"Come on, you gotta tell me if I did," Secretary said.
"Why do you care?" I asked.
Secretary thought for a moment. "I want to see if you're still as readable as ever."
"I'm not that readable," I complained.
"Nadia, a book can't be closed if it refuses to admit it's open," Sphinx said from within me.
I pouted at its betrayal, and Secretary took that as a win. They leaned against me, stroked their hand through my hair, and pointed me toward the mob of examinees.
"If they had your deal they wouldn't feel bad," Secretary said. "They'd drown this place in blood if it meant avoiding the prelims."
"Well they aren't me," I snapped.
Secretary jerked their hand back as if I bit it. A sort of sympathy—knowing them just the appearance of it—came over them.
"Is my little brute worried that she made the wrong choice?" Secretary asked.
I mumbled, "No. I made
a choice. It just wasn't a necessary one."
"Hmm, you weren't that confident you'd pass back at the outpost," Secretary said.
"I didn't know it was an obstacle course," I said. "If I did. . ."
Secretary shook their head in disappointment.
"Little brute, you should learn now that the exam is more than the test. Even the prelims," Secretary said. "First off, it's not just about finishing the course. We only accept the top fifty times."
"Okay, Sphinx flies. Would be pretty easy to get a good time."
"Little brute, do you know what the average time is for completing the prelims when we use the obstacle course?" Secretary asked.
I didn't say anything. They knew that was my answer, and so they leaned forward—hands on the railing to keep from falling off our balcony—and laughed into the wind.
"Forty minutes," Secretary said.
They pointed out toward the clump of examinees. I joined them and followed the edge of their nail as it landed on person after person. Many of them wore the costume of their collective, and others wore clothing that was homespun and patchy. There were those with weapons that were flecked with blood that could never be cleaned, and others sporting shrines of unknown designs—likely cutting edge—that I'd never seen. Most of them didn't have their entities out. The few that did rode theirs as mobility aids of some sort.
"It takes nearly forty bone breaking minutes before we see anyone start crossing the finish line. Why, my little brute, because the prelim isn't the course. Your competition is," they said. "All of you hungry to fulfill a dream that each other person would deny you of to sate their own fantasies of their future. Kids from isolated villages or raised by hermits racing alongside the prodigies and divas of the collectives. Monsters that haven't been seen since the Changeover slipping out from wherever they hid just to gain that little card in your pocket that'll let them take fate by the throat and fuck it raw."
Secretary hopped up on the railing. Leaned over to me so their lips were just shy of my ear.
"That mob hungers just as much as you, my little brute. Are you confident your hunger is greater than theirs?"
I gripped the railing like I could shatter it. Did I think I was hungry enough—of course I did, now. Even from the stands the wave of determination that flowed from the examinees was palpable, edged, and none of them shook as they knew what'd have to be done. They were ready to spill blood for their dream, but my hand had to be forced to spill it so I could come closer to ending my nightmare. I released the railing and let myself fall into my seat.
"Would I have passed?" I asked.
Secretary shrugged, "Little brute, only you can answer that."
"What if I want to know what you think?"
Secretary demurred before they shrugged and answered. "Amber's skilled and smart. She wouldn't let you fail. Melissa is full of potential, but has a bad habit of second guessing herself—a horrible weakness if you want to pass. Still, she'd recover and prove adaptable enough to make it through."
"And me?"
"I don't know," they said. "When I look at you I'm split. I see my little brute who would've been so quick to end my life. Even now my reflection is still a corpse in your eyes."
They hopped down from the railing. Crawled atop my seat until they straddled my waist. Their eyes examined my own—my spirit—for nuances that kept them from definite answers.
"In fact, it looks like it's more than just me. The trick hasn't taken yet in your head, but it's been seeded. Oh the corpses you'll make if I let you be," Secretary purred as their fingers drummed against my throat. "At the same time though, you're still so small. Doubtful of any greatness you could accomplish. Questioning if you want to in the first place. Yet you've lashed yourself to this ship and I, despite what you think of me, would prefer you to make harbor."
Secretary rolled from my lap and into the seat they'd sat earlier. I held my own hands to keep from shaking. My head turned to ask Secretary another question, but they tapped their finger against my nose to bid me to silence.
"Yup, still so readable," they said. "Split open and writ large. Nadia, you won't make it through this until you decide what you're willing to be. To do."
"Anything," I said, forcing myself to believe. "Anything except harm Amber or Melissa. We swore an oath I don't intend to break."
