"Do anything,
But let it produce joy."

- Walt Whitman

~

RACHELLE

"Damn it can you tell how they are doing?" Simba asks from beside me.

I shrug, "They are too far away, how do you suppose I tell?"

"I dunno judge the Aurae's reactions or something," he replies, looking around at all the pale-faced weirdos.

Aurelius explained this to us. Since they didn't require their sense of hearing, you know, the mind the talking thing that they do, they have a heightened sense of vision

That means that all the people around us are getting to witness all the action whereas we are completely in the dark. Its been twenty-five minutes since the race started, twenty five excruciating minutes of not knowing whether we are winning or not.

"Their faces are blanker than the look my friend Richie used to give me during tests," I say and Coral lets out a small laugh beside me.

Aurelius kept going 'ooh' and 'aah' and 'oh no' but I don't know what to make of those reactions. The goddess of victory just stared at the tracks the whole time without uttering a single word. She wanted entertainment. Is she not getting any?

There's just a whole bunch of clouds blocking our view. Aurelius, being the generous man he is, said that the track is surrounded by waterfalls on all sides and the mist from those heavenly bodies of water in obscuring our view.

Great.

"Do you think they've retrieved the key yet?" Simba asks again.

"You ask a lot of questions," I state and he just shrugs.

There was a this moment a few minutes ago, when all of our birthstones burned at the same time. I don't have any idea if that was a good omen or a bad one.

"I'm a curious little bird what can I say?" He says, leaning back on the stands in which we are sitting. The seating area is designed like one of the ancient Roman Colosseums. Well like one fourth of it. It didn't cover the entire track but all of us are sitting on marble steps with carvings made on the railings.

Well we are sitting in the VIP box with Aurelius and Victoria. I'm pretty sure Aurelius did that just for seeing our faces if our companions lose.

Suddenly, Lia, sitting in front of me, perks up, "There! The mist is parting!"

All of us stand at once and squint at the tracks near the finish line.

Two chariots appear side by side, and I can recognise Avalkyra's blazing red hair as well as Minakshi's chocolate brown ones in the left. A green shield is glowing around them.

Avalkyra is in the middle of sparring with the charioteer on the right while Meena is urging the horses to go faster.

"Where's Gus?" Rey says before I have the chance to.

Oh my. Something feels wrong.

"Come on Meena!" Simba shouts from beside me.

"Let's go Avalkyra!" Mikaello joins in.

Suddenly a quiver and bow appear in the Avalkyra's hands. She cocks two arrows and both fly at the Aurae racers' necks. They tumble out of the chariot and our chariot reaches the finish line.

All of us begin cheering loudly and I turn, hoping to see Aurelius scowl. Instead he has a smirk on his silver lips.

We rush to the platform where out chariot has stopped. And I stop short as I see the tears in Meena's eyes. Avalkyra looks defeated as well, even though they have won the race. My eyes follow to where they are looking and my heart stops short.

There, lying in a curled up, fetal position is Augustus. Bloody and bruised, not moving even a bit. There are arrows sticking out of different areas of his body, even one on his wings.

"What happened?!" Lia cries out, staring at the boy with the golden wings.

Kaito is there in an instant, pressing two fingers to the base of his neck.

"He's still breathing, we need to act fast," Kai says, making direct eye contact with Arbor a little further away.

He starts removing the arrows on the boy's body as Arbor makes her way to the chariot. I look away as more blood starts oozing out after the arrows are removed.

Arbor crouches down next to Augustus and takes his hand. There is a faint green glow where their hands meet. Immediately the wounds on his hands and legs and waist begin to patch up.

"Why didn't he heal himself? He's a Soul User," Coral mutters beside me.

She has a point. But you need energy to heal someone or yourself. And I'm guessing Gus didn't have any.

"Why isn't the wing healing? And why isn't he gaining consciousness" Kaito asks Arbor.

She frowns down at Gus's unconscious figure, "There is an unknown substance in his blood I can't heal."

My eyes fall to the patch in his wing, and notice the a purple-green hue around it. I nudge August standing beside me and point at that.

