Chapter 186

Lyle was backing up slowly. He did not want to make any sudden moves. It appeared that the King was able to use the manticores from the first challenge again. Lyle continued slowly. Stopping only when the creature looked right at him. Lyle had decided to continue toward the center of the maze when he came to a dead end up the side and had to back track. When he decided to make his move into the middle he ran right into the manticore and now he was here unable to move. Lyle could see like most of the other creatures that he had seen in the maze so far it was chained to stay in this one spot, but manticores can shoot the barbs out of their tails, which means that they have a much greater range than just the area that they are chained in. That potentially can make them more deadly than the other creatures in the maze except for one. Amaris could see that Lyle was having a stare down with the manticore. She was terrified after seeing what they did to those two poor men in the first challenge. Manticores were vicious and powerful creatures. She did not want to see Lyle have the same fate as the other men that went up against them earlier. The King let out a squeel of delight. Amaris looked at him and then focused on what he was looking at. "It looks like we will have our first show down of the challenge!" The King exclaims! Many of the crowd were into the action now too. Amaris looked harder, and realized that Adam had just turned into the same row that Lyle was in but he was on the other side of the manticore. He too had now walked right up on the creature and got it's attention. Both men were on either side of the beast, and both were standing as still as possible to not provoke the manticore into attacking. The King rubbed his palms together in anticipation. Amaris could hear many of the vampires in the stands around them rooting for the manticore to have a repeat performance. She could actually hear some of them making bets. Amaris could see the manticore frantically whipping it's head back and forth watching each man. From this action, they both realized that they were on opposite sides of the manticore. Amaris was watching intently in worry. She was watching Lyle take advantage of each time the manticore looked back at Adam and taking a small step away. She could also see that the manticore was getting frustrated because both men were out of it's reach and it could not move close enough to get either one. Lyle was inching closer and closer to the turn in the hedge where he would be able to make his escape. Lyle checked where his brother was one more time and was ready to make his move to get away. He was ready to signal Adam to do the same when he did so they could both get away at the same time. To his horror, he saw movement right behind his brother just as he saw Adam turn to run. Adam spun around and ran right into the minotaur. Adam yelled in surprise and dropped back to the ground. He started scooting back on his backside away from the minotaur. Lyle wanted to call out to warn his brother that he was moving closer to the manticore. It would do no good. Adam panicked and got up and spun around to run at the same time. He ran right into the waiting manticore. It's maw was open wide in anticipation. The manticore grabbed Adam by his shoulder, chest, and neck and shook his body like a rag doll. When it was done, it threw his body to the side. Right in front of Lyle. Lyle bent down to try and help his brother. He knew that he needed to do something quickly. Amaris saw him looking around for help as he put his hands on his brother and tried to apply pressure. The problem was there were more holes in him than Lyle could cover. Lyle took off his shirt, and tried to use that to help stop the bleeding. Lyle took a quick look to make sure that the manticore was not watching him waiting to strike. Lyle knew that the manticore may not be able to bite or claw him at this distance, but it could still shoot spikes from his tail that would reach that far or further. It's attention seemed to be on the minotaur. It was not trying to bite at it or whip it's tail to shoot spikes, but it was following it's back and forth pacing with interest. Lyle felt a hand on his arm. He looked down at Adam, who was fading fast. Adam seemed to be saying something to him. Lyle was not able to hear, so he leaned in closer to his brother. Lyle stayed there for a moment, and then Adam's hand fell from his arm and he was gone. Lyle sat there and then stared at his brothers lifeless body. Amaris knew that even though Lyle's brother had betrayed him Adam was still his brother. Lyle cared for him. Lyle sat there kneeling next to his brother's dead body for a while. After a few minutes, the King became agaitated. "Well this is anticlimatic. It needs more action. Guards, shoot some arrows in so he gets moving. We need to move this along." He wved his hand down to the guards waiting just outside the maze nearest to where he was kneeling. Since the guards did not know exactly where Lyle was because of the hedges, they all shot blindly. Arrows rained in from everywhere around the maze. One landed just on the other side of Adam's body and brought Lyle out of his stupor. He jumped to his feet, covering his head with is arms. Several arrows hit the manticore causing it to lash out in anger. The manticore thrashed, threw its head back and let out a frustrated roar. It whipped its tail in the air and let several spikes fly. One grazed Lyle's arm and landed in front of him. He looked up in surprise to see the minotaur had jumped on the manticore's back.