Page 39 of The Art of Exiley

I turn to see a beautiful scowl. Raphael “Rafe” Vanguard has risen from his seat at the cliquey popular table and is glaring directly at us.

“Hypatia,” he barks. “Come sit here.”

Hypatia rolls her eyes and blows him a kiss but doesn’t get up. Rafe’s eyes burn with anger—but not at her, at me.

“Why are they so—” I motion with my hand, indicating the general aloofness of Rafe and his friends.

“?’Cause they think they’re better than everyone,” Georgie says.

Hypatia doesn’t seem to be bothered by this assessment of her cousin. She says, “A bunch of us, mostly Sires, transferred here temporarily fromthe other Maker school, the academy in Avant. There’s rumors of a breach at Avant, and with the Sire abductions, the Council thought we’d be safer here.”

I wonder if the Families have made progress in confirming whether Ozymandias Tech is behind these abductions. I need to remember to ask Kor about it the next time we talk.

“Most of you guys are fine,” Georgie concedes. “But the ones in Guard training are scary.” She turns to me to explain. “There’s a military track for Avant Guard training at the Avant academy. You can recognize them because they wear bone rings”—she lifts her hand and waggles her fingers—“and treat everyone else like crap. Especiallyhim.” She glares at Rafe. “I have a grapefruit-size bruise on my butt from falling after he crashed into me the other day. And he didn’t even apologize.” She turns to Hypatia. “Sorry, I get that he’s your cousin, but he’s an ass. Like, why does he care that you’re sitting with us? Just because we’re recruits?”

“He can be really overprotective of me,” Hypatia says, running her tongue across her teeth. “My whole family is because I get sick a lot.” She rolls her eyes. “But Rafe can definitely sometimes be an ass.”

“I hate having so much of the Avant Guard around Arcadia,” Georgie says. “It feels like there’s more every day.”

“They’re very worried about an infiltration and want extra security for all the Sires.”

Kor had said they’d chosen Genesis specifically for its lack of military. Oh well.

I try to sound casual as I ask, “What would they do if they actually found an intruder?”

I bite down on a gushberry, and sweet juice gushes over my tongue. I harvested this batch myself from the gushberry groves during my agriculture class this morning. We learned all about the history of the red berry that the Makers engineered decades ago, a superplant full of natural energy-boosting nutrients.

Hypatia thinks about it for a moment. “The Makers are generally pacifists, but not the Avant Guard. They’re trained to protect our secrets no matter the cost.”

No matter the cost.Great. No big deal. It’s not like I came within an inch of my life yesterday or anything. I try to swallow the chewed-up gushberry around the painful lump in my throat.

Hypatia covers her mouth with her hand as she chews her own gushberry, but her large hazel eyes bug out as she looks over at Rafe’s table. A wiry boy hunched into a hooded jacket takes a seat next to Rafe. I recognize him as the boy who had been sleeping in the train car with Rafe when I first met him on the Atlas.

“That’s Simon Sanzio,” Hypatia squeaks, her lisp more prominent than usual. “He’s also from Avant. Isn’t he beguiling?”

I absolutely do not find Simon from Avant beguiling. Besides the fact that he’s at least two years younger than me, he has a pronounced slouch in his back, and his face is covered in acne.

“You’d have thought a utopian society could have cured pimples by now,” I say.

“Ada!” Georgie shoves me, and I know it’s rightly deserved.

“Wehavecured them,” Hypatia huffs, “but Simon forgets to use his tincture. His mind is very busy with songwriting.” Ooh. I wonder if I can get ahold of said tincture for PMS breakouts. “He’s in a band, and he plays the hurdy-gurdy.” Hypatia clearly has it bad for this Simon dude, and she babbles on. “He’s guilded as an Artisan, but he’ll need to present at Quorum to switch from the Avant chapter to the Genesis one. I need to figure out how to get him to ask me to Carnevale.”

“You can’t go to Carnevale until you’re fifteen,” Georgie says. The upcoming festival is months away, but I’ve already heard many apprentices grumbling about how they can’t go.

“Yes, I’m still working on solving that issue.” Hypatia purses her lips and appraises Georgie and me, clearly assessing how we can be utilized for whatever plot she’s concocting.

But I intend to keep my hands clean of any rule-breaking that could draw attention.

“So if Simon’s a transfer, does that mean he’s also a Sire?” I ask.

“No,” Hypatia says. “He came because he’s a Valkyrie. Rafe picked him up from Avant and escorted him here the same day you arrived.”

“What’s a Valkyrie?”

Hypatia stares at me like I just asked what the moon is.

But before I can get an explanation, a familiar voice above me says, “Apprentice Castle, do you have a moment?”

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