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  Her friend had a point. A good point Saytera hadn’t yet considered. Yansin did indeed seem to agree with Vivian.

  Nowla continued, “Ignore all this destiny talk if you want to. Now, I know you like to learn. Have you ever thought there is so much more for you to learn? So many places, so many things you don’t know. Wouldn’t you like to see the rest of the world?”

  “Well, of course.”

  The girl smiled. “You know, you could come for a visit. You don’t need to stay long. Just come, see how it is, then later you can decide. At least you’ll know what the rest of the world is like, what a city is like.”

  A gust of wind from the ocean made Saytera cold. Or perhaps it had been her friend’s words, for some reason. “Well, if Yansin agrees, of course I could come. For a short visit.”

  Nowla stroked her chin. “Right. Of course. You’d ask Yansin. But what if… what if you didn’t have time to ask her? What if you had to make a decision?”

  Saytera froze. This question didn’t sound like a random hypothesis. “What do you mean?” She felt her heart accelerating.

  Her friend took a long, deep breath, then looked at her. “Saytera, Vivian is coming now, to this beach. If you want to leave with us, this is your last chance.”

  Saytera’s heart pounded. She got up. “But I can’t. I haven’t told anyone, I didn't bring anything. And Yansin will be worried.”

  Nowla got up and put a hand on Saytera’s elbow. “Don’t worry, it’s just a visit; one last adventure. One last time. It’s my opportunity to show you the continent. It’s the opportunity for Vivian to tell you about you.”

  Answers… That’s what Saytera most wanted. But leaving like that didn’t sound right.

  Saytera pulled her arm and stepped away from her friend. “I’m not saying no, Nowla. Maybe I can visit you some other time. Maybe we can plan this better. Just not like this, no.”

  There was resignation rather than disappointment on Nowla’s face. “I wouldn’t count on that. Vivian said she won’t come back. We’ll never see each other again. But it’s all right. I’m sure you’ll be happy.”

  Saytera was hit with an unexpected pang of sadness.

  A very small rowboat approached, and Vivian pulled it on the beach. It looked like one of the boats Kerely used for her day trips. Vivian looked like a normal person. Indeed, perhaps she could tell Saytera about who she was, and what her destiny was.

  She ran to Vivian. “Can you tell me anything? About my destiny, who I am?”

  The woman smiled. “Calm down. You’ll have plenty of time.”

  Nowla caught up with them. “She’s not coming.”

  Vivian didn’t seem upset, just surprised. “Oh. Really?”

  Saytera shrugged, feeling uncomfortable. “I can’t. I didn’t tell anyone. I don’t think Yansin…”

  “She’ll understand,” said Vivian. “She might not like the idea now, but, once she knows you’re well, she’ll understand. Kerely told me you like to travel, but you travel so little here, you don’t even know all the Storm Islands!”

  Saytera shook her head. “I’m sorry. I can’t come. But could you at least tell me a little of what you know about me?”

  Vivian shook her head. “I can’t. I gave my word and I don’t mean to break it.” She turned to Nowla. “Let’s go, or we won’t reach the gap before sunrise.” Then to Saytera. “It was a pleasure meeting you. Good luck.”

  That was easier than Saytera had expected. Somehow, she thought the woman would be more insistent.

  Nowla entered the boat, Vivian pushed it into the water and jumped in. Saytera watched as her friend was about to disappear among the calm night waves, dreading walking back to the houses alone. Ugh, plus there was Cayo and his girlfriend and all the nauseous feelings the idea gave her. For a second she wished she were in that boat with them, going to the unknown. But then she remembered Yansin, and how worried she’d been when mentioning Vivian. That woman couldn’t mean anything good, if she could discompose wise, serene Yansin.

