FOUR

Chelsea and Justin stared a Tony who had a bewildered look on his face like he had just been hit on the head with a boulder and survived.

"Tony what's wrong?" Chelsea asked.

"I'm actually seeing something."

Justin gave Chelsea a doubtful look, "He's delusional. "

"I'm serious biker boy." Tony snapped, "it's like a trail hovering in the,  in different directions. "

"When you put it like that I guess you have the ability to see trails to whatever you're looking for. "

"No wonder I'm so good at hide and seek. "

"Focus Tony. " Chelsea said.

He nodded and faced the open expanse of land. The feeling was actually pretty amazing, he could see trails no one else good and got different reactions from all of them.

"There are three short cuts all of them are... dangerous. "

"Dangerous? "

"Yeah, I'm getting bad vibes from all of them."

"We'll take what we can get, lead the way Tony." Justin said pulling Chelsea in the direction the other boy was pointing.

They travelled down a steep slope, into a deep valley with sharp rocky edges, when they finally got to the bottom,  Chelsea could clearly see what had been sending the bad vibes.

The  gloomy area had several caves scattered about, each one more dark than the last.

"What is this place? " Chelsea asked

"That's the least we need to know," Justin turned to Tony, "where do we go from here. "

Tony pointed to a cave at the far edge but before they could even get close to the entrace there was a deep rumble from both the sky and the ground. Everywhere reddened and wind blew dangerously.

Chelsea felt fear grip her as she and the guys were lifted off the shaking ground like ragdolls and were immediately slammed back down.

The shaking stopped.

"Bloody hell what was that?" She groaned.

Justin, raising to his feet, "Whatever it was, its about to get a whole lot worse. "

It was like he was some kind of future seer or something cause true to Justin's words, things did get worse.

The ground shook again and it began to crack and split. Tony jumped and unfortunately landed on the other side of the crack away from the cave he had pointed. And just when you think things can't get any worse, a large black dog like monsrters with stained yellow fangs began to jump out of the deep crack.

"Help!" Tony yelled to the other two.

Chelsea couldn't lie, the rush of panic the swept through her was enough to make her shiver.

Justin raised his fists sneering at the three beasts before him, Tony had two licking fangs as they glared at him.

"Tony, I want you to dodge them till I figure out a way to get to you,"

"Really?  How do I do that?"

Justin dodged the first beast that lunged at him, "Figure it out yourself you twit."

Chelse saw Tony make a run for the safety of a boulder. She was actually worried about him but she couldn't do anything,  her present situation was just as bad. She screamed and ran behind Justin.

"Caves your sword?"

"I left the damn thing in the car do you expect me to jump through a portal with a sword that's-"

"Oh shut up and listen," he kicked one of the beasts and pulled her to the side, she stumbled a little closer. "Think very hard and concentrate,  it appears in your pocket in the form of a ring if you forget it anywhere. "

"That would've been nice to know moments earlier." she growled as he pushed her so one monster hound could leap between them. "Even if I have it I'm too afraid to use it."

"Chels!" It was Tony. He was running around the other side yelling and throwing sharp rocks at the hounds. She couldn't believe how brave he was acting. She had to do something too. She dodged behind a boulder and began to think hard. The sword, she could see it. She willed it to come to her pushing aside the doubts,  by now you'd think she would start believing that anything was possible.

She heard something drop to the ground,  she opened her eyes but instead of a ring she saw a laser pointer, she used too love them in middle school. She picked it up and saw it had two buttons:light mode and battle mode.

She didn't think twice. She pressed battle mode and immediately the laser pointer began to change shape and grow heavy and soon she was holding her sword.

She got out from behind the boulder and not thinking a plan through she whistled.  "Hey, uglies!"

One of the beasts turned and fixed her with a cold demeaning gaze. She stood feeling the shivers run through her. Not my smartest move.

Yet the sword in her hand seemed to fill her with a sort of false confidence because she lunged at the monster and gave it a mighty slash from what Justin had taught her. She went on until she had killed two of them.

Justin took out the last one with his bare hands. He stared at her. "You did better than I expected."

"Thanks." She wiped some black ooze from the monsters off her face. She turned to face the other part of the cliff. Tony was gone along with the, monsters that had been terrorising him. "Where's Tony?"

"He either entered another cave or got eaten."

"Don't be a bummer."

"Can't help it." He continued towards the cave Tony had pointed. "We've got to keep moving."

Chelsea sighed. She felt exhausted but followed him hoping Tony was alive and he'd meet them somewhere.

The caves were dimly lit by shimmering crystals which were shallowly embedded in stalactites. Chelsea made to remove one.

"Don't touch anything." Justin called from out in front. He hadn't turned back.

"But they're pretty"

"Don't you watch movies where touching stuff gets you in trouble."

"Those are booby traps, not crystals in rocks." She picked out a loose gem and stuffed it in her pocket. Before she even took two steps forward adeep rumble was heard. They looked up and saw the ceiling was coming down.

Justin grabbed her hand and dragged her ahead. "I told you not to touch anything."

Her mind was more fixed on how they'd get out of this. She wasn't sure which was worse, this or facing those monsters.

They kept running and just when they were sure they were going to be crushed, they were both pulled into an alcove. The stalactites crunched just outside their safe zone.

"Thought I'd never find you guys." Tony's grin was visible in the dark.

"How?"

He explained how he entered a cave full of traps. He was smart enough to avoid them. The monsters were not. "Come on let me show you something."

He led them down the alcove which was actually a tunnel. It outed into a narrow passage which had a large door guarded by large creatures which had the heads of eagles and bodies of horses.

"Hypogriff." Justin said in awe.

"What exactly is the problem? " Chelsea questioned.

"They'll bite your eyes out if you're not gentle." He replied.

"Whatever we're looking for is right through that door." Tony said.

"Chelsea you're up." Justin shoved

"Why?!"

"Animals like girls better than guys." Tony said supporting Justin.

"Do I look like Snow White to you?"

Nonetheless they shoved her out. The Hypogriffs craned their necks in her direction. They took tentative steps towards her.

"Hi bird-horse things," She stuttered trying to remember if anything she had done had ever prepared her for something like this.

The four birds drew nearer.  Staring at her like she was some sort of peasant.  At first she was thinking, jeez what snobs. Then she got an idea. She held her breath then bowed. 

From their hiding place the boys saw Chelsea bow to the Hypogriffs. The birds seemed to debate among themselves before one nudged Chelsea and nodded. She pointed to the doors  and made some vague gestures with her hands but the creatures seemed to understand.

She signalled to the boys to come over.

Beyond the doors were unbelievable treasures, rubies, crowns, gold, and weapons made of gems.

Justin told Tony to hold Chelsea's hand. He wasn't taking any chances again.

After sometime scanning through piles of artefacts,  they spotted a small pedestal where there were two items. A silver key and a bronze dagger.

Pick the wrong one, perish you shall. Chelsea read out. They turned to Tony.

"I'm up I know."

Justin still shoved him for the fun of it. "Let me warn you now, the wrong one is possibly covered in the kind of poison Egyptians use to cover their treasure. But no pressure."

"Thanks." Tony said sarcastically as his hand lingered over the key.

Chelsea knew they had very little time.  She hoped they could still make it out.

Tony's hand bounced between dagger and key for a long time before finally setting down on the dagger. Every one waited for the sound of someone gasping for air in death but fortunately it never came.

"We did it." He exclaimed.

"This is only the first task. We still have a gatr to close." Justin said.

"But how do we leave?" Chelsea asked staring past the Hypogriffs to the door.

Justin and Tony raised their brows like was that really a question.

"Come on Snow White, work your magic." Tony grinned