Hilda shot straight up to her feet, and this time Kamila let go of her wrist without a struggle. Antonin Voloshko, a prim man with his arms folded inside the long sleeves of his robe and a wooden rod curling his white hair away from his face, walked across the green until he stood next to Hilda. “Young lady, I have good news for you. Why don’t you come with me?”

At the words good news, Hilda’s eyes lit up, and she forgot about being mad at her sister, about the photographer they’d just cheated and being fatigued by the crowds and everything. The obvious glee on Hilda’s face must have rubbed off on Antonin, because he beamed back at her and motioned with a roll of his head for her to follow.

“As I’m sure you can guess,” Antonin said, “You will soon be an official aspirant to the Reapers. All that’s left is the formality.”

Kamila was right on Hilda’s heels as they made their way through the monastery’s courtyard, under a stone arch, and down the main hallway. They passed by several rooms as they trekked down the long corridor toward their destination. In one, Hilda saw three men standing around a table with an array of papers spread out and a large, bulky laptop computer in the middle of the table. They looked to be having quite the intense conversation. Hilda peered into the room, enraptured by the conversation and the machine. She’d seen a laptop computer once or twice in her life, but never outside of Kivv. The machines must have been quite rare and valuable, and she wondered what the men were discussing. In another room, when Hilda looked past the door she saw two figures, both wearing patchwork armor, leaning over a map. From her angle, Hilda couldn’t tell what land the map depicted, but rising up from the map’s surface was a model of what looked like one of the Crescent Land’s southern Arcologies.

Finally they came to the end of the corridor, and a single closed door. Antonin turned around and met Kamila’s eyes. “I’m afraid you’ll have to wait outside, Kamila Zelenko.”

Kamila groaned. When Hilda looked at her, Kamila wouldn’t return the eye contact. She glanced at her feet instead. “Are you sure I can’t re-take the tests?”

Antonin bowed his head, eyes closed. “You are welcome to – but I warn you that the results are unlikely to change.”

“Why?” Kamila’s eyes squeezed shut, and Hilda heard a tremor in her sister’s voice. “Why am I not good enough for you?”

“It is not a judgment on your strength, young one.” Antonin spoke with a tone Hilda supposed was meant to be reassuring, though it had little obvious effect on Kamila. “You are strong, stronger than almost any young person I’ve had the pleasure to meet. But I fear you would not understand what is necessary for a Reaper.” He opened the door and ushered Hilda in.

Hilda, standing in the threshold, looked up at Kamila. “I’ll be back soon. Hang in there.”

Wordlessly, Kamila turned her head away. Hilda didn’t say anything, but she knew Kamila moved so that Hilda wouldn’t see her tears.

The door closed behind her.

For several seconds, there was no light in the room – the only guiding point of reference Antonin’s footsteps, as he walked away from Hilda. By the way they echoed, the room must have been quite large, but Hilda stayed where she was, not reaching out to feel at the walls or following behind the elder Reaper.

Then light came – from a red-glowing mote floating in Antonin’s palm. “You know the words. Swear the Reaper’s Oath to me.” In the near-darkness, Antonin turned, his face a stern line as he stared down Hilda.

Hilda spoke, quietly and haltingly at first. As the words went on she picked up speed, spoke clearer and more confidently.

“I am a bastion of humanity, from now until the end of life.

“I seek to preserve life, and not to destroy it.

“The enemy is not humanity; the enemy is the Desert.

“The Aether is not the enemy; the Aether is a force.

The Desert is not the Aether; the Desert is its residue.

The enemy is deserving of emp–“

“Stop.” Antonin’s voice boomed, and brooked no objection, and he stepped forward, towards Hilda, towering over her, both his hands freed from their long sleeve and glowing with red. Hilda felt a charge in the air, heard the rushing of wind, felt stinging grains of sand against her face as Antonin approached. A glimmering red glaive, its shaft taller than Hilda herself, its blade alone half her height, formed in the instructor’s hands. He held his hands out, the shaft of the weapon resting on his palms.

Hilda tried to shrink away, but her feet wouldn’t respond. What did I do wrong? Are they going to reject me now?

“You are not a Reaper,” Antonin said. Hilda’s stomach lurched. Her jaw ached.

“Yet.”

She blinked.

“You are an Aspirant to the Reapers,” Antonin went on, “You are a probationary member of Mirshal, but the full Reaper’s oath is not binding until you become a full member.” His stern face softened. “Remember that first half well enough, and you will do fine. Now take this glaive.”

Hilda placed her hands on the pole, slowly lifted it from Antonin’s palms. It was heavy, but lighter than she’d expected from seeing it. She stepped away from Antonin and gave it an experimental swipe. The weapon should have been too large and unwieldy for her to use, but the back end of its shaft melted into the floor behind her and, when she thrust it forward, re-emerged, granting her a long reach. She saw the opposite wall, and felt she could reach out to it if she wanted.

“Do you feel that?” Antonin asked, and held out a hand. Hilda peered at her instructor’s hand, using the light of the still-glowing glaive to guide her. A small pile of glassy sand rested there. Antonin closed his fist around it, turned his hand over, and let the sand drain out onto the floor. “That’s the Desert. The enemy of humankind, yes?”

Hilda nodded, slowly.

“That’s the trade-off of magic, Hilda. It is the force that killed the old humanity, during the Aether War. It is more than just the sand, the mere physical signifier – it is the scouring wind that will, with time and lack of shelter, rip away your very soul and strand it in the wilderness. It is the reason you will one day be asked to walk to the end of the world.”

Hilda nodded.

“Now, I want you to return that glaive whence it came.” Hilda, not thinking, held out her hands, with the shaft laid across it. Antonin laughed. “No, not to my hands. To the Aether. You’ve practiced, and now I want you to fray the veil and place your weapon in safety there.” Antonin reached behind his back, and his hand returned with a stiff sheet of paper. “Here are the words, should you need them.”

The script was alternately angular and flowing, hard and soft with varying thickness of lines and density of ink. Hilda squinted to read it in the darkness, but soon realized she knew these Words by heart. She began to chant.

Prickles of electricity travelled up her fingertips and to her wrists, and then with a wave of her fingers she felt the veil – threads spreading apart, minutely, to allow just her fingers through.

The light vanished from the room as Hilda felt the weight of her glaive disappear. It lingered as a presence in the back of her mind, like a friend – or a sibling – standing over her shoulder reassuringly, there just in case. The thrill of electricity around her hands faded, leaving her muscles strangely sore and tingling.

“All magic has a cost, Hilda,” Antonin said. “Power does not come from nowhere. Power does not come from nowhere. And there, I do not speak only of magic.

“Now, go. You’ve done well today, and should reunite with your dear sister and brother. We’ll meet again, before I see you off for the year.”

Antonin stepped forward and reached out a hand. Hilda clasped it without thought, and wrapped her fingers over Antonin’s inner elbow, their forearms parallel in the manner of friends. Antonin smiled.

“Thank you, Hilda Zelenko. Now go in peace.”