Charming by Haig Moses (1st Draft)

Chapter Thirty

TESTING GROUNDS

The next morning seemed to follow in a series of steps. Each of the four pledges were woken up by the sharp ringing of a horn before getting dressed and being served breakfast which was lead by even more silence.

    We were then broken up into two groups of two: Inez and a curvy girl named Sabrina whose long lustrous tresses reminded me of something right out of the nineteenth century, and me and Yvonne a meek girl with a pixie cut. After each of us were given a map of the forest and the name of an item we were in charge of finding. We were on the hunt for a golden chalice.

    "But like where did they even find a chalice, much less a golden one," Yvonne grumbled as her balance wavered over a tree root. For the past thirty minutes she had been making some annoying, albeit factual, statements about this scavenger hunt that we were supposed to be completing. My eyes were glued to the map which held no indication or clue as to where it was going to be. "I mean I get what they're trying to do," she continued. "Trust me I get it, but at the same time it's like have some pity on us. You know, I was getting a massage when they forced me into a car and drove me here."

    "Better than being drugged and locked in a room."

    Yvonne froze, her wide eye locked on me as if questioning the very words that came out of my mouth and my silence was enough to quell her suspicions. "Jesus, and I thought fraternities were bad. Last year I heard someone in Gamma Delta Rae got alcohol poisoning through their pledging ceremony. But I mean look at you, still in the running despite the rumors."

    "Rumors?"

    The small girl nodded her head looking around the trees for anything that even seemingly glimmered. "Everybody's talking about how you freed that frat member because you're secretly sleeping with him. I heard some girl call you a house rat, which is so barbaric. Like did we go back in time to the nineties."

    "I never slept with Sebastian!"

    "But you slept with someone?"

    "What?" I stopped seeing Yvonne's eyes slightly glowing now as they took me in.

    "You slept with somebody in Alpha Phi," she clarified. "Because if you hadn't then you would've said I never slept with any of the fraternity members, but you just singled out Sebastian."

    My mouth fishtailed as my mind reeled for a quick explanation. I could easily lie with a "that's obviously what I meant", or "of course i never slept with anyone on that fraternity." I could even just be offended and deny it all to hell. "Are you trying to say i'm some type of whore?" but none of these sentences came from my mouth. So, I settled for a weak, "We should just keep looking for this damn thing."

    Yvonne, not easily bruised by cold demeanor, continued yammering away about her experience with Kappa recruitment until I saw it. For a moment, I figured it was just the sun in my eyes until I stepped forward and noticed the reflected light shimmering on the dull tree bark next to me. "And while I might not be a legacy like most of you, I think I have a lot to offer Kappa—" I quickly shushed the big mouthed girl which earned me a sharp gasp of surprise. "Did you just—"

    I silenced her again, this time pointing upwards to a tall branch of a tree where the golden chancel hung from the edge of a branch. The wind slowly rocking it back and forth. Behind it was the rushing river which was only cut through by sharp rocks and and steep slab of mud.

    Tongue wetting my lips, there had to be a way to get up there without killing ourselves. There were no branches low enough for us to begin a climb up and there was no way to grip the tree large enough. "Give me your belt," I said as I quickly started to undo my own.