It was lunchtime. It was a late lunch, but at least it could not be called dinner yet.
The Imperial Reservoir looked smaller from Mister Best's house, but still visible on the side of the ridged hill, that sloped gently up and all the twenty miles to the east, to Galton.
It glinted like fine marble in the noonday sun.
Dalliance had dreamed of pulling up similar structures from the substrate of the island for as long as he could remember, and that day was growing closer. Soon, in only a handful of weeks, it would be the third hunt of six: time for midterms, after, if he survived. Of course, he planned to.
Midterms were forty percent of the grade. On the one hand, he wasn’t shooting for the hundred: He just had to beat all but two of the other classmates. On the other hand, his classmates included Charity, Effie, and Sterling.
Prudence had been on the list he’d worried about, too, but wouldn’t be a factor anymore, though the thought made him feel guilty, and Lackey would probably fail out at midterms. Maybe. Knot was an unknown quantity. So was Rotter.
Dalliance didn’t much like the boy, but couldn’t remember his class—they didn’t really speak much. Circe was smart but easygoing, and hopefully, he could beat her scores . . . and also, she was a mage, so she’d get in regardless.
Immaculate would be a threat if he were competing. Dalliance wished the future knight all success and was grateful that he wasn’t wasting a spot that he didn’t need. Dalliance wished he could say the same for Effluvia and Sterling.
Oh, and Earnest, Dalliance, supposed: Earnest was a problem too, but he didn’t seem like it.
If anything, Dalliance hoped it would be Earnest, with maybe Charity, to win alongside him. Those two and Dalliance would be the perfect outcome. Effie would get in for her magic, as would Circe, and Sterling's dad could afford to send him, scholarship or no. Rotter, Lackey, and Knot . . . well, someone had to lose. He’d rather it not be his friends.
At the thought, the fairy’s words came back to him. Friends.
It wasn't that he'd never had any friends. Since he was old enough for swapping turns to make handling him easier, his mother and Earnest's mother had traded off on who had the two boys. Presumably, they got more work done that way, a Time Saver. But nobody really wanted to come over to the Rather farm with its tyrant patriarch, and as he got older, the invitations to other farms had dwindled. It was probably part of the price he paid for being so sarcastic as well, that only Earnest seemed to want to put the effort in to keep up.
But he'd been curious, anyway. Topaz had told him at every turn not to compare himself to others, for fear that he would either seem to blow them out of the water and make them unhappy, or the inverse would happen on some other plane. But that didn't mean he wasn't curious. He was dying to know what everyone's highest stat was; it just wasn't something that had come up in casual conversation yet.
He wanted friends. And friends share stuff. He remembered something his mother had said years ago, a pithy comment delivered while shelling beans. “Lonely people stay lonely because they're not generous. People who have friends share.”
So he was going to share. He didn’t have anything of value but secrets—but then, he had a lot of those, and after consideration, the secret about the zeros was the best he had. Sure, the idea that avoiding becoming well-rounded was a recipe for Tiering up better was easy enough to figure out, but when he discovered it, he remembered being told, Not everyone knows this. Good job. It was his secret to give. Even if they already knew, it would show willing.
Earnest, of course, was in, having been Dalliance's friend and having done the job for years. Effluvia seemed a little aloof, but also, in her position, she didn't even need to talk to commoners' sons like him, so perhaps she was being friendly. He would certainly give her a chance to show one way or another. Charity was pretty clearly being friendly. And Circe . . . he still wasn't sure what to make of Circe and the strange comments she made, but he thought he'd like to know a little more about her.
Putting in the effort required to talk to them felt like his feet had turned leaden, but he marched over to the other tables just the same.
“Can I have a word, Earnest?” he asked, as his friend came out from around the school cart. Earnest was carrying a trencher, one of the hundreds of leftovers from the Remembrance festival, now recycled into someone's community contribution to the school’s food effort. His trencher was covered with beans. Not the most imaginative of meals today, then. Dalliance wasn't feeling hungry anyway. If this went well, he could end up with a whole group that would sit together at the school table after class every day. The idea was appealing, a small island of warmth in the cold sea of his life.
Earnest nodded, claimed a seat at an empty table, and watched as Dalliance made the rounds.
