Page 7
The Adjudicator leans down until the rasp is meant for me alone. “Carry your own pack tomorrow as well, Onyx Mercer.”
Then he straightens. “Thank you for your patience, Candidate.”
His voice lingers in my ears after he turns away. I glance after him long enough to see the black cloak move toward the stairs, then drag my attention back to the desk.
“Perfect.” The attendant’s smile returns, crooked at one corner. She bows her head toward his back, then finds her script again. “Welcome, Candidate Seven. The Hunt thanks you for your courage.”
The gate beside her desk clicks and swings open.
I step through to the cleared side. People are still watching me, but I keep moving.
I mean not to look at him again, but I last four seconds.
Crossing the floor toward the gallery stairs, he stops beside the blind girl. Two fingers lift. A pair of attendants come over, take her gently under the arms, and lead her through a door in the side of the hall I hadn’t realized was there.
Is that what elimination looks like?
Nobody says anything. The chandeliers hum. Somebody laughs near the entrance.
I follow him up the gallery stairs. He takes the lead at the railing, and the other eight shift around him without being told.
Then the visor turns back toward the hall.
A murmur rolls through the hall as a silver-haired man in a navy suit crosses the floor and stops before the railing, with the nine Adjudicators lined up behind him.
“Welcome.” He swings one arm wide. “Welcome to the Hunt. You are the lucky few accepted this year. On behalf of the sponsoring Houses, we are grateful to each of you.”
His smile never slips.
“For the next seven days, this ground will judge every decision you make.”
He gestures toward the glass behind us. Seven lights illuminate a map of Tempest’s northern territory.
“One checkpoint opens each evening. Reaching it is optional. Arrive in time, and you’ll have food, water, and a guarded place to sleep. Miss it, and you’ll spend the night wherever the Hunt leaves you.”
A few people shift around me.
His smile gets a little wider.
“You are also competing against one another. Another candidate may eliminate you from the field. An Adjudicator may remove you if he decides you are no longer suitable for sponsorship. Make it to the seventh sunrise, and a House will take your contract. Finish among the highest scorers, and you earn an audience with the Vultures.”
The room feels smaller than it did a minute ago.
“And if we don’t finish?”
The silver-haired man turns toward the voice. “Then your participation concludes, and the Hunt thanks you for it.”
“I thought making it seven days meant we got what we came for.” A girl clutching a medical folder steps forward.
“Nobody said anything about elimination.”
“What happens to the people who get eliminated?” someone calls from farther back.
“The Hunt concludes for them as well.”
A bulky candidate near the front laughs, then spits on the floor. “If you didn’t want to be here, you should’ve stayed home. Fewer of you means more for the rest of us.”
“Home?” someone fires back. “Some of us don’t have one.”
