Artemis:
I stood there, quiet and dumbstruck after the realization of what had just happened. Separated from my brother by a wall of lions I was lost on what to do next. It felt like everything around me was just happening in the background as I focused on my thoughts. What did I do? How could I say those things to him? Would I feel good hearing something like that if I was in his place? "A-Apollo". I barely managed to say his name, but it was of no assistance. He turned away from us, running away to who knew where. I wanted to yell after him, I wanted to go after him but my body just couldn't move. Apollo, a person who'd never let anything get to him, I'd managed to break him down in the times he needed me to build him up the most.
I didn't even realize I was holding my paw up until I stepped on it. "Ack…" I clenched my teeth and raised my paw back up. It was bleeding and it looked like it had been sprained after Apollo managed to get me off of his back. I was angry and I regretted acting the way I did but I needed to go after him. I lunged forward and landed on my bad paw once more, not yet accustomed to my temporary disability. I fell forward and winced in pain, landing on my side and groaning. Dom and the others came to my side, Dom stood over me and bowed down to my side, nudging my back with his head to help motivate me to get up. I just rolled over onto my stomach and let out a sigh, I hated this weird pain in my paw but I didn't blame Apollo one bit.
"You should take it easy princess." He knew I preferred not to be called that but he did it anyway. "We have to go after Apollo." He looked down to me after I said that, raising and eyebrow. "You need to work on your priorities Princess, we've got to get you back to the pride. The adults will look for him, plus he's a tough one, he'll survive for a few hours." He kept on nudging me to get up and the others joined in not too long after. "Ok, alright!" I shouted, getting tired of their constant nudging. As soon as I got up, Dom slid his body under me. Taken aback by shock and a little embarrassment I almost retaliated and hit him but I decided to let it be. The others supported me on the other side, helping to brace me as we headed back to the pride.
Luckily, we hadn't gone too far and managed to make it back in no time. Unluckily however, my father wasn't very pleased to see me with a bad paw. He rushed over to me, alarming other members of the pride and even Blaze. Though unlike the others who rushed to us to see if everything was alright, Blaze just put his head back down on the ground where he was lying. "What happened?" My father had a fearful tone in his voice, he looked down at my paw for a brief second, before his gaze switched to frantically looking around at the other members of the group. "Where's Apollo?" I got off of Dom's back and stood on my good paw, the other still raised. I was about to speak when Dom cut me off. "He ran away after attacking Artemis."
My dad's fearful gaze turned into a look of confusion, just like me he couldn't believe that Apollo of all people would pick a fight with someone. "Apollo did what? Where did he go?" My father turned to the girls, his tone making it obvious that he was awaiting a speedy reply. Dom intervened once more, answering his question. "He went North in the direction of the hunting grounds." My father looked furious and I could tell he wasn't mad at Apollo but the fact that other predators also roamed the hunting grounds. He ran off in the direction of the watering hole, leaving the pride under the watchful eye of his brother Blaze.
"What do we do now?" A few pride lionesses started talking amongst themselves in confusion as to what their roles were now. "I'll tell you what we do." Blaze got up and yawned, stretching back and turning to the rest of the pride. "We hold the tryouts as planned." He smiled warmly, like nothing was even happening right now.
Blaze was serious, he gathered the contestants in a horizontal line in front of him, walking around them and explaining the rules. "In the field, you should always keep it in mind that you are not invincible. There's always a chance that something could happen and you could lose your life. But the chance of death is something you must accept if you wish to become a defender, and in times like these we have to learn to have faith in our allies, like my brother Lumiere. He's never failed me before and I highly doubt he's going to start failing today, especially on his own son. You all don't have the right to be worrying about that however, because you each have four trials to overcome if you even want to taste the opportunity of becoming a defender and representing your pride. The first test, bravery and quick thinking. The second, speed and agility, the third is strength and teamwork and the last, you'll have to wait and find out." He chuckled after saying that last part. He looked at me and raised and eyebrow after noticing my paw.