"That's the funny thing about oaths, no one ever does," Secretary said. "Anyways, as much as I love teasing you I have an offer for you."
Motes of light coalesced to form an envelope between their raised fingers. They handed it to me, and as I turned it over I saw the instructions:
Open Only In Private. Secretary answered before my brow could form the tiniest wrinkle of thought.
"A chance to prove how wide 'anything' really is," Secretary said.
I said, "You have to give me more than that."
"I don't, but because you're still such a cute little question, I will." They explained, "It's a chance for extra points to go on your exam. It helps the Lodge as well if you were feeling loyal enough to ask."
"Do I have to do it?" I asked.
"Are you that confident you'll pass?" they countered. "It's your choice, my little brute, always your choice. Just remember, opportunity is like a girl at the bar. If you dither about whether to ask her out, someone else will."
Secretary stretched in their seat before standing. I turned the envelope between my fingers— the corners pressed into my fingertips—and examined it like the weapon it was. My only question being if it was the weapon I'd plunge into my heart or use to carve out someone else's.
I didn't watch Secretary leave—they had ways to slip away that didn't make it worth the effort—though I did stay long after they were gone. I watched as the whistle was blown and every evil in my competition's hearts flew like vultures. Nameless nobodies from towns like mine were elbowed, stomped, and eviscerated by those around them—poor bastards never had a chance. Though the scions of the collectives didn't fare much better. Sure, they fended off a straggler here and there, but they were alone and it didn't matter how brilliant the light when the surrounding dark was so oppressive. In the end, the mob took them as well.
When we hit the forty minute mark and someone finally emerged from the bloody orgy of violence and sorcery that was the starting line, I left. The roar of the crowds and despair of gamblers saw me out.
On the ferry back to the mainland, Sphinx emerged from inside of me. It looked to the setting sun. My vengeance rippled on the water's surface as the boat disemboweled the bay.
"We don't need it," Sphinx said.
My nail teased the underside of the top flap. "Really?" I asked.
Sphinx's tail flicked as it circled to meet my face.
"Really. The way is only worth the effort we put into it. Cheats are a poison that taint every choice after.".
I agreed—especially now I agree—but I had seen what lurked in my competitor's hearts. Things more inhuman than what filled my nightmares as a girl. Each one of them would've taken Secretary's deal at the outpost. With how readily they shattered bodies, I knew they wouldn't question afterwards, like I did. They took comfort in their knives—some of them, from what I saw, took pleasure in them as well.
"Sphinx, could we have passed the prelims?" I asked.
Sphinx tried to meet my eyes, but couldn't. It searched for some undoubtedly cryptic answer for how we could've gotten through. There was none to be found.
"Then maybe this is my way," I said. "A poisonous one tainted from the minute I took Secretary's bargain at the outpost."
"That was a safe choice," Sphinx said. "A necessary one."
I scoffed, "We nearly died countless times over."
"You grew as a summoner," Sphinx added. "A new spell, dual casting, and I would think we…"
"We what?" I asked.
It said, "We began to trust one another."
I was quiet. We had only the whir of the ferry's engine, and the muffled clap of water folding over on itself. The wind's rushing cacophony. I pocketed the envelope. Laid my hand against Sphinx's face. Guided its head toward mine so our foreheads touched.
"I don't know if I can ever trust you," I said.
"Why?" Sphinx asked.
"Cause I barely trust myself. I shake, I cry, I kill, I'm divided. That's what you told me."
"You're also complex," Sphinx said. "A beautiful tapestry that's better suited for such feelings. Only monsters are simple, my dear summoner. Nadia."
"I feel like you see more in my spirit than I do yours," I said.
Sphinx chuckled, "It's not hard. I only have to look at you, but have you even once seen me?"
I hadn't. It knew I hadn't, but now I knew I hadn't. We parted heads and I examined Sphinx under the Omensight. Beneath the colors of Real, it was a silhouette painted in the endless nuances of Revelation. Underneath the many eyes that patterned its coat were burning stars—variations on Revelation's theme—the standard for entities higher up the Chain. Then I looked down, and saw a thread that ran between Sphinx and myself. Ran my sight against it until it opened upon a memory—one of Sphinx's.
