Chapter 12

Early the next morning, the excited ruckus from the swarm of candidates could be heard long before anyone even got anywhere near the main hall. A wooden frame had been set up in front of the doors—frustratingly empty—intended for displaying the list of successful candidates. It was already past the hour when they had been expecting the results to be released, but still there was no sign of anyone bearing the coveted list.

"Do you think something's wrong?" Chang-en whispered to Ying.

"What could possibly be wrong! It's just a test," An-xi snapped, but the rapid twitching of his narrow brows said otherwise.

An-xi wasn't the only one who was on edge. Several of the other candidates were pacing nervously, a couple had beads of sweat lining their foreheads despite the freezing weather, and there was one doing squats in the middle of the courtyard. Even Arban was strangely withdrawn, looking like a giant bear twiddling thumbs.

"Don't know what you're so worried about," Chang-en said. "We already know we're guaranteed a pass."

"It's not just about passing. Passing won't get you top of the list. Passing won't get you into the guild." An-xi pursed his lips together in a thin, hard line, his cheek muscles so tense that they looked close to snapping.

"One step at a time. I'm happy enough to sail through one gate. What's the point of worrying so far ahead?" Chang-en nudged Ying and shrugged his bony shoulders, then he stuck out his tongue at An-xi when the latter turned away. "Always so uptight," he mumbled with a crooked smirk.

The anxiety from the others was like a dense, suffocating cloud that enveloped Ying and swallowed her whole. The longer the suspense dragged, the more jittery she became. Despite Chang-en's reassurance that they would get a free pass through the first test, she wasn't entirely convinced. Gerel and the other masters disliked her too much. Even Ye-yang had warned her that they were unlikely to give up on this opportunity to officially expel her from the guild.

She stared at the blank frame, rubbing both her temples in concentric circles. Her head was throbbing, a side effect of the string of nightmares that had plagued her mind the entire night. She couldn't remember any of them now, but she had woken up drenched in cold sweat, feeling like she had a fever coming on. The sense of dread from her close encounter last night still lingered on, and she couldn't help eyeing her surroundings warily time and again, worried that the scarred assassin might show up.

Even if the guild was no longer safe, she still had to stay on. She needed more time to investigate her father's death—and to prove that she deserved a place here, just like he used to.

She sneezed. And again. The headache got worse and all her efforts at massaging acupoints went to the dogs.

"You should stop by the guild physician's later," Chang-en offered. "Not the best idea to be falling ill in the middle of the trial."

"That's assuming I even make it past today." Ying rubbed her nose, sniffling as she tried to keep her mucus where it belonged. In any case, a trip to the guild physician was out of the question. She didn't go last night when she had been poisoned, so she certainly wasn't going because of a little cold. One tap at her wrist and her pulse would give her away.

The long-awaited list didn't arrive. Instead, the apprentice hopefuls were in for a bigger surprise.

A stream of soldiers dressed in the stiff black uniform of the Cobra's Order came striding through the covered passageway and into the courtyard. Marching like clockwork, they lined the entire square perimeter, with two especially menacing-looking fellows positioning themselves by the entrance of the main hall. Their hands rested purposefully upon the hilts of the swords hanging at their waists, polished black shafts curving at the ends into the fearsome heads of cobras.

Gerel appeared behind them, followed by the other guild masters. All of them wore grim, stilted expressions on their faces, eyeballs constantly darting backward as if there was a monster lurking in the shadows.

"Master Gerel, what's going on? Where are the results of the test?"

The master's eyes spat fire as he stared down the unobservant fool. "Keep quiet," he said, his hands making impatient sweeping actions. "Clear a path. Clear a path."

The young men obediently stepped to the side, leaving a clear aisle leading toward the doors of the hall. They craned their necks, peering curiously toward the shadowy recesses of the passageway. Ying was too short to get a good look, so all she managed was a peek through the gaps between the other boys' shoulders.

Not long after, Grand Master Quorin emerged, together with the four beiles, but there was someone else with them. Someone unfamiliar.

He was a stern, imposing man with a pair of commanding eyes framed by thick, graying brows and high cheekbones, his head front-shaven in the recent favored style of Antarans, and the rest of his hair bound at the back of his head in a single queue. Thick gold hoops hung from his lobes, his black silk robes embroidered with shimmering gold thread in the pattern of fierce waves and finished with a matching black fur collar and leather gloves.

Ying knew who he was the moment she saw him. It was in the eyes. Gray—like Ye-yang's. Yet they were not identical. There was always a stillness and clarity in Ye-yang's gray irises, but this man had eyes like the storm, mercurial and volatile.

