When you find it in life, you lose it. What is it?

- FORSAKEN RIDDLE*

*(answer: purpose)

I STAND, STARING INTO THE JET.

It consumes, tainting the emeralds of the rainforest, a dark tapestry threading itself across the sky. It might’ve been pretty, if not for the sick feeling in my stomach. The funny thing is - I had murdered. Killed. Taken lives away from existence with a simple stab of the dagger. The Queen’s Cage had just made it direct. I had seen much more blood and gore before.

It’s a funny thing, when it’s different because you wield the blade yourself.

“They’re bound?” I ask Cas, his presence beside me detected by my Ability. He could’ve killed me. I could’ve killed him.

He nods his head. “Your first time?” he asks quietly.

“Torturing, yeah,” I agree. I look at the blade I used to do the deed. It’s clean now, brook water making it stainless, like the crimson never existed in the first place. I was no stranger to pain - in fact, it was familiar. Like books, watchful gazes, betrayals. “It’s a strange feeling,” I comment. “I think it’s guilt.”

He doesn’t say anything, for a while, not even questioning the I think.

“You’ll have to do worse, if you want to win,” is all he says, when he breaks the silence. All of a sudden Caspian Nameless looks lonely, his figure barely visible in the night but his shoulders heavy. “That’s why I don’t care about winning.”

I don’t point out that here he is, still helping me.

“I still do,” I say, before clarifying, "want to win."

“Don’t we all,” Cas replies, wryly. A resounding silence. For a minute I want to enjoy the night, the silence of the jungle broken by only whispering leaves, my partner beside me. And then I remember that I couldn’t enjoy it, I had no time. “Want to talk about it?” Poseidon’s Chosen offers, just as the thought strings itself in my head. He doesn’t call me a bad person, doesn’t accuse me.

I reply, honestly, “Maybe. Maybe not.” I reach for his hand, and the Chosen takes it. His fingers are dry. There’s no spark, no romantic electricity or bloom of a love-rose. I can feel his calluses and rough palm, and I interlock my fingers in his. It can’t feel anything but a small warmth in my chest amidst that strange, strange feeling.

It’s the first time I've held hands with someone.

Perhaps the thought should depress me.

“Us against the world,” I say. “How lonely that phrase sounds.”

“How lonely the world is,” adds Cas. Not a reply, or a response, just a statement.

“I feel bad,” I finally respond.

“I know.”

“But it doesn’t deter me from my goal.”

“Alright.”

I remember the harsh Second Isle, the Tutors with their blazing eyes and whips, the Servants with their accusatory whispers, the Guards with their stoic pity. Nobles, with their careful words, the Duchess and Duke, with their silence that screamed. And the books, the knowledge, the search and the hunger to be remembered. I tighten my grip.

I say, my voice even: “Remember me.”

He turns, and our eyes meet. Caspian smiles that grin, all teeth and malice, the edges of his lips stained with mischief.

“Alright,” he agrees.

I smile at Rayan. He raises his eyebrows.

“Arden’s guarding the two,” he says. “He really hates you now.”

“Of course.” I wave off the remark nonchalantly. Cas is on sentry watch, and Rayan and I are by the fire. It’s warm, but my hands and my skin. “I mean, I took his voice, his Ability, and now I torture the only person who cared to follow him to the lion’s den. It’s inevitable, really. It won’t be long before Vivianna’s group comes to us, and he as well Kage’ll serve as agitators for conflict. Problem solved.” Of course, the issue wasn’t as simple as I classified it, but it was true.

Rayan frowns. “Are you sure that Jonas will buy it?”

I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter. They just need to know that we’re selling.” Unless Jonas’ leverage over Vivianna - he has some kind of leverage, my Ability tells me - is powerful enough to tear apart the will of the Bloodthorn camp, conflict will make Vivianna’s already turbulent control rip apart.

“Siege preparation, then.” Rayan deepens his frown.

I take the opportunity to add, “War strategy was never one of my best subjects. I suppose you excel in it.”

The shrew-faced Zeus’ Chosen shrugs. “Maybe. We can’t dig trenches or sabotage aqueducts, so really the plan should depend on mind games. Ar’s great at those.” He doesn’t even notice that he uses her nickname, but I agree.

“People are fickle subjects,” I say.

“We don’t know when Vivianna and her posse will find Iason and Kage gone, or when they’ll decide to strike.” I don’t add that we can’t be fully sure of anything, but Rayan’s shoulders curve onto his person like my words were an added weight.

“Jonas seems to control his golems from behind based on the times we’ve seen him,” he finally says. “He tries to gang up and box singular targets in from escaping, but we can’t be sure of his prowess in a group melee. Bloodthorn has a similar Ability, but the peacocks are harder to cut down - if both of them focus on one target, that person will have to dodge both the peacocks and golems at the same time.”

