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AINSLEY AND TUCKER are the first team that takes to the field holding only their weapons. They dart out before the rest of us, determination clear on their faces, and swords held high; they plan to take out both hellboars first, while unimpeded by mannequins.

It’s a mistake.

There’s a reason everyone else’s strategy included distraction: the boars are big, heavy, easily confused beasts. They’re unable to make quick pivots or turns.

But at a straight charge, they’re nearly unstoppable.

We watch helplessly as the Pages go down in under sixty seconds.

At the last moment before impact, Ainsley shifts left. The weight of the sword takes her off-balance; she trips. She scramble to her feet—and the boar knocks her to the ground. She chokes out a bloodcurdling scream—am I going to watch her be devoured? Gouged to death?—and the boar explodes on top of her.

The second boar is a foot from goring Tucker through the middle—then it explodes mid-chase.

The arena freezes. The only sound is Ainsley crying on the ground as shiny particles rain down on her body.

“Page Edwards needs medical assistance,” Sel says coolly. “She and Page Johnson are disqualified.” Then, he turns to the rest of us and shouts: “The clock is still ticking!”

Sydney and I explode out of our ditch, and so do the other Pages, Celeste and Mina. How much time do we have? Eight minutes, maybe? Eight and a half?

I have to focus.

I have the heaviest mannequin over my shoulders, tucked against my weapon. My only thought is my agreed-upon goal—delivery. Behind me, one of Sydney’s daggers whistles through the air. A deep thunk. The boar chasing me hits the ground. The earth shakes.

I don’t look back; she planned to kill it in one strike, and I have no doubt she did.

The mannequin is heavy, but once I get momentum, I almost forget about it. And suddenly, I’m on the other side, heaving it up and over my head like a sack of potatoes.

I run wide back to our base, hoping to stay out of the other boar’s sight. I know Sydney is saving her other dagger. We can’t afford to make her use it on me.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see her dancing and weaving away from the monster. No, can’t look. One goal: delivery.

I skid into our base and hoist the next-smallest mannequin, just like we’d planned.

Move the heaviest first, while I’m fresh. Save the lightest for last, when I’m spent.

I’m halfway across the field when I trip over Sydney’s first dagger, abandoned in the grass. The mannequin and I go flying. It lands three feet in front of me—with a loud thud that draws our boar’s attention.

Sydney’s quick. She yells. Waves. Jumps to distract it, but—of course—our remaining boar has a scrap of focus.

Its beady eyes find me, and it charges.

I flash through my options: too far from the other side of the arena, can’t stand my ground, can’t use the mannequin in defense, can’t carry it and outrun the boar.

I grab Sydney’s knife and shoot to my feet, shouting at her, “Get it to safety!” I hope she knows what I mean.

I sprint back to our base, but arc wide so that the boar after me will curve too—and avoid trampling the lifeless mannequin on the ground.

Behind me, thundering hooves pound the earth. My thighs and lungs are on fire. Still, I push harder. I can hear its breathing—heavy grunts through a wet snout.

I veer left again to buy myself time, but the change in direction is too sharp, too fast. Something pulls painfully in my left knee. I keep running and fling myself into the ditch. My shoulder clips a pine tree, bark digs into my arm, but the frustrated squeal behind me lets me know I’ve made it. I’m safe.

When I twist back on my knees and look up, the boar is pawing at the ground and snorting in my direction. I hold my breath and watch as its heavy head begins swinging back and forth. Searching.

I’m less than six feet away, why is it—

It can’t see me. Its eyes are weak.

A twig snaps beneath my right foot, and its ears flick forward, its snout lifting in a slow, searching pattern.

But it can hear me. It has a good sense of smell. Great.

Did Sydney do what I asked? Did she grab the mannequin and get it to the other side? I don’t bother looking behind me; I know the smallest mannequin is there, still waiting to be rescued. How much time is left?

I hear shouting and pounding feet to my left. Celeste and Mina are still in the arena, still working.

My boar is pacing now, stubbornly waiting for me to come out so it can gore me. I’ve got to do something.

Okay. Think.

I have Sydney’s dagger, but I don’t have her throwing skills or aim. I have my cudgel still strapped to my back, but at this angle I don’t have enough power for more than a hard poke to the chin. I look around, to my side—then up.

I shove Sydney’s dagger handle into my mouth and start climbing the oak tree beside me before I decide whether it’s a good idea or not. All I know is that I know trees. I’ve climbed them since I was a kid. Trees are good.

