A/N: I am not good with the dæmon names like those usually used from His Dark Materials, like Pantalaimon, Stelmaria, Kirjava, Belisaria, etc., so I am mostly using simple dæmon names, like Lee Scoresby's dæmon, Hester, was called. This takes place in a parallel universe near identical to the one in the actual The Quest, except that the people from both Earth and Everealm have dæmons, like in Lyra's world.
I'm borrowing the general style of writing another fan fiction writer, DeadWizardGod, uses for his own His Dark Materials dæmon crossover, incidentally.
By the way, these are just what I imagine the characters' dæmons would be. Most, if not all, of them would probably be different if I knew more about what the Paladins were like in reality.
Disclaimer: I do not own either The Quest or His Dark Materials.
"Are you sure that's the right way to aim it?"
Katie glanced at her dæmon with slight annoyance. She loved Leopold dearly, but sometimes he could be so annoying the way he split hairs when it came to precision.
"Leo, let me figure this out," she said as patiently as she could, "I know what I'm doing."
Sir Ansgar looked up and said sternly, "Your dæmon has a small point, you know. You need to be very precise with how you aim the scorpion, Paladin."
"Got it!" said Katie.
"See? What did I tell you?" the cat dæmon said to her dryly. "Sometimes, 'splitting hairs' is very important."
"Hush, Leo!" said Katie. "I said I know what I'm doing."
"I'm your soul, Katie," Leo said tenaciously, "I'm supposed to help you be your eyes, remember?"
"All right, then!" said Katie, feeling annoyance grow again, "But don't chatter so much! You're breaking my concentration." She told Christian and Patrick where to aim an arrow, and they fired. The arrow flew through the air… and landed behind one of the dummy soldiers.
"It fell just behind another dummy," she said disappointedly. Sir Ansgar looked disappointed, too.
The mock battle continued, and Leo could tell that the other teams were mostly doing better than their Blue Team. The White Team was way in the lead, and the Yellow Team, which wasn't far behind, had lots of enthusiasm, especially from Shondo. Even the all-girls Red Team seemed to be doing a little better than them, if not by much.
"Katie, if we lose this battle, you know Christian, Patrick, and their dæmons are going to hold us responsible," Leopold said.
"Yes, I have a feeling, too," said Katie, "But I'm not kidding, I'm doing the best I can-Fire! Oops! Another miss. Even if we lose, Leo," she continued, "we still have to stick together. We have to see this through to the end, no matter what happens to us."
Leopold replied, "Yes, I know. But that means we both take punishment for our loss, probably from the Fates. We don't want that to happen, do we?"
Katie shook her head. Of course not. She didn't want that to happen. So they continued trying to make as many hits as they could, until Ansgar shouted, "Everyone, stop!"
Katie and Leopold came down from the tower, and after Ansgar and his troops checked out how many hits each team made, he remarked, "If there had been a real army, nothing, NOTHING would be here right now!" The he read off the scores as: Red-6, Yellow-10, White-13, and Blue-4.
Katie's heart sank, and so did Leopold's. He tried to comfort his human by purring against her legs.
Katie appreciated it.
Gregor observes as his human helps to prepare arrows to fire for the White Team. She says "Ow!" as Andrew accidentally brushes her with the arrow as he puts it in the scorpion. Andrew says something about a mud facial as Ashley gets back to work getting the arrows.
"You okay, Ashley?" asks Gregor as he hops onto the scorpion and looks at her head.
"Yeah, I'm fine, Greg," said Ashley, "I'm just really pumped up about this challenge. I haven't had this much fun in a long time."
"Me neither," said Gregor, "This is already making me feel like I'm in some kind of fairy tale. Can you get the arrows a little faster?"
"I'm trying," Ashley said to her rabbit dæmon, "I just can't help being out of breath!"
"You're short of breath, are you, Ashley?" remarked Sir Ansgar as he watched the White Team in the lead.
"Yeah," said Ashley, as she returned with more arrows, "But I can do this!"
"Me, too," said Gregor, bounding back and forth beside her, "I'm always ready for an adventure."
Ansgar's lioness dæmon growled in respect for Ashley and her dæmon's spirit in the battle.
Ashley blew out a bit of air through her mouth as Andrew fired another arrow. It looked like Bonnie was doing a very good job of directing their arrows at the opposing army. The other teams, except for the Yellow Team, seemed to be doing less than well, and Gregor had hope that his team would win the battle.
