Chapter 11: Gold Names

He opened the door.

He didn't argue.

He just nodded once and stepped out into the hall.

I heard the door click shut.

I didn't hear his footsteps go.

I lay awake half the night.

Every time I rolled over, I listened.

Nothing.

No footsteps.

At one point Pip woke up, climbed out of her basket, waddled to the door and sat there with her nose to the crack, chirping.

"Come back here," I whispered.

She ignored me.

She sat there until she fell asleep against the wood.

In the morning I opened the door.

Cassius was sitting on the floor of the hall with his back against the opposite wall.

His eyes were open.

He'd been there all night.

Pip tumbled out over my feet and climbed straight up his leg and onto his head, where she settled between his horns like a hen on a nest.

He didn't move.

"You stayed," I said.

"You said get out of the room. You didn't say get out of the hall."

"That's a lawyer's answer."

"I'm a lord. We're terrible."

I didn't smile.

I nearly did.

"I'm still going alone," I said.

"I know."

"Keep her with you. Feed her a honey cake at ten. Not two. One."

"One," he said gravely, with a baby dragon on his head.

The Hall of Stones was the oldest room in the academy.

It was long and narrow and cold, with a black floor and a vaulted ceiling, and the rank stones stood in two rows down its length.

Each one had a shifter's name carved at the bottom and a glyph glowing on its face.

Once a month, on ranking day, every class filed in, and the clerks wrote down every glyph in the big leather book.

The whole final year was there.

Delphine stood at the front in pink with her three wolves, being admired.

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