Chapter 90 Draft Day

The Crown Trials draft ran from the academy’s great hall at noon with four broadcast crystals, a national feed, and eleven hundred students in tiered seating.

Halcrest had never televised a draft before, since no team format existed until this year, and the committee discovered in nine days how much a broadcast is worth.

’Four cameras, one hero and three names he needs to take from me, yeah, and every person in this hall knows what the first pick is going to be.’

Lucas stood at the seed podium in the white-and-gold coat, frayed cuff hidden under a glove, looking nothing like a man enjoying himself.

The committee chair read the rules, the draft order, then a reminder that any called student answers publicly and immediately.

"The first seed will now name his first selection for the record," the chair said, holding the pickup crystal out across the podium.

"My first selection is Mina Park of the artificer track, and I hope she will consider it," Lucas answered.

The hall made a sound, and Mina stood up in the fourth row wearing a workshop apron she had not taken off, while eleven hundred people watched her think for four seconds.

"No, thank you, I want to be extremely clear that this is not about him at all," she said into the pickup crystal.

"It is customary for a declining student to state a reason on the record," the chair said.

"The reason is that I already have a team, my authorship belongs to me, and my choices stopped being anybody else’s property in the spring," Mina replied.

’She said authorship on a national feed, damn, and about eleven people in this country understood what she actually meant.’

Lucas took it well, which was the problem, since a golden boy who accepts a refusal gracefully is very hard to be angry at.

’He actually applauded her, damn, and half this hall now thinks she was rude to a saint.’

"The first seed will now name his second selection for the record," the chair said, the hall stopped rustling entirely.

"My second selection is Vivienne Ashe of the blade track, with respect to her house," Lucas answered.

Vivienne stood in the second row in the full Ashe half-cape, the hall went considerably quieter, since her suspended commands were printed on a board four buildings away.

"My house would find that selection extremely convenient, which is one of several reasons I decline it," she said.

"Do you wish to state the remaining reasons for the record," the chair asked.

"My judgment is my own, my house is aware of that, the country may now be aware of it as well," Vivienne replied.

The clip of that sentence outran every other piece of Crown Trials coverage by four in the afternoon, and House Ashe issued no statement for nine days.

’She just told her father, on camera, in front of the entire nation, using the word judgment, yeah, that cost her more than the suspensions did.’

Lucas stood at the podium with two refusals against him and the whole hall watching, then did the thing that makes the boy genuinely dangerous.

He smiled, the expression reached his eyes, he congratulated both women on having teams.

Then he called four other names, got four yeses, and built a stacked team out of the year’s best unassigned talent in under three minutes.

The second seed’s turn came at half past twelve, bringing Damien up to the podium with three names he never needed to say.

Mina was already walking down from the fourth row, Vivienne coming out of the second, while Isolde entered through the eastern door deliberately late, in academy black with no crest anywhere on her.

"Isolde Marlowe registers to the Sterling team as its third member," she said, before Damien reached the microphone at all.

"A student is meant to be selected by a seed rather than to register herself," the chair said.

"Then select me and be quick about it, since I have already walked the length of your hall," Isolde replied.

The hall laughed, which was not a sound anybody in Halcrest had ever made about a Marlowe, the registration went through.

[Team registered: Sterling]

[Damien Sterling - captain]

[Mina Park - artifice]

[Vivienne Ashe - blade]

[Isolde Marlowe - alchemy]

’A disowned villainess, a scholarship artificer, an heiress defying her house, and me, yeah, and not one of the four was written to be standing here.’

They built the team’s actual shape over four days in the eastern annex, through arguments that were loud and useful.

Mina owned deployment, which meant barriers, tripwires, terrain and the artifice that turned a room into a machine.

Vivienne owned pressure, which meant that whatever came at them had to solve a lattice of cuts before it reached anybody else.

Isolde owned control, which meant dosing, contact toxins, the reactions nobody sees until three moves later.

Damien owned command plus the ledger, which meant standing where the damage fell, turning it into a number that ended things.

"You are the team’s finisher and also the team’s target, which is a terrible structure," Vivienne said on the second evening.

"Right, it is a terrible structure that has won every fight I have had this year, so we use it and hate it," Damien answered.

’And in four days it goes into a building the system has flagged at shelf-level density, shit, with three people I have no intention of burying.’

"Ah, we will use it, I will be pricing your injuries the entire time," Isolde replied.

The spending happened on the fourth night, it was the largest single evening of the year.

[System Points: 12,400]

[Fate Bond, Mina Park: accumulated paired boon settlements]

[Villainess Clause residual and quest rewards: +61,600]

[System Points: 12,400 → 74,000]

[Team preparation: tempering, grimoire pages, alchemy stock, emergency medical]

[System Points: 74,000 → 22,000]

’Fifty-two thousand in one night, damn, and every point of it went into other people’s equipment, which nine months ago would have struck me as insane.’

The full sheet posted at midnight, four days before departure to Crown Basin.

[Damien Sterling]

[Level: 850]

[Experience: 462,000 / 850,000]

[Strength: 840] [Agility: 870] [Endurance: 840] [Mana: 820] [Perception: 860]

[HP: 8,400 / 8,400] [MP: 8,200 / 8,200]

[Active slots: 3 of 5 filled]

[Flicker: 3] [Iron Veil: 2] [Silver Rain: 3]

[Compounding Wrath: 1] [Eye of Reckoning: 2] [Sinner’s Brand: 2] [Stay of Execution: 2] [Reckoning: 1] [Sterling Saber Mastery: 3] [Dread Presence: 1]

[Weapon: Verdict, First Seal, +20% conductance]

[Title equipped: The Villain]

[Asset: Blank, Unwritten, script-sensing, noncombatant]

[Team: Sterling, four registered]

[Mina Park: ceiling removed, registered 271]

[System Points: 22,000]

[Divergence: 38%]

[Foreknowledge Integrity: 63%]

[Ascension Board, first-year: 2]

[Script Pages held: 0]

[Crown Basin - Correction Density: Anomalous]

[Death Flag: The Finale - Fatality 100% - advanced]

Damien read the last two lines eleven times and did not mention either of them to anybody at the table.

Blank refused to look at the venue map for a fourth consecutive day, that evening it started sleeping inside his coat rather than on the shelf.

’The alarm system has moved into my pocket, yeah, it has never once been wrong about a room.’

The transport to Crown Basin left in ninety-six hours, and every route he had ever memorized about that building came from a novel he could no longer entirely trust.