By the time I got back to the main courtyard, the second day of the festival had turned into a party, and the party had turned into a marketplace.
Everyone was selling something. Recruiters from the guilds stood under the oaks with their sleeves rolled up, pretending they'd just happened to wander by. Broadcasters were grabbing anyone in a uniform and asking them how it felt. Heirs of minor houses were pressing business cards on heirs of major ones. And over all of it, on screens hung between the lamp posts, the day's highlights played on a loop.
Lucifer's Winter's Ascent flickered ten feet tall above the cafeteria doors, his blade trailing frost that drifted out of the projection and settled on people's shoulders. Mythos had upgraded its displays over the summer, and now the replays came with a trace of whatever had been in the original. If you walked under Jin's skeletons, you got goosebumps. I watched three Pillen students do it on purpose and shriek.
