“Form up!” Vellmar called from the main doors.
With a rumble of boot heels on tiles, the Guards formed two precise lines facing each other, starting at the doors and extending halfway across the lobby.
Andira linked arms with a flabbergasted Ekatya and led her forward. “Let’s go to school,” she whispered.
“Good luck,” Gehrain said as they passed him.
His well-wishes were echoed repeatedly as Ekatya was escorted between the lines. She was too dazed to respond, a situation that worsened when Vellmar opened the outer door.
“Good luck, Captain Serrado,” said Lead Guard Ronlin. He stood at the top of the stone steps, heading a second dual line of Bondlancer’s Guards. Across from him was another unexpected face, though less so after Micah’s appearance.
“You ran away from the Whitesun winter, too?” Ekatya said. “I thought you’d be immune to it.”
“I couldn’t miss this, could I?” Rahel leaned in and spoke quietly. “Tell the truth and be yourself. That’s all they expect.”
“At this point in my life, I’m not sure I can be anyone else.”
“A truth for which we are all grateful.” Andira tugged her onward, and Ekatya passed through another honor guard of warriors who wished her well.
At the bottom of the steps, Vellmar and Ronlin strode past to take the point position, while Salomen and Lhyn moved up to walk beside Andira and Ekatya. Behind them came forty Guards. A few were focused, clearly on duty, but the rest strolled along, laughing and chattering.
It seemed that Ekatya’s challenge was a holiday of sorts.
It was also a vivid preview of how her life was about to change. Once the public announcement was made tomorrow, she and Lhyn would both have their own Guards. They had been handpicked by Micah and Gehrain, with additional input from Salomen for choosing Lhyn’s. The High Council had authorized funds to expand both the Lancer’s and Bondlancer’s units, a far simpler solution than the creation of two new state-funded units, which would have required full Council approval. Vellmar and Ronlin had just finished training the new warriors and awarded them their distinguishing armbands: black with silver triangles for Ekatya’s Guards, dark scholar blue for Lhyn’s.
Ekatya wasn’t looking forward to this aspect of life as the Lancer’s tyree, but at least she was already experienced in having her own sworn warrior. Lhyn wanted nothing to do with it and had strenuously objected. But there were some things even an accomplished linguist could not talk her way out of, especially when she came up against an expert debater. Despite Salomen’s initial distaste for her own Guards, she understood their necessity very well and had impressed it upon Lhyn in sharp and devastating detail.
Sometimes, Ekatya reflected, it was rather nice to sit back and watch someone else do the convincing.
Their route took them along the back side of Blacksun Temple, where Lanaril waited in her open garden gate. “Good morning!” she said brightly. “How inspiring to see so many people enjoying a bit of exercise. Might I join you?”
Alejandra appeared beside her. “Did someone mention exercise? I could use some after the last nineday of doing practically nothing.”
“Nothing?” Micah asked incredulously.
“I said practically nothing.”
When her grandparents stepped out from behind the garden wall, Ekatya gave up. “Is anyone not coming along for this?”
“Stars and Shippers, Katya, did you think we would let you go alone?” Nikolay pulled her into a firm hug. “Now go in there and show them what you’re made of,” he ordered. “Show them why they’ll be lucky to have you.”
“I think I’m the lucky one, Gramps.”
Elanor was waiting as soon as he let go. “I won’t tell you to make us proud,” she said. “You already have.”
Ekatya closed her eyes and held on, swallowing the tightness in her throat. “Thanks, Grams. Wish me luck.”
“Good luck, dear heart.”
And that, thought Ekatya as their parade wound across the park, was what made Grams so special. Everyone, even Lhyn and Andira, believed this was a foregone conclusion. Perhaps it was, but Grams understood why she couldn’t accept that. Blind trust in an outcome had never served her well. Preparation made the difference.
