The Jay

He vanished. The bateui cracked beneath him, and then he was nowhere: breathless, weightless, held for half a second in the space between sky and stone—and then the world slammed back into him. When he staggered up, the sky was smoke. Heat clawed at his coat. Ash stuck to his lashes. Beneath his boots, marble shimmered with embers, too smooth, too still. As if scrubbing off the blood could ever wash away the stench.

He knew this city’s name and he knew it well: Trence.

The Magistrates’ pride. Their fortress in the clouds.

The city hovered on a platform wider than any fortress he’d ever dreamed of. Beneath the pristine colonnades and sunlit arches, the lower tiers of the city vanished into the clouds. If you stood at the edge, they said, you could watch the world disappear below you, fields and rivers turning to mist, all your fears scattered like birds when the sun rose.

But today there would be no sunrise for Trence.

He coughed once, blood threading his spit onto white stone. Just a soldier. Just a body among bodies. But today, he reminded himself, the Old One fought through his hands. Today he would carve his name into the marble with his blood if he had to. Because he was with them.

A shout rose from ahead. He looked up.

He saw him.

A figure streaking through the smoke-laced sky, black cloak trailing behind like torn shadow. Scars lit faint amethyst across his forearms, like cracked glass catching stormlight. He dove and spun, cutting through the mists that roiled above the marble towers.

And beneath him was a woman. Her white cloak rippled around her like breaking foam, her body hovering just below his descent, hands outstretched. She moved as if the sky made way for her, as if the very currents bent themselves to her will. Some whispered he couldn’t fly without her, that without the Wind beneath him, the Jay would plummet like any man. He spat the thought onto marble. Power was power. The Jay didn’t need anyone. Men like that didn’t need anyone. Not like he did.

A roar behind snapped his eyes forward. Rebel banners spilled over the courtyard walls as the others poured in. His brothers and sisters in mud-stained leathers met figures in gray cloaks and white-and-gold masks. The Magistrates. They rained light down in spears that shattered stone and bone alike. Masks cracked, fell. The banners kept coming.

He stumbled, then surged with them, shoulder to shoulder with ghosts who’d stood beside him in trenches and ratlines. They needed the core. They needed to reach the heart of this floating cathedral and gut it so Trence would fall—so the Magistrates would lose their throne in the clouds, so the Coalition’s veins would bleed clean for once. Beside him, a woman fell. A boy screamed. A man with iron rings in his ears dropped to his knees with a grin and didn’t rise. The soldier sucked in one last breath and felt his ribs rattle.

“I am the soil they will not salt,” he said, quiet enough that only the absent gods above might hear him.

Then the air tore apart with a sound like mountains cracking. A shockwave rolled through the marble arcades, rattling columns to powder. The sky seemed to pull away from him, higher and higher, while the platform beneath his feet dropped. The core was gone. The heart was broken. As the white arches pitched and fell, as the city began its slow, beautiful plunge into the clouds below, he saw the Jay arc skyward one last time, trailing black and violet in a world that was suddenly nothing but wind.

He too fell—another fragment of sky breaking loose for the sake of something greater.

Sacrifice, he thought, tasting blood at the corner of his smile, was the only way to take from the light.

And when he closed his eyes, he believed he could feel the Wind.

We’ll find each other again—
and I’ll fail to love you once more.

The Book of Jay

A hush draped itself over Bacima’s coastal skyline, as if the city held its breath for what lay ahead. Dawn arrived tinged with the promise of a day much bigger than its tranquil veneer. The cobblestone streets echoed with the usual clatter of traders hawking wares under bright canopy stalls, but everyone from seamstress to swordsmith felt the currents of change. Today was “The Day of Reckoning,” so named by the more theatrical students of the Academy, a day fabled to change destinies, whispered in tavern corners as the one that might break or burn an entire generation.

At the heart of Bacima stretched a bustling marketplace, a swirling mass of colors and noise, yet an unusual stillness lingered near one cramped stall overflowing with vibrant, dusty rugs. Octavia stood at the edge of the market, fingers brushing the faded embroidery of a tapestry swaying gently in the salt-sweet wind. It smelled of dust and woven memory. Sunlight touched her hair, lighting it into copper and flame, but her eyes were elsewhere, far behind or far ahead.

