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"Y ou look like shit," Mireen observes helpfully as we trudge down to Mirror Lake in the predawn chill. Over my shoulder, I see Confluence Academy's four elemental towers punching through a cloud of mist.

My heart sinks like a stone in deep water. Part of me wonders if this will be my last time seeing the academy—if I'll die out here in these murky depths.

We walk with the other water offerings in our best attempt at "swimwear." Since they don't provide us with anything except uniforms and underwear, most of us have simply stripped down to nearly nothing. Some of the guys have just removed their tops and wear the long white slacks we’re given for bottoms.

Weeks of hard training and being fed well is already shaping us into something new. Muscles ripple where they didn't before and stores of fat have melted away, long since burned for energy or survival.

"I look like shit? Thanks," I mutter, stifling another yawn. After Raith's warning, sleep had been impossible. I'd spent half the night trying to decode more of the unbound book, searching for anything that might help me survive whatever waited in the lake. I'd even foolishly crept out of the room and looked for him at the wall, but I haven't seen him again since that first night. When I finally did lie down to sleep, the nightmares came more vividly than ever before.

Worse, when I did finally drift to sleep, Mireen’s “pets” managed to wake me several times. Her single rat has either multiplied or told friends about easy access to food. Our room is now shared by several chittering, scurrying little rats who sometimes climb my bed to sniff my face in my sleep.

Mireen calls it cute. I call it difficult to sleep through.

The eastern sky is just beginning to lighten as we reach the lakeshore, where Primal Sestra waits with several other instructors and groups of older students in black uniforms, either trimmed in aspirant silver or the silver and gold marking them as legacies. Behind them, the lake stretches like black glass, mist curling across its surface in ghostly patterns.

The remaining first-year water offerings gather in nervous clusters, their breath fogging in the cold air. Malakai and his people cluster together, eyes hard and violent as they look at us. Shirtless, I can see just how terrifyingly racked with muscle and power his body is. He looks like he could punch a hole straight through stone, and I know he’s no slouch when it comes to channeling, either.

A ball of worry and anger forms in my chest at his attention. Half of me wants to lift my middle finger and the other half wants to shrink away in fear.

"Waters," Sestra's voice carries across the shore without effort. "Today you face the element that calls to you. Those who pass will continue their journey toward Confluence Day. Those who fail..." She leaves the sentence unfinished, but we all know what failure means here.

"The trial is simple," she continues. "I have placed elemental echoes at varying depths throughout the lake. Each of you must retrieve at least one echo to pass. There are enough echoes for all of you, but some will be harder to find than others."

She gestures, and an aide brings forward a shallow bowl filled with what looks like clear marbles. "These are minor water echoes—impressions left by water elementals. Finding one will require you to sense its resonance with your own affinity. Channeling will be necessary both to locate them and to survive the depths."

At this, my stomach drops like I've swallowed a handful of stones.

Channel to survive the depths. Channel to find the echoes.

Of course.

Am I going to have any chance of this when I'm not a real water affinity?

Maybe. Being submerged in water will give me a unique advantage here. I’ll be surrounded by a nearly unlimited supply of water essence. For once, I might actually be positioned to excel at something.

"Instructors and third-years will take you to various locations around the lake. On their signal, you will enter the waters and begin the trial. You will have until sunset."

"Please tell me that brilliant brain of yours has a plan," Mireen whispers, her teeth chattering as she eyes the black water.

I stare at the mist curling off the lake's surface. "Get in, grab the first echo I find, get out before anything eats me."

She bumps her shoulder against mine. "Simple. Elegant. Probably won't work. See you on the other side anyway."

We're separated and led to various points around the lake. I'm not happy to see a third-year with a dangerous glint in her eye is the one leading me. I'm reminded of Raith's warning. Malakai has friends in the upper years. Friends who told him where certain people will be entering the lake. For all I know, he’ll be making a line directly for me as soon as the trial begins.

But I can't hide forever.

Staying scared is only going to mean staying weak. And I'm fucking tired of being scared.

So if he wants to come hunting for me during the trial? Let him.

Let Malakai think he's going to ambush me. Let him think he'll have the advantage if he finds me.