“Effie?” he tried, his voice catching slightly. He gestured toward the table where Earnest was now sitting, already looking terribly amused. Circe and Effluvia stood up together, their expressions a mixture of curiosity and condescension. He didn't even need to ask Charity; she had been approaching him anyway, a small, kind smile on her face. Noticing that made him feel a little lighter.
And then the four of them were seated. The air was taut with interest. Earnest was smirking. Charity looked worried. Circe seemed intrigued. Effluvia looked impatient, like a queen forced to attend a peasant’s court.
Dalliance looked at the four of them, his heart hammering against his ribs. He focused his will, activating his new, untested power.
[Prediction].
The world dissolved into a familiar, chaotic storm of ghostly images and tinny, overlapping voices. He saw himself launching into a grand, showman-like speech, trying to build suspense around his secret. He saw Earnest heckle him. He saw Charity look more worried. And then he saw the thread that mattered most: Ghost-Effluvia, her face a mask of profound annoyance, getting up and walking away before he even got to the point.
The vision snapped shut. He scrapped the speech. This had to be direct.
"So," he began, his voice a little tight, "I know we don't always talk about our stats." He met each of their gazes, his own expression more serious than they had ever seen. “I wanted to start by asking . . . how many zeros does everybody have?”
The question landed like a stone in a quiet pond.
Charity tilted her head and looked deeply confused. Circe mirrored the expression.
Earnest looked thoughtful. "Four," he said at last. "How come?"
But it was Effluvia’s reaction that stopped the air in Dalliance’s lungs. Her bored expression vanished, replaced by a sharp, calculating focus. Her eyes narrowed, all warmth gone, as if he’d just revealed a hidden dagger. "If you know something," she began, her voice low and dangerous, a warning coiled in the simple words.
Dalliance saw a future in which she remained at the table, and he took it, spilling the secret before he could lose his nerve. “The moment all of your stats hit two, you Tier up,” he said, the words a frantic rush. “Instantly. Whether you're ready or not. So keeping zeros gives you a buffer. If you gain experience and it spills over to your lower stats, the more zeros you have, the more of a buffer you have. So, if you want to be a [Wizard], you need to get your Wit to ten first.”
Effluvia took a sharp breath, her knuckles white where she gripped the edge of the table.
“Your buffer,” he finished, pressing the point home, “they're the most important resource you have. They're the only thing that lets you control your advancement.”
“We don’t say that sort of thing in public,” she hissed. She shot a panicked glance around the common area, at the other students milling about with their trenchers. She dropped her face into her palm. “Gods above,” she whispered. “Remember what I said about oaths on higher Tiers? The ones our fathers took? This is one of those things. The prerequisites for restricted classes are why those oaths exist. Not that zeroes bit: we all knew that, or should have. But the Chancellor wants everyone to go in blind about advanced classes. Like [Wizard]. I really wish I could bind everyone here to secrecy so we don't endanger everyone else just by knowing this.”
“Why?” Circe asked, her voice quiet but firm. “Who would kill someone over something like this?”
Effluvia let out a bitter, humorless laugh that held no trace of amusement. “Who? Every great house from here to the Imperial City, that’s who. Why do you think requirements for classes like [Chronomancer] or [Spellbow] aren’t posted on the town bulletin board? It's about relative advantage.”
She leaned forward, her voice dropping into a conspiratorial, venomous whisper that was more chilling than any shout. “Think about it. The great houses know the requirements. They know you need a ten in Agility or an eight in Spirit or whatever it is to become a [Spellbow]. They can guide their children perfectly, ensuring they unlock the most powerful classes every single time. Meanwhile, everyone else is fumbling in the dark, guessing, wasting points, spending time grinding stats they won't use, or Tiering up too early and being locked out permanently.”
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
She fixed Circe with a stare that was both pitying and contemptuous. “You can't have those in power unless there are some who do not have power. The powerless are necessary for the powerful, and the worst classes exist to uphold the better ones. That's the dark side of noblesse oblige. Just as those with power have the responsibility to shepherd those without, those without it, by their very existence, enable the existence and activity of those above them.”