Finally, Ansgar called for everyone to stop as the last arrows were used up. He and his men went to check the colored arrows to see which team scored the most. As Gregor and Ashley had hoped, the White Team were the victors, with the Blue Team being the losers. After giving Blue Team a sarcastic rebuke, Ansgar asked the White Team who showed the best leadership.
The three members of the team and their dæmons deliberated briefly and decided that their "eyes," Bonnie, and her dæmon, were the real leaders on their team. "You did it, girl," said Ashley to Bonnie with a grin on her face.
"Of course she did," said Gregor, "And so did Peregrin." He looked at her dæmon.
Sir Ansgar presented Bonnie with the Mark of Leadership as Andrew, Ashley, and their dæmons proudly watched.
Afterwards, Ashley and Gregor noticed the let down looks on the Blue Team's faces. "I sure wouldn't want to be in their shoes right now," whispered Gregor.
"Me neither, Greg," said Ashley.
Tassie didn't like the sound of this at all.
"Jim," she said, "How are we going to pass a Fates' challenge involving mounting hot horseshoes on a wheel, anyway?"
Jim glanced at the little badger. "Just bear with me, Tass," he said, "I don't entirely like it, either, but I'm strongly confident we can do this. I just need a little help from you to get it done."
"But I've never mounted a horseshoe, or anything else, in my life," protested Tassie. "How am I supposed to help when I don't know anything about it?"
"You're my soul, Tass," said Jim patiently, "If I can figure it out, you can figure it out. Our link to each other will show us both how to do it properly. We have a job to do, so try to focus on it."
Tassie shrugged helplessly. "If you say so, Jim," she submitted. "But I still have a bad feeling about this."
As soon as Crio gave the word for Jim and his two opponents, Ashley and Christian, to begin, the three of them put on their aprons and gloves, while their dæmons put on similar, miniature aprons and hot pads. Jim set about hammering his horseshoes and dipping them in the cool water afterwards, as instructed.
"What exactly do you want me to do?" Tassie asked.
"After they've cooled in the water," said Jim, "you help me hold them in place on the wheel while I hammer them in."
"Okay," said Tassie, "I just hope these hot pads are enough to keep my fur from being set on fire!"
"Me, too," said Jim.
They set about doing their work, Jim hammering the horseshoes and cooling them in the water, and Tassie holding them on each peg while they were nailed in. They soon noticed that each horseshoe wouldn't fit on just any peg, making it a little more complicated.
Jim was fully focused on the task at hand, but occasionally Tassie would take a brief glance at their competitors, noting that Ashley and Gregor were doing pretty well, too, while Christian and his dæmon were under a lot of pressure, going through the challenge almost frantically. If it weren't for the ape dæmon's speed and dexterity, Christian would probably have hardly kept up at all.
"Hey," said Tassie, "Maybe this isn't so hard after all."
"I told you," said Jim, "We could learn it working together while focusing on the task at hand. Now try to stop glancing at the others and help me."
Jim was flying through the challenge like a well-oiled machine, and Tassie was fast and nimble enough to keep up with him. Finally, it came to the point where Jim put on the last horseshoe, and said loudly, "Finished!"
Christian and Ashley finished their own work as quickly as they could, in case Jim made a mistake. After they were finished, it was determined that Jim and Tassie had finished the challenge first, and made no mistakes, and Crio said, "Paladin Jim will continue the Quest."
Shortly afterwards, Ashley was banished by a 4-5 vote, and Christian was saved. On the way back to Castle Sænctum, Tassie asked, "Do you have any idea how much this means to me, winning that challenge?"
"I do, Tass," said Jim, "Because I felt the same thing."
"Let's go get 'em, Jasmine!"
The proud dæmon was eager to ride beside his human. Jasmine had always loved renaissance fairs and knights in shining armor, and she thought this had something to do with her dæmon settling as a pony.
"It's just too bad I can't ride you in this tournament, Wildfire," she said. "But the tournament requires each of us to ride a horse from Everealm. Nonetheless, you'll be there to support me in this, right?"
"Of course I will, Jasmine!" said Wildfire, "Where else do you think I'd be?"
"Maybe in the stables with the other non-talking horses and ponies," cracked Jasmine.
