Chapter 3

DAISY

My nerves were off the charts, even if I wasn't doing anything I didn't do every other day. All I had to do was work on the brief that the presenters of the show gave me, and then they'd judge it. I only had to be better than one other person here to avoid being eliminated.

But that wasn't good enough for me. I needed to be the best all the time, even if that wasn't actually going to be possible. This was a competition, and presumably, everyone was going to bring everything they had with the intention of winning. I was going to have my work cut out for me.

My gaze slipped over to the competitor at the next station. He stretched, the muscles of his back stretching against his shirt and making my mouth go a little dry even if I wished that wasn't true. The last thing I needed was being attracted to one of my competitors. Luckily there wasn't anything in the contract about that.

He ran a hand through the thick dark red hair on his head. It suited him, especially when paired with the short beard he sported. It made him look like a Viking blacksmith, which I guessed did fit with the name. Though I could hardly believe he was using a god's name as his own. I supposed that wasn't entirely unreasonable, I'd heard the name Thor was popular in Scandinavian countries, so maybe it really was his name. Even so, I'd probably have picked something different if I were him. The judges on the show were gods themselves, and we were competing for a spot in the Jinx headquarters. It was weird for him to try and put them off so early.

But I shouldn't be thinking about this. It didn't matter to me what he called himself, and if anything, it was good for me if he annoyed the gods. That was one less person for me to annoy.

A gong sounded through the workshop, and I stopped what I was doing in time to see a woman with a bun on the top of her head and headphones around her neck.

"Hello, everyone," she said. "I'm Denise, the assistant producer, you'll either be dealing with me or the producer, Mel while here. Welcome to The Great Sculpting Challenge . We're going to start the cameras rolling in a moment, and you'll be given your brief by our hosts. Today is about getting footage of you working, so don't worry too much about talking to the cameras, just answer the questions the hosts ask you and focus on your work. We'll be filming interviews about how it all went tomorrow, which is how we're always going to film. So with that, let's get started." She clapped her hands together and gestured to several of the cameramen around the room.

A new set of nerves jumped to life inside me. I'd never been on TV before, and I'd certainly never thought about a reality show and how it might work. But it was too late to back out now. I just had to get on with it. Hopefully, it was going to be worth it.

Upbeat music filled the room and some curtains pulled back as a pair of presenters stepped into the room. Neither of them was dressed for a workshop like this.

The woman flicked her hair over her shoulder and smiled a little too brightly. "Hello, hello, and welcome! Would all of the competitors gather at the front here?" She gestured to a spot in front of their little platform.

I took a deep breath and stepped out of my station, almost bumping into Thor as I did.

"Sorry," he said.

"No problem," I murmured in response, ignoring him so that I could focus on whatever task was to come. Others from around the room came to join us, each of them looking either as nervous as I was, or like they'd thought they were convinced they'd won already.

I tried to pay attention to them all so that I could file away information for the future, but it was hard to know much about them just from a first glance.

"All right, thank you all for joining us today," the male host said. "I'm Duncan, and this is Rosie, we're your hosts for the competition. For the first challenge, you're going to have four hours to make yourself a new plaque. But you can't use your name. This is a blind judging and you won't even see the judges doing it, they'll give their feedback to us and we'll tell you. But because this is blind, your sculpture has to represent you while not including your name. You can use whatever techniques and material you want, but keep in mind that this is going to be the last challenge you'll be able to do that for."

I took a deep breath. Being able to use what I wanted was a good start. There would be challenges ahead for me when they asked us to use something specific, but right now, that wasn't an issue.

"What are you all doing standing here?" Rosie asked with excitement in her voice I definitely didn't share. "Your time starts now!"

Several of the other competitors raced back to their stations, but I preferred to take my time. I needed time to think about what I was going to use for my plaque. A daisy was obvious, but maybe a little too on the nose.

I stopped in front of my station, my attention catching on where it said Daisy Chains , an idea springing to mind. It had come from something Danny had called me as a kid, but I'd always intended to do a sculpture based on that. Perhaps now was the perfect time.

I headed into my station and over to the sketch pad. I rarely drew anything out before I started working on it, but the producer who had briefed me had said they wanted us to do it so that the art department could work on their part of the show. My pencil glided over the page but the drawing itself was beyond rubbish. I set it down and sighed. There was nothing I could do about that. I might be artistic when it came to sculpting, but drawing wasn't something I had any aptitude for.