“You’re quiet,” Nikolai said beside her. His voice was softer than usual, a knowing softness, not prying. He ran a hand through his dark hair, pushing back the curl that never listened. The sea air was already undoing it.

Octavia didn’t look at him at first. “Thinking,” she said eventually. “Unlike you, I do it occasionally.”

He chuckled, warmth tucked behind the sound. “Careful. Deep thoughts could ruin your reputation.”

“You’re hilarious,” she said sarcastically, nudging his arm. There was a smile in it. The real kind. Small and unguarded.

He pulled a mirror from his belt—old, scratched, barely holding its silver. A scowl. A tuck of hair. The mirror vanished again.

“If we’re late,” Octavia said, “I’m blaming your vanity.”

“It’s not vanity,” he said. “I just can’t go in looking like I’ve slept in a hedge.”

Octavia shook her head gently, the corner of her mouth curling into a faint smile of disbelief.

They turned together toward the Academy gates. Edendale rose ahead, dignified but worn at the edges. The path stretched long and cobbled, smelling of warm stone and reckoning to come. Their steps fell into rhythm the way they always had, two beats in tandem, one heartbeat apart. Behind them, the market exhaled. Ahead, the world was waiting to change.

Before them, at Edendale’s heart, stood the Academy for Military Might and Exploration, its pale towers reaching skyward like ivory sentinels guarding the coast. Built and maintained by the Coalition of Worlds, the Academy was both sanctuary and forge, a place designed to mold soldiers, explorers, and heroes fit to fight an endless war. Its spires had cast long shadows over Nikolai’s and Octavia’s childhoods, each room, each corridor, and each forbidden midnight escapade etched indelibly into their memories.

“We’re going to be late to the most important day of our lives,” Octavia snapped over her shoulder, pacing forward with the surefootedness of a soldier’s daughter. She reached out without looking, catching Nikolai’s sleeve. The unexpected closeness brought them shoulder to shoulder. Once, such contact had been thrilling, back in simpler years, before they realized how unkind hearts could be. “And it’s your fault,” she finished, a leftover smile clinging to the corner of her mouth.

He threw his hands in the air. “First, stop being so dramatic. It’s just another ceremony. And secondly—”

“You’re obsessing,” she cut in, arching an eyebrow sharply. “Of all people, you should be the most curious about your ancestry, considering your orphaness and all.”

“It’s not some medical condition,” he muttered, grinning despite himself. “Besides, I already know your lineage.”

“Oh?”

“Attitude every day since I met you in Iasslo. Definitely an Esther. Twenty Dimitri says I’m right.”

She laughed softly, a genuine sound that filled his chest with quiet joy. His eyes flashed, reflecting shared memories of earlier days. Days when she’d accused him of laughing too much, and he’d chided her for frowning too often. Each had grown accustomed to the other’s flaws—or so they liked to claim.

“You’re on.”

Their laughter faded gently, replaced by the soothing rhythm of waves breaking softly against the shore below. They hurried now, hearts beating quick, neither willing to articulate how weighty this day truly was. If they succeeded, no, best not to think of if. They had no choice but to succeed. Octavia’s eyes strayed to Nikolai’s face. She caught a grin there and felt a twist inside her chest, because that grin had once meant something more, something she couldn’t forget, no matter how many times she told herself they were only friends. Time might have scabbed over old heartbreak, but it never quite healed it.

By the time they arrived at the Academy’s gate, the three bells of noon rang out, deep and certain. They slipped through the iron barrier a breath before it clanged shut.

“Hopefully no one saw us,” Nikolai whispered, leaning in so only she could hear. His breath touched her ear, a fleeting moment that almost drew a ghost of a smile from her. She hastily shifted away, clearing her throat.

“Yes, hopefully,” she murmured, her gaze darting around the courtyard. She prayed no one had glimpsed them dashing in.

Inside, the grand hall soared overhead, columns carved from white stone, candelabras fashioned into floating orbs of magelight. The sweet scent of honey from amber-hued flowers made the solemn hush strangely comforting. Then the hush shattered with the bellow of Professor Luna.

“What in the name of the All Father are you cretins doing wandering in so late?” The professor’s broad form shook with anger, veins throbbing along his temples, feeding the rumor that he was a hair’s breadth from collapse. Indeed, only a few wispy strands adorned his scalp. He was forever known as Baldie behind his back, though neither was foolish enough to utter it now.

