Page 41 of Phixmery

“Come on Cadet Solace, we don’t have all day. If you don’t take that vial, I will pry your mouth open and make sure you take every last drop,” Craven snaps, his narrowed gaze bouncing between the vials and my mouth.

My belly warms and my breath catches in my throat.No, he’s an asshole. We are not having those types of depraved thoughts about him.

I pull my gaze away from him to the rest of my squad, half of whom are unconscious. Roz clinks his vial against mine, before doing the same with Ember and the twins. “Bottoms up! See you on the flip side!” He tips it back and downs the contents.

Ember rolls her eyes at him before doing the same with her vial, giving me an encouraging nod before lying on the ground as the tonic kicks in.

I uncork Nero’s first and pouring the miniature version of our vials into his beak. He hops down into my arms. “It will be okay, Rav. We’ll see each other when we wake up and it will be fine,” he murmurs softly before he too is asleep.

Wing One is watching me closely as I uncork my vial. My eyes meet Cravens and I don’t look away as I sit on the ground and down the entire thing. His eyes darken, but I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not, because my vision fades around the edges and then the realm fades to black.

“JUST LEAVE HER be, she’ll be up soon enough,” a female’s voice snaps.

Brightness shines behind my eyelids, making me groan as I struggle to open them. My mouth is dry and my throat is tight as I try to remember what happened.

“Ravina? Are you awake?” A voice asks… no, not just any voice. Melissandre.

Finally, I manage to pry my lids open, and all I see is green. And dirt. No snow. In fact, I’m overheating in my winter tunic, cloak and gear. “Where are we?” I cough as the words scratch my throat and Ember hands me a flask. “Thank you.” I sip on the warm liquid which relieves the uncomfortable scratch in my throat.

Nero hops onto my lap. “You’re the last one up. Everyone else woke up about ten minutes ago and no, no one knows where we are,” he answers me.

Evera pats her freshly braided hair as she addresses our squad. “Great, now that the wanna-be null is up, we need to get moving. The sun is already high in the sky, and until we come across some sort of landmark, we aren’t going to know which way we’re going with the trees blocking our way of the sky.”

That doesn’t seem like a wise decision. “I could just—”

“No one wants to hear what you have to say,” she screeches.

Lennox laughs mockingly. “Actually, I do want to hear what she has to say, because if we end up walking half a day in the wrong direction, I’m going to be thoroughly pissed off.” He turns to me, along with the rest of our squad.

Even Evera Gannon, whose face is pinched with disdain.

I smile at Lennox gratefully who winks in return. He’s almost a completely different male than the one who was listening to the rumors. In fact, he and Rozen get along like two peas in a pod. “I was going to suggest sending Nero up to scout for us. He’ll be able to tell us what he sees and which direction we should be heading in.”

Bracken speaks up. “That’s actually a really smart idea,” he says in awe, smiling proudly at me.

My eye twitches at his shock. I can have good ideas, for crying out loud. Do I really come across as a useless wallflower?

“Why do you sound so surprised, Cadet Levine?” Melissandre asks. “Maybe if you weren’t up Cresida’s ass you would know that Rav actually excels in all her lessons.” She turns to me with a nod. “I say we send Nero up. No other squad will have the advantage of someone with a Familiar. We should use that.”

Bracken mutters, “I’m not up Cresida’s ass, I know Ravina’s smart, I didn’t mean it like that.”

Murmurs of agreement for sending Nero up makes up the decision, despite Evera’s protests saying that she can find the way without cheating, but she’s ignored.

Nero nips my ear before he spreads his wings and takes off out of the tree-bank and into the sky. His giddiness of flying in warmer temperatures seeps down to me as he does his thing for us. I turn towards the others, taking stock of where we were dropped off. Two rucksacks are lying around the trunk of a massive tree. If we are going to survive and make it back to Phixmery, we’re going to need to sort through and ration for the longest amount of time possible. Maybe even hunt depending on what they gave us.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Evera seethes as she steps in front of me, stopping me from approaching the bags.

My brow furrows. “I’m taking stock of the inventory we have and making a plan for rationing supplies until Nero gets back. Unless you’ve already done that?”

Ember links her arm through mine. “I’ll help. My father used to take me on camping trips, so I’m familiar with this. Plus wilderness lessons,” she states as she pulls me around a fuming Evera and we get to work.

The twins, Roz and even Hayes and Bracken ask to help. With that many hands it doesn’t take long to sort through and repack the bags. They provided us with three swords, two bows with two full quivers, and various hunting knives. We were given two loaves of bread and a package of smoked meat. We will definitely have to do some hunting. There’s also a small canteen for everyone, and last but not least, they gave us basic medical supplies, but nothing to help with something life-threatening.

We work on separating the bread and meat into ten portions, which is enough for three small snacks each. Nero can manage his own foraging since we’re in the woods.

Lennox takes it upon himself to hand out the rations and explain that this is all we have until we set up camp and do some hunting or foraging tonight. I expect Evera to throw a hissy fit about her portion not being enough, but she doesn’t, which makes me believe that maybe, just maybe, she has a shred of decency. This trial won’t nearly be as bad if she can be a team player.

It’s not long after we’ve taken stock and repacked everything when Nero comes soaring back, landing promptly on my shoulder. I feel everyone’s gaze on me as they wait for me to relay his findings.

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