This was the High Commander of the Antaran people—Aogiya Lianzhe. The man who had single-handedly rallied an army and swept across the nine isles, conquering and cajoling, forming alliances and cutting down opponents until the fragmented Antaran clans were all united under one emblem. The mark of the cobra.

There was a sharp intake of breath from the few candidates who recognized the High Commander. The rest were curious and confused, itching to ask their neighbors who he was but not daring to breathe a word under Gerel and the other masters' hawklike stares.

Grand Master Quorin led the High Commander and the four beiles toward the hall's entrance. Once they had gone inside, the guild masters quickly herded the gaggle of young men in.

"I can't believe the High Commander is here," Chang-en murmured as they jostled with the crowd. "Do you think he's here because of the trial?" He shook his head. "Nah, can't be. No reason why he would be interested in us. He probably came to discuss more important business with Quorin and then decided to stick around out of respect."

Ying didn't think the High Commander needed to show anyone any ounce of respect. The deferential, subservient actions of the guild masters spoke volumes of who the master was and who the servants were.

She looked up at the man who had taken the central seat on the raised platform that was usually reserved for the grand master. He was handed a small bronze hand warmer by one of the senior apprentices, whose hands were visibly shaking. Removing his leather gloves, he wrapped his lean fingers calmly around the metal tripod as he listened to Quorin rattle on about something from his left. He tilted his head imperceptibly in a slight nod, and Quorin stood up to face the rows of curious young ones.

Clearing his throat emphatically, the grand master said, "His Excellency the High Commander has graced us with his presence today."

Everyone dropped to their knees and bowed their heads, right fist brought up across their chest in the traditional Antaran salute.

"You may all rise," the High Commander spoke, his voice mellow and resonant, like molten iron flowing through the mold of a sword. "I must apologize for disrupting the guild's plans. I understand the results for the first round of the apprenticeship trial were supposed to be released this morning."

Ying was surprised by how congenial the High Commander seemed to be. His tone was measured and unhurried, his words courteous and thoughtful.

Back on Huarin, she had heard plenty of stories from the village storyteller about the High Commander—those were a favorite of the ladies, who swooned at every mention of Aogiya Lianzhe's valiant and intrepid conquests. Ying had never been impressed by those stories. To her, they were accounts of violence and gore. So much blood had been spilled—Antaran blood—in exchange for the High Commander's idea of progress and peace. She liked the outcome, but she didn't like the process, and from all those stories she had painted an image of the High Commander in her mind. Someone who was ferocious and bloodthirsty, selfish and arrogant.

Certainly not the same person she was looking at now.

"Not at all, Your Excellency," Quorin replied. "The guild is honored that you can be with us. The results are over here. We can announce it now." He snapped his fingers and a senior apprentice brought out a rolled-up scroll.

Backs straightened immediately and all eyes glued upon the all-important piece of paper that contained their fate.

The High Commander smiled. "Before we do that, I'd like to meet the candidates that the beiles nominated this year," he said. "I've heard much about them. Lady Xana tells me that it would be the guild's loss to not accept her brother, but what would a woman know."

Arban immediately stepped forward, chest puffed up with pride. He turned and gave Ying, Chang-en, and An-xi a smug smirk.

"Bet he thinks he's a shoo-in now," Chang-en muttered as he walked toward the front of the hall together with the other two.

"Arban's a fool. He didn't even catch the undertones in what the High Commander said," An-xi said quietly.

Although Lady Xana was the High Commander's current favorite, everyone knew that the only woman who had some degree of sway was Lady Odval—Ye-kan's mother. It was naive of Arban to believe that his connection to the concubine would bring him any favor. If anything, the High Commander would be less inclined to promote him, for fear that it might strengthen whichever faction Lady Xana's clan was part of.

On her way forward, Ying did a quick search for Ye-kan, but she couldn't spot him anywhere in the crowd. He had probably found some excuse to sneak away, she figured, in case his father caught him here.

The four of them stood in a neat line in front of the raised platform, and only Ying dared not raise her gaze to look at the High Commander. She was an impostor, a fraud, and she felt like the High Commander's piercing gaze would rip her disguise apart. She glanced to the left instead and found Ye-yang looking her way.

He nodded, and the corners of his lips tipped upward ever so slightly.

The dream that Ying had forgotten suddenly revealed itself. His steady heartbeat, the warmth of his chest, the sound of his voice—all of it flooded back into her mind and as she stood there staring at him, the boundaries between dream and reality blurred. Her cheeks burned. She looked away, her heart pounding in her chest.

