The ache in my core increased at the thought. There was nothing honorable or noble about the Gauntlet. We were all just pawns in a battle between much more powerful forces. It wasn’t much of a stretch to believe that the Flame didn’t care whether we lived or died, and I already knew the same was true for the inquisitors.
There was no guarantee that any of us would get out of this alive.
“This way.” Headmistress Cruzal pushed her way through the chaos and gestured for us to follow. “Let’s get you somewhere quieter.”
The headmistress led us to the back of the stage, through a pair of narrow red curtains, and into a cramped hallway that wound its way deep into the bowels of the campus. I didn’t remember ever coming this way before, though that didn’t mean much. The School of Swords and Serpents was a big place. There were probably hundreds of tunnels and passages I’d never seen.
“Is he going to be okay?” Clem asked the headmistress. “The Yzlanti team member, I mean.”
“I don’t know,” Cruzal said, sounding sincere. She’d stopped in front of a small iron door and rapped on it three times with the middle knuckle of her left hand. A moment later, sparks of jinsei danced around the door’s perimeter and it swung open on creaky iron hinges. “No one will bother you in here. The door on the far side of the room will take you back to the dormitory wing when you’ve recovered from your ordeal.”
“How long can we stay?” I could have used a week of quiet rest. My core was raw and throbbing from the delamination. There’d been no time to examine the damage I’d caused myself, though it felt significant.
“As long as you want.” Cruzal gestured toward the table in the center of the room. “There’s a scrivened tablet there that can summon food and drink. Get whatever you need.”
“Thank you.” I wasn’t sure why Cruzal was being so nice, and I didn’t care. Looking that gift horse in the mouth wouldn’t earn me anything but a headache. Maybe she felt bad for us, or maybe she knew we deserved some time alone to talk about what we’d been through. Whatever the reason, I accepted her generosity graciously.
I led the others into the room and closed the door behind us. It was a cozy enough place, with comfortable chairs arranged around a low-slung table. I flopped down in the nearest chair and rubbed my temples in an attempt to banish the headache headed my way.
“Anyone hungry?” Eric snatched the tablet off the table. “Because I’m starving.”
“Give your body a second to catch up to your brain,” Clem said and took the seat to my right. “Let the adrenaline out of your system before you start shoveling food into your belly, or you’ll make yourself sick.”
“Okay, Mom.” Eric flopped down in a chair across the table from the one I’d chosen, stretched his long legs out in front of him, and crossed his ankles under the table. “I wonder if that dragon’s gonna tell us how we did. I bet we came in first.”
I doubted that. There were three possible golden rings according to the scoreboard, and we’d only gotten two. If any of the other teams had destroyed all the constructs before scoring any goals, or letting any goals be scored on them, they’d have gotten all three. I was willing to bet the Shambala team had done just that.
“We did good,” I agreed. There wasn’t any point in sharing my doom and gloom feelings with the rest of the team. I wanted to keep their spirits up and let them enjoy their victory for as long as possible. “Though we could have done better if we’d known the rules.”
“True.” Abi folded himself into the chair next to Eric and bridged his fingers over his belly. “I suppose that’s part of the challenge, though. If they spelled everything out for us, then we’d all get perfect scores.”
That was a point I hadn’t considered. The schools had each sent their best team to compete. Straightforward challenges would have been too simple for the star pupils to figure out. That would force the Flame to split the ties based on time, and that seemed wrong. Being the fastest wasn’t as much of a virtue as being the smartest or wisest or even the most powerful.
“And it’s not like they’re the only ones who aren’t telling the whole truth,” Hagar said from the chair to my left. “How are you feeling, Jace?”
“I’m fine.” I was not. My core was definitely thinner and more frayed after using my technique. An ache that just wouldn’t go away had settled in, and it hurt worse by the minute. I could still hide the worst of the pain from my friends, but I wasn’t sure how much longer that would be true. “How are you feeling?”
“Me?” Hagar leaned forward in her chair, her elbows resting on her knees. “I’m fine, Jace. Maybe we should get Hirani in here to check your core.”
“Did you injure yourself?” Clem’s eyes flicked from Hagar to me and back again. She pursed her lips into a frown and drummed her fingers on the arms of her chair. “If your core comes apart and you have to quit the competition, we’re done, you know.”
“I might have overdone it at the end, there.” Before anyone could say anything else, I raised both hands defensively. “I am okay, though. Nothing broke.”
“We should tell someone,” Hagar said. “Just to be on the safe side.”
Everyone else nodded in agreement with my clanmate. It made me want to tear my hair out.
“Listen,” I said. “If we tell anyone, they’ll drag me off to Bogotá. I’ll be out of the competition.”
“That’s better than being dead.” Clem locked eyes with me. “Or having your core split in half. I’d rather lose the competition than lose you.”
There was an uncomfortable
