I glanced over at Yura as we flew towards the keep. «Who was that?» I asked. «Ingo called him "Nalezen".»

"Yes," said Yura. "Nalezen. I believe he is the partner of Commander Cynthia."

I felt a momentary rush of nervousness at being caught and how we had behaved in front of him, but he didn't seem to be angry at all. Probably best to calm down; if we were in trouble, he would have said so. We flew the rest of the way in silence, until we came over the outer wall and saw everyone else gathered in the first courtyard, alongside Cynthia, Nalezen, Leo, and another dragon I didn't recognise, whom I guessed was Leo's partner.

I came in for a landing beside Grace, Brand and I kicking up a huge cloud of dust and grass as we flapped our wings to slow down. Grace was immediately at my side.

"Belfry!" she said. "Saints, you scared me when you weren't there this morning. Where have you been?"

«Oh, just…» I glanced up at Cynthia, who raised an eyebrow, «…preparing for the trial.» Privately, I whispered to Grace, sending thoughts towards her alone, «We camped out in the woods. I spent a little time flying out at night, alone. Just for fun.»

«Oh,» said Grace. She seemed a little…irritated? «Okay, then. If nothing happened I'm sure it's fine.»

«Right,» I replied. «It's fine.»

Cynthia cleared her throat, and I sat up at attention. "Well, now that we're all finally gathered," she said. "I believe it is time to begin." She began pacing back and forth in front of the line of our flight. "You have all been with the academy for weeks now, and it is time to see if you are ready for real work with the corps. In order to test your aptitude and the skills you have spent these weeks developing, you will now undertake an active trial.

"This trial will be split into three parts. First, a combat evaluation, in which your fighting skills will be tested on the ground. Then, an aerial evaluation, during which we will study your ability to perform crucial manoeuvres and operate with skill while flying. Finally, there will be a mock search-and-rescue situation, in which you will be tasked with locating and retrieving targets from a dangerous situation. While these are certainly not all the skills that you will need in the field, they will be enough to ensure that you stay alive long enough to keep learning and Unlocking greater ability."

She stopped in the middle of the courtyard. "Are there any questions before we begin?"

Yura crossed his arm over his chest, holding onto his shoulder. "Yes, actually," he said. "Will we be informed on what criteria we are being judged? In this combat examination we're about to have, will we be evaluated based on how long we take, on whether we can perform certain forms accurately, on whether we suffer any injuries, or on how many opponents we can dispatch?"

Cynthia shook her head. "No. You will not receive any advance information. Just do the best that you are able, and we will judge you from there. If you're good at what you do, you shouldn't need to worry about criteria."

Yura nodded. "Understood."

Cynthia walked to the edge of the courtyard, gesturing over towards the keep. "I'd like everyone except for Grace and Belfry to please wait in the atrium. So that those of you going last don't get any advantage from watching the other evaluations, you will need to remain separated until it is your turn, and then afterwards you may relax in the gardens until it is time for the mock mission as a group evaluation."

"Understood, sir," said Ingo. He tapped Griffin on the shoulder, and those two led the way back towards the keep, with the rest of the group rather hesitantly following behind.

As they vanished behind the doors, Grace tapped her hand against the metal of her breastplate. "Why both of us?" she asked. "I would have thought that this would be an individual examination."

«You two should be an indivisible pair,» said Nalezen, his voice much more gruff and commanding than it had been when he woke us up earlier. Grace jumped at the sudden sound. «Being separated is a worst-case scenario for knights in a combat situation. You should avoid it at all costs.»

"Shouldn't we be prepared for anything, though?" asked Grace. "I thought knights were supposed to be ready for whatever, whenever."

"You should," said Cynthia. "But this is an evaluation of the basics, and assuming that one of you isn't kidnapped, it should be a very rare situation for you two to be separated."

I shared a nervous glance with Grace. I didn't know we'd be tested together. All week, we'd been doing solo sparring matches. I didn't feel very ready for fighting together.

"Leo and Rorict will be your partners for this spar. Please ready yourselves."