He gasps before walking over next to Arbor, "Poison. The arrow was poisoned."

Arbor cusses frantically, "I can't heal that! Not even Water Users. The only person who could heal something like that-"

"-Is Augustus himself," Kaito finishes.

"What do we do?!" Lia asks with wide eyes, "We have to save him!"

Arbor looks down, "The poison is too far into his bloodstream. I-"

Augustine holds his hand up to shut the girl up and kneels down beside Augustus. The pink haired boy takes Gus's hand in his and closes his eyes.

Immediately Augustine and August both are surrounded by a glowing red hue. Their hands, the ones connected shine with a golden light.

Augustine takes his hand away from August, and opens his palm, where the golden light bursts into a cloud of rose gold ashes which surround the two boys.

I think my mouth is still open.

I just stare as Augustus's eyes begin to slowly open.

"How did you-" Arbor begins but August cuts her off.

"If you have not realised yet, I am cursed with powers which deviate from your regular Fire Users. Now I don't need an interrogation."

And then the boy proceeds to pass out next to Augustus.

"Wha-?" I utter.

Arbor takes Augustine's hand as well and closes her eyes.

"He's just exhausted himself a lot, because of this... trick he performed. We need a place to have them rest," she looks up and at Goddess Victoria standing near us.

"I can't believe he survived that," Aurelius tells her. She nods.

"We were commanded to test your worth before handing over the key. You winning the race is proof enough. Now, let us escort you to a shelter," the Goddess says, beckoning over a few soldiers.

"The ones I've attacked, will they survive?" I hear Avalkyra say softly to Victoria.

The goddess nods, "They are already cared for. You were brave, child of the Flames."

~

We are all sitting in the living room of one of the many marble houses of the Aurae.

Aurelius left us with the promise that he would lead us to their Hall of Portals the next day to depart for our next destination.

I don't know how time works in Aurae land because it's been hours and the sun has not moved one bit in the sky.

Avalkyra, Arbor and Minakshi are sitting next to a white wood bed on which Augustine is sound asleep. On the bed next to his, Gus is sound asleep, with Mikaello, Rey and Lia surrounding him.

He recovered, showed us the key, which doesn't really look like a key, then passed out again, muttering something about faerie porn.

Don't ask me, I have no idea what's wrong with the dude.

Zarren, Simba, Valerie and Kaito are gathered around the key, carefully examining it.

I join them as Simba comments, "It's kinda pretty guys, the colours."

Zarren scoffs, "All the white around us is making my head hurt."

I unfortunately agree with him.

"I have seen this shape before," Kaito says softly, and I think I'm the only one who hear him.

He looks down, "But where?"

I step away from the group towards where Mikaello, Rey and Lia are gathered near sleeping Gus, eyeing the previous group coldly.

"Look at them examining the artifact they wanted to trade for your wings," Mikaello says, anger evident in his tone.

Rey sighs and rolls her eyes, "Can you leave it be? They were right. I should have given the wings up. We almost lost Gus today Mika."

I touch Rey's shoulder, "Can you stop blaming yourself? Gus made the choice to save your wings, respect it at least."

Sometimes tough love is all you need.

"Who's to say they won't readily sacrifice us to go ahead in the other realms?" Mikaello spat.

"You have a point," Lia agrees with Mikaello.

"Damn straight you are right," I hear a weak voice and look down to see Gus look up at us with hooded eyes.

"How are you feeling?" I ask, moving away a little to give himself.

"Oh well, if you were my nurse, then I feel great."

"I was your nurse, you're welcome," Simba shouts from across the room and blows Gus a kiss.

The boy shudders. Then looks down at his body.

He gulps, "And who changed my clothes?"

"That would be me," Kaito says, staring straight at Augustus.

Augustus just stares back before he turns to me.

I shrug, "No one volunteered so we had to draw lots."

Gus turns back to Kaito, "Did you like what you saw?"

"You have a fairly toned body," Kai says with a nod. Everyone is silent at this point, just observing the conversation.

What kind of twisted flirting did we just observe?

