Page 6 of Silvercloak

“The final assessment is upon us,” he decreed, in his low baritone. “Though we can prepare for such events to the ends of the earth, we still must take into account the slippery element of chance. A wand snapped during a raid, a tincture belt shattered on the ground, compromising injuries, and conflicting information.”

He held up six cream-colored envelopes. “As such, you will each draw a different hand for this exercise. Three of you will have no disadvantages. One of you will lose your wand. One of you will have a limb temporarily frozen. And one of you will work on different information than your peers. Cards will be drawn in alphabetical order of surname.”

Vertillon fanned the envelopes in his weathered hands, then offered Sebran the first pick. Sebran pulled an envelope, opened it, and nodded woodenly. Tiernan drew next, then Saffron.

You have no disadvantages.

It wasn’t quite true—she had her own temperamental magic to contend with—but it was a relief nonetheless.

As Auria then Nissa drew the last two envelopes, Saff looked up at Tiernan, whose foot jittered uncontrollably. The sea-green tinge to his cheeks had only intensified. He’d clearly received a disadvantage.

And he was already terrified of letting his notoriously cruel father down.

Saffron would never forget their first week on the streetwatch. A vicious gang of thieves called the Whitewings had cut the tongues out of the mouths of several children who’d accidentally witnessed a robbery, then burned said tongues with magical fire so they could not be reattached. Saff, Tiernan, and Auria had been first on the scene, and Tiernan had spent the first twenty minutes vomiting into a gutter.

When word got back to Tiernan’s father about his son’s weak stomach, Kesven Flane had chained Tiernan to a chair and forced him to watch vivid reenactments of torture, animated with the kind of illusionary magic Saff used to hide her secret, every night for a month.Then Kesven had brought home an inebriated Ludder—a person born without magic—and sliced their tongue out for real, forcing Tiernan to practice healing it. Over and over and over again, until the Ludder blacked out from the pain and a small piece of Tiernan’s humanity died.

And now, during the final assessment, the last show of strength before jobs were assigned, Kesven would see his son weakened. An embarrassment to the family name, even though it was through random chance, no fault of his own. Kesven would not see it that way.

“Switch with me,” Saff whispered under her breath.

Tiernan twitched in her direction. “What?”

“Swap envelopes.”

After a split second of indecision—clearly trying to discern whether Saff was trying to pull one over on him—he slipped his envelope into her hand. She reciprocated. Professor Vertillon was none the wiser.

Saffron read her new fate.

Your leg will be frozen for the duration of the assessment.

“I have no disadvantages,” announced Auria.

“Me neither,” said Tiernan, shooting Saffron a grateful look.

“Nor me,” confirmed Gaian.

“No wand,” muttered Sebran. He rubbed at his cheek, as though checking he’d shaven well. “But I suppose I can keep these?” He patted his tincture belt, and Vertillon nodded confirmation.

“It’s a bit on-the-nose to give the foreigner false information,” muttered Nissa.

“Not false,” pointed out Saff. “The professor saiddifferent.”

“And besides, it was drawn at random, Nissa,” said Auria hotly. She took any criticism of the Academy personally, though she had no familial ties to it, just a fundamental reverence for the rules and the establishment. A future Grand Arbiter to her bones.

“What’s the information?” Gaian asked.

“Don’t know. I assume I’ll be given it during the exercise?” Nissa asked.

Vertillon nodded again. “Indeed. Sebran—I mean, Cadet Aduran—will have his wand removed as he passes the threshold of the GrandAtrium. At which point Cadet Killoran’s leg will also freeze.” He took a step to the side. “You may enter.”

“This is it,” whispered Auria, patting her tincture belt for the thousandth time, eyes glowing with anticipation. She wholly and genuinely believed everything was going to work out. Saff envied her that easy faith. The world hadn’t yet beaten it out of her.

Saffron checked her own belt. She was no Brewer, so it wasn’t notched with vials but instead with an array of weapons and equipment they always took with them on the streetwatch: ropes, manacles, a tourniquet, a baton. Matter could not be created from nothing, no matter how strong the mage, and so some things had to be analog. She also carried a rune-engraved blisblade notched in a leather holster—daggers unique to the Silvercloaks, enchanted so that even a shallow self-inflicted wound provided an enormous full-body ripple of pain-pleasure. A fast way to replenish the magical well in a pinch.

Not that it had ever worked for Saffron. Nor did velvine breath.

She had to seek pleasure the old-fashioned way.