The glyph's echo still rang in my bones as I stepped out of the ring. No applause. No ceremony. Just silence.
But I wasn't led away like Arlen had been. A warden bowed his head slightly as I passed — not in respect, but in recognition. Of what, I wasn't sure. Power, maybe. Or danger.
I stood in the shadows near the far wall, still dazed, as the next name was called.
"Initiate Sylva Dorn."
A girl stepped forward — tall, russet-haired, with a long scar running from her jaw to the base of her throat. She wore no jewellery, no house sigil. Her boots were scuffed, and there was something feral in the way she moved, like she'd learned to fight before she could read.
We locked eyes for a moment. She looked at me like she recognized something. And with one small smile she entered the ring.
Her glyphs were not as many as mine — seven, the traditional number — but they flared brighter than any before. An emblem shaped like a hawk descending through clouds.
She didn't hesitate. Chose one. Stepped into it like stepping into her own name.
The circle lit up with a clean, piercing blue light.
Magic flared to life, sharp and cold, and then settled into her skin like it belonged there.
No outburst. No cracks in the stone. But every scribe watched her closely. Another chosen.
Sylva didn't stumble when she left the circle. She moved to the wall where I stood and leaned beside me like we'd done this together.
She didn't say thank you. Or congratulations. Instead, she muttered, "What the hell was that with you?"
I blinked at her. "I was about to ask you the same thing."
She shrugged and we both fell into a comfortable silence as the trial continued
We were given a quarter hour to recover before the wardens herded us toward the dormitory wings. The others shuffled in silence, muttering or glancing over shoulders like the very stone might judge them.
Sylva fell into step beside me again, chewing absently on the edge of her glove.
"Still buzzing?" she asked. I gave a half-smile. "Still breathing."
"Barely."
We reached the fork in the hall, north to the Scriptorium, east to the dorms and ducked into the stone-walled passage where the lanterns burned low. The air smelled of ink and metal and some kind of bitter root.
"You're not from the Vale," she said suddenly. I glanced at her. "That obvious?"
"Accent's softer," she shrugged. "And you don't walk like you've always belonged here."
"I haven't."
Sylva studied me for a moment. "So, why come?"
I didn't answer right away. How could I explain a burned doorframe and a mother's shadow pressed into scorched stone? How could I explain the hunger for answers that ink couldn't satisfy?
"It was… time," I said quietly. "To stop hiding. To see what she left behind."
"Your mother?"
I nodded.
"You think she was one of them?" Sylva asked, voice low. "The scribes?"
"No." I swallowed. "Something older." She whistled under her breath. "Well. That's charmingly cryptic."
I glanced at her, curious. "And you?"
"What?"
"Why are you here?"
She didn't answer immediately either.
"Same reason anyone comes. To be more than what I was."
"And what were you?"
A beat. Her eyes flicked to mine. "Hunger"
It wasn't dramatic. It wasn't even bitter. Just fact. We walked the rest of the way in silence. But not the kind that hurt.
The kind that lingered — like an unspoken pact between two girls who'd passed through fire and come out branded, but standing.
The hall of the initiates' dormitory was carved from pale stone outlined with silver — quieter than I expected. No chatter, no footsteps, just the gentle hum of glyphlight pulsing in the sconces overhead.
We reached the door labelled "East-Quill-5." Our room.
Sylva pushed it open first. "Hope you don't snore."
"I don't sleep," I muttered, stepping in behind.
The room was narrow but tall, with two beds along opposite walls, a shared table, and a pair of ink-stained desks already stacked with parchment and rules etched in tiny cursive script. Someone had left a silver bowl of chalk beside the fire grate, along with two blankets and a cracked window that let the mountain wind in like a welcome ghost.
We were halfway through deciding which side we hated least when the door slammed open again.
"Room for one more? Please don't say no — I do terribly with rejection."
A boy stood in the doorway, arms loaded with scrolls, boots unlaced, and hair tousled like he'd wrestled his way through a windstorm of books and sarcasm. He wore the initiate's robes sideways. Sideways, somehow and a badge pinned on backwards.
Neither of us spoke.
He dropped his scrolls onto the desk nearest the window and flopped onto the bed with a dramatic sigh. "They put me in with the solemn types. Perfect."
Sylva raised a brow. "Who are you?"
"Lorian Valen. Glyph analyst. Occasional disappointment. Full-time delight." He grinned at both of us. "You two have that brooding-heroine energy I've read so much about. I approve."
"Third beds weren't mentioned," I said.
"They weren't. Don't worry. They had me slated for a west wing with a boy who literally lit his pillow on fire before his trial." He held up a slightly scorched corner of parchment as proof. "Thought this might be safer. Or at least less flammable."
Sylva crossed her arms. "What was your glyph?"
"Hmm? Oh, mine didn't glow." He waved a hand dismissively. "It sneezed. Coughed, really. I'm guessing that's a unique talent."
"You failed?"
He smirked. "I survived. Which around here seems to count for something." That almost bought a smile on my face.
Sylva didn't smile, exactly, but she rolled her eyes in a way that felt suspiciously like the start of tolerating him.
Lorian kicked off his boots, stretched, and pointed at the cracked ceiling. "Anyway, if any mysterious bloodlines, dangerous prophecies, or forbidden glyphs decide to show up tonight, kindly wait until morning. I bruise easily."