SIX
News travels fast, but gossip travels faster, and dinner from two hours ago now turns in my belly. I swallow back bile as I catch snippets of what the others are saying while we wait to be led into the throne room.
Every initiate is talking about me. About how I let my sacrifice go. How I refused to make my Petition. How I think I’m better than everybody else.
They cluster in small groups, whispering behind their hands while shooting glances in my direction like I might suddenly sprout wings and fly away.
I’m this close to trying when a vesper appears, wearing a white robe embroidered with the royal constellation. He clears his throat. “If I can have your attention.”
The conversations stop, every initiate shifting to face him. I’m just grateful for the momentary reprieve.
“You may prepare.” He clasps his hands and waits.
I take a deep breath before reaching for the gold starbursts at my shoulders.
I pinch, and the chain draped across my chest slackens, allowing me to remove my gown’s delicate cape.
Cool air brushes the bare skin of my back, tickling down my exposed arms. Without the additional layer, the gown’s neckline seems to plunge even farther, and the long slits in the shimmering skirt allow my legs to slip through.
The woman closest to me slides out of a fur jacket.
Underneath it, she’s wearing a cropped top that hugs her breasts but leaves her midriff bare.
The man next to her strips to a loose vest that’s little more than two pieces of fabric tied with a length of leather cord, putting his sinewy arms on display along with glimpses of a hewn slab of abdominal muscles.
The other initiates disrobe in similar fashion, slipping off coats and jackets to reveal more flesh for the Stars to burn their mark into.
I hug my arms across my chest, wondering where the Stars will brand me. If they will.
“When the doors open, you will form a single line leading toward the well in the center. Please wait for your name to be called.” He rattles off instructions, my peers hanging on his every word, but I’m only half listening.
Stand here. Walk there. Bow to this person. Bleed into that place. And don’t forget to smile. The pageantry of it all makes my teeth ache.
When he finally shuts up, the girl closest to me whispers, “Did you really release your sacrifice?”
I’m almost impressed she dared to ask—if she weren’t maintaining her distance like my rebellion might be contagious.
I stare back at her. “No, I taught it to dance.”
She shifts farther away, nose wrinkling. A few others edge closer, spurred on by her bravado, and I grit my teeth.
The doors swing open, saving me from their curiosity. We file in with theatrical slowness. I’m near the rear of the line, and when I finally make it inside, I understand what took so long.
It’s like time stopped here centuries ago.
The Eternal Throne commands the room. Carved from obsidian, it surges up in jagged, angular lines from a dais situated on the far wall, the entire pedestal a physical constellation of black stars.
There must be a mile of nochtimetric patterns worked into its surface.
Each line is etched and filled with shimmering resin that seems to glow in the dark room.
The throne and this room are the oldest part of the palace, the only things to survive the Last War. Everything else was rebuilt around it.
There are no plastered walls or polished marble floors. But the space isn’t barren like that room at the top of the Royal Astrolatory, and thankfully, no sacrificial bird is waiting. The only offering we’ll make tonight is a single drop of our blood as a gift to the Stars.
The domed ceiling rises impossibly high, the glass so clear that it might be mistaken for open sky, if not for its impressively thin copper foiling.
The night spreads above us, constellations surrounding the black void of the Night’s Scar, each star burning so brightly it’s as if they’ve gathered to watch—just like the audience of nobles seated a respectful distance behind the throne in a gallery wrapping around either side of it.
Too much blood was spilled in the name of claiming that throne by people desperate to believe their power could be eternal, too. I swear I hear them: a thousand years of ghosts calling to me, crying out, desperate to be heard. But I force myself to follow the procession and take my place.
The vesper begins to chant, and I lower my gaze to the floor.
The stone has been carved with deep channels to create a labyrinth of connected patterns that form the shape of every patron constellation.
I search for the pegasus of Order Icaros, its wings spread wide in eternal flight.
Instead, I find the remnants of a different pair of wings.
Like always, their etched lines are filled in with mortar as a warning.
