Chapter 7

I couldn't go back to the tent.

Not only would Rodhi and the others no longer remember me, but based on the heavy silence of the arena, vibrating with the hum of crickets and the plopping of raindrops on tents, it sounded like everyone was asleep at last.

Plus, I couldn't risk anyone's life again. The thrum of power within me had faded, but what if it regenerated once I fell asleep? What if I exploded again?

When I stepped out onto the vacant Bascite Boulevard, therefore, I began walking in the opposite direction. Away from everyone else, over the bridge, to the courtyard.

Here, that fountain Coen had supposedly been standing on tinkled peacefully, blending in with the sound of the heavy drizzle. I surveyed the sections of buildings in every direction and aimed for the one with the most trees. The treehouse I'd built with Quinn when we were ten wasn't the only tree I'd ever climbed. We used to dare each other to go higher and higher, until we were in the canopies with the monkeys and sloths.

Those memories left me feeling oh so very heavy right now.

Trying to focus purely on my present situation, I found the perfect tree nestled between two stone buildings, its canopy of leaves spread wide over the massive fork of its limbs.

A jump and a grunt later, I had swung my legs over its lowest branches and nestled myself in the crook of its arms. Lonely. I was lonelier than I'd ever been in my life, but there were no tears to clog my throat now. Only dry, aching hollowness.

In the starlight, I brought the pill in front of my face and examined it.

"What are you?" I breathed—to the pill itself or to the power it was supposed to repress, I didn't know. Coen had saved my life, so I doubted he'd try to ruin it by feeding me a harmful drug, but still… all that he'd said about the Good Council…

I closed my eyes, processing it.

Tomorrow was the Branding. If the bascite they would force in my blood made me burst with something ten times more powerful than what I'd just experienced, if I hurt anyone in that crowd, could I even blame the Good Council for hauling me away right then and there and tossing me to the pirates? My blood was wrong, somehow, twisted and monstrous, like a disease swimming through my veins, ready to bite.

But this pill would negate it, according to Coen. Suppress the monster and let the Good Council-sanctioned magic rise to the surface. Or—had he said that last part? What if the pill suppressed all magic, and nothing happened when they Branded me?

Sleep on it, Fabian would tell me. Perhaps that was all I could do for now.

So I slipped the pill in my front tunic pocket and let my dreams pull me under.

"Hey, stop it. You're tickling me."

For a moment, I forgot everything. I was back in my bed at home, the birds were whistling, and Don was poking me awake.

Then I sat bolt upright.

And almost fell from the tree.

Three separate monkeys scurried away, chittering to each other in the soft, orange light of dawn and a salt-stained breeze wafting in from the ocean.

"What, were there bugs in my hair?" I muttered, patting my head… and stopped. Whereas last night my curls had taken on a truly unruly shape after the bascale incident, now it flowed down my back in two tight, intricate braids.

My hands shifted down to the front pocket of my tunic in a panic.

A lump. The pill was still there, but that thrum in my chest… it was completely gone. That horrible, clawing power and the bascite that had triggered it must have left my system. For now.

I loosed a sigh and peered up at the three pairs of monkey eyes blinking at me through the tree's canopy.

"Thank you?" One of the Wild Whisperers must have taught them how to braid hair. Did that mean they could understand human language, even if I couldn't understand them? I cleared my throat and said, more earnestly, "Thank you. Really. I was beginning to look like I might have some troll ancestors."

The joke fell flat, of course. Monkeys don't laugh, I reminded myself, and shook my head. Last night had really tangled up every thought in my brain.

A brain that a Mind Manipulator had already infiltrated once. Even if it was just to make me believe the fountain in the courtyard was invisible, even if he hadn't been solely responsible for the pirate hallucination, that thought left a sour tinge on my tongue. And everything Coen had said flooded back…

"Rayna?"

I jumped and looked down, blinking.

"Lander?"

"What are you, uh, doing up in a tree?"

His face came into view, neck craned to look up at me. At the same moment, a fourth monkey skittered up the trunk and swung past me to join the others, but even that didn't faze me. Lander was here.

Biting back a sob, I jumped down, landed in front of him on my hands and knees, and rose up to throw my arms around his neck.

"You found me. Oh, where have you been? I spent all night searching for you."

"I spent all night searching for you," he said, slowly hugging me back. "You and Quinn. Have you seen her, by the way? I can't believe we got separated so quickly."

"I…" My breath stumbled. How could I tell him that Quinn had abandoned me, hadn't even asked about him, and surely wasn't searching for us? No, it would be better to let him see her once everything had settled and she came to herself. "I haven't seen her, no," I finished, wincing internally at the lie all the same.

"Oh, no. I was really hoping you had. I hope she's doing okay." Lander withdrew and raked a startled gaze over my braids. "Are you okay?"

"Fine," I said, waving a hand. If I couldn't tell him about Quinn, I sure as hell couldn't tell him about the bascale and Coen Steeler and the pill. Not yet. For now, I was content to let the familiarity and joy at his presence inflate in my heart. I hooked arms with him, and said, "How did you find me?"

