“So, dear Darrow, how did you cheat?” he asks. Antonia glances over from her conversation with Arria, a small girl made of curling hair and dimples.

“Oh, come now, man.” I laugh. “They sent Quality Control after me. How could I have cheated? Impossible. Did you cheat? Your score is high.”

I speak the midLingo. It’s more comfortable than that highLingo fartdust Priam jabbers on in.

“Me? Cheat! No. Just didn’t try enough, apparently,” Cassius replies. “If I had my wits, I’d have spent less time with the girls and more on studying, like you.”

He’s trying to tell me if he tried he could have done just as well. But he’s too busy to put in as much effort. If I wanted him as a friend, I’d let him get away with it.

“You studied?” I ask. I feel a sudden urge to embarrass him. “I didn’t study at all.”

A chill goes through the air.

I shouldn’t have said it. My stomach plummets. Manners.

Cassius’s face sours and Antonia smirks. I’ve insulted him. Priam frowns. If I want a career in the fleet, then I will likely need Cassius au Bellona’s father’s patronage. Son of an Imperator. Matteo drilled this into me. How easy it is to forget. The fleet is where the power is. Fleet or government or army. And I don’t like government, not to mention that this sort of insult is how duels begin. Fear trickles down my spine as I realize how thin a line there is to tread. Cassius knows how to duel. I, for all my new skills, do not. He would rip me to pieces, and he looks like he wants to do just that.

“I joke.” I tilt my head to Cassius. “Come on, man. How could I score so high and not have studied till my eyes were bleeding? Wish I’d spent more time fooling off like you—we’re in the same spot now, after all. Fat lot that studying did for me.”

Priam nods his approval at the peace offering.

“I bet it was a slog!” Cassius crows, tipping his head to acknowledge my peculiar breed of apology. I expected the play to go over his head. Thought his pride would blind him to my sudden apology; the Gold may be proud, but he isn’t stupid. None of them are. Have to remember that.

After that, I do Matteo proud. I flirt with a girl named Quinn, befriend and joke with Cassius and Priam—who has probably never sworn in his life—throw my hand out to a tall brute named Titus whose neck is as thick as my thigh. He squeezes too hard on purpose. He’s surprised when I nearly break his hand, but damn is his grip strong. The boy is even taller than Cassius and I, and he’s got a voice like a titan, but he grins when he realizes that my grip, if nothing else, is stronger than his. Something strange about his voice, though. Something decidedly disdainful. There’s also a feather of a boy named Roque who looks and speaks like a poet. His smiles are slow, few, but genuine. Rare.

“Cassius!” Julian calls. Cassius stands and throws an arm around his thinner, prettier twin. I didn’t piece it together before, but they are brothers. Twins. Not identical. Julian did say his brother was already in Agea.

“Darrow here is not what he seems,” Julian tells the table with a very grave face. He has a knack for theatrics.

“You don’t mean …” Cassius puts a hand to his mouth.

My finger grazes my steak knife.

“Yes.” Julian nods solemnly.

“No.” Cassius shakes his head. “He’s not a Yorkton supporter? Julian, tell me it isn’t so! Darrow! Darrow, how could you be? They never win a game! Priam, are you hearing this?”

I throw my hands up in apology. “A curse of birth, I suppose. I am a product of my upbringing. I cheer for the underdog.” I manage not to sneer the words.

“He confessed it to me on the shuttle.”

Julian is proud to know me. Proud his brother knows he knows me. He looks for Cassius’s approval. Cassius isn’t oblivious to this either; he gently doles out a compliment and Julian leaves the highDrafts and returns to his midDraft seat halfway down the table with a content smile and squared shoulders. I didn’t think Cassius would be the kind sort.

Of those I meet, only Antonia openly dislikes me. She doesn’t watch me like the others at the table. From her, I feel only a distant breed of contempt. One moment she is laughing, flirting with Roque, and then she feels my gaze and becomes ice. The feeling is mutual.

My dormitory is from a dream. Gold trim lines a window that looks out into the valley. A bed is laden with silks and quilts and satins. I lie in it when a Pink masseur comes in and stays for an hour kneading my muscles. Later, three lithe Pinks file through to tend to my needs. I send them to Cassius’s room instead. To calm the temptation, I take a cold shower and immerse myself in a holoexperience of a digger in the mining colony Corinth. The Helldiver in the holoexperience is less talented than I was, but the rattling, the simulated heat, the darkness and the vipers, they comfort me so much that I wrap my old scarlet rag around my head.

More food comes. Augustus was all talk. Gob full of exaggerations. This is their version of hardship. I feel guilty as I fall asleep with a full stomach, clutching the locket with Eo’s flower inside. My family will go to bed hungry tonight. I whisper her name. I take the wedding band from my pocket and kiss it. Feel the ache. They stole her. But she let them. She left me. She left me tears and pain and longing. She left me to give me anger, and I cannot help but hate her for a moment even though beyond that moment there is only love.

“Eo,” I whisper, and the locket closes.

19

THE PASSAGE

I vomit as I wake. A second fist strikes my full stomach. Then a third. I’m empty and gasping for air. Drowning in my sick. Coughing. Hacking. I try to scramble away. A man’s hand grabs me by the hair and throws me into the wall. God, he’s bloody strong. And he’s got extra fingers. I reach for my knifeRing, but they’ve already dragged me into the hall. I’ve never been so manhandled; even my new body can’t recover from their strikes. There’s four of them in black—Crows, the killers. They’ve discovered me. They know what I am. It’s over. All over. Their faces are expressionless skulls. Masks. I pull the knife I took from dinner from my waist and am about to stab one of them in the groin. Then I see the flash of gold on their wrists and they hit me till I drop the knife. It’s a test. Their strikes against a higher Color are sanctioned by the issuer of the bracelets. They haven’t found me out at all. A test. That is what this is. It is a test.

They could have used stunners. There’s a purpose to the beating. It’s something most Golds have never experienced. So I wait. I curl up and let them beat me. When I don’t resist, they think they’ve done their job. They sort of do; I’m raggedshit by the time they’re satisfied.

I’m dragged through the hallway by men nearly three meters tall. A bag is shoved over my head. They’re staying away from technology to scare me. I wonder how many of these kids have felt physical force like this? How many have been so dehumanized? The bag smells like death and piss as they drag me along. I start laughing. It’s like my bloodydamn frysuit. Then a fist hits my chest and I crumple, gasping.

The hood also has a sound device installed. I’m not breathing hard, but my breaths come back louder than they should. There are over a thousand students. Dozens at a time must suffer this same fate, yet I hear nothing. They don’t want me to hear the others. I’m supposed to think I’m alone, that my Color means nothing. Surprisingly, I find myself offended that they dare strike me. Don’t they know I’m a bloodydamn Gold? Then I snort back a laugh. Effective tricks.

I’m lifted up and thrown hard onto a floor. I feel a vibration, the smell of exhaust. Soon we’re in the air. Something in the bag covering my head disorients me. I can’t tell which direction we’re flying, how high we’ve risen. The sound of my own raspy breath has become terrible. I think the bag also filters out the oxygen, because I’m hyperventilating. Still, it’s not worse than a frysuit.