by Megan Crewe
“As I said, it’s a very immersive program. She’ll have the greatest success this way.”
Dad looked like he was going to argue further. I touched his arm. They had to be okay with this. If they kicked up a fuss now, for all I knew the Confed would decide they were a bad influence and restrict our time together even more.
“I think it’s best if I follow the usual protocols,” I said. “It won’t be forever.”
Dad turned back to me, and his eyes softened. He nodded to Welch, who moved on.
We ended up sitting on the concrete in the shade of one of the buildings. I broke off pieces from my cinnamon roll to share with Mom and Dad, despite their protests. I had a hard enough time forcing the rest past the lump in my throat, even though the buttery, spicy dough tasted as delicious as always.
Mom told me about a new commission she’d gotten to make dance costumes for a ballroom studio, Dad did exaggerated impressions of the wackiest people he’d gotten on the line at the call center, and all three of us pretended this was just normal catching up after a vacation or something. I lost myself in the moment enough that it didn’t feel like a whole hour could’ve passed before Welch came ambling over again.
“Time to go,” he said, quiet but firm.
Mom and Dad pulled me into another round of hugs. “You show those college mages just how impressive you are,” Mom said. “And don’t forget how proud we are of you to have gotten there.”
I swallowed hard as I smiled. The smile was a lie, but I couldn’t bring myself to even hint that they might not have the whole story. How would it help them to be worrying even more about what I’d be doing now? They were so relieved that I’d made it through the Exam. I couldn’t spoil that joy when they couldn’t change what was ahead of me.
Someday, I’d be able to tell them. I’d get through this new ordeal and back to the people I loved, lo prometo.
Another man in Exam gray showed up to escort my parents back over the bridge. I gave them one last wave before they passed out of sight. Welch patted me on the back.
“Let’s go. You’ve got a plane to catch.”
A weight settled in my gut as I followed him. I was about to leave Rikers Island, but I was bringing the Confed’s prison with me—in the ’chantment they’d cast on me and in the lies I had to keep telling to protect everyone and everything I cared about.
Chapter Two
Finn
It turned out it was a lot easier to be brave when you had someone to be brave for.
I’d thought I’d found some sort of inner Zen about my fate while the Exam’s staff tidied up my various injuries until I reached a condition befitting a Lockwood. Afterward, standing in this waiting room with Rocío, holding her and knowing that she’d won as much as anyone could, and that I’d played some small part in her victory… That consolation had seemed like enough to carry me through.
As the great Virgil line went, tu ne cede malis, sed contra audentior ito. I would not give in to the evils within the Confed but fight them all the more boldly however I could.
Then one of the examiners had come to collect Rocío. Alone with a table of food I couldn’t summon any interest in, the certainty of purpose that had felt so solid a moment ago started to crumble. The minutes slipped by as I waited for someone to come collect me, and a clammy sensation of dread seeped over my skin. I paced from one end of the room to the other, but I couldn’t shake it.
They were going to burn me out: sever my connection to the magic, which had been as much a part of my life as air, as gravity, and leave me utterly deafened to it.
No more melodic whisper in the air. No more swivel of a thumb or murmur of a poetic lyric to conduct that energy to my will. I would be as dull as the Dulls.
I couldn’t imagine it, and that was terrifying.
No more struggling to cast even half as well as the rest of the family, I reminded myself. No more studying until my head ached and then receiving my latest grades with a sinking heart. No more pretending I could somehow construct myself into a great mage, because I wouldn’t be a mage at all, not in any tangible way.
Nausea twisted my stomach at that thought. The magic and I might have a fraught relationship, but I’d wanted to be better, not just to impress my family and peers but also because I loved what little I could do with it. There was nothing more exhilarating than weaving intent into being by working in harmony with that energy.
