"Again!"
I was already on the ground before the word finished leaving his mouth. Flat on my back, staring up at the sky, trying to remember how to breathe. My sword had landed somewhere to my left. I didn't look for it yet.
Dormin stood over me. Not even winded.
"Slow and sloppy. Pivot the moment your sword meets mine and parry away to create an opening." He held out his hand and pulled me up. "Same as I showed you. Again."
I picked up both swords. The grips settled into my palms the way they always did, heavy and honest. The blades were too sharp for my messy form. I'd already cut myself twice this morning without trying.
I raised them and faced him. Eyes forward. Breathe.
Find the opening. Strike the vitals. Don't telegraph.
I stepped in and drove my right blade toward his ribs.
He brought his sword down hard, pinning it toward the ground. But his head was open.
My left came up fast.
His free hand caught my wrist before the blade got anywhere close. He twisted once, not hard, just enough. My sword hit the dirt for the third time that morning.
"Better," he said, letting go. "You found the opening. You just weren't fast enough to use it."
I got up and picked up my swords to try again but something caught my eye. Layla was training with a bow, her hair catching the wind off her arrow releases. She hadn't looked over once all morning.
"Oren."
"Yeah?" I answered without looking at him.
"You need to focus." His knee came up hard into my chin. My teeth clicked together on my lip and the world went white for half a second. I hit the ground hard, the breath leaving me all at once.
"I don't know where your attention keeps going but you're not going to learn anything this way."
I got up slowly, my whole face throbbing. Blood ran from where my teeth had caught my lip. I wiped it on my sleeve.
Dormin turned away to grab his water.
I swung hard at his back.
He didn't turn around. His leg swept around toward my head in one fluid motion. I ducked under it, both hands shifting to my right sword, driving it toward his ribs with everything I had.
The tip barely grazed his side before his arm came across and clotheslined me into the dirt.
I lay there for a moment staring up at the sky again. Same sky. Same position. Different bruise forming on my throat.
Dormin looked down at me.
"That," he said, "was better."
The sound of horses entering the eastern part of the compound caught both of our attention. A group of riders led by someone dressed in red and black. The leader dropped from his horse and said something to a nearby trainer without breaking stride.
"Who's that?" I asked.
"That's Rue. Grade One. One of the best we have below Zero." Dormin watched him cross the yard. "Don't stare."
Too late.
Rue noticed and smiled as he changed direction toward us. He stopped at Layla first, said something I couldn't hear. She laughed and shoved him lightly.
Yeah. Fuck this guy.
He walked over. He wasn't much bigger than me but the difference was immediate and impossible to miss. Heat came off him in waves that made me sweat from three feet away. I'd felt something like it before, faintly with Damian, overwhelmingly with Ragnar. This sat somewhere between the two. Maybe closer to Ragnar.
Scars ran down both arms. One long one crossed his face along the eye.
"Dormin." He nodded. "They've got you doing trainer work now? That's rough."
He looked at me. "So who's this? Another sad peasant from Riverdale?"
"For your information I'm—" Dormin cut me off.
"This is Oren. Incredible potential, still working on the sword fundamentals." He patted my back once.
"Well you're training him so we can't expect much." Rue laughed.
Dormin's expression didn't change but something behind his eyes did.
"Excuse me?"
Rue's stance shifted. Subtle. The kind of shift you only recognize if you've been watching people fight all morning.
"Care to prove me wrong?" He smiled.
Dormin stepped forward. I could see him shaking slightly.
"Dormin." Layla's voice was low. "Don't."
Rue took one step and disappeared. He reappeared behind Dormin before I registered the movement, one hand relaxed at his side, completely unbothered.
"Listen to reason. You know how this ends."
"Look down," Dormin said.
A short blade pressed into Rue's stomach. Not deep. Just enough.
Rue looked down at it. Then back up. Something shifted in his expression that wasn't quite a smile and wasn't quite respect.
Layla stepped in and pulled Dormin back by the shoulder.
Rue straightened up and looked at Layla.
"Come see me sometime, sweetheart."
Then he walked away without another word.