It resided in a place where only poetry and prophets could go. Revelation was blinding and discursive even as brilliance and ingenuity floated upon searing winds. There was a beauty to it in the same way that there was beauty in how the sun could sear your retinas and make the last thing you'd ever see become something sacred. That was its home, some place impossible and grand, and in that blazing place they didn't budge as their fellow soldiers marched to meet the call of a scared girl. As sky and ground were conflagrations of sensibility, Sphinx was the only one who listened to my plea in its entirety.
My self doubt and my desire for resolve, my sorrow and my rage, my guilt and my yearning for the way to redemption. It heard my desire to know, and beneath it my plea to not be let forward until I did. Its siblings would enable me to my end—guide me up the Chain as fast as possible with no care for if I burnt away before completing my task. Revelation was not caring, but Sphinx was in the way they knew how. So over teeming masses it flew and flew until the end of bonfire skies, and the beginning of the Underside's edge.
When my vision pulled back I was being shaken by the ferryman. Blood ran from my eyes like water from a stream. I looked up to find Sphinx worried—it was always rare for their face to take to new feelings. It gently pushed aside the ferryman, and guided me up onto its back. I crawled into place. My blood dropped into its fur and spread like ink in water.
"I'm sorry," I muttered.
"What have I said about doubts and debts," Sphinx said.
"Was I not supposed to see that?" I asked.
Sphinx shook its head. "I don't know. Maybe not, but you saw it even if your eyes won't remember," it said.
"Do you miss it?" I asked.
Sphinx padded down from the deck to the dock. Its gait so smooth I felt nothing.
"Sometimes," it said. "There's a clarity there in that place where shadows die and mysteries find no purchase. The Real is complex. Everything occluded behind everything else. So many schemes and shadows. Too many to guard from."
"Is that what you're trying to do?" I asked.
Sphinx laughed. "It's—if I'm to be fair to Mutation's maiden and Rememberance's puppeteer, even that drunken mummer of yours—are all trying to do for you. Protect you. Perhaps the puppeteer is right, and you're simply too cute."
"Is that a joke?" I asked.
Sphinx groaned, "Yes, I don't think I like it very much."
That brought me to laughing. It joined me. Together we chortled down the street past shops and street vendors. So much comedy opened up before us because I could finally see it. We returned to the lobby at headquarters to wait for Melissa and Amber. Sphinx curled on a couch while I rested my head against its bulk.
"So Melissa?" I asked.
Sphinx said, "I'd rather not."
"I'm ready," I said.
Sphinx sighed and said, "Yes. She shifts and changes. Yet her musculature is crystal. I did not see her demand for clarity and conviction toward absoluteness to benefit you."
"Yeah," I said, "I can see that. She's still my friend—maybe—and I don't think I could ever stop loving her."
"You already cut her from your life once," Sphinx said. "If together they rejoin, then such is the way and who am I to interfere."
"Thanks," I said.
"Doubts and debts, Nadia."
"Sphinx," I began, "I'm not enough as I am to pass."
"Nadia—"
I cut it off, "I'm not. We both know that."
"I disagree, but will humor this," Sphinx said.
"You said it yourself, by taking Secretary's offer the first time I learned a new spell. I learned how to dual cast. Alls below, I learned how to kill." I rolled over, and said, "Now I have to practice. I don't think I want to, but I think I need to if I want to move forward."
"Always forward," it muttered. "And if the way is strewn with glass?"
"Then I hop on your back," I said. "Trust that you'll fly me out."
Sphinx shook its head, but it smiled. "You wouldn't learn that way. However, I will always walk with you."
I rolled onto my back and allowed myself a brief affair with sleep. Melissa shook me awake when the moon was rising—could see a hint of it before it took center stage at the eye of the ceiling. I stretched, and let Sphinx and Melissa guide me to the elevators where Amber stood.
"How were the prelims?" Amber asked.
I yawned, "Clarifying. So, did we get a table that overlooks the bay?"
Melissa beamed, "Of course."
The elevators carried us smoothly up to one of the highest floors of Lodge headquarters. Melissa skipped and hummed in anticipation. The restaurant was behind a black door, marked with three moons in three phases, with nothing else to discern that it was even there. I took a step backward, forward again, and marveled at how the door could only be seen within that narrow gap of a step-and-a-half. Melissa waved us inside while bouncing up and down.
As we passed through the door we entered a hallway composed of branches that gave way to a beautiful deck of smooth wood floors. There was only one table in the entire place. Melissa hurried to her seat while I meandered over to the large bay windows that were taller than Melissa's chimera form. The glass was cool to the touch, and outside I could see the sun—red as a busted lip—linger for one last tantalizing glimpse. The darkness of night crowding and pushing the sun to pass on.
