Heln sat down, leaning against the cave wall. The floor was smooth and so cold it felt wet, the walls and ceiling were rough, like someone had carved them out as an afterthought. The only light was Rhyss's barrier, its harsh glow creating strange, deep shadows. He stared at one and swore he saw eyes staring back at him, but he blinked and they were gone.

"Did you hear me?" Rhyss was standing near the entrance, facing them both. Heln couldn't see her expression in the darkness, but he assumed it was murderous.

"I heard you, but it was so completely obvious that I don't know the answer to that I decided it was probably entirely rhetorical." Bel sat up and began fussing with her own hair. "I already told you, there was no power core so it was some sort of fluke. If you're going to interrogate me, do it intelligently. Honestly, I'm an innocent bystander in all of this."

"Really? How do you figure that?" Heln's voice was rough like he'd been trying to scream.

"I'm completely innocent and a bystander, obviously."

He rolled his eyes.

"But Heln might know the answer to your question," Bel finished unrepentantly.

"Thanks, Bel, I appreciate that." Heln wrapped his arms around his knees, trying to stay warm. "I don't know anything, really. The magic felt wrong."

"Right." Rhyss sat down, her hand close enough to her dagger that she could snatch it if the occasion arose. Heln wasn't sure he wanted to know what counted as an occasion for her. "You mentioned that before. What does 'wrong' mean, exactly?"

Heln shrugged. Not all low Ihalins were born with magic, though most of them had secondary traits like his pointed ears and eyes that were a little too blue. Rhyss's tone indicated he should be grateful he could be useful. He would feel more grateful if they weren't trapped in an ice-cold cave in the middle of the night. "It felt dead, and there was no magical signature."

"So you can't tell who cast it."

"That's generally what not having a magical signature means, yes." Heln knew he shouldn't sass the person who would probably gleefully drag them into an interrogation room the moment they were free. Regardless of how Bel spoke to her.

The Guard was in charge of keeping the Grove and the woods that surrounded the city safe from beasts and keeping citizens from wandering too far out. The Enforcers worked in the City itself and with the citizens. There was a longstanding rivalry between the two that stretched far beyond mortal memory.

Being in a Guard interrogation room would not end well for someone whose only career path lead straight into the Enforcers. Bel would probably be okay, but Heln didn't want to go to a Guard prison even for a single night under any circumstances.

"Hm."

Heln was tired of barely being able to see their faces. He tugged the light stick from his bag and pressed his thumb over the activation line on the bronze half. The crystal that made up the other half slowly ignited to a steady glow, the yellow-tinted light almost cheerful.

Rhyss didn't look mad, at least. Bel was sitting on the opposite side of the cave, only a few feet away, her chin resting on her knees.

"So what do we do?" Heln set the light stick between the three of them. The bronze end adhered to any surface with a touch of the second line. It looked like a little campfire. Heln wondered if they could light a fire. The warming script sewn into his jacket wasn't doing much to help.

"Let me call my superiors." Rhyss pressed her fingers against one of her arm guards. Magic script carved into the wood lit up blue, forming the pattern of a speaking crystal. Heln wondered how it worked for a moment, after all, speaking crystals were made of crystal for a reason. The magical vibrations could travel better from crystal to crystal. "And then I'll make a report. You two are lucky that we were near this cave, I helped carve this protection script two days ago, just in case."

"In case of what?" Bel looked around.

Heln shrugged. "Dirt constructs, apparently."

"Clay constructs," Bel corrected him, "and yes, good point."

"In case of anything." Rhyss looked a little smug. "Guards are always prepared. And it pays off, in case you didn't notice. You didn't even thank me."

"Thank you," they said in unison.

"See? Was that so hard?" Rhyss began tapping on her arm guard, punctuating long and short pauses. Heln didn't know any codes at all, but he supposed that was how they got it to work through the scripted wood armor. Script worked best with stone and crystal. It took her a few minutes to tap out her message, ignoring Bel's inquiries into what exactly she was saying. Once she was done, she pulled her braid over her shoulder, fiddling with the bead on the leather strap at the end. Ihalins traditionally wore large, metal ornaments in their hair, but leather or ceramics were more practical for everyday wear. Bel's strap was leather, too. The bead was made of stone, and the type indicated clan. Rhyss's was a teal that was only a shade paler than her hair. Heln didn't know rocks, the best he could say was it probably wasn't turquoise.