Leo and the dragon, a larger one only a hair smaller than Nalezen with silvery scales and a horizontal, spiked crest like a cobra's hood went to stand at the opposite end of the yard from us. I stepped forward, keeping myself in front of Grace, with her sheltered just behind my wing. I sized up our opponents. Leo carried a thick bastard sword across his back. I could tell from a lever embedded in the hilt and the seams in the blade that it was capable of transforming, but "into what?" was the question, and one I couldn't answer from looks alone. His partner, Rorict, had a body that matched his snakelike hood, longer and more serpentine than other dragons I'd seen, with his belly low to the ground and his wings wide but short. His tail was long enough that even snaking back and forth across the grass a few times in front of him, it still drooped over the ledge.

«Plan?» Grace asked through the bond.

«Uh—»

"Begin!" shouted Cynthia.

«Improvise!» I finished as our foes darted towards us. Rorict moved faster than I expected given his short and bent legs, and blasted a cone of fire in front of him that obscured his and Leo's approach. I held my wing up as a shield against the flames, feeling the heat disperse across my scales before the fire petered out. By the time it did, though, Rorict was on top of me. I went for my axe, but before I could pull it from its clip on the harness, Rorict shot underneath me, sliding between my legs before rearing up and wrapping his torso around mine, using his tail to enforce the grapple. The wing I'd held up and the arm I went for my weapon with were both pressed awkwardly against my body, loudly protesting with pain as Rorict squeezed.

"Shit!" Grace called out, pulling her spear from its holster. She flipped the lever to slide the blade down and reveal the gun barrel, but as she did, I felt a distant pressure as Leo leaped where Rorict had me pinned on the ground, stepping off of his partner's back with his blade held high in the air. Grace had to jump backwards into a quick roll to avoid the blow, which sliced deep into the dirt and forced Leo to stand over his sword for several seconds to yank it free.

I tried to take advantage of his poor position with a swipe from my claws, but Rorict grabbed my wrist just as I raised it, holding it in place as he squeezed again. I filled up my lungs as much as I could to try and avoid having the air forced out of them, but I could feel the pressure on my ribs steadily mounting.

Grace took her shot at Leo, a spray of metal shards following the thunderous report of the gunpowder. She was off-kilter from her roll, though, and the blast went wide, half spraying into the ground at Leo's feet and the other half caught on his sword that he raised as a shield against it, digging tiny grooves and bite marks into the metal but failing to do any real damage. She cursed, flicking the lever back and using the spear like a glaive, swiping it sideways, only for the blade to clang against Leo's.

Rorict constricted again. The only "practise" that this fight was bringing to mind was the fist fight with Ingo, and with Rorict holding me like an actual snake, I couldn't escape here the same way I had then. His tail was long enough to hold my hind legs against my body, and I didn't have the leverage to push them or my forelegs free. The only muscles I could move more than a fraction of an inch were my jaws, which I couldn't get a good enough angle with to bite Rorict given that my neck was restrained, and my tail, which wasn't flexible enough to hit Rorict with.

Although…this was a tandem fight and not a solo spar….

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«Grace!» I shouted through the bond. «Lure him over here! I have an idea!»

She didn't give a verbal response, but I felt an affirmative answer in my mind. She and Leo had gone out of my vision range, Grace under constant retreat to avoid getting cut in half from Leo's heavy-handed swings. I could still hear the clash of metal and their footsteps on the grass.

As they moved behind me, there was a solid thunk of metal slamming against dirt, and Grace shouted, «Now!»

I swung my tail as hard as I could, aiming on a hunch that felt like it came from where our minds brushed together. Just as I hoped, it impacted a solid body, and I heard Leo cough as I knocked the wind from his lungs, and then a clamorous thump as he rolled along the ground in his armour.

«Help!» I said to Grace, trusting the connection to carry the meaning I needed her to get in that single word. It seemed she got what she needed to, as a moment later I heard the shink of metal sliding through scales, and Rorict let out a whining growl. The pressure on my hind legs lifted enough that I was able to force them loose from his grasp, pressing them against the ground and using my newfound leverage to pry Rorict off of my torso, sending him sprawling to the ground on his back in front of me.