"Hey, don't make jokes about dæmons being far from their humans, Jasmine," rebuked Wildfire, his red fur bristling a little in the breeze. "You know what it's like for humans and dæmons to be too far apart from each other."
"Yeah, I do," Jasmine said, "But I think you should lighten up, sometimes. If you don't have a good sense of humor, you can't enjoy life."
"Whatever," said Wildfire, "Let's just listen to Sir Ansgar. He's talking again."
Ansgar was giving instructions on how to fight in the tournament. It involved archery, spear throwing, jousting, and smashing a skull with a warhammer. Earlier, Ansgar had called Paladin Leticia out for temporarily losing her piece of the Sunspear on the field, and Wildfire and Jasmine didn't feel entirely comfortable with that.
"I hope that never happens to us," whispered Wildfire.
"Hush, Wildfire," whispered Jasmine back.
When the tournament began, Jasmine was up first. She rode on her horse, with Wildfire running beside her, and shot several arrows accurately into the target, earning numerous points. She also threw the spear accurately enough, jousted pretty well, and successfully hit the skull with the hammer.
There was applause. Sir Ansgar asked Jasmine's name, and also asked where she had learned to do all that. Her response, with a smile, was, "My imagination."
Ansgar, a little surprised, complimented her imagination, and told her to keep it up, and he liked her spirit. He also mentioned that she got a score of 91 points.
"Looks like you did it, girl!" Wildfire complimented.
Jasmine smiled and said, "Not yet. Everybody else has to go next."
Of course, most of the others fared worse than Jasmine. Some of them couldn't make the arrows or the spears stick in their targets. Some couldn't hit the skull when they passed it. And some passed through the joust too quickly. Ambidextrous Lina even threw the spear backwards.
But two people did very well. Andrew managed to equal Jasmine's score of 91, and near the end, Shondo made a mega score of over 180 points, disappointing Jasmine and Wildfire, of course.
"Oh well," said Wildfire, "You win some, you lose some."
"We should still be proud, Wildfire," said Jasmine, "We did very well; we scored second along with Andrew, and I felt like a real knight getting out there and doing that stuff."
"Same here," Wildfire agreed, "Although winning the Mark of Dexterity would still have been nice."
Jangodal was thinking with her clever mind for a few moments. It was time for the barricade challenge, and her human, Christian, had been chosen to be the leader of one of the teams.
"Christian, let me whisper this in your ear," the clever chimpanzee dæmon said as they prepared to choose their teammates. "This might be a good opportunity to get rid of a few of our weaker and more troublesome fellow Paladins. Why don't you deliberately choose the people who are usually weaker players for our team?"
Christian looked slightly surprised. "The weaker ones, Jango?"
"Yes," she said, "I'm sure that good ol' Lina will be glad to pick the stronger Paladins, and if we have some weak Paladins on our side, and we lose this challenge, it would be a good opportunity to get rid of one more of them when we return to the Fates."
Christian blinked. "You want us to lose?"
"Just this once," said Jangodal, "I'm thinking that players like Bonnie, Adria, and Patrick have to go. They're more of a problem for us, for the most part, than Lina, Shondo, Andrew, and Leticia. Believe me, it'll be smooth sailing all the way, especially if we win the Fates' challenge tonight, which I think we can."
Christian thought about this for a few seconds. "You know, Jango, that doesn't sound like such a bad idea after all. Even in a quest for a hero, sometimes the competitors have to be a little cutthroat. All right, we'll try it your way. I really would like to see a weak player get banished, too."
"Good boy!" said Jangodal.
So Christian chose said people for his "build n' break the barricade" team, while Lina chose the others. Christian's weaker team inevitably built a weaker barricade that looked like a pile of stuff, while Lina and her team built a pretty formidable barricade. Then, as they used battering rams on the other side to break through, Christian's team, equally as inevitably, had difficulty breaking through Lina's formidable barrier, while Lina's team managed to smash through Christian's barricade in a shorter time. Lina's team, of course, won, and Lina was chosen to win the Mark of Ingenuity.
Christian spat on the ground. "Well, we're doing right so far, Jango," he whispered to his dæmon, "Let's hope the Fates are with us."
"Oh, don't worry," she replied, "I'm sure they will be. We're a shoe-in for the One True Hero."