My body feels electric with newfound resolve. Davrin couldn’t handle me two days ago during challenge matches. Let’s see Malakai do better.

They're brave thoughts from a shivering, half-naked girl pretending to be a water affinity—a girl whose knowledge about her affinity is coming a few paragraphs a night from an old book.

"Go," the third-year says from behind me. I don't miss the half smile she wears. Why the hells does a third-year want to help first-year waters kill one another?

It makes me wonder if there's actually something more to Malakai's murderous intent. What if it's not just simple bloodthirst or ambition? What if there's some other angle I'm not seeing?

But now is hardly the time to dwell on mysteries.

I wade through the slimy shallows of the lake, my breath fleeing the moment the icy water touches my bare skin. Goosebumps erupt across my body, but I force myself to keep walking deeper, feet slipping on submerged rocks slick with algae.

Eventually, I'm deep enough to swim and submerge myself beneath the waters. We've trained with Sestra to form bubbles of air around our mouths beneath the water.

Before now, I've never succeeded. This knowledge wasn't exactly helping me sleep once Raith told me about the trial. I decided I could, at worst, swim on the surface and just hold my breath as much as possible.

I fumble in the freezing cold and dark waters for several minutes, bobbing to the surface to gulp air and then diving down again as I try to draw water and air together to make a bubble around my mouth.

It's slow work, but I eventually succeed.

Sort of.

Instead of a small bubble around my mouth and nose, I end up creating a huge one around my entire head. It stretches and threatens to break if I swim too fast, but it provides me with air and a surprisingly clear view of the lake's depths.

I see vegetation rising from below, swaying eerily in unseen currents. If I squint, I think I even see a few distant dark shapes moving through the water. Other students, maybe?

I glance behind my back, suddenly sure I'll see Malakai himself coming at me. But it's just more water and more vegetation.

With the bubble in place, I find my thoughts drifting to Beck and Ambrose's stupid story about some kind of sea monster as I swim.

It would be easier to dismiss if their stories and this lake didn't seem to match what I've been seeing in my nightmares for weeks.

Pushing it all from my mind, I focus on the task at hand. I need to find an echo to pass the trial, and I need to pass the trial to make it to Confluence Day.

So how the hell am I going to do that?

According to the book, the unbound can sense the elements differently—not by creating, but by feeling what already exists. I let myself sink slightly, trailing my fingers through the water, trying to sense... something.

At first, there's nothing. Just cold, dark water. Then, gradually, I become aware of currents—little eddies and flows that seem to carry whispers of... intention? Memory? I can't quite grasp it, but I know it's there.

I dive deeper, following one such current. The light fades quickly, leaving me in greenish twilight. My ears pop and pressure builds around me, but I push on, drawn by something I can't name.

There—a flicker of blue light perhaps twenty feet below. An echo?

I swim toward it, my head feeling like it might cave in as the pressure continues to mount.

Once I'm closer, I can see it's indeed one of the marble-like echoes, nestled in a crevice between rocks. I reach for it, fingertips closing around the smooth sphere.

I sense something coming toward me.

I swirl so fast the bubble around my head nearly pops. And then I see him. Malakai is swimming toward me with a bubble around his eyes, nose, and mouth and a shifting, shimmering kind of water dagger in one hand.

Panic clutches at me, threatening to keep me stuck in place—motionless and helpless.

And then he’s on me.

I kick off the ground, dodging his first stab in what feels like slow motion. He comes again, and I see he's moving faster than he should be able to—using the water to propel himself, somehow.

I barely twist out of the way of another attack as his big body flows past, yanking me to the side with the force of his movement.

A cold reality settles over me.

Do something, or you're going to die down here.

Malakai turns, dagger in his hand as his muscular body ripples in the dark depths of the water. Something about the muffled silence of fighting for my life beneath the water—with nothing but my ragged breath echoing within my own bubble—feels wrong. Claustrophobic.

I reach into the water, struggling to even think of what I would do with my powers if I had complete command. Form a weapon of my own? Try to push him down with heavy currents? Pop his bubbles?

Before I can even start to try, he's on me again, rushing through the water like a human arrow, dagger extended toward me.

