Actions and Consequences || l.s. au ✔

15. OWNING THE ARENA

At least, that had been the plan... before getting arrested.

Niall turned back and grunted. "I blame you! This is completely your fault!"

Harry didn't even blink. "Solaris ate the apples. If you want to blame anyone, blame her. And besides, you were the one who lost our money!"

The guards leading them looked at them with confusion. "You both are sentenced to death via entertainment, because some person ate an apple?"

"Horse." Niall clarified eloquently.

"Right."

Harry rolled his eyes and looked towards the guards. "Death via entertainment? Do you mean you are going to tickle us till we die of laughter? I'm sorry, we are new here in Deniese. Arrived just this morning in fact..."

The other guard shook his head. "Not your entertainment, lads. The king's entertainment. You are going up to the arena!"

"So... are we supposed to sing till we die?" Niall questioned.

Both guards exchanged a look before chortling out hard.

Okay, that does not sound too good. 

Harry had sudden flash backs from when they had had that teeny-tiny misunderstanding in Valency and Niall had almost ended up as a female prostitute. But they had gotten it all sorted out and the cow stampede was also eventually contained. Though the mayor's chicken passed away. But bird would have died anyways, so Harry could not be held responsible for that.

"I told you she was hungry." Niall complained again. For some reason, he was unable to let this one slide.

That morning, as they were departing for Deniese from the road side tavern few miles out, Niall had indeed told Harry that his horse was looking a bit starved. Harry had promptly ignored this comment as he himself had seen to it that Solaris was stuffed with oats before starting out for the journey. But upon reaching the town, while neither of them were looking at the horses, his greedy steed had sneaked of a few red apples from a cart passing by. A clear sign that the animal had been spending way too much time around Niall.

The dramatic cart owner had then thrown an award-winning performance highlighting his descent to doom due to the loss of...wait for it... three apples.

Of course, they could have simply paid for the fruits ('my precious little children, eaten to their deaths' ), but Niall, as they discovered, had gotten himself pick pocketed. But wait, it gets worse.

Seeing the disturbance in the busy town square, the local guards had quickly approached them. And due to a long ongoing skirmish with the neighboring kingdom of Emonak, all foreigners were under heavy scrutiny to begin with. So, within seconds, they were declared as spies sent from Emorak to sabotage the fruit production of Rosales and were captured.

Harry shuddered. The fruits and the prison giving him a sense of déjà vu. Blasted Timora!

And all the while he and Niall were being knighted as crooks, the real four-legged saboteur sneaked up a few more apples, even sharing the plunder with Ivory, because Harry had taught his horse manners.

And it was not even 10 in the morning yet!

That's it. If Harry made it out of this alive, Solaris was soooo not getting a treat for a month.... a week at least. Okay, three days!

And thus, they were in prison, being led to their deaths...by entertainment.

They were taken to another dark musty underground room were a few other 'criminals' were also waiting. strong chains were then brought in and within minutes, Harry's left foot was connected to Niall's right. The remaining four prisoners were also paired up in twos. And the worst part was, Harry actually had a fair idea by now, what the said entertainment of demise was. The 4-meter-long chain linking him and Niall and the roars erupting from the surface was a dead giveaway.