Chang-en's elbow suddenly jabbed her in the side, jolting her back to the present.

"The High Commander asked you a question," he hissed.

Ying's neck snapped upward, looking toward the man seated on the platform. He was watching her—studying her—the way a snake would carefully size up every element in its surroundings.

In that moment, the High Commander reminded Ying of the cobra she had seen emblazoned on all the airships, banners, and uniforms that belonged to the Cobra's Order.

Back in her childhood when she had been running amok across the Huarin grasslands, she had come across a python circling around one of her rabbit traps. The trap had snared one fluffy victim that Ying had wanted to bring home for Nian as a pet. She squatted some distance away, observing the snake with fascination as it continued making its rounds. Snakes were rare in the nine isles. They didn't fare so well with the cold. The python continued to slither aimlessly, its forked tongue darting in and out of its mouth as it went along.

After a while, Ying tired of the snake's repetitive motion and decided to move on to check some of her other traps instead. She had only just turned away when a low hiss wafted into her ears. She swiveled back. The rabbit that had been whimpering in the trap was gone, with only a bleeding stump remaining—remnants of the foot that had been trapped by the jaws of Ying's bamboo contraption. The rest of that rabbit sat within the belly of the python, who was now staring at Ying with its frightful yellow eyes and slit-like pupils. It spat out its tongue in a victorious hiss, then quickly slithered away through the dense grass.

"Aihui Min," Gerel barked, "what are you doing? Answer the High Commander!"

"He asked why you wrote about airship modifications in your essay," Chang-en added, seeing the dazed look on Ying's face.

Airship modifications? Wait, the High Commander actually read her work?

"Oh, umm, the"—Ying stammered, trying to gather her senses—"the question asked us to discuss the introduction and evolution of the airship, so I took that to include the future possible iterations as well." She clenched and unfurled her clammy palms over and over. "I only made a few suggestions…"

"That was not part of the question requirements," Gerel said. "Your essay veered completely off topic."

"Let's not be too hasty, Master Gerel," the High Commander said.

The sneer on Gerel's face immediately gave way, and his face turned an ugly shade of ash gray. He gulped, taking a step back, as if that would help him fade into the background.

The High Commander was watching Ying with a glint in his eyes, a slight smile toying at the edges of his lips. "Aihui Min, am I right?" he said. "Grand Master Quorin graciously allowed me to take a look through all the scripts submitted by the candidates. Yours I found quite interesting.

"You're absolutely right," the High Commander continued. "The development of the Antaran airship is far from complete. On the contrary, we are still lagging far behind. The Empire"—he paused, his index finger tapping thoughtfully on the chair's handle—"has acquired some new embellishments to their airship fleet, bought from the emerald-eyed mercenaries beyond the eastern seas. Ideas like yours are what we need in the Engineers Guild right now. Tell me, how did you come up with those ideas? Was your work inspired by anyone in particular?"

"By my father, Your Excellency," Ying admitted. "He was an engineer too."

"Yes, yes." The High Commander lowered his gaze toward the bronze warmer on his lap, thoughtful. "Shan-jin was very talented, much more than most. His contributions toward Antaran engineering, toward the development of our airships, are no trifling matter. It is not surprising that you draw inspiration from him."

Ying carefully observed the wistful expression on the High Commander's face, listened to the solemn words leaving his lips, and pride welled up inside her like a burgeoning spring.

"Quorin," the High Commander said, turning toward the grand master, "it seems to me that Number Eight has sent someone with great potential to you. I'm quite looking forward to seeing how this trial proceeds."

The grand master subtly gestured at the apprentice who was holding the scroll, and the latter scurried off. "Indeed," he said, a self-effacing smile stretching across his wrinkled skin. "The guild is always happy to welcome new talent."

Out of the corner of her eye, Ying could see the colorful changes in the expressions of the beiles and their representatives. Chang-en immediately nudged her, a cheeky grin spreading across his face. Arban's lips were set in a hard line, his face reddened with the indignation of being completely overlooked. The second beile, Erden, kept his emotions more tightly guarded; only the twitching of his meaty jaw betrayed his resentment. An-xi's face had gone white as a sheet, nostrils flaring as he tried to keep his own ego in check. In contrast, the sleepy-eyed third beile simply wore a mild smile and reached out to pat Ye-yang encouragingly on the shoulder. What that smile really meant, Ying didn't know. As for the first beile, he gave Ye-yang a curt nod of acknowledgment, but that was all. Throughout the entire exchange he had remained indifferent, his face like an unreadable slab of stone.

