Chapter 2
Fifteen seconds to climb up and down the tower. Fifteen seconds.
I don’t even watch the officer click open the hourglass. They don’t care if you wait for them to say go or not, and that can give me an extra two seconds or so.
My feet are climbing the steps five at a time before I can even think if I’ll make it. Before I wonder why that hourglass was so small. Before the whirlwind of panic in my chest pulls me to its depths.
I don’t even know what my legs are doing, don’t know if I’m still breathing, if my heart’s still beating. All that’s left in my mind is the need to get to the top of this tower at an inhuman speed. No sounds come to me but silence. Emptiness. I don’t even count the seconds lest I lose my focus.
The top floor comes into view. A tight space with a ballista pointed out the window and a guard holding some flags. I rip one of them from his hand before he reaches out too slowly.
If I blink, if I falter, if I pause to think, I won’t make it.
But if I go down the same way I came, I’ll also fail.
Before I have time to understand what I’m doing, I’m biting the flag and heading to the window, where I lower myself while hanging from the sill.
A fall from this height could break me. And yet I spread my legs, feeling the outer stone of the tower—and let go.
My thighs and hands grip the outer wall to break my fall, only the skirt of my dress between my skin and the stones.
The ground greets me with a thud, as pain radiates from my knees to my entire body.
My skirt is destroyed, blood’s oozing from my scraped thighs and hands, and yet I run back to the table and toss the flag on it.
My chest moves up and down in desperation, grabbing for air and more air, and I finally look at my tiny hourglass.
The top is empty, but I don’t know when the last grain of sand fell.
I might have barely made it, or maybe I got here much later than I should.
I still can’t believe I jumped out of the tower, even if I latched onto the wall.
And despite everything, I might fail. Thunder cracks in the distance as two drops of water fall on the table.
The instructors look at me with calm, uncaring expressions. For them, it’s easy; they’ve been doing this for three days. For them, I’m just a number. It’s not their dream. Telling me I’ve been rejected won’t even disturb their night’s sleep in their comfortable beds.
But I jumped out of the tower. I’m bleeding and hurt. Shouldn’t that count?
My heart beats fast, fast, fast. So loud.
The male instructor points.
To the Foros table.
The last two years, I hated when it happened. This time, I want to cry with joy. I passed the tower. I still have a chance.
I nod, then head toward the pretty instructor, my legs trembling and my body still in pain from the fall. I’m so rattled that all the inappropriate thoughts about him have left my mind.
He opens a large tome as I focus on the cloth covering the cups, the wind blowing my hair and my ripped dress.
“Number?” His voice has none of the harshness I’d associate with a Trial instructor. It’s friendly, even. Sweet, almost.
The cups are made of copper, an overpowering scent that’s going to make my job hard, and yet I concentrate, sensing them under the cloth.
“Three hundred and forty-seven,” I say as I let my nose get used to the scents.
“Mayara of the Earth?” he asks, his tone neutral, a subtle Sorensen accent in his voice.
I hate the last name my mother picked, but it’s still mine.
“Yes,” I say, all my focus on the cups.
“Daughter of Ruynara of the Spring and Sonos of the Dawn?” He definitely has an accent.
“Yes,” I mutter. True or not, it’s what is written on my documents.
“Third time?”
The surprise in his voice makes me look at his face, and I hate the confused frown and the judgment in his eyes. I wish I could snap and yell, “What if it is?”, but the last thing I want to do is antagonize an academy instructor.
I smile. “It’s in the records, right?”
He stares at the book again like someone tasting mildly spoiled fish and unsure if it’s bad or not. Maybe there is a note saying I’m the stupid girl who won’t quit. But I don’t care what he thinks. I’m here to do what I trained for.
My nose got used to the cups, and now it hunts for the scent of the wooden ball.
Figuring out the direction of a smell at such a close range is not easy, and I’ve never heard of anyone doing it, but I realized it was how I’d seal my destiny.
Sorry, Foros. I’m not going to put my fate in your hands. Instead, I’ll trust my senses.
Focusing on the cups, I ignore the smells of rain, earth, blood, ignore the pretty instructor’s smell of skin and clean hair and a hint of bergamot. Instead, I reach out with invisible fingers to find the wooden ball.