I jerk to the side, but I'm not fast enough this time. The cold bite of his weapon shocks me, pain exploding through my nerves like lightning, my screams piercing inside the solitude of my air bubble.

He stabbed me in the left shoulder. Blood so dark it almost looks black clouds out from the wound, gushing from between my clasping fingers.

Distantly, I sense something else in the water with us. Another student, maybe? Or are more of his soldiers on their way to take turns stabbing me?

No. I'm not going to die like this. Not this easily.

I don't think. I let instinct take over. My mind reaches into the water until I feel like I can make it move at my command. Using an invisible tendril of lake water, I press in on Malakai's face, watching with satisfaction as his eyes open wide and the bubbles providing him air smear and pop, scattering into thousands of tiny bubbles that rush upward.

While he's distracted, I kick toward the echo I dropped, scoop it up, and then realize my situation has gone from bad to worse.

I see three shapes coming from behind Malakai, soldiers of his, by my guess. All three are holding magical weapons.

But there's something else. Something much more dangerous.

It wasn't them I sensed in the waters. The thing I sensed is far, far larger than them. And it's moving fast. At first, I think a cloud is passing over the lake far ahead that casts a deep shadow behind the three approaching student soldiers. But then it twists and moves in a way that shadows don't.

Two deep blue eyes suddenly appear behind the three figures, and the eyes make sudden sense of the shadow. It's a serpent with massive wings, and it's coiled and waiting behind the three students, its massive mouth opening slowly.

Malakai manages to get his bubbles back in place over his face. He looks triumphant for a moment, and then he must see the look on my face.

He turns, and a cluster of bubbles bursts up from his head. A scream, I hope.

Maybe I'm about to die, but at least I got the chance to see Malakai become so scared he screamed and broke his spell.

My smile fades when the creature—which looks like it's at least seventy or eighty feet long with wings at least that wide—explodes forward. The first student disappears, seemingly swallowed by the massive shadow of the beast.

It slithers out of view, leaving only a dark stain slowly spreading in the otherwise deep blue water. The other two students turn, see the blood, and begin frantically swimming for the surface.

Malakai turns from them and comes toward me, knife still raised.

Is he serious? Killing me is still his fucking priority?

Even as I see the shadow rush up from the depths again and aim for one of the remaining two student soldiers, I turn my attention to Malakai. I grip the water again with a power that feels like it's already running thin. I form a rope of thickened water and wrap it around his ankle, anchoring him to the ground.

I flinch as he flies toward me, then watch with surprise as the rope of water actually holds. He's jerked back just inches before he reaches me with his knife.

I make the rope extend, wrapping it around his legs and ankles, squeezing them together and pulling him down until he's stuck on the lake's floor.

My ragged breaths and my pounding heart roar inside the bubble of air I'm channeling around my head.

There's only one of Malakai’s allies left, and they've almost reached the lake's surface. I see them pass through a shaft of sunlight, temporarily revealing enough detail to make out it's a girl swimming in the white offering underwear. Whatever weapon she had is long since dismissed as she focuses on escape.

And then I see the creature swirl and twist up from the darkness below. Its body is elegant and lethal—sinuous lines covered in thick scales that catch the sunlight in glittering patterns. The navy blue serpent keeps its wings tucked tight to its side as it gives a swish of its long, finned tail. It explodes upward, jaws snapping shut around the girl just before the beast's momentum carries it above the lake's surface.

For a moment, it's completely gone, leaving only the disturbed ripples of water from its ascent.

And then it crashes back down, those deep blue eyes pointed straight for Malakai as it pumps its tail, rocketing toward him.

Fuck.

I see him struggling to escape, but he can't. He's still anchored by the magical rope of water I'm channeling.

Maybe he's screwed either way—maybe we both are—but I don't want to be part of his death. Maybe he deserves to die, but I'm not going to stain myself by being the one to do it. I don't have time to think about whether that's the right or wrong decision.

I release the spell, and even from twenty feet up, I can see the relief and confusion in Malakai's face.

I wince, eyes closed because I don't want to see the beast eat him. I wait three heartbeats, then I can't keep them closed anymore. I open my eyes and scream.