With Effluvia's reluctant blessing and dire warning hanging in the air, Dalliance explained everything. He laid out the long journey to [Wizard] and his suspicions about his father’s long, cruel game to forge him into a 'Grit Titan.'
When he finished, the silence at the table was heavy, thick with the weight of secrets shared. Earnest was uncharacteristically quiet, his usual smirk absent, replaced by a look of grim calculation. Charity was pale, her expression a mixture of horror at Cadence's cruelty and a quiet, profound pity for the boy sitting opposite her. Circe, for her part, was busy with her third trencher of beans, a silent, steady presence in the swirling currents of the conversation.
Dalliance looked at Effluvia, who had been silent throughout his explanation. He expected something—pity, perhaps, or a word of caution. Instead, she was looking down at her own perfectly manicured hands, a vague, distracted expression on her face as if she were contemplating a particularly dull lesson on crop rotation.
"The obvious conclusion," she said at last, her voice detached and analytical, "would be that he did it because he wasn't able to tell you."
The comment was so unexpected, so off-topic, that Dalliance was momentarily confused. "Couldn't tell me what?"
She looked up, her dark eyes cool and appraising, utterly devoid of emotion. "The secret. Remember what we don't talk about? Fathers don't get to tell their sons, either. Knights do not share strategy with Squires. High-Tier warriors do not share secrets with low-Tier warriors. The oaths prevent it. A man like Cadence has been entrusted with secrets, and he couldn't trust his son not to blab and spread the word that 'zeros are good.' And," she paused, her gaze unwavering, "he was apparently right not to."
Her eyes flicked to him, a silent, damning indictment. "Today, you have played the part of the loudmouthed, untrustworthy commoner."
Dalliance shrugged uncomfortably. That part, at least, was true.
"So," she continued, laying out the logic with the cold precision of a mathematician, "we know he couldn't entrust you with the knowledge. We know he wasn't capable of giving it to you, even if he wanted to. If he wanted you to become this great 'Grit Titan,' he had to force you down the path without telling you about it. It was the only logical move."
Dalliance stared at her. She wasn't admiring his father's cruelty. She was simply analyzing his strategy from a completely detached, pragmatic perspective. To her, from the cold heights of her upper-class gaze, it was a brutal but understandable choice a patriarch might make to control a valuable, but volatile, asset. Dalliance felt a chill run down his spine. His father's actions, which had always felt like the chaotic rage of a monster, had just been articulated with a terrifying, inhuman clarity.
As much as he hadn't expected her comment, he didn't expect Charity’s next question either. Her blue eyes met his, a look of profound, almost frustrated, confusion on her face that had been building throughout the conversation.
"I understand," she said, "why you would want to know that. Why this was valuable for you, and why you'd want to share it. But why would I need to know? Why do I need to know these dangerous secrets?"
Dalliance was genuinely gobsmacked. He had just handed her the keys to the kingdom, and she was asking why it mattered. "What? Why wouldn't you want to pursue optimal progression?"
"Stats," she said, her voice firm but not unkind. "They don't matter. They don't matter for [Theologians]. They don't matter for [Seers]," she added, gesturing to a now very thoughtful Earnest. "Or [Philosophers]. If I wanted to be a [Soldier], this would be important. But . . . it's irrelevant to my path."
It was a bombshell. For a [Theologian], the path to mastery wasn't about having the highest Wit or the biggest Mana pool; it was about understanding the synthesis of a collection of liturgical doctrines, about faith and interpretation. He had never considered it. He had always thought "the best" was synonymous with "the highest stats," the most points. He looked away from Charity’s confused face, seeking an ally, someone who understood the game.
He looked over at Effluvia and found his own alienated puzzlement perfectly reflected on her face. Another stat maximizer. No wonder she'd said it would be the two of them at the top. She was staring at Charity and Earnest as if they were bizarre, alien creatures who had willingly chosen not to pursue their own betterment.
"I think I see where you're coming from," Circe said, finally looking up from her beans. "I'm going to be the best healer, but healing is about half wortcraft, so I don't really need my stats to be perfect, either. Still, gotta have mana."
The tension at the table was thick enough to cut with a knife. Charity looked lost, Dalliance knew he looked horrified, and Effluvia looked like she had just discovered a new, incomprehensible species.