I don't think Gus understood it either, because he is looking at Kai with the strangest expression.

"Ahem alright," I say eyeing everyone. The tension here could be cut with a knife.

"Who's up for some drinking game?" I say, as I pull out three bottles of freshly brewed malt liquor I stole from the kitchens before leaving.

~

"Let's go y'all!" I say excitedly. Finally, finally we're doing something fun.

All of us are sitting in a circle holding a glass of liquor. It took while to convince Kaito, Lia, Arbor and Coral to join the game. Mika, Rey, Gus, August, Simba, Avalkyra, Meena and surprisingly Valerie agreed instantly.

"But intoxication will affect our bodies and we have to be in perfect condition to face everything," Arbor argues once more, staring into her cup, "Gus especially shouldn't be drinking."

Gus nods and holds up the cup, "Don't worry Sugar, someone needs to keep y'all in check anyway. This here is apple juice. Plus, Atticus instructed to keep the morale high."

Others nod in agreement.

"Okay, so what do we play?" I hold up a deck of cards, "Kings Cup, or I Never?"

"Yeah I'm not confessing any of the shit I've done in this life. Lets go with King's Cup," Zarren says, while placing a white pillow under his butt. It's sort of between afternoon and evening now, so it feels kinda weird, drinking right now, but all of us have realised by now that time is very slow here.

I place a bigger empty cup and the deck of cards in the center.

"Rules?" Coral asks softly.

"Each number of card signifies a special activity to do, which I will tell you as we pick our cards up. The person who picks up the fourth and final king card ends the game and has to drink from the king's cup in the center."

"I'll start," Simba says excitedly, and picks up a card. He holds it up to show an eight.

"Eight is mate. You have to drink and appoint a buddy to drink with you."

Simba nudges Kai's shoulder, "Drink up, mate."

Kai rolls his eyes before taking a sip of his drink as a result of which he scrunches his face up in disgust.

"How can anyone like this?" He asks, pointing to the cup.

"It's an acquired taste," says Gus, before he picks up a card.

He reads it, "Nine is bust a rhyme. I know this, I say a word and everyone has to rhyme it. The one who screws up has to drink," he thinks for a moment, "Keys."

He nudges Augustine who immediately answers, "Please."

Then goes Coral, "Tease."

Gus snickers at that.

Then it goes to Arbor who says, "Fleas."

Then I hear, "Ease," from Minaskhi and it is my turn.

"Crease," I say and turn to Zarren, who looks like he's thinking hard but then shakes his head.

"Drink! Drink! Drink!" Simba chants and Zarren drinks then grimaces a little.

"I agree with Kaito, this tastes terrible."

It is Augustine's turn and he picks out a Jack.

I smile at him, "Say something you have never done, those who have will have to take a drink."

The pink-haired boy thinks for a while before smiling coyly at me, "I never smuggled drinks into another realm."

I scowl at him before I drink from my cup. And I'm surprised to see Augustus, Avalkyra, Arbor and Kaito do the same.

"Damn, Sugar is a bad girl," Gus whistles. Arbor blushes a little.

Simba turns to Kaito, "Why are you carrying drinks?"

"I'm carrying brandy, it's very popular among humans for healing the non-fatal anomalies like cough and cold."

"What about you KiKi?" Gus asks, looking at Avalkyra.

She flares at him, "If you call me that again, I will slice your throat so much so that even August won't be able to heal you. And I just happen to really like wine."

Gus turns to August, "You healed me?"

August shrugs, "There was poison in your system which these low lives weren't able to heal."

Gus claps him on the back, "My man!"

I smile. He didn't even question August, he was just grateful for the help.

Coral then picks up a card, the King. I tell her to make a rule that everyone has to follow throughout the game and have to drink if they don't follow, and pour her entire cup into the King's Cup. I refill her glass as she thinks.

~

After a long time of playing, Coral is the one who gets the final King and had to drink the King's Cup which was filled to the brim.

As a result she is passed out on the dining table after she did some extremely dangerous pirouettes on top of it, muttering some very incorrigible sentences.

