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Step Into the Darkness, Carry the Light

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Prologue

My mouth waters in anticipation as I raise the plump berry to my lips, eagerly awaiting the sweet juiciness I know will burst from beneath the bright skin. The moment shatters when Dad’s whispered alarm fills my ears, a harsh tone I barely ever hear him use. Firm fingers quickly wrap around my wrist and shake it until the fruit falls from my grasp. 

My wide eyes flash up to Dad, searching his now relieved smile, until settling on the discarded berry. As my heart thumps unevenly in my throat, it takes a second for me to realize how close I was to death.

I learned to be grateful for what I have a long time ago because you never know when it will end. My mother would whisper that to me at night as she tucked me into bed, humming a soft lullaby that never failed to pull me toward sleep. It always stuck with me, years after she stopped walking me to my bedroom in the corner of our small cabin, the words she uttered before my heavy eyelids would drop. 

When it will end, she would say, not if.

“See the color of these berries, bumblebee? That means they’re poisonous, so watch out.” Dad’s voice drags me from my inner thoughts, and I eye the bright red spheres that hang innocently from a bush. 

“They look just like cryberries,” I state, leaning forward to inspect the impostors more closely. “How can you tell the difference?”

Dad laughs, the deep rumble making my lips stretch involuntarily into a smile. “Similar, but not quite the same. Look closer, Cassie. These are bigger and brighter. They want you to choose them, to fool you into believing they will be even more delicious than a cryberry. Just because something appears better doesn’t mean that it is. Now, let’s go home before your mother starts to worry. The sun will set soon.” 

He slowly gets up, stretching out his knees as he goes. I follow suit and snatch the leather pouch full of our non-life-threatening berries from his hand. I love how he lets me come with him when he forages, teaching me all that he knows about plant life, and in return, I try to be as little of a burden as possible. 

We walk the short trek back to our house in comfortable silence, one of Dad’s arms slung across my shoulders. I lean my head against him and focus my eyes on the ground as we weave past shadows the trees cast, always staying within the light. I can feel the warmth seep into my back as the sun creeps below the trees, the shadows on the forest floor lengthening in a gentle reminder to hurry. 

Then I’m talking again, quietly chatting about the latest thing I learned in my studies with Mom and a plot twist from one of my favorite mystery books that I’m rereading for the tenth time. Dad just nods his head, chuckling when I throw in a joke to keep him entertained. 

Only when we pass through the wooden threshold and I’m swept into my mother’s arms do I realize there was a slight tightness in my stomach while we were walking home.

“Welcome back,” Mom gushes, bending far enough away to brush a strand of brown hair from my face. I stare up at her hazel eyes, only a few shades darker than mine, and take a deep breath, leaning into her comforting touch. She ushers the two of us into the house and softly shuts the door. “Dinner is almost ready.”

I watch my parents hug with a small smile, struggling to smother my unease. I’ve never liked the silence. Being outside for fifteen years without problems hasn’t quite subdued the fear, not fully, even though my parents have tried to prepare me for everything. 

At a young age, they explained to me what happened to our world, how monsters swallowed humanity thirteen years before I was born. I’ve yet to see an Obsidian in real life, but sometimes, when it’s silent, I think I can hear them moving in the distance, snapping a tree branch. That a shadow slightly more formed than the others is our death inching closer to us. 

My eyes flash to the front door, muscles tensing like a demon is already on the other side, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. Waiting for the end.

Almost as if pulled there by a force, my eyes switch from the door to one of the many torches that line the inside of our home. The torch in the living room is dimming, signaling it's time to switch in new pieces of wood. My increased heartbeat evens out as my gaze settles on the flickering flame. The comfort that swathes me rivals my fear when looking into the inky darkness of night. The flames protect us from the monsters that revel in the shadows. 

As long as we have fire, we will survive.

1

Daggers and Emmerick

My consciousness comes back quickly, as if it was holding its breath for as long as it could and then had to gasp for air. Eyes snapping open, I stare at the black mat that’s sprinkled with small red drops. 

My blood, I think slowly. The flashback of being with my parents years ago floods my vision, but I force the images away, trying to focus on the multitude of voices shouting above my head.

“She’s fainted!”

“It hasn’t even been thirty seconds!”