Octavia opened her mouth to speak, surely to throw Nikolai to the wolves, but Professor Luna merely jabbed a finger at Nikolai’s insignia pinned to his uniform. No words, no lecture, just the cold, silent command to move. So they did. Under these arches, even Octavia’s boldness yielded to protocol.

The ceremony hall welcomed them with polished marble floors and towering pillars that cast elongated shadows under countless hanging lanterns. The hush was so complete their footsteps seemed almost unholy. Familiar professors, old friends, even the braggarts who claimed to be scions of Sovereigns all gathered around six points shaped like an ancient star. At its center stood the Cauldron, carved with runes that glowed in subtle pulses.

Nikolai halted, breath seizing. Two men stationed near the Cauldron bore crisp white uniforms with six golden rings. He recognized them at once, the High Council’s emblem, seldom worn in such a public setting. Octavia followed his gaze, her dimple reappearing in an uneasy half-smile.

“They never attend specialization ceremonies,” she muttered.

Nikolai nodded. “No. They never do.”

From an elevated dais, Dean Charleston read the standard ceremony instructions, but one of the white-uniformed councilmen raised a hand, silencing him with a mere flick of the wrist. In a voice echoing with authority, he introduced himself:

“My name is Torris Puliknov, of the House of Sebagh, direct descendant of the Paragon, blood of Valira. They called me the Great Dash.” His words moved like iron dressed as silk, pride saturating every syllable. “Most of you have heard my name. I forged the systems that gave the Coalition dominion, that wrested planets from the Outlanders who thought themselves untouchable. But since my absence from the front, complacency has rotted our grasp. The tribes of Lilith creep back into territories we bled to win. I will not allow it. I am here to end this drift, once and for all.”

Murmurs spread like ripples across the hall. Even Nikolai felt a stir of excitement. Ancient talk spoke of Torris as the near-equal of the Six Heroes of Old.

The ceremony began properly. Students approached the Cauldron one by one, each letting the runes around it flare with their inherent power.

“Next up, Mallia,” announced the Dean, his voice echoing through the grand hall.

Mallia carefully walked up the steps and meticulously placed her hands on the ancient bowl, runes imprinted on six points around the border.

Runes, the language of the gods, Nikolai thought to himself. He had never seen an artifact up close before. The few he had encountered were typically housed in royal households, preserved as relics belonging to the legendary heroes who founded them.

As Mallia pressed her palms to the Cauldron, light spilled into the Mephistus corner, expected. She had always lived in the forge, her hours consumed by flame and study. What no one expected was the force of it. The surge climbed nearly to the rim, bright enough to make the air hum. Champion, perhaps even Exalted. Whispers stirred. Maybe blood of the Ten Battleforged, the captains of Mephistus’s army.

Nikolai leaned forward, breath caught. “I never thought she’d carry so much of Mephistus’s blood,” he whispered, the glow pulling his words loose, as if it had unmoored him from the room.

Octavia, seated beside him, flexed her fingers against the smooth marble of her chair. “Really? I expected her to be at the level of one of Mephistus’s generals.” The instant the words left her mouth, she winced, instantly regretting her comment.

From the next row, Dagon’s laugh cut through the murmurs like a steel edge glinting in torchlight. “A general? Really?” He tilted his head, that familiar condescending grin carving into place. It didn’t need effort. It was a part of him, etched, not performed.

His hair, thick and windswept, caught the low lighting like it had been made for torchlight and battlefield. Shadow clung to the edges of his jaw, not quite a beard, not quite vanity, just enough to make him look like someone who’d survived things others hadn’t.

And his eyes, dark, cold, and far too focused for a boy who laughed so easily, held her like a dare.

“If Mallia’s descended from Mephistus’s Sword or Shield,” he said, the grin never touching those eyes, “then I’m a direct son of the Old Man himself.”

Seated beside him, Victoria nearly rolled her eyes out of her skull. “Please. You could be twice as strong and twice as smart, and the only thing you’d have in common with that man is between your legs.” She looked him up and down. “And even that’s up in the air.”

For a split second, surprise replaced Dagon’s haughty composure. His shoulders relaxed, lips threatening an actual smile. Nikolai, however, pressed on the matter. “She’s the best forgemaster in our class,” he said, gaze drifting back toward the ceremony. A coil of tension lay beneath his words, as if something about Mallia’s success reminded him of his own uncertain place in the Academy.

