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“Good. Go at it, then.”

She’s hesitant but draws something small from her pocket—a match. It’s the simplest, smallest anchor.

“Don’t be an idiot,” Orla shouts. “You’ll catch the whole room on fire. You want to add that to our problems?”

Roland isn’t the sort to back down. “You have a better idea?” The walls are closing in fast.

“And if it doesn’t break through?”

“Why wouldn’t it?” he asks. “The Light is stronger than the Dark.”

He’s being naive and making the mistake so many others at Gossemort make. We’re not only taught the Light—we’re indoctrinated with it. They all believe in our cause, but they haven’t seen Imaelhain’s Darkness yet. They haven’t wielded the Dark themselves. For them, it’s a simple problem of good versus evil. Only Lonan and I know better.

The boy looks to the girl holding the match. “Do it.”

She looks terrified.

“You want to sit here until we’re all crushed? If you want to live, do it.”

A larger boy wielding a war hammer steps through the crowd. “I’ll do it.”

Before anyone can object, he swings back his hammer, calling the Light to it.

“Wait,” I shout, but too late.

He swings toward the main door. It smashes into the door, and a tremor rattles the whole room, worse than before. The walls tremble, and for a moment, I think it might’ve worked. But then there’s a change—the walls move twice as quickly as before. Panic spreads through the room.

“You!” the leader shouts, pointing at the pyromancer. “Fire. Now!”

“Don’t be an idiot,” I shout over the crowd. “Bludgeoning didn’t work. Fire won’t either.”

“It’s a completely different class of magic.”

“We can’t use magic like a battering ram,” Poppy shouts.

Roland isn’t listening. He charges toward the pyromancer and shoves her toward the door. “I’m not going to die because you refuse to act. Do it.”

The girl panics.

Fire erupts from her lighter—a massive plume that envelops the wall, so hot that screaming breaks through the room, so bright I have to close my eyes. Students stumble away, their clothes singed with the errant flames that catch the curtains and rafters, climbing up toward the ceiling.

The walls quicken again. The room is shrinking.

Another girl collapses to the floor, puts her head between her knees, and starts shaking. Roland shouts at the boy with the war hammer to try again. He’s grasping for control, thinking that leadership insulates him. But he has a mutiny on his hands as the others shout him down. This can’t last long. We’re like a hive of angry bees.

“What do we do?” I whisper. I made that bargain with Saint Nona. Was it meant to end like this? Is this my fate?

Lonan’s shoulder presses into mine. He holds his sword tightly in one fist, eyes assessing the crowd. “I don’t know.”

Someone punches Roland and a brawl breaks out, some of us preferring to fight than fear. Others push against the walls. Stages of grief unravel around us. But I am numb and silent. I close my eyes, gripping my scythe. The voice told us this was a trial—a test of our loyalty to the Light. I can’t use my Dark magic now—it could make everything worse.

The ground trembles beneath our feet. And then that is fracturing too. A great crack splits down the middle of the Founders Hall floor, a chasm opening even as the walls and ceiling continue to close in. The shouts of panic reach a new frenzy as all of us scramble toward the edges of the room.

Then the floor begins to tilt. People begin to slide toward the open chasm, and I sprint for the wall, searching for anything to anchor myself. I reach behind me, try to grab hold of Poppy’s hand. But her fingers slip through mine as an arm curls around my waist. Lonan pulls me into him, chest to chest, holding me tight as he grips one of the columns with his other arm. I scan the room, looking for the rest of my cohort. In this moment, I care only that my friends make it. It’s terrible—the selfishness born only in circumstances this dire. Two students slide over the edge, and their screams echo through the room as they fall. I don’t know where that chasm leads or how deep it goes. I only know the raw instinct instructing every move of my body. Survive, survive, survive.

A table slides past, and it crosses in front of a nearby pillar where Poppy and Hugo cling to each other, and relief floods me. But I can’t find Orla or Ollinde.

Lonan’s arm is firm around my waist. He presses us together as though we aren’t enemies, as though we weren’t fighting in the halls barely half an hour ago. And he buries his face in my shoulder. I feel his breath on my neck as his arms wrap solidly around my middle.