Page 126

The hunter stared at the broken blade in his hand. Dropping it, he barked a command and rose. Adam held his sword ready, but the hunter barked a command and fell to his knees. He tilted his head back, baring his throat.

“Huh?”

“I think he wants you to kill him,” Jack said. “Trial by combat and all that.”

His sword was ready to oblige. The memory, the pain and hurt, the purple-blue of what had been done to him by White, wanted it.

“No.” Adam shook his head. “I’m not going to do that.”

The hunter blinked.

“No,” Adam repeated.

The hunter reached for his head. Adam braced for another fight, but the hunter broke off the tip of his antler. Holding it in both hands, trembling, he left it in the snow.

Then he stood and ran. His fellows followed, carrying their wounded and melting away into the snow.

Blinking, Adam bent, lifted the antler shard, and tucked it into his jacket pocket.

“Are you two all right?” he asked, turning to Jack and Daff.

Jack was fingering the hole in his shirt and sweater vest from the arrow.

“Yes,” Daff said, plucking another from Jack’s back and dropping it into the small pile on the ground.

Jack stared at them and his eyes flicked to Daff.

“How do we get out of here?” Adam asked.

“We should be close enough for the school to find us,” Daff said. She tapped her SPR and held it near her mouth. “I don’t know what happened, but can you hear me? We need to get back.”

A door appeared beside them. They entered cautiously and found themselves back in Jack’s broom closet.

Jack gave the doorway a grateful pat as it closed behind them.

“What happened?” Adam asked.

“Someone hijacked our jump,” Jack said.

Daff was still staring at her SPR. She took it off and held it up to her eye.

“How?”

“I don’t know, but it was higher magic. I don’t think it was whatever they were. They seemed as confused as us.”

“Then why did they attack us?” Daff asked.

“I think someone aggroed us,” Jack said.

When Adam blinked at him, he added, “It’s a video game thing. You use a monster to take out another player, or a monster to take out another monster. That kind of thing.”

“So they dropped us there hoping that the hunters, or whatever they are, would take care of us.”

“Exactly.”

Whoever Lore was, whoever had directed Cole and given him the spells to make the soul bottles and made or directed whoever had the rest of them, they did not want whatever the Archive Infinite had told Jack getting out.

“So what is it?” Adam asked. “What’s the big secret?”