All the while, her dah sat silently, puffing on a pipe smoldering with snakeroot. The tincture in the smoke helped with the crick and rasp of his joints. But she suspected his silence was less about tempering any pain than it was to allow her the time to fill the quiet with her complaints.

  She let out a sigh to announce the ending.

  Her dah sucked on his pipe and exhaled one long bitter breath of smoke. “Let me ken it better for you. You certainly tweaked the nose of the nonne who taught you this last quarter.”

  Nyx rubbed the bruise from Sister Reed’s bony fingers and nodded.

  “But you also impressed yourself upon the prioress of the entire school. Not a small feat, I imagine.”

  “She was being kindly at best. And I don’t think my clumsiness helped the situation. Especially breaking the school’s treasured orrery.”

  “No matter. What is broken can always be set aright. On the balance of it, I’d say you fared well for one morning. You’ll finish your seventhyear in another turn of the moon. Leaving only the eighthyear to go until the final culling to the ninth and highest tier. It seems, under such circumstances, earning the good graces of the prioress herself versus irking a single nonne—a sister who you’ll soon leave behind anyway—is not a bad trade.”

  His words helped further temper her misgivings. Maybe he was right. She had certainly endured far harsher obstacles to reach the seventh tier. And now I’m so close to the top. She shoved that hope down deep, fearing even wishing it might dash her chances.

  As if reading her thoughts, her dah underscored her luck. “Look where you started. A babe of six moons mewling atop a floating raft of fenweed. If not for your bellyaching, we wouldn’t aheard ya. Gramblebuck would have dragged my sledge right past ya.”

  She attempted to smile. The story of her being found abandoned in the bog was a point of joy to her dah. He had two strong sons—both in their third decade now, who managed the paddocks and ran the sledges—but the man’s wife had died giving birth to his only daughter, losing both at the same time. He took Nyx’s discovery in the swamps as some gift from the Mother, especially as there was no evidence of who had left the infant naked and crying in the bog. The spread of fenweed, a fragile and temperamental plant, exhibited no evidence of any treadfall around her body. Even the tender blooms that covered the floating mat’s surface showed no bruise to their petals. It was as if she had been dropped from the skies as a reward for the devout and hardworking swamper.

  Still, while this oft told story was a point of pride for her dah, for her it was laced with an uncomfortable mix of shame and anger. Her mother—maybe both her parents—had abandoned her in the swamps, surely left to die, perhaps because she had been born afflicted, the surfaces of her eyes glazed to a bluish white.

  “How I loved ya,” her dah said, admitting another truth. “Even if you hadn’t been picked to join the firstyears at the Cloistery. Though my heart just about burst when I heard you passed the test.”

  “It was an accident,” she muttered.

  He coughed out a gout of smoke. “Don’t say that. Nothing in life is simple chance. It was a sign the Mother still smiles on you.”

  Nyx didn’t believe as devoutly as him, but she knew better than to contradict him.

  At the time, she had been a housegirl at the school, assigned to washing and scrubbing. She had been mopping one of the testing wards when she tripped over a tumble of small blocks—some stone, others wooden—on the floor. Fearing they might be important, she gathered them up and set them atop a nearby table. But curiosity got the better of her. While neatly stacking them, she felt how different shapes fit against one another. It was how she experienced much of the world around her—then and now—through the sensitivity of her fingers. With no one around, she began fiddling with the blocks and lost track of the time, but eventually the ninescore of shapes built themselves into an intricate structure with crenellated towers and jagged walls that formed a six-pointed star around the castle in the center.

  Lost in her labors and concentrating fully on her work, she had failed to notice the gathering around her. Only when done did she straighten, earning gasps from her hidden audience.

  She remembered one nonne asking another, “How long has she been in here?”

  The answer: “I left when she came in with the mop and pail. That was less than one ring ago.”

  “She built the Highmount of Azantiia in such a short time. We give the aspirants an entire day to do the same. And most fail.”