  The boat was disappearing in the distance, but still fairly close. Perhaps Saytera could still run or swim to them. What was she thinking? Of course she wouldn’t go. She wanted to stay and learn with Yansin, and then make the most of her potential. But could a short trip hurt her? Just a short trip? Well, Yansin would be mad. With that thought, Saytera tried to muffle the crazy idea that was growing inside her and stop looking at the boat, but then she looked at the sky and all the stars reminded Saytera of the vast Universe that she knew nothing about. Would she spend her entire life in the same place?

  The boat was getting smaller and smaller. Couldn’t Vivian have insisted more? A dry “no, she couldn’t” from Yansin seemed to be the answer. “Yansin is too scared,” she heard Nowla in her own mind. Was Saytera scared too? What was she scared of? Didn’t she want to learn about herself? Suddenly, she was overcome with the greatest fear she had ever felt, and it wasn’t fear of disappointing Yansin, or facing an unknown war: it was the fear of never knowing what else life could offer her.

  The boat had already disappeared in the darkness of the ocean, amidst the rocks surrounding the bay, but it couldn’t be too far. Would she go with Vivian and see whatever the woman wanted to show her, or would she stay and never know? Not knowing: that was a risk not worth taking. A little voice inside her head whispered, “Saytera, don’t, Saytera, don’t go”. It was Yansin’s voice, and Saytera understood it as her voice of fear, which kept repeating, “Don’t go”. Saytera muffled that voice. It was not too late, and it could be her last chance.

  She ran into the water, waved her arms and shouted as loud as she could. “Come back! Vivian! Nowla! Come back, please! I want to come with you!”

  Stopping only to yell, she swam in the direction of the boat. Her yells muffled the “don’t go” in her head, but she feared Vivian and Nowla were too far and couldn’t hear her, or maybe it was too late for them to turn back. She kept yelling, but heard no reply other than the ocean rumbling like it always did. Feeling empty inside, she let her body float in the water. Perhaps it had been for the best. One day she would travel outside the islands. One day. When? With whom? At that moment her island became such an insignificant thing, a little prison. How could she want to stay there? For learning? She didn’t even learn the basic stuff all the other teens were learning at Blaze Island.

  A shout interrupted her thoughts. Nowla was calling her name. They were coming back. Of course they’d come back for her. Saytera watched the boat as it approached her.

  Vivian pulled her up. “We almost left without you.”

  “I know.”

  The night breeze was cooler than Saytera had supposed at first, and with her clothes wet, she shivered.

  Vivian seemed to notice. “I’ll get you some dry clothes on the boat.”

  “Aren’t we already on the boat?”

  Vivian laughed. “This? No, it won’t take us to the continent. Look, over there.”

  4

  New Paths

  Dess looked at the panel announcing the names chosen to move on to command training. The names. Not including his. He felt disconnected from his body, from reality, from everything, because nothing made sense anymore. There was no ground below him, no sky above, just a strange nothingness. Logic brought him back to the moon. A mistake, perhaps? Probably.

  His memory took him back three days. There hadn’t been a single part of the exam he didn’t know inside out. Everything had opened up for him and he focused as he’d always done. Whatever problems from before were gone, just him and the simulator, or him and the questions, no past, no future, just that moment. The only thing bugging him was how easy it had been, as if most of what they’d studied didn’t matter. The result had come a few minutes before. He’d gotten 99%. The highest grade in his class—as expected. And yet, he hadn’t been selected.

  Displaying publicly the winners just made everything twice as awkward, but then, everyone would soon know who’d been chosen. But he wasn�
��t prepared to see that, he wasn’t prepared for this result. For all his life planning and preparing, this was something he had never expected.

  “It might be a mistake.” Marcus’s voice.

  Strange to hear a familiar voice in this strange reality. Oh, he was standing by Dess.

  “Yeah…” Dess said.

  His friend tapped him on the shoulder. “For real. It doesn't make sense, right?”

  “I don’t know.” He didn’t know anything anymore. “Yours is not there either.”

  Marcus sighed. “Not sure I was counting on it.”

