The Spade Queen

Prologue

July 20th, 2016

Only three people were waiting. The room was huge, enough for at least a hundred people. It seemed unnatural for only three people to be occupying such a large space.

Everything about the room was oddly uncomfortable, considering it was mostly empty. The only objects were steel benches running along the entire length of a wall, plus half a dozen plastic chairs that littered the floor in random places.

There was also a half heartedly set-up table of refreshments, filled with fruit and lemonade and cookies. None of the three teenagers touched the food at the table, already feeling sick to their stomachs. It was their fourteenth birthday. Normally, birthdays in the training house meant nothing more than a milestone.

Six more years until testing.

Three more years.

One more year.

They were used to birthdays being nothing worth celebrating. But, this was the birthday where their fates were decided at the hands of a machine. One simple scan that took into account every breath, every thought, every movement that they ever made.

Fourteen was the age that every child simultaneously feared, and looked forward to.

The two young boys were dressed nicely, in black tuxes of brand new expensive fabric. The girl, who had not an ounce of anxiety to be found on her face, wore a flowy white dress that hung just above her knees. The top was laced and strapless, and she found herself constantly pulling up the itchy fabric.

She'd never been too fond of dresses, or any object that screamed 'fancy' for that matter. But this dress was completely dreadful.

Her dark curls were tied half back, and the half that hung loose swung freely into her face. She couldn't understand what the problem was with keeping her hair in a ponytail.

"Do you think I'll be a Club?" asked the boy beside her, who also happened to be her best friend.

"Shh!" she snapped at him. The boy stood, facing her.

"What? It's not like they told us we had to be quiet," he said defensively, but his voice had lowered to a whisper.

He backed up towards the refreshment table, and popped a strawberry in his mouth. She rolled her eyes.

"Still, now's not the time, Blake."

The other boy shuffled in his seat. She recognized him from her classes, but she wasn't sure of his name, nor was she sure she had ever heard his voice.

He was small, quite a bit shorter than herself, and he had black hair that lay flat on his head. She waited for him to say something, but eventually he stopped moving and showed no sign of speaking anytime soon.

Finally, the door slowly creaked open. Blake scurried back to his seat on the bench, and the three of them sat with their hands in their laps.

The boss, a tall man with spiky hair and a beard, strolled in. He grinned at the three kids. His name was Axel, and he was a former Spade. Apparently he was assigned the job of running the Training House years ago, and forced to leave the Spade kingdom. He was a very strict man, punishing any kid who forgot to call him Boss. Not many forgot.

"So, you kids are finally fourteen!" He paused, as if the kids were to reply, but they didn't so much as make eye contact.

He cleared his throat, and snatched a cookie from the table. "Not hungry?" he asked, taking a bite.

"No," Blake muttered. Axel shot him a look, but said nothing. "...Boss," he added quickly.

After a painfully long silence of Axel finishing off his cookie, he waved over the girl.

"Zella, you're up first."

Slowly, Zella stood from her spot on the bench and shuffled towards the boss. She took a deep breath and smoothed out her dress. She was ready.

"Wait!" Blake leaped up and ran over to Zella before embracing her. "Good luck, Zella, I know you'll make it," he whispered into her shoulder. Zella smiled.

"See you on the other side, Blake."

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The testing room's loudspeaker droned on about the same story Zella had heard a billion times. She recited the words under her breath, along with the computer-animated voice. As much as she was sick of listening to the history of the world, it kept her mind from getting anxious.

Nonetheless, Zella's heart hammered as a foreign machine pricked her finger, drawing a miniscule drop of blood and storing it somewhere inside of itself. She scolded herself silently. She wasn't supposed to feel any fear, or show any signs of weakness.

The devices are smart, she was told. They can sense any nervousness, and that can betray everything else. Zella couldn't afford that, she knew who she was, and a weak scared little girl wasn't it. Her nerves calmed after her short internal peptalk, and she held her chin up and kept her shoulders back.

A separate contraption swabbed around her mouth, and another snipped at her hair. There was only one thing left.

Once the steel machines had cleared her path, Zella had a clear view of the room. It was a blindingly white ceramic, both the walls and the ceiling, with the exception of a slightly less white linoleum floor.

A giant black screen took up the majority of the wall in front of her, and just before that, stood the final scanner. She prepared herself to walk across it, and heard faint screams from outside the room.

"No, don't take me back, I belong in a kingdom, I swear..."

Zellas heart broke a little from the desperate cries. The other boy got denied, and now he would be sent back to the City of Jokers for good. There were two testing rooms, Blake would be going in any second. She didn't have time to wait for him though.

She prayed for the poor boy silently as she stepped through the scanner. Hopefully the City of Jokers isn't as harsh as they say.

She'd been taken from the city before she was even a month old, when the Training House staff did their monthly search for any new babies. She didn't intend on going back. She knew she possessed kingdom blood. Well, everyone thinks that, but Zella was positive.

She scrunched her eyes, knowing her results would pop onto the screen any second.

This is it.

She didn't open her eyes until the loudspeaker silenced from telling it's story for the millionth time. Bold letters flashed on the screen, and the computer voice spoke once more.

"Congratulations. You belong to the Spade Kingdom."