Right now, none of it is appealing.
I keep thinking about how Mariah and Patricia looked at me when I told them that the Order killed my mother. I can still see their eyes: they may believe my story, and they’re sorry if it’s true, but they think it’s something I need to accept.
Their branches of root bring both of them closer to death, and so maybe acceptance is possible for them, but I’m not them.
I’m a daughter whose mother was taken from her.
Acceptance, I decide, is for people whose parents just died with no reason. True accidents or illness. Acceptance is not possible for murder.
Whatever Mariah did sent cracks through all of my old walls and brought After-Bree, raw and spiteful, clawing to the surface. I don’t bother to repair them. I just let myself feel. More deeply than ever before, I feel the presence of death in my chest. My mother’s, my grandmother’s, my great-grandmother’s. Now that I hold all of that death, how can I just accept it?
If there’s one thing the Order has taught me, it’s that I’m my family’s Scion. I have a duty to fight for them.
* * *
I’d been in the infirmary in the Lodge basement so many times, I’d started thinking of the entire floor as “William’s.” I’d completely forgotten it houses the Order’s training rooms too.
Even underground, the biggest room’s ceiling is twelve feet overhead. It can easily fit every chapter member and probably another twenty on top of that. Tonight, however, it’s just the six Pages that remain in the tournament, spread out while we wait for our coaches.
In the center are three concentric circles painted on a large square mat. The smallest circle in the middle is outlined in white, the next-largest blue, and the one after—almost fifty feet in diameter—is red.
On the far wall, lined up on a rack, is an assortment of metal weapons. Long wooden staffs banded with silver rings, four sets of silver bows with a quiver of silver arrows beneath each, maces, swords, and daggers.
I remind myself that I don’t need to win win. I just need to lose well.
The door bangs open. In walk a man and a woman in their late thirties. The man is tall and broad-shouldered with closely cropped blond hair. The woman is taller than Nick, and her black hair is cut into a short, severe bob. They’re both dressed in expensive athletic gear and wearing soft, worn shoes that make little sound as they walk.
“Line up,” the man barks at us, pointing to one side of the mat. We scurry over while he watches. If the eyes are windows, then this man’s are boarded shut with no clear view into what goes on within. “My name is Liege Owen Roberts, Squire of a Fallen Scion of Bors. This is Gillian Hanover, a Liege of Kay.”
Fallen Scion. What would it feel like to lose one’s Scion in battle? Suddenly, the man’s hardened appearance takes on new meaning.
And Gillian, Nick’s former trainer, was never Awakened at fifth-ranked, but nothing about her looks weak or incapable. Nick said she’d been in the field since she was fifteen, deployed by the Regents to fight Shadowborn worldwide, just like the Merlins.
In other words, they’re both plenty deadly.
“We are here for the next five nights to oversee your preparation for the combat trial, and assist with skill acquisition as necessary.” The last bit Gillian says with an eye on me, and it takes everything in me not to look away in embarrassment. Somewhere to my left, Vaughn snickers. “We will also referee the trial so that the members of this chapter, and the three Scions in need of Squires, may evaluate your bouts from the audience.”
When Gillian takes a step forward, the weight on her left side lands differently: she wears a prosthesis. It’s possible she’s always used it, and equally possible she’d been injured in battle.
“All Scions must become proficient in the use of a longsword, but not every Scion will inherit one from their knight. As a Squire, you will need to demonstrate proficiency in the weapon your Scion uses, as you’ll be generating that same weapon from aether once the two of you are bonded. Who here can explain the inherited weapons of the Lines of Arthur, Owain, and Gawain?”
Vaughn recites the details as if reading from a book. “Scions in the Line of Arthur inherit enhanced strength and intuition for battle strategy, and the ability to wield Excalibur. As such, Scion Davis uses a longsword. Scions of Owain inherit the Knight of the Lion’s aether construct familiar and use the quarterstaff. Scions of Gawain, healing, strength at noon and midnight, dual daggers.”
“Very good.” Gillian nods, her eyes assessing Vaughn quickly. “Over the next three nights, we will begin the evening with a demonstration, modeling the bouts you will undertake on Thursday evening. These bouts will be Page against Page, and structured so that each of you has an opportunity to demonstrate your skill—or weakness—with each form of combat.”
I wait for Gillian and Owen to step into the sparring circle, but instead the door slams open and Sel strides into the room in loose pants and a black tank.
The Kingsmage pulls everyone’s attention like a magnet, but he passes the Pages without a word, his face a blank mask. As he walks toward the smallest ring, he calls swirling blue aether into one palm and draws it out with the other until it stretches and solidifies into a shining quarterstaff. In the white ring, he pivots to face the coaches and twirls the crystalline weapon from one hand to the next, behind his back and across his chest.
I haven’t seen him since the fight between him and Nick. To anyone else he looks like his normal broody, stoic self, but I can tell it’s just a front; his casting smells acrid and sharp in my nose.
Sel is furious.
I take slow, deep breaths in through my mouth to block out the scent of his rage. I add duct tape and glue and spackle and plaster to my walls, because inside me, After-Bree is responding to him. She wants to be furious too.
“Selwyn and I will demonstrate quarterstaff combat,” Owen says. “Pages aiming for the Line of Owain, please pay close attention. Watch our demo for speed of attacks and for techniques to defend against a Shadowborn opponent, which Selwyn here will mimic for educational purposes.”
The coaches know for a fact that Sel is part demon, but no one else here does. No one except me. Distantly, I wonder if I should warn Owen. Yell that he should reschedule, stop the match now before it starts. Sel’s far too angry. Another, freshly cruel part of me says, why bother? If Owen knew who I was, he’d probably turn me in without a second thought. Let Sel beat him. Let me watch.
They start slow with measured footwork, one opponent rotating around the other. Then, at some cue, Owen advances, and the fight begins.
I can’t take my eyes off Sel. His movements are everything that I know mine won’t be: arcs that glide through the air, quick strikes that send his staff whistling toward Owen’s. Where Nick is powerful and arena-ready, Sel is lean and built for agility and speed. He doesn’t move like a human at all, and it baffles me that I ever thought he was one.
Loud clacks fill the room; the weapons meet again and again.
Owen’s staff whips low at Sel’s legs. Sel leaps—into a perfect one-handed backflip. The wood never meets its mark. Owen scowls. Sel straightens with a grin.
Owen shifts tactics, lunging for an overhead strike. Sel evades fluidly, under and around Owen’s attack, then twists his staff for a wicked blow to Owen’s ribs. Owen grunts, recovers, and moves into a flurry of attacks.