I take the opportunity to consider the problem. “We can’t be sure there aren’t numerical Drawbacks to their Abilities,” I say. “If I remember correctly-” I flash back to that fateful first day “-I’ve seen seven golems and five peacocks at the most. It can’t be a control Drawback, either, for Jonas - the golems act independently, but he has the Ability to command them to zero in on a target. I haven’t paid much attention to Vivianna.”

Rayan nods. “The only way we can find out their limitations and use them is to place them in a situation where they have no choice but to rely on numbers-”

I shake my head. “You’re forgetting about Halkyone and Maia. An archer and a spearbearer complicate things. It’s not a war of attrition - I mean, it technically is - but more finding out all of their cards. Dividing them, both mentally and physically.”

“Guerilla tactics.” The pinched-faced boy stares into the fire. Consideration. “The Forsaken Invasion? No-”

“We lure them deep into the jungle, into a hoard of more dangerous monsters. Harpies won’t do the trick, either. An obvious trap, where they have no choice but to fall into it, but it unfolds in a way they don’t expect. A standard Angelo’s Pass,” I identify with my Ability. “It might be overkill for an initial move, to identify their limitations, but we need to throw them off, don’t we?”

“Separate the group,” Rayan slowly adds. A conclusion reached after comparing perspectives. “Two Angelo’s Passes.”

I raise an eyebrow. “It’ll be tricky,” I warn. But we could do it, my Ability whispers. “We’ll have to have tight control over their plans and moves.”

Rayan looks into my eyes, and nods.

Silence, but it’s full of thought and consideration.

I let my Ability loose, allowing it to pick apart the idea as the embers of the flame warm my hands. “Did you hear from Your Liege?” I ask after a while. “Before the Cage, I mean.” A pause, that I fill: “I didn’t even mean to come here. Morai threw a bunch of coincidences my way, and I went on the ferry before I was ready.”

Rayan shrugs, turning away. “One Daystart, I woke up from a dream where My Liege visited me with superhuman senses. I told my mother and father, and we discussed the meaning of me being Chosen.” He prods the fire with a branch, letting it fall into the flames with an unreadable expression. “After I went out that Dayend, I came back to a letter on the door, in my Dad’s handwriting, that I should go to the Cage.”

“But now you’re thinking that he didn’t write it,” I realize, from the bitterness that comes with the last statement. I bark out a situationally-inappropriate laugh. “That’s one low blow the Fates used. The Gods really think we’re entertaining, aren’t we? It’s even worse, when you get the treatment from Imperials. Bedtime stories and doubted legends, but legends we are, used to reinforce the Anothen sky.”

Rayan drops the stick. “You know nothing of the Gods,” he says quietly. “Nothing of loss, nothing of hunger, nothing of hitting rock bottom.”

I realize again that I’d like to protest against that sentence, but I really can’t. The times I had nightmares and fell into that dark pit - that pit that threatened to swallow me and never spit me out - wasn’t bottom.

I had never truly lost everything before - in the end, I still had - have - my noble title shielding me from finding the end of the pit. I’m surprisingly at peace with the idea. The remnants of scars on my back, the sinking of the whip and the blade, had never deprived me of my existence.

I agree, “I don’t.”

Denying the truth never brought any benefits.

I don’t let the conversation die, speaking again: “It’s good, then, that you’ll try to murder me in the end.” Sometimes I doubted that I would win, felt selfish for wanting to. “Having an opponent,” I add, “always makes things fun.”

Zeus’ Chosen instantly stiffens.

You’ve hit a sore spot, says my Ability, like it isn’t obvious.

“It’s good that I’m fun, then,” the shrew-faced Chosen snarls after a while, his fists balled at his sides, and storms off.

I’m left alone, lying on the jungle ground by the fire. Having no one else to bother and nothing else to do, I close my eyes and think.

At dawn, I go and dig ditches with Cas.

“I pissed off Rayan,” I immediately say, two wooden shovelling-instruments in my hand.

Cas pats me on the back. “Good for you. I don’t think it’s possible to piss off the other one, though.”

I think of the calm exterior that the Aphrodite’s Chosen projects, and nod my head in agreement. Elegant moves, she’s composed of - fiery anger can’t break that facade.

I look at my partner-in-crime - like always, he looks tame and wild at the same time. I reach to mess up his dark hair, which he endures with a smirk.

“You better not do that when your hands are dirty,” he warns mischievously. “I won't let a speck of mud touch my luxurious mane.” He tosses the mane in question flamboyantly, and I grin.

