Rix exploded as Aelin screamed.

My redheaded Shooter charged at the Hitter, slicing with both of her weapons as she moved over me. I saw white blood drawn and knew I had to act.

I hooked my leg behind him, knocking him off balance, which was enough for her to dodge the counterattack. I lept to my feet and grabbed both of the discarded pieces of stake. I planned on pounding them on their Hitter but saw their Shooter start pulling her bow off her back. Thankfully, they had all been so confident that they hadn’t drawn any of their weapons. I still didn’t think we had a chance, but there was a part of me that was expecting Trent or their teacher to break up the fight if we could hold out long enough. Since diplomacy had failed, we were going to have to try to outfight them.

I threw both pieces of the stake at her as hard as I could. She didn’t try to dodge as she pulled out her bow. The jagged broken part lodged into her right arm. She screamed and dropped her bow. I thought about picking it up but remembered the warning about trying to use equipment that was too high for my level.

Instead, I ran over and hit her as hard as I could. I turned to Rix and saw that she was throwing sand in the face of their Caster. Their Hitter was holding his throat, white blood oozing out of it. Another robed figure, this one with their hood up, was screaming something while pointing at the downed man.

The first punch had only knocked the green-haired woman down, so I hit her again. My fist screamed as she dropped to the ground.

“AELIN! LET’S GO!” I screamed

Aelin snapped out of her stunned state and started moving, running away from their Tank, who was wearing metal armor and had a large shield, and placed themselves in between us and the dying Hitter. I had started to think about trying to finish them off, but there was no way that we were going to beat a Tank of that level with sticks, a knife, and a broken sword. It wasn’t going to be long before the Hitter was healed and then we were in trouble.

I looked over at the Caster and saw him on the ground, also trying to hold in his throat.

Rix had taken advantage of their overconfidence and that had cost them. Something that I’d heard Adventurers talk about was how despite the Mantles, you could still die if you were stabbed enough times by a low-level monster. They apparently had gotten cocky and thought there was nothing to fear from us and they’d been very wrong. While a level eight might have higher stats, they hadn’t done their first double. So Rix could apparently slit the throat of some of them with a level-one weapon.

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It also meant that their total stats were less than mine. Leveling eight times would give them sixteen extra stat points, bringing their total to fifty-one while I had sixty-two. I could probably take any of them one-on-one, but there were three of them and time was on their side.

“RIX!” I yelled as she stabbed him in the chest. "Leave him!”

I grabbed Aelin’s hand and pulled her as I started running away from our old camp.

I was about to turn around to see if Rix had followed when I saw that she had already caught up to us.

“Grab her!” I yelled as I reached around behind Aelin. I had hoped that I wouldn’t have to explain as I lifted the blonde woman off of her feet.

Rix grabbed the other side of her and we ran as fast as we could.

We ran for over an hour without stopping. We reached the trail at a bridge and ran across the bridge, then back into the woods.

“Why can’t we stay on the trail?” Aelin demanded as we ran.

My arm was burning and I was going to have to take a break soon. “Hold up!” I said as I slowed down.

Rix dropped Aelin to keep from falling and skidded to a stop.

I slung the blonde around in front of me and wrapped her in a hug to keep her from falling. We could still see the bridge from where we were and with the creek running from west to east, it would take the other team a few minutes to cross the bridge after they came out of the tree line.

“We have to buy time.” I sucked in a deep breath. "Hopefully one of the teachers will stop them.”

“No one is going to save us.” Rix was leaning against a tree trying to catch her breath. "You should have let me finish them.”

“They had a Healer.” I looked at the redhead. "You weren’t going to kill them.”

“A Healer can’t heal them if they don’t have a head.” Rix fired back.

“About that.” The irritation I was feeling was getting funneled towards her. "You are way too comfortable with killing. A Mantle does not teach you how to fight like that."

"Not every orphan has the luxury of being raised by the All-Church." She glared at me. "Or being employed by the Dispatchers. Some of us had to claw our way out of the Outlands to get here."

"You came from the Outlands?" There were Godless cities in between the ones that were protected by a God, but the Outlands were the areas away from the cities and roads that connected them. The place where there was no government and the law was simply 'might makes right'.

She just glared at me, but didn't say anything as she turned away and sank to the ground against a tree facing the other way.

"What about you?" The anger I was feeling was gone, but I needed to know. "She's from the Outlands and I've seen worse as a Porter. Why don't you seem bothered at all by seeing her cut people up?"

Aelin hung her head. "I didn’t grow up in the best of places." She shook her head as if she was trying to ward off memories. "I've seen some stuff."

Before I could respond, Rix interrupted.

"They're here."