Earnest, seeing the impasse, leaned back in his chair, a placating, easy-going smile on his face. "I mean, thank you," he said, directing a nod to Dalliance. "For the tip. Going forward, I'm certainly not going to do things wrong if I know how to do them better. And you know, being more charming, yeah, that'll help me out no matter what I do. I can't let him," he said, jerking a thumb at Dalliance and glancing at the others, "get too far ahead, so I've got to stay smart. Plus, I won't get that scholarship if everybody leaves me behind."
He saw he'd lost Charity's attention and tried to explain his larger worldview. "Don't worry, I'm not like . . . checking out. It's just . . . this is 'just life,' you know? This is the most generic thing you will ever do, while also being the most important thing you could do. Anyway, I figure, what you’re saying, is that you’re telling us things only the nobles are supposed to know.”
Charity, backwater scion of an old family, no matter how fashionable her father might—or might not—be, squared her shoulders. “This calls for secrecy,” she said firmly. Dalliance felt a pang of regret at seeing them closing ranks.
“I can keep a secret,” Earnest said. “Just count me out of the dramatics.”
“This isn’t like one of your games,” Effluvia shot back.
He rolled his eyes. “I can keep a real secret,” he reiterated.
“I might have a way to help.”
Effluvia turned to Charity, genuine interest flickering in her expression.
“I should be able to perform the Rite of Secrecy,” Charity said. “It’s something I’ve been trained for, after all.”
That, at least, impressed the noble girl. "What, now?"
“Right now, no,” Charity clarified quickly, “but I know the basics. I’d need time to assemble the offering—but I can do it, if it’s that important.” Her voice skipped slightly, the words trembling with nervous sincerity.
Effluvia’s reply was slower, matching her tone. “I’ll be honest with you,” she said. “I don’t know how big either one of these secrets really is—but I’m more concerned they’re not the only ones Master Rather has—”
Dalliance sat bolt upright, his ears flushing red.
“That confirms it,” Earnest said quietly.
Dalliance realized he had the full attention of the entire table. “If you want to wait until after we’ve sworn the oath,” he suggested cautiously.
“Great,” said Effluvia. Her expression leaned into something almost predatory. “That’s even better. Now you’re interesting, Master Rather.”
Dalliance looked at his hands, determined to keep a stoic expression.
"We're like a conspiracy,” Earnest said lightly, transparent in his attempt at cutting the tension.
“More like a council,” Dalliance replied. The word felt weighty but not overblown—the perfect fit.
"It's the start of something new." That, Charity.
Earnest and Dalliance's eyes met for an instant, but neither commented.
“I think I know how we should end today’s conversation,” Charity said slowly, glancing around the group. “Unless anyone had anything else?”
No one spoke.
“Alright, then,” she said almost shyly. “I know we’re not all women—but we’re mostly women.”
She held out her hands. Effluvia took her left without hesitation, as though she already understood what was being asked.
Dalliance stared at the pale, unworked hand extended toward him with the puzzled concern of someone who did not. Moreover, someone who had seen no potential futures in which they were not holding hands soon after. He wasn’t going to say no.
Why on earth wouldn’t he? It was awkward.
But there was still only one possible future, with a hundred tiny, inconsequential variations.
He took her hand, as was fated. It was cool and smoother than he expected—light as air.
“Do ut des,” chanted Charity.
Dalliance recognized the phrase at once, though he didn’t know what it meant. It was the beginning of a prayer.
Charity closed her eyes, her voice taking on a formal, liturgical cadence. "Potentia, Industry, Judgment. I have meditated on your virtues and their cost. Hear this lowly student, as I beseech you. This is my entreaty: that you bless this enterprise. Foster what could be. Guide what is attempted. And smother vainglory."
She pulled her hand free from Effluvia and made a complicated symbol in the air, a sigil from one of the floating god-islands. Dalliance felt goosebumps break out across his body.
"I forgot you were a [Theologian]," Earnest grumbled, looking sick.
"Not yet," Charity said, her voice filled with a quiet confidence.
But, Dalliance thought, someday, she will be. He wondered if he could get her through the midterms.
I, too, would want to read that.