I gave up and made my way over to the scrap store. One of the other competitors was searching through it in a frantic way that made me think the competition aspect of the show was getting to him already, and I vowed not to let that be me. I wasn't going to win if I let my emotions get the better of me, I just had to do what I did best. Sculpt.

A heavy pair of black chains caught my attention and I made my way over, trying to pick them up and failing. Using magic around so many other people wasn't something I particularly liked doing, but everyone here was paranormal of some kind, or they wouldn't have gotten an invite, which meant it would be fine for me to do it.

I pulled magic into my hands, directing the sparks towards the chains and lifting them into the air. I'd have to come back to see what else I could use for my sculpture, otherwise, my magic would run out.

I carefully floated them back to my workstation, trying to avoid other people so that I wouldn't cause an accident. I was dimly aware of one of the cameras being trained on me, and instantly hated the way it made it feel as if someone else was watching me. I was used to being alone in my space when I was creating and this was something else entirely.

The chains clanked loudly as I got them into position, fixing them down so they didn't move. I placed my hand on the cold metal to get a sense of how it felt and what it needed in order to become the sculpture I wanted it to be. I wasn't usually self-conscious about my process, but now I was wondering how out of touch I appeared when I was touching metal to try and see what it wanted to become, especially when I didn't actually believe that I could talk to the metal. It was just part of what I did to get ready for a sculpt.

It only took me a few moments to get my protective gear in place and grab the angle grinder. It was too big to do the fine work I'd need to do in order to make my sign stand out, especially the petals of the flowers, but it should do for cutting the chains down to a more manageable size. I considered heading back to the scrap heap to see if I could find something smaller to work with, but decided against it. Four hours was a short window, even for something that wasn't particularly big. When I added in the risks of learning new equipment and not being in a familiar space, it was a wonder I ever thought this was a good idea.

Once the chains were a more manageable size, I moved part of the link over to the anvil and started to flatten it. I lost myself in my work, using all of the tools I was used to in order to start pulling small daisy-like flowers out of the heavy metal of the chain. It was painstaking work, but I knew it was going to look good in the end.

"You have one hour left!" Rosie called, making me jump. I hadn't been paying much attention to the time, which was clearly an issue.

I took a deep breath and focused instead on the piece in front of me, grabbing the blow torch and using it to make the metal hot enough for me to move into position. I was going to have to do fewer daisies than I'd hoped for, but it should still look good, especially when put around my name. I lost myself in work again. No matter what happened now, it was in my best interests to continue what I was doing. I was part of the competition now, and that meant doing everything I could to win and hopefully find myself more business in the process.

At least I'd been able to finally forget about the cameras. I dreaded to think about what they were capturing me doing, but at least they weren't as intrusive as I feared.

"One minute left, you need to make sure you're finishing up!" Duncan shouted, his voice echoing around the room.

I grabbed a cloth, trying to ignore how much my hands were shaking as I wiped down my sculpture. It would be better if I had time to polish it properly, but I didn't think I had time for that, and it was better for it all to look uniform rather than half-finished.

"All right, step away from your sculptures," Rosie called.

A bell sounded, and a few people around me relaxed, which I suspected meant that they'd ended filming. Denise appeared at the front of the room, not seeming in the slightest bit stressed.

I wiped some sweat from my forehead and waited for her to say something.

"All right, everyone, the cameras are no longer running. We'll be taking your sculptures through to the judges now, you can grab yourself a coffee and relax until the presenters return with the results," she said.

I was a little disappointed that we weren't going to actually witness the judging, especially because I was curious about the gods who were here for the show. I wasn't exactly in a hurry to hear them criticise my work.

A couple of porters came to take my sculpture away and I watched them take it, surprised that this was how it was all going. Which was probably just because I was used to there being a seamless transition on reality shows, whereas now I was getting a behind-the-scenes look at what went on instead.

It was nothing like I expected.

I made my way over to the drinks stand, trying to get a peek at what my other competitors had done as I passed their stations. It wasn't entirely clear what a couple of them were, but others looked like they were stiff competition. Including Thor's. I wasn't entirely sure how he'd managed to make the metal look light enough to be a storm cloud, but he had. I just had to hope that my daisies lived up to the judge's expectations.