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The first man ran across the rooftops and then vanished, just as a second made it halfway down the rope. Each of them fell one right after the other, and then the quarry fell silent. All six of them scattering to the four corners of the space. Nothing but black shadows moving as faster than her human eyes could track.
“So, they have ten minutes to hide?” She asked, trying and failing to find any sign of the team hiding below. “Are they all vampires?”
“Yes, to the ten minutes, but no. Most of them are wolf-born,” she said. “Others are human. The vampires only train like this when we’re preparing for a fight. To make sure the soldiers going afield are truly ready to face whoever they’ll meet.”
Mina nodded. It made sense in a tactical way. To train where the men would be weakest. “Don’t the wolves have the advantage? Their sense of smell must be—"
“That is why there is a tree in the center of the town. That bark is enchanted. It releases a powerful fragrance that makes it hard for the wolves and vampires to track the less gifted of us.”
“Have you trained like this before?” Mina asked as a loud horn sounded beside her. The seeking team leapt onto their rope line and began zipping down into the quarry even faster than the first team.
“I have,” Lucy said, her eyes tracking the seekers. “I am not the greatest at it, but I do love to watch how the others work. Look at that, the first has already been found.”
Mina followed her finger as she pointed and sure enough, a large burst of glowing blue smoke shot into the air, and Harker chuckled behind them.
“That’ll be Jordanian, he’s new and he’s slow. They always give blue to the newbie.”
Mina arched an eyebrow at him over her shoulder and gasped as a faint series of pops sounded in the distance and two more clouds burst at the far side of the village. Orange and yellow.
“The twins,” Lucy said.
“So, the smoke is released when they’ve been found?” Mina asked though she was sure she’d already heard the answer at some point.
“Yes, and whoever lasts the longest gets a treat at dinner tonight. If they beat the seekers, they get a monetary reward as well,” Harker explained as a green flare burst into the air, and then pink.
“Looks like Seward is the last one,” Harker said, stepping up beside Mina.
She caught a strange note in his voice. “Why do you sound concerned?”
“Seward isn’t much better than Jordanian; he’s never been the last before. Something must be—”
A loud roar erupted into the air, and then a burst of vibrant red smoke hit the wind. Harker relaxed a fraction and then tensed all over again a minute later as the group below appeared coated in the debris from their smoke. All of them solemn as they carried a limp figure between them, followed by a large brown werewolf whose fur was mottled with glowing red chalk.
Harker hissed and turned to shout to the soldiers still practicing behind them. “Medic! Renfield’s done it again.”
“Done what?” Mina frowned, watching the group stalk up the cliffside.
“Ren, the wolf,” Harker said, pointing at the creature moving at the back of the pack. “He’s got control issues. Tends to wolf out at the wrong times and go bloodthirsty on whoever is closest to him. Looks like Seward got hit this time. It was Caleb last month.”
Mina took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Are we going to be playing this game with him?”
Harker shook his head. “No. He’ll be sitting in the brig for a few days after this.”
“Let’s leave them to it, we should pick our colors for the next round,” Lucy said, hoping to her feet again.
Mina blinked at her. “Already?”
“The first round is over. It’s not that complicated a game,” she said, with a shrug. “Would you rather go back into the palace?”
Mina arched an eyebrow at her and put her hands on her hips. “Alright, let’s do this.”
Lucy clapped her hands together and skipped her way over to the tables where the soldiers had picked up their colors.
Mina watched as Lucy chose a pink strip of fabric and scanned what was left. Red, blue, green, tan, and a handful of others, but her eyes caught on the red.
She ran the fabric through her forefinger and thumb and sighed. “How do i—”
“Allow me,” a familiar voice offered, extending his hand from behind her.