"He seems like an ass," I said, sitting down on a nearby bench. Dormin dropped down next to me, breathing hard.
"I wouldn't have won that. I was lucky to even see him appear behind me," he said, looking down.
Layla came over and pushed his shoulder lightly.
"Come on. Oren still needs to learn the basics. Let's take him to see Fad."
We got up.
"This," Dormin said, "is the part that's going to suck."
● ● ●
"Now pay attention because I'm only explaining this once."
Fad was a small man with the energy of someone who had said the same things a thousand times and resented every single repetition. He sat behind a desk buried under scrolls and didn't look up when we walked in. Dormin had warned me on the walk over. Don't ask questions. Don't interrupt. Don't make eye contact unless he makes it first.
I'd already decided to ignore all three of those.
"Within this organization there are six obtainable ranks. You are currently Grade Four. That means you are a trainee. You learn, you survive, you do what you're told. Nothing more."
He finally looked up. His eyes moved over me the way you'd assess a weapon you weren't sure was worth sharpening.
"Grade Three requires ten successful missions. Certified operative. Independent low risk contracts. Grade Two requires twenty five to fifty flawless missions with demonstrated battlefield adaptability. You will be expected to survive conditions that would kill most people."
He paused there. I thought about the mission. About the hill and the arrows and Charlotte's face when Ragnar dropped her. I wondered if that counted as surviving conditions that would kill most people or just barely surviving conditions that had already killed two.
"Grade One requires defeating twenty opponents simultaneously and mastering five forms of magick. Elite contracts. Team leadership."
Twenty opponents simultaneously, I thought about Rue in the yard an hour ago. One step and he was behind Dormin before anyone registered the movement. That was Grade One.
I kept that thought to myself.
"Grade Zero is the apex. One hundred to two hundred flawless missions. Total weapons mastery. Complete magick mastery. Undetectable to Grade One operatives." He set his quill down. "There is currently five Grade 0 operatives."
The room was quiet for a moment.
"And above Grade Zero?" I asked.
Dormin closed his eyes briefly.
"Grand Master. One position. One person. To even be considered you must surpass every grade requirement, defeat ten Grade Twos, ten Grade Ones, and five Grade Zeros in succession, master every form of magick, and demonstrate leadership under conditions that would break anyone else." He picked his quill back up. "No one in this room will ever hold that title. Any questions?"
I raised my hand.
"No."
I put it down slowly.
"Good. Leadership structure." He pulled out a fresh scroll. "Grand Master at the top. Supreme authority. What he says is law. Below him the Veiled Council. Intelligence, magickal research, strategy. Their identities are unknown outside the Society. You will never know who they are and you will never ask."
He moved his finger down without looking.
"High Executor below that. Operational commander. Contracts, deployment, mission oversight. Everything moving in the field goes through him. Below the Executor are Branch Masters. Regional leaders. Recruitment, training, mission distribution. You answer to your Branch Master before anyone else outside your immediate team."
He set the scroll down.
"Finally the Clan Heads. Leaders of the specialized orders. Each clan has its own focus and its own standards. If you are assigned to one you answer to your Clan Head directly."
He looked at all three of us.
"Any questions?"
I raised my hand again.
He stared at me for a long moment. Then at Dormin. Then back at me.
I put it down.
"Good. Get out."
● ● ●
We walked out into the evening. The sun had dropped low enough that the magick lanterns were beginning to light themselves one by one down the path.
"You guys hungry? My treat," Dormin said.
"Sure," I said.
"I could eat." Layla muttered.
We turned toward the western side of the compound. Without warning Layla pulled her bow, nocked an arrow, and loosed it at a figure in the distance. The man dropped to the ground.
"A thousand gold," she said, already walking toward the body. She crouched down and pulled a sigil from his coat.
"No fair, I saw him first," Dormin said.
I stood there watching her. "You just killed someone. In the Society compound."
"Certain operatives carry bounties. All I did was collect." She stood and pocketed the sigil.
Dormin laughed and clapped me on the shoulder.
"Welcome to the S.O.A."