He walked over to me; I felt a lump forming in my throat as he got closer. I knew he was going to point out my injury and tell me not to participate, but I also wanted this. If Apollo wasn't here to do it, I would at least. "Are you ready?" I was nothing less than flustered when I heard those words, I expected him to tell me to sit it out, but he didn't even seem to care that I was injured. "Y-yeah, I-I'm ready." I cleared my throat a few times, subtly trying to get rid of the fear gripping me at the chest. "Good." He walked off, signaling for us to follow as he led the way into the nearby woodland area next to the pride territory.
Our Pride's territory was on the outskirts of the savannah, nearby the woodlands and on the inside of a pile of huge rocks, granting us shade from the full impact of the sun, as well as cover and protection from surprise attacks. Blaze led the charge into the woodlands, followed by Dom and two of the girls from before. Their names were Angie and Lia, sisters who'd been granted grace by my father to enter the pride. I was at the back, limping to keep up with the others. "We're here." Blaze said before stopping in the middle of basically nowhere. It had nothing unusual about this place so what exactly was he going to test us for. It was growing later in the day as we'd taken a while to get there and it was going to get dark soon.
"What are we doing here?" Dom was always the first to speak up on any matter. Sometimes I felt like he read my mind. "Oh, you'll see." Blaze bowed down to a dead tree branch. He placed his paw on it, probably to see if it was sturdy as he patted down the grass around it and pushed away other sticks and branches. He lit it on fire with a gentle and controlled flame from his mouth. A level of control I'd only ever seen from my dad. He allowed it to burn upwards by manipulating the flame on his own. "Now we wait." He smiled once more; it was becoming a bit creepy judging that he always smiled after doing the most peculiar things.
I was grateful for the rest and it looked like my paw wasn't hurt too bad as after a while I could put a little weight on it. Blaze paid attention to the fire as the others lied down as well. Dom was alert but the sisters were almost asleep at that point. I lied down on my belly, watching Blaze as he had manipulated the flame for about two hours effortlessly without making it burn the other parts of the branch. Suddenly, we heard the sound of rumbling coming our way. I had no idea what that was, but then again, I hadn't been able to identify a lot of animals on the savannah, not like I got taken on regular hunts. I heard grunting noises coming our way and got up, Dom was the first to get up and looked through the spaces in the trees in attempt to see what could possibly be coming our way.
The sisters got up as well and we all peeked through the trees. "Protect the fire!" Were the last words we heard from Blaze's voice before looking back to notice that he had gotten up and gone. A huge dark silhouette was approaching us making grunting sounds, at first, I thought it could be an elephant but it was shorter, though more robust. It ran through trees like they weren't even there, knocking them over with ease. "Fire, fire!" Were the only words we could make out before we had to rush out of the way. "A Rhino!" Dom shouted, before ramming into me to get me out of the way. I fell hard on my side and felt like my vision was getting a bit blurry. The only thing I could make out was the huge beast attempting to stomp out the fire Blaze had created.
"We have to protect the fire!" Dom shouted across to the sisters before coming back to me. "Are you ok?" He nudged my side with his paw. "Yeah, I've been through worse." I managed to raise my head and smile at him. He helped me up and we both focused our sights on the Rhino. The sisters were lighting other trees on fire in attempt to take the Rhino's attention off of the fire Blaze had created. "How do we beat this thing?" Dom turned to me with a lost expression on his face. "We don't, we just have to protect the fire." I said, signaling for Dom to grab the end of the branch. Dom understood my notion and ran to the burning tree branch, picking up the safe end in his mouth and running off. "Protect Dom!" I shouted to the sister as the Rhino focused its attention on him.
They turned their attention to me for a moment and nodded, running at each flank of the rhino as I knew what I had to do myself. I took a deep breath and pressed both paws on the floor, wincing a little at the pain still present from my injury. I focused all my energy into my next roar as I could feel the clouds above begin to swirl overhead. I let out one last breath to relax myself before breathing in heavily and tensing every muscle in my jaw and gut. I pulled my head back as a flicker of lightning appeared before my eyes and I let it loose, a wild bolt zipping its way towards the rhino's thick hide. All I saw after that was the beast stopping in its tracks as everything else went dark. I heard the sound of my head impacting with the ground once more with a muffled thud. "Artemis!" The sound of Dom's voice was all too familiar to my fading conscience.