I left the testing room feeling uncertain—I thought I had done well on the math and physics questions, but I wasn’t at all sure about the ethics and essay sections of the test.
I wished I could have gotten my ranking right away. Still, I supposed it was unreasonable to expect the professor to grade every single test as soon as he got it. Auren’s tutor always had, but he’d only had two students to worry about.
As I stepped out into the hallway, I cast a cautious look around me to be sure Chud Larson wasn’t waiting to beat me bloody. Auren’s tutor had only taught us academic subjects and while our father had trained my brother in hand-to-hand combat, he had refused to teach me even the simplest hold or throw.
“You’re a woman, Aurora,” he reprimanded me when I begged to learn everything that Auren did. “Your place is in the kitchen—not on the battlefield.”
So I was woefully unprepared to defend myself—though I was fast. Hopefully I could run away from the angry upperclassman if I saw him coming for me. Or maybe if I stayed out of his orbit long enough, he might just forget about me. That was probably too much to hope, though.
But there was no one waiting for me out in the broad corridor but Jorn-o, who broke into a grin when he saw me.
“Hey, there you are, Auri—how did it go?” he asked.
I thought about protesting the nickname, but found I kind of liked it. It was hard to remember to always answer to my brother’s name. It might be nice to have a name that was all mine here at the Academy.
“All right, I guess,” I said cautiously. “How about you?”
“All that math…” Jorn-o shook his head. “I studied for six months for the entrance exams but once I was taking the test it all seemed to fly right out of my head like a Bronze-wing soaring for a Mating Flight.”
“Oh, too bad,” I said sympathetically. “But try not to worry—I bet you did better than you think.”
“Sure hope so.” He ran a hand through his brown hair. “Hey, are you hungry? It’s almost time for dinner and I’d like to beat the crowd to the Mess Hall.”
I put a hand to my stomach.
“Starving.”
Jorn-o frowned as he looked me briefly up and down.
“I can believe it. Come on then—let’s go.”
9
AURORA
The Mess Hall was about as big as the grand auditorium where we’d listened to the Head Master’s welcome speech but the smell hit me long before we reached it.
Rich roasting meat, fresh bread, onions sizzling in butter, fragrant herbs, and something sweet I couldn't identify all drifted down the broad stone corridor toward us. My stomach clenched so hard it almost hurt, and I found myself walking faster without meaning to.
Jorn-o laughed.
"Hungry?"
"I think I could eat an entire Brown dragon," I admitted.
"Well, let's hope they don't hear you say that," he remarked with a grin. "Dragons are awfully touchy about being discussed as food."
I smiled despite myself as we rounded the final corner.
The Mess Hall was enormous.
Its vaulted ceiling disappeared into shadow high overhead where stone blackened by centuries of dragon smoke stretched from one side of the cavern to the other. Massive chandeliers forged from dark iron hung on heavy chains, each one crowded with dozens of glowing oil lamps that cast pools of warm golden light over the polished stone floor.
Long tables—at least thirty of them—filled the room from end to end, each one broad enough to seat forty or fifty cadets. At the far end of the hall, banners embroidered with dragons of every color hung between towering pillars of volcanic stone, while enormous fireplaces roared merrily despite the warmth of the mountain itself.
The whole place buzzed with noise.
Hundreds of voices overlapped one another. Wooden benches scraped against the floor. Tin cups clattered. Somewhere a group of older cadets burst into laughter while another table was already arguing loudly over some point of strategy from a recent exam. The sound echoed through the great chamber until it seemed as though the Old Drake itself had come alive around us.