I say evasively and with mischief, “We’ll see.” I point towards the map in his hands. “Are we at the spot ‘Dennie marked?”

Cas nods. “Five ditches, we’ll have to dig. We’re right at the spot of the first one.” I hand him the makeshift shovel. Apparently Cas and Arden carved them last night, curious log-formed, paddle-ended tools.

“D’ya think,” I call as we start digging, “that ‘Dennie and Ray will be able to watch over our dear hostages while finishing their traps? Also, could you water the dirt? Mud’s easier to dig up.”

Cas complies, raising his hands to the air as I see clear liquid droplets from, the beading of water from the environment. There’s no telltale glimmer of magic, no flash of color that comes with Cas bleeding his surroundings using his Ability.

The beads form, hanging in the air as if time’s frozen, before my partner crosses his arms. Like when he was putting out the fire, except on a smaller scale, a globe of water like a large, floating pool appears.

I step back. I can’t imagine the amount of control it takes - for an all-rounder in skills outside of his Ability, he has an exemplary tight rein over it. Resourceful, adaptable - Caspian Nameless has talent. The thought about the decision to back him that day, has never a tinge of strategic regret.

The sphere floats slowly towards the ground, the sight almost ethereal, as it finally breaks - almost like a glass bauble - scattering liquid into the ground. Cas pushes his hands down, and the water follows, probably sinking further into the tightly-packed dirt. Still, we dig.

The sun hovers higher in the sky.

“D’ya think hunting traps will actually make them believe that we’re hiding something in the forest?” Cas finally asks. “No,” he corrects himself, “I may not be a strategic genius, and they may not be, either, but d’ya think that they’ll actually be stupid enough to fall for it?”

“It depends,” I say, “on if Iason gets them riled up enough to make them willing to fall into a very obvious trap.” A pause, before I continue, “But that’s the thing, isn’t it? They’ll be expecting monsters and us swooping in to pick off the remains, not falling into poisonous ditches- Sarawolf, please.”

Cas gingerly hands me the leaves on the harpy-skin handkerchief, and I scatter them all over the ditch’s narrow bottom. The trap itself curves like an upside-down tepee - a carefully-planned construct. My partner offers his shoulders, and we both manage to get out of the ditch. Cas fishes a prepared-braided net out of his shirt, and we nail it loosely over the trap, pushing nearby leaves onto the latticework.

We move on.

The sun still shines, the orb casting streams of almost irritatingly bright light through the carefully-layered smaragadine flora of the Cage’s jungle. It irritates me, but I know that if I lift my face to glare at the source of the radiance it’ll only make it worse. I make an annoyed sound, and sigh.

“Sometimes, I wonder if the Cagekeepers are actually out there,” I confess, seizing the silence. “But then that raises a lot more questions. Like can they see us fighting against each other? Are they allowed to contact us? Could we use their supposed surveillance technology to our advantage?” I turn to Cas, who’s a good couple paces behind. “You good, there? Am I talking too much?”

Poseidon’s Chosen raises his eyebrows at the superfluous question, but still answers, “I’ve no choice but to listen, so go ahead.” Sarcasm.

I pout. "Oh, come on. Don’t be so mean to your closest friend on the Isle."

Cas considers the statement. “You know, it does say a lot about me that I can’t refute that statement.”

I throw my head back and laugh, careful to dodge the light. “It does, doesn’t it? I’m an amazing friend, though. Don’t feel too bad about it.” I stop walking for a second to pat his shoulder mockingly. “At least, I’m probably the best partner on the Isle you could get. Pretty sure.”

“The ‘pretty sure’ doesn’t reassure me,” Caspian remarks with a grin.

“But you love me, though,” I joke with a playful wink. “We’ve known each other for all of, what, a Dayhept without killing each other? That in itself tells you a lot.”

“It shouldn’t,” my partner replies. The words are serious - serious undertone - but his smile doesn’t fade.

“It shouldn’t,” I agree. I grin at him. “I don’t feel like a true Chosen of the Gods for building a tower of corpses at my feet, do you?” I say it nonchalantly, but I’m more honest than my Ability advises me to be.

What did it mean to be a Chosen? A hero, a legend? What did it feel like, to be remembered by history? If you’d asked the younger Seraphina, she’d have gone on some lengthy spiel about saving people, winning battles, getting happily-ever-afters. Now, I can’t answer the question - not without acknowledging the fact that victory isn’t all that I myself ham it up to be.

Not without doubting myself.

“You either live the hero, or see yourself live long enough to be the villain,” recites Cas. Something dark lurks in his eyes. “You do everything you can to survive, but it really doesn’t matter in the end, right? The world kicks you ‘till you’re down, and keeps kicking you until you end up in a grave. Death’s inevitable, failure’s inevitable - why do people care so much about surviving, saving their own skin in this corpse of an Empire?”