Dagon’s condescension flared once more. “Being one of the best at the Academy doesn’t mean you’re on par with a god’s general,” he spat, the syllables landing with the force of a challenge. The taut lines of his jaw dared anyone to contradict him.

Octavia exhaled sharply, determined to keep her composure. “It does this year,” she said, forcing her voice into calm. “So many royal families enrolled, I’d bet my last Dimitri that’s why Torris showed up at all.” Then, almost petulantly, she twisted in her chair to put her back to Dagon, shutting him out of her world.

Dagon arched a brow, turning a fraction so Octavia’s shoulder came into his peripheral vision. His posture coiled, as though her dismissal were a personal affront. “Yeah, royal families are pretty great, aren’t we?” he muttered, the arrogance in his tone capable of stirring even the pacifists of Ket.

Nikolai tried not to bristle. Part of him, the part that carried the orphan’s envy, wondered if he might have thrived more easily had he been born to lineage instead of loneliness. It chafed him to see how some houses did little more than bask in their inherited glory, but no one could deny Dagon’s might. He was a tower of sinew and grim resolve, famed across the Academy for his monstrous strength, and for belonging to the formidable House of the Titan.

A scoff came from down the row, where Maximus, self-proclaimed “great” by rumor and by ego, sat in a languid sprawl. “Got something to say, blondie?” Dagon demanded, shifting his weight so that the chairs groaned under his mass.

Maximus, chin lifted, spat near Dagon’s boots. “Your house is tainted with Outlander blood. How dare you speak of greatness when your line drips with void-born filth?” There was a vicious gleam in his eyes, as though any mention of Lilith’s legacy lit a spark he couldn’t stifle.

They all knew the Academy’s stance on the descendants of Lilith, how the goddess of the void had begun the Great War and cursed her progeny to sow chaos. Coming from another student, Dagon might have shrugged it off, but Maximus stood as his equal in power. And Maximus carried the weight of the House of Sebagh, the most venerable lineage of them all. A single breath of rivalry simmered into dangerous heat.

Dagon leaned in slowly, the motion predatory. His breath ghosted across Maximus’s ear, and his voice dropped to a whisper. “You know where to go when we’re done here. I’ll put you down like a dog in the street.”

Tension rippled in the air, sharper than any blade. It was no secret that descendants of Tiberius, like Dagon, were famed for short tempers and fierce pride. As he pulled away, faint mockery danced in his eyes, an invitation to violence. Maximus answered with a scornful, silent glare.

The ceremony moved on, student after student laying hands on the Cauldron’s runes. Most flared at ranks fit for soldiers, superior, sometimes enhanced. By common measure, it was remarkable. Here, though, among heirs and legends in waiting, their light seemed small. Mice in a den of lions.

Eventually, it was Octavia’s turn. She rose, brushing the folds of her uniform with measured grace, and strode down the aisle. Conversation ebbed. Lantern light seemed to cling to her, following her every step as though reluctant to let her go. There was an effortless strength in the set of her shoulders, in the way she refused to look anywhere but straight ahead. She moved like the hush before a thunderstorm.

Nikolai watched, pulse quickening with each step. The calluses on her hands spoke louder than any title. He knew how many hours of training had carved them there.

When her palms touched the Cauldron, fire leapt toward the Maverick corner. For an instant the glow carved her cheekbones in bronze, and Nikolai felt the ache of recognition. She wasn’t the princess she pretended to be, nor the girl who laughed at him on morning runs. Not truly. She was the storm itself, unflinching, uncontained.

The memory of their bet surfaced, and he groaned inwardly. Twenty Dimitri gone. But the sight of her, burning against the Academy’s measured silence, was worth far more than coin.

She stepped down from the dais, grin breaking across her face, freckles caught in the light. The old ache in his chest deepened.

“That’ll be twenty Dimitri,” she whispered, hand outstretched, half invitation, half triumph.

He pressed the coins into her palm. “Cheater.”

A ghost of genuine laughter warmed her face, and those elusive dimples deepened.

