Prophecy of the Nexus

Chapter 16

"How different are we talking?" Sir Atticus said slowly.

"Totally," I replied. "Like they saw an old, bold man. While I saw this young woman with long silver hair and purple eyes."

Sir Atticus stood up suddenly, making his desk rattle and sending countless reports to the floor. He was glaring at me. "Are you sure?" he said in a low voice.

I nodded. "One hundred percent. She looked at me when we had our lineup." I thought back to the look that stuck in my head all these years. The lingering eyes that had once given me hope, but now I wasn't so sure. "Was she a witch?" I asked. The witches had the same silvery hair, but why would they want to be involved in our Arknight programme?

Sir Atticus shook his head and began pacing his office. "No. Witches wouldn't dare come near the city without permission. Plus, their eyes aren't purple." I hesitated, trying to remember why that was important. Sir Atticus spotted the confusion on my face. "It's one of the first signs of a lost soul."

"So this woman was a demon mid-transformation?" Marcus asked.

"Could be," Sir Atticus said, thinking deeply. "But, they usually run away as soon as the Halo burns them. She wouldn't stay unless she was powerful enough to overcome it." I shivered. I didn't want to imagine what a demon with the power to shrug off the Halo's power could do. Sir Atticus turned to look at me. "We are going to need to do the Aurelian trials again."

"Why? I'm already a Squire, sir," I pointed out.

"Because we need to find out if something else is afoot," Sir Atticus responded. He was looking a little manic now. "If your result doesn't calibrate with your previous score, then we know it has been altered."

I nodded. The plan made sense, and from what I remember, the trials weren't difficult at all. But there was one problem with the plan. "Sir, I've come a long way since my trials, and so won't my score be different. How will we compare me now to me at eleven? How will we know if I would have passed?"

Sir Atticus chuckled. "Simple, we need a control. Someone who passed the first time." We both turned to Marcus, who groaned.

The next day we prepared for the Aurelian trials. It was strange, as we had to be the only people in history that would do it more than once. There were no repeats or retries. You had one shot, and that was that. I thought back to my first trials and how awkwardly they had gone.

There were three parts to the trials: mind, body, and spirit. The mind was an analysis of our critical thinking, our knowledge, and intelligence. Next was the body which focused on physical exercise. This had gone badly for me last time (it was the thing I blamed for not making Squire the first time). The last test was by far a more interesting one. To test your spirit, they brought you into a dark room and you had to hold a node. You were then told to think of things: the Divine, families, angels, friends, and our very soul. The node then measured your divine connection. It was more therapeutic than anything. Still, I wondered if mine would be different now.

We headed to the classroom for the examination side. Marcus stood silently outside, waiting for Sir Atticus with the test. "Do you know who got the highest score of our year?" I asked casually. The tension was weirdly thick with just the two of us. Marcus seemed just as competitive as ever, but there was more to him now. Would he try to prove he was just as good as me? Even though there was no question, he was clearly better.

Marcus snorted. "I got the highest score." I eyed him sceptically. "Don't look at me like that. I had 'the great Sir Atticus' as a mentor. How could I not?"

"And you swear your trial wasn't interfered with?"

"Trust me," Marcus said, grinning at me. "If Atticus had interfered, he would have meddled twice as hard to stop me becoming an Arknight." It was an odd comment. I would have thought any parent or guardian would want a child to follow in their footsteps, let alone being an Arknight. However, if you had seen the horrors of war with demons, you might think otherwise.