Two blue eyes, each the size of dinner plates, hover directly in front of me. White steam curls from reptilian nostrils and rows of teeth like blue crystals are slowly revealed as it opens a mouth large enough to swallow me whole.

Behind the dragon-like head, its serpentine body drifts back, so long that the finned tail is shrouded in shadow. Dread creeps into my bones as I see dark wings spreading slowly in the waters. The sheer size of the monster settles on me, making the blood drain from my head until I think I might pass out.

It’s huge.

Ancient.

Fucking impossible.

To lose consciousness would be a mercy. There's no surviving this thing.

It has to be an elemental, but something so huge and powerful defies all explanation.

It twists suddenly, curling in on itself as Malakai stabs it from below. A small burst of blue blood drifts from the wound as it turns to look at its attacker. With a movement I can only describe as dismissive, it slaps its tail through the water, slamming into Malakai so hard his air bubbles explode again and his body goes limp to float in the water.

It turns its attention back to me.

I can't say what the hell I'm thinking, but I know there's no point in attacking it. And it's close enough to touch, so I reach a hand out and place it on the beast's snout, even as my lungs burn for air.

As soon as I touch it, I feel a rush of power, but it's nothing like when I touched Raith or Bastian or anyone else. This power feels… dirty. Messy. Chaotic.

It surges into me almost greedily, filling me like a waterskin until the pressure seems like it might burst me from the inside.

My body becomes a lightning rod in a storm, every nerve ending screaming as the raw, untamed energy floods through me. I think I scream, but I lose all sense of time as the energy floods me. The only thing I remember is a faint, ethereal voice and the sensation of being lifted.

"Thank you, unbound. If you see me during Confluence Day, you must run. I can't keep it from hurting you. So run."

I blink several times, frown in confusion, and then wonder why I'm not dead. I can sense that time has passed. Seconds or minutes, I’m not sure. But I must have lost consciousness.

I cough, spitting up water and wincing at the memory of my shoulder. I was stabbed.

I sit up, and shout in fear.

Malakai is lying beside me on a rectangle of magical water. The rectangle is keeping us above the water and slowly drifting toward shore, where I see students climbing from the water with glowing echoes in hand. I spot some other affinities and first-years waiting on the shore as well.

I touch the place where Malakai stabbed me and feel only smooth skin. When I look at my bare shoulder, I see a magical blue mark like a scar, but oddly beautiful.

What the hell happened?

I try to remember. I saw Malakai's allies being eaten. I let Malakai go so he would have some chance of escape, but then the creature was right in front of me. And then… it spoke to me.

So it was an elemental, then. But gods. It must have been a truly ancient elemental to take a form so large and powerful. And it must have healed me and put us on this water platform.

It… saved us? But why would it save us and then warn me to run if I saw it on Confluence Day?

Malakai coughs and sits up, his muscular body already showing hints of an ugly purple bruise forming from his armpit to his hip. He sees me and his eyes harden.

I hold my palms up, then realize I'm still holding an echo.

His eyes fall to it, too. He doesn't have an echo.

"I could have let you die back there," I say, scooting back on the platform and reaching for water essence. But I find I’m completely exhausted. The power slips through my fingers like sand.

Malakai's features harden. "You should have let me die."

"Malakai… come on," I say, scooting back more, though there's not much room to escape on the small magical rectangle of water. "For once, just be a decent human being."

He snorts through his nose. "You've got no gods damned idea what kind of human being I am. Keep the echo. And don’t think this changes a fucking thing between us, Thorne." Without another word, he pushes off the water platform and disappears beneath the depths of the lake.

I let out a long breath and collapse, body shivering as I clutch the pearl-like echo as if my life depends on it.

Alive. I'm alive, and with any luck, my friends will be too when the trial is over.

For the first time in weeks, I think maybe we actually have a chance of making it to Confluence Day. I showed down there I'm finally getting some grasp of my powers.

No. More than some. I fought Malakai off by myself. I survived coming face to face with whatever that thing was.

I lay on my back, eyes closed as the sun warms my nearly-frozen body. A small smile spreads across my lips.

I can do this. It's never going to be easy. It's never going to be pretty. But I can fucking do this.