First Year

by Rachel E. Carter

  The girls assured her it would make her more beautiful than any lady of the realm, and that the prince would surely propose upon seeing their friend in it.

  My jaw clenched.

  Priscilla turned to smirk at me. “Don’t worry, Ryiah. No one will see you wearing another ratty hand-me-down like the one you did for solstice. Only the apprentices will be noticed… and since you are attempting Combat, you won’t have to worry.”

  “Or maybe I can just borrow yours,” I told her tightly. “We both know you are just ornamental. The masters would never be daft enough to give an apprenticeship to a convent girl like you.”

  One of her friends laughed unexpectedly, only to quickly cover it up with a cough as Priscilla glared at both of us.

  “For a commoner you certainly think highly of yourself. Don’t get any delusions, Ryiah. You are nowhere close to the prince and me. Sir Piers may have believed in you once, but that was before mid-year. You’d be a fool to still think you had a chance now.”

  Her words had a truth that bled, and I was momentarily tempted to tell her what her precious prince had done. She already hated me, so what was stopping me?

  Don’t be a fool, Ryiah. You know perfectly well that would be a mistake. Alex always tells you to control your temper. Right now is that time.

  Rather than continue the unpleasant exchange, I headed to the baths to soak away the bitterness and frustration that were threatening to take over.

  By the time I had returned, Priscilla and her friends were long gone, leaving me alone to the silence of an empty barracks.

  Good. The last thing I needed was more time alone with that witch.

  Everyone else was still out, studying, dining, or enjoying one last night of freedom with friends. I should have been doing the same, but I wasn’t ready to face the interrogation that would undoubtedly follow from my brother, from Ella, from myself.

  I didn’t know how to feel about what had transpired in that dark hallway, and until I knew, it was best to keep the secret untold.

  I’d been kissed before. Many times, actually.

  In Demsh’aa there had been a boy…but there had been no spark, no sense of worlds colliding when his lips had brushed up against mine.

  Darren’s kiss tonight had been everything Jason’s had lacked.

  It had made my legs weak, my lungs burst.

  It had been an assault of everything wrong and right, right and wrong, wrong and right.

  I’d seen fire when he touched me, and he had made me want to burn.

  Jason had held me gently, as if I was a doll he hadn’t wanted to break. Darren had grabbed me—roughly, impulsively—like he couldn’t stop if he wanted to. He hadn’t asked permission. He’d taken it, and for some inexplicable reason I had let him.

  And then I had kissed him back.

  The mere fact that I had liked Darren’s kiss was upsetting enough. That my body had betrayed me and acted on its own accord was unfathomable.

  There were a thousand reasons why kissing the non-heir, or letting him kiss me, was a mistake. He was a prince. He was fickle. He was rude. He was arrogant. I knew better. I was lowborn. He was wrong.

  I didn’t even like him.

  And what about Priscilla? Most everyone in the Academy, including myself, assumed she and the prince were set to be betrothed and that it was only a matter of time before the engagement was announced.

  What was Darren thinking now?

  Did he think he’d made a mistake?

  Was I just another conquest he had hoped to win over a lonely night?

  Had he been testing me?

  I’d seen the look in his eyes when he had realized I was kissing him back: shock.

  What if the kiss was a joke? A horrible, cruel, sadistic joke?

  I slammed my fist into my pillow. Blast the prince for being so unreadable. I never knew when to take him at his word, let alone his actions.

  Don’t trust them, and you can’t get hurt. That was what Ella had told me that day after she saw me arguing with Priscilla and Darren. She’d never told me what had happened back at court, and now I was unable to think of anything else.

  It doesn’t matter what Darren meant by it, I told myself after an hour of restless turning, you are here for one reason. That reason is not him. You are here for your magic, and that alone. So get some sleep.

  The next morning I woke up with dark lines under my eyes. Much to my dismay, I had barely slept. I’d continued to relive that kiss and its sequential doubt all night long. The only time I had slept I’d been back to my familiar nightmare on the hill, losing the mid-year duel to Priscilla for all the world to see.

  It was by far the worst night’s sleep I’d ever received.

  “You look like death,” Ella greeted me as I opened my eyes.

  “Thanks,” I told her dryly.

  “I would have thought you’d be the most rested, considering you went to bed just as the sun was setting,” Ruth pointed out from the bed next to us.

  I glanced at the two of them. “Is there something you want to ask me?

  “Just making an observation,” Ruth said shrugging.

  We headed out to the dining hall to meet up with the rest of our group. As I piled my bowl high with porridge, I tried to avoid looking across the room to see how the non-heir was faring across the way.

  “I hope you tell me what’s bothering you,” Ella whispered as I passed her the jam.

  “There’s nothing bothering me,” I said quietly.

  Alex shot me a raised brow. My brother didn’t believe me either.

  “You two can pester me all you like—”

  “Attention, first-years.”

  Everyone was immediately silenced as Master Barclae entered the room looking formidable and intimidating in his black silks. He stood near the front of the room, almost adjacent to where the prince and his friends were seated. My eyes darted to Darren, and I saw that, unlike me, there was nothing disheveled to the non-heir’s appearance. I could also see Priscilla running a hand through his hair, and my stomach clenched.

