He drew madra together desperately, though he knew there was no time for the technique before they hit.
Then Orthos opened his mouth and blasted a hole in the center of the wall.
They went through with no more damage than a smoldering patch on the back of Lindon's outer robe. He could feel it burning, but he couldn't spare any attention to put it out.
So far, he understood the reasoning behind the obstacles. The flying balls tested your awareness and reaction time. The brick wall tested your raw power—it was already re-forming behind Lindon, so the only way to pass through was to tear a hole in it.
The third obstacle was a cloud of wasps.
He almost cried. What does this have to do with enforcing the law?
Devoutly, he swore to himself that he wouldn't go through any more trials without learning more about them ahead of time. He could have cheated his way through here without a problem.
Riding Orthos was something like cheating...though far, far less comfortable.
The wasps began stinging him, and he both thanked and cursed Eithan for his Bloodforged Iron body. There was nothing it handled better than poison, but without its help, he would have passed out.
There were four more obstacles after that.
Yerin could have passed the Highgold application in her sleep. The Blackflame Trials had pushed her harder than this, and her training with Cassias and Eithan even harder. She had passed through in first place, earning astonished looks and not a few people trying to snatch her up for their organizations.
She ignored them all, strolling over to the end of the Lowgold course. If she had passed the Highgold so easily, Lindon should have blown through the application like a spring breeze. He loved having time to plan for things like this, but it wasn't as though he really needed it. Not in her estimation, anyway. Planning for a fight was important, but he used a plan more like a crutch. That was how the weak did things.
The Lowgold course was longer than hers had been, so Yerin arrived in time to see the first person emerge from the orange cloud. To her surprise, it wasn't Lindon.
A girl on a flying...broomstick?...blasted out, tumbling onto the grass at the end. She flipped heels-over-head, rolling to a halt and looking around in a daze. Her hair had been tangled from the fall, her ponytail had dead grass in it, and her purple eyes were hazy.
She sat up, looking around, and saw no one. Then she put her hands up in victory—they were gloved in black—and collapsed onto her back, breathing hard.
Yerin gave her a quiet scan, sneaking a glimpse at her soul. Her madra was rock-stable for a Lowgold, deep and quiet as a winter pond. Yerin couldn't figure why she hadn't advanced to Highgold yet. With power that solid, she should have been able to do it in a snap.
The girl seemed to notice something, glancing around until she saw Yerin. Yerin didn't look away—if she had been caught, she'd been caught. No use playing around about it.
Rather than looking offended, the girl gave a cheery wave and let her head fall back down against the ground.
An instant later, a new batch of students came through the clouds. The first flew on green wings, though one of them was broken and his eye was swollen shut. The next was covered in a cloak from head-to-toe, and flew on a jet of streaming blue sparks.
The third was Orthos.
She was surprised they'd let Lindon take him. Sure, contracted beasts were normally considered like a weapon or construct, but they didn't normally have a two-stage difference from their contractors. Sacred beasts didn't advance like sacred artists did, but Orthos still had power on the level of a Truegold.
Which surprised her even more, because he had only come in fourth.
He trotted out, not seeming to hurry, carrying something in his mouth. It took her a breath or two to see it was Lindon, limp and covered in blood. There were slices in his outer robe, pieces of it were on fire, and his face was covered in lumps like bug bites.
But he groaned and moved in Orthos' mouth, so she reasoned he was fine.
She walked up to the turtle as the remaining members of the successful fifty made it through. "What rolled him over?" she asked.
Orthos spat him onto the ground, where Lindon groaned upon landing.
"He needs a shell," Orthos said.
Three days after the qualification, there was a ceremony to welcome the new generation of Skysworn trainees. In consideration of the red light that was swallowing more and more of the horizon each day, the usual feast and celebration were cut short.
Each inductee was handed a green pin marked with a cloud, which would identify them until they graduated their training and received the Skysworn armor. They were then given a brief, personal greeting by the Skysworn Underlord. He had made himself presentable for the occasion, so his hair was washed and clipped back, baring the scar high on his left cheek. He was even out of his armor, wearing instead a crisp layered outfit that had the look of a uniform.
For Lindon and Yerin, he practically threw their pin at them and gave them no greeting, but Lindon didn't mind. He was eager to minimize any future contact with the Underlord; that seemed to be the best way to live a long and healthy life.
Finally, when all sixty trainees had been given their pins, they sat down for instruction. Twenty full Skysworn, Truegolds all, lined the walls of the room, looking in at the student tables.
They stood in pairs, which Lindon took to be partners when he saw Renfei and Bai Rou among them.
The Highgold table and the Lowgold tables were separate, with five Lowgolds for every Highgold. More than one of the students at Lindon's table sent jealous glances at the higher table. Some of the more advanced trainees gave smug looks back.
Yerin looked as though she were falling asleep. Her bladed arms sprawled, threatening the people seated on either side of her.
Naru Gwei stepped between the tables, looking as though he would rather be anywhere else. Lindon's white arm struggled to escape from the table, but he wrestled it back down. Orthos, seated next to Lindon, fought to stay quiet and still. Lindon could feel the effort in the turtle's soul and in the thickening pillar of smoke that rose from his shell.
"You'll be separated into teams," the Captain said at last, nodding to the full Skysworn around the walls. "Every pair of Skysworn gets five Lowgolds and one Highgold. Normally we'd get you started by finding lost pets or delivering messages, something suited for your level of advancement. We don't have the luxury of that this time."
It was so quiet that Orthos' breath sounded like a bellows. None of the trainees seemed willing to make a sound.
"We always choose the better fighters among the young. We have to, because the bigger your weapon, the less you have to draw it. We've got the biggest hammer in the Empire, and everyone knows it."
A halfhearted cheer rose from the Highgold table, but Naru Gwei ignored it, so it died quickly.
"If we were at peace, I'd have higher standards for your training. I'd want you to be familiar with imperial policy, and the names of all the political players." He waved that aside. "It's a luxury. We're in a crisis, so we're cutting everything down to the bone. We only need one thing from you: to fight. When and where we tell you. The Empire's scurrying like a kicked anthill, and there are always snakes and rats who want to take advantage of that while we're looking away. We'll need to defend the Empire from those traitors...and from the real enemy to the south."
He pulled a long straw out of his chest pocket and started chewing on it. "We're baptizing you in fire. There's plenty of fight to go around. We'll be taking you from battle to battle, and in between, you're expected to spend every second pushing for your next advancement. The Empire has no time for you to waste.