Kalden paced through the Darklight’s estate, waiting for the results of his soulscan.

He’d met with Irina that afternoon, but he’d secretly hoped she would laugh the idea away. Followed by some smug comment like, “Your brother is clearly mistaken, Mr. Trengsen. I can read your soul like an open book, and I would have noticed if you were still a Blade Artist.”

Kalden had played that scenario through his head as he walked across campus. He’d played it as he rode the elevator up to Irina’s office, and he’d played it in the waiting room.

But Irina didn’t laugh when they finally spoke. On the contrary, she seemed to think a soulscan was a perfectly reasonable idea, and she contacted her colleague to get it done.

That proved she hadn’t considered this until now. Not because she and Elend were confident in their assessment, but because the thought had never even crossed her mind.

“You sure you don’t wanna do something?” Relia asked as he passed through the living room. “We could play a board game.”

“I’m fine,” Kalden said.

Akari sat on the leather sofa beside Relia, looking as nervous as Kalden felt. In fact, she’d probably be pacing too if Relia weren’t braiding her hair.

“We could get a drink.” Akari looked longingly toward the kitchen, all but squirming away from Relia’s grasp.

“True,” Relia replied. “Alcohol is technically a solution!”

Akari rolled her eyes. “That joke is older than this house.”

“Okay.” Relia dragged out the word. “Last time I try to lighten the mood.”

“Sorry.” Akari slumped back against the cushions. “This just sucks.”

“It does,” Kalden agreed.

“But you can still focus on the positives,” Relia said. “I mean, Sozen’s alive! And he wants to hang out with you again. That’s good, right?”

“Of course,” Kalden said. “It’s just a lot to process all at once.” He probably looked heartless for focusing on the aspect issue over his long-lost brother. But the truth was, he felt guilty showing too much excitement in front of Akari. This must have been ten times worse for her. He’d decided to pursue a new aspect this afternoon, but she’d had her heart set on spacetime mana this whole summer. No … more like her entire life. For her, this was the first step toward making things right.

Now, he’d been forced to tell her that her mistake might be permanent.

The front door opened a second later, and Kalden rounded to face Irina as she strode into the foyer.

She paused in the hall, not even removing her shoes or jacket. “Well, you’re clearly waiting on me, so I guess I’ll just say it.” She met Kalden’s eyes. “Your brother was right.”

He’d known this was coming, but the words still felt like a punch to the gut.

Irina pulled out a manilla envelope from her leather bag, then set the results on the coffee table between them. The picture was a dense pattern of white lines against a dark blue background. It looked like a cross between a fingerprint scan and an x-ray.

“Half your soul is blade mana,” she explained. “We’ve highlighted the different components here.”

Sure enough, everything was exactly as Sozen had said. The scan highlighted one larger pattern in Kalden’s soul, with four smaller patterns inside of it. Those matched the Artegium’s database signatures for knowledge, metal, craft, and destruction mana.

“So I’m already a Blade Artist,” Kalden said.

Irina nodded. “And if we scan Miss Zeller’s soul, I suspect we’ll see that she’s a Spatial Artist.”

“You never thought to do this scan before?” Kalden tried to keep his voice calm, but it still carried a sharp edge. Irina and Elend were supposed to be the experts. If they’d overlooked this, then what else were they wrong about?

“I’m sorry,” she said with a quick shake of her head. “Even the best Knowledge Artists can’t pull ideas out of thin air. We’re only as good as our own experience, and your case isn’t just rare. It’s unprecendented.” She gestured to the papers on the table. “We use soulscans to deduce why aspecting rituals go wrong. We don’t use them on Pure Artists for non-medical reasons.”

“But it’s impossible to remove an aspect,” Kalden said, echoing his brother’s earlier words. “You never thought this was suspicious?”

“Yes,” she agreed. “It makes sense in hindsight. But Mystics make exceptions to the rules all the time. The evidence suggested this was one of those exceptions.”