“Someone get the Serous. What a waste of resources.”

Without fully understanding the situation, I jump to my feet with my hands curling into fists. From the few snippets I could concentrate on, there are only a couple of options for where I am. The same places I’ve been for the last three years since joining the academy.

All of them suck.

I blink rapidly to clear the black spots in my vision until I see the large, muscled man looming across from me. Brown hair shaved close to his head, a twisted smirk distorting his features. Emmerick, such a lovely human being and classmate, looks ready to smash my face in for a second time tonight, but he holds his ground.

“I think you’ve lost, Cassie.” The oaf doesn’t even look out of breath.

“I’m standing, aren’t I?” I bite out through clenched teeth, wiping at the blood trickling from my nose. 

My eyes dart around the poorly lit room, toward the other students who exude annoyance at my pathetic display of strength, until they land on the one instructor in the old gymnasium. I’m not sure ‘instructor’ is the best word for him since he’s about as caring as an Obsidian. 

Lywell Raddo, a middle-aged man with glasses and a lanky frame, leans against the door with an air of indifference. When a challenge is in session, he always plants himself in front of the only exit. I wonder if it’s a conscious decision to make sure no one can leave.

Eyes so dark they almost look black lock with mine, and he tilts his head to the side, curly flaxen hair falling across his forehead. “The rules state that the match ends if an opponent forfeits or goes unconscious. You, my dear, were clearly out of it, even if just for a second. That means Emmerick wins, continuing his undefeated streak.” Raddo pushes the wire-framed glasses farther up his nose and gives me a wicked grin. “Better luck next time.”

I glance around the room, doing my best to hold my tongue. Six other classmates of mine watch with bated breath, not hiding their hope that I’ll restart the match anyway.

I step back, putting on my most charming smile. As my mouth widens, I feel the sting of a split lip. “Well, I’ll be going to bed then, if that’s it. Pity, I was ready for round two.”

Turning around, I march toward the exit until I’m directly in front of Raddo. He peers down at me for a second before stepping to the side. Opening the door, my head stretches to look behind me. “It’s been fun. Thanks for the splendid memories, as always. See you next week?”

I slam the door before anyone can respond, sagging against the wood once it’s closed. What a mess. I barely remember what happened in the fight prior to my quick snooze, though I’m sure it went exactly how all of my other challenges had gone. With Emmerick feeling the need to release some steam on the nearest individual, and that was me. 

I really need to learn to stand farther away from him.

I remember what my mind had conjured up while I wasn’t awake, though. My chest squeezes as my dream comes back to me. My parents. The nightmare of their deaths almost three years ago resurfaces every night, but seeing them in a daydream is new. 

My fingers twist within the gray sweatshirt above my heart. The pain that seizes me when I think of them never goes away, but it always fades. I wait as long as I dare—I refuse to let anyone in that challenge room see me like this—until the throbbing settles into a dull ache. Three seconds will have to do.

Blowing out a breath, I force the tension from my body and push off the door, slowly making my way back to my dorm room. Normally, I’d do a training session before going to bed, but more than anything, I’m ready to shut my brain off for a few hours. 

My feet guide me to my room as I walk the empty stone hallways, the soft tapping of my steps echoing around me. It’s late enough that I doubt anyone will try to stop me. The guards who protect the school are more focused on not letting anything get in when the sun’s gone rather than stopping our illicit fights. That’s why the challenges only happen at night. 

It doesn’t take long to reach the dorm wing. The school is only big enough to fit about two hundred humans in total. Between the five grades of students, instructors, and guards, there are about a hundred and thirty of us. 

I quietly slide the door to my room open, careful not to wake up my roommate and best friend, Sara Rosen. It doesn’t matter. Sara sprawls on her bed, lightly snoring. I’ve always envied her ability to sleep so soundly, especially since I rarely get five hours of rest a night. 

Heading into our adjoining bathroom, I walk toward the small flower box containing our light source, Azura. It’s a mushroom that emits a blue glow, almost as luminous as torchlight. I pour water from the sink into my hand and let the droplets splash onto the wide blue caps. 

We’d get into big trouble if we let our light source die. It’s a common plant that grows easily, but with how much we use, there’s not a lot left over to replant a room. 