  “I swear.”

  Someone had then grabbed her chin and turned her face. “And look at the blue cast to her eyes. She’s all but blind.”

  Afterward, she had been granted a spot among the firstyears, entering the Cloistery a year younger than anyone else. Only a handful of children from the village of Brayk had ever been granted entrance to the school, and none had climbed higher than the third tier. She secretly took pride in this accomplishment, but it was hard to maintain that satisfaction. As she climbed the tiers with the same shrinking class, the others never let her forget her lowly beginnings. They shamed her for the stink of the silage about her. They teased her for her lack of fine clothes and manners. And then there was her clouded vision, a wall of shadows that continually separated her from the others.

  Still, she found solace in her dah’s joy. To stoke that happiness, she kept steadfast in her studies. She also found pleasure in learning more about the world. It was like climbing out of the darkness of a root cellar and into a bright summer day. Shadows remained, mysteries yet to be revealed, but each year more of the darkness about the world lifted. The same curiosity with which she handled those blocks in the testing ward remained and grew with each tier gained.

  “You will make it to your ninthyear,” her dah said. “I know it in my bones.”

  She gathered his confidence into her heart and held it there. She would devote everything to make that happen.

  If nothing else, for him.

  Off in the distance, a ringing echoed from the heights of the Cloistery. It was the Summoning Bell. She had to be in her latterday studies before they rang again. She did not have much time.

  Her dah heard it, too. “Best you get going, lass.”

  She gained her feet by the hearth and reached to his hand, feeling the wiry muscles under thin skin, all wrapped around strong bones. She leaned and kissed him, finding his whiskered cheek as surely as a bee to a honeyclott.

  “I’ll see you again when I can,” she promised him, remembering she had sworn the same earlier to Gramblebuck. She intended to keep that promise to both.

  “Be good,” her dah said. “And remember the Mother is always looking out for you.”

  As she headed toward the door, she smiled at her dah’s undying faith in both her and the Mother Below. She prayed it was not misplaced—not with either of them.

  3

  SENSING THE PRESS of time, Nyx returned along the same path that brought her home. Only now she wielded her spare cane ahead of her, a worn staff from when she was years younger. Its length was nicked and pitted from long use. It was also slightly shorter in length than the newer one she had abandoned in the classroom. Still, it felt like a comfortable old friend in her hand. She swept it along ahead of her. Though she knew the path well, the cane’s assurance and weight helped steady her.

  She quickened her pace. It would not be good to be late, not after this morning’s travails. Once past the school gates, she dashed up along the six tiers. She was breathless upon reaching the seventh, but she made it before the second Summoning Bell.

  Relieved, she hurried to the left, away from the shame of the astronicum dome. She intended to collect her other cane later, when no one was looking. Each morning, their studies were devoted to the matters of the world: the riddles of arithomatica, the dissections of biologica, the applications of balances and measures. The latterdays were spent in the scholarship of histories, the orders of religions, and the literata of the ancients.

  She preferred the mornings, mostly due to the amount of reading involved later in the day. Though her fingertips were deft, they were not sensitive enough to read the ink impressed into the sacred tomes. To help her with her studies, a young acolyte had been assigned to her as an aide. Jace had failed in his fifthyear, but rather than being sent home, he had been offered a place at the school in the scriptorium, mostly copying texts, but also serving as her eyes. During the day, he softly recited what she needed to understand, sometimes continuing in her dormitory cell at night.

  She rushed to where he usually waited. While Jace could have made her life even more difficult, he was kind and patient with her. She also suspected he might be fond of her in ways more than tutorial. Jace was four years older, but he was far more boyish than even her fellow seventhyears. To help compensate, he grew a scruff of beard to roughen his round face. His sedentary life contributed to a wide belly and a slight wheeze when he hurried to keep up with her. But he, more than anyone, could make her laugh. In many ways, he was the reason she could tolerate her latterday studies.