  Unlike Dess. For the first time he looked around, to see how other people were reacting. Many were glancing at him. They knew. They all knew he’d been counting on it. There were only six names there, including Sam and Amil, those idiots. They were all decent students, but most of them were not better than Marcus, and they were definitely not better than Dess.

  Focusing on his friend was good. “Why not?” Dess asked. “You’re better than some of them.”

  “Maybe.”

  Strange. With Marcus’s influential parents, Dess had been sure he’d be picked. Perhaps at the end of the day it didn’t matter much for him, or it was just something he didn’t care about. Strange.

  “Look,” Marcus pointed. “There’s commander Serra. Why don’t you ask her?”

  Indeed. The old woman walked by them, dark hair tightly tied in a braided bun, very un-military high heels clacking on the floor. Dess felt somewhat uneasy to approach her like that, but he had to know.

  Serra’s office had an imposing dark wooden desk. Very fancy, considering how rare wood was on Saphirlune.

  Her hands were steepled on the table. “What is your question, Mr. Starspark?”

  That last name usually got an inner scoff from Dess, but today nothing was funny. He’d gone through it in his head and decided to go straight to the point. “Is there a problem in the announcement panel, or was I not chosen for command training?”

  The commander leaned back and smiled, as if she’d been expecting that question. “There’s no problem with the panel. Is that all?”

  “No. I would like to know the reason why my name is not there. I’ve always had the best performances among my colleagues.”

  “Oh.” She feigned surprise. “Is that so? Well, Mr. Starspark, as you should be aware by now, the choice for command is based on a myriad of factors, performance in class and exam results being just two of them.”

  Myriad of factors. Right. Some damn excuse to put whoever had the most powerful parents. Dess had to control his temper. He decided to play the woman’s game. “Can I understand which factor, amongst this myriad, explains why my results didn’t count?”

  “First of all, your results are not that superior. Our chosen applicants got 89% to 95% on their exam. The difference is small and not significant.”

  “Because the exam was ridiculously easy!” Dess slammed his fist on the table.

  She smiled. “There. That’s one factor.”

  He wished he could punch her face, not the table, but he swallowed his anger and pride. “I apologize. This is a delicate moment for me. I’ve never disrespected a superior before.” He looked at her in the eye. “ I dedicated the last seven years of my life for command.”

  Serra took a deep breath. “Well, Mr. Starspark, don’t think we haven’t noticed you, or that we don’t appreciate all that you bring to our forces. But try to look at it from a rational angle. Instead of continuing training, you could go straight to the army. It means you can earn a wage. This is good for you. It doesn’t mean you can’t progress. In fact, if you prove to be remarkable, you might find yourself eventually in command. No huge change.”

  Everything changed. As much as in theory they said that command was open to every initiate, there was no precedent for it.

  “I don’t need a wage. I work. I’ve worked throughout all my training!”

  “Well, there. I’m sure you’ll agree we can’t have a commander working in the kitchen, can we?”

  All the anger he’d kept bottled down burst out.

  Saytera woke with the movement of her bed rocking gently, reddish blue sky outside a window. This was neither dream or nightmare, just a strange reality she could not quite grasp. Had it really been her, the previous night, who had decided to come? Or just a strange part of herself? What difference? For good or bad, there she was.

  She sat up, got out of bed and almost fell, as the floor was tilted sideways. Boat. Right. She also noticed she was wearing those weird skirts—pants, tying both of her legs. Nowla was sleeping in another bed. Saytera went upstairs and outside, where heavy wind hit her face. They were moving faster than any boat she had ever seen or been on. It had poles with some kind of dark grey fabric—sails. She had heard about them, but had never seen one.

  Vivian was on the back, behind a huge steering wheel. She smiled but her expression was focused. Saytera wanted to talk to her, but the wind was too noisy.

  There was no sign of land or even rocks behind them, just a trail of foam heading into the purple-orange sky. In front of them, the sun emerged from the water, a trail of light meeting them. They were encircled in horizon, which meant they were outside the Dotted Sea, far from the Storm Islands.