"What is this place?" I asked.
"It's called, Nowhere Fast," Amber answered.
Melissa's voice took a downturn, "You've been here before?"
"Not in a long time."
I leaned against the glass to try and grab a peek at the city below, but it was too dark. Night reflected from heaven down to the earth. The problem was it was wrong. There should've been lights from all the houses and nighttime businesses. A smattering of earthbound stars.
"It's called a porthole," Amber said. "Made from sand found in the Underside. When you peer through it lets you get an approximation of what the Underside is like below you."
"I didn't know this was what night looked like," I said.
"Awesome, now can we please eat?" Melissa whined.
Figuring we'd tortured her enough, Amber and I took our seats. Each of them flanked me while I had no opposite to keep me from looking out the porthole. Menus already sat at our table—though to call them that implied as if there were options. No, they were more like dining itineraries. Line by line detailing what we'd eat and the drink it paired with. The only option was the final line with the question: What's the last thing you want to taste?
"What's
Sunshine Pearls Marinated in The Jolt of a First Breath supposed to mean?" I asked.
Melissa said, "Conceptual-fare. You know, like how we Glorycakes before the first day of school."
"Sure, but I thought that was just a metaphor. Invoke the Court but not really summon it."
Amber flapped wide her napkin before laying it across her lap with nary a wrinkle. I tried to do the same, but my hand jittered and the cloth wouldn't lay right—Sphinx helped fix it.
"Well, this is actual Conceptual-fare. Everything's made from ingredients taken from the Underside. I hear those collective-kiddies grow up on the stuff," Amber said.
I asked, "Is that good for you?"
Amber shrugged, "When was the last time they ever did anything good for themselves."
Melissa snapped, "I don't want to hear about how the collectives are doing weird eugenics experiments or whatever conspiracy you believe about them."
Amber said nothing. My eyes had widened in shock—it took a lot to make Melissa snap, but despite their disagreements on the collectives it didn't deserve this. She looked around to apologize to other non-existent patrons. Then back to us.
"I'm sorry," Melissa said, "I just want a nice night, please."
"We'll have plenty of nice nights," Amber said.
"Will we? Cause I heard that secretary in the lobby. We only get access to stuff like this as a consolation for if we
die," Melissa said. "We could die, and never get a night like this again. So I want to make this last."
"And go nowhere fast," I said.
Melissa nodded. I debated reaching for her hand—even divorced we felt a similar pain, but would it hurt more if I held her—and watched as Amber did what I couldn't. Be there for her. I held silent my own worries and gave her time to gather herself. Our food arrived while she did. The plate was stacked with a string of sunrise yellow pearls in a sort of hexagonal pyramid. While a jagged mist wafted from the dish.
The waiter—a four-armed entity with an empty oval where a face should be—fiddled with its flouncy skirt as it instructed us to slurp the pearls like a noodle. As one we raised the first pearl to our mouths, and popped it inside. It tasted bright as sunshine, and brought a static-y tingle to every nerve in my mouth as if it was being woken up from a long sleep. Then I slurped, and let the shock slip into my gut and diffuse through my body. Every part of me waking up and leaving me so
aware. I could feel the thread count of the cloth beneath my fingers. Hear the tiny moan-hiccup of pleasure Melissa would make when she was tasting what she considered a good meal—or when I did my job and treated her like one.
I turned to Amber because what I didn't smell was the yeast of a good bear or the burn of a spirit. Definitely not the cinnamon of whiskey. Every sense was awakened for this brief moment, and Amber smelled nothing of a brewery or any drink at all. Instead, she smelled like copper. A smile crossed her face as she misread my surprise.
"How's it taste, Temple?" Amber asked.
When I slurped the last pear I spoke. "Very good. Al dente. But I
feel so much more," I said.
Melissa lifted the menu and pointed it out to me. Underneath the title of the dish it explained the Courts that went into it, in this case it was Morning and Rebirth. I'd never heard of either of them before. They weren't on the Public Record, and I'd never met anyone with them before. As I rolled the taste over in my mouth I wondered if there was anyone taking the exam that was bonded to them.
Afterwards, the waiter came with a platter of cocktails for us. Three glasses expertly carved, and filled with what looked like snow piled inside.