When Heln had gone to live with his father the year before, he'd told him that he could wear whatever he felt comfortable with: the green agate of the DoVan clan, or the more common quartz worn by low Ihalins. Heln had cut his own hair off that night. His father had seemed to understand, taking him out to get it cleaned up. He hadn't let it grow any longer for that entire year.

"So, actually." Rhyss's voice cut through his thoughts. In the dim light her eyes shone oddly when she glanced at him. "There's been… weird things happening out here, apparently. That's why they brought in all of the Trainees even though it's the Festival. I guess by 'weird things' they meant 'dirt monsters', because I worked this route last year and saw nothing like that. Well, no answer yet. For now, I guess we just sit tight."

"What you're telling me is that they knew about the dirt monsters but they didn't, I don't know, warn people?" Bel pretended to look shocked. "A cover up."

Rhyss glared at her. "I am assuming that they didn't want to cause a panic, and that they were not anticipating anyone leaving the path, and believed that we could handle it."

"So what, this is our fault?"

"Obviously."

Bel huffed and leaned against the wall, staring pointedly out the cave entrance. Heln followed her gaze, but there wasn't much to see. The light show had ended, leaving the forest a hazy darkness, no details visible beyond the pearly luminescence of the shield. If anything was out there they wouldn't be able to see it. He couldn't even make out the shapes of the trees.

They would be rescued soon. He and Bel might get in trouble for trespassing in the Glade, but it was probably better than being eviscerated by a clay construct. Though they might be eviscerated by their grandmother.

The back of the cave didn't offer a better view. It was lost in shadows, a deep, dark circle that looked like a throat.

"It goes on for a while, I followed it once." Rhyss told him. Heln barely kept himself from jumping, he hadn't noticed her watching him. "The floor stays pretty even, too. No big holes or anything like that. I walked for… fifteen minutes? It's all the same, curves a little bit but that's it."

"I guess we can always run that way if we have to," Bel said.

"No," Rhyss said. "We wait for my superiors to respond."

"Eleti alive." Bel rolled her eyes "I was joking."

Heln tried to make out more, he thought maybe he could see the curve, but that was it. A breeze that smelled of earth and deep, hidden places brushed against Heln's face like gentle fingers, accompanied by a soft sound, like the sigh at the end of a long, hard day. "I dunno, Bel might be right. It must let out somewhere."

He let his shields slip. There were still clay constructs, or whatever they really were, outside again. The sensation of dead magic crawled across his senses and he yanked the shields back up.

But not before he realized there was something deeper in the cave, too. He couldn't really describe how it felt. It was different than any magic he had ever sensed before. The closest thing that he could really compare it to was the miniature temple replica that was in the small grove on his school campus, but even that had magical signatures.

Heln carefully let his shields down again and directed all of his attention to the back of the cave, straining to sense something deeper. It thrummed like a heartbeat, one that pulsed to a rhythm that was familiar and foreign at the same time.

A hand on his shoulder startled him, like he had been asleep. Maybe he had been; he was on his feet and quite a bit farther from the entrance than he had been. Bel gave him an apologetic smile. "Hey, buddy, I really was joking.  That would be a really bad idea, come back to the entrance, we should have help soon."

"I…" Heln stared at his half-sister like it was the first time he'd ever seen her. He hadn't even been aware he was moving. "Are you actually agreeing with Rhyss?"

"Ha. No." Bel laughed, but the sound was too uneasy, almost bordering on hysterical. Heln really looked at her and realized it was the first time he'd seen her like this, off-footed and unsure. She was pale and her hands were shaking. "I just think we have enough to deal with outside, without crawling down weird tunnels. I wonder who has a big enough grudge against us to do this?"

"It's probably against Rhyss."

"I'm right here," Rhyss said, but it didn't have any venom, for once. Unless it was untraceable and more deadly than usual. "Maybe it's a grudge against the Enforcers."