«Hold him down!» Grace said, and I was already in action. Before Rorict could roll over, I pounced, springing forward and landing with my hands pinning his forearms against the dirt. He growled and tried to twist his torso to the side, but I planted a hind leg on his tail near the base where blood was leaking from Grace's strike, curling my claws just enough to dissuade him from twisting any further. Rorict snarled and bared his teeth, an orange glow building in his throat before Grace jumped in, pressing the point of her spear up against his throat.

"Rorict yields!" shouted Cynthia.

The glow died, and Rorict stopped struggling. A brief second later, after my brain finished processing that, I stepped off, letting him roll over and snake away to the sideline near Cynthia.

"Hrah!" roared Grace, and I turned to see her slam the butt of her spear into Leo's forehead. He had flicked the lever on his sword, revealing a greatly-oversize firearm barrel concealed within the blade, but the strike made him stumble backwards, unable to raise it to aim and barely able to keep his footing.

I dashed towards them, finally able to pull my axe out and twist it into its extended form. Leo quickly recovered his balance, and looked like he was going for a shot with his gun again.

«Low!» I shouted to Grace.

«High!» she reciprocated. She ducked and swung her spear sideways at the same time that Leo pulled the trigger and I swung my axe.

All of the attacks resolved at once. A blast of metal fragments exploded from Leo's gun, missing Grace by inches, but managing to catch my flank with a few pellets, dragging long cuts across my scales. If it had been a life-or-death fight, I would have gone for his knees, but as it stood, I hit his calves with the haft of my axe just as Grace hooked his shoulder in the cross-brace of her spear going the opposite direction. The combined forces of our strikes and the gun's recoil pulled him right off his feet, twisting sideways in the air before he fell to the ground, Grace's spear and my axe hovering over his neck.

"Leo yields as well!" shouted Cynthia.

Grace and I stepped away to allow Leo some room to get to his feet. I hadn't realised how hard I was breathing until that moment, but although the fight was short, the exhaustion it had provoked caught up with me all at once. I winced and dropped my axe to hold my aching ribs.

I watched as Rorict approached Leo with a miffed face, gesturing at the stab wound on his tail. Leo rolled his eyes and pulled a small phial from his pocket, sprinkling the blood it held over Rorict's wound as he muttered a phrase. I heard the sounds of the phrase, but couldn't at the same time. The effect was a little dizzying, but once the "words" had ceased, the droplets of blood burned briefly and brightly with deep scarlet flames before vanishing, and the skin of Rorict's cut pulled itself together, knitting the wound closed in mere moments.

Bloodcraft. Where had he learned that skill? Apart from the alchemical recipes Linus had given me, I hadn't been able to find any texts on bloodcraft in the entire academy.

"Well done," said Cynthia. "The tallying of your scores will need to wait until the trial is fully finished, but that was a good first showing. Your teamwork is commendable."

"Thanks," said Grace. "Honestly, I'm kind of shocked we did well. We've mostly been training solo combat."

I wanted to smack her for letting our apparent lack of diligence slip, but Cynthia didn't seem aggravated by it. She merely nodded. "That means your bond is very deep, then," she said. "I can say this: Your bond potential with each other was unusually high. Normally we see that in dragons and humans that lived together prior to becoming knights. I suppose that the bond you share as sisters must be unfathomably deep."

«It is,» I said. I ushered Grace closer, letting my tail curl around where she stood.

"That's good to hear," said Cynthia. She cleared her throat and straightened, clasping her hands behind her back. "Now, then. Time to proceed onto the aerial portion of the test. Once we're finished, you will have a period to rest while your flight-mates have their turns."

In comparison to the combat section, the flight portion was so much easier and less stressful. At least with this, we had actually done a lot of recent practise for it. Nalezen and Rorict flew along beside us with their partners on their backs while Cynthia called out manoeuvres that we had to perform as soon as we heard the order.

"Roll right!" she called. "Flip turn! Weapon strike, front-left! Skywalk, right flank! Dive! And…stop!"

That's not so say it wasn't exhausting. The tension of hanging in the air, waiting for the next order had me on edge for the hour or so we were up in the sky, not to mention the several times Cynthia wanted Grace to skywalk during a roll or turn. Every time I thought she was going to slip, I felt our movements click into a natural rhythm that let me turn the swinging weight into a sharper turn, and allowed her to take advantage of the inertia of my movements to get where she needed to be.

