet, she drew her titanium knife out and pierced it through his heart. His lips parted as shock and anger flashed in his eyes before he dropped to the floor with a thud.
Maya let out a gasp, her mouth open in a silent scream as she shrank back and sank to the floor.
Aella pulled her knife out of Evans' chest and grabbed Maya's hand, tugging her up. "Don't ask, just follow me!"
She knew the girl was in shock, but this was a moment of life and death. Any second of hesitation, and they would all be dead whether in the hands of their enemies, or in Aella's case, her present allies.
"Vinson!" Maya called out when they ran past him.
He staggered as he stood, but within seconds he was a few paces behind the two girls, following Aella as blindly as Maya was.
It was unfortunate that things happened at a teenage after party in the middle of nowhere, but on the other hand it made it easier to escape into the dark woods. Aella had been warned they would be directly ambushed this time but she hadn't expected the attackers to be so bold as to show themselves in a crowded space.
"Why did you have to push me like that?" Vinson whined as they ran across the field separating the house from the woods.
'So your ass wouldn't be in hell at such a young age!' Aella wanted to shout back.
Instead she chose not to respond and risked a glance behind to see if they had any pursuers.
They did. Two men were hot on their heels. They were fast, but as Aella had assumed, they were humans. They didn't have supernatural abilities to catch up in the blink of an eye. Though they would gradually catch up if this went on longer. She felt the screaming of her lungs and the will of her muscles go far beyond what exercise could ever demand. This was the body and brain in full survival mode and it was nothing but pain.
An arrow whizzed past Aella as she ran, and a few milliseconds later a man cried out in pain. Maya looked back and slowed. Aella tightened her grip on Maya's hand to urge her to continue running.
Another arrow followed seconds after, knocking down the last pursuer with a yelp, but Aella wasn't taking any chances. She continued running and soon they entered the darkness of the woods, collapsing onto the ground as soon as they took cover in a small rock cave.
The blackness of the cave covered them, and even though she hated being in the dark, it would help them hide from any other pursuers, if there were any left.
"Oh." Aella shut her eyes in frustration as she realized what she'd left behind in the chase. "My emergency bag!"
"You were prepared for this?" Vinson asked, bewildered.
"I-"
The pain from the wound that Aella had forgotten came like a sudden squall out at sea, pushing a gasp out of her. Bullets of rain from ragged black clouds stabbed at her thigh with absolute brutality. The pain shot up fast, erasing every thought from her head and paralyzing her body.
She tore off two pieces of her dress with her bloodied knife. It was a good choice to wear a flowy gown for the party. She had extra cloth to spare, and a wound to treat.
"Aella?" Maya called out from a few feet away. "You okay?"
Vinson briskly crawled over to Aella in the low-ceiling cave trying to spot her wound but it was too dark for him to see anything.
After tying a makeshift tourniquet a finger-long higher than the wound on her thigh, she pressed snugly against the wound to stop the free-flowing surge of the sticky blood. Her vision was continuously blotched with violent colours that moved and merged without pattern or design. Drops of perspiration invaded her eyes and tasted salty on her lips. Still she continued to apply pressure.
She lay her back against the cold, wet floor of the cave and spoke in short breaths. "Hey Vinson, could you shift and face me?"
He complied. With a groan she lifted her burning leg onto his knee.
"Don't you think we should get out and find a doctor? That stab looked bad-"
Without warning a warm light illuminated the cave, casting shadows against their bodies and the cave stalactites. Aella raised a hand to cover from the light, keeping the other on her wound.
"Who are you?" she asked the bearer of the light, gripping her knife once again.
"Relax, it's just me," Archer's voice echoed from the mouth of the small cave.
"'Me', who?" Vinson asked, confused and on edge.
She lowered her arm, revealing Archer and a fire mage.
The glowing embers leaped and twirled in a fiery dance in the mage's hand, twinkling like stars in the hot swirling air. It looked small in his hand, like a golf ball only squashed into an ellipse. How was he able to cast magic? As far as Aella knew, it was impossible in the New World.
Vinson quickly looked away from Aella as the cave became brighter.
"Don't worry about it," she assured him. "I'm wearing shorts anyway."
He'd seen her wearing shorts dozens of times during the many summers they spent together. She wasn't embarrassed in front of him. In front of Archer and the fire mage, though…
"Medic?" Archer asked as he crawled into the cave.
She sighed, remembering that her image was the least of her problems as cold sweat trickled down her forehead. "Yes, please."
He flipped his backpack towards his front and started pulling out first aid supplies to treat the wound. "Ash, I need you to get closer. Excuse me, Aella."
She just nodded. The fire mage grunted and entered the cave, moving his hand nearer to her. She watched the flame on his hand moving softly, careful not to get too comfortable with the heat and end up losing consciousness.
A hiss escaped Aella's lips whenever Archer poured drops of liquid into the wound after pouring water, with her gritting her teeth afterwards to withstand the pain.
"Sorry, who are you guys again?" Vinson's shaking voice bounced around the cave.
"Allies," Archer responded.
"Is that a magic trick or something? Why is there fire coming out from your hand?"
Now his voice was cracking. Aella was as nervous as him. How was she going to explain this to the two of them? She wouldn't know where to start.
She tried to turn her head to Maya, but the slight movement was enough to make the world spin.
"Focus on the fire," Ash said, his voice midnight cool unlike the ball of heat in his hand.
Aella looked up at him, but his face was covered by the yellow ball of light on his hand. She listened to him and concentrated on the movement of the flames, slow yet alive. The fire swayed to the left, then right, then left again.
Before long, her eyes closed and when she awoke, she was back in the Old World.