After ensuring the Azura mushroom’s health, I strip my dirty clothes off and step into the shower, carefully washing the minor scrapes that line my arms and face. 

Exhaustion aches in my bones when my head finally hits the pillow. I try not to think about how easy it was for Emmerick to defeat me in the fight. After three years as a student at Hallow Academy, experiencing countless painful challenges, my skills are still lacking, no matter the effort I put in.

With only a few months of school before we graduate and join the losing side of the war, I know I’m not ready to make a difference.

If I’m going to become a hunter who won’t die on their first day outside the walls, I need to become stronger.

~~~~~

“I’m curious. What were you dreaming about that put you in such a deep sleep?” Sara turns her head to study me as we walk the long hallways of the school. 

I’m usually out of bed and halfway through a training session when Sara gets up, but today, she had to throw me out of bed to wake me. And I mean, she physically tossed me onto the floor, which was an exciting way to greet the day.

I was dreaming about the same thing I was during the challenge: my life before the academy. I’ve never talked with Sara about my parents or how they died, so I skim as close to the truth as possible without going into details. “The day before I joined the academy. It brought back some unhappy memories.” 

We follow the white granite path through a large stone archway that leads to an outside trail with an overhead balcony. The entire academy looks reconfigured from a giant stone castle, complete with torches and display cases of distinct Obsidian-slaying weapons. I’m unsure if they are proper weapons or just for show, but a few times, the temptation almost had me picking the lock.

“Ah, I see,” she breathes, and I bet she does see. 

Only those who either can’t get an apprenticeship in a specialized school—like researcher, blacksmith, historian—or have nowhere else to go join a military academy, training to become a soldier in the war against the demons that plague Arrynd, our country.

The instructors say we lost contact with Ortibam, the only country connected to ours, days after the spread began. And because Arrynd is surrounded by the Night Sea—a deadly ocean that is impossible to cross except through a thinly raised stretch of land called the Bone Strip, also overrun by Obsidian—we have no way to ask for military help or resources. 

Any attempt we’ve had at trying to cross the sea with hastily made boats or sending scouts to sneak their way through the Bone Strip to Ortibam has gotten us nothing but more casualties. We haven’t stopped trying, but Arrynd has been on its own for the last thirty-one years, and we’re losing the fight. Soldiers are the only thing that stands between our complete extinction and a minuscule chance at surviving. 

I wonder if Sara’s entrance to the school resembles my own. Hunters, whose primary goal is to travel the country protecting families and farms from Obsidian attacks, were too late to save anyone but her.

When I become a hunter, I wonder how many times I’ll be too late to save someone.

I sigh and stuff my hands into my gray hoodie’s pockets, suddenly wishing I hadn’t brought up such a depressing topic. “You know what? I just think I didn’t sleep well last night, and now my brain is malfunctioning. Don’t worry about it.”

Sara purses her lips, her chocolate brown eyes not easily deceived. “Uh-huh, sure. I’ve never known you to sleep well, Cassie. You and sleep are like,” she pauses and wiggles her fingers at me, “hot and cold, day and night, daggers and Emmerick.”

I laugh and bump into Sara with my shoulder. It’s true; Emmerick would never choose a weapon length less than two feet. It just doesn’t fit with his superior-in-all-things-mighty personality. 

Thinking of Emmerick brings up last night’s challenge, and the humor drains out of me. Sara knows I get challenged, though she doesn’t know about this latest one. 

She’s seen me come back from some nasty fights in the past and has threatened to tell the headmaster about them, but I’ve always talked her out of it. The backlash from the other students would be extreme, and I’m not convinced Headmaster Hallow doesn't already know it’s going on. While he may not intervene, it would be odd for the challenges to be happening for so long without him hearing about them. Professor Raddo knows about them, so why couldn’t Hallow? 

Besides, the challenges help me practice my skills in high-stakes scenarios. The system mainly showcases the strength of bullies, but that doesn’t mean I can’t get something out of it. Thinking of the silver lining keeps me from cracking under the humiliation.

We continue down the stone awning that lines the inner perimeter of the academy. The pillars on our left obstruct my view of the expansive green grass, but I can hear some of the younger kids discussing different tactical drills they must have just learned in class. Thunder cracks overhead, warning the students that rain might encroach on their discussion. 

I lean out towards the grounds to stretch my head past the covered walkway to the sky, eyeing the dark storm clouds in the distance with a frown. I pick up my pace. At eighteen and in the fifth-year class, I rarely use the courtyard since it’s the prime hangout spot for anyone under the age of fifteen. Team drills occupy most of the green space when class is in and out of session.