The ceremony progressed at a swifter pace than usual, owing to a long-standing tradition that excused royal scions from certain formalities. Maximus of the House of Sebagh, Dagon of the House of the Titan, Sammael of the House of Flight, Rebecca of the House of Secrets, and Lance of the House of Wrath had all been evaluated at birth, sparing them the typical rigmarole. Yet despite the privilege to depart whenever they wished, none of them stirred from their seats. Curiosity gleamed in their eyes. Half a decade’s worth of wagers and whispered predictions were about to come due, and none intended to miss the final reveals.

When the Dean called for Vivian Nox, a hush descended. Heads turned as she moved down the aisle with poised, almost defiant grace. She shrugged off her ceremonial coat, revealing spiral tattoos etched in inky black across her left arm and up toward her collarbone, physical testimony of her descent from Lilith. Tension rippled through the gallery like a stiff wind across still water. The Academy had never made life easy for a Lilith-blooded student, and Vivian wore that knowledge in the set of her jaw and the unblinking focus of her gaze.

She reached the Cauldron and placed her hands against its ancient rim, the runes along its circumference glimmering in response. A current of mana flared within the vessel, surging so high it almost overflowed.

A voice rang out from somewhere near the back, raw with disbelief. “Supreme rank? A general?”

Torris, standing off to one side, fixed Vivian with an unyielding stare. His posture spoke of scrutiny and faint disgust. “I want eyes on her,” he murmured to a High Council peer. “She is not to be trusted.”

At the far side of the dais, Dagon cast a quick glance at Maximus, his earlier swagger replaced by something sharper. “I don’t think there’s ever been a supreme-ranked Lilith at this Academy,” he said, low enough that only those nearest him could hear.

Maximus raked a hand through his immaculate hair, gaze still on the Cauldron’s gleaming surface. “And for her to use that power against her own kin shows how much she can’t be trusted.” His stare slid to Torris, almost challenging him. It was unclear whether he spoke from prejudice or an unyielding sense of duty. Perhaps both.

Dagon made a soft, derisive sound in his throat. “No one’s ever good enough for you, eh, Golden Boy? Either she’s an abomination if she fights you, or a traitor if she helps.”

Maximus couldn’t help but smile. “Hit a nerve, did I?”

A third voice cut in before Dagon could snap a retort.

“Put the rulers away,” Nikolai said, unfolding from his chair. A half-grin touched his mouth, but it lacked its usual ease. “I’m up.”

No one ever noticed him first. He was average height, black hair falling in waves that wavered between polished and unkempt. Strong enough, but not like Dagon. Smart enough, but never the brightest. No crest stitched to his uniform, no lineage to open doors. What he carried were six years of raw hands, sleepless nights, and the hope that if he bled hard enough, he might leave a mark. Maybe even a name.

He laid his hand on the Cauldron and waited. Nothing. The runes around the rim flared weakly, then guttered out, leaving only the one carved at the bottom still alight.

“Zero affinity?” the Dean muttered, as if the words themselves couldn’t be right.

Torris’s face hardened, confusion curdling into scorn. “Unprecedented,” he declared, his voice slicing the hush in two. Silence pressed in, suffocating.

From the front row, a voice pierced the hush. “That bottom rune, doesn’t it glow for ordinary citizens?”

“Likely,” another answered, thinly veiled disdain in their tone. “Means he’s no different from anyone off the street.”

The words landed heavier than any blow. Every hour of study, every bruise, every scar worn like proof collapsed inward. Nikolai’s face faltered. He pulled his shoulders in tight and walked back to his seat, jaw locked. Dagon and Maximus stayed silent. Somehow, that cut deeper than their laughter ever had.

Barney rose, the scrape of his chair louder than the whispers. He looked back at Nikolai, just a nod, quiet as breath. I see you.

“You can still matter,” he said, voice low but steady. “First crew to the galaxy’s center. The artifacts that could end this war. Sometimes it isn’t the blade that changes things, it’s the hands that carry it.”

In the hush that followed, Barney’s mana surged into the Cauldron and three runes flared to life, Esther, Mephistus, Tiberius. The blaze climbed the chamber walls, and a collective gasp broke loose.

“A champion…with three gods?” someone stammered, voice cracking. Two affinities at that rank was legend. Three was myth.

Even Torris faltered, his composure fraying as his eyes narrowed, as if trying to bend what he saw into the shape of something familiar.