The examiners would test her on morals and ethics, intelligence, and aptitude for a number of areas the caste valued. In addition, they would administer her civics test, a requirement the Council had added to citizenship applications.
The last test was in the dance of combat.
Excluding the civics test, which was scored separately, each caste exam was worth nine points. Out of a possible thirty-six points, she needed twenty-five to pass—and she would lose points in the combat. Had she any real skill with a sword, stave, or knife, she would have been better able to compete against an Alsean opponent. Unfortunately, her skill was hand-to-hand, where her light Gaian bones and less dense musculature put her at a significant disadvantage. Then there was her empathic ability, which would earn her a big, fat zero.
She would need to perform extremely well to make up for those deficiencies.
“You’re overthinking it,” Lhyn said from beside her. “I did the same thing at the start of my challenge. I haven’t given you any advice, because I knew you didn’t want to hear it. Will you hear it now?”
The red domed roof of the warrior caste house gleamed in the sunlight, its impressive bulk dwarfing the trees below. Ekatya could not look away as they approached. “Now is all the time I have left,” she said.
“They’re not just testing what you know. They’re testing who you are. They don’t want to know about Captain Serrado, just like my testers didn’t want to know about Dr. Rivers. They already knew that part of me. They’re looking under your skin.”
“Lovely,” Ekatya muttered. “How is anyone supposed to prepare for that?”
“You don’t. That’s the point. The other point”—she caught Ekatya’s hand—“is that under this skin, you’re a warrior down to the marrow of your bones. They’ll see that. They’ll want that.”
Ekatya squeezed her hand. “From your lips to Fahla’s ears.”
She did not let go, not as they turned into the long, grassy promenade that led to the grand entrance, not as they climbed the stone steps, not even when they went through the doors. But inside the lobby, Lhyn gave her a kiss and slipped away.
She took in few details after that, too overwhelmed with the grandeur of the space and the requirements of her initial inscription. Andira took her to a massive desk of wood and stone, where she recited her full name and those of her parents and grandparents, submitted her thumbprints, and gave the equivalent of her service record to the clerks busily recording every word. Andira made a formal statement of sponsorship, signed by her own thumbprint.
The clerks vanished through an archway into what Ekatya vaguely remembered were the archives. Five ticks later, a door opened beside the semicircular desk. Two new warriors emerged, introduced themselves as her testers, and led her away.
She cast a final look back at Andira, who smiled and held a hand over her heart before the heavy door closed between them.
“This way.” The taller warrior led her down the silent corridor and through another door. “Please sit, Captain.”
“I’m not a captain any longer.” She walked to the chair on the far side of the round table while the two warriors sat side by side.
“Not to your Fleet,” said the other. “But we don’t see your rank as dependent on whether or not the Protectorate continues to hold your oath.”
“In truth,” said the first, “we’ve long thought that the Protectorate did not deserve your service. Would you agree?”
They’re looking under your skin. Lhyn’s advice was suddenly crystal clear: though disguised as a conversational opener, the testing had already begun.
“I served more than the Protectorate,” Ekatya said. “I served those who needed me. My crew. The officers whose training I
was entrusted with. Protectorate citizens who depended on us. The Resilere. Alsea. Yes, there were individuals who did not hold my respect—” She paused, remembering Rahel’s advice to tell the truth. “And who didn’t deserve my service. But I didn’t serve individuals. I served the Protectorate Fleet and its ideals, and I’m proud of my record.”
“Even though your record includes abandoning Alsea to the Voloth?” asked the second.
It took every bit of her training to keep a neutral expression. “If my record ended there, no, I wouldn’t be proud of it. I obeyed orders because at the time I thought it was my duty, even when the orders felt wrong. Lancer Tal taught me a different way of thinking.”
“But not before you challenged her honor.” The first warrior glanced at her reader card. “Colonel Micah recorded it, as was his duty. You challenged the Lancer out of anger.”
Was this a test or a trial?