That night, at the Fates' challenge, to Christian's disappointment, he lost the challenge to Patrick. But he was still confident that his "friends" had his back, and that either Adria or Bonnie would be banished, and so did Jangodal. So both of them were very surprised, and unjustly so, when they were banished by a 2-2-1 vote.
As the others left and Christian was told to place his piece of the Sunspear into the altar, he said to Jangodal, "So much for scheming winning us the title, huh, Jango?"
Jangodal scratched her hairy head. "I don't understand. I thought it was intelligence and cunning that would win it for us. I guess not."
"I am so not looking forward to this," said Josef.
"I feel the same, Josef," remarked Adria, "Bonnie doesn't look altogether confident, so that's some comfort, but Leticia's a big, strong woman. It's going to take all we have if we're going to win this."
"Yeah," said the little Miniature Pinscher dæmon, "Not to mention Panthero and Peregrin, too."
The second round of the Battle Dome challenge began. Adria clandestinely thought of a plan along with Bonnie. Together, they double-teamed Leticia, cornering her against the wall of the round dome. Leticia looked surprised, but also like she wasn't going to give up.
Josef barked and pawed fiercely at Leticia's leopard dæmon, too, while Bonnie's pigeon dæmon flew circles around both of his opponent dæmons at the same time. Occasionally, dæmon scratches happened, and their humans felt it, too, but they were all determined to stay on the planks and keep up the fight.
Suddenly, Panthero, Leticia's dæmon, lunged out at both of his opponents and scared the pants off Josef, and Bonnie's dæmon, and the three of them scattered on the planks. Adria tried to move into a different position near the center of the dome, to find a new avenue of attack.
And then, she abruptly toppled backwards, off the plank, and stood in the hay below it. Josef was appalled by his human's clumsiness, to say the least.
"I can't believe you just did that!" he said to Adria. "You weren't attacking, you weren't blocking, you weren't parrying; you just fell! Is that any way for a true hero to fight? You're going to lose this for the both of us soon enough."
"I know, I know, Josef," said Adria in a huff as they left the dome, "But we're still in the Quest, and that's what's most important, and I'm not going to let it get to me. Which is more than I can say for you, unfortunately. I hope you're not going to complain every time something goes wrong."
"You know I'm not a complainer," Josef protested, "I just don't like to see us lose constantly without achieving anything at all, and you've been embarrassing me since you failed to shatter that skull while shouting, 'FOR EVEREALM!' I don't think I'll ever forget Sir Ansgar's 'pathetic' remark after that."
"You won't if you keep talking about it," said Adria, "Now stop trying to sour my mood! I want to cheer on whoever wins this challenge, and we will redeem ourselves at the Fates' challenge tonight; you'll see."
And indeed, she did not disappoint herself, or her dæmon, that night.
After Adria's defeat, Bonnie and her dæmon succeeded in making Leticia drop her sword in the hay, though Leticia herself managed to remain on the plank. And Peregrin managed to keep Panthero at bay by flying in his eyes and trying to blind him.
"Ow!" cried Leticia, "Keep that bird away from yourself, Panthero! When he blinds you, he blinds me!"
"Gggrrrr! I'm doing my best, Leticia!" cried her leopard dæmon back in a growl. "What do you suggest we do? We've got to figure out a clever way to take down Bonnie, because apparently muscle alone isn't enough."
"I think I know what to do," said Leticia with a slight smile. "And I think it does take a little muscle. Now, roar at Peregrin when I give the signal."
"What signal?" Panthero asked.
Leticia, without warning, plunged forward, shoving Bonnie with her shield. Panthero roared in Peregrin's face next, and both human and dæmon fell off the plank and into the hay.
"Bye bye, Bonnie," cracked Leticia.
"Sayonara, Peregrin," Panthero rumbled.
Later, during the final round, in was time for Leticia to face the other two earlier winners, Shondo and Andrew, two very tough men with two very tough dæmons. One thing Leticia's dæmon, Andrew's dæmon, and Shondo's dæmon all had in common was that all of them were shaped like big, wild cats. It certainly made for equal footing when it came to the dæmons' strength and strategy, but Leticia wasn't entirely confident she could beat a wrestler and an MMA fighter alone in a small dome.
Sir Ansgar gave the word to attack. The three of them made their moves toward each other.