An examiner appeared in the doorway: Examiner Khalil, one of the three who’d remarked on my performance in the Exam and delivered their verdict. She was one of the youngest examiners I’d seen here—mid-twenties like my sister Margo, I estimated—and unlike the other two, she’d been generous enough to look a little sad.
“Mr. Lockwood,” she said now. “If you’d come with me?”
My feet resisted for a second before I managed to propel myself toward her. I’d come here because I wanted my future to be defined by my actions and not my family’s name. That was what I’d gotten. I could at least put a good face forward.
I fell into step beside the examiner. “Are you going to give me the standard doctor line?” I asked in the most cheerful voice I could muster. “‘It won’t hurt a bit’?”
Examiner Khalil’s fingers twitched as she adjusted the edge of her hijab, which was the same shade of gray as her uniform. Her dark eyes were solemn.
“I don’t believe there’s any pain from the actual procedure,” she said in her soft, clear voice. “Afterward, naturally, you’ll find there’s some discomfort as you adjust to the loss of magical sensation. There are mages who specialize in easing the transition. Your family should be able to connect you with one as need be.”
Did they offer the same reassurance to all the novices who ended up burned out, even the ones whose families didn’t have the means to pay for undoubtedly expensive therapy—which was most of them? I suspected not.
“One more adventure,” I said. “It certainly has been an exciting week.”
My attempt at good humor fell flat before the words were even out. I swiped my hand over my mouth, trying to think of a better follow-up, and Khalil stopped in the middle of the hall.
The examiner’s gaze darted up and down the narrow, white-walled space. No one else was in sight. She leaned closer, her voice dropping.
“I don’t agree with all of the policies we follow here,” she said. “I—I can’t do anything about the burning out. They’d notice. I can try to mitigate some of the rest, so you won’t lose everything.”
“The rest?” I repeated. A deeper chill rippled through me. “What are you talking about?”
She’d already focused her gaze on my forehead, her hands rising to either side of my head. “I had a placement under your father for a year while I was in college. From what I saw, he was a good person. From what I’ve seen of you, you’ll be one too. But you can only exercise that goodness if you still know.”
Before I could question her any further, a lilting lyric slid from her lips. The magic she wove tickled across my scalp. I hesitated, torn between wanting to know what in Hades’s name she was doing and not wanting to ruin the casting by interrupting her. Everything she’d just said indicated she wanted to help me, not harm me.
The tickling crept down the back of my head as Examiner Khalil sang another line. The tap of footsteps carried from somewhere deeper in the building. Her voice wavered. She caught it and spun out a quick coda. With a jerk of her hand, she gestured for me to start walking again.
“What—?” I said, and Examiner Lancaster came around the bend up ahead. The elegant, silver-haired woman who appeared to be in charge of the Exam proceedings glanced us over with a thin smile. Khalil bobbed her head to her supervisor. She directed me to a door just a few paces from where she’d stopped me earlier.
“I’ll be waiting to escort you to your parents when the procedure is finished,” she said, her tone carefully even.
“Thank you,” I said, as if it made any sense to be thanking her for
leading me to my punishment. Perhaps I should be for whatever she’d been attempting to do a moment ago, if she’d even been successful.
On the other side of the door, two mages waited in the small room: one with a magimedic crest on her blue uniform and the other in regular Exam gray. My mouth went dry as I sat in the padded chair. I tried to smile to show I didn’t blame them for what they were about to do, but I couldn’t seem to work the muscles in my face quite right. I suspected it came out more like a grimace.
“We find the procedure is best done under sedation,” the magimedic said. As I nodded, she rolled her casting from her tongue. My lips parted with questions I meant to ask—and a wave of blackness swept through my mind, blotting out my consciousness.
A hollow buzzing filled my ears, as if I were underwater. My lungs heaved instinctively, sucking in air that was right there for the taking, and I blinked awake with a flinch against the chair.
The magimedic stood next to me, studying me. The other examiner was gone. I shook my head to clear it. My thoughts stayed as jumbled as if they were underwater—pebbles tossed by the current of a rapid stream.