  “Today marks your halfway progress to the end-of-year trials,” the Master of the Academy began. “From here on out, expect your training to become much more intense. You may think that you are already giving your studies everything you have to give, but trust me when I say the next five months will prove that theory wrong.

  “At this point your masters have pushed you to your limits. They have shattered your will and built you back up into the resilient warriors that remain. Now, it is not your masters, but your peers who will challenge your stay.

  “You already know what it is to break. You also know what it means to survive. You didn’t last this long by chance. The masters did everything they could to encourage you to leave. The first-years that remain now will not shy away from a challenge. They will not leave willingly.

  “You will become your own worst enemies. You will push yourselves further than your masters require. You will not sleep, eat, or breathe without the apprenticeship in mind. Not a day will go by that you won’t compare yourself with others of your same faction, and this will spur an inevitable competition.

  “By now I am sure all of you are aware that the best way to increase your probable success is by reducing the count among your own factions. In the past, students have encouraged one another’s departure by any means necessary.

  “While I believe competition is a healthy and necessary part of your schooling, I am here to remind you that during this time the rules of conduct still apply. Hazing is not permitted, and any student caught participating in such will be sent home immediately. I do not condone such actions as have occurred in the past, and I have already advised the constable that he has full authority should inappropriate proceedings arise.”

  Master Barclae scanned the audience with a furrowed brow and then gave a wolfish smile. “That said, I am pleased to announce two more students have departed from your ranks. It appears a week of respite was too much temp
tation. I can only hope this trend continues in the months that follow.” He chuckled and then gave a cursory gesture with his right hand. “Now, continue on with your meal. I wouldn’t want to ruin your morning completely.”

  The Master of the Academy exited the room, black silks billowing, as the rest of us picked at our plates in silence. From what he had just told us, we were in for the worst five months of our lives.

  I could hardly wait.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  It wasn’t even a full week into the second half of our year before the Master of the Academy’s predictions began to play out. For better or for worse, every first-year had increased the intensity of their studies, and no one, no one, was ever seen at a meal or break without a book in hand. Training had become a nightmare, and first-years were sent to the healing ward on a daily basis. Narhari’s expectations became nothing compared to the limits we had set for ourselves.

  Students had stopped sharing in each other’s progress, and friendships were becoming strained. People were guarded, secretive, and tempers flared.

  Each of us had an apprenticeship in mind, and Master Barclae’s warning had forced us to acknowledge the reality that everyone, even friends, threatened that progress.

  Unfortunately, there had been two parts to the Master of the Academy’s warning, and the latter had taken effect as well. Hazing had begun, though it was seldom referred to as such, and while it was forbidden, no one was bothering to halt it.

  Most of the class secretly supported its purpose, though they were afraid to be at its receiving end. Even the masters seemed unusually oblivious to its presence, and I suspected Master Barclae’s public condemnation had been just that: a public cover and nothing more. After all, wasn’t he one of the ones that wanted to “cut our waste?”

  The first time I witnessed the hazing was during Piers’s drills three days after the announcement.

  Ella and I had just started our fourth mile when the burly brothers Jake and William had sprinted past, laughing a little too loudly for comfort. She and I had looked behind, just in time to see one of the younger boys of our faction pitch forward into a giant trench that had suddenly appeared in the middle of his track.

  The boy broke both legs and spent the rest of the day being treated by the healing mages of the Academy. A day later, he resigned.

  Master Barclae interrogated our class, but no one gave up the names of the boy’s tormentors. I had wanted to at first, but Ella hastily pointed out that if we did, we would find ourselves first in line for the next hazing.

  “The boy could have come forward himself, if he had wanted justice,” she said. “If you tell, you’ll be considered a snitch. Whether you want to admit it or not, this is just another test. Most people believe the masters already know who did it—they just don’t care. Combat mages don’t ask others to solve their problems. Hazing is just another way for them to tell us that we are not cut out for our faction. Don’t give them a reason, Ry.”

  I hated to admit it, but she had a point.

  So now we were into our second week, with two more unfortunate incidents under our belts. Another boy in Combat had woken up screaming to a hoard of snakes hiding out in his bed. One of Priscilla’s friends, the girl who had laughed at her expense a week before, found all her belongings drenched in what I could only assume was a slimy mass of fish guts.

  One by one, everyone who had ever criticized a member of the prince’s inner circle was becoming victim to the notorious hazing. And while no one had been hurt in a manner past healing, I grew increasingly upset that the non-heir and his counterparts were leading the assault.

  Sure, Darren’s friends were reducing the odds, but they were also increasing their own. No one was foolhardy enough to haze his following, and so the group’s actions just promoted their own standing, making it that much harder for others to move up.

  I was tired of sleeping with one eye open, and after my encounters with Priscilla and Jake, I knew it was only a matter of time before I was next.

  I hadn’t been alone with the prince since that moment in the halls, but I swore that if I had the opportunity, I would give Darren a piece or two of my mind. I wasn’t sure whether I was more upset by the kiss or the hazing, though I told myself it was the latter.