Akari sat perfectly still on the sofa, but she looked ready to blast a Missile through the wall.

“You’re saying they have no choice?” Relia spoke up. “They have to stick with their old aspects?”

Irina shook her head. “This is uncharted territory, which means we know nothing. Aside from you two, Sozen Trengsen is the only living example of someone who’s escaped the Archipelago. In fact, I’ve already set up a meeting with him.”

“But removing aspects is impossible.” Kalden sank onto the sofa across from Akari and Relia. “Even this Mystic couldn’t do it.”

Irina fixed him with a look. “We have a rule in Healing Arts, Mr. Trengsen. We never declare a new problem impossible until we’ve spent at least ten minutes trying to solve it. And I’d say your case warrants far more than just ten minutes.”

She was right, of course. He’d had a long day, and he wasn’t thinking straight. He even found comfort in her condescending tone; it reminded him that he didn’t have all the information yet.

“Besides,” Irina continued. “Your scan shows several anomalies.”

Akari learned forward. “Like what?”

“Half of this soul appears to be aspected,” Irina tapped the paper on the table. “But your body produces no blade mana. Stranger still, you can access one hundred percent of your pure mana.”

Kalden gave a slow nod. His brother had used the word “suppression” back in the bar, as if the enemy Mystic had simply plugged up a part of their souls. But if that were true, then how did Kalden have the mana counts of a normal Apprentice? How had he scored so well on the admissions exams? Not to mention Akari, who’d scored closer to an Apprentice than a Foundation.

Irina pulled out another sheet and set it down beside Kalden’s scan. “I showed your results to my colleague—anonymously, of course—and she compared it to an ordinary Blade Artist’s soul.”

Kalden furrowed his brow as he glanced between the images. “What am I missing?”

“You see these pieces here?” Irina tapped a corner of the second image, gesturing to several white clusters where the lines converged. “We call those ‘filomeres.’ They’re the last parts to form during an aspecting ritual. They seal everything in place.”

“What’s that mean?” Akari asked.

“Sounds kind of like a hair tie.” Relia gestured to Akari’s braid which had already begun to unravel at the bottom.

“It’s more permanent than that,” Irina said. “Filomeres are also the reason we can’t aspect our mana more than once. A small number of people are also born with these, and they can’t aspect their mana at all.” She turned back to Kalden. “This is why your brother was able to re-try the ritual. Most of the work was done. He just needed the last step.”

“Okay,” Kalden said. “So the Mystic erased these filomere things on everyone’s soul. He nullified our aspects without actually removing them. But how does that help us?”

Irina glanced at Akari. “You can’t remove your spatial aspect, but that was never your goal. Without the filomeres in place, you might condense the spatial part of your soul and make room for your temporal aspect.”

Akari gave her a blank stare as if she didn’t dare get her hopes up. “You’re saying I can still become a Spacetime Artist?”

“I’m saying it’s possible, but it won’t be easy.”

Akari breathed a visible sigh of relief. “And what about Kalden?”

“Mr. Trengsen could do the same, in theory. I’ve seen blade mana combined with other aspects. For example, sunspear mana combines blade with fire.”

“But I’m still stuck as a Blade Artist,” Kalden said.

“We’ll research this further,” Irina said. “As I said before, this is all uncharted territory, and it’s too soon to say what’s impossible.”

“I understand,” Kalden said in a formal tone. “Thank you for your time, Grandmaster Darklight.”

She left them alone after that, and Kalden resisted the urge to slump his shoulders or hang his head. This dream of Knowledge Arts had been slowly building in the back of his mind ever since he came to Koreldon. Irina had planted the seed during his first appointment, and Elend had cultivated it during their sparring in the backyard. Finally, his duel against Tori Raizen had etched the dream into stone.

With Knowledge Arts, he could scan each challenge in advance, finding a thousand secret paths to victory. He could identify weaknesses in his opponents, or in the environment. He could make the most of his weaker body and bring victory to his team.

Talek. He hadn’t realized how much he wanted this until it was gone.