"Or the Guard and we really are innocent bystanders." Bel smiled sweetly at her.

Rhyss glared at her, then turned to Heln. "Do you think there's something there? I didn't see anything, but the tunnel smooths out after a while. Maybe it does lead somewhere."

"Nice, change the subject, she can dish it out but—"

"Stuff it, Bel."

"No." Heln shook his head. He pulled his shields back up, turning back to the front of the cave. "I thought I heard something, but it was just a breeze."

"Are you sure, I—" Rhyss was cut off by someone knocking on the shield. The three of them all made noises that they would have to deny later. Rhyss had a completely different dagger in her hand before Heln could even blink. This one looked more utilitarian than the one still in the floor, a straight blade with a black wrapped handle. He had to wonder exactly how many knives she had on her person.

"Rhyss? It's Vin." The voice sounded young, even muffled by the shield. "Why are you holed up in there?"

Rhyss let out a breath, her shoulders slumping, then she straightened into a murder stance. At least the knife had disappeared. "Don't do that!"

"Ask why you're in there?"

"Knock on a barrier, jerk!" she snapped.

Heln decided he didn't want to remind her she'd done the same thing to him when she'd first come upon them or he might actually find out how many knives she'd squirreled away, and he didn't want to know. 

"That's my mentor," she added for Heln and Bel's benefits. "And he's still a jerk, but he'll know what to do. Let's get out of here."

"I heard that."

She pulled her dagger out of the ground and the shield faded, allowing moonlight to shine through and paint the cave entrance a pale blue. Heln picked up his light stick, deactivating both sets of magic script. Rhyss sheathed the dagger at her back and punched the arm of the young man standing there.

He looked a few years older than them, his hair bundled at the base of his neck, the edges of his darker coat a little more impressively decorated than Rhyss's and his cape a little longer. "Hey. Why the distress signal? If you wanted to hang out with… wow. A boy and your arch nemesis. Never mind, I understand now."

"Aww Rhyss, are you telling people about how much we hate each other now? I'm touched. Flattered, really." Bel put a hand to her chest and batted her eyes. "I hate you, too."

"Shut up, Bel. They go to my school, I caught them on the side path." Rhyss glared at Vin. "There were some kind of constructs out there, we could have died."

"No constructs now." Vin looked around anyway, but there was nothing but trees and bushes as far as Heln could tell. Vin seemed to be satisfied, too, giving them a smile. "Hey, don't worry, we'll get you back to the Festival, come on out."

"They were trespassing so we will be getting them to an interrogation room."

"Rhyss, we talked about this."

"Yes, about taking my job seriously." Rhyss nodded.

"Actually I was referencing our discussion on not abusing our power, but…"              

Before any of them could leave a huge figure silently charged in from the side and slammed into Vin. He barely managed to turn at the last instant, but was still thrown away from the cave. The thing turned to them and made a horrible noise, something between a roar and a landslide.

It was a clay construct, but it was twice as tall and wide as the previous one, with roots and branches sticking out of its chest like spikes. It was almost too big to fit into the cave entrance.

Almost.

"Go!" Rhyss shoved them both. "Go go go!"

"What about—" Bel started to say.

"Just go I'll help Vin!" She had her dagger back out, slashing it through the air in front of the construct. The blue glow of the blade expanding into a scythe of blue light that plowed into it. The light shattered across its shoulder and it grunted, but didn't stop.

Bel grabbed her arm and started dragging her before she ran on her own.

The entire tunnel was shaking, dust raining from the ceiling. Heln held the light stick out in front of them, orange light bouncing wildly off the walls.

"Hey ugly!"

Heln turned in time to see Vin hit the thing in the back with a ball of magic. It spun around to face him with a shower of loose soil.

"Vin!" Rhyss skidded to a stop on the smooth floor and started to run back.

"Get going!" Half of Vin's face was covered in a sheet of blood that gleamed in the light of the next volley of magic he was reading. "This tunnel should lead straight to the Temple! Run!"

Rhyss bit her lip, squared her shoulders a bit, shoved Heln's shoulder and began running again.

There was a loud crash behind them. When Heln looked back he couldn't see anything, not even moonlight filtering through the cave entrance.