Setting his jaw, Scorio stared out across the azure waters and waited.
Chapter 70
Scorio had never seen the basilica so packed. The balconies teemed with spectators, ranging from dour dignitaries to wealthy nobles from the four Houses to the privileged and lucky commoners Praximar had invited to attend. Every torch was lit, so that the undergrowth that had spread amidst the peripheral biers and the thick ivy that climbed the walls was cast into sharp relief, making the scene all the more surreal.
Flocks of birds flew in confused vortices from one balcony to the other, seeking refuge from the sound and activity and finding none. Great Souls mingled across the floor, while the far stage was crowded with the elite from all four Houses, their ceremonial regalia glinting in the light.
The very air felt crisp, electric, charged with expectation and nerves. Moving forward with his companions, all of them dressed in ceremonial robes crafted for this very occasion, Scorio felt a rising sense of wonder. Couldn’t stop his eyes from ranging over the packed throngs, the House tutors who advised their sponsored students with last-second advice, the older Great Souls who mingled with the Cinders and Emberlings, wishing them luck with cynical smiles and gruff encouragement.
All of this was for them. The five hundred souls who’d been rebirthed into this world, given a new lease on life and a chance to defend Bastion and their kind from the predations of hell. The energy, the resources, the time, the expertise, the sheer scale of the expenditure spent on grooming them, training them, preparing them for this one moment was stunning.
Humbling, almost.
Or it would have been if Scorio hadn’t seen the other side of the curtain. The realities behind the performance, the rage simmering in the streets.
But studying the faces of his fellow cohort-mates, he saw how taken in they were. Some smiled foolishly, charmed and awed by the spectacle. Others fought to present a tough exterior, feigning indifference to the pageantry. A rare few were truly focused, their gazes stabbing through the crowd into some invisible middle distance as they mentally prepared themselves for what was to come.
A massacre.
Every member of their cohort would soon die. Some sooner, some later, but pain and death were the sole universal constants that united them all. But few of his fellow classmates appeared worried; they’d been swept along by the momentum of it all, saw their imminent death as natural, part of the process.
As did Scorio.
If anything, the scores of times he’d died in the old Gauntlet had prepared him for this in more ways than one. Not only had it helped hone his skills, allowed him to catch up with his more privileged classmates, but it had stolen the sting of death from the process. Time and again, he’d died, clutching at his slithering entrails as they slid free, stabbed, clubbed, beheaded, or lacerated to such an extent that he was claimed by the blood loss.
He’d paid a toll. Had walked a fine line between spiritual destruction and personal growth, but he’d paid the price unflinchingly.
All for this, this day, this moment, this chance to show the Academy, Praximar, Jova Spike, that he could not only compete with the best of them but defeat them all.
Were it not for his broken wrist, he’d feel positively combative.
Instead, he pressed the swollen and aching limb to his chest. He’d wanted to lower it by his side, but doing so increased the pressure and pain.
No matter. Victory in the Gauntlet came down as much to teamwork and determination as it did personal talent.
At least, that’s what he kept telling himself.
“Look at them,” said Naomi, her upper lip curling into a sneer. “So excited to sell themselves to the highest bidder.”
“To continue their education,” said Lianshi. “Nobody wants to be cast out of the Academy. Even the poorest performing Cinder dreams of making it just far enough to be invited back.”
“To what end?” Naomi glared at her contemptuously. “So that they may excel further, earn greater attention and resources, and be yoked to a golden harness?”
“Sure,” said Lianshi. “What alternative is there?”
To which Naomi had no ready response.
“Lianshi!” A bright call from a few biers over, and Scorio saw Juniper raise a hand in a wave. “Good luck!”
Lianshi’s face paled, then flushed, and then she ducked her head only to raise her chin and brush her hair back, all in such rapid succession that if Scorio had blinked he’d have missed it.
“Thanks!” Lianshi gave a tentative wave back. “You, too!”
“You talk to her?” asked Leonis, his voice a low rumble as they finally reached their biers.
“I did. Um.” Lianshi looked so unsure of herself that Scorio was about to tell Leonis to leave the matter alone, but then she continued. “I, ah, well, we were in line together at the quartermaster’s to collect our new robes. And she just turned and stared at me and said we needed to talk. I wanted to die, but I agreed, and then we stepped aside once we’d been given our robes and sat down to drink tea though I don’t think I took a sip the whole time we spoke—”
“Deep breath, Lianshi,” said Naomi, tone long-suffering.
Lianshi did just that and gave Naomi a tight-lipped smile. “Right. Sorry. But yes. We spoke. Compared trials, ultimately. And… well. She’s amazing. She forgave me.”
“Forgave you?” asked Leonis, brows knitting together. “For what?”
“For what I did to her, or might have done, or probably did.” Lianshi placed her hands on the jeweled edge of her bier and stared down at her fingers. “One way or another, I clearly had the capacity to betray her. So she forgave me, and I cried, and it was wonderful and awful and…” She took a deep shuddering breath, then looked up with a painfully raw smile. “So yes. We talked.”
“Good for you,” said Naomi, and bumped her shoulder against Lianshi’s own. “Well done.”
“Juniper didn’t really give me much of a choice,” said Lianshi, voice small.
“Still. You could have run. You didn’t. Well done.”
Lianshi blushed and looked away.
The crowd rippled, a presage of an approaching presence, and Scorio saw Kuragin’s shaggy head looming over those who walked with him. For a wild moment, Scorio thought the group was coming his way, but their angle of approach was wrong, they were simply passing by. Amidst the crowd, he caught sight of Jova Spike walking arm in arm with Zala, Chloe a step beside, chatting with another woman.
The great, oceanic murmur that filled the basilica seemed to fade away, and Scorio felt his stomach knot, his breath still.
Kuragin, sensing his stare, turned and met his gaze from over all the heads. Grinned with cruel mirth, and then drew his thumb across his neck.
But Scorio wasn’t watching him.
Instead, he studied how Jova walked, measured her self-assurance, her poise, her utter, inviolable confidence. Even in her ceremonial robes of white and gold, she looked dangerous, other, more mature, more everything. She’d ringed her eyes with the same dark kohl, had her dusty black hair raked over to hang down over one shoulder, the other side shorn near to the skin.
A Tomb Spark. The only one in their whole class. There’d been rank speculation that a half-dozen others might make it, but none of them had.
Jova walked by, and Scorio was sure she’d not even look his way. That he was so beneath her notice that she might even have forgotten their bet. But at the last moment, her gaze slid across to fix him where he stood, unhesitating, unsurprised, as if she’d known he’d be there and had no doubt that he’d be watching her.
Scorio clenched his jaw, clenched his healthy fist, and raised his chin. For one searing second their gazes met, and in the depths of her dark eyes, he saw an emotion he couldn’t read. But then she was gone, swept on by, moving to their biers along with their host of hangers-on.