Thunder roars in the sky, and I flinch as the instructor lifts the cloth, then says, “Pick your cup.”
All his friendliness is gone, replaced by a dry, irritated tone, and I focus on my task. Wood is quite distinct from metal, and the bottoms of the cups can’t block the scent from within. If there was a scent. I smell nothing.
Nothing.
And I need to push away the panic about to make me shiver and confuse my mind. I need to focus. Where’s the ball?
“Are you going to choose or not?” the instructor asks, his tone still irritated, as he’s likely eager to get rid of me and go to his quarters to rest and avoid the impending storm.
But I can’t smell any ball, and my stomach feels like a cold pit of despair. No. I’ll trust my senses. This instructor is trying to sabotage me, but I won’t let him. There’s only one solution.
My heart’s about to erupt from my chest, but I turn around and yell, “There’s no ball! The three cups are empty!”
Other instructors and a few candidates look at me.
The Foros table instructor snorts. “Nonsense. Step aside.”
I do as he says, so that everyone sees that I’m telling the truth.
He turns one cup around. Empty.
Another. Empty.
Then he puts a hand in his pocket and brings out a ball poorly hidden in his hand. He lifts the third cup and places the ball under it at the same time, not even trying to disguise what he’s doing.
“See?” he says.
I wish I could strangle him, but I turn around to the crowd. “He’s lying!” I shout. “Cheating!”
Some of the instructors are already looking away as if this was a common occurrence, as if I was a worthless nuisance. My chest feels heavy and hollow. Can’t they see what’s happening?
A strong palm clamps over my mouth, preventing me from yelling. I don’t even know how this instructor jumped over the table and got to me so quickly. I want to bite those hands, but his hold is too strong.
“Guards!” he yells.
More men approach me. I don’t understand how the academy can allow this, how nobody tried to check if I was telling the truth. Didn’t they see that there was no ball under any of the cups? That I was right?
The instructor’s hand leaves my mouth only to be replaced by a gag. Hands push me to the ground, yanking my arms behind me. My head aches and a buzz fills my mind.
Rain pours on the canopy, wetting the ground and my ripped dress.
Nobody steps up to defend me, to agree with me that it was a mistake. And I’m here, fallen—like my dreams.
My throat is dry, begging for water, and my scraped legs and hands sting as if touching a hot pan. I’m alone in a cell in the basement of the academy, a bare room with stone walls and a door with iron bars. No other prisoners are here, either in this cell or the others.
The thunderstorm came and went, and hours and hours passed. Nobody came to see me. Nobody came to apologize, let me go, and tell me I’ve been admitted with high honors to the Sky Academy.
My illusions that this was some unfortunate misunderstanding have dissolved. All my silly, false hope… gone.
In the hallway, a jar with lumos algae provides a faint luminescence, its dim light barely reaching me.
The scent of urine and mold is so overpowering that I have to stifle my sense of smell.
With no chair, no bench, no mattress, I’ve been sitting cross-legged, my back leaning on the uncomfortable, rough wall.
But the worst discomfort is imagining my brother waiting, wondering if I’m still alive.
I should have been back home by now either to pack or to tell him I failed.
Odd that this second possibility doesn’t strike me as desperately tragic anymore.
I take a deep, shaky breath. This is no tragedy either.
Surely they’ll let me go tomorrow—or in a few days.
Maybe months. Eventually, I’ll be back at the restaurant.
The thought hits me with a surprising sense of relief, and yet tears pool in my eyes.
Is this it? Where it ends? I’ve been thinking of ways to expose that instructor, to ask for a second chance, but how exactly am I going to do that? And if nobody helped me when they could clearly see what he did, why would they help me now?
Not a single realistic solution crosses my mind—only foolish hopes.
And then, perhaps my hopes were always foolish.
What hurts is that I don’t understand why.
So many candidates passed, many of them not even sent to the Foros table.
Why did I always have to go there? And why did that instructor decide to ruin my chances?
Answers might not fix anything, but I want to know. Need to know.
Still, right now, I’d do anything to contact my brother—and for some water. I considered banging on the bars and yelling for the guards, but I doubt it would make a difference. Plus, I want to get out of here, and my best bet is for them to deem me harmless and well behaved.