The hollowness didn’t leave. If anything, it expanded to completely encompass me. The numbness crept all across my skin and blanketed my tongue. My hand moved to shape the familiar rhythm that would tune me into the emotions of those around me, and my fingers stumbled.
There was nothing to apply that rhythm to—not the faintest hint of energy I could hearken in the space around me. The world had gone empty, drained of magic.
My pulse stuttered in the instant before I remembered that wasn’t the case at all. The magic was still there. I simply couldn’t reach the slightest strain of it. Whatever part of my mind had once responded to its harmony might as well have been ashes.
Burned out.
“Your Exam is complete,” the magimedic said gently. “I’m afraid that despite your efforts, you did not meet the criteria for Champion, and so have undergone the burning out procedure.”
I barely registered her words. My heart kept pounding hard. The sound of it in my ears, the thud resonating through my chest, made my surroundings feel even more vacant. A quiver ran through my limbs. I gripped the arms of the chair, fighting for some semblance of internal balance.
“Take your time,” the magimedic went on. “Some disorientation is normal, but it’ll pass as you settle in. My best advice is to look forward and make the most of what you have, not to dwell on what might have happened before.”
What might have happened? Why was she talking as if I wasn’t already aware of my “efforts” and their result? I knew precisely what had happened to bring me here. There’d been— I’d had to—
Images flitted through my memory: a hedge of razor-sharp thorns, a boy hurling a bolt of magic at another. My head ached when I tried to focus on them. I rubbed my temple and pushed myself out of the chair.
Walking made the hollowness worse too. No shifting undertone of magic twined with the tempo of my steps. I grasped the handle on the door, and a sudden, vicious urge tore up through me, the urge to throw myself at that blank surface, batter it with fists and feet until I provoked some kind of echo in answer.
I’d done something like that before. There’d been a clouded wall creating a numbing distance from the magic. Prisha’s voice pierced the haze in my head: One, two, three, go!
That situation had been different. The wall had been a construct around me, around her, around—someone. I couldn’t break through anything to get back to the magic now. I was broken.
A shudder of panic ran through my chest. It wound tight around my lungs as I stepped into the hall.
An examiner was waiting for me: a young woman with a hijab covering most of her wavy black hair. I’d spoken to her before—there’d been a table, they’d sat there, three of them… A concerning disregard for the security of the Confederation.
No, she hadn’t said that bit. It’d been the other woman, the older one with the sleek silver hair. The examiner who’d appeared at the Exam’s end, when I’d lain reeling on my back at the base of that barbed hedge. She’d also—a silver box. A screen with an image of a house. Soldiers.
The fragments jumbled even more. I frowned and gave my head another shake. What was this examiner’s name again? Perhaps she hadn’t introduced herself.
We started walking down the hall. I hardly noticed my legs moving. “Normally we arrange transport home,” the examiner was saying. “But in your case, with your parents so nearby, of course they insisted on coming themselves.”
My parents were here. The panic swept even deeper, dislodging every other discomfort. Dad and Mom knew now—they knew that I’d failed, that I was a failure, even more explicitly than I’d been before.
I had no time to brace myself. The examiner ushered me into another white-walled room, and there they were, standing tensed by a couple of unused sofas.
A hot flush of shame surged over my face as I fumbled for words. Before I needed any, my mother caught me in her arms with an inhalation just shy of a sob. She hugged me to her slender frame so tightly it was my eyes that heated next.
She was holding me as if she were afraid she’d never get to hug me again. I supposed she probably had been afraid of that. O gods, they hadn’t even known if I’d survive. Perhaps the rest didn’t matter all that much, at least not yet.
I hugged Mom back as I hadn’t since I was a little kid. The warmth of her embrace penetrated the numbness around me just a bit.
