The other leaders filed out of the room in silence. I watched them go, looking for some signs in their eyes that any of them could be swayed to join me.
I got nothing.
I’d lost, and I hadn’t even known it.
The Prize
CLEM STARED AT ME IN utter shock. I felt as surprised as she looked. The idea that the Church of the Empyrean Flame would forfeit everything to the dragons had seemed inconceivable just minutes ago. They’d clung to power for millennia, guiding the footsteps of Empyreals through the ages. They ruled the first city at Atlantis, and their edicts controlled the rest of the world. What possible reason could they have to let all that fall through their grasp?
“They don’t believe you can defeat the dragons,” Clem said. “It’s the only explanation that makes sense.”
I stalked around the room and struggled to understand what we’d just heard. There was a piece missing. I had to figure out what, and soon. The third challenge was coming; the rest of the students had said as much.
“It’s not just that they’re afraid I can’t win,” I said. “They don’t want me to win. There’s something about the second reward they want to keep out of my hands. They’re willing to sacrifice a lot to make sure that happens.”
I tried to remember everything about the meeting I’d just had with the team leaders. They’d all been dead set against me, except for Tochi. He’d seemed flippant about the whole thing, and I wasn’t sure why. And then, in the middle of everything, he’d acted the fool and dropped his ax. Why would he draw attention to himself like that?
The ax. Had he been trying to tell us something with that little stunt?
I dashed around the table to where Tochi had been seated. There was nothing on the table, nothing in his chair. I kneeled on the floor and examined the indentation where his ax had fallen. I channeled a tiny globe of jinsei between my fingers and let the light play over the carpet. Something sparkled between the fibers. A long, silvery thread.
I plucked it from where it lay within the outline of the ax’s head and held it up for Clem to see.
“Any idea what this is?” I asked. The thread was about the thickness of a human hair, slightly springy, and a yard long. “This was on the carpet where Tochi dropped his ax.”
Clem rushed over to me, peered at the item dangling between my fingers, and gestured at the table.
“I’m not positive, but I think it’s a snake script.” She tapped the table’s lacquered surface. “Put it here.”
I dropped the thread on top of the table, and it coiled into a loose circle.
“Yes,” Clem said. “That’s it.”
Excitedly, she ran her fingers around the silver thread. Jinsei trickled from her fingertip, forming a second circle around the first. One second passed, then two. The jinsei that Clem had left behind coiled tighter and tighter. Then, with a sharp pop, the two circles became one.
The silver wire contorted itself across the table like a snake. It writhed back and forth for a moment, undulating waves passing along its length. Then, bit by bit, it spelled out a long, spidery line of text.
“The brother has your rewards. Challenge in two days.” I read the script, and my heart sank. “Why would he tell us this?”
“Honor,” Clem said flatly. “The Jinsei Institute must not agree with what’s happening. They want you to compete, Jace.”
“He could have given me some more information.” I scratched my head, frustrated. “What am I supposed to do with this? The brother has my reward—that must mean Brother Rhône—but how does that help me find the challenge? And where is this challenge that’s going to happen in two days?”
“He couldn’t risk a more direct message, and a snake script won’t hold many words.” Clem tilted her head back and forth as if trying to ferret some deeper meaning behind the pair of short sentences. “He took a big risk just giving you this much. It’s up to us to figure out what he meant.”
That was always the problem. No one could ever tell me the whole story. Everything came in bits and pieces that I had to figure out how to stick together.
“Where is the brother staying?” I asked Clem. “If he’s got our reward, it’s probably in his quarters.”
“I think I know where he’s staying,” Clem said quietly.
“We should gather the others,” I started, and Clem cut me off.
“No, no one else. We don’t know who we can trust, Jace.”
“We can trust our own team,” I insisted. “You think Eric or Abi might turn against us? That’s ridiculous.”
“No,” Clem said. “Not them.”
“You think Hagar would betray me?” I shook my head in disbelief. “She saved my life, more times than I can count. There’s no way she’d cause problems for us.”
Clem gathered the thread off the table and twisted it around her index finger until it formed a thin band that looked for all the world like a simple ring. She touched a droplet of jinsei from her fingertip to the thread, sealing it in place. It was a good disguise, and we wouldn’t have to worry about anyone finding it. But it still didn’t answer how Clem felt about my handler.
“I don’t think she’d betray us,” Clem said carefully. “But I do think she’d report all of this back to the elders. It’s something they’d want to know, don’t you think? And once they find out about it, there’s a chance someone else in your clan will hear the details. And, honestly, Jace, we don’t know who might turn us in to the Inquisition. Let’s get the reward, first.”
As much as I
