I kept my head down, toying with my eggs with my fork.
“I…can’t really tell you,” I said at last, remembering how the Head Master had commanded Ryse and me to keep the morning’s incident a secret.
My friends erupted.
“What? After all that?” Toady exclaimed.
“You have to tell us,” Leaper said.
“Yeah, you have to,” Bugs echoed him.
“Come on, Auri—we’ll keep it quiet,” Jorn-o urged.
I ran a hand through my hair feeling thoroughly frustrated. I ought to be able to talk about this. I had nearly been killed that morning—nearly been murdered by another cadet—but my hands were tied and my mouth was sealed.
Then I remembered that the Head Master hadn’t specifically told me not to talk about what had started the whole mess in the first place. And since I felt I had to give some kind of explanation, that was what I did.
“All right, but you really can’t tell anyone,” I said, looking around the table.
My friends all nodded eagerly, and Toady made a show of zipping his wide mouth closed and then locking it and throwing away an invisible key.
“Fine,” I said as they all leaned closer. “So Larson sat behind me during the entrance exam and about halfway through, I realized he was copying my answers…”
I told about the cheating and when I was finished, Jorn-o sat back and let out a long, low whistle.
“Whew! So you’ve been keeping that under your hat this whole time?” he asked me. “No wonder Larson rags on you so much during Flight Simulator.”
“Yeah, well…” I shrugged uncomfortably. If I could tell them everything, I would have mentioned that the Flight Simulator was currently broken and that I had nearly died falling off of it. But I couldn’t, so I didn’t—even though it felt really unfair that I had to keep my trauma to myself.
At least Ryse Skoren knows about it, whispered a little voice in my head. He knows all of it after you cried all over him too and wrapped yourself around him like an idiot.
The memory made my cheeks get hot with mortification and I tried to push it away. But I couldn’t help reliving the way I had clung to the enigmatic North Wing Leader so tightly and the fact that he hadn’t pushed me away. Well, not until I mentioned his “dragon eyes.”
The boys discussed my situation at length and when any of them asked why and how Ryse Skoren was involved, I had to shake my head and say I couldn’t talk about it. This caused groans of frustration and a lot of begging, but I stuck firm to my determination. I didn’t want to give the Head Master any excuse to kick me out of the Academy and he was already upset with me because he now had to punish Larson who was either his nephew or his son.
I thought it was more likely that Larson was his nephew. The two of them looked nothing alike—except for their height. Both were tall and muscular—though not as big as Ryse Skoren, who had felt like a mountain of muscle when I was wrapped in his arms.
And there I went thinking about the North Wing Leader again. What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I just put him out of my mind?
I promised myself I would stop thinking about him. I had a test in Advanced Aeronautical Mathematics today and I needed to concentrate on that.
But it seemed like every time I looked up from my untouched tray, Ryse Skoren was staring at me with his golden eyes narrowed as though he was wondering something about me. I remembered him saying I wasn’t like the other cadets…had he found out my secret somehow? Or was he just keeping an eye on me to be sure Chud Larson didn’t come over to pound me to dust?
Either way, I was glad when the Great Bell tolled, and I could finally clear my tray and escape from the Mess Hall.
24
AURORA
I was so distracted with the events of that morning, I made a C on my math test. It was the worst score I’d ever received, and Professor Griven called me to stay back a few moments after the end of class.
“Cadet, what is the meaning of this?” He demanded, showing me the paper. “Look at this—so many stupid mistakes! I’ve never seen such poor work from you.”
I saw that he was right. None of my answers were wrong because I didn’t understand the problems—it was because I’d done things like forgotten to carry a one or added or subtracted incorrectly. Little errors that ended up making the whole problem wrong…which felt, in a way, like a metaphor for my life at the Academy lately.
“I’m sorry, Sir,” I mumbled, hanging my head. “I had…a lot on my mind today.”
“Look, Cadet, I know the whole First-year class is excited because it’s almost time to try to Impress your dragon eggs, but there is no excuse for this kind of substandard work,” he said sharply. “You need to get your head out of the clouds and pay attention!”