  Saytera’s legs trembled. She sat on a bench on the low side of the boat, her hand touching the fast moving water, feeling half excited, half terrified, as if these feelings were not different sides of the same something she could not quite explain.

  A dark shape appeared beyond the clouds, like a rock. Probably an island. The boat slowed down and straightened. Was that “the gap” they had to reach before sunrise? All Saytera could see was a solid rock wall. They were headed in that direction, which made little sense, as there would be no place to dock. As they got closer, Saytera noticed a vertical opening, like a crack in the cliff, so perhaps that was indeed the “gap”. Still, where were they going to stop? The boat kept moving towards the cliff, and it wasn’t as slow as Saytera first thought. Vivian looked calm, perhaps only a little more concentrated than before, and it would be stupid to interrupt her to say they were about to crash, even if that was what it looked like.

  When Saytera saw that the rock wall was about to embrace them, she prepared for the impact, but, instead of crashing, the boat glided smoothly into the opening, almost touching the walls on both sides. The gap was not as narrow as she had first thought, although barely wide enough for the boat. The passage got wider and wider as they entered. It was a large cave, illuminated by some rays of light coming from a small, far opening on the opposite side. Vivian docked near a small inner beach, and tossed an anchor. The cave was beautiful, with small crystals here and there reflecting the little light in it.

  Vivian smiled. “We travel at night. It’s safer.”

  Safer only meant there was some danger. The cave’s beauty vanished: it was just a strange place Saytera should never be at. Her stomach clenched wondering what would happen to her when she returned. When she returned. Saytera felt chills that were not exactly excitement.

  Saytera glanced at Vivian. “You’re going to take me back, right?”

  Vivian crossed her arms. “Of course. Unless you want to stay longer, or visit other places… or planets. But I’m giving you my word that I’ll take you back if you ask. You know Terens don’t break their word.”

  Saytera had never heard that word. “What’s a Teren?”

  “Sorry, Saytera, I’m… just, using… old names. Islanders don’t break their word.”

  “But you’re not an islander.”

  Vivian rolled her eyes. “Indeed. We’re much more than that. Still, I don’t break my word.”

  She sounded sincere. Perhaps this wasn’t so bad. And there was no point worrying about something she couldn’t control. For now, all she could do was enjoy her trip. The cave had tiny crystals shining here and there, like a night sky from where one could glance at the distant universe. But these stars, they were close enough. If S
aytera wanted, she could get out of the boat and touch them.

  “Is this the gap?”

  “Yes,” Vivian replied. “It’s beautiful, huh? But don’t go outside. There are things in the water.”

  The crystals on the walls still reflected light in all directions. So close, and yet unreachable, and Saytera was not sure if that made them more beautiful or less.

  “C’mon!” Marcus pleaded. “We have to go.”

  All Dess wanted to do was remain home, researching texts in his universal reader, finding maybe that lost bit of magic he missed, the key to moving forward, finding strength when all was lost. He felt as if the floor had opened below him and he was falling, falling, falling.

  But then, his friend had no idea what had happened. Dess decided not to make it a secret, and took a deep breath. “I quit. I’m no longer in the academy, or in the military. I’m not even sure I’m welcome there.”

  Marcus sucked in a breath and widened his eyes, but then he just acted as if nothing happened. “I’m sure you can change your mind. And it’s a graduation ceremony. Even if you never step foot there again, you have to go.”

  Dess wasn’t sure Serra would allow him to change his mind. He’d thrown his insignia in her trash bin. And broken her fancy wooden desk. At the time, he thought he was being the master of reason for not punching her. Now, he realized perhaps it’d been foolish. But he didn’t want to talk about it. He just asked, “For what?”

  “You never know. They watch us. Do you think they have the party after the names are announced for no reason?”

  He touched his rings, trying to find something there, some courage, some power, something. “They had one before the exams too.”