  “You know it’s going to be us soon,” Ella said, eyeing Priscilla as we sat down for the evening meal. Two more weeks had passed, and Combat was running out of first-years who had openly feuded with the non-heir’s crowd. Only one of their victims had left, but it didn’t mean the hazings were any more pleasant.

  “We’ve only had two hazings in Alchemy,” Ruth pointed out.

  “No one has attempted Restoration yet,” shy James admitted, attempting to sit between my brother and Ella until Alex gave him a sharp look.

  As soon as James returned to his seat at the edge of our table, my brother spoke up: “It’s probably because we’ve only got ten left, as is.”

  Ella sighed. “I wish we had ten. Those are much better odds than the five in thirty-three for Combat.”

  I elbowed my friend. “That’s the thinking that brought on the hazing in the first place, Ella!”

  My friend swallowed uncomfortably.

  “Why do you think you two are next?” Alex asked.

  “Because they are. Priscilla hates them,” Ruth said matter-of-factly. She stared at my brother. “How have you not noticed that?”

  Alex shrugged his shoulders good-naturedly. “I try to keep out of girlish drama.”

  “Well, Ry’s got bad relations with the prince too,” Ella said before I could stop her. “Didn’t Darren go after the two of you during orientation week for Combat?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Alex admitted ruefully.

  “Right, Ryiah?” Ella pressed.

  I stared at my plate, using my fork to stab small indents into a slice of roasted potato.

  “Ryiah?”

  I glanced up at her. “Right.”

  I excused myself, promising to meet up with Ella and Clayton for our nightly practice outside the armory: “I need to stop by the barracks first. I think I left one of my books there.” It was a lie, but I needed to get some space, alone, before I faced my friends again.

  The last thing I wanted to do was discuss the prince. Even the mention of his name brought back memories of that night, and the last thing I wanted was to remember it.

  Yes, I’d enjoyed that kiss. But so would have any hot-blooded female. It wasn’t a crime, just a lack of judgment on my part.

  “Ryiah?”

  I almost jumped out of my skin. Standing in the shadows of the hall just beyond was Darren.

  My heart began to beat wildly, and blood rushed my face. I tried to appear uncaring as I asked shortly, “What?”

  “Can I have a word with you—outside?”

  “No.” I was proud of my resolve. I did not bat an eye.

  “Ryiah, please.” Darren walked over to where I stood, frozen, and reached down to take my hand.

  The second our skin touched, I was hit with a rush of fire and ice, the same tingling sensation as before.

  I looked up involuntarily. A flash of recognition—and guilt— flared up in those fathomless eyes. He dropped my wrist immediately.

  “You should go back to your friends,” the prince said abruptly, turning.

  I was furious. Darren couldn’t even apologize now that we were five feet apart.

  “You coward,” I snapped, racing out in front of him so that the non-heir was forced to meet my angry gaze. “First you assault me, then you try and send me on my way like I’m some lovesick fool? And don’t think for a moment that I am not aware that you are the one behind the hazing. You really have some nerve—”

  “You think I assaulted you?” Darren had stopped his retreat to stare at me in blatant disbelief. I was sure he was remembering my body’s traitorous reaction to that kiss.

  His doubt only enraged me more. How dare he assume I had liked it! Even if I had.

  “Believ
e it or not, not every girl welcomes the advance of a weakling prince that has no chance at a throne, even one so lowborn as me.” It was cold and untrue, but I knew it would hurt someone as prideful as Darren. And I wanted to hurt him in any way that I could. The nonheir’s earlier dismissal stung more than I cared to let on.

  “Well, I am sorry I offended you,” Darren said shortly. “I assure you I will not make the same mistake twice.” His eyes darkened. They were now as unflinching and barren as stone.

  “You had better!” My breath caught, and I was dismayed to find my vision was becoming blurry. What was wrong with me? I needed to get away before he saw me cry.

  Something flickered in the prince’s eyes, and I realized it was too late.

  There was an unbearable silence, and then I spotted the Academy door a couple paces away. I reached for its handle, intent on escape.

  Darren paled. “Wait, Ryiah, don’t—”

  A sea of red greeted me as soon as I stepped outside. Buckets of sticky, foul-smelling gore covered every inch of my frame. I was drenched, rivulets of scarlet raindrops dripping from my hair, my face… not a part of my skin untouched.

  “Go back to where you came from, lowborn.”

  It took me a moment to wipe enough blood away to see the person who had addressed me, though I had recognized his voice immediately.

  A few steps forward Jake, the speaker, William, and Priscilla stood watching with malignant smiles plastered to their faces.

  I was right: the hazings were personal.

  “Save yourself anymore humiliation,” William suggested.

  Priscilla snickered. “Go home, Ryiah. This school was never meant for commoners.”

  My skin burned beneath the plaster of repugnant red. They were just trying to get under my skin, trying to break me.

  Hadn’t Ella and I suspected something like this would happen? I was irate, and rightfully so. But that didn’t explain the shattering, the tearing at my chest.

  I felt betrayed. I felt used. I was angry. Fire was filling my veins, and a dark loathing was met with unbidden tears.

  Darren stepped out from behind me, eyes averted, to stand beside his friends. His clothes were immaculate.