“I assume Colonel Micah also recorded the outcome. Lancer Tal ripped my head off my neck and handed it to me.”
She wasn’t certain, but she thought the second warrior might have let a tiny bit of amusement slip through.
“Yes,” he said gravely. “He did record that outcome. Why did you swear an oath of service to her after that?”
For personal reasons that she would not divulge here, test or no test.
“The Voloth were coming and I couldn’t get off this planet,” she said truthfully. “As a Protectorate Fleet captain, death was preferable to Voloth capture. If I was going to die, then I wanted to go out fighting. There was no better person on Alsea to fight for than Lancer Tal. She had earned my respect.”
They nodded again, their faces blank. She had no idea whether or not she was saying the right things, then or for the next hantick as they continued to pick apart her decisions. Belatedly, she realized that this was the ethics and morals test. She had never envisioned it taking this form.
At last, they gave her a cup of shannel and a tentick break. She sipped gratefully, trying to loosen the painful knot that had taken up residence between her shoulder blades. Not even her last hearing back at Command Dome had been this difficult. Then, she had been defending herself against spurious accusations and ridiculous suspicions. She had respected neither the process nor the individuals putting her through it.
These warriors had made no accusations and shown no suspicions. They had spoken no words that were not factual. Yet they had made her painfully aware that her choices were not always good ones.
“Are you ready, Captain?”
She set down her empty cup. “Yes.”
“Tell us about the formation of the castes and Unification.”
Thank the stars, it was the civics test. Her trial was over.
She spoke for half a hantick without stopping, eager to show what she knew. They gave no indication of any errors she might have made, interrupting only to ask additional questions or steer her toward related topics. Once again, her realization was late: many of these questions were testing her intelligence and aptitudes. She had expected tests with specific, quantitative objectives, but Alsean testing seemed far more qualitative, achieving its objectives in a more diffuse manner.
She wondered, in a brief lull as the warriors consulted over their reader cards, how the point assignments worked in a system like this. Then they asked another question, and she had no time to think of anything but how best to answer.
By the end of the second hantick, she had downed two more cups of shannel and was desperate for a bathroom break. When the warriors set down their reader cards, she was sure they had sensed her need and were discreetly assisting.
“Congratulations, Captain Serrado,” the first said.
“Welcome to our caste, warrior.” The second stood from his chair and leaned across the table, offering his forearm.
Ekatya rose and clasped it automatically, her brain scrambling to catch up. “You mean I passed? But I haven’t done the dance of combat.”
The first chuckled, a shocking sound given her blank demeanor of the past two hanticks. “You don’t need to. You’ve already scored a twenty-six point five.” She offered her own forearm. “That’s nearly a record.”
“It certainly puts you in the top one percent,” the man added. “Not that we were surprised.”
Twenty-six point five? That meant she had lost a mere half point in all three exams.
“But . . . how? I’m sonsales. And what about the ethics and morals test?”
“Empathic ability isn’t required,” the woman answered. “Though it can be used to make up for lower scores in other areas. Not ethics and morals,” she added. “Those stand alone. But we don’t judge by who you’ve been. We judge by who you are.”
The man pushed in his chair and rolled up his reader card. “You’ve been a loyal warrior to two oath holders simultaneously. That’s a difficult set of obligations to balance. Your choices and actions have done you great credit.”
“Of course we’ll want to see your dance of combat as well.” The woman slid her own reader card into its belt pouch. “If you’ll come with us, we’ll take you downstairs.”
The changing room would not have been out of place in a luxury spa. Despite its underground location, natural light was somehow brought in from outside, enhancing the warm tones of the wooden lockers and cushioned benches. It buzzed with activity, full of warriors in various states of dress, nearly all of whom looked up and smiled at her entrance. She was the first Gaian to set foot in this room, yet no one said a word. Alsean courtesy beat curiosity.
