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I NSIDE THE CAVERNOUS GRAND ATRIUM STOOD A RECONSTRUCTION of an Augurest temple, hewn from pale stone and surrounded by red-leafed trees.

Augurest temples were shaped like an open eye: two curved outer walls sharpening into points where they met, with a domed purple roof.

Inside was a winding spiral of a corridor, like an iris, leading into the central worship chamber—the pupil.

They were designed to honor the prophetic power of the Five Augurs but were famously a hostage liability.

Once intruders entered the spiral corridor, the worshippers in the central chamber became trapped.

Sure enough, this looked like a re-creation of a hostage situation. Two burly men flanked the arched entrance, wearing long scarlet robes with the moon phases embroidered in black and gold, the unmistakable ruby pins at their throats.

Bloodmoons.

Everything in Saffron bristled at the sight of them. Even though she knew these men were just Silvercloaks playing dress-up, even though she knew this wasn’t real, her body rose to the threat like the hairs on a fallowwolf’s scruff standing on end.

All at once she was six years old again, watching the murder of her parents through a narrow golden keyhole. The charred flesh, the reek of ash and honey. The slump of her father’s body as it hit the ground. The surge of raw horror in her chest.

Instead of shaking it off, she leaned into the pain of the memory. She could either suppress it, or she could use it, and she’d already come this far with the latter.

The cadets crossed the Grand Atrium’s threshold as a unit, and Sebran’s pine wand soared into Vertillon’s outstretched hand. Nissa cupped her palm to her ear, receiving her alternative information.

Saffron’s leg, of course, did not freeze as it should. But she was used to pretending.

She altered her gait, dragging her left foot behind her like a corpse.

“Welcome, candidates,” boomed Captain Aspar, their commanding officer, though she was nowhere to be seen.

The room’s acoustics had been enchanted to amplify the voices inside it, and her words tremored, slightly distorted.

“In the worship chamber, there are twelve hostages. The temple has been taken by an unknown number of Bloodmoons. You are to rescue the hostages with as few casualties as possible. As always, no killing spells—use effigias to turn your foes into statues, to represent death, but only when strictly necessary. The best cohort in the Academy’s history retrieved all twelve hostages while taking every Bloodmoon alive.

That is the standard you should be aiming for. Good luck.”

The six cadets all turned to stare at one another.

“Taking every Bloodmoon alive?” muttered Nissa, dropping her hand from her ear. “Why would that be a priority?”

“Intelligence,” replied Gaian. “You know, the reason we’re here.”

“And so that innocent hostages aren’t murdered in retribution.

” Auria’s voice was hollow, echoey—their voices too were amplified by the room’s enchanted acoustics.

She tucked a lock of frizzy ginger hair behind her pale ear.

“At first glance, I think this is a reconstruction of the Temple of Augur Amuilly, in the apothecary district. It was built roughly seven hundred years ago, meaning its walls are approximately forty-eight inches thick, and it won’t have an escape tunnel, like some of the newer temples. Could you burrow one, Nissa?”

“I’m not a fucking mole, ” Nissa seethed.

A frown notched between Auria’s brows. “No, but Wielders can manipulate earth. I don’t know why you have to be so—”

“Not sure that’s the best solution.” Peacemaking Tiernan scratched his head, looking up at the glittering purple dome.

“My father always impressed on me the importance of community relations. What if we accidentally damage the temple? What if we burrow too hard or deep and destroy its foundations? If the whole thing crumbles to the ground, not only have we killed the hostages, but we’ve also decimated the Silvercloaks’ reputation amongst the Augurest community. ”

Nissa rolled her eyes. “Fuck the community.”

Gaian smirked. “You know, it’s never clear what you’re arguing for or against.”

“Maybe I just like arguing.” Nissa’s fingers twitched to her lips, as though smoking a phantom achullah.

Saffron swallowed hard and looked away, trying desperately hard not to remember how their naked bodies felt intertwined, Saff’s soft edges pressing against Nissa’s hard planes, candle wax dripping over her bare hip—that tantalizing line between pain and pleasure, where the finest magic bloomed.

“What information were you given?” Auria asked Nissa.

Nissa paused for a second. “I’m not sure I should share.”

Auria clenched her fist around her slim wand. She and Nissa clashed so often that Gaian had started a tally.

“Let’s think about how we’d take this building from a military perspective,” said Sebran.