We began walking, arm and arm, back toward the courtyard.

"Those class royals woke everyone up and told us we had free rein of the entire Institute until Branding tonight. The others began to wander off to explore, but I… I didn't know anyone, so I just kind of stood there." Lander's ebony cheeks flushed. "But then one of those monkeys came up to me and started pulling on my sleeve, and it led me straight to you."

"Huh." I almost stopped. "Maybe you're going to be a Wild Whisperer, Lander."

We came to the courtyard, now bustling with people. Not just inductees, from the looks of it, but older students, too, who were showing off their various powers. This was a mingling, then, a get-to-know-you free-for-all before we were separated into sectors. Yet there seemed to be a wall already, an invisible one, with all that flirting and giggling and posing on one side and Lander and me on the other.

As we hovered on the edge of the courtyard, a group of rowdy boys ran past us, throwing rocks at the monkeys that had followed us along the rooftops.

"Hey!" I started, whirling, but Lander placed his other hand on my shoulder.

"Don't, Rayna. Don't make enemies before Branding. You never know who'll end up in your sector."

"Spoken like a true diplomat," I muttered through my teeth. Lander's entire line of family had been the mayors of Alderwick for generations—a small leadership role given the size of our village, but a political one nonetheless—and Lander himself was expected to take on the mantle once he returned home from the Institute. No one had ever seemed to doubt he'd pass his Final Test.

Lander sighed. "I don't want to think about politics. Let's go explore like everyone else, and maybe we'll see Quinn somewhere along the way."

I kept my mouth shut and went along with him.

We meandered through the jumble of roads and alleys and buildings, taking closer looks at every part of campus and passing jaunty groups of other inductees. The whole time, I kept half an eye out for Coen, though I didn't know why, and Lander kept swinging his neck around for any hints of Quinn.

No sign of either of them, until we had ambled to the Shape Shifter section.

There, Lander was just telling me, "It would be awesome to be able to—" when he stopped dead. I followed his gaze and felt him shrink beside me.

Quinn was there, with Jenia and… a lot of older Shifters. All men. All strikingly handsome, though I couldn't see how you'd ever know what a Shifter truly looked like, if they could manipulate any part of their appearance.

Quinn didn't seem to mind, however, and before I could pull Lander back around the corner, she'd reached out to stroke one of their chests, laughing, running her nails down his skin.

"Do it again," we heard her say. It was Quinn's voice, but… higher-pitched than usual. Sultry, somehow, and I still couldn't move to drag Lander away as the Shifter grew, his muscles bulging out far past the scope of normalcy, and she shrieked and dragged her fingers over every dip and curve again. Beside her, Jenia clapped.

"Quinn?" Lander whispered.

She didn't hear, and I finally found my muscles again.

I yanked him away until we were in the shadows of an adjacent building, where I gripped his shoulders.

"Lander, don't read too much into it. It's her first time being around anyone her age besides you and me. She just needs time to adjust…"

He ripped himself away from my grip, hurt crunching his features.

"This is the first time I've been around anyone else our age, too, and you don't see me going around, pawing at every hot girl I see. This is…"

"Talk to her, then," I said, switching tactics, desperate to wipe that pain off his face. "Next time you get a chance, talk to her and tell her that there needs to be some new boundaries moving forward if you're going to stay in a relationship together."

Lander rubbed the bridge of his nose, as if willing himself not to sniff.

"I don't know, Rayna. That sounds an awful lot like the start of a breakup."

It did, but I didn't want to confirm that out loud. I only slung an arm around his shoulder and squeezed tight. "C'mon. Let's go find one of those carts of food, eat some lunch, and bask in the sunshine until Branding. Clear our minds."

He nodded, his gaze dropping low, and I felt it for the first time in my life.

A spark of anger toward Quinn.

The Good Council arrived just as the stars were ebbing into view between clouds.

The arena had been utterly transformed. Instead of tents, there was now a stage set up right where Bascite Boulevard opened up to the field, a neat row of chairs for the Good Council members before it, and hundreds of smaller, more rickety chairs behind them, where all us inductees would sit until our names were called.

As we filtered onto the field and claimed our seats—the placement didn't matter, one of the class royals declared as she directed us, since everyone's name would be pulled out of a hat—I didn't know where to look first: the arch of flickering flame above our heads, courtesy of older Element Wielders, the rest of the Institute's students filling the stadiums surrounding us, or the Good Council members themselves.

Five of them had come to witness the Branding. Two men, two women, and one… I didn't even know what to call her. A goddess, maybe, because her skin glowed brighter than starlight, her icy-blue eyes framed by razor-sharp bangs and a thick flow of the blackest hair I'd ever seen. She sat in the middle of them all, front and center, far more regal than any of the so-called princes or princesses here.