Spirit of A Snowdrift was what it was called, so I figured it was made from Sleep—commonly known as the Winter Court. Its ruling Principle was Death, so it was a clear pairing. The snow poured like water into my mouth and deadened my nerves ever so slightly. Melissa's reddened like it always did in winter. We chuckled over our drinks, and Amber just smiled and sipped away. In the light of the morning having tasted rebirth, even as sleep drifted in, how could we worry?
"What was so clarifying about the prelims?" Amber asked.
I said, "It's how intricate the tests are. Like, the 'test' was an obstacle course, but the test was something more. . ."
"Sinister?" Amber offered.
"A bit negative, but yeah."
Melissa asked, "Okay, but how's an obstacle course sinister?"
"It's how you run it. Every examinee at once. Everyone for themselves," I said.
"That's not good. If you did it that way you'd just confuse them. They'd fight each other more than they'd run the course."
"And that's the point," Amber said. "First it tests your ability to follow basic instructions. It doesn't say anywhere to fight after all. But after that, it tests how prepared you are for if a fight breaks out, and if you're efficient enough to not give away too many details to secure yourself."
Melissa finished her drink. I matched her, and Amber followed close behind. It was time for the second dish. It was a pink tongue—three of them—curled atop a smoldering piece of charcoal that finished cooking the meat exactly as the square plates clacked in front of us.
The waiter said, "It's called the
Dictator's Abdication. Composed of Tyrants and Melancholy. If you desire more heat you'll find a dish filled with
votive tears freshly cracked. We recommend the dish eaten in one bite."
I missed the spice of home—what Mom raised me on—so I sprinkled
votive tears over the tongue. Lifted it by its skewer and downed it in one go as instructed. There was a smokiness—an ash—that coated my tongue as the tongue burst into a fatty powder. I closed my eyes and felt the weight of a crown on my brow. It was sharp and the blood I spilled to claim it would always sting my eyes. There was a time when I loved how my eyes felt—prickly and aware—when blood would paint them in one arterial spew. Those were times long past, and the residual heat of a rule brought to ash intensified by knowing that I once touched greatness brought tears to my eyes. I tried to live in the last full flavor of burst fast that popped from a clump of ashen-tongue.
Sphinx pushed my drink into my hand as I groped for it. It was called,
The Sweet Song of An Open Door, and was poured from a tea kettle that whooshed softly in offering of other ways. Roads that could be taken only because you'd tasted the bitterness of how one ended. There was a honeyed coolness to how it coated my tongue—smothered the heat.
"What's the benefit supposed to be for eating this stuff?" I asked.
The waiter answered, "It's said to aid in opening one's mind. By familiarizing yourself with the nuance of a Court and their interactions you're better prepared to engage with complex sorceries."
"Or feel your way around what it's like when Courts go to war," Amber said.
"That's just what they say at least," the waiter said. "Now, I have to go retrieve your final dish."
"Don't we have to tell you?" I asked.
The waiter curtsied, "You already have."
I asked Amber, "Do you think eating this stuff really prepares you?"
"Nothing can prepare you," Amber said. "Maybe, at a high intake and high quality you can get some minor benefits: be more aware, be more thoughtful, etcetera."
Melissa said, "Aren't you the one who said that summoners are supposed to cheat?"
Amber smirked, "Don't use my brilliant quips against me. I'm right though, I always am, but there's a difference between cheating the enemy and cheating yourself."
"Like the bigmouth at the outpost?" I asked.
"Perfect example," she said. "Cheating yourself is mistaking preparation as experience. We prepare because we don't know what will happen. We train so we make up for our deficiencies in what has
already happened. Eating fancy food, doing endless drills and forms, and whatever else has a use. I just don't ascribe that much use to it."
Melissa asked, "So then what do we do? We know the tests are going to be more involved than the objective, and not much else."
"We learn what we can. Don't take things at face value. Find whatever edge we can get, and otherwise lean on our promise," Amber said. "We know what we can't do, and that lets us do anything else."
I said, "You make it sound so simple."
Amber chuckled as she sipped her drink. "Hardly," she said. "It's just, I refuse to imagine a world where I let you down."
We shared a moment, and I felt a heat on my lips—my body remembering. I saw that same heat in her eyes as I did that night. From this distance, I took more warmth in it than fear. Secretary had said she'd refuse to let me fail. Over drinks like this I believed it. Then swept my eyes over to Melissa whose eyes were swimming as the cocktails leaned against her thoughts.
"What do we do when we make it?" she asked.