Sara and I move swiftly toward our classes' gym, which can be accessed from the current pathway, just after the entrance to the mess hall. Past the two rooms, the colonnade splits into three separate pathways. The left trail continues to ring around the courtyard in a square that also leads to the faculty and guard wing. Going straight is a small dirt trail that heads toward the garden. The right follows the walkway until it travels back into the main building.

I long to follow the dirt trail, sit by the flowers, and listen to the soft babbling of the pond. It’s been a while since I’ve been there. It is the most serene place in the academy, yet most people forget it even exists. There isn’t much time for relaxing when you’re at war. 

Stuck in my head, I collide with a lithe body exiting the cafeteria. I stumble back a few steps but catch my footing before I end up embarrassingly on my butt. My mouth flies open, a snappy response on the tip of my tongue. It dies as I lift my head to stare at the two figures in front of me.

“My goodness, Cassidy, I’m very sorry about that. I should have been paying attention to where I was walking. Are you alright?” A hand comes down on my shoulder, and Officer Zypha Felvor’s pale green eyes survey me with worry. 

As head of security, she’s clad in her usual black uniform, her red hair pulled into a tight bun that highlights the silver strands lining the sides.

“I’m fine, Officer Zypha. It was my fault.” I smile and deftly slide out of her hold, glancing behind Zypha to find her second-in-command. The black-haired man is only a few years older than us, but he’s risen through the ranks quickly.

Adrian Camson stands rigidly off to Zypha’s left in the same standard officer uniform, his hands clasped behind his back. His sharp blue eyes roam over Sara before locking onto mine, but he remains silent. 

In fact, I don’t think I’ve heard him say three words to me since the day I joined the academy. The thought tugs my mouth into a frown, and his gaze dips to it before pulling back up to my eyes. 

My cheeks flood with heat without permission, the mortification of the flush almost doubling the warmth on my face. I focus on the head officer, who continues to apologize. Stop overreacting, Cassie! He did nothing to warrant a stupid blush. 

“Well, it’s good to see you both either way. How are your classes going?”

Before I can respond, Sara loops her skinny arm through mine, shoots Zypha a dazzling smile, and drags me down the hallway. I sputter, attempting to break free, but she holds on tight. How can someone so tiny be so strong? 

“It was nice seeing you, Zypha.” Sara twirls around and waves at the stunned woman, still pulling me along. “Unfortunately, we have sparring class to get to. You know what Professor Tala will do to us if we’re late!” 

Zypha blinks in bemusement before waving back with a grin. She shouts something about the importance of good attendance as we disappear into the gym. 

I tug on my best friend’s arm to get her to slow down, partly grateful she pulled me away from what felt like the beginnings of an epic embarrassment. “Sara, we still have ten minutes left before class. What’s the rush?” 

She lowers her speed to a casual stroll, weaving through black leather sparring mats to reach the back of the room and running a hand through her short brown hair. Even half-irritated, my best friend is beautiful.

“Zypha is kind and all, but she tries too hard to be involved in our lives. Besides,” Sara shivers and wraps her arms around herself, “Adrian stresses me out. He’s way too intense to be around.”

I tilt my head and purse my lips, drumming my fingers on the sides of my gray training pants. I always found Adrian’s fierce gaze comforting. He appears to be someone you can count on, albeit not for a good laugh. 

I’ve never seen him in action, but I’ve heard whispers of his power and agility, that he’s killed an Obsidian in less than ten seconds, and no human has ever matched him in combat. They even said that Hallow Academy begged him to join a year earlier than the required age, too desperate to wait. If those stories are true, I wonder why someone with such great strength would spend his days as an uneventful security officer.

2

A Fierce Tongue

I spin around and face Sara while walking backward. My mouth pulls up at the corners as I give a teasing laugh. “Adrian can't creep you out when we’ve been preparing for years to kill a lot scarier things.”

“That’s different,” Sara huffs out with a grimace. “The Obsidian are supposed to be scary. It’s like their job. It wouldn’t hurt Adrian to smile once in a while.” 

I chuckle, my gaze bouncing through the vast gymnasium. Mats evenly space the stone floor, and equipment fills the perimeter, ranging from shelves of various swords to worn wooden targets. As we near the back wall, it’s impossible to ignore the paint splattered against the stone. Every graduate from Hallow Academy has painted their name on the stone blocks, a last rite before they’re considered a fully fledged soldier in the war. Twenty-five years' worth of academy history is strewn across the wall, each name written in either black, red, or white dye.

Adrian’s name is displayed first in his class from four years ago, which isn’t surprising given the rumors about him. Our current professor, Tala, is there too, five years before him and placed third in her year.

Chelsea and Amber are already wrestling, forgoing their weapons on the side of the ring. There are multiple training facilities throughout the academy, enough that every class can train in one simultaneously. The seniors always receive the largest gym, which I assume is so we can see the graduation list as daily motivation.

