Chapter 118: The Grand Selection [5]

"Alden did not qualify for the Grand Selection. Therefore, he will be sent back."

The words went through the chamber and came back off every surface and then sat in the air without fading.

At the edge of the chamber, along the gallery where the ten Spires stood in formal attire, Isabella’s expression did not change. Not at first. But after a beat, her eyes widened by a fraction. That sudden, telling moment when something unexpected happens and the mind processes it before the face can hide it.

Theodore, standing beside her, was another situation entirely.

’He wasn’t selected?!’

Theodore stared at the center of the basin where Alden stood and tried to make the information fit into something that made sense. It wouldn’t.

’He performed better than anyone. Those wings, the lightning formation which broke the wall. Every single other cadet had shown something more straightforward, and every single other cadet had been chosen. Adrian got picked for a clap and a fast step. And Alden, who had cracked the marble of the chamber itself, is being sent back?’

’What do you mean by that?!’

And then the other thought arrived, the one Theodore had been pushing back since the announcement,

The lies.

He and Isabella had stood in the royal palace before a grieving king and a full court and announced, with complete confidence that the Upper Academy had already selected Alden. That he was a Critical National Defense Asset. That his execution would be strategic suicide.

After reaching Apothesis, Alarion had discovered the lies and punished Theodore for it. Fortunately, Alarion had eventually let the matter go.

But that was with Alden present. That was with the assumption that the Grand Selection would produce a result.

If Alden was sent back now, the Astern Kingdom would receive him unselected. They would know within hours that everything Theodore and Isabella had said in that court was fabricated. That they had lied to a king. That they had manipulated a royal trial and announced a classified war declaration early, all in service of protecting someone who turned out not to be good enough for the Upper Academy anyway.

Theodore’s fists closed.

’And Alden will lose his head the moment he steps back into the Kingdom without the protection of Apothesis.’ His eyes moved to Alden’s still figure in the center of the floor. ’Everything we did to keep him alive would have been pointless. He dies, we lose our credibility, and the Kingdom has every justification to come after us for making a fool of the crown.’

’How did this happen? WHY did this happen?’

Above the basin, Alarion slowly raised his hand.

His fingers moved into position, not pointing at anything, just positioning themselves with the specific stillness of someone preparing to do something simple and final.

Alden saw it.

His lips parted slightly.

He wanted to say something.

But what would he say?

He had already shown them everything. He had given them two full demonstrations, both of them genuinely unusual, and all four of them had looked at him like he wasn’t there. If none of the four Assemblies wanted him, no argument or additional display was going to change that. They were not people who changed their minds because a cadet complained.

Alden slowly closed his mouth.

’Damn it.’

His fists were tight at his sides. For the first time in a long time he had nothing. No plan, no trick, no angle he hadn’t tried. Nothing.

He looked at the floor.

’I can’t do anything about it anymore. I can’t force them to choose me. I’m done...’

He let a slow breath out.

Then:

"Sigh."

It was barely a sound. Quieter than the ambient noise of the chamber, quieter than anyone’s breathing. But somehow, in the vast perfect silence of that space, it traveled.

Every head turned toward the Windsky platform.

Alden raised his eyes.

Constantine sat exactly as he had sat the entire time. Still posture, closed eyes, the compressed wind ring moving slowly around his torso. His expression was calm.

But his eyes had opened.

And they were looking directly at Alden.

Alden’s pupils contracted.

His eyes reflected Constantine’s raised hand and did not quite believe what he was seeing. After everything that had just happened, his mind was slow to accept it.

"I choose Alden."

Constantine’s voice filled the chamber quietly and completely.

The relief that hit Alden was not small.

It moved through him all at once, through his chest and his shoulders and his hands, his fists opening, the careful composure he had been holding cracking open into something much simpler and more honest.

’I got chosen.’

He stood there for a moment just letting it be real.

’It doesn’t matter which one. It doesn’t matter that it took this long, or that I almost didn’t make it, or that I have no idea what this Assembly even specializes. I got in. That’s enough.’

He looked at Constantine and felt something uncomplicated and genuine.

’Thank God.’

But then he noticed the others.

Lady Aurora’s hand had moved against the armrest of her throne. Her palm was pressed flat into the stone, and where her hand met the surface, a hairline crack had appeared in the marble. She had barely moved and the stone had fractured. Her expression stayed completely composed, but that crack said something her face wasn’t saying.

Aetherion turned his head toward Constantine. Slowly. He carried the heavy posture of someone who had been waiting for a decision he knew was coming, yet was still completely unprepared to face it.

"Are you sure, Constantine?"

The question was calm. But the seriousness underneath it was not small. ℯℯ𝘭.

Leonidas said nothing. He didn’t need to. He was looking at Constantine with the focused, unblinking attention of someone who was waiting for his reply and will have opinions about it after.

Constantine didn’t answer right away.

Several seconds passed. His gaze lowered from Alden toward the pendant resting against his chest. One hand rose and found it, his fingers settling against it gently, the way you touch something when you’re not reaching for it consciously but your hand goes there anyway. Like a memory living in an object.

His expression did something. Almost nothing. The softest possible change, then it was gone.

Then he looked back at Alden.

"I know what I’m doing."

His voice was quiet and certain. He spoke like someone who had already finished fighting with himself inside and was simply reporting the final answer.