  She headed to the archway outside the scriptorium. As she rounded a corner, she heard her friend’s telltale huff, heavier and pained, as if he had run all the way here. She smelled the odor of lime on his clothes, indicating he had spent the morning preparing fresh vellum for his work.

  “Jace, I’m sorry I’m late. We should—”

  Then a new note struck her nose. Bitter and rich in iron. It wafted off of him with each exhale. Blood. Startled, she tripped over something on the ground. Even her cane had missed it. She fell and realized quickly it was one of her friend’s legs. Why was Jace sitting under the archway? Her hand patted up his body.

  “Jace, what’s wrong?”

  Her fingers found his face, earning a gasp from him. She felt the hot blood under his nose, all swollen and crooked. He winced from her touch and pulled her hands down.

  “Nyx … they mean to hurt you.”

  “Who—?”

  But even she could guess the answer. A scuffle of leather on stone sounded from all around her. She heard a hard snicker behind her.

  “Run,” Jace urged, and pushed her up.

  She hesitated in a crouch, frozen by fear.

  “Don’t let her get away!” Kindjal shouted.

  The words broke her panic. Nyx searched for a way to escape. She extended all her senses, reflexively filling the world around her with each rasp, whisper, and scuff. She shied from a shift of shadows to her right and fled the pall of sweat and breath swelling behind her. As she headed away, she sought succor from the school, from any sister or brother who might be nearby.

  With her heart hammering in her throat, the reach of her ears stretched. They piqued and fixed to the familiar tones of Sister Reed around the next corner.

  “… proper place. She’ll wish she was merely switched.”

  Another responded, his voice a high-pitched grate. It was Hieromonk Plakk, who led the latterday studies. “And the prioress?”

  “What happens between bells, especially between vexed students, cannot be laid at my feet. I shall claim—”

  The second Summoning Bell clanged across the tiers, cutting off her words.

  Gasping, heart pounding, Nyx felt herself near to fainting with terror, almost lifting out of her body. For a moment, a strange new sense overwhelmed her. The echoing of the bells shredded through the shadows, pushing them back, revealing with greater clarity the walls, stairs, and paths around her. She could even make out shapes closing upon her.

  One neared, and she spun away from it. Fingers snatched at her sleeve, but she kept free.

  A curse blurted out behind her.

  Byrd.

  She followed the path revealed by the ringing echoes, leaning upon this newfound sense to make her escape. Still, as she fled, she confirmed this new sense with her cane as best she could. The hunters quickly fell behind her, but they did not give up their pursuit, gathering like a storm at her back.

  She reached the stairway that led up to the eighth tier. As a seventhyear, she did not know that level all that well. Still, she swept up the steps, leading with her cane. Her awareness strangely split as she climbed. Her chest burned, her heart pounded, but she also felt as if a part of her were floating above, looking down at herself. But she had no time to dwell on the strangeness.

  At the top of the steps, she dashed across the tier. With the bells fading, the world closed around her again. She sank back into her body.

  “There she is!” Kindjal shouted behind her.

  Nyx fled in terror from the approaching slap of sandals on stone. With the eighthyears already ensconced in their classes, there was no one else about. Panicked, she tried to go faster. Her shoulder struck a corner and spun her a full circle. Still, fear kept her upright and moving.

  But where could she go?

  Having lost that momentary new sense of the world, she headed along the only path she knew well. Every student eventually crept up to this level and made a secret pilgrimage. The journey ended where their hopes were either dashed to the ground or lifted high.

  Nyx was no exception. She had crossed the eighth tier several times each year to reach this spot. She sped toward that goal. It was the only route she had memorized.

  The hunters followed, laughing darkly, chasing her with threats.

  She finally reached another set of steps. These were no steeper or longer than the ones she had climbed to reach this height, but she skidded to a stop at their base. This set of stairs led up to the ninth and final tier. Only those deemed worthy of Ascension were allowed to traipse these steps. It was a path forbidden to all others. Its mysteries were for those chosen few. To trespass meant immediate expulsion from the school.

