One of them was a bunch of sticks sitting on a rock, something she would have sworn was a mistake, but someone civilized had clearly tied the bundle together. She added that into her bag, along with a neatly folded green plastic tarp. By now, sweat was pouring off her, and rolling up the sleeves of her button-down cotton shirt did little to help. She took more frequent breaks. Sunburn became a serious concern, so it was a huge relief when her next clue led to a bottle of sunscreen.
After a couple hours of battling the intense summer heat, Lissa became so hot and tired that she no longer had the mental energy to be annoyed about missing out on whatever was happening at Court. All that mattered was getting to the end of this test. The map showed two more clues, which she took as a promising sign. She would reach the end soon and then could simply wait for someone to get her. A flash of realization hit her. The tarp. The tarp was a sun block, she decided. She could use it at the end.
This cheered her up, as did the next prize: more water and a floppy, wide-brimmed hat that helped keep the sunlight from her face. Unfortunately, after that, what appeared to be a short leg of the trip turned out to be twice as long as she expected. By the time she finally reached the next clue, she was more interested in taking a water break than digging out whatever else the guardians had left her.
My heart went out to her. I wished so, so badly that I could help. That was my job, to protect her. She shouldn't be alone. Or should she? Was that also part of the test? In a world where royals were almost always surrounded by guardians, this solitude had to be a total shock. Moroi were hardy and had excellent senses, but they weren't built for extreme heat and challenging terrain. I could have probably jogged the course easily. Admittedly, I wasn't sure I would have had Lissa's deductive skills in figuring out the clues.
Lissa's last reward was flint and steel, not that she had any idea what they were. I recognized them instantly as the tools of a fire-making kit but couldn't for the world figure out why she'd need to build a fire on a day like this. With a shrug, she added the items to her bag and kept going.
And that's when things started to get cold. Really cold.
She didn't entirely process it at first, mainly because the sun was still shining so brilliantly. Her brain said what she felt was impossible, but her goose bumps and chattering teeth said otherwise. She rolled her sleeves back down and quickened her pace, wishing that the sudden cold had at least come with cloud cover. Walking faster and exerting herself more helped heat her body.
Until it began to rain.
It started off as a mist, then changed to drizzle, and finally turned into a steady curtain of water. Her hair and clothing became soaked, making the cold temperature that much worse. Yet ... the sun still shone, its light an annoyance to her sensitive skin but offering no warmth in compensation.
Magic, she realized. This weather is magical. It was part of the test. Somehow, Moroi air and water magic users had united to defy the hot, sunny weather. That was why she had a tarp--to block the sun and the rain. She considered getting it out now and wearing it like a cloak but quickly decided to wait until she reached the endpoint. She had no idea how far away that really was, though. Twenty feet? Twenty miles? The chill of the rain crept over her, seeping under her skin. It was miserable.
The cell phone in the bag was her ticket out. It was barely late afternoon. She had a long time to wait before this test ended. All she had to do was make one call ... one call, and she'd be out of this mess and back to working on what she should be at Court. No. A kernel of determination flared up within her. This challenge was no longer about the Moroi throne or Tatiana's murder. It was a test she would take on for herself. She'd led a soft and sheltered life, letting others protect her. She would endure this on her own--and she would pass.
This determination took her to the map's end, a clearing ringed in trees. Two of the trees were small and close enough together that Lissa thought she might be able to drape the tarp into some sort of reasonable shelter. With cold, fumbling fingers, she managed to get it out of the bag and unfold it to its full size--which was fortunately much larger than she'd suspected. Her mood began to lift as she worked with the tarp and figured out how to create a small canopy. She crawled inside once it was complete, glad to be out of the falling rain.
But that didn't change the fact that she was wet. Or that the ground was also wet-- and muddy. The tarp also didn't protect her against the cold. She felt a flash of bitterness, recalling the guardians saying magic was allowed in this test. She hadn't thought magic would be useful at the time, but now, she could certainly see the perks of being a water user to control the rain and keep it off her. Or, better yet: being a fire user. She wished Christian was with her. She would have welcomed the warmth of both his magic and his embrace. For this kind of situation, spirit seriously sucked--unless, perhaps, she got hypothermia and needed to try to heal herself (which never worked as well as it did on other people). No, she decided. There could be no question: water and fire users had the advantage in this test.
That's when it hit her.
Fire!
Lissa straightened up from where she'd been huddled. She hadn't recognized the iron and flint for what they were, but now, vague recollections of fire-making were coming back to her. She'd never been taught those skills directly but was pretty sure striking the stones together would make a spark--if she only had dry wood. Everything out there was soaked... .
Except for the bundle of sticks in her bag. Laughing out loud, she untied the sticks and set them in a place shielded from the rain. After arranging them in what seemed like a campfire-friendly pattern, she tried to figure out what to do with the steel and flint. In movies, she thought she'd seen people just hit them to make sparks fly. So, that's what she did.