Amber shrugged and I was silent.
Melissa slapped the table. "Come on, Nadia, you have to know, right? The big step in your plan."
"I don't really know. I'm focused on passing first," I said.
And killing the Lodgemaster.
"Would you tell me if you did?" Melissa asked.
"Sure—," I said.
"Cause I don't think you would," she said.
"Melissa," Amber said.
She banged the table with her fist. "No, if there's any chance we might die I need her to hear this," she stated. "I don't think you're telling me everything. Maybe it's not mine to know, but I'm still here. Alls below, I don't know why, but I'm still here. With you. Cause if I wasn't I'd just worry. When I stormed off that night in the car, I worried. Every raindrop that slammed against my window I saw as a tidal wave threatening to drown you. My sisters had to hold me down from driving in that mess."
She drained her cup. "When Secretary took you, I worried. I know two spells of yours, and none of them could heal you. Take a blow for you. It only takes one stray blow to kill someone. Then when you came back from it you looked like a hole had been blown in you, and you just had to appreciate the sound of your emptiness. Now there's this exam and I worry what we'll have to go through. What
you'll have to go through. If I die, I worry about who's going to worry for you. Who'll remind you to appreciate architecture, or enjoy the colors of sunset. Make you have a good meal. Fuck, I'm rambling."
I didn't drink while she spoke. It wouldn't have been right if I did. Not when I did know my next step, the actual reason we're here, and that I had an offer from the one person both her and Amber don't trust in the slightest waiting for me to open. I rolled the cup between my palms—they'd gone cold somehow—and bowed my head as I pondered my problems like they were sediment at the bottom of a glass.
"Melissa," I said. "I'm going to kill the Lodgemaster."
Melissa's sensibility broke through the surface of her tipsy stupor. She gripped the table like a gecko and pulled herself together.
"Is that the truth?" she asked.
"Yeah," I said.
She asked, "Are you sure?"
"I saw it," I said.
Melissa took a deep breath in before she expelled a hot breath.
"Thanks," she said.
I could see the load discorporate like a slain entity from her shoulders. Her smile stretched higher, and I ached at how a few words of admission healed her. There was so much I could admit. Wanted to admit, but there'd be a point at which they'd become new burdens. The source of more worries rather than less. I thought about the envelope—that would be a new burden—then decided to leave things like this. Let that be my big secret now revealed while I dealt with what remained.
That was when the final dish came. Each of ours was different and the waiter set up a screen to block us from seeing each other eat. Instead I only saw the mirror that lined my screen and reflected back my face. My eyes were haunted by the dead of last night. I watched my face twitch and dance under my own observations—my expressions were broken, wrong. Did I always look like this? Was I always this open? I shut my eyes unwilling to stare at myself. Opened them when I was safe to see only my plate. There was a pudding—it looked like a pudding at least—and a little sign pinned at the center. It said:
Curdled Future.
The name wasn't appetizing, but I still took a bite. There were sparks of brightness-fatty yet light, a promise to come—and after every spark I tasted a rancid oil that coated my throat. It brought to mind hands stayed, decisions never taken, and the sour taste of promise brought undone. When my eyes closed I couldn't force out the flavor, I just let itself inside of me. In pudding induced visions I saw Amber's body—ashen and broken—curled around Melissa's in an attempt to squeeze tight onto a life that had already vacated her body. I only had the one bite—turned instead to the waiter with fury in my eyes.
"I'd never want this," I said. "How is this the last thing I'd want to taste?"
The waiter shook and squeaked, "It's because you'd never want it. The dish is the last thing, as in the least, you'd want to experience. We only serve it as a nudge during exam season."
"Of course you do," I said, bitter and unwilling to eat any more of it.
The table was cleared, and we were left to bask in the haze of food that spoke a little too loudly for my taste. Amber had them bring out a whiskey and poured the three of us shots. We battened down our palates with something Real.
Melissa told us we already paid, so we left. When we crossed the door's threshold, I stole a glance back and saw that the door was gone. Probably for the best. We meandered over to the elevator, but stopped as we noticed a crowd had formed on every balcony peering down below to the secretaries' desk. A crowd of summoners—even including the blowhard from the outpost—banged against the desk. Their voices carried upwards like a hot draft.
"I'm telling you we deserve special circumstances! I know you offer them to others, so why not us?" he asked.
"Yeah," said someone else, "we were targeted just for being examinees."
"The Lodge should do something," another yelled.