I step up onto the large burl overgrowths on either side of the oak, gripping their bulbous shapes as well as I can with sneakers, and wrap my hands around to find the next burl—hoist myself up. The boar’s head lifts to follow me, but I’m gambling that it can’t see me very well and just knows that I’m moving. The limbs are too far up to do me any good, but I stop about ten feet up with one arm in a death grip around the trunk, precariously balanced on a burl just wider than my shoe.

The boar has backed up now, just a few feet from the tree line. It’s hard work getting the cudgel and its leather strap off with one hand, but I manage it quickly and hold the still-buckled weapon away from me and the tree, waving it a bit to get the boar’s attention. It stops moving. Its beady eyes follow the motion eagerly.

This is a bad idea.

One. Two. Three!

I toss the cudgel off to my right and grab the dagger with my free hand while the creature does just what I hoped: it shifts its bulk toward the falling cudgel, away from me, its head dips down to inspect the staff—and I shove off from the tree, launching myself forward onto its back, dagger pointing down.

Gravity drives the sharp blade into the creature’s shining neck, not me, but the blow works just the same.

The animal squeals and bucks, tossing me in the air like a rag doll. I hit the ground with a jarring thud and curl into a ball, ready for the heavy stomp of hooves—but it never comes.

My head pops up just in time to see the boar—my knife still lodged deep inside—crumble to the ground.

“Run!” Sydney screams. She’s going for the mannequin. I scramble to my feet and sprint to the other side of the arena; we both have to get there in time.

Sydney slides down the ditch right behind me, mannequin over her shoulder, just as the whistle goes off.

We’re the only team from our round to pass. Sometime during my flying squirrel impersonation, Celeste and Mina let two of their mannequins get gored.

When we emerge from our side of the arena, the Legendborn cheer from their observation spots in the woods. I feel dazed but exhilarated. Sydney doesn’t smile at me, exactly, but she nods in my direction before she walks off to join Vaughn and Blake and the other four Pages who have passed. They stand together, congratulating one another.

The four who didn’t are in varying levels of shock and devastation. Mina’s wiping tears from her face while Ainsley rubs her back in slow circles. Celeste and Tucker are in a heated argument; from the snippets I hear, they both blame their partners for their eliminations.

I stand between them, unsure where I fit in.

When I glance his way, Sel is looking up the hill where the Legendborn have begun stomping their way through the trees to meet us. His brows are knitted together in concentration, his head cocked to the side as if listening for something.

“Nick! Nick! ”

When Victoria shouts, Sel is already moving toward the sound. He flashes by me so quickly that I hear the wind crack around his body before he disappears into the tree line in a shadowy blur.

We’re all running to follow.

The trees stand so thick up the slanted hill, it’s hard to see what’s happening, but we can hear it. Something is tumbling through the trees like an enormous bowling ball, cracking trunks in half like giant pins. That something is coming closer, the sounds are getting louder, and then it bursts through a pair of pine trees, sending bark and splinters in every direction, and spills out onto the arena floor, stopping us all short.

It’s a massive, full-corp serpent, its scaled body as big and round as a tractor tire. It pulls half of its body up off the ground until it towers twenty feet above us, bloodred eyes the size of my fist blazing down on us. The glowing creature opens its jaws to release a shrill, nightmarish hiss that scrapes against my eardrums.

A hellsnake , my mind supplies. With a body wrapped tight in its glowing tail.

“Nick!” I scream for him, but it’s no use. It only takes a second to see that he’s enveloped head to toe in a coil of muscle, only the pale hair at the top of his head visible in the hellsnake’s grip.

The Awakened Legendborn gather aether as they run, forming glowing swords and daggers. I catch a glimpse of Felicity and Russ, casting armor on themselves as they dash forward, but the quick-shadow shape of Selwyn Kane speeds out of the trees and leaps onto the snake before anyone else has reached it.

While the serpent writhes, Sel scrabbles up its body, using its scales as handholds. He mounts its head as the creature thrashes back and forth, its forked tongue flicking out like a glowing whip. Sel had no time to form a weapon, but his entire body is wrapped in thin, swirling clouds of silver-blue aether. He pulls back with a roar and thrusts both of his arms into the snake’s eyes, burying them into the sockets up to his elbow.

The creature screams loud enough to shatter glass. Its big body spasms so hard anyone else would have been thrown, but Sel holds tight and only pushes his arms in farther. Viscous fluid erupts in his face. After a final shudder, the hellsnake goes stiff and falls forward, releasing a gasping Nick right as its head hits the ground.