As Aloisia stalked back towards him, Inari gripped her wrist.
“Stop.” He pulled her to a halt. “You’re making me dizzy.”
“We need a way out.” She glanced up at the canopy above, and the glimpses of the darkening sky amid the leaves. “Soon.”
“We need to bide our time,” he countered.
“What time is there? With each moment that passes, the trial draws closer. I have to be there.”
“I know. But, unless you have some escape plan you have failed to inform us of, we cannot do anything right now in this moment. So, we bide our time.”
Aloisia jerked her hand free of his, her shackles ringing with the movement, and resumed her pacing.
As she turned back to face the entrance of the cage, four Shadow Sisters approached.
“The chieftain wishes to speak with each of you. Alone,” one said.
Another lifted a wooden tube. She aimed it at Kaja. Before any of them could move, or even speak, the woman pressed her lips to the tube and blew. A dart protruded from Kaja’s neck, her eyes wide as her fingers found it.
“You first.”
“What was that?” Aloisia asked.
Kaja removed the thin dart, feathered at one end. “Poison?”
The Shadow Sisters opened the cage and bundled Kaja out.
“Wait!” Aloisia tried to stop them, but she could do little with her wrists bound.
Inari pulled her back, and they closed the wooden barred door behind them, hauling Kaja towards a hut.
Aloisia shoved him away, backing up until her shoulders hit the bars of the cage. “Is this biding our time?”
“We will find a way out.” Inari braced an arm on the bar by her head, leaning close to keep his voice low. “I promise.”
“If anything happens to her…” Aloisia puffed out a sigh. “It’s my fault. She’s here because of me. Everyone is.” She closed her eyes, pressing the heels of her hands to them.
“What happened back there was not your fault.” Inari brushed her hair back from her face, his fingers lingering on her braids. “There was nothing any of us could have done to stop her.”
She dragged her palms down her face, lifting her gaze to meet his. “And what if there is nothing any of us can do to stop her again? And again, and again, and again. Until every one of us is in the ground.”
“I will not let another of us die here.”
“How?”
“I will not allow it.”
“That doesn’t answer my question…” Aloisia took to pacing once again, unable to remain still whilst Kaja had been taken from them.
After an agonising amount of time, Kaja was brought out of the hut and returned to the cage. Another dart was shot. Oda was retrieved in place of Kaja.
“What happened?” Aloisia looked over the other huntress.
“She just questioned me.”
“And the dart?”
“I’m not entirely sure.” Kaja’s lips pressed into a hard line. “But whatever is in the solution they dipped it in, it makes you talkative. I’m not dead yet, nor unwell. So, I don’t know.”