The battle didn't go quite as expected, to say the least. Before Shondo and his dæmon could attack, Leticia lunged at him and shoved him right into the hay, with Panthero doing the same to his dæmon. Andrew made a move to attack, and started wrestling with Leticia, but the big woman wrestled right back, and Panthero pounced on Andrew's own cat dæmon, causing her to fall backwards and into her human, aiding Leticia in pushing him off the plank.
Everyone watching from above cheered, the Paladins, Crio, Sir Ansgar… well, maybe not the Vizier. But Leticia cheered loudest of all, and Panthero let out a triumphant roar.
"Now this moment, is epic, Panthero," said a grinning Leticia. "After knocking out an MMA fighter and a wrestler, and being beaten in play fights so many times by my brothers, I feel like I can finally call myself a fighter!"
"I'll say," said Panthero, "Maybe now, you can get that medal you've been dreaming of since showing up in Everealm."
And she did. Afterwards, Sir Ansgar presented Leticia and Panthero with the Mark of Strategy for knowing that it took more than just mere strength to win her battle.
"You finally made your mark, girl," Panthero wisecracked.
Leticia smiled again.
"Attack!" shouted Sir Ansgar.
The Paladins rushed to their stations in the scorpion challenge. Bonnie and her pigeon dæmon, Peregrin, raced to the top of their team's lookout tower. They had elected to be the "eyes" of the White Team, which also consisted of Ashley and Andrew.
"This is gonna be awesome, Pip!" said Bonnie.
"You're telling me!" Peregrin replied, "With my bird's-eye view of things, and your skills at giving orders and directions, we already have this challenge in the bag!"
Bonnie told Andrew to aim the scorpion a little to the left, and fire. Soon, the arrow shot from the scorpion and squarely into one of the dummy soldiers on the other side of the wooden wall.
"That was an awesome hit! Ha, ha!" Bonnie shouted.
"Bonnie's White Team has hit one already," complimented Sir Ansgar.
"Did you hear that, Bonnie?" Peregrin said, "Sir Ansgar already likes the job we're doing, and before he said that he didn't even care about us, or the Quest!"
"I don't," Ansgar called upwards, "But as I told you, it is my job to turn you all into warriors, and even people whom I don't care about still deserve some praise if they are living up to their training and their duties."
"Well, at least that's good news," said Peregrin.
"Come on, Pip," said Bonnie, "Let's focus. We need to do the best at this!"
"I'm focusing! I'm focusing!" said Peregrin frantically.
The challenge continued. Bonnie and Peregrin managed to direct the scorpion and their teammates very accurately, and Ansgar believed they were in the lead. Bonnie kept laughing enthusiastically whenever they scored a hit. From what Peregrin could gather in the background, Lina's Yellow Team was doing pretty well, Leticia's Red Team was doing so-so, and Katie was having a very hard time being precise with her eyes and the direction the scorpion had to point.
"I wonder if it has to do with her nearsightedness," mused Peregrin.
"Say, Bonnie," he said aloud, "Who do you think is showing more spirit in this, us or Shondo?"
"Oh, definitely us," said Bonnie, grinning, "Shondo's really pumped up, but we're destined to win this one. I can feel it."
When it came down to the last arrow, and Sir Ansgar told everyone to stop, he surmised that the White Team were the victors, as Bonnie and her dæmon had hoped. When Andrew and Ashley agreed that Bonnie and Peregrin showed the greatest leadership, girl and dæmon felt greatly honored to receive the Mark of Leadership.
"We always used to make up our own fantasy characters, Pip," said Bonnie later. "We always made up stories in our head, and now I really feel like we belong here, not just a character, but us, the two of us." She smiled wistfully.
"I couldn't have said it better myself," said Peregrin, cooing like the pigeon he was, "It's like, now, we can be a couple of heroes."
"Uh, how, exactly, are we supposed to do this again, Patrick?"
Patrick glanced impatiently at his meerkat dæmon. "It's not that complicated, Tosca," he replied, "We just have to set up some flags on a post to send a flag signal warning of the marching of Verlox's forces, and one of us has to stand in that tower and describe the flags' appearances to the other two members, and exactly where they have to go, in order to get the job done."
"Uh, right," said Tosca, "Well, just let me know when you need me. I hope it won't be for anything really important."
"Tosca, this whole damn thing is important, you know that," said Patrick in irritation. "Look, just follow my lead. Andrew and Shondo and Maxi and Leonarda and going to need us."
Tosca shrugged. "Whatever you say. I'm just being cautious, you know that."