Everyone except for me and Augustus is pretty much wasted, even though the Sun is just about to set.

All of our companions turned out to be lightweights, especially Zarren. After finishing three cups, he began swaying and giggling and talking about Juniper blossoms. I have no idea why.

Minakshi turned out to be a sloppy drunk and began walking around, tripping on her own feet and cussing out the pieces of furniture for 'attacking' her. We had to ask Gus to put her to sleep to end the furniture's misery.

Avalkyra just sat in a corner, talking to her blades and boasting to them about her victory today. I went closer to her to hear her muttering to her katana, "And then... I hit the dude's head... while he was cuddling with Gus... on the chariot..."

Um...okay.

Valerie did not get drunk at all and excused herself to go sleep away from all the commotion.

Earlier, Mikaello had entered Valerie's room by mistake and came out screaming with a curved dagger sticking out of his palm. And then he passed out on one of the beds either because of exhaustion or alcohol or shock, I can't tell.

Gus had to drink enormous amounts of nectar to heal the dude. All the while ignoring Kaito who kept offering to give him a bottle of brandy instead of nectar.

Then after a while of Kaito complaining that no one wanted his brandy, he drank it by himself and passed out in a corner, his head resting on Zarren's shoulder who now had began muttering some nonsense about a banyan tree.

Rey had gotten her wing stuck underneath one of the beds shortly after that, and Gus, Lia and I had to team up to lift the king sized bed off of her wing.

How the hell did she manage to get it under there in the first place?

She then proceeded to cradle the lower half of her wings in her hands and sing them some faerie lullabies. Sounded like a crow dying but whatever.

She then lay down next to where Mikaello was snoring and began singing lullabies to his wings.

August just sat next to Simba and tried to eat his gold coin.

I can fortunately say that he has been unsuccessful in accomplishing it.

I go over to where they are having a very animated conversation so far.

"So you think my hair is hot?" Simba asks, touching his hair.

Augustine touches it too, "No, but I can make it hot."

Simba perks up, "Do it."

And now Simba's hair is on fire. Pink-purple flames lick his forehead as he smiles slightly, his hooded eyes crinkling at the edges.

Simba nods, "I can feel my hotness increase, you think Val will like me now?" He slurs.

"I dunno man," Augustine lays his head against a window sill, "She always looks like she's one word away from kicking you in the nuts."

"That's what makes her...so beautiful...." Simba trails off. I resist the urge to laugh as he puts his burning head on Augustine's shoulder, both gazing out of the window together, "Jane Austen once said...We are all fools in love...."

They look like a couple made in heaven.

I beckon Gus over to them and he too claps his hand over his mouth to keep himself from laughing.

"This is gonna be a long night," I sigh.

"You were the one to take the drinks out. You reap what you sow Princess."

I roll my eyes at him. He just gives me a stupid smirk.

A moment later, we are both on the ground, him on top of me, both his hands on the ground to prevent his body from crushing mine.

The source of this misfortune? Lia De Fayil, who happened to stumble into Gus's back with a lot of force and who is currently standing near us, giggling and saying, "Sorry!"

Our faces are inches apart and he is still wearing a smirk on his face, "How does it feel to make your fantasies about me a reality, huh, Princess?"

I can't think straight. All my mind is saying to me is too close, too close!

"I-"

"Now kiss," comes Augustine's voice from above us.

Oh my Sydan no.

His breath fans over my face but his smile turns into a frown when he takes in my expression with a frown. He must have noticed how distraught I looked.

He pushes himself up and offers his hand to pull me up.

"You okay there, Princess?" He asks, actual concern evident on his face.

I nod, not meeting his eyes, "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine."

~

Hello my loyal followers! How was the chapter? I had to make it less intense because I packed in too much action in the previous one

I hope you liked it! I particularly ship Augustine and Simba even though they are never gonna be a couple I'm sorry.

And well I'm sorry -hxryul  that Mikaello keeps running into bad luck.

Ok, now truth be told, I'm facing a slight writer's block and just can't decide what to do next, so unfortunately the next few chapters might take a load of time :'(