"Like what?" someone on our balcony yelled. "Give you another shot for proving you're shit!"
On the balcony below us one of the Blue Tears boys from earlier shouted, "Ask if you get an award for losing before it started?"
That began the cavalcade of heckling. All of us examinees knew we'd be leaping into the jaws of death tomorrow. The tension in the air—the worries that plagued us about what was to come—we lanced it like a boil and spilled the putrid pus of our anxieties onto them. We flung our resentment like bricks. Those summoners got to turn back—live another year if they were smart—so why come here and demand a chance to die.
I noticed Melissa's eyes stayed on the blowhard at the center. She remembered him—even through the haze of booze she remembered him—and looked to me in confusion.
"What happened?" she asked.
I pretended not to hear her. Ignored the question that lurked underneath,
what did you do? Instead I let the rage and disgust in the air flow over me. There was no sympathy in the words being hurled, and from what I saw today I expected none to be found in the tests tomorrow. We, us examinees, all knew what we signed up for. It was time I accepted it. So I looked over the crowd and bent my mind down to scrub out their faces.
Carve, wipe, scrape, gone, gone in the process of othering them until they weren't people. Faces scribbled over like a word that had to be ground out from the memory of the page. Sure, it flickered—glimpses of the humans beneath coming through. I reapplied it harder the next time. Fixed it in my mind as I walked to the elevators and ignored the faceless men and women—no, the faceless empty things that pushed air out of nonexistent mouths—and smiled.
"Amber, which way to where we sleep?" I asked.
* * *
When we arrived, I realized that there were three rooms attached to one central suite. Amber had set our sleeping arrangements herself. My room was between hers and Melissa's, or it would be provided I was willing to move my bags myself. I also noticed that all of the cookware in the small kitchen that came with the suit had been dumped into the sink. They still shone with a wetness from a fresh clean. Before I could ask her what it was about, Amber had retired to her leaving me to deposit Melissa in hers.
Melissa had taken to the booze the worst of us. I set her on her side and slid the waste bin beside her head. When I left she clutched at my pant leg. Her eyes fixed on me, and she shook my pant leg for emphasis.
"You're a good person," she said.
"Really?" I asked.
"Mhmm," she said, "if you weren't I couldn't still love you."
Her voice trailed off as she fell to sleep. I watched her body inflate and deflate with each breath. The taste of the
Curdled Future and the visions it conjured brought me to the edge of agony each microsecond it took for Melissa to breathe again.
"Her body is resolute," Sphinx said.
I muttered, "I know."
"Food can't see the future," Sphinx said.
"I know. Let's go read that offer."
I followed Sphinx into my room—they shut the door with a kick of their hindleg—and I fell onto the bed. They hopped up next to me, and I removed the envelope from my pocket. Pressed my nail under the flap, worked until my thumb was nestled inside, and slashed across its length.
The envelope popped open, and deposited a square package wrapped in brown paper onto my chest. As it fell it had assembled itself out of motes of light. I looked back to the envelope to see a tiny formation lose its subtle shine—its function fulfilled. Then I withdrew the letter. Read it aloud to Sphinx and myself to avoid missing any words.
"You've been duly recognized for your skill and ingenuity by the Lodge and its staff. As such, you are being offered the first of an unknown number of tasks to earn yourself a number of extra points on your exam evaluation. Note, this offer does not prevent you from failing the exam itself. However, a high enough score before failure may incur an automatic exemption pass to be applied for next year's exam. Secondary note, the continuation of this offer—that being the acquisition of extra points—is contingent on your acceptance of the prior task. If these terms are desirable, please equip yourself with the gear found in the parcel. You are responsible for providing your own weapons. Also, for the sanctity of the exam—and your own plausible deniability—it is required that you store your entity for the duration of your task. Thank you, Regional Lodgemaster, Nemesis Khapoor."
I sat up and unwrapped the parcel. Folded in the center was a gray suit that looked similar to latex, but had less of a sheen. Atop the suit was a mask, plain and unadorned, but the way my eyes and attention rolled off it was all too familiar. It was the same Sorcery that my parent's killers used. I forced myself to stare at that mask even when I wanted to look away. Hated everything that it stood for—that its creators took from me—and then I placed it on my face. Didn't think about what it meant that it fit perfectly.
Instead, I read aloud the words that hovered in the air before me, visible only due to the HUD the mask provided: Please proceed to the Wild Hunt, in ten minutes.