They stopped in front of a locker that held a comfortable set of her workout clothing. Andira had sent it over yesterday, “so you can wear something that fits.” Now, holding the only familiar thing in this entire building, Ekatya wondered if it was also an intentional psychological boost.
“Toilets and showers are through there.” The man pointed to an archway at the end of the room, then turned to indicate a closed door on the opposite wall. “That’s the door to the training room. We’ll wait for you there.”
As she passed by the sumptuous showers on her way to the toilets, she thought she would surely be needing one by the time this last test was finished. She had not sparred with an Alsean since her ill-fated challenge fight with Andira, but she hadn’t forgotten how completely outmatched she had been—or how much it had hurt.
Nothing worth doing is easy, Grams always said.
Grams would birth a brick when she saw the bruises Ekatya was about to acquire.
A wave of excitement rippled through the room while she changed clothes, manifesting in whispers, the rustles of hurried dressing, and an occasional audible word.
“She is?”
“I have to see . . .”
She found her testers standing by the door with identical expressions of annoyance.
“Have you nothing better to do?” the man asked.
Ekatya stopped, confused, but he was looking past her.
“Not really,” said a voice behind her.
“We heard who’s out there,” said another. “I’m not missing this!”
Ekatya turned to find every warrior who had been changing now dressed and crowded at her back. She looked at her testers questioningly.
“Unlike the others, the physical test isn’t private,” the man explained. Glaring at the crowd, he added, “But it doesn’t usually attract this much attention.”
No one moved.
With a sigh, he opened the door. “Come along, then.”
Ekatya followed them into a training room with the same natural light and warm tones as the changing room. Padded mats lay flush with the wooden floor, set in a geometric pattern that allowed for multiple activities while looking like an art installation.
Every mat but one was empty, though the walls were lined with warriors wearing workout clothes and eager expressions. She saw several familiar faces interspersed among them.
In the center of the room, her test opponent stood waiting on a dark blue mat.
“As your sponsor, I claim the right to administer this exam,” Andira said. “Do you accept?”
It was a smoothly laid trap, one she hadn’t seen coming. Andira had repeatedly tried to spar with her, but Ekatya could not bring herself to do it. Her memories of their first and only match were still etched on her conscience: the rage, the ferocious need to hurt, the fact that only Andira’s exceptional skill had kept them both from serious harm.
In the time it took to reach the mat, she considered and dismissed the option of refusal. It would not affect her caste right, but it would certainly affect her caste standing.
Andira had counted on that, damn her.
“I accept,” she said, stepping onto the cushioned surface. As their audience cheered, she stopped in front of Andira and dropped her voice to a furious whisper. “Do you realize how manipulative this is?”
“A good warrior faces her fears. I’ve asked you ten times to spar with me. You were never ready.”
“I’m not ready now!”
“You don’t want to do it now. But you’re ready.”
“You arrogant—how dare you force me into this? Did you think I’d be grateful?”
“I thought you’d be exactly this angry. Do you want to hurt me? This is your chance.”
That brought her up short. “No, I don’t want to hurt you!”
“Even though you’re angry?” Andira’s smile held no triumph. It was the soft smile Ekatya saw in their home, the one she gave only to those she loved. “Good. Then spar with me, and we’ll show them what the first Alsean Fleet admiral can do.”
“I’m not an admiral yet.”
“You earned a score of twenty-six point five. You’re already in the caste. The only thing between you and your new rank is the official announcement.”
“And this,” Ekatya said tightly. “Laying hands on you. I can’t. I can’t do this.”
“You’ve laid hands on me already.” Leaning in, Andira whispered, “I’ve enjoyed every piptick of it.”
She stepped back—or at least, Ekatya thought she was stepping back. The leg sweep caught her unawares and sent her to the mat before she knew what was happening. She let out an oof as the breath was forced from her lungs, then saw movement above and instinctively rolled away.
Alsea Rising: The Seventh Star (Chronicles of Alsea Book 10) Page 36