  She trembled at the bottom. She had spent her first seven years in Brayk, the next seven here at the Cloistery. At this moment, her life teetered between a bright future and a shameful fall. Though she could not know her final fate, she had always strived for her best and hoped for the same.

  But now …

  Behind her, the others closed in. Byrd noted her hesitation. He guffawed, but there was no amusement, only threat. He punctuated it with his next words. “She’s trapped. Just you watch. I’m gonna take her cane and whip her arse good. Till she can’t sit down for a fortnight.”

  Laughter burst out as the others closed off any escape.

  Her cane was suddenly ripped from her grip. She tried to snatch it back but was shoved away.

  Another voice, maybe Rymal, urged Byrd to greater harm. “Crack it across her hands instead. Good’n hard. Shatter ’em both. Like she broke the orrery. Only fitting, I tell ya.”

  Nyx clenched her fists, her heart pounding in her ears. Over the years, she had broken a bone or two from the occasional misstep and bad fall. Pain did not scare her, but her hands contributed as much to her vision as her clouded eyes. Her palms knew every vibration in her cane. Her fingertips revealed details that her eyes could not. What was threatened here wasn’t just the snap of a few bones, but a crippling that would leave her all the more blind.

  Still, there were even worse fates.

  Kindjal found her brother’s ear. “You should go ahead and ruin her instead,” she said with menacing glee. “Make sure she’s cast out of the school forever.”

  This earned more laughter, only now veined with nervousness. They all knew the menace behind this new threat. For a girl to reach Ascension, she had to be a virgin, untouched and pure. For some reason, this did not seem to apply to the boys. Not that there weren’t fervent trysts in the dormitories, involving everything but the final act. To cross that last line meant exile—not just from the school, but from Brayk itself. Such was the shame.

  “I think a beating is good enough,” Byrd said, his voice struggling to sound firm. “That’ll put this swamper in her proper place.”

  His sister scoffed. “She deserves worse. She doesn’t belong here. We all know it. You’re just scared.”

  Nyx heard the acid in Kindjal’s voice. The highmayor’s daughter had always struggled in her lessons. It was whispered that her father paid for her climb up the tiers with chests of silver eyries and gold marches. No one dared say such in her presence. For some reason, Nyx had always drawn her ire, perhaps because of the high marks Nyx had earned in their classes.

  Byrd sputtered against his sister’s aspersions of cowardice. His voice strained with fury and embarrassment. “Ansel, Merkle, grab her. Lackwiddle, help them, too.”

  He intended to involve as many as possible to ensure no one spoke. Afterward they could easily blame her violation on some random tryst in the village.

  Nyx backed away, her heels striking the first step behind her. With that touch, anger erupted inside her, driving back her terror. A coldness snuffed the heat from her body.

  If I’m to be cast out, let it be by my own action.

  She lifted her leg and backed onto the first stair. This small act drew shocked gasps. She ignored them and took another step, then another. She refused to give Byrd or Kindjal the satisfaction of ruining her.

  Byrd must have recognized the same and growled his fury.

  She did not flee from his anger, but instead she used it like a wind to fill her sails and push her upward. Behind her, the heat of the twin pyres grew with each step. The smoky incense washed away the reek of the threat below.

  Byrd cursed. “Don’t think you can escape that easy.”

  Though she couldn’t see him, she heard him rush the stairs. Startled at his boldness, she froze.

  Kindjal called to her brother, panic in her voice, perhaps only now realizing she had pushed him too hard. “Byrd, no! You can’t.”

  He stopped long enough to growl back and reassure his twin, “Don’t worry. Father will clear my debt if it comes to that.”

  The exchange cut through Nyx’s shock. She turned and fled up the steps, running toward her doom.

  * * *

  ALREADY ADDLED, NYX fought to keep her footing as she reached the school’s summit. With only rumors and stories to guide her, she was lost.