But, when all was said and done, we did move in synchrony with one another. I felt where she was going, and tilted or pitched to compensate and hasten her movements, and she could tell how I needed to move and used her weight to add force to the motion wherever it was needed. When our manoeuvres harmonised, they were lightning-quick, and when there was no option but to go in opposing directions, we were able to time it just so, so that we retained as much force as possible without disrupting the other. It almost started to feel like I had last night in flight. I stopped thinking, and just felt things out, only this time I knew I was working with Grace and not a bundle of instincts in my brain.

By the time we finished the section, my wings felt like they would fall off if they caught a particularly stiff breeze, and I could see where Grace's gloves had been frayed on the palms from how many times she had slid along a line.

"All right, I think that's enough!" said Cynthia. "Come!" She and Nalezen led the way as we slowly soared back over the keep and landed in the courtyard.

"You two have done well so far," she said as she dismounted and hopped to the grass. "If it were down to the individual tests, you'd pass right now with a little room to spare."

"Great!" said Grace, glee bubbling up to the surface.

"However, the mock mission is the most important part of the test, and you'll be performing with the rest of your flight as a team," said Cynthia. "It will take more than just skills that you can memorise to pass. We will be looking at your ability to function as a unit. I hope that you have enough cohesion for that."

«Me too,» I said. After the week we'd had, I still wasn't sure how I felt about Brand and Ingo, but I at least had some hope that having them and me on the same operation would be explosively bad.

"Now, go take a rest in one of the gardens," said Cynthia. "Your flight-mates must have their turns."

I bowed my head, and Grace gave the knights' salute with a wide smile on her face before turning to lead me down into the trench paths, taking us to one of the larger garden spaces nearer to the inner wall of the fortress. She took a seat in a small wooden bench that hung by chains from trusses overhead, letting it slowly swing back and forth.

"We're doing good!" she said. "We're doing great, even!"

«Don't start counting chickens,» I warned. «Like she said, we still have the worst ahead of us.»

"I know, it's just…" she let out a happy sigh. "I'm glad that it feels like things are going right for once. There's been a lot of downs in our lives, but now…" tears welled in her eyes and she sniffled, "…things are looking up, I think."

As always, her honest joy was infectious, doubly so when I could feel the impression of it through our bond. I wiped an imaginary tear from my own eye. «Yeah,» I said. My voice cracked. «Feels good to have a little positivity.» I could only hope that that would stay true once our training here was done.

It took several hours for the rest of the flight's tests to conclude. Grace and I only poked our heads up to watch the brief combat tests, content to let the comparatively long and dry aerial tests pass us by while we rested up. For the most part, people seemed to do well, working as a team to take down one opponent and then the other, similar to what Grace and I did. The only hiccup was Ingo and Griffin, who didn't really work together at all. It more so seemed like Griffin tried to stay out of Ingo's way while he handled the entire fight himself. To his credit, they were able to finish it reasonably fast, but the struggle of fighting one against two was evident, as was Cynthia's slightly veiled disappointment.

In contrast, everyone did well in the flight challenge except Brand and Yura. While they were too far away for me to hear all of Cynthia's commands, what I did catch made it seem like the period between command and action was excessively long while Brand struggled to parse the instructions, and then struggled to perform them. They lacked the same smoothness and grace that all the other fliers had, but even if they were late and ugly, all of Cynthia's commands were followed without any outright failures. Yura did well too, although they didn't make him do any skywalking, which was good.

The others slowly trickled into our garden to join us in resting as they finished their tests. No one was terribly talkative, not even Arthur; everyone seemed content to have a moment of silence to catch their breath. Yura and Brand arrived last, with Cynthia and Leo just behind them.

"Alright," said Cynthia. "That's all for the first section of tests. While we did see some areas of weakness among the flight, nothing was off enough thus far to bar you from your mission. So, it's all coming down to the last section. You have one more hour to rest. Once your time is up, you will return to the flight yard for your briefing. Understood?"

"Understood," the flight echoed.

"Good," said Cynthia. "I will see you then. Don't let this be a disappointment."

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