The last four words he says with something akin to hate - a mix of spite, malice, regret, according to my Ability - and a life of being stepped on. My partner’s grin sharpens into something madder, something that belongs to those insane enough to try their hand being a God.

“A corpse of an Empire,” I say, rolling the syllables around in my mouth. “Huh. You could say that, and you wouldn’t be wrong.” A corpse of an Empire, a graveyard for past heroes and legends- “I can see it and I can’t,” I observe slowly, after a while, “how the Gods would find this-” I gesture towards my surroundings “-entertaining.”

Cas’ lips quirk. “A vicious cycle of people not wanting to die,” he replies, “but different people coming out of the cycle every time. Yeah, I can, too.”

I give a content sigh. “That probably makes us some form of bad people.”

Cas gives a noise of agreement.

I can feel a familiar chord strung in the Nameless, the same string of insanity that I can feel from Rayan and Arden, too. “When you’re forced to conform to a role of a puppet,” I say, slowly, “you’re still closer to the puppeteer, than most.” The Cage, I realize, is engineered to stretch that string in us, until we’re killed or we snap.

My Ability labels my thoughts as philosophical.

I ignore it.

“Don’t you want to destroy the stage, sometimes?” Poseidon’s Chosen shatters the pause that follows.

“Sometimes.” I still smile. “If this was a stage, I don’t think the me from before would be rooting for the me right now.” The Seraphina with a conscience. The Seraphina who knew not victory, power, opportunity.

My partner’s smile dims, just a bit. “I look after my sister, I try when I can, to be the person I can root for.” Cas’ tone is noticeably darker now, even but brimming with emotion I immediately force my Ability not to identify. I instead hook my Ability on the trees, letting it identify the herbs and species of flora, as I reply.

“We’re sixteen.” I don’t add the only.

“We’re sixteen,” Cas agrees, his voice a faint echo.

He shifts the shovel in his other hand, and this time he reaches for my hand first. I hold onto his dry fingers tight, and we continue towards the future in silence.

We finish in the evening. I eye our ‘hostages.’

“They haven’t tried to escape?” I ask.

“Of course they have,” Arden replies with a snort. “It just didn’t work. I can’t believe they thought pretending they had information about my biological family would work. I mean, one, they’re dead, and two, they’re dead.” She barks a small laugh.

I give a small chuckle. “Who tried that? Kags, or Ias here?” I nod towards the Chosen who’s glaring at me with a surprisingly unsettling gaze. Eyes of dark hatred, a shell of the righteous hero at the beginning - perhaps it’s his first time despising someone. Oh, well. I smile at Iason, and it only serves to make the emotion deepen.

Kage, on the other hand, is a bloody mess. I don’t let my gaze meander over their injuries too much, but I give them a nod. It’s not hate that fills their eyes, surprisingly, but something akin to good humor. My Ability swarms over their face - some sort of-

“Kags here, surprisingly.” Aphrodite’s Chosen smiles. “Ias can't speak, remember? Good go, though. A good go.”

Rayan speaks up. “I’ve extended my senses around the sites we’ve been to. No trace of Bloodthorn or her ilk.”

Cas nods. “Same here. No trace, not even a peep,” he says, “knowing Bloodthorn, she’ll be quick to defend her supposed subordinates’ honor. Maybe that Jonas should delay their plans for a while, but-”

“That’s the thing, though,” Arden points out calmly, “we don’t know her. Or Jonas. We are circling our plan around what makes sense for them to act, after all - human emotions are unpredictable. It’s our weakness.” By her twitching lips - her face turned away from the hostages - I can see that her Act has started. The slight changes in Rayan and Cas’ faces means they’ve caught on. I see Iason’s ears prick.

“We should revise our plan, then,” I say lazily, schooling my expression into a slight frown.

After extending the bait for a couple more minutes, we scatter. As according to plan, I let a dagger slip discreetly from my fingers and onto the ground a few paces away from the hostages. I pretend not to notice the ting it makes as it hits the floor and I stretch, yawning.

Iason’s eyes widen, as Kage raises an eyebrow. They’re different, the Skia - this time a lazy disinterest has engulfed their face, and my Ability blares in warning. No, I can’t back out right now, not at the instant where the plan begins - I’ll have to improve something, anything-

Leaning against a tree, I pretend once again, slipping on the mask of an Act, and watch Apollo’s Chosen clumsily try to get at the blade. Gods, he’s making it so obvious-

I close my eyes.

Much better.

Night falls. The traps are set. The bait is set.

The plan begins.