Because it isn’t just a proud archive of the academy’s graduates.

It’s also a memorial.

More than half of the names have the academy’s symbol stained red beside them: an ‘H’ and ‘A’ overlaying each other. Those are the warriors who have fallen in battle, and most of them are students who were lower than tenth place in the rankings. All twenty-five students ranked last have a symbol by their name.

I clench my teeth and move toward the side of the room, focusing on my usual stretching routine. I eye Amber as she circles Chelsea, whose chest is heaving with wheezes. Amber is a flash of red as she steps close to Chelsea, throwing her off balance and then sweeping her legs out from under her. Chelsea lands on her back with a thump, her long black hair splayed out behind her, and I wince. Why they would want to waste all their energy before class begins is beyond me.

The nearest corner puffs with dust as my discarded hoodie lands in a heap. I lower myself to the floor, grab my toes, and rest my head on my knees. Releasing a deep breath, I close my eyes and sink into the stretch.

My goal today is to not need the infirmary. Honestly, that’s my goal every day. For my first year at the academy, I spent more nights there than in my dorm room. 

My senior year has gone a little more smoothly, but the nurse likes to point out that we still have a few months left of the school year. It’s nice to know she believes in me, I think with a sarcastic chuckle. 

The room fills with chatter as the rest of the class files in and starts their warm-ups. I glance at Sara, whose sparring steps look more like a dance than an attack routine. She’s incredibly elegant but still strikes like a panther. 

I smile as I remember the first time I faced her in the sparring ring. I finally thought I’d found an opponent that I could beat, but boy, was I wrong. 

Tala, the senior professor, strides into the room with purpose and conversations quickly die out. She spares me a withering glance before planting herself in the center of the chamber. 

Most of our class is terrified of being reprimanded by Tala’s fierce tongue. For me, I’ve verbally sparred against our instructor so many times that I can predict what she’ll say to me before she says it. She’s hated me all these years—beginning on the day I said yes to joining the academy—and I still don’t know why. 

I haven’t had to deal with her dislike of me until my senior year, when she officially became my professor. Before that, she normally ignored me as much as possible while her gray eyes shot daggers from afar.

Hands perched on her hips, she tells us all to take five laps around the courtyard. Complaints erupt throughout the room, but one look from Tala shuts them up. “Do you think I care that it’s raining out? Do you think the demons will wait for perfect weather to slaughter innocent people? Get your sorry butts out there right now!” 

The class scrambles through the door, establishing a brisk pace under the stone canopy. A sigh pulls from my lips as a wild crack of thunder rumbles the ground under our feet. 

Sara and I were out here just minutes ago, but it feels like night has captured the afternoon. Black storm clouds whirl above us, and the courtyard is vacant of the young students practicing their skills earlier. The sound of the rain pelting down on earth and stone overpowers my senses. I take in a lungful of air, the scent of a storm prickling my nose. The pillars do very little to keep the cold raindrops from pelting us sideways as the wind picks up in fervor. 

I glance up at the wall’s ledge and scan the guards that stand rigidly in the rain, watching over the perimeter. A thunderstorm is never good for the academy: darkness and lack of sight with the rain are a dangerous combination.

Sara cups the side of her face to keep the water out of her eyes. “Professor Tala is in a worse mood than normal. What’s her deal?”

I smirk as I watch the students in front of us hug the side of the school to escape the brunt of the storm. I push wet brown strands of hair that escaped my ponytail from my eyes in one fluid, forceful movement. Even though it’s pouring, I still relish the sensation of my feet hitting the stone, my muscles straining with exertion, pushing my body forward. Warm-up is my favorite part of the class. 

“Her deal,” I shout over another boom of thunder, “is that the rain probably ruined her perfectly styled hair. ‘How am I supposed to fight back a horde of Twos without chipping a nail?’” I whine in my finest high-pitched Tala impersonation. 

Sara laughs, telling me to keep quiet before someone overhears. 

“That’s not funny, Cassidy.” Joshua rotates his head to look back at me with a disapproving scowl, his curly black hair bouncing with every step. Like most of the men in our class, he’s bulky from years of training. I remember his face as a classmate who witnessed my epic fail of a challenge last night.

“Oh, you’ve done it now,” Sara leans in to whisper in my ear. 

Oh, yes, I did. Ugh, I’m gonna get a lot of crap for this. Of course the teacher’s pet is the one to witness my great impression. 

“Sounds to me like you’ve lost your sense of humor. Do you want my help to find it?” I give Joshua my sweetest smile and bat my waterlogged eyelashes at him. He huffs and runs faster, like he can’t stand to be near me. 

That’s just great. When Tala hears about this, I can kiss my daily goal goodbye. 