"Too much caution can get you killed, you know," responded Patrick.
Patrick and Tosca ran up the tower to translate the keycode on the scroll. Patrick began describing them to his partners, doing his best to be accurate with each one. There were so many similar flags, though, that it took a long time to figure anything out for sure.
The opposing team, Lina, Bonnie, and Leticia, thought they had it, but Sir Ansgar said they didn't. Patrick's team was still in it. A little later, they tried it out, but Ansgar said they were wrong, too, and that they couldn't afford to stay much longer. Then, Tosca had an idea.
"Why don't we rotate roles with our partners, Patrick, so that we can get a closer look at those flags and another person can be the eyes?" she suggested.
"Good idea," said Patrick, "Let's try that." Patrick called out for Andrew to take his place in the tower so he could get a closer look at the flags and hopefully get the challenge done faster. Andrew agreed, and they did so.
The women continued to work the same way they had from the beginning, while the men got a better understanding of the flags and the code they had to spell. Tosca and the other two dæmons on her team worked as best they could to help.
In the end, the male team and their dæmons prevailed first, getting their message correct before the female team. Then the men helped the women finish their own signal flag system, and the message was sent out.
The women felt let down for not thinking of what Patrick and Tosca had thought, but Patrick and his dæmon felt pretty celebratory for winning the challenge and sending the important message with a couple of brains, like someone who subsequently won the Mark of Intelligence would.
"After so long, we're finally getting someplace," Tosca said. "I knew I was smart, but I didn't realize I was that smart."
"You're my dæmon, Tosca, remember?" replied Patrick. "If I'm smart, so are you."
It was time for the final challenge for the title of "One True Hero."
"You ready to win this, Maxi?" Shondo asked his dæmon, "Because I sure am. We were meant for something like this."
"We certainly are," said Maximiliana, Shondo's mountain lion dæmon. "I can smell the dead meat of Verlox right now!"
"Yeah," said Shondo, "As always, we're going for the dubs, except this time, we're going for the biggest dub of all."
"You got this, Leonarda?" Andrew inquired of Leonarda, his white tiger dæmon.
"Got it," said Leonarda, "Once we've won this, Verlox is gonna be rice pudding!"
Andrew laughed. "That's the spirit. Somehow I think we were meant to do this, and win!"
Lina looked a little nervous, but ready to give it her all, as her kestrel dæmon took note of.
"Nervous, Lina?" he asked her.
"Hmm? Maybe a little," she admitted. "But I'm not giving up. Everealm needs its One True Hero, and I'm going to do my best to be that hero. You've got my back, right, Gheppio?"
Gheppio made a raptor's cry. "I always have; I always will."
As soon as the challenge commenced, they had to look for a scroll hidden in tree vines first. The three humans used swords to hack through the vines, while their dæmons tried to sniff out the right ones to cut. Lina and Shondo both found theirs pretty quickly.
"We got this, Gheppio!" said Lina.
"Here we go!" said Maxi.
Andrew and Leonarda had a bit more difficulty finding their scroll. It took a lot of cutting for numerous minutes, but finally, they found it, and moved on ahead.
Meanwhile, Lina and Shondo had to properly balance some items on a scale, one for each of them. Shondo was pumped up, as always, and in a hurry, and he was having a hard time getting the things balanced correctly as a result. Lina, however, with help from Gheppio, managed to figure out the right way to balance them without taking too much time. Once she got them balanced rightly, they moved on ahead.
Shondo, on the other hand, was stuck at the scales for a long time.
Lina moved on to the third part, which only two of the Paladins would pass. The last one would be banished after losing. Here, they had to chain a door in the ground tightly shut, to lock in a dangerous ogre. There was plenty of chain to use and many locks, which meant this would take quite a while.
"Damn!" said Gheppio, "And I thought this was getting a little too easy!"
"Bear with me, Gheppio," said Lina, "I need you to help me get these chains through all the correct spots."
"Easy," said Gheppio. "I can fly while I guide the chain, remember?"
Andrew and Leonarda caught up to Shondo and Maxi at the scales and got to work. Although they weren't quite as inclined to do well at this challenge as Lina had been, they still managed to finish ahead of Shondo, who was almost mystified by the apparent stubbornness of the scales and the things on them.
Andrew caught up to Lina and set to work on chaining another ogre lair's door shut. Leonarda kept a careful lookout for the proper places to insert the chain.