He’d served in the Vallish infantry before enrolling in the Silvercloak Academy.

“There are two Bloodmoons manning the entrance, and likely at least two in the central chamber guarding the hostages. Another four or five spaced out in the spiral corridor to block our way.” He tapped his bottom lip with his forefinger.

“Nissa’s wind could provide a lethal weapon when combined with effigias.

Take out all the Bloodmoons in the tunnel in one fell swoop. ”

“We’re not supposed to kill the Bloodmoons,” Auria said, with the air of a parent trying not to lose patience with an unruly child. “We need to think about this as sorcerers, not soldiers. What spells could we use to extract the hostages without ever encountering the Bloodmoons?”

“What are you going to do, roll your little vials through the spiral corridor for them to sip at?” Nissa laughed, but not kindly.

She had a point. There were no windows into the central chamber—it was sealed off from the outside world. How could they cast spells with any kind of precision when they couldn’t see the targets? Magic was far more directional than that.

“We could take invisibility elixirs,” Auria suggested. “They’d help us sneak in and disarm the Bloodmoons.”

“Use your head,” Sebran replied, irritated. “The guards would see the front doors open. And even if we weren’t instantly killed, the odds of us accidentally firing curses at one another …”

As the cohort bickered, Saffron’s mind spun like a roulette wheel.

She always did this, thought while others spoke, weighed every word or action carefully before committing to it.

Because Saints knew what happened when you didn’t think it all the way through.

When you turned a doorknob a quarter of an inch, and your parents were slaughtered between one heartbeat and the next.

In any case, they were all thinking about it the wrong way. Shallowly, one-dimensionally. Putting too much weight on the solution without giving the problem its due diligence.

Forgetting one very simple question: Why?

Interrupting Sebran’s rant about the acceptable number of civilian casualties being higher than zero, Saff said, “Look, why would the Bloodmoons hold up an Augurest temple in the first place? Don’t we need to understand their motives first?”

“We’re not fucking diplomats,” said Nissa, golden eyes boring intensely into Saff, a stare that carried an almost physical heat. There was a rumor that Nissa’s grandmother was a dragon, but Saff couldn’t quite wrap her head around the logistics.

“Auria, could there be anything of great value in Augur Amuilly’s temple?” Saff asked. “Something worth this level of Bloodmoon manpower?”

Auria pursed her lips. “Some of the older worship chambers contain relic wands from the era of the Five Augurs. Not the wands belonging to the Augurs themselves, but from other Foreseers in that time period. Followers believe these relics still contain old power, and that in the right hands, they could be used to cast new prophecies.”

Saff nodded intensely. “So maybe we focus on extracting the relic, not the hostages. Draw the Bloodmoons away from the innocent people they have no real interest in.”

“I like that idea.” Auria’s blue eyes crinkled. “But the relics would likely be in underground vaults. If they were in plain sight maybe we’d be able to levitate them out, but …”

“This is ludicrous.” Sebran shook his head in disgust. “You’re intentionally misinterpreting the assignment.

Following orders is critical in a hierarchal institution.

The captain told us to extract the hostages—not a relic that might be completely irrelevant, that might not even exist .

” He projected his voice a little more clearly than usual, as though he wanted the higher-ups to hear.

“Would you like me to fetch a straw, Sebran?” Saff asked earnestly.

Sebran frowned. “Why?”

“For all your sucking up.”

“ Sen effigias, ” came a sudden command from beside Saff. Then again, “ Sen effigias .”

In a burst of impatience, Nissa had struck the two guards flanking the entrance.

They stood still as statues, their bodies turned to ash-gray stone.

For the purposes of this exercise, they were dead.

“Shall we?” Nissa asked sweetly, starting toward the entrance, and Saff was knocked momentarily breathless by a surge of anger.

“What the hell?” hissed Auria.

Nissa turned on her heel, exposing the vertical column of runes tattooed up the side of her neck. “There’s only one way into the temple, and they were guarding it. We’d have had to do it at some point.”

“No, the captain said it was possible to complete the task with all Bloodmoons and hostages taken alive.” Auria’s cheeks were pink with rage.

“I can think of countless enchantments we could’ve used to get past them.

Exarman, to disarm. Vertigloran to make them dizzy and disoriented.

You didn’t need to ruin the assessment before we even—”

“I’m going to make a wind tunnel,” Nissa interrupted. “Who’s coming?”