The room thrummed with disbelief, half awe, half dread. And for the first time all night, it felt as though every gaze had snapped open to the truth. The Academy’s future, the Coalition’s future, might not belong to the heirs at all, but to a handful of wild, extraordinary souls.

Escaping the hall felt like the only solace from the lacerating envy twisting his gut. Before he knew it, he found himself climbing the winding steps of the observatory tower, a place so often overlooked that it felt like it belonged solely to him. Stars and planets circled overhead on a bronze model, each one shifting in cosmic dance. Familiar star charts spread across a round table, a testament to the wonder the war had all but smothered.

Of course, Octavia’s footsteps sounded behind him, echoing across the dome. Even when the door creaked, he made no attempt to hide. The hush lay thick between them. Finally she spoke, her words balancing somewhere between an offer, a question, and a command.

“I can leave or I can stay,” Octavia said, teetering on the line between the hallway and the observatory, casting a glance at Nikolai’s slumped form. He stood by a great brass model of the constellations, shaped like the skeleton of the galaxy itself.

He exhaled. “I knew I never should’ve told you about this place,” he replied, the corners of his mouth twisting, though he managed a small, reluctant gesture for her to enter.

“This is an observatory, Nik,” she insisted, stepping in on light feet. “Not some secret passage.”

Nikolai’s gaze drifted to the domed ceiling overhead, dusty glass panes that had once revealed entire starfields. “Might as well be,” he said. “No one’s set foot in here for half a millennium. Not since folks figured out they could just mount observatories onto a bateui and sail the skies.”

Octavia followed his stare, past shelves of ancient star charts and a telescope taller than any man she’d met. “All that’s left is a pretty view of night,” she murmured. She flicked an appraising glance at him, noticing the tightness at his jaw, how his usually lively eyes were dull with ache. “So you want to tell me what’s wrong? Or do you want to sit here with me and pretend everything’s okay?”

She let her question hover between them. They had known each other too long for him to bluff. That knowledge shone in the set of her shoulders, equal parts comfort and challenge. Finally, Nikolai swallowed hard.

“Octavia,” he began. His voice snagged like a blade catching on stone. “It’s like a part of me died today. All I’ve ever wanted was to train, fight at the front, become… someone. Someone who looks in the mirror and sees something more than an ordinary life. I’m tired of just being okay at things, Octavia.”

She didn’t interrupt. Didn’t correct him.

Because she knew—of course she knew—that this wasn’t really about mirrors or mediocrity.

But she let him lie.

Because love, the kind that stays, sometimes doesn’t call things by their real names.

Nikolai rubbed the creases along the corners of his eyes, the tension in his posture evident. He watched Octavia tuck a strand of chestnut hair behind her ear, her dimple flashing before she pressed her lips into a firm line.

“Do you want me to bring out the violin?” she asked with a quiet snort.

He blinked, surprised. “What?”

She lifted a brow, stepping closer until the scent of old parchment and starlight surrounded them both. “So you’ll have a soundtrack to all this self-pity.” Her voice held an edge, but her gaze radiated something softer. “Not everyone ends up a Maximus or a Dagon. Plenty of us claw and scrape our way through. And you…” Her lips curved in a way they didn’t for anyone else. “You survive.”

“Listen, Octavia,” he began, but the words faltered on his tongue.

She placed a hand on his chest. Her dimple deepened, though her tone stayed firm. “You’ve known worse than this, Nikolai. Will you lock yourself in here with your regrets? Or be the same stubborn boy you’ve always been?”

Her question hung in the dusty air. Then, without another thought, he pulled her into his arms. She stiffened for a single heartbeat, memories and old resentments perhaps, but soon relaxed, hands curling around his waist.

“Thanks,” he murmured against her hair, his breath stirring the loose strands.

She tipped her head up, pressing her cheek to his. “For the record,” she whispered, voice tight with sincerity, “you’ve never been ordinary.”

A sudden roar reverberated through the walls, sending dust motes dancing. The sound of Dagon’s fury, harsh and full of challenge, told them the Academy’s day was far from over. They shared a final glance before rushing to meet the tumult below.

Mana is a finicky thing. Some explode with it and some remain unremarkable. You all ask why I chose the path I did.

That is why. I will not put the future of my world in the hands of chance. Not unless I must.

Journals of Derrost