Ying suddenly remembered the eldest prince, who would be slaving for the rest of his pitiful life in the Juwan mines. She took another look at the four beiles, each with their own strengths and characters, standing proudly before the High Commander. One of these four men would be named the successor to the Aogiya High Command and be the next ruler of the nine Antaran isles. But who would it be?

A thought crept into her mind. Could any one of them have been involved in her father's death? All were powerful enough to command scores of trained assassins and vicious chimeras. Even Ye-yang.

While Ying pondered the succession of the Aogiya ruling family, the senior apprentice who had been sent off returned bearing the scroll.

Quorin cleared his throat. "Without further ado, we will release the results of yesterday's test. If your candidate number and clan name is not on the list, it means you have failed the test and must pack your things immediately. Lessons for the second stage of the trial begin tomorrow."

The apprentice promptly hung the scroll onto a wooden frame and undid the string to unfurl the long stretch of parchment. There was a sudden forward surge as the apprentice hopefuls jostled to get a better look at the names on the list.

Already standing at the front, Ying skimmed through the list starting from the top. The masters had ranked the candidates based on performance. The name at the top of the pile was Niohuru An-xi. No surprise there. She heard An-xi exhale deeply beside her. The tension in his shoulders visibly lessened.

Arban was in second place, with Chang-en ranking within the top ten. As for her…Right at the bottom of the list, squeezed uncomfortably into the narrow sliver of white space between the fortieth name and the edge of the parchment, were the characters "Aihui Min." The brushstrokes used to fill in her name weren't even the same as that of the other forty qualifying candidates.

"I made it," she murmured. She reached out and grabbed Chang-en by the arm. "I made it," she repeated, a little louder this time.

It didn't matter that the characters of her name were half the height of everyone else's and barely legible, squeezed in because of the intervention of the High Commander, nor that Master Gerel was now glaring at her with poison oozing from his eyes. She—Aihui Ying—had made it through to the next round by the skin of her neck.

"The Engineers Guild has always been a vital pillar supporting the High Command. I expect great things from all of you," the High Commander's resonant voice rang out across the hall. Then, he looked directly at Ying, a thoughtful twinkle in his slate-gray eyes. "I'm sure you won't disappoint me."

He had addressed his words to everyone present, yet Ying felt like he was speaking only to her. She was like the rabbit—being studied, observed, curiously contemplated by the python.

Everyone echoed a chorus of assent, and the High Commander threw his head back and laughed, seemingly pleased by the response. He got up from his seat and turned to Quorin. "There must be many important things in the guild that need looking into. I shall not impose any further." He walked briskly down the steps of the platform and paused in front of his sons and nephew. "The four of you, come with me. There are some things we have to discuss."

The High Commander and four beiles promptly left the hall, with Grand Master Quorin and the other guild masters trailing behind like the obedient servants they were. Once they were out of earshot, the entire hall erupted in a rowdy outburst.

The first person to say anything to Ying was Arban. "Aihui Min," he called out, walking up to her with a smile on his tanned face. He reached out to place one fleshy palm on her left shoulder, but Ying quickly stepped aside to avoid it, acutely wary of any sort of physical contact with the other candidates.

"Congratulations," Arban said. "Looks like you scraped through. You should thank your lucky stars that the High Commander showed up today, else you'd be like those pathetic losers over there." He jerked his thumb toward a group of dejected boys who were being comforted by their peers.

"But the first beile did say that the four of us would be guaranteed passage to the next stage," Chang-en said, scratching at his chin. "Surely the guild needs to give the beiles that bit of respect?"

"Respect has limits. The guild can't be accepting a complete rice bucket just because a beile sent him in," An-xi chimed in. He was looking more like his smug and superior self. Gone was the downtrodden expression from the earlier disappointment at having been overlooked by the High Commander.

"As long as the High Commander doesn't think you're a rice bucket, who cares what the guild masters think?" Chang-en said. "Especially this year, since the High Commander himself will be presiding over the final test. His is the only opinion that matters, eh?"

Ying shook her head. Chang-en was trying to prod An-xi. He was doing a marvelous job of it, judging from An-xi's look of loathing. Chang-en was entitled to his fun, but she wished he would leave her out of it.

The High Commander's sudden appearance had turned the tables for her. As Ye-yang had anticipated, the guild masters wanted to expel her from the trial—and they had almost succeeded, with help from her unconventional essay. She had taken a gamble. Luckily for her it had paid off, but things had not gotten any better for her in the guild.

Her journey ahead would be even harder than it already was—assuming the assassin didn't get to her first.