"Come on, Andrew!" she encouraged him, "We can win this!"
"Yeah!" said Andrew, "We're gonna be the Heroes very soon!"
Lina looked slightly distracted by Andrew's cockiness.
"Don't let them get to you, Lina," said Gheppio, "Just concentrate on winning this."
"I am, I am," insisted Lina, "And they're not bothering me that much."
Gheppio had a feeling that wasn't entirely true, but this was no time for an argument; he and Lina had to focus on becoming the One True Hero, and arguing would distract them further.
Ultimately, Shondo finally managed to get his scales weighed the right way, and he proceeded to the ogre gate challenge. As soon as they saw what to do, Shondo, with Maxi's guidance, started to set about chaining the door shut.
"Go for it, Shondo, LIKE YOU MEAN IT!" said Maxi, imitating what Shondo had said at the scorpion challenge much earlier in the Quest.
"LIKE I MEAN IT!" agreed Shondo.
It was a full race to the finish, but, partly because they arrived first, Lina and Gheppio finished the task first, and moved on to the last task. It involved shooting arrows at a target, until a precise shot caused a drawbridge to come down to lead across a small river that separated Lina from the other side.
She took one of two bows and started to shoot arrows at the target. She wasn't getting anywhere quickly, because she kept missing, or hitting the edges of the target, but she kept trying, knowing her fate depended on it.
Andrew and Shondo raced each other very closely to close the ogre's doors, and finally, Andrew was second to finish, and moved on. As soon as he saw this, Shondo was very frustrated. He wasn't going to be the One True Hero, after all.
Soon, he and Maxi disappeared in a shaft of light, and reappeared in the Fates Hall. They turned in their piece of the Sunspear, and joined the other Paladins and their dæmons in banishment.
"You may not be the One True Hero, Shondo," said Maxi, "But I still think you are a hero, anyway."
Shondo smiled sadly. "I know it too, Maxi. I know it too."
Andrew soon caught up to where Lina was still trying to shoot arrows into the target.
"I feel like Leonarda is breathing down my neck, Lina," said Gheppio, "We've got to hurry!"
"Don't worry, Gheppio," said Lina, "I think I've almost got it."
Andrew and his dæmon finished reading about what they had to do here, but before Andrew could grab a bow, Lina fired again, and the arrow hit precisely on the center of the target!
As the drawbridge fell, Andrew and Leonarda disappeared in a shaft of light, too, and soon, they were the last ones to be banished.
"I hope Lina does a good job as the One True Hero," said Leonarda hopefully.
"I think she will," said Andrew. "Somehow I always knew the One True Hero would be one of the most virtuous, kindest, and bravest of us all, and somehow, I knew that was Lina."
Lina and Gheppio crossed the drawbridge and rushed back to the Fates Hall, beaming in triumph that they had won, and they wouldn't ever be banished now. For the first time since the Paladins saw them, the Fates were smiling. Or at least, two of them were, Karu and Talmuh. Solas, it seemed, showed very little emotion. They told Lina to assemble the Sunspear with the banished Paladins' pieces and her own, as well as the ornate spear point stuck in the altar.
"We did it, Gheppio," said Lina, smiling widely, "We actually did it! I'm the One True Hero!"
"Yes," said Gheppio proudly. "It's a great feeling. But don't let it get to your head too much, Lina. I'm sure the One True Hero is expected to show humility, too."
"Don't worry, Gheppio," said Lina, "I know that." She continued to smile as she held the Sunspear in the air. Gheppio hovered in the air and cried like a bird of prey again.
All of a sudden, the power of the Sunspear unexpectedly brought back all the eleven banished Paladins and their dæmons from their banishment. Their faces disappeared from their dark windows, and they physically reappeared in the Fates Hall, kneeling and bowing to Lina and Gheppio. All of them were ready to congratulate Lina on her victory when Sir Ansgar and his lioness dæmon came back from distracting the enemy.
Sir Ansgar, upon seeing who was the chosen One True Hero, also bowed to Lina, and stated that he was ready to fight alongside her against Verlox's forces, and having returned from banishment, the other Paladins were also to be Lina's army.
"You thinking what I'm thinking, Gheppio?" Lina asked just before they departed for Castle Sænctum.
"I think so, Lina," said her dæmon. "Verlox, here we come!"