The fallen constellation.
Suddenly, it’s like I’m back in that bookstore. The knot in my throat tightens until it’s hard to breathe. This can’t end soon enough.
I search for my family among the tiered rows of spectators.
Andry is up on his knees in his chair, craning for a better look.
My sister has one hand on his tunic to keep him from toppling over.
Andry waves at me, grinning from ear to ear, and I wave back, glad that at least one person doesn’t care that everyone is talking about me.
Because judging by Broderic’s rigid stance, he’s noticed, too, and he cares.
The woman beside him leans close, her hand touching his arm as she whispers something in his ear.
She’s beautiful in a calculated way—brown hair arranged in perfect ringlets, a dress that suggests everything while revealing nothing, and enough jewels to assume she’ll fulfill my brother’s only criterion for a potential wife.
Velesont? Calix? I can’t tell from here.
But the way she positions herself—the casual ownership in how she touches him—sends my heart leaping only so it can plummet.
Another sacrifice in the name of responsibility.
The sinking sensation continues when the doors to the throne room open again and Bishop Marius enters with the king and a contingent of guards in black dress uniforms. His knights position themselves in front of the exit.
With the royal family and most of the nobility in attendance, the knights aren’t here to observe. They’re here as security.
Bishop scans the initiates with the same cold, assessing look he wore in the alley. When his gaze reaches mine, it pauses for just a moment longer than the others. Then he takes a place by the main door, hands clasped behind his back, eyes tracking King Ophelian as he makes his way to the throne.
The vesper from the astrolatory trails behind him, holding a bloodred pillow with an ornate box resting on top.
The king stops before the throne, and a hush falls over the room.
“Five hundred years ago,” he begins, his voice carrying through the space, “our ancestors faced a choice: submit to the darkness that threatened to consume our world—or stand against it together.”
A few nobles shift in their seats. Some of the older ones mutter to each other. More than a few look at the fallen constellation’s blackened mark like it’s marring the floor.
“They chose unity,” the king continues. “Five bloodlines joined with mine to bring an end to the fighting. Five stood here after the last blood was shed. Five swore it would never happen again. And those five bloodlines—your bloodlines—entrusted my family to guide us into a new era where magic was granted not by luck or chance but to those who were worthy of it. To those willing to take up the responsibility of governing it for all of Antares.”
A laugh bubbles in my throat, but I swallow it down.
And five hundred years later, we license magic to anyone with a large enough bank account.
We marry to steal the secrets of other orders and secure our family fortunes.
We whisper behind one another’s backs. It’s not exactly the unified front he’s describing.
I suppose we all secretly hate each other but pretend otherwise for political gain doesn’t sound quite as inspiring.
“Tonight,” the king says, his gaze sweeping over us, “you join that sacred trust. Tonight, you take your first step toward sharing the great responsibility of protecting our kingdom. Tonight, you become guardians of Antares’s future.”
My feet ache as the speech drags on, the straps of my shoes digging into my skin. I shift my weight carefully as he drones on about duty and the future, trying to ease the pressure on my pinched toes.
He finally winds down—thank the Stars—and nods to the vesper. She steps forward, bowing her head as she lifts the pillow to present the box. The king reaches inside and draws out last night’s dagger, its jeweled handle glinting in the starlight.
With a dramatic flourish, he raises the knife and says, “Come forth and claim your birthright.”
This part is usually over quickly. At least Broderic’s was, four years ago in Damalis. The ceremony itself had been fast and to the point. A boring knife and a tiny bowl on an altar. At least tonight’s pomp and circumstance gives people something to stare at besides me.
Broderic received his mark without complaint, and we celebrated with a cake Isidore baked that afternoon. Something tells me that my own Kindling won’t be so simple, since tonight there is a line of initiates waiting to step forward and make their offering to the Stars.
But I will survive, and, in a few days, we’ll be back in Damalis, where I’ve never been robbed or attacked, there’s no need for brooding soldiers, and people are too busy to bother with forbidden books.