The Valley

One

I woke up to the feeling of fingertips against my arm, as if someone were attempting to wake me up. I slowly opened my eyes and saw my brother, Luke, frantically tapping me to wake me up. "We're still in the Arena, aren't we?" I asked, a deep sadness hits me causing my heart to fall into my stomach.

"Yeah. The Test has begun. We should search the area to see if there's any others." Luke said, grabbing ahold of my wrist to pull me to my feet. I nodded in response before hearing the sound of footsteps approaching us. Suddenly, Luke was face-to-race with a short girl that had blue eyes and a ginger pixie cut. Luke had drawn his sword and had it against the girls neck.

The girl's eyes widened as she nervously stared at the blade Luke was given as his weapon. She had her pale arms raised in defeat. "Put the weapon down. Are you guys here to be tested? I'm Cheryl." The girl said. I watched as Luke carefully studied her, all while I had my hand on the sheath where my dagger was hidden.

"How old are you?" Luke questioned, glancing at me with eyes that refused to put his sword down. I swallowed a lump in my throat and nodded, practically begging for him to spare the poor girls life.

"I'm fourteen." Cheryl responded, fear seemingly clouding her vision. I slowly walked over to Luke and Cheryl and placed my hand on the blade, slowly lowering it. "Thank you." The girl said, visibly relaxing. I simply nodded at her and glared slightly at my older brother.

From behind the trees, a boy with dark blue eyes and curly brown hair appeared. "Cheryl! Thank God you're okay!" He said in a relieved tone and hugged Cheryl. He was tall and she barely met his shoulder with the top of her head. The boy looked around my age, perhaps a year or two older. He noticed Luke and I and stared at me for about thirty seconds. "Who are you?" He asked, shaking his head as if just taken out of a trance.

"I'm Luke Jones and this is my sister, Hali." Luke said, pointing to me as he said my name. I close-mouth smiled at the boy and he looked at me before smiling back. "Who are you?" Luke asked, clearly annoyed at the fact that I was being kind to the boy.

"I'm Adam Michaels, Cheryl's older brother. Nice to meet you." Adam said, holding out his hand for Luke to shake. Luke narrowed his eyes and hesitantly shook Adam's hand.

"Pleasure." Luke said, poison could've been evident in his tone. Adam smiled nervously and shook my hand, butterflies exploding in my stomach, causing my heart to flutter.

"Nice to meet you." Adam said, smiling widely at me. "Lovely weather we're having." He joked, causing me to double over in laughter. He watched me as I laughed with a bright smile across his face. "You have a smile pretty. Wait..."

"Thanks." I replied with a small chuckle at his dorkiness. Honestly, he was cute. Too bad I couldn't let myself get distracted. I sighed quietly and analyzed out surroundings.

"There's two more over at our camp we made. I suppose they only allow six per Test session. It's quite odd." Cheryl said, nervously side-eyeing Luke. I stifled a laugh because, despite circumstances, Luke wasn't at all scary. He was the most harmless guy I knew.

"Could you take us to your camp?" I asked, glancing over at Luke, who nodded with his eyes narrowed. Cheryl smirked playfully and turned her head towards Adam, earning an approving nod from him. Before we knew it, we were being led across a river and what I was guessing was south.

I remember when Luke and I were younger and we had hosted a ball for Luke's tenth birthday party. Our parents had hired a professional pianist, chef, and decorator. I was only seven at the time, this being ten years ago, my memories of the day were still clear. We were the richest family in the state and had apparently caused plenty of grief to the middle class and lower class citizens. So, on Luke's birthday, our mansion was ransacked and burned to the ground. My brother told me to become a human compass to find our safe house so we could escape the cold snow. I was wearing a pink formal dress that was tied with a ribbon at the waist, so I had to hold my dress up to protect it from the water. From then on, I was known as 'Miss Compass'.

Eventually, we had arrived at a small camp with four beds made from sticks and a medium sized fire pit. I noticed that Cheryl and I were wearing the same outfit: a tight black jumpsuit with black boots and singular orange line across the cloth that covered our biceps. Adam and Luke were wearing the same black jumpsuit and black boots, however, their orange stripe was on the shin of their jumpsuits.

I saw a boy with wavy brown hair and chocolate brown eyes appear from behind a tree that was in front of a crystal clear lake. There was a girl with wavy brown hair and blue eyes as clear as the lake. The girl studied me and narrowed her eyes at my brother. She glanced over at the boy beside her and pursed her lips. "I'm Jasmine." The girl said. Why were there so many pretty people in the Arena?

"I'm Eric Beli, Jasmine's brother. I see you've brought some people, Adam. Who are they?" Eric asked, questionably raising his left eyebrow at Adam.

"This is Luke Jones and this is Hali Jones." Adam said, pointing at us as he said our names. I watched as Eric crossed his arms over his chest and examined us. He turned to his sister and nodded before turning back to look at us, Eric now speaking.

"Welcome to Camp Beli of the Arena, assholes."