~~~~~

No one knows for sure where the first Obsidian came from, or if it’s inflicted anywhere else but Arrynd. There are rumors about how they came here, though. That the sin of our country drew the worst race of monsters from hell, or the black souls of the dead molded together to create a nightmare come to life. 

Either way, the Obsidian arrived. I’ve only seen them once in my life, the day my parents died. Since then, I’ve dedicated the last three years to learning everything about them in order to destroy them.

The first recorded incident was near Pellema, a small town fifty miles from Hallow Academy. Before anyone knew what was happening, the monsters took over Maltava, the largest trading city in Arrynd, where there was no stopping the spread. It was only a matter of time before the entire country collapsed in on itself, leaving us on the edge of extinction.

They don’t seem to be sentient, just attracted to humans. One bite from an Obsidian transforms a human into one of their own. The person becomes encrusted in the black rock of the Obsidian’s skin, and they pounce on the nearest victim within minutes. 

A single creature turned ten people, who then turned a hundred people, until the monsters became a colossal problem. Regular weapons can barely crack their stone skin, but through extensive trial and error, we found that fire is the easiest way to kill them. It melts their skin, breaking through their armor, and allows us to take them down from the inside. 

Fire also naturally repels the Obsidian and daytime makes them weaker. Attacks often happen at night, as they meld with the shadows, stalking their prey. Having a source of light at all times increases the chance of survival tenfold. 