As Lander and I settled into our seats, I observed the too-slender back of her neck over all the inductee heads in front of me, and a shiver nipped my own.

Shape Shifter. She had to be. Nobody else could achieve that level of beauty.

"I think she's a crone," Lander breathed, having followed my stare. "A crone trapped in a young woman's body. It just… it doesn't look right."

He'd been in a strange mood since the Quinn thing and seemed to be saying the most ominous things possible in response to everything, but I couldn't disagree.

That. That was who'd stare me down when the stamp of bascite met my shoulder, when it sunk through my skin to mingle with the blood in my veins and trigger… whatever monstrous magic had exploded from me last night.

If Coen was right and the Branding activated more raw, uncontrollable power in me, that was who'd feel the surge of it first. And from the way she sat, rod-straight, in her chair, I knew she'd be pissed if I so much as knocked her over.

The pill felt as heavy as a marble in my front pocket.

I had to decide, and soon.

"Young ladies and gentlemen!"

A middle-aged man with a jovial face hopped onstage. His cheeks were tight and shiny, and his rounded spectacles winked in the firelight. The crowd—from the soon-to-be branded to the onlookers in the stadium to the Good Council—fell quiet.

"I am your president, Mr. Gleekle, and I want to personally welcome you all to this crucial stage in your cultivation as worthy citizens of Eshol!"

His voice… it seemed closer than it should be, as if an unnatural wind had picked up each word and sent it streamlining straight to my ears. I was willing to bet everyone else was experiencing the same thing, and that the unnatural wind actually split off into thousands of different directions to amplify his speech.

"You see," Mr. Gleekle continued, smiling wider despite the drop in his tone, "the world outside of Eshol is bursting with more than just pirates hungering for the magic that will soon be granted to you. It is full of slavers and murderers and thieves and monsters, dangers beyond our comprehension. This island is safe, but only if we make sure each and every citizen is able to control their magic and use it for the greater good of our society."

Deep, pounding silence followed those words, as if even the beating of thunder in the distance had paused like the beating of our hearts. My mind churned with images of that four-fingered pirate and other vague, shadowy figures behind her. Slavers and murderers. Thieves and monsters. Perhaps the Good Council wasn't so intimidating compared to them.

Mr. Gleekle clapped his hands, and the spell broke. "Now, each of you are going to join us on stage when we call your name. Mrs. Wildenberg?" He motioned someone toward him with a fat finger. "If you could please bring the hat out."

An older, ashy-skinned woman hobbled onto the stage, hoisting up an upside-down sunflower hat that had to have been enlarged by Shifter magic.

"Thanks, Joanne," Mr. Gleekle told her, and then turned back to us. His eyes, I noticed through the glint of his glasses, stayed firmly away from the Good Council in the front row. "Mrs. Wildenberg will pull each of your names from the hat, completely at random, of course, and then I myself will brand you on behalf of the Good Council itself. You might feel a little pinch as your magic takes shape, but do not panic. Once it is clear which form your magic has taken, please join the rest of your new sector in the stadium until the end of Branding."

Shifting movement as everyone twisted left and right to try to make out which sector was sitting where in the stadium. For once, though, none of the older students were showing off their magic. Each sector seemed to bleed together.

I wondered, ever so briefly, if Coen was thinking about me, or if he'd already forgotten our little conversation in the alley last night. The way he'd sauntered off, the portrait of nonchalance, seemed to suggest the latter.

If I just knew where he'd gotten this pill from… or why… or how…

That bubble of bliss that Lander had brought with him seemed to pop inside me. Now. Now was the moment I had to decide. Trust Coen, a Mind Manipulating man I'd just met, or trust that the Good Council wouldn't toss me away before the test?

Because deep down, I knew that whatever had happened last night would happen again on a much larger scale when that faerie metal became a permanent part of my system.

What would my fathers tell me right now, if they were here?

Don would tell me to be wary of funny mushrooms, of course, but Fabian would tell me to trust my instincts. And then Don would go, well, yeah, but never trust your instincts when it comes to mushrooms, my Auntie Greta did that once and she… and Fabian would say this is different than your Auntie Greta who thought she saw the God of the Cosmos tap-dancing on a frozen lake, Don, and then they would bicker the whole night through.

What would I tell myself to do, if I was giving my own self advice?

My answer came when that Good Council thing in the beautiful female body turned to assess the crowd behind her, and I saw the purely predatory hatred ripple in her ice-blue eyes.

No, I might not fully trust Coen, but I didn't fear him like I feared her.

As two other instructors brought out a cart of hundreds of metal rods capped with circular bascite stamps, I fished the pill from my pocket.

And popped it in my mouth.

Then swallowed it dry.

Nobody saw, not even Lander, whose eyes were focused on the stage now, but…

Something quieted within me as the pill settled in my stomach, like a faint whine in my ears that I hadn't even realized was there just… dropping away.

Onstage, Mr. Gleekle spread his arms and boomed, "Let the Branding begin!"