Nevertheless, the shame returned the moment she eased back. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I tried. I—”
“Finnegan,” she said firmly, cutting me off. She never used my full name unless she wanted my immediate attention. Her eyes shone with a watery gleam. “You’re here. You’re all right. We’ll figure out the rest later. But you have nothing to apologize for.”
Dad gripped my shoulder. When I turned to look at him, his jaw was tight. He tugged me to him, clapping his other hand against my back and giving my shoulder a squeeze.
I’d declared for the Exam and refused to rescind that declaration against his very adamant protests, but when he spoke, the rawness of his voice wasn’t remotely angry.
“It’s good to have you back,” he said. “Please tell me you’re done proving yourself for at least a little while?”
The half-hearted joke made me choke on laughter, but it also reminded me that I wasn’t done, not at all. I’d been going to tell them—they needed to know what really happened in the Exam, all the lies we’d been fed, all the ways the Confed’s military division was using people. I’d promised her. I’d promised—
I stiffened as the memories jarred in my mind. I could see her perfectly: those dark brown eyes that could be fierce and tender at turns, the stubbornly sharp point of her chin, the waves of her hair tossed in a breeze. I could feel the shape of her in my arms when I’d held her not more than a few hours ago. Why couldn’t I remember exactly what I’d said to her?
Why couldn’t I put a name to that face?
“Finn,” Dad said, but my thoughts were whirling too swiftly for me to answer. Someone had said something—someone had stopped me in the hall—
So you won’t lose everything.
The way the magimedic had spoken to me, as if I wouldn’t know where I was or why, made sudden, sickening sense. They hadn’t just taken my connection to the magic. They’d meant to take my memories of the Exam too—and they’d nearly succeeded. As it was, all I had left were those ragged fragments.
The girl who’d led our way through the Exam, the girl my heart squeezed at the thought of, the girl I’d meant to do whatever I could to stay by—I’d lost her name.
Chapter Three
Rocío
On our first morning of training, I found myself in a room that reminded me a lot of the gym in my old high school. The ceiling loomed high overhead, and the running shoes I’d been handed along with the sweats I was now wearing squeaked on the waxed wooden floor. The air s
melled faintly rubbery. A basketball hoop was even fixed to the wall at the far end, but I wondered whether anyone who trained here under the Confed ever used that or if it was leftover from whatever this building had been before they’d taken it over.
Many of my Dull classmates had used that high school gym to take turns “accidentally” bumping and elbowing me, seeing if they could piss me off enough that I’d retaliate with a casting. I was pretty sure I’d have to get through whatever challenges waited for me here the same way: head low, mouth shut, focused on coming out the other side.
The examiners had said they’d been impressed by how I’d tackled the Exam’s trials. That they wanted me to help them find more “effective” strategies for their military missions. No one had said anything about that since I’d been passed into the National Defense division’s custody yesterday evening, so I guessed I’d have to bring it up myself.
A cool draft blew through the room, and I rubbed my arms. How much damage had the magic already suffered in the three decades of fighting between our mages and the magical insurgent groups that had risen up after our Unveiling? It was desperate enough to have reached out to me. We had to get started on healing it soon.
Over by a door labeled Equipment Room, Desmond, one of my teammates from the Exam, flashed a grin at Leonie, the old-magic girl from New Orleans who’d joined up with us in the final stages. He sidled a little closer as he said something that made her laugh. His tall, skinny frame looked almost relaxed in his standard-issue sweats. Of course, he’d talked as if this training were an extension of the sci-fi books and movies he liked to quote from, so maybe he wasn’t as nervous as I was.
Our other teammate to make Champion, Prisha, was leaning against the wall near me. She didn’t come across as half as polished in those sweats as she had in her blouse and slacks when I’d seen her at the beginning of the Exam, but even though she was way more new-magic than me, she still held herself with Academy girl airs. From what Finn had said, she was the first in her whole family to show a talent—just rich enough to buy her way into the right circles.