Even knowing their weakness, we find ourselves on the losing side of the war. Things look bleak, but humanity isn’t known for giving up.

~~~~~

My face scrunches as I pluck at the black tank top that’s suctioned to my stomach. We’ve been out of the rain and back in the training room for an hour now, yet I still look like a drowned rat. Tala vetoed allowing everyone to change clothes after our warm-up laps, saying this is a great ‘deal-with-an-unfortunate-situation’ exercise. 

We started with practicing our sparring techniques, but have now switched to one-on-one sparring matches. In this drill, everyone gathers around the middle ring, and we watch our classmates get beaten up as we take notes on what not to do. People always seem to take more notes when it’s my turn. 

The aim is to last three minutes in the ring without stepping out or becoming unconscious; if both people are still standing, it’s a draw. 

Each year focuses on a different aspect of our military training. Students in Year One learn everything about the enemy, from their average height to the difference in their speed when the sun is up. They also learn useful practical skills, assisting in the academy’s greenhouse and workshop. Year Two works with weapons, since wielding Obsidian swords and arrows is dangerous and takes a lot of dexterity. The weapons are on fire, after all. 

Year Three memorizes different tactical skills, learning to fight with order and structure so no one in your group dies. Year Four students put those drills into action. At the end of the fourth year, students should be proficient enough to go out with any team and kill quickly and efficiently. 

Year Five is all about placement as an academy graduate. You show off your fighting skills, endurance, and anything you can to get a high enough ranking to choose the job you want. 

To make sure no one slacks off, the rankings are secret until the end of each month, where the scores reconfigure based on how well you did the month prior. Normally, the rankings don’t change too much. Top students stay on top and those on the bottom…

Let’s just say those on the bottom are trying really hard not to be there.

Tala walks around the ring, her gray eyes swinging between Sara and Joshua as they take turns dodging and jabbing. Her face is gentle compared to when she looks at me, but a small frown etches her mouth. Obviously, the lack of intensity is not making her happy. 

The rain has made the students sluggish, as if their punches are moving through water. It’s been about two minutes so far, and with a quick survey of the room, I can tell that most fights will probably end in draws. A lot of kids are sitting, some twisting water from their shirts, the clothes making puddles around them. 

The only two people on their feet are me and Emmerick, though I suspect Emmerick has never sat down in his life. His oversized frame oozes intimidation, with a neck the size of a tree trunk. He looks like a bear that has the uncanny ability to walk on two feet. 

Just observing Emmerick makes my mind travel to the elixir Serous and all the times I’ve had to take it after sparring with him. 

I’ve never heard of the medicine before coming here, but thirteen years after the Obsidian arrived, more powerful, mutated monsters emerged. Some gained back senses, like their sight or hearing, or their skin became fireproof, making it almost impossible to kill them until you chip enough of their natural armor to use the fire internally. 

Hunters captured some of the more unique demons and found that one of them could regenerate from any cuts that weren’t lethal. They extracted its blood and transformed it into a regeneration elixir, one significantly less potent than its origins. It’s saved more lives than we can count. The best part is that, because of its intense level of filtration, there’s no chance of transforming, no matter how much someone takes.

What I hate most about Serous is how the medicine has brought out aggressively violent tendencies in almost everyone. Except for being maimed, Serous cures all injuries, so why not break bones in the worst way possible? Why not go for a savage attack to let out all your anger and frustration over the misery that looms during such a calamity? 

The instructors promote the drug as an opportunity to not hold back, to train like your opponent is genuinely an Obsidian. All it does is let the tyrants of the class torment the weaker opponents with zero consequences. 

I understand wanting to prepare us for the pain we’re guaranteed to endure outside these walls, but do we truly have to suffer in here as well?

I won’t need Serous today, I chant, the determination pulsing in time with my heartbeat. While I size up my classmates’ fatigue for my future fights, I notice a tall figure in black standing near the entrance, surveying the match. 

Adrian is leaning against the doorway, his arms folded over themselves. He’s been coming to our classes regularly once sparring starts, and I assume he’s here to scout for Officer Zypha’s security team. 

Not that I would know. The guards rarely interact with students, more focused on keeping the Obsidian out than on what the students are doing. They leave that up to the instructors. Besides Adrian and Zypha, whom I only know because of my first night here, I have never talked to another guard. 

I frown, absently picking at my wet shirt. Adrian also never interacts with the group and silently watches until he sees fit to leave. His presence always throws me off, like he’s judging us. 

Tala calls time, and both Joshua and Sara immediately sag, breathing hard. Sara shuffles off the mat and lies on the ground, closing her eyes. A thought pops into my mind that makes my lips curl upwards. With everyone so tired, I might win a match for once.

My eyes are still on Tala, so I notice as soon as she spots Adrian in the room. Our instructor smooths out her shirt and puts on a beaming smile. I roll my eyes, tipping my face away so she doesn’t see my response. 

Does she not realize how obvious she is? The man is ten years younger than her. Talk about creepy.

“Alright, guys, that match was overly uneventful for my taste. Let’s mix things up, shall we? Emmerick, you’re up.”

“Finally,” Emmerick rumbles, stretching his thick arms. He sneers at his closest companions, distorting his too-small face on his too-big head. 

As I watch Tala’s lips curl maliciously, a pit in my stomach tells me exactly who he’s going up against.

Loved what you’ve read so far? Obsidian Reign is just getting started. Mark your calendars for November 3rd to grab your copy and keep the adventure going! Thank you so much for reading, and don’t forget to follow me on social media for updates.